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animal, is so mild, that one may approach him (be familiar with 

 him, i. e. tame him) and ride on him. But under his throat he 

 has scales, lying in a reverse direction, one ch^ih (foot) in diameter. 

 If a man touches them, the dragon is sure to kill him". 



The Classic^ have taiight us that the dragon belongs to the 

 four creatures that have the most ling (^), i.e. whose shen 

 manifests itself in the most powerful way. The "Rh ya yih ' goes 

 further and states that the dragon possesses the most ling of all 

 creatures. According to the Shui ying fu ^ "the yellow dragon is 

 the quintessence of shen, and the chief of the four dragons. If a 

 king does not drain off ponds and lakes, their water can penetrate 

 into deep pools, and the yellow dragons, following their nature, 

 swim in ponds and lakes". 



Ltj PuH-WEi' relates the following: "Confucius said: 'A dragon 

 {lung) eats what is pure and moves about in what is pure *. A 

 cM (fk^) eats what is pure and moves about in what is muddy, 

 A fish eats what is muddy and moves about in what is muddy. 

 Now I, in ascending do not reach the dragon (i. e. I am not 

 such a high being as the dragon), and in descending do not 

 reach the fishes (i. e. I am not such a low creature as the fishes); 

 I am (like) the cW ". 



HwAi NAN TszE ^ g ocs as far as _to_de clare the dragon 

 to be the orig in__ of all cr eatures, as we le arn from _ the, 

 follow ing passa giZIIilAll__creatures , winged , TSiry, scaly and 



^ ^3 3li ^8 ' *'''® Appendix to the 'Rh ya (a vocabulary probably dating from 

 pre-Christian tinaes, cf. De Groot, Rel. Syst. I, p. 302), "a broad elaboration of this old 

 dictionary by the hand of Lo Yuen, .^S I^ , who flourished in the latter half of the 

 12th century." (De Groot, 1.1. IV, p. 166) ; Section ^f|: ^^MM^ifeo 



2 J^ FfS |§j , written before the Ch'en dynasty (A. D. 557—589) by Sun Jeu-chi, 



^^Z^'-^- Mnt ^«"°^ Dragon: ^ U ^ %^ Z i^ . PIfl 



3 H ^ ;^ 1 the reputed father of Shi Hwang, the founder of the Ts'^in dynasty 

 (B.C. 249—206), in his work entitled: Lu-shi cJfun-tsHu, Q _P^ ^fe ^, "Annals 

 of Lu", Section -^ ||| . 



5 ^^ ^ •^, "The philosopher of Hwai-nan", i.e. Liu Ngan, ^J ^, (who died 



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