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Book of Tea (Version 2)-Kakuzō Okakura · The Dhammapada

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  Speaker 1: Chapter one of the Book of Ta by Cakuzo Okakura.
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  Speaker 1: This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in
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  Speaker 1: the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please
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  Speaker 1: visit LibriVox dot org. Recording by Clive Catterel. The Book
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  Speaker 1: of Ta by Cakuzo Okakura, Chapter one, the Cup of Humanity.
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  Speaker 1: TA began as a medicine and grew into a beverage
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  Speaker 1: in China. In the eighth century, it entered the realm
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  Speaker 1: of poetry as one of the polite amusements. The fifteenth
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  Speaker 1: century saw Japan innobolit into a religion of estheticism Teaism.
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  Speaker 1: Teaism is a cult founded on the adoration of the
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  Speaker 1: beautiful among the sordid facts of everyday existence. It inculcates
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  Speaker 1: purity and harmony, the mystery of mutual charity, the romanticism
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  Speaker 1: of the social order. It is essentially a worship of
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  Speaker 1: the imperfect, as it is a tender attempt to accomplish
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  Speaker 1: something possible in this impossible thing we know as life.
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  Speaker 1: The philosophy of t is not mere aestheticism in the
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  Speaker 1: ordinary acceptance of the term, for it expresses conjointly with
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  Speaker 1: ethics and religion, our whole point of view about man
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  Speaker 1: and nature. It is hygiene, for it enforces cleanliness. It
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  Speaker 1: is economics, for it shows comfort in simplicity rather than
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  Speaker 1: in the complex and costly. It is moral geometry inasmuch
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  Speaker 1: as it defines our sense of proportion to the universe.
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  Speaker 1: It represents the true spirit of Eastern democracy by making
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  Speaker 1: all its votaries aristocrats in taste. The long isolate relation
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  Speaker 1: of Japan from the rest of the world, so conducive
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  Speaker 1: to introspection, has been highly favorable to the development of teaism.
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  Speaker 1: Our home and habits, costume and cuisine, porcelain lacquer painting,
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  Speaker 1: our very literature all have been subject to its influence.
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  Speaker 1: No student of Japanese culture could ever ignore its presence.
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  Speaker 1: It has permeated the elegance of noble boudoirs and entered
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  Speaker 1: the abode of the humble. Our peasants have learned to
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  Speaker 1: arrange flowers, our meanest laborers to offer his salutation to
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  Speaker 1: the rocks and waters. In our common parlance, we speak
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  Speaker 1: of the man with no tea in him when he
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  Speaker 1: is insusceptible to the serio comic interests of the personal drama. Again,
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  Speaker 1: we stigmatize the untamed eastheat, who, regardless of the mundane tragedy,
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  Speaker 1: runs riot in the spring tide of emancipated emotions as
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  Speaker 1: one with too much tea in him. The outsider may
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  Speaker 1: indeed wonder at this, seeming much ado about nothing. What
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  Speaker 1: a tempest in a tea cup, he will say. But
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  Speaker 1: when we consider how small, after all, the cup of
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  Speaker 1: human enjoyment is, how soon overflowed with tears, are easily
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  Speaker 1: drained to the dregs in our quenchless thirst for infinity,
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  Speaker 1: we shall not blame ourselves for making so much of
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  Speaker 1: the tea cup. Mankind has done worse. In the worship
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  Speaker 1: of Bacchus. We have sacrificed too freely, and we have
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  Speaker 1: even transfigured the gory image of Mars. Why not consecrate
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  Speaker 1: ourselves to the Queen of the Camellias and revel in
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  Speaker 1: the warm stream of sympathy that flows from her altar.
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  Speaker 1: In the liquid amber within the ivory porcelain, the initiated
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  Speaker 1: may touch the sweet reticence of Confucius, the piquancy of
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  Speaker 1: loved say, and the ethereal aroma of Sakyamuni himself. Those
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  Speaker 1: who cannot feel the littleness of great things in themselves
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  Speaker 1: are apt to overlook the greatness of little things in others.
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  Speaker 1: The average Westerner, in his sleek complacency, will see in
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  Speaker 1: the tea ceremony but another instance of the thousand and
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  Speaker 1: one oddities which constitute the quaintness and childishness of the East.
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  Speaker 1: To him, he was wont to regard Japan as barbarous.
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  Speaker 1: While she indulged in the gentle arts of peace. He
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  Speaker 1: calls her civilized since she began to commit wholesale's laughter
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  Speaker 1: on Manchurian battlefields. Much comment has been given lately to
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  Speaker 1: the code of the Samurai, the art of death, which
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  Speaker 1: makes our soldiers exult in self sacrifice, but scarcely any
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  Speaker 1: attention has been drawn to tearsom, which represents so much
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  Speaker 1: of our art of life. Fain would we remain barbarians
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  Speaker 1: if our claim to civilization were to be based on
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  Speaker 1: the gruesome glory of war? Would we await the time
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  Speaker 1: when due respect should be paid to our art and ideals?
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  Speaker 1: When will the West understand or try to understand the East? We, Asiatics,
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  Speaker 1: often appalled by the curious web of facts and fancies
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  Speaker 1: which has been woven concerning us. We are pictured as
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  Speaker 1: living on the perfume of the lotus. If not on
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  Speaker 1: mice and cockroaches, it is either impotent fanaticism or else
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  Speaker 1: abject voluptuousness. Indian spirituality has been derided as ignorance, Chinese
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  Speaker 1: sobriety is stupidity. Japanese patriotism as the result of fatalism.
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  Speaker 1: It has been said that we are less sensible to
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  Speaker 1: pain and wounds on account of the callousness of our
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  Speaker 1: nervous organization. Why not amuse yourselves at our expense, Asia
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  Speaker 1: returns the compliment. There would be further food for merriment
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  Speaker 1: if you were to know all that we have imagined
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  Speaker 1: and written about you. All the glamor of the perspective
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  Speaker 1: is there, all the unconscious homage of wonder, all the
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  Speaker 1: silent resentment of a new and undefined You have been
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  Speaker 1: loaded with virtues too refined to be envied, and accused
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  Speaker 1: of crimes too picturesque to be condemned. Our writers in
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  Speaker 1: the past, the wise men who knew informed us that
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  Speaker 1: you had bushy tails somewhere hidden in your garments, and
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  Speaker 1: often dined off a prickassey of newborn babies. Nay, we
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  Speaker 1: had something worse against you. We used to think you
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  Speaker 1: the most impracticable people on the earth, for you were
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  Speaker 1: said to preach what you never practiced. Such misconceptions are
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  Speaker 1: fast vanishing amongst us. Commerce has forced the European tongues
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  Speaker 1: on many an Eastern port. Asiatic youths are flocking to
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  Speaker 1: Western colleges for the equipment of modern education. Our insight
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  Speaker 1: does not penetrate your culture deeply, but at least we
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  Speaker 1: are willing to learn. Some of my compatriots have adopted
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  Speaker 1: too much of your customs and too much of your etiquette,
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  Speaker 1: in the delusion that the acquisition of stiff collars and
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  Speaker 1: tall silk hats comprised the attainment of your civilization. Pathetic
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  Speaker 1: and deplorable as such affectations are, they evince our willingness
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  Speaker 1: to approach the West on our knees. Unfortunately, the Western
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  Speaker 1: attitude is unfavorable to the understanding of the East. The
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  Speaker 1: Christian missionary goes to impart, but not to receive. Your
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  Speaker 1: information is based on the meager translations of our immense literature,
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  Speaker 1: if not on the unreliable anecdotes of passing travelers. It
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  Speaker 1: is rarely that the chivalrous pen of the laf Cardio Herne,
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  Speaker 1: or that of the author of the web of Indian
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  Speaker 1: life enlivens the Oriental darkness with the torch of our
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  Speaker 1: own sentiments. Perhaps I betray my own ignorance of the
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  Speaker 1: tea cult by being so outspoken. Its very spirit of
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  Speaker 1: politeness exacts that you say what you are expected to say,
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  Speaker 1: and no more. But I am not a polite teaist.
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  Speaker 1: So much harm has been done already by the mutual
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  Speaker 1: misunderstanding of the new world and the old that one
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  Speaker 1: need not apologize for contributing his tithe to the furtherance
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  Speaker 1: of a better understanding. The beginning of the twentieth century
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  Speaker 1: would have been spared the spectacle of sanguinary warfare if
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  Speaker 1: Russia had condescended to know Japan better. What dire consequences
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  Speaker 1: to humanity lie in the contemptuous ignoring of Eastern problems.
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  Speaker 1: European imperialism, which does not disdain to raise the absurd
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  Speaker 1: cry of the Yellow peril, fails to realize that Asia
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  Speaker 1: may also awaken to the cruel sense of the white disaster.
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  Speaker 1: You may laugh at us for having too much tea,
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  Speaker 1: but may we not suspect the dew of the West
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  Speaker 1: have no tea in your constitution. Let us stop the
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  Speaker 1: continents from hurling epigrams at each other, and be sadder,
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  Speaker 1: if not wiser, by the mutual gain of half a hemisphere.
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  Speaker 1: We have developed along different lines, but there is no
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  Speaker 1: reason why one should not supplement the other. You have
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  Speaker 1: gained expansion at the cost of restlessness. We have created
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  Speaker 1: a harmony which is weak against aggression. Will you believe it?
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  Speaker 1: The East is better off in some respects than the West.
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  Speaker 1: Strangely enough, humanity has so far met in the tea cup.
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  Speaker 1: It is the only Asiatic ceremonial which commands universal esteem.
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  Speaker 1: The white man has scoffed at our religion and our morals,
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  Speaker 1: but has accepted the brown beverage without hesitation. The afternoon
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  Speaker 1: tea is now an important function in Western society. In
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  Speaker 1: the delicate clatter of trays and saucers, in the soft
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  Speaker 1: rustle of feminine hospitality, in the common catechism about cream
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  Speaker 1: and sugar, we know that the worship of tea is
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  Speaker 1: established beyond question. The philosophic resignation of the guest to
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  Speaker 1: the fate awaiting him in the Dubious Decoction proclaims that
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  Speaker 1: in this single instance, the Oriental spirit reigns supreme. The
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  Speaker 1: earliest record of tea in European writing is said to
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  Speaker 1: be found in the statement of an Arabian traveler that
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  Speaker 1: after the year eight seven nine, the main sources of
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  Speaker 1: revenue in Canton were the duties on salt and tea.
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  Speaker 1: Marco Polo records the deposition of a Chinese minister of
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  Speaker 1: finance in twelve eighty five for his arbitrary augmentation of
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  Speaker 1: the tea taxes. It was at the period of the
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  Speaker 1: Great Discoveries that the European people began to know more
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  Speaker 1: about the extreme orient At the end of the sixteenth century,
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  Speaker 1: the Hollanders brought the news that a pleasant drink was
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  Speaker 1: made in the East from the leaves of a bush.
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  Speaker 1: The travelers Giovanni Battista Ramusio fifteen fifty nine, l Almada
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  Speaker 1: fifteen seventy six, Maffeno fifteen eighty eight, Tareira sixteen ten
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  Speaker 1: also mentioned tea in the last named year. Ships of
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  Speaker 1: the Dutch East India Company brought the first tea into Europe.
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  Speaker 1: It was known in France in sixteen thirty six and
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  Speaker 1: reached Russia in sixteen thirty eight. England welcomed it in
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  Speaker 1: sixteen fifty and spoke of it as that excellent and
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  Speaker 1: by all physicians approved. China drink called by the Chineans
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  Speaker 1: Cha and by other nations tae alias t Like all
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  Speaker 1: good things in the world, the propaganda of tea met
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  Speaker 1: with opposition. Heretics like Henry Saville sixteen seventy eight denounced
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  Speaker 1: drinking it as a filthy custom. Jonas Hanway say on
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  Speaker 1: tea seventeen fifty six said that men seemed to lose
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  Speaker 1: their stature and comeliness, women their beauty through the use
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  Speaker 1: of tea. Its cost at the start about fifteen or
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  Speaker 1: sixteen shillings a pound forbade popular consumption, and made it
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  Speaker 1: regalia for high treatments and entertainments, presents being made thereafter
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  Speaker 1: princes and grandees. Yet in spite of such drawbacks, tea
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  Speaker 1: drinking spread with marvelous rapidity. The coffee houses of London
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  Speaker 1: in the early half of the eighteenth century became, in
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  Speaker 1: fact tea houses, the resort of wits like Addison and Steel,
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  Speaker 1: who beguiled themselves over their dish of tea. The beverage
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  Speaker 1: soon became a necessity of life, a taxable matter. We
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  Speaker 1: are reminded in this connection what an important part it
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  Speaker 1: plays in modern history. Colonial America resigned herself to oppression
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  Speaker 1: until human endurance gave way. Before the heavy duties laid
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  Speaker 1: on tea American independence states from the throwing of tea
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  Speaker 1: chests into Boston Harbor. There is a subtle charm in
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  Speaker 1: the taste of tea which makes it irresistible and capable
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  Speaker 1: of idealization. Western humorists were not slow to mingle the
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  Speaker 1: fragrance of their thought with its aroma. It is not
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  Speaker 1: the arrogance of wine, the self consciousness of coffee, nor
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  Speaker 1: the simpering innocence of cocoa. Already in seventeen eleven, says
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  Speaker 1: the Spectator, I would therefore, in a particular manner, recommend
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  Speaker 1: these my speculations to all well regulated families that set
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  Speaker 1: apart an hour every morning for tea, bread and butter,
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  Speaker 1: and would earnestly advise them for their good to order
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  Speaker 1: this paper to be punctually served up and to be
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  Speaker 1: looked upon as a part of the tea equipage. Samuel
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  Speaker 1: Johnson drawes his own portrait as a hardened and shameless
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  Speaker 1: tea drinker who, for twenty years diluted his meals with
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  Speaker 1: only the infusion of the fascatating plant, who, with tea
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  Speaker 1: amused the evening, with ta solaced the midnight, and with
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  Speaker 1: tea welcomed the morning. Charles Lamb, a professed devotee, sounded
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  Speaker 1: the true note of Teaism, when he wrote that the
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  Speaker 1: greatest pleasure he knew was to do a good action
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  Speaker 1: by stealth and have it found out by accident. For
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  Speaker 1: teaism is the art of concealing beauty that you may
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  Speaker 1: discover it, of suggesting what you dare not reveal. It
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  Speaker 1: is the noble secret of laughing at yourself, calmly yet thoroughly,
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  Speaker 1: and is thus humor itself the smile of philosophy. All
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  Speaker 1: genuine humorists may in this sense be called Ta philosophers. Thackeray,
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  Speaker 1: for instance, and of course Shakespeare. The poets of the Decadence,
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  Speaker 1: when was not the world in decadence, in their protests
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  Speaker 1: against materialism, have to a certain extent also opened the
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  Speaker 1: way to Teaism. Perhaps nowadays it is our demure contemplation
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  Speaker 1: of the imperfect that the West and the East can
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  Speaker 1: meet in mutual consolation. The Taoists relate that at the
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  Speaker 1: great Beginning of the no Beginning, Spirit and matter met
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  Speaker 1: in mortal combat. At last, the Yellow Emperor, the Sun
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  Speaker 1: of Heaven, triumphed over Schu Jung, the demon of darkness
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  Speaker 1: and earth. The Titan, in his death agony, struck his
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  Speaker 1: head against the soul of vault and shivered the blue
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  Speaker 1: dome of Jade into fragments. The stars lost their nests.
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  Speaker 1: The moon wandered aimlessly among the wild chasms of the night.
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  Speaker 1: In despair, the Yellow Emperor sought far and wide for
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  Speaker 1: the repair of the heavens. He had not a search
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  Speaker 1: in vain. Out of the Eastern Sea rose a queen,
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  Speaker 1: the divine Nyuka, horn crowned and dragon tailed, resplendent in
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  Speaker 1: her armor of fire. She welded the five colored rainbow
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  Speaker 1: in her magic cauldron and rebuilt the Chinese sky. But
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  Speaker 1: it is told that Niuka forgot to fill two tiny
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  Speaker 1: crevices in the blue firmament. Thus began the dualism of love,
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  Speaker 1: two souls rolling through space and never at rest until
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  Speaker 1: they joined together. To complete the universe, everyone has to
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  Speaker 1: build anew his sky of hope and peace. The heaven
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  Speaker 1: of modern humanity is indeed shattered in a Cyclopean struggle
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  Speaker 1: for wealth and power. The world is groping in the
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  Speaker 1: shadow of egotism and vulgarity. Knowledge is brought through bad conscience,
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  Speaker 1: benevolence practiced for the sake of utility. The East and
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  Speaker 1: the West, like two dragons tossed in a sea of
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  Speaker 1: ferment in vain, strive to regain the jewel of life.
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  Speaker 1: We need a nyuka again to repair the grand devastation.
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  Speaker 1: We await the great Avatar. Meanwhile, let us have a
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  Speaker 1: sip of tea. The afternoon glow is brightening the bamboos,
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  Speaker 1: The fountains are bubbling with delight. The sowing of the
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  Speaker 1: pines is heard in our kettle. Let us dream of
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  Speaker 1: evanescence and linger in the beautiful foolishness of things. End
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  Speaker 1: of chapter one, chapter two of the Book of Tea
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  Speaker 1: by Kakuzo Okakura. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain.
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  Speaker 1: Recording by Clive Catterel. The Book of Tea by Carkuzo Okakura,
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  Speaker 1: Chapter two, The Schools of Tea. Tea is a work
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  Speaker 1: of art and needs a master hand to bring out
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  Speaker 1: its noblest We have good and bad tea, as we
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  Speaker 1: have good and bad paintings, generally the latter. There is
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  Speaker 1: no single recipe for making the perfect tea, as there
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  Speaker 1: are no rules producing a Titian or Assassin. Each preparation
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  Speaker 1: of the leaves has its individuality, its special affinity with
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  Speaker 1: water and heat, its own method of telling a story.
