Yang Chu's Garden of Pleasure · 8 of 20

Chapter VII: Duty to the Living and the Dead

YANG CHU said:

"There is an old saying, 'We must pity the living and part with the dead.' This is a good saying.

"Pity does not merely consist in an unusual feeling.

"So we may give the feverish rest, satiety to the hungry, warmth to the cold, and assistance to the miserable; but for the dead, when we have rightly bewailed them, to what use is it to place pearls and jewels in their mouths, or to dress them in state robes, or offer animals in sacrifice, or to expose effigies of paper?"