A Lute of Jade | Page 7

coloured towers?Rise up like rainbow clouds, and many gentle?And beautiful Immortals pass their days in peace,
her message to her lover with its splendid triumphant note of faith foretelling their reunion at the last -- in fine, the story of their love with the grave between them -- is due to the genius of Po Chu-i. And to all poets coming after, these two lovers have been types of romantic and mystic love between man and woman. Through them the symbols of the mandarin duck and drake, the one-winged birds, the tree whose boughs are interwoven, are revealed.?They are the earthly counterparts of the heavenly lovers,?the Cow-herd and the Spinning-maid in the constellations of Lyra and Aquila. To them Chinese poetry owes some of its finest inspirations, and at least two of its greatest singers, Tu Fu and Li Po.
Chinese Verse Form
In passing it is necessary to refer to the structure of Chinese verse, which, difficult as it is to grasp and differing in particulars from our European ideas of technique, has considerable interest for the student of verse form and construction.
The favourite metres of the T`ang poets were in lines?of five or seven syllables. There is no fixed rule as regards the length of a poem, but, generally speaking, they were composed of four, eight, twelve, or sixteen lines. Only the even lines rhyme, except in the four-line or stop-short poem, when the first line often rhymes with the second and fourth, curiously recalling the Rubaiyat form of the Persian poets. There is also a break or caesura?which in five-syllable verses falls after the second syllable and in seven-syllable verses after the fourth. The Chinese also make use of two kinds of tone in their poetry, the Ping or even,?and the Tsze or oblique.
The even tone has two variations differing from each other only in pitch; the oblique tone has three variations, known as "Rising, Sinking, and Entering." In a seven-syllable verse the odd syllables can have any tone; as regards the even syllables, when the second syllable is even, then the fourth is oblique, and the sixth even. Furthermore, lines two and three, four and five, six and seven, have the same tones on the even syllables. The origin of the Chinese tone is not a poetical one, but is undoubtedly due to the necessity of having some distinguishing method of accentuation in a language which only contains about four hundred different sounds.
The Influence of Religion on Chinese Poetry
To Confucius, as has been already stated, is due that groundwork of Chinese poetry -- the Odes. But the master gave his fellow countrymen an ethical system based upon sound common sense, and a deep knowledge of their customs and characteristics. There is little in the Confucian classics to inspire a poet, and we must turn to Buddhism and the mystical philosophy of Lao Tzu for any source of spiritual inspiration from which the poets have drawn. Buddhism and Taoism are sisters.?Their parents are self-observance and the Law. Both are quietists, yet in this respect they differ, that the former is the grey quietist, the latter the pearl. The neutral tint is better adapted to the sister in whose eyes all things are Maya -- illusion. The shimmer of pearl belongs of right to her whose soul reflects the colour and quiet radiance of a thousand dreams. Compassion urged the one, the love of harmony led the other. How near they were akin! how far apart they have wandered! Yet there has always been this essential difference between them, that while the Buddhist regards the senses as windows looking out upon unreality and mirage, to the Taoist they are doors through which the freed soul rushes to mingle with the colours and tones and contours of the universe. Both Buddha and Lao Tzu are poets, one listening to the rhythm of infinite sorrow, one to the rhythm of infinite joy. Neither knows anything of reward at the hands of men or angels. The teaching of the Semitic religions, "Do good to others that you may benefit at their hands," does not occur in their pages, nor any hints of sensuous delights hereafter.* In all the great Buddhist poems, of which the Shu Hsing Tsan Ching is the best example,?there is the same deep sadness, the haunting sorrow of doom. To look on beautiful things is only to feel more poignantly the passing of bright days, and the time when the petals must leave the rose. The form of desire hides within it the seeds of decay. In this epic of which I have spoken, Buddha sees the lovely and virtuous Lady Aruna coming to greet him, says to his disciples:
--?* This is a simplistic and inaccurate picture of religious teachings. Mr. Cranmer-Byng, like many cross-cultural scholars,?seems to have fallen into the