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  Speaker 1: Though truly beautiful, must always be in it. How much
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  Speaker 1: do we not suffer through the constant failure of society
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  Speaker 1: to recognize this simple and fundamental law of art and life? Litunai,
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  Speaker 1: a Sung poet has sad A remarked that there were
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  Speaker 1: three most deplorable things in the world. The spoiling of
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  Speaker 1: fine youths through false education, the degradation of fine art
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  Speaker 1: through vulgar admiration, and the utter waste of fine tea
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: through incompetent manipulation. Like art, tea has its periods and
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  Speaker 1: its schools. Its evolution may be roughly divided into three
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  Speaker 1: main stages, the boiled tea, the whipped tea, and the
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  Speaker 1: steeped tea. We moderns belong to the last school. These
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  Speaker 1: several methods of appreciating the beverage are indicative of the
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  Speaker 1: spirit of the age in which they prevailed. For life
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  Speaker 1: is an expression our unconscious actions, the constant betrayal of
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  Speaker 1: our innermost thought. Confucius said that man hideth not. Perhaps
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  Speaker 1: we reveal ourselves too much in small things, because we
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  Speaker 1: have so little of the great to conceal. The tiny
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  Speaker 1: incidents of daily routine are as much a commentary of
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  Speaker 1: racial ideals as the highest flight of philosophy or poetry.
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  Speaker 1: Even as the difference in favorite vintage marks the separate
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: idiosyncrasies of different periods and nationalities of Europe, so the
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  Speaker 1: t ideals characterized the very moods of Oriental culture. The
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  Speaker 1: cake tea which was boiled, the powdered tea which was whipped,
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  Speaker 1: the leaf tea which was steeped, mark the distinct emotional
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  Speaker 1: impulses of the Tang, the Sung, and the Ming dynasties
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  Speaker 1: of China. If we were inclined to borrow the much
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  Speaker 1: abused terminology of art classification, we might designate them, respectively,
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  Speaker 1: the Classic, the Romantic, and the naturalistic schools of tea.
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  Speaker 1: The tea plant, a native of southern China, was known
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  Speaker 1: from very early times to Chinese botany and medicine. It
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  Speaker 1: is alluded to in the classics under the various names
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  Speaker 1: of Tao t Sei, chung Kha, and ming, and was
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  Speaker 1: highly prized for possessing the virtues of relieving fatigue, delighting
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  Speaker 1: the soul, strengthening the will, and repairing the eye sight.
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  Speaker 1: It was not only administered as an internal dose, but
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  Speaker 1: often applied externally in the form of a pace to
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  Speaker 1: alleviate rheumatic pains. The Taoists claimed it as an important
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  Speaker 1: ingredient in the elixir of immortality. The Buddhists used it
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  Speaker 1: extensively to prevent drowsiness during their long hours of meditation.
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  Speaker 1: By the fourth and fifth centuries, tea became a favorite
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  Speaker 1: beverage among the inhabitants of the Yanksi Kayang Valley. It
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  Speaker 1: was about this time that modern idiograph char was coined,
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  Speaker 1: evidently a corruption of the classic twel The poets of
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  Speaker 1: the Southern dynasties have left some fragments of their fervent
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  Speaker 1: adoration of the froth of the liquid jade. Then emperors
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  Speaker 1: used to bestow some rare preparation of the leaves on
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  Speaker 1: their high ministers as a reward for eminent services. Yet
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  Speaker 1: the method of drinking tea at this stage was primitive
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  Speaker 1: in the extreme. The leaves were steamed crushed in a mortar,
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  Speaker 1: made into a cake and boiled together with rice, ginger, salt,
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  Speaker 1: orange peel, spices, milk, and sometimes with onions. The custom
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  Speaker 1: obtains at the present day among the Tibetans and various
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  Speaker 1: Mongolian tribes, who make a curious syrup of these ingredients.
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  Speaker 1: The use of lemon slices by the Russians, who learned
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  Speaker 1: to take tea from the Chinese caravans aries, points to
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  Speaker 1: the survival of the ancient method. It needed the genius
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  Speaker 1: of the Tang dynasty to emancipate Tea from its crude
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  Speaker 1: state and lead to its final idealization. With lu Wu
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  Speaker 1: in the middle of the eighth century, we have our
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  Speaker 1: first apostle of Tea. He was born in an age
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  Speaker 1: when Buddhism, Taoism, and Confucianism were seeking mutual synthesis. The
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  Speaker 1: pantheistic symbolism of the time was urging one to mirror
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  Speaker 1: the universal. In the particular, lu Wu, a poet, saw
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  Speaker 1: in the Tea service the same harmony and order which
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: reigned through all things. In his celebrated work The Cha
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: King the Holy Scripture of Tea, he related the Code
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: of Tea. He has since been worshiped as the tutelary
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: god of the Chinese tea merchants. The Chucking consists of
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: three volumes and ten chapters. In the first chapter, lu
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: Wu treats the nature of the tea plant. In the
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: second of the implements for gathering the leaves, in the
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: third of the selection of the leaves. According to him,
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: the best quality of the leaves must have creases like
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: the leathern boot of a tartar horseman, curl like the
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: dew lap of a mighty bullock, unfold like a mist
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: rising out of the ravine, gleam like a lake touched
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: by a zephyr, and be wet and soft like fine
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: earth newly swept by rain. The fourth chapter is devoted
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: to the enumeration and description of the twenty four members
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: of the tea equipage, beginning with the tripod brazier and
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: ending with a bamboo cabinet for containing all these utensils.
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: Here we notice lu Wu's predilection for Taoist symbol Also,
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: it is interesting to observe in this connection the influence
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: of tea on Chinese ceramics. The celestial porcelain, as is
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: well known, had its origin in an attempt to reproduce
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: the exquisite shade of jade, resulting in the Tang dynasty
• 24:17
  Speaker 1: in the blue glaze of the south and the white
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: glaze of the north. Lu Wu considered the blue as
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: the ideal color for the tea cup, as it lent
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: additional greenness to the beverage, whereas the white made it
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: look pinkish and distasteful. It was because he used cake tea.
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: Later on, when the tea masters of Sung took to
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: the powdered tea, they preferred heavy bowls of blue, black
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: and dark brown. The mings, with their steeped tea rejoiced
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: in light wear of white porcelain. In the fifth chapter,
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: lu Wu describes the method of making tea. He eliminates
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: all ingredients except salt. He dwells also on the much
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: discussed question of the choice of water and the degree
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: of boiling it. According to him, the mountain spring is
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: the best. The river water and the spring water come
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: next in order of excellence. There are three stages of boiling.
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: The first boil is when the little bubbles like the
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: eye of fishes, swim on the surface. The second boil
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: is when the bubbles are like crystal beads rolling in
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: a fountain. The third boil is when the billows surge wildly.
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: In the kettle. The cake tea is roasted before the
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: fire until it becomes soft like a baby's arm, and
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: is shredded into powder between pieces of fine paper. Salt
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: is put in the first boil, the tea in the second.
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: At the third boil, a dipper full of cold water
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: is poured into the kettle to settle the tea and
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: revive the youth of the water. Then the beverage was
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: poured into cups and drunk oh nectar. The filmy leaflet
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: hung like scaly clouds in a serene sky, or floated
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: like water lilies on emerald streams. It was of such
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: a beverage that Lotung, a Tang poet wrote, the first
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: cup moistens my lips and throat. The second cup breaks
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: my loneliness. The third cup searches my barren entrail, but
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: to find therein some five thousand volumes of odd idiographs.
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: The fourth cup raises a slight perspiration. All the wrong
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: of life passes away through my paws. At the fifth cup,
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: I am purified. The sixth cup calls me to the
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: realms of the immortals the Seventh cup Ah, But I
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: could take no more. I only feel the breath of
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: cool wind that rises in my sleeves. Where is Horai San?
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: Let me ride on this sweet breeze and waft away thither.
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: The remaining chapters of the Cha King treat of the
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: Vulgarity of the Ordinary Methods of Tea Drinking, a historical
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: summary of illustrious tea drinkers, the famous tea plantations of China,
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: the possible variations of the tea service, and illustrations of
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: the tea utensils. The last is unfortunately lost. The appearance
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: of the chaking must have created considerable sensation at the time.
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: Lu Wu was befriended by the Emperor Taisung seven six
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: three to seven seventy nine, and his fame attached many followers.
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: Some exquisites were said to have been able to detect
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: the tea made by lu Wu from that of his disciples.
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: One Mandarin has his name immortalized by his failure to
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: appreciate the tea of this great master. In the Sung dynasty,
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: the whipped tea came into fashion and created the second
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: school of tea. The leaves were ground to fine powder
• 27:54
  Speaker 1: in a small stone mill, and the preparation was whipped
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: in hot water by a delicate whisk made of split bamboo.
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: The new process led to some change in the tea
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: equipage of lu Wu, as well as in the choice
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: of leaves. Salt was discarded forever. The enthusiasm of the
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: song people for tea knew no bounds. Epicures vied with
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: each other in discovering new varieties, and regular tournaments were
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: held to decide their superiority. Emperor Kai Sung eleven o
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: one to eleven twenty four, who was too great an
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: artist to be a well behaved monarch, lavished his treasures
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: on the attainment of rare species. He himself wrote a
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: dissertation on the twenty kinds of Tea, among which he
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: prizes the white tea as of the rarest and finest quality.
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: The tea ideal of the songs differed from the tangs,
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: even as their notion of life differed. They sought to
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: actualize what their predecessors tried to symbolize. To the Neo
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: Confucian mind, the cosmic law was not reflected in the
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: phenomenal world, but the phenomenal world was the cosmic law itself.
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: Ions were but moments, nirvana always within grasp. The Taoist
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: conception that immortality lay in the eternal change permeated all
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: their modes of thought. It was the process, not the deed,
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: which was interesting. It was the completing, not the completion,
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: which was really vital. Man came thus at once face
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: to face with nature. A new meaning grew into the
• 29:35
  Speaker 1: art of life. The tea began not to be a
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: political pastime, but one of the methods of self realization.
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: Wang Yucheng eulogized tea as flooding his soul like a
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: direct appeal, that its delicate bitterness reminded him of the
• 29:51
  Speaker 1: after taste of a good counsel. So Tumpa wrote of
• 29:55
  Speaker 1: the strength of the immaculate purity in tea, which defied corruption,
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: as a truly virtuous man. Among the Buddhists, the Southern
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: Zen sect, which incorporated so much of Taoist doctrines, formulated
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: an elaborate ritual of tea. The monks gathered before the
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: image of Bodhi Dhama and drank tea out of a
• 30:15
  Speaker 1: single bowl with the profound formality of a holy sacrament.
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: It was this Zen ritual which finally developed into the
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: tea ceremony of Japan in the fifteenth century. Unfortunately, the
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: sudden outburst of the Mongol tribes in the thirteenth century,
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: which resulted in the devastation and conquest of China under
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: the barbaric rule of the Yuen emperors, destroyed all the
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: fruits of Sung culture. The native dynasty of the Mings,
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: which attempted re nationalization in the middle of the fifteenth century,
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: was harassed by internal troubles, and China again fell under
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: the alien rule of the Munchus. In the seventeenth century,
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: manners and customs changed to leevena vestige of the former times.
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: The powdered tea is entirely forgotten. We find a Ming
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: commentator at loss to recall the shape of the tea
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: whisk mentioned in one of the Sung classics. Tea is
• 31:13
  Speaker 1: now taken by steeping the leaves in hot water in
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: a bowl or cup. The reason why the Western world
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: is innocent of the older method of drinking tea is
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: explained by the fact that europe knew it only at
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: the close of the Ming dynasty. To the latter day
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: Chinese tea is a delicious beverage, but not an ideal.
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: The long woes of his country have robbed him of
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: the zest for the meaning of life. He has become modern,
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: that is to say, old and disenchanted. He has lost
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: that sublime faith in illusions which constitutes the eternal youth
• 31:50
  Speaker 1: and vigor of the poets and ancients. He is an
• 31:54
  Speaker 1: eclectic and politely accepts the traditions of the universe. He
• 31:59
  Speaker 1: toys with nature, but does not condescend to conquer or
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: worship her. His leaf tea is often wonderful with its
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: flower like aroma, but the romance of the Tang and
• 32:10
  Speaker 1: Sung ceremonials are not to be found in his cup. Japan,
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: which followed closely on the footsteps of Chinese civilization, has
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: known the tea in all its three stages. As early
• 32:24
  Speaker 1: as the year seven to nine, we read of the
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: Emperor Shomu giving tea to one hundred monks at his
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: palace at Nara. The leaves were probably imported by our
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: ambassadors to the Tang court and prepared in the way
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: then in fashion. In eight o one, the monk Saicho
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: brought back some seeds and planted them in Yai San.
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: Many tea gardens are heard of in succeeding centuries, as
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: well as the delight of the aristocracy and priesthood in
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: the beverage. The Sung tea reached us in eleven ninety
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: one with the return of Yesai Zenji, who went there
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: to study the Southern Zen school. The new seeds which
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: he carried home were successfully planted in three places, one
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: of which the Uji district near Kiyoto, bears still the
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: name of producing the best tea in the world. The
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: Southern Zen spread with marvelous rapidity, and with it the
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: tea ritual and the t ideal of the song. By
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: the fifteenth century, under the patronage of the shogun Ashikago Voshinasa,
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: the tea ceremony is fully constituted and made into an
• 33:30
  Speaker 1: independent and secular performance. Since then, teaism is fully established
• 33:35
  Speaker 1: in Japan. The use of the steeped tea of the
• 33:38
  Speaker 1: later China is comparatively recent among us, being only known
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: since the middle of the seventeenth century. It has replaced
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: the powdered tea in ordinary consumption, though the latter still
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: continues to hold its place as the tea of teas.
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: It is in the Japanese tea ceremony that we see
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: the culmination of tea ideals. Our successful resistance of the
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: Mongol invasion of twelve eighty one had enabled us to
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: carry on the song movement so disastrously cut off in
• 34:08
  Speaker 1: China itself. Through the nomadic inroad. Tea with us became
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: more than an idealization of the form of drinking. It
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: is a religion of the art of life. The beverage
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: grew to be an excuse for the worship of purity
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: and refinement, a sacred function at which the host and
• 34:27
  Speaker 1: guest joined to produce, for that occasion the utmost beatitude
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: of the mundane. The tea room was an oasis in
• 34:35
  Speaker 1: the dreary waste of existence, where weary travelers could meet
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: to drink from the common spring of art appreciation. The
• 34:44
  Speaker 1: ceremony was an improvised drama whose plot was woven about
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: the tea, the flowers, and the paintings. Not a color
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: to disturb the tone of the room, not a sound
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: to mar the rhythm of things, Not a gesture to
• 34:58
  Speaker 1: obtrude on the harmony, not a word to break the
• 35:01
  Speaker 1: unity of the surroundings. All movements to be performed simply
• 35:05
  Speaker 1: and naturally. Such were the aims of the tea ceremony,
• 35:10
  Speaker 1: and strangely enough, it was often successful. A subtle philosophy
• 35:16
  Speaker 1: lay behind it all. Teaism was Taoism in disguise. End
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: of chapter two, chapter three of the Book of t
• 35:36
  Speaker 1: by Cakuzo Okakura. This LibriVox recording is in the public
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: domain recording by Clive Catterul The Book of Ta by
• 35:46
  Speaker 1: Cacuzo Okakura, Chapter three, Taoism and Zenism. The connection of
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: Zenism with Ta is proverbial. We have already remarked that
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: the tea ceremony was a development of the Zen ritual.
• 36:04
  Speaker 1: The name of loud Sea, the founder of Taoism, is
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: also intimately associated with the history of tea. It is
• 36:13
  Speaker 1: written in the Chinese School Manual concerning the Origin of
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: Habits and Customs that the ceremony of offering tea to
• 36:20
  Speaker 1: a guest began with Quan Yin, a well known disciple
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: of Lootzi, who first at the gate of the Han
• 36:28
  Speaker 1: Pass presented to the old philosopher a cup of the
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: golden elixir. We shall not stop to discuss the authenticity
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: of such tales which are valuable, however, as confirming the
• 36:42
  Speaker 1: early use of the beverage by the Taoists. Our interest
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: in Taoism and Zenism here lies mainly in those ideas
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: regarding life and art which are so embodied in what
• 36:54
  Speaker 1: we call Teaism. It is to be regretted that, as
• 36:59
  Speaker 1: yet there appears to be no adequate presentation of the
• 37:01
  Speaker 1: Taoists and zen doctrines in any foreign language, though we
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: have had several laudable attempts, translation is always a treason, and,
• 37:11
  Speaker 1: as a Ming author observes, can at its best be
• 37:15
  Speaker 1: only the reverse side of a brocade. All the threads
• 37:19
  Speaker 1: are there, but not the subtlety of color or design.
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: But after all, what great doctrine is there which is
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: easy to expound? The ancient sages never put their teachings
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: in systematic form. They spoke in paradoxes, for they were
• 37:35
  Speaker 1: afraid of uttering half truths. They began by talking like fools,
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: and ended by making their heroes wise. Ladsia himself, with
• 37:45
  Speaker 1: his quaint humor, says, if people of inferior intelligence hear
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: of the Tao, they laugh immensely. It would not be
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: the Tao unless they laughed at it. The Tao literally
• 37:59
  Speaker 1: means a path. It has been severally translated as the way,
• 38:04
  Speaker 1: the absolute, the law, nature, supreme reason, the mode. These
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: renderings are not incorrect, for the use of the term
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: by the Taoists differs according to the subject matter of
• 38:19
  Speaker 1: the inquiry. Loud Sea himself spoke of it. Thus, there
• 38:24
  Speaker 1: is a thing which is all containing, which was borne
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: before the existence of heaven and earth. How silent, how solitary,
• 38:34
  Speaker 1: It stands alone and changes not. It revolves without danger
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: to itself, and is the mother the universe. I do
• 38:43
  Speaker 1: not know its name, and so call it the path.
• 38:47
  Speaker 1: With reluctance. I call it the infinite. Infinity is the fleeting.
• 38:53
  Speaker 1: The fleeting is the vanishing. The vanishing is the reverting.
