Li Yu - The Carnal Prayer Mat

"But if our nature is in accord with the Principle of Heaven," said the Knave, "so long as we feel an action to be deeply satisfying, why shouldn't it square with the manifest justice of the Principle? Your disciple has spent his entire life as a thief without ever getting into any trouble. Are you telling me that I'm now going to fall foul of the law?"

"That's not the way to look at it, layman," said Lone Peak. "Both the Principle of Heaven and the law are absolutely watertight. No one who harms the Principle or breaks the law ever gets away with it. His retribution may come early, or it may come late. If it comes early, it will be less severe, but if it is long delayed, it will suddenly burst upon him with intolerable force. That priest had broken the commandment against lust and the woman the law against adultery, and of course the Lord of Heaven would have destroyed them. But does he not have the Thunder God to do it for him? Does he need to turn to a mere mortal for help in killing them? Even if he does, well, every mortal in the world has a pair of hands. Why should he turn to you in particular? Are your hands the only ones that can kill? The sovereign authority must not be lent, nor the sword of authority allowed to slip away. The Lord of Heaven cannot handle such a serious matter himself, so he sees that sinners are killed by other sinners. No one, absolutely no one, is left out! Thus your otherworldly retribution certainly cannot be avoided.

"Perhaps your action is less serious and will be judged a little less severely than if you had killed honest folk. But since you've followed this profession all your life, surely by now every official in the country knows your reputation. As the proverb says, 'A man fears fame as a pig fears to grow fat.' You may have done good by giving your money to the poor, but no one will ever believe it; people will always suspect that you have a secret cellar under your house where you've hidden the money, and sooner or later they'll come after you. If you really had the stolen money at home, you could use it to buy them off and so save your skin. But I'm afraid you'll find the money you gave to the poor impossible to recall at short notice, and your life will be in jeopardy. Thus your thisworldly retribution is inescapable too. And a delayed retribution may well prove worse than the sin itself."

The Knave had always been a violent man with a fiery temper that everyone feared, so he had never received any moral advice. Now, confronted with the priest's compelling arguments, he felt moved by a spirit of repentance. There was no need to pressure him further; he was committed to reforming himself.

"Admittedly," he said to Lone Peak, "the things I have done are not the actions of a good or superior man. But since rich men are unwilling to distribute their money themselves, it has been my practice to take a little from them and do a few good deeds in their behalf: In doing so, I am thinking of others, not myself. From what you say, however, I have done many evil things for which retribution is inescapable, both in this world and in the next. If I repent now, will you still be able to intercede for forgiveness?"

Lone Peak pointed to Stubborn Stone. "His sins were far worse than yours, but because he turned his mind to goodness, he moved Heaven into taking back the daughters who would have redeemed his debts. That is something you saw with your own eyes, not something I made up, so you already know whether you can be forgiven."

Stubborn Stone was delighted when he heard of the Knave's intention to turn his mind to goodness. He told how he himself had rejected the master's advice three years before and thrown himself into all kinds of debauchery, and how the retribution he suffered as a consequence had borne out the master's warnings to the letter. He urged the Knave to heed his example.

The Knave took his decision and made his bows to Lone Peak that very day, acknowledging him as his teacher. Receiving the tonsure, he embarked on a strict course of self-denial and in less than twenty years attained the fruits of enlightenment. He died sitting in the buddha position, like Lone Peak and Stubborn Stone.

Obviously there is no man who is unfit to become a buddha. It is only because we are so controlled by money and sex that we cannot avoid the path of error and reach salvation's shore. That is the reason why Heaven is so sparsely populated and Hell so densely crowded, why the Jade Emperor has nothing to occupy his time and King Yama is too busy to cope. In a more general sense it is all due to the meddling of the Sage who separated Heaven and Earth. He should never have created woman or instituted money, reducing man to his present sorry state. Let me now sum up the case against the Sage with a quotation from the Four Books : "Was it not the Sage himself who invented burial images?" [95]

CRITIQUE

Whereas at the beginning of the book he was grateful to the Sage, now, at its close, he berates him. That worthy cannot be feeling either too pleased or too vexed about it. This truly is a book that mocks everything ! Let me come to the Sage's defense with yet another quotation from the Four Books : "Those who understand me will do so through The Carnal Prayer Mat ; those who condemn me will also do so because of The Carnal Prayer Mat ." [96]

[1] Li Yu thought he had been born in 1611, but the clan genealogy says 1610. He died early in 1680.

[2] Gonggong was a term of address for a eunuch and also for a grandfather.

[3] The Bencao gangmu of Li Shizhen, first published in 1593.

[4] The kidneys (and the sex functions) are related to the water element, the heart to fire.

[5] The ideal political system advocated by the philosopher Mencius.

[6] Li Yu is apparently speaking of ginseng rather than aconite. The best ginseng grew in Manchuria and the next best in Korea. The better varieties were known as daodi , that is, genuine.

[7] I have used italics to mark passages of simulated address by the audience to the storyteller/narrator. Simple questions from the audience are not italicized.

[8] The victims of amorous excess.

[9] The allusion is to the Zhuang Zi . See Burton Watson, trans., The Complete Works of Chuang Tzu (New York: Columbia University Press, 1968), p. 313: "Now suppose there were a man here who took the priceless pearl of the Marquis of Sui and used it as a pellet to shoot at a sparrow a thousand yards up in the air-the world would certainly laugh at him."

[10] These are the titles of the first two sections of the "Songs of the States" in the Poetry Classic ( Book of Songs ). They stand for the "Songs" as a whole, many of which are about love.

[11] For this passage, see D. C. Lau, trans., Mencius (London: Penguin Books, 1970), pp. 65–66. King Tai's flight was a migration to a new settlement. Note that the words Li Yu puts into the puritan's mouth parody Mencius's lecturing style.

[12] The last rulers of the Xia and Shang dynasties, respectively, who were famous for their gargantuan debaucheries.

[13] A reference to the Buddhist parable of the burning house ( Lotus Sutra ).

[14] The olive, with its bitter taste, stands for a salutary lesson.

[15] A legendary body of water. Although shallow, it is uncrossable; even a feather will sink.

[16] There were eight or nine sacred mountains.

[17] The poet Tao Qian (A.D. 365–427). See his "Biography of Mr. Five Willows."

[18] See the story "The Priest Moonbright Saves Liu Cui" in Gujin xiaoshuo, Stories Old and New , published about 1621.

[19] The poet, who lived from A.D. 210 to 263. White (contracted) pupils signify disdain, black (dilated) pupils signify approval and pleasure. We are told in his biography ( Jin History 49) that Ruan revealed his mood by purposely making his eyes white or black.