anarchist, believing that if there were no active government all men
would be happy. Then everyone could attain unity with Nature for
himself. Thus we find in Lao TzÅ­, and later in all other Taoists, a
scornful repudiation of all social and official obligations. An answer
that became famous was given by the Taoist Chuang TzÅ­ (see below) when
it was proposed to confer high office in the state on him (the story may
or may not be true, but it is typical of Taoist thought): "I have
heard," he replied, "that in Ch'u there is a tortoise sacred to the
gods. It has now been dead for 3,000 years, and the king keeps it in a
shrine with silken cloths, and gives it shelter in the halls of a
temple. Which do you think that tortoise would prefer--to be dead and
have its vestigial bones so honoured, or to be still alive and dragging
its tail after it in the mud?" the officials replied: "No doubt it would
prefer to be alive and dragging its tail after it in the mud." Then
spoke Chuang TzÅ­: "Begone! I, too, would rather drag my tail after me in
the mud!" (Chuang TzÅ­ 17, 10.)

The true Taoist withdraws also from his family. Typical of this is
another story, surely apocryphal, from Chuang TzÅ­ (Ch. 3, 3). At the
death of Lao TzÅ­ a disciple went to the family and expressed his
sympathy quite briefly and formally. The other disciples were
astonished, and asked his reason. He said: "Yes, at first I thought that
he was our man, but he is not. When I went to grieve, the old men were
bewailing him as though they were bewailing a son, and the young wept as
though they were mourning a mother. To bind them so closely to himself,
he must have spoken words which he should not have spoken, and wept
tears which he should not have wept. That, however, is a falling away
from the heavenly nature."

Lao TzÅ­'s teaching, like that of Confucius, cannot be described as