• 39:00
  Speaker 1: The Tao is in the passage rather than the path.
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: It is the spirit of cosmic change, the eternal growth,
• 39:08
  Speaker 1: which returns upon itself to produce new forms. It recoils
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: upon itself like the dragon, the beloved symbol of the Taoists.
• 39:18
  Speaker 1: It folds and unfolds as to the clouds. The Tawer
• 39:23
  Speaker 1: might be spoken of as the great transition. Subjectively, it
• 39:27
  Speaker 1: is the mood of the universe. Its absolute is the relative.
• 39:33
  Speaker 1: It should be remembered in the first place, that Taoism,
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: like its legitimate successor, Zenism, represents the individualistic trends of
• 39:42
  Speaker 1: the Southern Chinese mind, in contradistinction to the communism of
• 39:46
  Speaker 1: Northern China, which expressed itself in Confucianism. The Middle Kingdom
• 39:52
  Speaker 1: is as vast as Europe and has a differentiation of
• 39:55
  Speaker 1: idiosyncrasies marked by the two great river systems which traverse it.
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: The Yangxe, Kayang and huang Ho are, respectively, the Mediterranean
• 40:04
  Speaker 1: and the Baltic. Even to day, in spite of centuries
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: of unification, the Southern Celestial differs in his thoughts and
• 40:13
  Speaker 1: beliefs from his northern brother, as a member of the
• 40:15
  Speaker 1: Latin race differs from the Teuton. In ancient days, when
• 40:20
  Speaker 1: communication was even more difficult than at present, and especially
• 40:24
  Speaker 1: during the feudal period, this difference in thought was most
• 40:28
  Speaker 1: pronounced the art and poetry of the one breathe an
• 40:32
  Speaker 1: atmosphere entirely distinct from that of the other. In laot
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: Sea and his followers, and in Kutsugen, the foreigner of
• 40:40
  Speaker 1: the Yanksi Kayang nature poets, we find an idealism quite
• 40:44
  Speaker 1: inconsistent with the prosaic ethical notions of their contemporary Northern writers.
• 40:49
  Speaker 1: Laot Sea lived five centuries before the Christian era. The
• 40:55
  Speaker 1: germ of Taoist's speculation may be found long before the
• 40:58
  Speaker 1: advent of laud Sea, surnamed the Long Eared. The archaic
• 41:03
  Speaker 1: records of China, especially the Book of Changes, foreshadow his
• 41:07
  Speaker 1: thought with a great respect paid to the laws and
• 41:11
  Speaker 1: customs of that classic period of Chinese civilization, which culminated
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: with the establishment of the Chaoo dynasty in the sixteenth century.
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: B C kept the development of individualism in Czech for
• 41:22
  Speaker 1: a long while, so that it was not until after
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: the disintegration of the Choo dynasty and the establishment of
• 41:29
  Speaker 1: innumerable independent kingdoms that it was able to blossom forth
• 41:33
  Speaker 1: in the luxuriance of free thought. Loud Sea and Soshi
• 41:38
  Speaker 1: chuang Sei were both Southerners and the greatest exponents of
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: the New School. On the other hand, Confucius, with his
• 41:47
  Speaker 1: numerous disciples, aimed at returning ancestral conventions. Taoism cannot be
• 41:53
  Speaker 1: understood without some knowledge of Confucianism, and vice versa. We
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: have so said that the Taoist absolute was the relative
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: in ethics. The Taoists railed at the laws and the
• 42:07
  Speaker 1: moral codes of society. For to them, right and wrong
• 42:10
  Speaker 1: were but relative terms. Definition is always limitation. The fixed
• 42:17
  Speaker 1: and changeless are but terms expressive of a stoppage of growth,
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: said Kuzugen. The sages move the world. Our standards of
• 42:27
  Speaker 1: morality are forgotten of the past needs of society. But
• 42:31
  Speaker 1: is society to remain always the same? The observance of
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: communal traditions involves a constant sacrifice of the individual to
• 42:40
  Speaker 1: the state. Education in order to keep up the mighty
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: delusion encourages a species of ignorance. People are not taught
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: to be really virtuous, but to behave properly. We are
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: wicked because we are frightfully self conscious. We nurse a
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: conscience because we are afraid to tell the truth to others.
• 43:03
  Speaker 1: We take refuge in pride because we are afraid to
• 43:06
  Speaker 1: tell the truth to ourselves. How can one be serious
• 43:11
  Speaker 1: with the world when the world itself is so ridiculous?
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: The spirit of barter is everywhere honor and chastity. Behold
• 43:20
  Speaker 1: the complacent salesman retailing the good and true. One can
• 43:24
  Speaker 1: even buy a so called religion, which is really but
• 43:27
  Speaker 1: common morality, sanctified with flowers and music rob the church
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: of her accessories and what remains behind. Yet the trusts
• 43:37
  Speaker 1: thrive marvelously, for the prices are absurdly cheap. A prayer
• 43:43
  Speaker 1: for a ticket to heaven, a diploma for an honorable citizenship.
• 43:48
  Speaker 1: Hide yourself under a bushel quickly, for if your real
• 43:51
  Speaker 1: usefulness were known to the world, you would soon be
• 43:54
  Speaker 1: knocked down to the highest bidder by the public auctioneer.
• 43:58
  Speaker 1: Why do men and women like to advertise themselves so much?
• 44:03
  Speaker 1: Is it not but an instinct derived from the days
• 44:05
  Speaker 1: of slavery. The virility of the idea lies no less
• 44:11
  Speaker 1: in its power of breaking through contemporary thought than in
• 44:14
  Speaker 1: its capacity for dominating subsequent movements. Taoism was an active
• 44:19
  Speaker 1: power during the Shin dynasty, that epoch of Chinese unification
• 44:24
  Speaker 1: from which we derived the name China. It would be
• 44:28
  Speaker 1: interesting had we time to note its influence on contemporary thinkers,
• 44:33
  Speaker 1: the mathematicians, writers on law and war, the mystics and alchemists,
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: and the later nature poets of the Yanxi Kyang. We
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: should not even ignore those speculators on reality who doubted
• 44:46
  Speaker 1: whether a white horse was real because he was white
• 44:50
  Speaker 1: or because he was solid, nor the conversationalists of the
• 44:53
  Speaker 1: Six dynasties, who, like the Zen philosophers, reveled in discussions
• 44:58
  Speaker 1: concerning the pure and the Abso above all we should
• 45:02
  Speaker 1: pay homage to Taoism for what it has done towards
• 45:05
  Speaker 1: the formation of the celestial character, giving to it a
• 45:08
  Speaker 1: certain capacity for reserve and refinement as warm as jade.
• 45:14
  Speaker 1: Chinese history is full of instances in which the votaries
• 45:17
  Speaker 1: of Taoism, princes and hermits alike, followed, with varied and
• 45:22
  Speaker 1: interesting results, the teachings of their creed. The tale will
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: not be without its quota of instruction and amusement. It
• 45:30
  Speaker 1: will be rich in anecdotes, allegories, and aphorisms. We would
• 45:35
  Speaker 1: fain be on speaking terms with the delightful Emperor who
• 45:38
  Speaker 1: never died because he had never lived. We may ride
• 45:41
  Speaker 1: the wind with elite sea and find it absolutely quiet
• 45:45
  Speaker 1: because we ourselves are the wind, or dwell in mid
• 45:49
  Speaker 1: air with the aged one of the hong Ho, who
• 45:51
  Speaker 1: lived betwixt heaven and earth because he was subject neither
• 45:54
  Speaker 1: to the one nor the other. Even in that grotesque
• 45:59
  Speaker 1: apology for ten Taoism which we find in China at
• 46:01
  Speaker 1: the present day, we can revel in a wealth of
• 46:04
  Speaker 1: imagery impossible to find in any other cult. But the
• 46:12
  Speaker 1: chief contribution of Taoism to Asiatic life has been in
• 46:15
  Speaker 1: the realm of esthetics. Chinese historians have always spoken of
• 46:20
  Speaker 1: Taoism as the art of being in the world, for
• 46:24
  Speaker 1: it deals with the present, ourselves. It is in us
• 46:28
  Speaker 1: that God meets with nature, and yesterday parts from tomorrow.
• 46:33
  Speaker 1: The present is the moving infinity. The legitimate sphere of
• 46:37
  Speaker 1: the relative relativity seeks adjustment. Adjustment is art. The art
• 46:45
  Speaker 1: of life lies in a constant readjustment to our surroundings.
• 46:50
  Speaker 1: Taoism accepts the mundane as it is, and, unlike the
• 46:53
  Speaker 1: Confucians or the Buddhists, tries to find beauty in our
• 46:57
  Speaker 1: world of woe and worry. The sung allegory of the
• 47:01
  Speaker 1: Three Vinegar Tasters explains admirably the trends of the three doctrines. Sacumuni, Confucious,
• 47:08
  Speaker 1: and loud Sea once stood before a jar of vinegar,
• 47:12
  Speaker 1: the emblem of life, and each dipped in his finger
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: to taste the brew. The matter of fact, Confucius found
• 47:20
  Speaker 1: its sour, the Buddha called it bitter, and loud Sea
• 47:25
  Speaker 1: pronounced its sweet. The Taoists claimed that the comedy of
• 47:30
  Speaker 1: life could be made more interesting if every one would
• 47:33
  Speaker 1: preserve the unities. To keep the proportions of things and
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: give place to others without losing one's own position was
• 47:41
  Speaker 1: the secret of success in the mundane drama. We must
• 47:45
  Speaker 1: know the whole play in order to properly act our parts.
• 47:49
  Speaker 1: The conception of totality must never be lost in that
• 47:52
  Speaker 1: of the individual. This lout Sea illustrates by his favorite
• 47:57
  Speaker 1: metaphor of the vacuum. He claimed that only in vacuum
• 48:02
  Speaker 1: lay the truly essential. The reality of a room, for instance,
• 48:07
  Speaker 1: was to be found in the vacant space enclosed by
• 48:09
  Speaker 1: the roof and the walls, not in the roof and
• 48:12
  Speaker 1: walls themselves. The usefulness of a water pitcher dwelt in
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: the emptness where water might be put, not in the
• 48:20
  Speaker 1: form of the picture or the material of which it
• 48:22
  Speaker 1: was made. Vacuum is all potent, because all containing in
• 48:29
  Speaker 1: vacuum alone, motion becomes possible. One who could make of
• 48:34
  Speaker 1: himself a vacuum into which others might freely enter, would
• 48:37
  Speaker 1: become master of all situations. The whole can always dominate
• 48:42
  Speaker 1: the parts. These Taoist's ideas have greatly influenced all other
• 48:49
  Speaker 1: theories of action, even to those of fencing and wrestling.
• 48:54
  Speaker 1: Jiu Jitsu, the Japanese art of self defense, owes its
• 48:58
  Speaker 1: name to a passage in the Tao Ti King. In
• 49:01
  Speaker 1: jiu jitsu, one seeks to draw out and exhaust the
• 49:04
  Speaker 1: enemy's strength by non resistance vacuum, while conserving one's own
• 49:08
  Speaker 1: strength for victory in the final struggle. In art, the
• 49:13
  Speaker 1: importance of the same principle is illustrated by the value
• 49:16
  Speaker 1: of suggestion. In leaving something unsaid, the beholder is given
• 49:21
  Speaker 1: a chance to complete the idea, and thus a great
• 49:25
  Speaker 1: masterpiece irresistibly rivets your attention until you seem to become
• 49:29
  Speaker 1: actually a part of it. A vacuum is there for
• 49:33
  Speaker 1: you to enter and fill up with the full measure
• 49:35
  Speaker 1: of your esthetic emotion. He who has made himself master
• 49:41
  Speaker 1: of the art of living was the real man of
• 49:43
  Speaker 1: the Taoist. At birth, he enters the realm of dreams,
• 49:46
  Speaker 1: only to awaken to reality. At death, he tempers his
• 49:51
  Speaker 1: own brightness in order to merge himself into the obscurity
• 49:54
  Speaker 1: of others. He is reluctant, as one who crosses a
• 49:58
  Speaker 1: stream in winter, hesitating as one who fears the neighborhood,
• 50:03
  Speaker 1: respectful like a guest, trembling like ice that is about
• 50:07
  Speaker 1: to melt, unassuming, like a piece of wood not yet carved,
• 50:12
  Speaker 1: vacant like a valley, formless like troubled waters. To him,
• 50:19
  Speaker 1: the three jewels of life were pity, economy, and modesty.
• 50:26
  Speaker 1: If we now turn our attention to Zenism, we shall
• 50:29
  Speaker 1: find that it emphasizes the teachings of Taoism. Zen is
• 50:33
  Speaker 1: a name derived from the Sanskrit word dyana, which signifies meditation.
• 50:39
  Speaker 1: It claims that through consecrated meditation may be attained supreme
• 50:43
  Speaker 1: self realization. Meditation is one of the six ways through
• 50:48
  Speaker 1: which buddhahood may be reached, and the Zen sectarians affirm
• 50:52
  Speaker 1: that Sakumuni laid special stress on this method in his
• 50:55
  Speaker 1: later teachings, handing down the rules to his chief disciple Cashier.
• 51:02
  Speaker 1: According to their tradition, Kashiapa, the first sen patriarch, imparted
• 51:07
  Speaker 1: the secret to Ananda, who in turn passed it on
• 51:10
  Speaker 1: to successive patriarchs until it reached Bodhi Dharma, the twenty
• 51:14
  Speaker 1: eighth Bodhi Dharma, came to northern China in the early
• 51:18
  Speaker 1: half of the sixth century and was the first patriarch
• 51:21
  Speaker 1: of Chinese Zen. There is much uncertainty about the history
• 51:26
  Speaker 1: of these patriarchs and their doctrines. In its philosophical aspect,
• 51:32
  Speaker 1: early Xenism seems to have affinity on one hand to
• 51:34
  Speaker 1: the Indian negativism of Nagarajuna and on the other to
• 51:39
  Speaker 1: the Nan philosophy formulated by Sancharacharya. The first teaching of
• 51:44
  Speaker 1: Zen as we know it at the present day must
• 51:47
  Speaker 1: be attributed to the sixth Chinese patriarch Yeno six three
• 51:51
  Speaker 1: seven to seven one three, founder of Southern Zen, so
• 51:55
  Speaker 1: called from the fact of its predominance in southern China,
• 52:00
  Speaker 1: is closely followed by the great Baso Die seven eight eight,
• 52:04
  Speaker 1: who made of Zen a living influence in celestial life.
• 52:09
  Speaker 1: Here Kujo seven one nine to eight one four, the
• 52:12
  Speaker 1: pupil of Baso, first instituted the Zen monastery and established
• 52:17
  Speaker 1: a ritual and regulations for its government. In the discussions
• 52:22
  Speaker 1: of the Zen school after the time of Baso we
• 52:25
  Speaker 1: find the play of the Yangtsi Kayang mind causing an
• 52:28
  Speaker 1: accession of native modes of thought in contrast to the
• 52:31
  Speaker 1: former Indian idealism. Whatever sectarian pride may assert the contrary.
• 52:37
  Speaker 1: One cannot help being impressed by the similarity of Southern
• 52:40
  Speaker 1: Zen to the teachings of Laotzi and the Taoist conversationalists.
• 52:45
  Speaker 1: In the Tao Ti King, we already find allusions to
• 52:48
  Speaker 1: the importance of self concentration and the need of properly
• 52:51
  Speaker 1: regulating the breath, essential points in the practice of Zen meditation.
• 52:57
  Speaker 1: Some of the best commentaries on the Book of Laotzi
• 53:00
  Speaker 1: have been written by Zen scholars. Zenism, like Taoism, is
• 53:06
  Speaker 1: the worship of relativity. One master defines Zen as the
• 53:11
  Speaker 1: art of feeling the polar star in the southern sky.
• 53:15
  Speaker 1: Truth can be reached only through the comprehension of opposites. Again, Zenism,
• 53:21
  Speaker 1: like Taoism, is a strong advocate of individualism. Nothing is
• 53:26
  Speaker 1: real except that which concerns the working of our own minds. Yeno,
• 53:31
  Speaker 1: the sixth Patriarch, once saw two monks watching the flag
• 53:35
  Speaker 1: of a pagoda fluttering in the wind. One said, it
• 53:39
  Speaker 1: is the wind that moves. The other said, it is
• 53:43
  Speaker 1: the flag that moves. But Yeno explained to them that
• 53:47
  Speaker 1: the real movement was neither of the wind nor the flag,
• 53:51
  Speaker 1: but of something within their own mindsh Akujo was walking
• 53:56
  Speaker 1: in the forest with a disciple when a hare scurried
• 53:58
  Speaker 1: off at their approach. Why does the hare fly from you,
• 54:02
  Speaker 1: asked he Gujo. Because he is afraid of me, was
• 54:06
  Speaker 1: the answer. No, said the master, It is because you
• 54:10
  Speaker 1: have murderous instinct. The dialog recalls that of Soshi, chant
• 54:17
  Speaker 1: say the Taoist. One day, so she was walking on
• 54:20
  Speaker 1: the bank of a river with a friend. How delightfully
• 54:23
  Speaker 1: the fishes are enjoying themselves in the water, exclaimed Soshi.
• 54:28
  Speaker 1: His friends spake to him, Thus, you are not a fish.
• 54:32
  Speaker 1: How do you know the fishes are enjoying themselves? You
• 54:35
  Speaker 1: are not myself, returned Soshi, How do you know that
• 54:39
  Speaker 1: I do not know the fishes are enjoying themselves. Zen
• 54:45
  Speaker 1: was often opposed to the precepts of orthodox Buddhism, even
• 54:49
  Speaker 1: as Taoism was opposed to Confucianism. To the transcendental insight
• 54:55
  Speaker 1: of the Zen, words are but an encumbrance to thought.
• 55:00
  Speaker 1: The whole sway of Buddhist scriptures only commentaries on personal speculation.
