One commentator says Poh Chü was a "criminal," probably from his sympathetic remarks in the context. "No," replied Lao Tzŭ, "the world is just as you see it here." But as he again urged it, Lao Tzŭ said, "Where would you go to begin with?" "I would begin," answered Poh Chü, "by going to the Ch'i State. There I would view the dead bodies of their malefactors. I would push them to make them rise. I would take off my robes and cover them. I would cry to God and bemoan their lot, as follows:--'O sirs, O sirs, there was trouble upon earth, and you were the first to fall into it!' "I would say, 'Perhaps you were robbers, or perhaps murderers?'... Honour and disgrace were set up, and evil followed. Wealth was accumulated, and contentions began. Now the evil which has been set up and the contentions which have accumulated, endlessly weary man's body and give him no rest. What escape is there from this? This might almost have come from _The Curse of Capital_, (Aveling) or from one of Mr. Hyndman's discourses. "The rulers of old set off all success to the credit of their people, attributing all failure to themselves. All that was right went to the credit of their people, all that was wrong they attributed to themselves. Therefore, if any matter fell short of achievement, they turned and blamed themselves. "Not so the rulers of to-day. They conceal a thing and blame those who cannot see it. They impose dangerous tasks and punish those who dare not undertake them. They inflict heavy burdens and chastise those who cannot bear them. They ordain long marches and slay those who cannot make them. "And the people, feeling that their powers are inadequate, have recourse to fraud. For when there is so much fraud about, In the rulers. how can the people be otherwise than fraudulent? If their strength is insufficient, they will have recourse to fraud. If their knowledge is insufficient, they will have recourse to deceit. If their means are insufficient, they will steal. And for such robbery and theft, who is really responsible?" * * * * * When Chü Poh Yü See p. 49. reached his sixtieth year, he changed his opinions. What he had previously regarded as right, he now came to regard as wrong. But who shall say whether the right of to-day may not be as wrong as the wrong of the previous fifty-nine years? See p. 365. Things are produced around us, but no one knows the whence. They issue forth, but no one sees the portal. Men one and all value that part of knowledge which is known. They do not know how to avail themselves of the unknown in order to reach knowledge. Is not this misguided? Men value the phenomena of which the senses make them conscious, but not the phenomena of the senses themselves. Alas! alas! the impossibility of escaping from this state results in what is known as elective affinity.