Taoism has been described as “the art of being in the world,” and the main thrust of its teaching was opposed to the Confucian ideas of social order. Instead, it stressed that the individual should seek to flow with the watercourse way, the Tao. Lao-tzu described this mystical concept, which like Zen defies objective analysis, in the following way:

The metaphysics of Heraclitus are sufficiently dynamic to satisfy the most hustling of moderns: “This world, which is the same for all, no one of gods or men has made; but it was ever, is now, and ever shall be an ever-living Fire, with measures kindling and measures going out.” “The transformations of Fire are, first of all, sea; and half of the