Celestial differs in his thoughts and beliefs from his Northern
brother as a member of the Latin race differs from the Teuton.
In ancient days, when communication was even more difficult
than at present, and especially during the feudal period, this
difference in thought was most pronounced. The art and poetry
of the one breathes an atmosphere entirely distinct from that of
the other. In Laotse and his followers and in Kutsugen, the
forerunner of the Yangtse-Kiang nature-poets, we find an
idealism quite inconsistent with the prosaic ethical notions of
their contemporary northern writers. Laotse lived five centuries
before the Christian Era.

The germ of Taoist speculation may be found long before the
advent of Laotse, surnamed the Long-Eared. The archaic
records of China, especially the Book of Changes, foreshadow
his thought. But the great respect paid to the laws and customs
of that classic period of Chinese civilisation which culminated
with the establishment of the Chow dynasty in the sixteenth
century B.C., kept the development of individualism in check
for a long while, so that it was not until after the disintegration
of the Chow dynasty and the establishment of innumerable
independent kingdoms that it was able to blossom forth in the
luxuriance of free-thought. Laotse and Soshi (Chuangtse) were
both Southerners and the greatest exponents of the New School.
On the other hand, Confucius with his numerous disciples aimed
at retaining ancestral conventions. Taoism cannot be understood
without some knowledge of Confucianism and vice versa.

We have said that the Taoist Absolute was the Relative.
In ethics the Taoist railed at the laws and the moral codes