Of course it is sad to be told that it is immoral to be consciously good, and that doing anything is the worst form of idleness.  Thousands of excellent and really earnest philanthropists would be absolutely thrown upon the rates if we adopted the view that nobody should be allowed to meddle in what does not concern him.  The doctrine of the uselessness of all useful things would not merely endanger our commercial supremacy as a nation, but might bring discredit upon many prosperous and serious-minded members of the shop-keeping classes.  What would become of our popular preachers, our Exeter Hall orators, our drawing-room evangelists, if we said to them, in the words of Chuang Tzu, ’Mosquitoes will keep a man awake all night with their biting, and just in the same way this talk of charity and duty to one’s neighbour drives us nearly crazy.  Sirs, strive to keep the world to its own original simplicity, and, as the wind bloweth where it listeth, so let Virtue establish itself.  Wherefore this undue energy?’ And what would be the fate of governments and professional politicians if we came to the conclusion that there is no such thing as governing mankind at all?  It is clear that Chuang Tzu is a very dangerous writer, and the publication of his book in English, two thousand years after his death, is obviously premature, and may cause a great deal of pain to many thoroughly respectable and industrious persons.  It may be true that the ideal of self-culture and self-development, which is the aim of his scheme of life, and the basis of his scheme of philosophy, is an ideal somewhat needed by an age like ours, in which most people are so anxious to educate their neighbours that they have actually no time left in which to educate themselves.  But would it be wise to say so?  It seems to me that if we once admitted the force of any one of Chuang Tzu’s destructive criticisms we should have to put some check on our national habit of self-glorification; and the only thing that ever consoles man for the stupid things he does is the praise he always gives himself for doing them.  There may, however, be a few who have grown wearied of that strange modern tendency that sets enthusiasm to do the work of the intellect.  To these, and such as these, Chuang Tzu will be welcome.  But let them only read him.  Let them not talk about him.  He would be disturbing at dinner-parties, and impossible at afternoon teas, and his whole life was a protest against platform speaking.  ’The perfect man ignores self; the divine man ignores action; the true sage ignores reputation.’  These are the principles of Chuang Tzu.

Chuang Tzu:  Mystic, Moralist, and Social Reformer.  Translated from the Chinese by Herbert A. Giles, H.B.M.’s Consul at Tamsui. (Bernard Quaritch.)

MR. PATER’S LAST VOLUME

(Speaker, March 22, 1890.)

When I first had the privilege—­and I count it a very high one—­of meeting Mr. Walter Pater, he said to me, smiling, ’Why do you always write poetry?  Why do you not write prose?  Prose is so much more difficult.’