• 55:06
  Speaker 1: The followers of Zen aimed at direct communion with the
• 55:09
  Speaker 1: inner nature of things, regarding their outward accessories only as
• 55:14
  Speaker 1: impediments to a clearer perception of truth. It was this
• 55:18
  Speaker 1: love of the abstract that led the Zen to prefer
• 55:21
  Speaker 1: black and white sketches to the elaborately colored paintings of
• 55:24
  Speaker 1: the classic Buddhist school. Some of the Zen even became
• 55:29
  Speaker 1: iconoclastic as a result of their endeavor to recognize the
• 55:32
  Speaker 1: Buddha in themselves rather than through images and symbolism. We
• 55:37
  Speaker 1: find Tankawoshu breaking up a wooden statue of Buddha on
• 55:40
  Speaker 1: a wintry day to make a fire. What sacrilege, said
• 55:45
  Speaker 1: the horror stricken bystander. I wish to get the sharli
• 55:48
  Speaker 1: out of the ashes, calmly rejoined the Zen. But you
• 55:52
  Speaker 1: certainly will not get shally from this image, was the
• 55:55
  Speaker 1: angry retort, to which Tanka replied, If I do not,
• 55:59
  Speaker 1: this is soer not a Buddha, and I am committing
• 56:02
  Speaker 1: no sacrilege. Then he turned to warm himself over the
• 56:05
  Speaker 1: kindling fire. A special contribution of Zen to Eastern thought
• 56:13
  Speaker 1: was its recognition of the mundane as of equal importance
• 56:16
  Speaker 1: with the spiritual. It held that in the great relation
• 56:20
  Speaker 1: of things, there was no distinction of small and great,
• 56:24
  Speaker 1: an atom possessing equal possibilities with the universe. The seek
• 56:29
  Speaker 1: of a perfection must discover in his own life the
• 56:31
  Speaker 1: reflection of the inner light. The organization of the Zen
• 56:36
  Speaker 1: monastery was very significant of this point of view. To
• 56:40
  Speaker 1: every member except the abbot, was assigned some special work
• 56:43
  Speaker 1: in the caretaking of the monastery, and curiously enough, to
• 56:47
  Speaker 1: the novice was committed the lighter duties, whilst to the
• 56:51
  Speaker 1: most respected and advanced monks were given the more irksome
• 56:54
  Speaker 1: and menial tasks. Such services formed a part of the
• 56:59
  Speaker 1: Zen discipline, and every least action must be done absolutely perfectly. Thus,
• 57:05
  Speaker 1: many a weighted discussion ensued while weeding the garden, pairing
• 57:09
  Speaker 1: a turnip, or serving tea. The whole ideal of Teaism
• 57:15
  Speaker 1: is a result of this Zen conception of greatness in
• 57:18
  Speaker 1: the smallest incidents of life. Taoism furnished the basis for
• 57:24
  Speaker 1: esthetic ideals. Zenism made them practical. End of chapter three,
• 57:38
  Speaker 1: chapter four of the Book of Ta by Cacuso O. Kakura.
• 57:42
  Speaker 1: This LibriVox recording is in the public domain recording by
• 57:47
  Speaker 1: Clive Catterul Chapter four the Tea Room. To European architects
• 57:55
  Speaker 1: brought up on the tradition of stone and brick construction.
• 57:59
  Speaker 1: Our Japanese method of building with wood and bamboo seems
• 58:03
  Speaker 1: scarcely worthy to be ranked as architecture. It is but
• 58:08
  Speaker 1: quite recently that a competent student of Western architecture has
• 58:11
  Speaker 1: recognized and paid tribute to the remarkable perfection of our
• 58:15
  Speaker 1: great temples. Such being the case as regards our classic architecture,
• 58:21
  Speaker 1: we could hardly expect the outsider to appreciate the subtle
• 58:24
  Speaker 1: beauty of the tea rum, its principles of construction and
• 58:28
  Speaker 1: decoration being entirely different from those of the West. The
• 58:34
  Speaker 1: tea rum, the sukiya does not pretend to be other
• 58:38
  Speaker 1: than a mere cottage, a straw hut, as we call it.
• 58:43
  Speaker 1: The original idiographs for sukiya mean the abode of fancy. Latterly,
• 58:49
  Speaker 1: the various tea masters substituted various Chinese characters according to
• 58:54
  Speaker 1: their conception of the te rum, and the term sukiya
• 58:57
  Speaker 1: may signify the abode of vacancy or the abode of
• 59:01
  Speaker 1: the unsymmetrical. It is an abode of fancy inasmuch as
• 59:07
  Speaker 1: it is an ephemeral structure built to house a poetic impulse.
• 59:12
  Speaker 1: It is an abode of vacancy inasmuch as it is
• 59:14
  Speaker 1: devoid of ornamentation, except for what may be placed in
• 59:18
  Speaker 1: it to satisfy some esthetic need of the moment. It
• 59:23
  Speaker 1: is an abode of the unsymmetrical inasmuch as it is
• 59:25
  Speaker 1: consecrated to the worship of the imperfect, purposely leaving some
• 59:30
  Speaker 1: thing unfinished for the play of the imagination to complete.
• 59:34
  Speaker 1: The ideals of teism have since the sixteenth century influenced
• 59:39
  Speaker 1: our architecture to such a degree that the ordinary Japanese
• 59:42
  Speaker 1: interior of the present day, on account of the extreme
• 59:45
  Speaker 1: simplicity and chasteness of its scheme of decoration, appears to
• 59:50
  Speaker 1: foreigners almost barren. The first independent theorem was the creation
• 59:57
  Speaker 1: of Seno Soyeki, commonly known by his line later name
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 1: of Rikiu, the greatest of all tea masters, who in
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 1: the sixteenth century, under the patronage of Taiko Hideyoshi, instituted
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 1: and brought to a high state of perfection the formalities
• 1:00:12
  Speaker 1: of the tea ceremony. The proportions of the tea room
• 1:00:17
  Speaker 1: had been previously determined by Jowo, a famous tea master
• 1:00:21
  Speaker 1: of the fifteenth century. The early tea room consisted merely
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 1: of a portion of the ordinary drawing room partitioned off
• 1:00:29
  Speaker 1: by screens for the purpose of the tea gathering. The
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 1: portion partitioned off was called the kakoi enclosure, a name
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 1: still applied to those tea rooms which are built into
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 1: a house and not independent constructions. The sukiya consists of
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 1: the tea room proper designed to accommodate not more than
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 1: five persons, a number suggestive of the saying more than
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 1: the graces and less than the muses. An ante room
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 1: midsuya with the ti tea utensils are washed and arranged
• 1:01:01
  Speaker 1: before being brought in, a portico machiai in which the
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 1: guests wait until they receive the summons to enter the
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 1: tea room, and a garden path the roji which connects
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 1: the machiai with the tea room. The tea room is
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 1: unimpressive in appearance. It is smaller than the smallest of
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 1: Japanese houses, while the materials used in its construction are
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 1: intended to give the suggestion of refined poverty. Yet we
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 1: must remember that all this is the result of profound
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 1: artistic forethought, and that the details have been worked out
• 1:01:40
  Speaker 1: with care, perhaps even greater than that expended on the
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 1: building of the richest palaces and temples. A good tea
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 1: room is more costly than an ordinary mansion, for the
• 1:01:52
  Speaker 1: selection of its materials, as well as its workmanship, requires
• 1:01:55
  Speaker 1: immense care and precision. Indeed, the car and is employed
• 1:02:00
  Speaker 1: by the tea masters form a distinct and highly honoured
• 1:02:03
  Speaker 1: class among artisans, their work being no less delicate than
• 1:02:07
  Speaker 1: that of the makers of lacquer cabinets. The tea room
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 1: is not only different from any product of Western architecture,
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 1: but also contrasts strongly with the classical architecture of Japan itself.
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 1: Our ancient noble edifices, whether secular or ecclesiastical, were not
• 1:02:25
  Speaker 1: to be despised, even as regards their mere size. The
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 1: few that have been spared in the disastrous conflagrations of
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 1: centuries are still capable of awingess by the grandeur and
• 1:02:36
  Speaker 1: richness of their decoration. Huge pillars of wood from two
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 1: to three feet in diameter and from thirty to forty
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 1: feet high, supported by a complicated network of brackets, the
• 1:02:48
  Speaker 1: enormous beams which groaned under the weight of the tile
• 1:02:51
  Speaker 1: covered roofs. The material and mode of construction, though weak
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 1: against fire, proved itself strong against earthquakes and was well
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 1: suited to the climactic conditions of the country. In the
• 1:03:05
  Speaker 1: Golden Hall of Horiuji and the Pagoda of Yakushiji, we
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 1: have noteworthy examples of the durability of our wooden architecture.
• 1:03:13
  Speaker 1: These buildings have practically stood intact for nearly twelve centuries.
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 1: The interior of the old temples and palaces was profusely decorated.
• 1:03:24
  Speaker 1: In the Hoodo Temple at Uji, dating from the tenth century,
• 1:03:28
  Speaker 1: we can still see the elaborate canopy and gilded baldacchinos,
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 1: many colored and inlaid with mirrors and mother of pearl,
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 1: as well as remains of the paintings and sculpture which
• 1:03:38
  Speaker 1: formerly covered its walls. Later at Niko. In the Nejo
• 1:03:43
  Speaker 1: Castle at Kiyoto, we see structural beauty sacrificed to a
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 1: wealth of ornamentation, which in color and exquisite detail equals
• 1:03:51
  Speaker 1: the utmost gorgeousness of Arabian or Moorish effort. The simplicity
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 1: and purism of the tea room resulted from the emulation
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 1: of the zen monastery. A zen monastery differs from those
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 1: of other Buddhist sects. Inasmuch as it is meant only
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 1: to be a dwelling place for the monks, its chapel
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 1: is not a place of worship or pilgrimage, but a
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 1: college room where the students congregate for discussion and the
• 1:04:18
  Speaker 1: practice of meditation. The room is bare except for a
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 1: central alcove, in which, behind the altar is a statue
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 1: of Bodidama, the founder of the sect or of Sakumuni,
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 1: attended by Cashiapa and Ananda, the two earliest sen patriarchs.
• 1:04:36
  Speaker 1: On the altar, flowers and incense are offered up in
• 1:04:39
  Speaker 1: the memory of the great contributions which these sages made
• 1:04:42
  Speaker 1: to Zen. We have already said that it was the
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 1: ritual instituted by Zen monks of successively drinking tea out
• 1:04:50
  Speaker 1: of a bowl before the image of Bodidarma, which laid
• 1:04:53
  Speaker 1: the foundations of the tea ceremony. We might add here
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 1: that the altar of the Zen chapel was the prototype
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 1: of the tokonoma, the place of honour in a Japanese room,
• 1:05:04
  Speaker 1: where paintings and flowers are placed for the edification of
• 1:05:07
  Speaker 1: the guests. All our great tea masters were students of
• 1:05:14
  Speaker 1: Zen and attempted to introduce the spirit of Xenism into
• 1:05:17
  Speaker 1: the actualities of life. Thus, the room, like the other
• 1:05:22
  Speaker 1: equipments of the tea ceremony, reflects many of the Zen doctrines.
• 1:05:27
  Speaker 1: The size of the Orthodox tea rum, which is formats
• 1:05:30
  Speaker 1: and a half or ten feet square, is determined by
• 1:05:34
  Speaker 1: a passage in the Sutra of Vikramaditia. In that interesting work,
• 1:05:40
  Speaker 1: Vikramaditia welcomes the saint Manjushiri and eighty four thousand disciples
• 1:05:44
  Speaker 1: of Buddha in a room of this size, an allegory
• 1:05:48
  Speaker 1: based on the theory of the non existence of space. To
• 1:05:51
  Speaker 1: the truly enlightened again, the roji, the garden path which
• 1:05:56
  Speaker 1: leads from the machiai to the tea rum, signifies the
• 1:05:59
  Speaker 1: first stage of meditation, the passage into self illumination, though
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 1: rogi was intended to break connection with the outside world
• 1:06:08
  Speaker 1: and produce a fresh sensation conducive to the full enjoyment
• 1:06:12
  Speaker 1: of estheticism in the tea room itself. One who has
• 1:06:16
  Speaker 1: trodden this garden path cannot fail to remember how his
• 1:06:19
  Speaker 1: spirit as he walked in the twilight of evergreens, over
• 1:06:22
  Speaker 1: the regular irregularities of the stepping stones beneath which lay
• 1:06:26
  Speaker 1: dried pine needles, and passed besides the moss covered granite
• 1:06:30
  Speaker 1: lanterns became uplifted above ordinary thoughts. One may be in
• 1:06:36
  Speaker 1: the midst of a city and yet feel as if
• 1:06:38
  Speaker 1: he were in a forest, far away from the dust
• 1:06:41
  Speaker 1: and din of civilization. Great was the ingenuity displayed by
• 1:06:46
  Speaker 1: the tea masters in producing these effects of serenity and purity.
• 1:06:52
  Speaker 1: The nature of the sensations to be aroused in passing
• 1:06:55
  Speaker 1: through the roji differed with different tea masters. Like Griqueue
• 1:07:00
  Speaker 1: aimed at utter loneliness and claimed the secret of making
• 1:07:04
  Speaker 1: a roji was contained in the ancient ditty I look beyond.
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 1: Flowers are not nor tinted leaves on the sea beach,
• 1:07:13
  Speaker 1: A solitary cottage stands in the waning light of an
• 1:07:17
  Speaker 1: autumn eve. Others, like Kobori Enshiu, sought for a different effect.
• 1:07:25
  Speaker 1: Enshiu said the idea of the garden path was to
• 1:07:28
  Speaker 1: be found in the following verses. A cluster of summer trees,
• 1:07:33
  Speaker 1: a bit of the sea, a pale evening moon. It
• 1:07:38
  Speaker 1: is not difficult to gather his meaning. He wished to
• 1:07:41
  Speaker 1: create the attitude of a newly awakened soul, still lingering
• 1:07:45
  Speaker 1: amid shadowy dreams of the past, yet bathing in the
• 1:07:48
  Speaker 1: sweet unconsciousness of a mellow spiritual light, and yearning for
• 1:07:52
  Speaker 1: the freedom that lay in the expanse beyond. Thus prepared,
• 1:07:58
  Speaker 1: the guest will silently approach the sanctuary, and if a
• 1:08:02
  Speaker 1: samurai will leave his sword on the rack beneath the eaves,
• 1:08:06
  Speaker 1: the tea room being pre eminently the house of peace,
• 1:08:10
  Speaker 1: then he will bend low and creep into the room
• 1:08:13
  Speaker 1: through a small door not more than three feet in height.
• 1:08:17
  Speaker 1: This proceeding was encumbered on all guests, high and low like,
• 1:08:22
  Speaker 1: and was intended to inculcate humility. The order of precedence
• 1:08:27
  Speaker 1: having been mutually agreed upon. While resting in the machiai,
• 1:08:31
  Speaker 1: the guests one by one will enter noiselessly and take
• 1:08:35
  Speaker 1: their seats first, making obeisance to the picture of flower
• 1:08:38
  Speaker 1: arrangement in the tocanoma. The host will not enter the
• 1:08:43
  Speaker 1: room until all the guests have seated themselves and quiet reins,
• 1:08:47
  Speaker 1: with nothing to break the silence save the note of
• 1:08:49
  Speaker 1: the boiling water in the iron kettle. The kettle sings well,
• 1:08:55
  Speaker 1: for pieces of iron are so arranged in the bottom,
• 1:08:57
  Speaker 1: as to produce a peculiar melody, in which one may
• 1:09:00
  Speaker 1: hear the echoes of a cataract muffled by clouds of
• 1:09:04
  Speaker 1: a distant sea breaking among the rocks, a rain storm
• 1:09:07
  Speaker 1: sweeping through a bamboo forest, or the sowing of pines
• 1:09:11
  Speaker 1: on some far away hill. Even in the daytime, the
• 1:09:16
  Speaker 1: light in the room is subdued, for the low eaves
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 1: of the slanting roof admit but few of the sun's rays.
• 1:09:23
  Speaker 1: Everything is sober in tint from the ceiling to the floor.
• 1:09:28
  Speaker 1: The guests themselves have carefully chosen garments of unobtrusive colors.
• 1:09:33
  Speaker 1: The mellowness of age is over all, everything suggestive of
• 1:09:38
  Speaker 1: recent acquirement being tabooed, save only the one note of
• 1:09:41
  Speaker 1: contrast furnished by the bamboo dipper and the linen napkin,
• 1:09:46
  Speaker 1: both immaculately white and new, however faded, The tea room
• 1:09:51
  Speaker 1: and the tea equipage may seem everything is absolutely clean.
• 1:09:56
  Speaker 1: Not a particle of dust will be found in the
• 1:09:57
  Speaker 1: darkest corner, for if any exists, the host is not
• 1:10:01
  Speaker 1: a tea master. One of the first requisites of a
• 1:10:05
  Speaker 1: tea master is the knowledge of how to sweep, clean,
• 1:10:08
  Speaker 1: and wash for there is an art in cleaning and dusting.
• 1:10:13
  Speaker 1: A piece of antique metalwork must not be attacked with
• 1:10:15
  Speaker 1: the unscrupulous seal of the Dutch housewife. Dripping water from
• 1:10:19
  Speaker 1: a flower of ours need not be wiped away, for
• 1:10:22
  Speaker 1: it may be suggestive of dew and coolness. In this connection,
• 1:10:27
  Speaker 1: there is a story of Rickieue which well illustrates the
• 1:10:30
  Speaker 1: ideas of cleanliness entertained by the tea masters. Rikiu was
• 1:10:35
  Speaker 1: watching his son Choan as he swept and watered the
• 1:10:37
  Speaker 1: garden path. Not clean enough, said Rickieu, when Choan had
• 1:10:42
  Speaker 1: finished his task, and bade him try again. After a
• 1:10:47
  Speaker 1: weary hour, the sun turned to Ricieu, father, there is
• 1:10:51
  Speaker 1: nothing more to be done. The steps have been washed
• 1:10:53
  Speaker 1: for the third time. The stone, lanterns and the trees
• 1:10:57
  Speaker 1: are well sprinkled with water, moss and lika a shining
• 1:11:00
  Speaker 1: with fresh verdure. Not a twig, not a leaf, have
• 1:11:04
  Speaker 1: I left on the ground, young fool, chided the tea master.
