Page:A history of Chinese literature - Giles.djvu/137

 During the third century A.D. another and more mer- curial set of poets, also seven in number, formed them- selves into a club, and became widely famous as the Seven Sages of the Bamboo Grove. Among these was Liu LlNG, a hard drinker, who declared that to a drunken man "the affairs of this world appear but as so much duckweed on a river." He wished to be always accom- panied by a servant with wine, followed by another with a spade, so that he might be buried where he fell. On one occasion, yielding to the entreaties of his wife, he promised to " swear off," and bade her prepare the usual sacrifices of wine and meat. When all was ready, he prayed, saying, "O God, who didst give to Liu Ling a reputation through wine, he being able to consume a gallon at a sitting and requiring a quart to sober him again, listen not to the words of his wife, for she speaketh not truth." Thereupon he drank up the sacrificial wine, and was soon as drunk as ever. His bias was towards the Tao of Lao Tzu, and he was actually plucked for his degree in consequence of an essay extolling the hetero- dox doctrine of Inaction. The following skit exhibits this Taoist strain to a marked degree :

"An old gentleman, a friend of mine (that is, himself), regards eternity as but a single day, and whole centuries as but an instant of time. The sun and moon are the windows of his house ; the cardinal points are the boundaries of his domain. He wanders unrestrained and free ; he dwells within no walls. The canopy of heaven is his roof ; his resting-place is the lap of earth. He follows his fancy in all things. He is never for a moment without a \vine-flask in one hand, a goblet in the other. His only thought is wine : he knows of naught beyond.

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