The Erotic Comedies (Vassi Collection Volume XI) Read Online Free PDF Page B

descendants of a small band of people that followed Lao Tzu out of China after he wrote his Tao Te Ching . Instead of going to the mountains to die, as legend has it, he went to live. Leaving China at the age of eighty-five, he continued for another sixty-three years, teaching the people non-ado. So powerful was his influence that it sustained them for almost three millennia.
    In the seventeenth century of the Christian era as measured by western calendars, they were visited by two Dominican priests who came upon their valley by accident. The men were scandalized by what they considered obscene rites and general godlessness. They attempted to preach the gospel, but were met by a respectful indifference. They became an odd sight, flapping furiously about in their black and white robes, brandishing crucifixes, waving their bibles in the air, shouting at the people to put their clothes on and repent. It must be admitted that it was difficult to preach hellfire and brimstone to a people who had no concept of sin except "doing what is unnecessary," a faculty the priests excelled in. But the people were willing to let them be, viewing them as merely one of the more bizarre manifestations of the unfathomable universe.
    The missionaries were able, however, to test the tolerance of even this ultimately benign people, first by chopping down living trees to make a dead church, and then by running through the grove where the guide was awaiting his daily meal and lashing the backs of the happy fuckers who were preparing his food. The people, for the first time in centuries, were confused, and they asked the guide what they should do, an action no guide in anyone's recollection had been asked to perform.
    He thought about it a while and requested that the priests be restrained. Then, hoping to pierce to the core of the situation, he asked two of the young maidens to draw forth some sperm from their bodies so he might take their measure. The priests howled with outrage at the tender ministrations being given them by the gentle fingers and loving tongues of the women. And when they came, it was with horrible curses mingled with terrible prayers.
    The king tasted each of their deposits and retched violently.
    "These men are ..." he began to say, and then paused, not having a word for the concept "depraved." He spit out the sperm and pondered for a while. "Take them to where the eagles nest," he said at last, "and push them from the mountain."
    The priests were disposed of and the people remained undisturbed for another four hundred years.
    Yet, their time was marked. In one of the wars which continually erupted about them, their valley was discovered by a platoon of Chinese soldiers. Shortly thereafter, they were descended upon by a delegation from the People's Republic, and told that they were to be liberated from the chains of spiritual autocracy and introduced to the wonders of democracy.
    "You will be removed from your primitive state," the directive read, "and given factories and schools and police. Women will be free and allowed to work side by side with men. Everyone will learn to read and illiteracy will be eliminated." Finally, they were informed, they would elect their own representative to sit in the People's Assembly in Peking. Beyond that, they would be taught how to farm, pen animals, make iron, and build roads.
    The people were stunned. The night the representatives left, with word that they would return in a week with soldiers, planners, teachers, officials, and anthropologists, the guide summoned the entire village.
    "There is no way to know why these things happen," he said. "It is like watching the night sky and seeing a star suddenly plunge into the darkness of space. It is our time to be destroyed, and there is nothing we can do."
    He stroked his wispy beard. "For myself, I will not live to serve those smiling and well-intentioned brutes who think their primitive machinery is superior to our formless understanding. I will