• 1:11:09
  Speaker 1: That is not the way a garden path should be swept.
• 1:11:12
  Speaker 1: Saying this, Rikiu stepped into the garden, shook a tree,
• 1:11:16
  Speaker 1: and scattered over the garden gold and crimson leaves scraps
• 1:11:20
  Speaker 1: of the brocade of autumn. What Riku demanded was not
• 1:11:24
  Speaker 1: cleanliness alone, but the beautiful and the natural. Also, the
• 1:11:30
  Speaker 1: name abode of fancy implies a structure created to meet
• 1:11:34
  Speaker 1: some individual artistic requirement. The tea room is made for
• 1:11:38
  Speaker 1: the tea master, not the tea master for the tea room.
• 1:11:43
  Speaker 1: It is not intended for posterity, and is therefore ephemeral.
• 1:11:48
  Speaker 1: The idea that everyone should have a house of his
• 1:11:50
  Speaker 1: own is based on an ancient custom of the Japanese race,
• 1:11:54
  Speaker 1: Shinto's superstition, ordaining that every dwelling should be evacuated on
• 1:11:58
  Speaker 1: the death of its chief. Perhaps there may have been
• 1:12:03
  Speaker 1: some unrealized sanitary reason for this practice. Another early custom
• 1:12:09
  Speaker 1: was that a newly built house should be provided for
• 1:12:12
  Speaker 1: each couple that merried. It is on account of such
• 1:12:15
  Speaker 1: customs that we find the imperial capitals so frequently removed
• 1:12:19
  Speaker 1: from one site to another in ancient days, Their rebuilding
• 1:12:24
  Speaker 1: every twenty years of Isse Temple, the Supreme Shrine of
• 1:12:28
  Speaker 1: the Sun Goddess, is an example of one of these
• 1:12:30
  Speaker 1: ancient rites, which still obtain at the present day. The
• 1:12:35
  Speaker 1: observance of these customs was only possible with some form
• 1:12:39
  Speaker 1: of construction, as that furnished by our system of wooden architecture,
• 1:12:43
  Speaker 1: easily pulled down, easily built up. A more lasting style
• 1:12:49
  Speaker 1: employing brick and stone would have rendered migrations impracticable, as
• 1:12:54
  Speaker 1: indeed they became when the more stable and massive wooden
• 1:12:57
  Speaker 1: construction of China was adopted by us after th Nara period.
• 1:13:02
  Speaker 1: With the predominance of zen individualism in the fifteenth century, however,
• 1:13:07
  Speaker 1: the old idea became imbued with a deeper significance, as
• 1:13:10
  Speaker 1: conceived in connection with the tea room. Zenism, with the
• 1:13:14
  Speaker 1: Buddhist theory of evanescence and its demands for the mystery
• 1:13:17
  Speaker 1: of spirit over matter, recognized the house only as a
• 1:13:21
  Speaker 1: temporary refuge for the body. The body itself was but
• 1:13:25
  Speaker 1: as a hut in the wilderness, a flimsy shelter made
• 1:13:28
  Speaker 1: by tying together the grasses that grew around. When these
• 1:13:32
  Speaker 1: ceased to be bound together, they again became resolved into
• 1:13:35
  Speaker 1: the original waste. In the tea room, fugitiveness is suggested
• 1:13:40
  Speaker 1: in the thatched roof, frailty in the slender pillars, lightness
• 1:13:45
  Speaker 1: in the bamboo support, apparent carelessness in the use of
• 1:13:49
  Speaker 1: commonplace materials. The eternal is to be found only in
• 1:13:54
  Speaker 1: the spirit, which embodied in these simple surroundings, beautifies them
• 1:13:59
  Speaker 1: with the subtle light of its refinement. That the tea
• 1:14:04
  Speaker 1: room should be built to suit some individual taste is
• 1:14:08
  Speaker 1: an enforcement of the principle of vitality in art. Art
• 1:14:12
  Speaker 1: to be fully appreciated, must be true to contemporaneous life.
• 1:14:17
  Speaker 1: It is not that we should ignore the claims of posterity,
• 1:14:20
  Speaker 1: but that we should seek to enjoy the present. More.
• 1:14:25
  Speaker 1: It is not that we should disregard the creations of
• 1:14:27
  Speaker 1: the past, but that we should try to assimilate them
• 1:14:30
  Speaker 1: into our consciousness. Slavish conformity to traditions and formulas fetters
• 1:14:36
  Speaker 1: the expression of individuality. In architecture, we can but weep
• 1:14:41
  Speaker 1: over the senseless imitations of European buildings which one beholds
• 1:14:45
  Speaker 1: in modern Japan. We marvel why, among the most progressive
• 1:14:50
  Speaker 1: Western nations architecture should be so devoid of originality, so
• 1:14:54
  Speaker 1: replete with repetitions of obsolete styles. Perhaps we are passing
• 1:15:00
  Speaker 1: through an age of democratization in art, while awaiting the
• 1:15:04
  Speaker 1: rise of some princely master who shall establish a new dynasty.
• 1:15:09
  Speaker 1: Would that we loved the ancients more and copied them less.
• 1:15:14
  Speaker 1: It has been said that the Greeks were great because
• 1:15:16
  Speaker 1: they never drew from the antique. The term abode of vacancy,
• 1:15:23
  Speaker 1: besides conveying the Taoist theory of the all containing, involves
• 1:15:27
  Speaker 1: the conception of a continued need of change in decorative motives.
• 1:15:32
  Speaker 1: The tea room is absolutely empty except for what may
• 1:15:36
  Speaker 1: be placed there temporarily to satisfy some esthetic mood. Some
• 1:15:41
  Speaker 1: special art object is brought in for the occasion, and
• 1:15:45
  Speaker 1: everything else is selected and arranged to enhance the beauty
• 1:15:48
  Speaker 1: of the principal theme. One cannot listen to different pieces
• 1:15:52
  Speaker 1: of music at the same time, a real comprehension of
• 1:15:55
  Speaker 1: the beautiful being possible only through concentration upon some central motive.
• 1:16:01
  Speaker 1: Thus it will be seen that the system of decoration
• 1:16:03
  Speaker 1: in our tea rooms is opposed to that which obtains
• 1:16:06
  Speaker 1: in the West, where the interior of a house is
• 1:16:09
  Speaker 1: often converted into a museum. To a Japanese accustomed to
• 1:16:14
  Speaker 1: simplicity of ornamentation and frequent change of decorative method, a
• 1:16:18
  Speaker 1: Western interior permanently filled with a vast array of pictures,
• 1:16:22
  Speaker 1: jatuary and brick a pack gives the impression of mere
• 1:16:25
  Speaker 1: vulgar display of riches. It calls for a mighty wealth
• 1:16:30
  Speaker 1: of appreciation to enjoy the constant sight of even a masterpiece,
• 1:16:34
  Speaker 1: and limitless, indeed, must be the capacity of artistic feeling
• 1:16:37
  Speaker 1: in those who can exist day after day in the
• 1:16:40
  Speaker 1: midst of such confusion of colour and form, as is
• 1:16:43
  Speaker 1: often seen in the homes of Europe and America. The
• 1:16:49
  Speaker 1: abode of the unsymmetrical suggests another phase of our decorative scheme.
• 1:16:55
  Speaker 1: The absence of symmetry in Japanese art objects has often
• 1:16:59
  Speaker 1: been commented on by Western critics. This also is a
• 1:17:03
  Speaker 1: result for working out through Zenism of Taoist ideals. Confucianism,
• 1:17:09
  Speaker 1: with its deep seated idea of dualism, and Northern Buddhism,
• 1:17:13
  Speaker 1: with its worship of a trinity, were in no way
• 1:17:16
  Speaker 1: opposed to the expression of symmetry. As a matter of fact,
• 1:17:19
  Speaker 1: if we study the ancient bronzes of China or the
• 1:17:22
  Speaker 1: religious arts of the Tang dynasty and the Nara period,
• 1:17:25
  Speaker 1: we shall recognize a constant striving after symmetry. The decoration
• 1:17:30
  Speaker 1: of our classical interiors was decidedly regular in its arrangement.
• 1:17:36
  Speaker 1: The Taoist and zen conception of perfection, however, was different.
• 1:17:41
  Speaker 1: The dynamic nature of their philosophy laid more stress upon
• 1:17:45
  Speaker 1: the process through which perfection was sought than upon perfection itself.
• 1:17:50
  Speaker 1: True beauty could be discovered only by one who mentally
• 1:17:53
  Speaker 1: completed the incomplete. The virility of life and art lay
• 1:17:58
  Speaker 1: in its possibilities for growth. In the tea room, it
• 1:18:02
  Speaker 1: is left for each guest in imagination to complete the
• 1:18:05
  Speaker 1: total effect in relation to himself. Since Zenism has become
• 1:18:10
  Speaker 1: the prevailing mode of thought, the art of the extreme
• 1:18:13
  Speaker 1: orient has purposefully avoided the symmetrical as expressing not only
• 1:18:17
  Speaker 1: completion but repetition. Uniformity of design was considered fatal to
• 1:18:24
  Speaker 1: the freshness of imagination. Thus, landscapes, birds and flowers became
• 1:18:29
  Speaker 1: the favorite subjects for depiction, rather than the human figure,
• 1:18:33
  Speaker 1: the latter being present in the person of the beholder himself.
• 1:18:37
  Speaker 1: We are often too much in evidence as it is,
• 1:18:40
  Speaker 1: and in spite of our vanity, even self regard is
• 1:18:43
  Speaker 1: apt to become monotonous. In the tea room, the fear
• 1:18:48
  Speaker 1: of repetition is a constant presence. The various objects for
• 1:18:52
  Speaker 1: the decoration of a room should be so selected that
• 1:18:55
  Speaker 1: no color or design shall be repeated. If you have
• 1:18:59
  Speaker 1: a living flower, a painting of flowers is not allowable.
• 1:19:04
  Speaker 1: If you are using a round kettle, the water pitcher
• 1:19:07
  Speaker 1: should be angular. A cup with a black glaze should
• 1:19:11
  Speaker 1: not be associated with a tea caddy of black lacquer.
• 1:19:15
  Speaker 1: In placing a vase of an incense burner on the touconoma,
• 1:19:18
  Speaker 1: care should be taken not to put it in the
• 1:19:20
  Speaker 1: exact center, lest it divide the space into equal halves.
• 1:19:25
  Speaker 1: The pillar of the touconoma should be of a different
• 1:19:27
  Speaker 1: kind of wood from the other pillars, in order to
• 1:19:30
  Speaker 1: break any suggestion of monotony in the room. Here again,
• 1:19:35
  Speaker 1: the Japanese method of interior decoration differs from that of
• 1:19:38
  Speaker 1: the occidant, where we see objects arrayed symmetrically on the
• 1:19:42
  Speaker 1: mantelpiece and elsewhere. In Western houses, we are often confronted
• 1:19:47
  Speaker 1: with what appears to us useless reiteration. We find it
• 1:19:52
  Speaker 1: trying to talk to a man while his full length
• 1:19:54
  Speaker 1: portrait stares at us from behind his back. We wonder
• 1:19:58
  Speaker 1: which is real, he of the picture or he who talks,
• 1:20:02
  Speaker 1: and feel a curious conviction that the one of them
• 1:20:04
  Speaker 1: must be a fraud. Many a time have we sat
• 1:20:08
  Speaker 1: at a festive board, contemplating with a secret shock to
• 1:20:12
  Speaker 1: our digestion. The representation of abundance on the dining room halls.
• 1:20:17
  Speaker 1: Why these pictured victims of chase and sport. The elaborate
• 1:20:21
  Speaker 1: carvings of fishes and fruit. Why the display of family
• 1:20:24
  Speaker 1: plates reminding us of those who have dined and are dead.
• 1:20:30
  Speaker 1: The simplicity of the tea room and its freedom from
• 1:20:33
  Speaker 1: vulgarity make it truly a sanctuary from the vexations of
• 1:20:36
  Speaker 1: the outer world. There, and there alone can one consecrate
• 1:20:40
  Speaker 1: himself to the undisturbed adoration of the beautiful. In the
• 1:20:45
  Speaker 1: sixteenth century, the tea room afforded a welcome respite from
• 1:20:48
  Speaker 1: labour to the fierce warriors and statesmen engaged within the
• 1:20:51
  Speaker 1: unification and reconstruction of Japan. In the seventeenth century, after
• 1:20:57
  Speaker 1: the strict formalism of the Tokugawo rule had been dive developed,
• 1:21:00
  Speaker 1: it offered the only opportunity possible for the free communion
• 1:21:04
  Speaker 1: of artistic spirits. Before a great work of art, there
• 1:21:08
  Speaker 1: was no distinction between daimyo, samurai and commoner. Nowadays, industrialism
• 1:21:14
  Speaker 1: is making true refinement more and more difficult all the
• 1:21:17
  Speaker 1: world over. Do we not need the tea room more
• 1:21:21
  Speaker 1: than ever. End of chapter four, Chapter five of the
• 1:21:33
  Speaker 1: Book of t by Cakuzo Okakura. This LibriVox recording is
• 1:21:38
  Speaker 1: in the public domain recording by Clive Catterel the Book
• 1:21:44
  Speaker 1: of t Chapter five, art Appreciation. Have you heard the
• 1:21:52
  Speaker 1: Taoist tale of the Taming of the Harp? Once in
• 1:21:56
  Speaker 1: the Hoary Ages, in the ravine of lung Men stood
• 1:21:59
  Speaker 1: a kiri tree, a veritable king of the forest. It
• 1:22:03
  Speaker 1: reared its head to talk to the stars. Its roots
• 1:22:07
  Speaker 1: struck deep into the earth, mingling their bronzed coils with
• 1:22:10
  Speaker 1: those of the silver dragon that slept beneath. And it
• 1:22:15
  Speaker 1: came to pass that a mighty wizard made of this
• 1:22:18
  Speaker 1: tree a wondrous harp, whose stubborn spirit should be tamed,
• 1:22:22
  Speaker 1: but by the greatest of musicians. For long the instrument
• 1:22:26
  Speaker 1: was treasured by the Emperor of China. But all in
• 1:22:29
  Speaker 1: vain were the efforts of those who, in turn tried
• 1:22:31
  Speaker 1: to draw melody from its strings. In response to their
• 1:22:35
  Speaker 1: utmost strivings there came from the harp, but harsh notes
• 1:22:39
  Speaker 1: of disdain ill according with the songs they fain would sing,
• 1:22:43
  Speaker 1: The harp refused to recognize a master. At last came Peiwoh,
• 1:22:50
  Speaker 1: the Prince of harpists. With tender hand, he caressed the
• 1:22:54
  Speaker 1: harp as one might seek to soothe an unruly horse,
• 1:22:58
  Speaker 1: and softly touch the chords. He sang of nature, and
• 1:23:02
  Speaker 1: the seasons of high mountains and flowing waters, and all
• 1:23:06
  Speaker 1: the memories of the tree awoke once more. The sweet
• 1:23:10
  Speaker 1: breath of spring played amidst its branches. The young cataracts,
• 1:23:15
  Speaker 1: as they danced down the ravine, laughed to the budding flowers.
• 1:23:19
  Speaker 1: Anon were heard, the dreamy voices of summer with its
• 1:23:22
  Speaker 1: myriad insects, the gentle pattering of rain, the wail of
• 1:23:26
  Speaker 1: the cuckoo hark, a tiger roars. The valley answers again.
• 1:23:33
  Speaker 1: It is autumn in the desert. Night sharp like a sword,
• 1:23:36
  Speaker 1: gleams the moon upon the frosted grass. Now winter rains,
• 1:23:41
  Speaker 1: and through the snow filled air swirled flocks of swans
• 1:23:45
  Speaker 1: and rattling hailstones beat upon the boughs with fierce delight.
• 1:23:51
  Speaker 1: Then Peiwoh changed the key and sang of love. The
• 1:23:55
  Speaker 1: forest swayed like an ardent swain, deep lost in thought,
• 1:23:59
  Speaker 1: one high like a haughty maiden, swept a cloud, bright
• 1:24:03
  Speaker 1: and fair, but passing trailed long shadows on the ground
• 1:24:07
  Speaker 1: black like despair. Again the mode was changed. Peiwoh sang
• 1:24:13
  Speaker 1: of war, of clashing steel and trampling steeds, and in
• 1:24:17
  Speaker 1: the harp arose the tempest of lung men. The dragon
• 1:24:21
  Speaker 1: rode the lightning, the thundering avalanche crashed through the hills.
• 1:24:26
  Speaker 1: In ecstasy, the celestial monarch asked Peiwoh wherein lay the
• 1:24:30
  Speaker 1: secret of his victory? Sire, He replied, others have failed
• 1:24:35
  Speaker 1: because they sang, but of themselves. I left the harp
• 1:24:39
  Speaker 1: to choose its theme, and knew not truly whether the
• 1:24:42
  Speaker 1: harp had been pay woe or pay woe with the harp.
• 1:24:48
  Speaker 1: This story well illustrates the mystery of art appreciation. The
• 1:24:52
  Speaker 1: masterpiece is a symphony played upon our finest feelings. True
• 1:24:57
  Speaker 1: art is pay woe, And we the harp lung men.
• 1:25:01
  Speaker 1: At the magic touch of the beautiful, the secret chords
• 1:25:05
  Speaker 1: of our being are awakened. We vibrate and thrill in
• 1:25:08
  Speaker 1: response to its call. Mind speaks to mind, We listen
• 1:25:14
  Speaker 1: to the unspoken. We gaze upon the unseen. The Master
• 1:25:18
  Speaker 1: calls forth notes. We know not of memories long forgotten,
• 1:25:22
  Speaker 1: All come back to us with a new significance. Hopes
• 1:25:26
  Speaker 1: stifled by fear, yearnings that we dare not recognize, stand
• 1:25:30
  Speaker 1: forth in new glory. Our mind is the canvas on
• 1:25:34
  Speaker 1: which the artists lay their color. Their pigments are our emotions,
• 1:25:40
  Speaker 1: their cairascurro, the light of joy, the shadow of sadness.
