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Tract upon Nourishing the Spirit.
Ανα.
On Yang sin shin, Fostering the Spirit of the Mind. THERE is nothing more intelligent than spirit, but when men do not know how to foster it, then spirits become spiritless, because of their want of intelligence. When men allow the seven passions and the six objects of desire to disturb their spirit, although at the time, their bodily powers are most vigorous, and they might other- wise promote the growth of their spiritual energies, yet their spirits remain dark. That their spirits should be dark is still a small mat- ter; but by gratifying every kind of relish and attachment, and by thinking on things that they have no need, and ought not to think of, they leave their spirits without a moment's rest, until their spirits are dissipated and confused, and have no home to return to. Hence the Rationalist doctors laid so much stress on
養神 fostering the spiri-
tual energies, considering that when the spirit was kept still, wisdom would spontaneously spring up; when wisdom sprang up, the virtuous nature decreed to be conferred by heaven, would manifest itself in the very centre of our
mental being; until, without aim and without effort, we might combine in ourselves the natural tenden- cies to good which emanate from the Mighty Infinite; thus, by cultivating stillness, they nourished their spiritual energies. Their disciples having missed the original aim, have been despised by the literati and the Budhists, because they aimed only at nourishing their bodily powers; and their spirits, bright and intelligent though they be, were unable to attain to the virtuous nature conferred by the decree of heaven: all this because they allowed the spirit of emulation to con- tend within, esteeming themselves to be right and others wrong, con- sorting only with men of similar views, and opposing all who differed from them, little thinking that that by which we can cause our vir- tuous nature to expand, until it fills the universe is the human spirit; and that that by which our natural life is enabled to extend its pant- ings, is also the human spirit.
The modern alchymists however, swallowing medicaments in order to foster their spirits, are very gross in their conceptions, and would never succeed in fostering the same by stillness, without renouncing their sensualities and passions, so as not to be influenced by them. The way in which men enter deeply into the great principles of reason (★ Ï) is by cultivating perfect stillness, when their spirits become settled as when a sharp bodkin is employed to penetrate substances, there is nothing so hard that it will not perforate. The literati em- ploying their energies in the pursuit of knowledge, and making it their