202 A Chinese Biographical Dictionary

he felt the loss as keenly as though he were a grown man. Entering the public service he rose to the highest offices of State, never being seen from his earliest youth to his latest hoars without a book in his hand. Canonised as ^.

508 Ch'üan Tsu-wang (T. |a ^ and H^lj ). A.D. 1705 — 1755. A scholar of profound learning, who attracted much attention in his youth, but who failed to distinguish himself in Peking and retired into private life at his home in Chehkiang. He was the head of several colleges, and wrote notes on history, on the topography of the Han History, essays, etc. etc.

509 Chuang Chou ^ ^ (T. -^ ^ ). Commonly known as ^ i^ or ^ -^ Chuang Tzti. 3rd and 4th cent. B.C. A native of H^ Mdng in modern Anhui, who devoted his life and enei^es to the glorification of Lao Tzt. He appears to have held a petty official post at j^ ^ Ch4-yflan in Shantung; hence in the book language he is often spoken of under that name. When the Prince of Ch*u, hearing of his fame as a scholar, sent messengers with costly gifts to offer him the post of Prime Minister, Chuang Tzti smiled and said, *'You offer me great wealth and a proud position indeed; but have you never seen a sacrificial ox? After being fattened up for several years it is decked with embroidered trappings and led to the altar; but would it not then willingly change places with some uncared-for pigling? Begone! I will never take office.'* On another occasion he was out fishing when the Prince sent two high officials to beg him to undertake the administration of the Ch'u State. '1 have heard," replied Chuang Tzti, that in Ch'u there is a sacred tortoise which has been dead now for some three thousand years; and that the Prince keeps this tortoise carefully enclosed in a chest on the altar of his ancestral temple. Now

would this tortoise rather be dead and have its remains venerated ,