• 1:25:45
  Speaker 1: The masterpiece is of ourselves, as we are of the masterpiece.
• 1:25:53
  Speaker 1: The sympathetic communion of minds necessary for art appreciation must
• 1:25:57
  Speaker 1: be based on mutual concession. The spector must cultivate the
• 1:26:01
  Speaker 1: proper attitude for receiving the message, as the artist must
• 1:26:04
  Speaker 1: know how to impart it. The tea master kobori Enshiu,
• 1:26:10
  Speaker 1: himself a daimyo, has left to us these memorable words.
• 1:26:15
  Speaker 1: Approach a great painting as thou wouldst approach a great prince.
• 1:26:20
  Speaker 1: In order to understand a masterpiece, you must lay yourself
• 1:26:23
  Speaker 1: low before it and await with bated breath its least utterance.
• 1:26:29
  Speaker 1: An eminent song critic once made a charming confession, said he,
• 1:26:34
  Speaker 1: in my young days, I praised the master whose pictures
• 1:26:37
  Speaker 1: I liked. But as my judgment matured, I praised myself
• 1:26:42
  Speaker 1: for liking what the masters had chosen to have me like.
• 1:26:47
  Speaker 1: It is to be deplored that so few of us
• 1:26:50
  Speaker 1: really take pains to study the moods of the masters.
• 1:26:54
  Speaker 1: In our stubborn ignorance, we refuse to render them this
• 1:26:57
  Speaker 1: simple courtesy, and thus often missed the which repast of
• 1:27:01
  Speaker 1: beauty spread before our very eyes. A master has always
• 1:27:06
  Speaker 1: something to offer, while we go hungry solely because of
• 1:27:09
  Speaker 1: our own lack of appreciation. To the sympathetic, a masterpiece
• 1:27:15
  Speaker 1: becomes a living reality towards which we feel drawn in
• 1:27:19
  Speaker 1: bonds of comradeship. The masters are immortal, for their loves
• 1:27:23
  Speaker 1: and fears live in us over and over again. It
• 1:27:28
  Speaker 1: is rather the soul than the hand the man the
• 1:27:31
  Speaker 1: technique which appeals to us. The more human the call,
• 1:27:35
  Speaker 1: the deeper is our response. It is because of this
• 1:27:40
  Speaker 1: secret understanding between the master and ourselves, that in poetry
• 1:27:44
  Speaker 1: or romance we suffer and rejoice with the hero and heroine. Chikamatsu,
• 1:27:49
  Speaker 1: our Japanese Shakespeare has laid down as one of the
• 1:27:52
  Speaker 1: first principles of dramatic composition, the importance of taking the
• 1:27:56
  Speaker 1: audience into the confidence of the author. Several of his
• 1:28:00
  Speaker 1: pupils submitted plays for his approval, but only one of
• 1:28:03
  Speaker 1: the pieces appealed to him. It was a play somewhat
• 1:28:07
  Speaker 1: resembling the Comedy of Errors, in which twin brethren suffer
• 1:28:11
  Speaker 1: through mistaken identity. This said Chicumatsu has the proper spirit
• 1:28:16
  Speaker 1: of the drama, for it takes the audience into consideration.
• 1:28:21
  Speaker 1: The public is permitted to know more than the actors.
• 1:28:25
  Speaker 1: It knows where the mistakes lie, and pities the poor
• 1:28:28
  Speaker 1: figures on the board who innocently rush to their fate.
• 1:28:33
  Speaker 1: The great masters, both of the East and the West,
• 1:28:37
  Speaker 1: never forget the value of suggestion as a means for
• 1:28:40
  Speaker 1: taking the spectator into their confidence. Who can contemplate a
• 1:28:44
  Speaker 1: masterpiece without being awed by the immense vista of thought
• 1:28:48
  Speaker 1: presented to our consideration? How familiar and sympathetic are they all,
• 1:28:54
  Speaker 1: How cold in contrast the modern commonplaces. In the former,
• 1:28:58
  Speaker 1: we feel the warm out pouring of a man's heart.
• 1:29:01
  Speaker 1: In the latter only a formal salute. Engrossed in his technique,
• 1:29:07
  Speaker 1: the modern rarely rises above himself. Like the musicians who
• 1:29:12
  Speaker 1: vainly invoke the lungmen harp, He sings only of himself.
• 1:29:17
  Speaker 1: His works may be nearer science, but a further from humanity.
• 1:29:22
  Speaker 1: We have an old saying in Japan that a woman
• 1:29:25
  Speaker 1: cannot love a man who is truly vain, for there
• 1:29:28
  Speaker 1: is no crevice in his heart for love to enter
• 1:29:30
  Speaker 1: and fill up. In art, vanity is equally fatal to
• 1:29:35
  Speaker 1: sympathetic feeling, whether on the part of the artist or
• 1:29:38
  Speaker 1: the public. Nothing is more hallowing than the union of
• 1:29:44
  Speaker 1: kindred spirits in art. At the moment of meeting the
• 1:29:48
  Speaker 1: art lover transcends himself, and once he is and he
• 1:29:53
  Speaker 1: is not, he catches a glimpse of infinity. But words
• 1:29:56
  Speaker 1: cannot voice his delight, for the eye has no tongue,
• 1:30:01
  Speaker 1: freed from the fetters of matter, his spirit moves in
• 1:30:04
  Speaker 1: the rhythm of things. It is thus that art becomes
• 1:30:07
  Speaker 1: akin to religion and nobles mankind. It is this which
• 1:30:12
  Speaker 1: makes a master be something sacred. In the old days,
• 1:30:16
  Speaker 1: the veneration in which the Japanese held the work of
• 1:30:18
  Speaker 1: the great artist was intense. The tea masters guarded their
• 1:30:23
  Speaker 1: treasures with religious secrecy, and it was often necessary to
• 1:30:26
  Speaker 1: open a whole series of boxes, one within another, before
• 1:30:30
  Speaker 1: reaching the shrine itself, the silken wrapping within whose soft
• 1:30:34
  Speaker 1: folds lay the Holy of holies. Rarely was the object
• 1:30:38
  Speaker 1: exposed to view, and then only to the initiated. At
• 1:30:45
  Speaker 1: the time when Teaism was in the ascendancy, the taiko's
• 1:30:48
  Speaker 1: generals would be better satisfied with the present of a
• 1:30:51
  Speaker 1: rare work of art than a large grant of territory
• 1:30:54
  Speaker 1: as a reward for victory. Many of our favorite dramas
• 1:30:58
  Speaker 1: are based on the loss and recovery of a noted masterpiece.
• 1:31:03
  Speaker 1: For instance, in one play, The Palace of Lord Hosokawa,
• 1:31:07
  Speaker 1: in which was preserved, the celebrated painting of Dharuma by
• 1:31:10
  Speaker 1: Sessen suddenly takes fire through the negligence of the samurai
• 1:31:14
  Speaker 1: in charge. Resolved at all hazards to rescue the precious painting,
• 1:31:19
  Speaker 1: he rushes into the burning building and seizes the kakemono,
• 1:31:22
  Speaker 1: only to find all means of exit cut off by
• 1:31:25
  Speaker 1: the flames. Thinking only of the picture, he slashes open
• 1:31:29
  Speaker 1: his body with his sword, wraps his torn sleeve about
• 1:31:33
  Speaker 1: the cessen, and plunges it into the gaping wound. The
• 1:31:37
  Speaker 1: fire is at last extinguished. Among the smoking embers is
• 1:31:41
  Speaker 1: found a half consumed corpse, within which reposes the treasure,
• 1:31:45
  Speaker 1: uninjured by the fire. Horrible as such tales are, they
• 1:31:51
  Speaker 1: illustrate the great value that we set upon a masterpiece,
• 1:31:55
  Speaker 1: as well as the devotion of a trusted samurai. We
• 1:32:00
  Speaker 1: must remember, however, that art is of value only to
• 1:32:03
  Speaker 1: the extent that it speaks to us. It might be
• 1:32:07
  Speaker 1: a universal language if we ourselves were universal in our sympathies.
• 1:32:11
  Speaker 1: Our finite nature, the power of tradition and conventionality, as
• 1:32:16
  Speaker 1: well as our hereditary instincts, restrict the scope of our
• 1:32:19
  Speaker 1: capacity for artistic enjoyment. Our very individuality establishes, in one sense,
• 1:32:26
  Speaker 1: a limit to our understanding, and our esthetic personality seeks
• 1:32:30
  Speaker 1: its own affinities in the creations of the past. It
• 1:32:35
  Speaker 1: is true that with cultivation our sense of art appreciation broadens,
• 1:32:39
  Speaker 1: and we become able to enjoy many hitherto unrecognized expressions
• 1:32:43
  Speaker 1: of beauty. But after all, we see only our own
• 1:32:47
  Speaker 1: image in the universe. Our particular idiosyncrasies dictate the mode
• 1:32:52
  Speaker 1: of our perceptions. The tea masters collected only objects which
• 1:32:56
  Speaker 1: fell strictly within the measure of their individual appreciation. One
• 1:33:02
  Speaker 1: is reminded in this connection of a story concerning Kobori Enshu.
• 1:33:07
  Speaker 1: Enshiu was complimented by his disciples on the admirable taste
• 1:33:10
  Speaker 1: he had displayed in the choice of his collection, said they,
• 1:33:14
  Speaker 1: each piece is such that no one could help admiring.
• 1:33:18
  Speaker 1: It shows that you had better taste than Rikiu, for
• 1:33:21
  Speaker 1: his collection could only be appreciated by one beholder in
• 1:33:23
  Speaker 1: a thousand. Sorrowfully, Enschiu replied, this only proves how commonplace
• 1:33:30
  Speaker 1: I am. The great Rikiu dared to love only those
• 1:33:34
  Speaker 1: objects which personally appealed to him, whereas I unconsciously cater
• 1:33:38
  Speaker 1: to the taste of the majority. Verily, Rikiu was one
• 1:33:42
  Speaker 1: in a thousand among Tea masters. It is much to
• 1:33:48
  Speaker 1: be regretted that so much of the apparent enthusiasm for
• 1:33:51
  Speaker 1: art at the present day has no foundation in real feeling.
• 1:33:56
  Speaker 1: In this democratic age of ours, men clamor for what
• 1:33:59
  Speaker 1: is popularly considered the best, regardless of their feelings. They
• 1:34:04
  Speaker 1: want the costly, not the refined, the fashionable not the beautiful.
• 1:34:11
  Speaker 1: To the masses. Contemplation of illustrated periodicals, the worthy product
• 1:34:15
  Speaker 1: of their own industrialism, would give more digestible food for
• 1:34:19
  Speaker 1: artistic enjoyment than the early Italians or the Ashikaga masters
• 1:34:24
  Speaker 1: whom they pretend to admire. The name of the artist
• 1:34:28
  Speaker 1: is more important to them than the quality of the work.
• 1:34:31
  Speaker 1: As a Chinese critic complained many centuries ago, people criticize
• 1:34:35
  Speaker 1: a picture by their ear. It is this lack of
• 1:34:40
  Speaker 1: genuine appreciation that is responsible for the pseudo classic horrors
• 1:34:44
  Speaker 1: that today greet us wherever we turn. Another common mistake
• 1:34:51
  Speaker 1: is that of confusing art with archaeology. The veneration born
• 1:34:56
  Speaker 1: of antiquity is one of the best traits in the
• 1:34:58
  Speaker 1: human character, and fain would we have it cultivates to
• 1:35:01
  Speaker 1: a greater extent. The old masters are rightly to be
• 1:35:05
  Speaker 1: honoured for opening the path to future enlightenment. The mere
• 1:35:09
  Speaker 1: fact that they have passed unscathed through centuries of criticism
• 1:35:13
  Speaker 1: and come down to us still covered with glory, commands
• 1:35:16
  Speaker 1: our respect. But we should be foolish, indeed, if we
• 1:35:20
  Speaker 1: valued their achievement simply on the score of age. Yet
• 1:35:24
  Speaker 1: we allow our historical sympathy to override our esthetic discrimination.
• 1:35:29
  Speaker 1: We offer flowers of approbation when the artists is safely
• 1:35:32
  Speaker 1: laid in his grave. The nineteenth century, pregnant with the
• 1:35:36
  Speaker 1: theory of evolution, has moreover created in us the habit
• 1:35:40
  Speaker 1: of losing sight of the individual in the species. A
• 1:35:43
  Speaker 1: collector is anxious to acquire specimens to illustrate a period
• 1:35:47
  Speaker 1: or a school, and forgets that a single masterpiece can
• 1:35:51
  Speaker 1: teach us more than any number of the mediocre products
• 1:35:54
  Speaker 1: of a given period or school. We classify too much
• 1:35:58
  Speaker 1: and enjoy to little. The sacrifice of the esthetic to
• 1:36:03
  Speaker 1: the so called scientific method of exhibition has been the
• 1:36:07
  Speaker 1: bane of many museums. The claims of contemporary art cannot
• 1:36:13
  Speaker 1: be ignored in any vital scheme of life. The art
• 1:36:17
  Speaker 1: of to day is what really belongs to us. It
• 1:36:20
  Speaker 1: is our own reflection. In condemning it, we but condemn ourselves.
• 1:36:27
  Speaker 1: We say that the present age possesses no art. Who
• 1:36:30
  Speaker 1: is responsible for this? It is indeed a shame that,
• 1:36:34
  Speaker 1: despite all our rhapsodies about the ancients, we pay so
• 1:36:37
  Speaker 1: little attention to our own possibilities. Struggling artists, weary souls
• 1:36:43
  Speaker 1: lingering in the shadow of cold disdain in our self
• 1:36:47
  Speaker 1: centered century. What inspiration do we offer them? The past
• 1:36:51
  Speaker 1: may well look with pity at the poverty of our civilization.
• 1:36:55
  Speaker 1: The future will laugh at the barrenness of our art.
• 1:36:59
  Speaker 1: We destroyed the beautiful in life. Would that some great
• 1:37:03
  Speaker 1: wizard might, from the stem of society shape a mighty
• 1:37:07
  Speaker 1: harp whose strings would resound to the touch of genius.
• 1:37:14
  Speaker 1: End of chapter five, Chapter six of the Book of
• 1:37:23
  Speaker 1: t by Cacuzo Okakura. This LibriVox recording is in the
• 1:37:28
  Speaker 1: public domain recording by Clive Cattul Chapter six. Flowers in
• 1:37:37
  Speaker 1: the trembling gray of a spring dawn, When the birds
• 1:37:40
  Speaker 1: were whispering in mysterious cadence among the trees, have you
• 1:37:44
  Speaker 1: not felt that they were talking to their mates about
• 1:37:46
  Speaker 1: the flowers? Surely, with mankind the appreciation of flowers must
• 1:37:52
  Speaker 1: have been coeval with the poetry of love. Where better
• 1:37:56
  Speaker 1: than in a flower sweet in its unconsciousness, fragrant because
• 1:38:01
  Speaker 1: of its silence, can we imagine the unfolding of a
• 1:38:04
  Speaker 1: virgin soul. The primeval man, in offering the first garland
• 1:38:08
  Speaker 1: to his maiden, thereby transcend the brute. He became human.
• 1:38:13
  Speaker 1: In thus rising above the crude necessities of nature, he
• 1:38:18
  Speaker 1: entered the realm of art when he perceived the subtle
• 1:38:20
  Speaker 1: use of the useless in joy or sadness. Flowers are
• 1:38:25
  Speaker 1: our constant friends. We eat, drink, sing, dance and flirt
• 1:38:30
  Speaker 1: with them. We wed and christen with flowers. We dare
• 1:38:35
  Speaker 1: not die without them. We have worshiped with the lily.
• 1:38:39
  Speaker 1: We have meditated with the lotus, we have charged in
• 1:38:43
  Speaker 1: battle array with the rose and the chrysanthemum. We have
• 1:38:46
  Speaker 1: even attempted to speak in the language of flowers. How
• 1:38:50
  Speaker 1: could we live without them? It frightens one to conceive
• 1:38:54
  Speaker 1: of a world bereft of their presence. What solace do
• 1:38:57
  Speaker 1: they not bring to the bedside of the sick, What
• 1:39:00
  Speaker 1: a light of bliss to the darkness of weary spirits.
• 1:39:05
  Speaker 1: Their serene tenderness restores to us our waning confidence in
• 1:39:08
  Speaker 1: the universe, even as the intent gaze of a beautiful
• 1:39:12
  Speaker 1: child recalls our lost hopes. When we are laid low
• 1:39:16
  Speaker 1: in the dust. It is they who linger in sorrow
• 1:39:19
  Speaker 1: over our graves. Sad as it is, we cannot conceal
• 1:39:25
  Speaker 1: the fact that, in spite of our companionship with flowers,
• 1:39:28
  Speaker 1: we have not risen very far above the brute scratch
• 1:39:32
  Speaker 1: the sheepskin, and the wolf within us will soon show
• 1:39:34
  Speaker 1: its teeth. It has been said that a man at
• 1:39:38
  Speaker 1: ten is an animal, at twenty a lunatic, at thirty
• 1:39:43
  Speaker 1: of failure, at forty are fraud, and at fifty a criminal.
• 1:39:49
  Speaker 1: Perhaps he becomes a criminal because he has never ceased
• 1:39:52
  Speaker 1: to be an animal. Nothing is real to us but hunger,
• 1:39:57
  Speaker 1: Nothing sacred except our own desires. Shrine after shrine has
• 1:40:02
  Speaker 1: crumbled before our eyes, but one altar is forever preserved,
• 1:40:06
  Speaker 1: that whereon we burn incense to the supreme idol ourselves.
