This Illusionary Life: Selections from the Taoist “Book of Lieh-Tzu,” Part 1 of 2

Today, it is a pleasure to share passages from Book 3: Dreams in the ‘Book of Lieh-Tzu,’ written by the Venerated Enlightened Master Lieh Tzu (vegetarian), and translated by Lionel Giles. Whereby King Mu of Chou realizes the illusionary nature of worldly pleasures.

BOOK 3 Dreams

“In the time of King Mu of Chou, there was a magician who came from a kingdom in the far west. He could pass through fire and water, penetrate metal and stone, overturn mountains and make rivers flow backwards, transplant whole towns and cities, ride on thin air without falling, encounter solid bodies without being obstructed. There was no end to the countless variety of changes and transformations which he could effect; and, besides changing the external form, he could also spirit away men’s internal cares. King Mu revered him as a God and served him like a prince. He set aside for his use a spacious suite of apartments, regaled him with the daintiest of food. The magician, however, condemned the King’s palace as mean, the cooking as rancid, and the concubines as too ugly to live with. So King Mu had a new building erected to please him. […]

The magician could not well refuse to take up his abode in this palace of delight. But he had not dwelt there very long before he invited the King to accompany him on a jaunt. So the King clutched the magician’s sleeve, and soared up with him higher and higher into the sky, until at last they stopped, and look! they had reached the magician’s own palace. This palace was built with beams of gold and silver, and incrusted with jewels and jade. It towered high above the region of clouds and rain, and the foundations whereon it rested were unknown. It appeared like a stupendous cloud-mass to the view. The sights and sounds it offered to eye and ear, the scents and flavors which abounded there, were such as exist not within mortal ken. The King verily believed that he was in the Halls of Paradise, tenanted by God Himself, and that He was listening to the mighty music of the spheres. He gazed at his own palace on the Earth below, and it seemed to him no better than a rude pile of clods and brushwood. It seemed to the King as if His stay in this place lasted for several decades, during which He gave no thought to His own kingdom. […]

Then he made further inquiry, and asked the magician to explain what had happened. ‘Your Majesty and I,’ replied the magician, ‘were only wandering about in the spirit, and, of course, our bodies never moved at all. What essential difference is there between that sky-palace we dwelt in and your Majesty’s palace on Earth, between the spaces we travelled through and your Majesty’s own park? You are accustomed to being permanently in the body, and cannot understand being out of it for a while. Can any number of changes, or successive intervals of fast and slow, fully represent the true scheme of things?’ The King was much pleased. He ceased to worry about affairs of State, and took no further pleasure in the society of his ministers or concubines.”