In many passages of the books which go by his name, Confucius is made to impress on his disciples the necessity of attending to what is unseen and internal, and taking it for granted that the visible and external will follow as a natural consequence.[35] In this too he is nearly like to Lao-tzŭ. One passage of the Lun-yü even speaks of _Li_ (禮), or the full complement of external virtues, on which Confucius generally lays great stress as something to be postponed to the genuine qualities of the heart.[36] The whole of the thirty-third chapter of the Chung-yung may be regarded as a sort of commentary on what Lao-tzŭ has said on this and some other topics. The passages quoted in this chapter from the Shi-ching are merely texts which have not the slightest reference to the homilies on them except in one or two cases. Further, as Lao-tzŭ believed in a long-past time of simplicity and purity, so also did Confucius, and his love for antiquity and his esteem for the ancient sages were perhaps even greater than those of Lao-tzŭ.[37] Of the five characteristics given of the old kings who had kept good government in their kingdoms the first is that they honoured those who had Te (德), that is, their perfect inborn nature, and this is explained to mean those who approach _Tao_. Both sages represent the ancients as solid and not showy, as wanting in intellectual arts but perfect in simple virtue. They should be, both thought, in the conduct of life no less than in affairs of State the models for all after generations. Turn to the good old paths wherein our forefathers walked who were better than we, is what Lao-tzŭ and Confucius equally teach. Go back, says the latter, to the days of Yao and Shun, and Yü, and kings Wên and Wu, and Duke Chou, and make them your patterns in all things even as they made Heaven theirs. Ascend still further, says Lao-tzŭ, and follow the lives of those primitive worthies who died before the arts and vices of civilisation had appeared on the earth. What the inducements are which Lao-tzŭ holds out to a life of self-subduing and virtue has been seen already, and those which the Confucian books hold out to such a life are very similar.[38] An insight into the mysteries of Providence, length of years, a peaceful death, and a good name among men are the chief rewards for such a life. Confucius in one place is represented as making perfect knowledge precede self-purification.[39] This, however, is not, I think, in accordance with the general spirit of his teachings, and if he ever did make the statement reported it is probably only one of those nonsensical utterances which he seems to have occasionally made, solely for the purpose of having a long string of short sentences. The statement in question is even on Chu-hsi’s interpretation absurd and impossible.