• 1:40:12
  Speaker 1: Our God is great, and money is his prophet. We
• 1:40:16
  Speaker 1: devastate nature in order to make sacrifice to him. We
• 1:40:20
  Speaker 1: boast that we have conquered matter, and forget that it
• 1:40:23
  Speaker 1: is matter that has enslaved us. What atrocities do we
• 1:40:27
  Speaker 1: not perpetrate in the name of culture and refinement? Tell me,
• 1:40:34
  Speaker 1: gentle flowers, teardrops of the stars, standing in the garden,
• 1:40:38
  Speaker 1: nodding your heads to the bees as they sing, of
• 1:40:40
  Speaker 1: the dews and the sunbeams, Are you aware of the
• 1:40:44
  Speaker 1: fearful doom that awaits you? Dream on sway and frolic
• 1:40:49
  Speaker 1: while you may in the gentle breeze of summer to morrow,
• 1:40:53
  Speaker 1: a ruthless hand will close around your throats. You will
• 1:40:56
  Speaker 1: be wrenched, torn asunder, limb by limb, and borne away
• 1:41:00
  Speaker 1: from your quiet homes. The wretch she may be passing fair,
• 1:41:05
  Speaker 1: She may say how lovely you are, while her fingers
• 1:41:07
  Speaker 1: are still moist with your blood. Tell me, will this
• 1:41:12
  Speaker 1: be kindness? It may be your fate to be imprisoned
• 1:41:15
  Speaker 1: in the hair of one whom you know to be heartless,
• 1:41:18
  Speaker 1: or to be thrust into the buttonhole of one who
• 1:41:21
  Speaker 1: would not dare to look you in the face where
• 1:41:22
  Speaker 1: you were man. It may even be your lot to
• 1:41:25
  Speaker 1: be confined in some narrow vessel with only stagnant water
• 1:41:29
  Speaker 1: to quench the maddening thirst that warns of ebbing life flowers.
• 1:41:35
  Speaker 1: If you were in the land of the Mikado, you
• 1:41:37
  Speaker 1: might sometime meet a dread personage armed with scissors and
• 1:41:40
  Speaker 1: a tiny saw. He would call himself a master of flowers.
• 1:41:46
  Speaker 1: He would claim the rights of a doctor, and you
• 1:41:48
  Speaker 1: would instinctively hate him, for you know a doctor always
• 1:41:52
  Speaker 1: seeks to prolong the troubles of his victims. He would cut, bend,
• 1:41:56
  Speaker 1: and twist you into those impossible positions which he thinks
• 1:41:59
  Speaker 1: so proper that you should assume. He would contort your
• 1:42:03
  Speaker 1: muscles and dislocate your bones like any osteopath. He would
• 1:42:07
  Speaker 1: burn you with red hot coals to stop you bleeding,
• 1:42:10
  Speaker 1: and thrust wires into you to assist your circulation. He
• 1:42:15
  Speaker 1: would diet you with salt, vinegar, alum and sometimes vitriol
• 1:42:20
  Speaker 1: boiling water would be poured on your feet when you
• 1:42:23
  Speaker 1: seemed ready to faint. It would be his boast that
• 1:42:26
  Speaker 1: he could keep life within you for two or more weeks,
• 1:42:28
  Speaker 1: longer than would have been possible without his treatment. Would
• 1:42:32
  Speaker 1: you not have preferred to have been killed at once
• 1:42:34
  Speaker 1: when you were first captured? What were the crimes he
• 1:42:38
  Speaker 1: must have committed during your past incarnation to warrant such punishment?
• 1:42:41
  Speaker 1: In this the wanton waste of flowers among Western communities
• 1:42:47
  Speaker 1: is even more appalling than the way they are treated
• 1:42:50
  Speaker 1: by Eastern flower masters. The number of flowers cut daily
• 1:42:54
  Speaker 1: to adorn the ball rooms and banquet tables of Europe
• 1:42:57
  Speaker 1: and America to be thrown away in the morrow must
• 1:42:59
  Speaker 1: be something enormous. If strung together, they might garland a continent.
• 1:43:05
  Speaker 1: Beside this utter carelessness of life, the guilt of the
• 1:43:09
  Speaker 1: flower master becomes insignificant. He at least respects the economy
• 1:43:14
  Speaker 1: of nature, selects his victims with careful foresight, and after death,
• 1:43:19
  Speaker 1: does honour to their remains. In the West, the display
• 1:43:23
  Speaker 1: of flowers seems to be a part of the pageantry
• 1:43:25
  Speaker 1: of wealth, the fancy of a moment. Wither do they
• 1:43:29
  Speaker 1: all go these flowers when the revelry is over. Nothing
• 1:43:33
  Speaker 1: is more pitiful than to see a faded flower remorselessly
• 1:43:36
  Speaker 1: flung upon a dung heap. Why were the flowers born
• 1:43:41
  Speaker 1: so beautiful and yet so hapless? Insects can sting, and
• 1:43:45
  Speaker 1: even the meekest of beasts will fight when brought to bay.
• 1:43:49
  Speaker 1: The birds whose plumage is sought to deck some bonnet
• 1:43:52
  Speaker 1: can fly from its pursuer. The third animal, whose coat
• 1:43:55
  Speaker 1: you covet for your own, may hide at your approach.
• 1:43:59
  Speaker 1: Alas the only flower known to have wings is the butterfly,
• 1:44:03
  Speaker 1: All others stand helpless before the destroyer. If they shriek
• 1:44:08
  Speaker 1: in their death agony, their cry never reaches our hardened ears.
• 1:44:12
  Speaker 1: We are ever brutal to those who love and serve
• 1:44:14
  Speaker 1: us in silence. But the time may come when for
• 1:44:17
  Speaker 1: our cruelty we shall be deserted by these best friends
• 1:44:21
  Speaker 1: of ours. Have you not noticed that the wild flowers
• 1:44:24
  Speaker 1: become scarcer every year? It may be that their wise
• 1:44:28
  Speaker 1: men have told them to depart till man becomes more human.
• 1:44:32
  Speaker 1: Perhaps they have migrated to heaven. Much may be said
• 1:44:39
  Speaker 1: in favor of him who cultivates plants. The man of
• 1:44:42
  Speaker 1: the pot is far more humane than he of the scissors.
• 1:44:46
  Speaker 1: We watch with delight, his concern about water and sunshine,
• 1:44:50
  Speaker 1: his feuds with parasites, his horror of frosts, his anxiety
• 1:44:55
  Speaker 1: when the buds come slowly, his rapture when the leaves
• 1:44:59
  Speaker 1: attain their luster. In the east. The art of floriculture
• 1:45:04
  Speaker 1: is a very ancient one, and the loves of a
• 1:45:06
  Speaker 1: poet and his favorite plant have often been recorded in
• 1:45:09
  Speaker 1: story and song. With the development of ceramics during the
• 1:45:14
  Speaker 1: Tang and Sung dynasties, we hear of wonderful receptacles made
• 1:45:17
  Speaker 1: to hold plants, not pots, but jeweled palaces. A special
• 1:45:23
  Speaker 1: attendant was detailed to wait upon each flower and to
• 1:45:26
  Speaker 1: wash its leaves with soft brushes made from rabbit hair.
• 1:45:30
  Speaker 1: It has been written Pink Sea by Yun Chung Lang
• 1:45:34
  Speaker 1: that the paeony should be bathed by a handsome maiden
• 1:45:36
  Speaker 1: in full costume, that a winter plum should be watered
• 1:45:39
  Speaker 1: by a pale, slender monk. In Japan, one of the
• 1:45:44
  Speaker 1: most popular of the no dances, the Hatchinoki, composed during
• 1:45:48
  Speaker 1: the Ashikaga period, is based upon the story of an
• 1:45:51
  Speaker 1: impoverished knight who on a freezing night, in lack of
• 1:45:55
  Speaker 1: fuel for a fire, cuts his cherished plants in order
• 1:45:58
  Speaker 1: to entertain a wandering friar. The friar is in reality
• 1:46:03
  Speaker 1: no other than Hojo Tokiyori, the harun al Rashid of
• 1:46:07
  Speaker 1: our tales, and the sacrifice is not without its reward.
• 1:46:11
  Speaker 1: This opera never fails to draw tears from a Tokyo audience.
• 1:46:14
  Speaker 1: Even to day. Great precautions were taken for the preservation
• 1:46:21
  Speaker 1: of delicate blossoms. Emperor Huensung of the Tang dynasty hung
• 1:46:25
  Speaker 1: tiny golden bells on the branches in his garden to
• 1:46:28
  Speaker 1: keep off the birds. He it was who went off
• 1:46:31
  Speaker 1: in the springtime with his court musicians to gladden the
• 1:46:33
  Speaker 1: flowers with soft music. A quaint tablet which traditionalist grabs
• 1:46:39
  Speaker 1: a Yoshitsuni, the hero of our Arthurian legends, is still
• 1:46:42
  Speaker 1: extant in one of the Japanese monasteries, Sumuderra, near Kobe.
• 1:46:48
  Speaker 1: It is a notice put up for the protection of
• 1:46:50
  Speaker 1: a certain wonderful plum tree and appeals to us with
• 1:46:53
  Speaker 1: the grim humor of a warlike age. After referring to
• 1:46:57
  Speaker 1: the beauty of the blossoms, the inscription says, whoever cuts
• 1:47:02
  Speaker 1: a single branch of this tree shall forfeit a finger. Therefore,
• 1:47:06
  Speaker 1: with that, such laws could be enforced nowadays against those
• 1:47:09
  Speaker 1: who wantonly destroy flowers and mutilate objects of art. Yet,
• 1:47:17
  Speaker 1: even in the case of pot flowers were inclined to
• 1:47:19
  Speaker 1: suspect their selfishness of man. Why take the plants from
• 1:47:23
  Speaker 1: their homes and ask them to bloom mid strange surroundings?
• 1:47:28
  Speaker 1: Is it not like asking the birds to sing and
• 1:47:31
  Speaker 1: mate cooped up in cages? Who knows, but the orchids
• 1:47:35
  Speaker 1: feel stifled by the artificial heat in your conservatories and
• 1:47:39
  Speaker 1: hopelessly long for a glimpse of their own southern skies.
• 1:47:44
  Speaker 1: The ideal lover of flowers is he who visits them
• 1:47:47
  Speaker 1: in their native haunts. Liked Tao Yu and Ming all
• 1:47:50
  Speaker 1: celebrated Chinese poets and philosophers who sat before a broken
• 1:47:55
  Speaker 1: bamboo fence in converse with the wild chrysanthemum or Linwo Singh,
• 1:48:00
  Speaker 1: losing himself amid mysterious fragrance as he wandered in the
• 1:48:03
  Speaker 1: twilight among the plum blossoms of the western lake. Tis
• 1:48:07
  Speaker 1: said that Chaou Musi slept in a boat so that
• 1:48:11
  Speaker 1: his dreams might mingle with those of the Lotus. It
• 1:48:15
  Speaker 1: was the same spirit which moved the Empress Comyo, one
• 1:48:18
  Speaker 1: of the most renowned narrow sovereigns. As she sang, if
• 1:48:21
  Speaker 1: I pluck thee, my hand will defy all thee o
• 1:48:23
  Speaker 1: flower standing in the meadows. As thou art, I offer
• 1:48:27
  Speaker 1: thee to the Buddhas of the past, the present, of
• 1:48:29
  Speaker 1: the future. However, let us not be too sentimental. Let
• 1:48:36
  Speaker 1: us be less luxurious, but more magnificent, said loud Sea.
• 1:48:41
  Speaker 1: Heaven and earth are pitiless, said Gobadaishi. Flow flow, flow, flow.
• 1:48:48
  Speaker 1: The current of life is ever onward. Die Die, Die Die.
• 1:48:53
  Speaker 1: Death comes to all. Destruction faces us wherever we turn.
• 1:48:58
  Speaker 1: Destruction below and above, destruction behind and before. Change is
• 1:49:04
  Speaker 1: the only eternal. Why not as welcome death as life?
• 1:49:09
  Speaker 1: The abbot counterparts one of the other, the night and
• 1:49:12
  Speaker 1: day of Brahma. Through the disintegration of the old, recreation
• 1:49:16
  Speaker 1: becomes possible. We have worshiped death, the relentless god of mercy,
• 1:49:22
  Speaker 1: and many different names. It was the shadow of the
• 1:49:26
  Speaker 1: all devouring that the Gabers greeted in the fire. It
• 1:49:30
  Speaker 1: is the icy purism of the sword soul before which
• 1:49:33
  Speaker 1: Shinto Japan prostrates herself even to day. The mystic fire
• 1:49:38
  Speaker 1: consumes our weakness. The sacred sword cleaves the bondage of
• 1:49:42
  Speaker 1: desire from our ashes, springs the phoenix of celestial hope.
• 1:49:47
  Speaker 1: Out of the freedom comes a higher realization of manhood.
• 1:49:53
  Speaker 1: Why not destroy flowers if thereby we can evolve new
• 1:49:57
  Speaker 1: forms ennobling the world idea, we only ask them to
• 1:50:01
  Speaker 1: join in our sacrifice to the beautiful. We shall atone
• 1:50:05
  Speaker 1: for the dead by consecrating ourselves to purity and simplicity.
• 1:50:10
  Speaker 1: Thus reasoned the tea masters when they established the cult
• 1:50:13
  Speaker 1: of flowers. Anyone acquainted with the ways of our tea
• 1:50:19
  Speaker 1: and flower masters must have noticed the religious veneration with
• 1:50:23
  Speaker 1: which they regard flowers. They do not cull at random,
• 1:50:28
  Speaker 1: but carefully select each branch or spray with an eye
• 1:50:31
  Speaker 1: to the artistic composition they have in mind. They would
• 1:50:35
  Speaker 1: be ashamed should they chance to cut more than were
• 1:50:37
  Speaker 1: absolutely necessary. It may be remarked in this connection that
• 1:50:42
  Speaker 1: they always associate the leaves, if there be any, with
• 1:50:46
  Speaker 1: the flower, for the object is to present the whole
• 1:50:49
  Speaker 1: beauty of plant life. In this respect, as in many others,
• 1:50:54
  Speaker 1: their method differs from that pursued in Western countries. Here
• 1:50:59
  Speaker 1: we apt to see only the flower stems, heads, as
• 1:51:02
  Speaker 1: it were, without body, stuck promiscuously into a vase. When
• 1:51:08
  Speaker 1: a tea master has arranged a flower to his satisfaction,
• 1:51:11
  Speaker 1: he will place it on the tokonoma, the place of
• 1:51:14
  Speaker 1: honor in a Japanese room. Nothing else will be placed
• 1:51:17
  Speaker 1: near it which might interfere with its effect, not even
• 1:51:20
  Speaker 1: a painting, unless there be some special esthetic reason for
• 1:51:24
  Speaker 1: the combination. It rests there like an enthroned prince, and
• 1:51:29
  Speaker 1: the guests or disciples, on entering the room will salute
• 1:51:32
  Speaker 1: it with a profound bow before making their address to
• 1:51:34
  Speaker 1: the host. Drawings from masterpieces are made and published for
• 1:51:39
  Speaker 1: the edification of amateys. The amount of literature on the
• 1:51:43
  Speaker 1: subject is quite voluminous. Or when the flower fades, the
• 1:51:47
  Speaker 1: master tenderly consigns it to the river or carefully buries
• 1:51:51
  Speaker 1: it in the ground. Monuments are sometimes erected to their memory.
• 1:51:58
  Speaker 1: The birth of the art of flower arrangement seems to
• 1:52:02
  Speaker 1: be simultaneous with that of teaism. In the fifteenth century.
• 1:52:06
  Speaker 1: Our legends ascribed the first flower arrangement to those early
• 1:52:10
  Speaker 1: Buddhist saints who gathered the flowers strewn by the storms
• 1:52:13
  Speaker 1: and in their infinite solicitude for all living things, placed
• 1:52:16
  Speaker 1: them in vessels of water. It is said that Soami,
• 1:52:21
  Speaker 1: the great painter and connoisseur of the court of Ashikaga Yoshimasa,
• 1:52:25
  Speaker 1: was one of the earliest adepts of it. Juko, the
• 1:52:29
  Speaker 1: Tea Master, was one of his pupils, as was also Seno,
• 1:52:33
  Speaker 1: the founder of the House of Ikenobo, a family as
• 1:52:37
  Speaker 1: illustrious in the annals of flowers as that of the
• 1:52:39
  Speaker 1: canoes in painting. With the perfecting of the tea ritual
• 1:52:43
  Speaker 1: under Rikiu in the latter part of the sixteenth century,
• 1:52:47
  Speaker 1: flower arrangement also attained its full growth. Rikiu and his successors,
• 1:52:53
  Speaker 1: the celebrated Oda Huraka, Furuka Oribe Koyetsu, Kobori Enshiu, and
• 1:52:59
  Speaker 1: Khata Tigiri Sekishiu, vied with each other in forming new combinations.
• 1:53:05
  Speaker 1: We must remember, however, that the flower worship of the
• 1:53:08
  Speaker 1: tea masters formed only a part of their esthetic ritual
• 1:53:12
  Speaker 1: and was not a distinct religion by itself. A flower arrangement,
• 1:53:17
  Speaker 1: like the other works of art in the tearem, was
• 1:53:19
  Speaker 1: subordinated to the total scheme of decoration. Thus, Sekishiu ordained
• 1:53:25
  Speaker 1: that white plum blossoms should not be made use of
• 1:53:28
  Speaker 1: when the snow lay in the garden. Noisy flowers were
• 1:53:31
  Speaker 1: relentlessly banished from the tea rom A. Flower arrangement by
• 1:53:35
  Speaker 1: a tea master loses its significance if removed from the
• 1:53:39
  Speaker 1: place for which it was originally intended for. Its lines
• 1:53:42
  Speaker 1: and proportions have been specially worked out with a view
• 1:53:45
  Speaker 1: to its surroundings. The adoration of the flower for its
• 1:53:50
  Speaker 1: own sake begins with the rise of flower masters toward
• 1:53:53
  Speaker 1: the middle of the seventeenth century. It now becomes independent
• 1:53:58
  Speaker 1: of the tea rim and knows no law save that
• 1:54:02
  Speaker 1: the vase imposes on it. New conceptions and methods of
• 1:54:05
  Speaker 1: execution now become possible, and many were the principles and
• 1:54:09
  Speaker 1: schools resulting therefrom A writer in the middle of the
• 1:54:13
  Speaker 1: last century said he could count over one hundred different
• 1:54:16
  Speaker 1: schools of flower arrangement. Broadly speaking, these divide themselves into
• 1:54:22
  Speaker 1: two main branches, the formalistic and the natural esque. The
• 1:54:27
  Speaker 1: formalistic schools, led by the Ikinobos, aimed at a classic
• 1:54:31
  Speaker 1: idealism corresponding to that of the Canu academicians. We possess
• 1:54:36
  Speaker 1: records of arrangements by the early masters of the school,
• 1:54:39
  Speaker 1: which almost reproduce the flower paintings of Sansetsu and Suinobu.
