SOURCE: "The Taoist Movement," in The Parting of the Way: Lao Tzu and the Taoist Movement, Beacon Press, 1957, pp. 88-97.

In the essay that follows, Welch discusses the rise of philosophical Taoism, with particular consideration of its connections to medical and scientific beliefs.

Lists of the world's principal religions usually include "Taoism." We might therefore suppose that "Taoism" was a religion comparable to Christianity, Buddhism, or Islam. We might suppose that like them it could be traced back to a founding prophet—in its case, Lao Tzu—whose followers set up a church—the Taoist church; that various branches of Taoism developed as the church divided into sects; and that the church and its doctrines, originally pure, became corrupted with the passing of centuries until they ended up as the Taoist priests and sorcery of today.

This is almost wholly mistaken. Taoism cannot be traced back to Lao...