• 1:54:45
  Speaker 1: The Naturalesque school, on the other hand, accepted nature as
• 1:54:49
  Speaker 1: its model, only imposing such modifications of form as conduced
• 1:54:53
  Speaker 1: to the expression of artistic unity. Thus we recognize in
• 1:54:57
  Speaker 1: its works the same impulses which form the Yukioe and
• 1:55:00
  Speaker 1: Shijo schools of painting. It would be interesting, had we time,
• 1:55:06
  Speaker 1: to enter more fully than it is now possible, into
• 1:55:08
  Speaker 1: the laws of composition and detail formulated by the various
• 1:55:12
  Speaker 1: flower masters of this period, Showing as they would the
• 1:55:15
  Speaker 1: fundamental theories which governed Tokugawa decoration. We find them referring
• 1:55:21
  Speaker 1: to the leading principle Heaven, the subordinate principle Earth, the
• 1:55:26
  Speaker 1: reconciling principle Man, and any flower arrangement which did not
• 1:55:30
  Speaker 1: embody these principles was considered barren and dead. They also
• 1:55:35
  Speaker 1: dwelt much on the importance of treating a flower in
• 1:55:37
  Speaker 1: its three different aspects, the formal, the semi formal, and
• 1:55:41
  Speaker 1: the informal. The first might be said to represent flowers
• 1:55:46
  Speaker 1: in the stately costume of the ballroom, the second one
• 1:55:49
  Speaker 1: in the easy elegance of afternoon dress. The third in
• 1:55:53
  Speaker 1: the charming de sabilie of the boudoir. Our personal sympathies
• 1:55:59
  Speaker 1: are with the flowers of the tea master, rather than
• 1:56:02
  Speaker 1: those of the flower master. The former is art in
• 1:56:05
  Speaker 1: its proper setting and appeals to us on account of
• 1:56:08
  Speaker 1: its true intimacy with life. We should like to call
• 1:56:12
  Speaker 1: this school the natural in contradistinction to the naturalesque and
• 1:56:17
  Speaker 1: formalistic schools. The tea master deems his duty ended with
• 1:56:22
  Speaker 1: the selection of the flowers and leaves them to tell
• 1:56:25
  Speaker 1: their own story. Entering a tea room in late winter,
• 1:56:29
  Speaker 1: you may see a slender spray of wild cherries in
• 1:56:32
  Speaker 1: combination with a budding camellia. It is an echo of
• 1:56:36
  Speaker 1: departing winter, coupled with the prophecy of spring again. If
• 1:56:40
  Speaker 1: you go into a noon tea on some irritatingly hot
• 1:56:44
  Speaker 1: summer day, you may discover, in the darkened coolness of
• 1:56:47
  Speaker 1: the tokonoma a single lily in a hanging vase, dripping
• 1:56:51
  Speaker 1: with dew. It seems to smile at the foolishness of life.
• 1:56:57
  Speaker 1: A solo of flowers is interesting, but in a concerto
• 1:57:01
  Speaker 1: with painting and sculpture, the combination becomes entrancing. Sekishiu once
• 1:57:06
  Speaker 1: placed some water plants in a flat receptacle to suggest
• 1:57:09
  Speaker 1: the vegetation of lakes and marshes, and on the wall
• 1:57:13
  Speaker 1: above he hung a painting by Salmi of wild ducks
• 1:57:16
  Speaker 1: flying in the air Shoha. Another tea master combined a
• 1:57:21
  Speaker 1: poem of the beauty of solitude by the sea with
• 1:57:24
  Speaker 1: a bronze incense burner in the form of a fisherman's
• 1:57:27
  Speaker 1: hut and some wild flowers of the beach. One of
• 1:57:30
  Speaker 1: the guests has recorded that he felt in the whole
• 1:57:33
  Speaker 1: composition the breath of waning autumn. Flower stories are endless.
• 1:57:40
  Speaker 1: We shall recount but one more. In the sixteenth century,
• 1:57:45
  Speaker 1: the morning glory was as yet a rare plant with us.
• 1:57:48
  Speaker 1: Rikiu had an entire garden planted with it, which he
• 1:57:52
  Speaker 1: cultivated with assiduous care. The fame of his convolvuli reached
• 1:57:56
  Speaker 1: the ear of the Tycho, and he expressed a desire
• 1:58:00
  Speaker 1: to see them, in consequence of which Rikiu invited him
• 1:58:03
  Speaker 1: to a morning tea at his house On the appointed day.
• 1:58:07
  Speaker 1: Taycho walked through the garden, but nowhere could he see
• 1:58:11
  Speaker 1: any vestige of the convolvulus. The ground had been leveled
• 1:58:15
  Speaker 1: and strewn with fine pebbles and sand. With sullen anger,
• 1:58:18
  Speaker 1: the despot entered the tea room, but a sight waited
• 1:58:22
  Speaker 1: him there which completely restored his humor. On the Tokonoma,
• 1:58:27
  Speaker 1: in a rare bronze of sung workmanship, lay a single
• 1:58:30
  Speaker 1: morning glory, the queen of the whole garden. In such
• 1:58:37
  Speaker 1: instances we see the full significance of the flower sacrifice.
• 1:58:42
  Speaker 1: Perhaps the flowers appreciate the full significance of it. They
• 1:58:45
  Speaker 1: are not cowards like men. Some flowers glory in death.
• 1:58:51
  Speaker 1: Certainly the Japanese cherry blossoms do as they freely surrendered
• 1:58:55
  Speaker 1: themselves to the winds. Anyone who has stood before the
• 1:58:59
  Speaker 1: fragrant avalonech at Yoshino or Arashiyama must have realized this.
• 1:59:04
  Speaker 1: For a moment they hover like bejeweled clouds and dance
• 1:59:08
  Speaker 1: above the crystal streams. Then as they sail around the
• 1:59:11
  Speaker 1: laughing waters, they seem to say, farewell, o spring, we
• 1:59:15
  Speaker 1: are on to eternity. End of chapter six, chapter seven
• 1:59:29
  Speaker 1: of the Book of t by Kakuzo Okakura. This LibriVox
• 1:59:33
  Speaker 1: recording is in the public domain. Recording by Clive Cattul
• 1:59:40
  Speaker 1: Chapter seven, Tea Masters. In religion, the future is behind us.
• 1:59:49
  Speaker 1: In art, the present is the eternal. The tea masters
• 1:59:53
  Speaker 1: held that real appreciation of art is only possible to
• 1:59:56
  Speaker 1: those who make of it a living influence. Thus they
• 2:00:00
  Speaker 1: sought to regulate their daily life by the high standard
• 2:00:03
  Speaker 1: of refinement which obtained in the tea room. In all circumstances,
• 2:00:08
  Speaker 1: serenity of mind should be maintained, and conversation should be
• 2:00:12
  Speaker 1: conducted as never to mar the harmony of the surroundings.
• 2:00:17
  Speaker 1: The cut and color of the dress, the poise of
• 2:00:20
  Speaker 1: the body, and the manner of walking could all be
• 2:00:23
  Speaker 1: made expressions of artistic personality. These were matters not to
• 2:00:28
  Speaker 1: be lightly ignored, for until one has made himself beautiful,
• 2:00:33
  Speaker 1: he has no right to approach beauty. Thus the tea
• 2:00:37
  Speaker 1: master strove to be something more than the artist art itself.
• 2:00:43
  Speaker 1: It was the zen of aestheticism. Perfection is everywhere, if
• 2:00:48
  Speaker 1: we only choose to recognize it. Rickieue loved to quote
• 2:00:52
  Speaker 1: an old poem which says, to those who long only
• 2:00:55
  Speaker 1: for flowers, fain would I show the full blown spring
• 2:00:59
  Speaker 1: which abides in the toiling buds of snow covered Hills
• 2:01:05
  Speaker 1: Manifold indeed have been the contributions of the tea masters
• 2:01:08
  Speaker 1: to art. They completely revolutionized the classical architecture and interior decorations,
• 2:01:14
  Speaker 1: and established the new style which we have described in
• 2:01:17
  Speaker 1: the chapter of the Tea Room, a style to whose
• 2:01:20
  Speaker 1: influence even the palaces and monasteries built after the sixteenth
• 2:01:23
  Speaker 1: century have all been subject the many sided Kobori. Enshiu
• 2:01:30
  Speaker 1: has left notable examples of his genius in the Imperial
• 2:01:33
  Speaker 1: village of Katsura, the castles of Nagoya and Nijo, and
• 2:01:37
  Speaker 1: the monastery of Kohoan. All the celebrated gardens of Japan
• 2:01:42
  Speaker 1: were laid out by the tea masters. Our pottery would
• 2:01:46
  Speaker 1: probably never have attained its high quality of excellence if
• 2:01:50
  Speaker 1: the tea masters had not lent it to their inspiration.
• 2:01:53
  Speaker 1: The manufacture of the utensils used in the tea ceremony,
• 2:01:56
  Speaker 1: calling forth the utmost expenditure of ingenuity on the parts
• 2:01:59
  Speaker 1: of our ceramics. The seven kilns of Enshiu are well
• 2:02:04
  Speaker 1: known to all students of Japanese pottery. Many of our
• 2:02:08
  Speaker 1: textile fabrics bear the names of tea masters who conceived
• 2:02:11
  Speaker 1: their color or design. It is impossible indeed, to find
• 2:02:15
  Speaker 1: any department of art in which the tea masters have
• 2:02:18
  Speaker 1: not left marks of their genius. In painting and lacqua,
• 2:02:23
  Speaker 1: it seems almost superfluous to mention the immense services they
• 2:02:26
  Speaker 1: have rendered. One of the greatest schools of painting owes
• 2:02:30
  Speaker 1: its origin to the tea master Hounami Koyetsu, famed also
• 2:02:33
  Speaker 1: as a lack of artist and potter. Beside his works,
• 2:02:38
  Speaker 1: the splendid creation of his grandson Koho and of his
• 2:02:41
  Speaker 1: grand nephews Korin and Kenzan almost fall into the shade.
• 2:02:46
  Speaker 1: The whole Korin school, as it is generally designated, is
• 2:02:50
  Speaker 1: an expression of Teaism. In the broad lines of this
• 2:02:54
  Speaker 1: school we seem to find the vitality of nature herself.
• 2:03:00
  Speaker 1: Great as has been the influence of the tea masters
• 2:03:03
  Speaker 1: in the field of art, it is as nothing compared
• 2:03:06
  Speaker 1: to that which they have exerted on the conduct of life.
• 2:03:10
  Speaker 1: Not only in the usages of polite society, but also
• 2:03:13
  Speaker 1: in the arrangement of all our domestic details. Do we
• 2:03:16
  Speaker 1: feel the presence of the tea masters. Many of our
• 2:03:20
  Speaker 1: delicate dishes, as well as our way of serving food,
• 2:03:24
  Speaker 1: are their inventions. They have taught us to dress only
• 2:03:28
  Speaker 1: in garments of sober colors. They have instructed us in
• 2:03:31
  Speaker 1: the proper spirit in which to approach flowers. They have
• 2:03:35
  Speaker 1: given emphasis to our natural love of simplicity, and shown
• 2:03:38
  Speaker 1: us the beauty of humility. In fact, through their teachings,
• 2:03:43
  Speaker 1: Tea has entered the life of the people. Those of
• 2:03:49
  Speaker 1: us who know not the secret of properly regulating our
• 2:03:52
  Speaker 1: own existence on this tumultuous sea of foolish troubles which
• 2:03:55
  Speaker 1: we call life, are constantly in a state of misery.
• 2:03:59
  Speaker 1: While vainly trying to appear happy and contented, we stagger
• 2:04:03
  Speaker 1: in the attempt to keep our moral equilibrium. And see
• 2:04:06
  Speaker 1: foreirunners of the tempest. In every cloud that floats on
• 2:04:09
  Speaker 1: the horizon, Yet there is joy and beauty in the
• 2:04:14
  Speaker 1: roll of billows as they sweep outward towards eternity. Why
• 2:04:18
  Speaker 1: not enter into their spirit, or, like lit sea, ride
• 2:04:21
  Speaker 1: upon the hurricane itself. He only who has lived with
• 2:04:26
  Speaker 1: the beautiful can die beautifully. The last moments of the
• 2:04:30
  Speaker 1: great Tea masters were as full of exquisite refinement as
• 2:04:34
  Speaker 1: had been their lives. Seeking always to be in harmony
• 2:04:38
  Speaker 1: with the great rhythm of the universe, they were ever
• 2:04:41
  Speaker 1: prepared to enter the unknown. The last tea of Rikiu
• 2:04:45
  Speaker 1: will stand forth forever as the acme of tragic grandeur.
• 2:04:52
  Speaker 1: Long had been the friendship between Rikiu and Taiko Hideoshi,
• 2:04:56
  Speaker 1: and high the estimation in which the great warrior held
• 2:04:59
  Speaker 1: the tea master. But the friendship of a despert is
• 2:05:03
  Speaker 1: ever a dangerous honor. It was an age rife with treachery,
• 2:05:08
  Speaker 1: and men trusted not even their nearest kin. Rikiu was
• 2:05:12
  Speaker 1: no servile courtier, and had often dared to differ in
• 2:05:15
  Speaker 1: argument with his fierce patron, taking advantage of the coldness
• 2:05:20
  Speaker 1: which had for some time existed between the tycho and Rikieu.
• 2:05:24
  Speaker 1: The enemies of the latter accused him of being implicated
• 2:05:27
  Speaker 1: in a conspiracy to poison the despot. It was whispered
• 2:05:31
  Speaker 1: to Hideoshi that the fatal poison was to be administered
• 2:05:34
  Speaker 1: to him with a cup of the green beverage prepared
• 2:05:36
  Speaker 1: by the tea master. With hideoshi suspicion was sufficient ground
• 2:05:42
  Speaker 1: for instant execution, and there was no appeal from the
• 2:05:45
  Speaker 1: will of the angry ruler. One privilege alone was granted
• 2:05:49
  Speaker 1: at the condemned, the honor of dying by his own
• 2:05:52
  Speaker 1: hand on the day destined for his self immolation, Rikiu
• 2:05:59
  Speaker 1: invited his chief disciples to a last tea ceremony mournfully
• 2:06:04
  Speaker 1: at the appointed time, the guests met at the portico.
• 2:06:08
  Speaker 1: As they look into the garden path, the trees seem
• 2:06:11
  Speaker 1: to shudder, and in the rustling of their leaves are
• 2:06:14
  Speaker 1: heard the whispers of homeless ghosts, like solemn sentinels. Before
• 2:06:18
  Speaker 1: the gates of Hades stand the gray stone lanterns. A
• 2:06:23
  Speaker 1: wave of rare incense is wafted from the tea room.
• 2:06:27
  Speaker 1: It is the summons which bids the guests to enter.
• 2:06:30
  Speaker 1: One by one, they advance and take their places. In
• 2:06:34
  Speaker 1: the tokonoma hangs a cachemon a wonderful writing by an
• 2:06:38
  Speaker 1: ancient monk dealing with the evanescence of all earthly things.
• 2:06:43
  Speaker 1: The singing kettle, as it boils over the brazier, sounds
• 2:06:46
  Speaker 1: like some cicada pouring forth his woes to departing summer.
• 2:06:52
  Speaker 1: Soon the host enters the room. Each in turn is
• 2:06:57
  Speaker 1: served with tea, and each in turn silently drains his cup.
• 2:07:01
  Speaker 1: The host last of all. According to established etiquette, the
• 2:07:07
  Speaker 1: chief guest now asks permission to examine the tea equipage.
• 2:07:11
  Speaker 1: Ricieu places the various articles before them with the kkimona.
• 2:07:17
  Speaker 1: After all have expressed admiration of their beauty, Rikieu presents
• 2:07:21
  Speaker 1: one of them to each of the assembled company as
• 2:07:23
  Speaker 1: a souvenir. The bowl alone, he keeps, never again shall
• 2:07:29
  Speaker 1: this cup, polluted by the lips of misfortune, be used
• 2:07:31
  Speaker 1: by man. He speaks and breaks the vessel into fragments.
• 2:07:39
  Speaker 1: The ceremony is over. The guests, with difficulty restraining their tears,
• 2:07:45
  Speaker 1: take their last farewell and leave the room. One only
• 2:07:49
  Speaker 1: the nearest and dearest is requested to remain and witness
• 2:07:52
  Speaker 1: the end. Rikieu then removes his tea gown and carefully
• 2:07:57
  Speaker 1: folds it upon the mat, thereby disclosing the immaculate white
• 2:08:00
  Speaker 1: death robe, which it had hitherto concealed. Tenderly, he gazes
• 2:08:05
  Speaker 1: on the shining blade of the fatal Dagger, and in
• 2:08:08
  Speaker 1: exquisite verse thus addresses it welcome to thee o sword
• 2:08:13
  Speaker 1: of eternity, through Buddha and through Daruma alike, thou hast
• 2:08:17
  Speaker 1: c left thy way with a smile upon his face.
• 2:08:22
  Speaker 1: Rikiu passed forth into the unknown End of chapter seven
• 2:08:32
  Speaker 1: end of the Book of t by Cacusa Okakura, read
• 2:08:36
  Speaker 1: by Clive catterul Hereford, two thousand, twenty one