Composition
In most redactions, the Cantong qi is divided into 3 parts. Parts 1 and 2 contain the main text. With the exception of a few short passages in prose, they are written in 4- or 5-character verses (the 5-character verses prevail in the first part, while the second part is almost entirely made of 4-character verses). Several poems written in either meter mirror one another in subject matter and vocabulary.
Part 3 is made of several additional compositions: (1) An "Epilogue" ("Luanci" 亂辭), mostly written according to the saoti 騷體 prosody, so called after the Lisao (Encountering Sorrow) piece in the Songs of Chu (Chuci). (2) The "Song of the Tripod" ("Dingqi ge" 鼎器歌), a poem in three-character verses, another prosodic form not found in the first two parts. (3) A final section—entitled in different ways by different commentators—stating that the teachings of the Cantong qi are based on the Book of Changes, Taoism, and alchemy, and containing a final poem in which the author describes himself and his work.
In some redactions, moreover, the third part is concluded by an anonymous postface entitled "Eulogium" ("Zanxu" 讚序).
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Famous quotes containing the word composition:
“It is my PRIDE, my damn’d, native, unconquerable Pride, that plunges me into Distraction. You must know that 19-20th of my Composition is Pride. I must either live a Slave, a Servant; to have no Will of my own, no Sentiments of my own which I may freely declare as such;Mor DIE—perplexing alternative!”
—Thomas Chatterton (1752–1770)
“Since body and soul are radically different from one another and belong to different worlds, the destruction of the body cannot mean the destruction of the soul, any more than a musical composition can be destroyed when the instrument is destroyed.”
—Oscar Cullman. Immortality of the Soul or Resurrection of the Dead? The Witness of the New Testament, ch. 1, Epworth Press (1958)
“I live in the angle of a leaden wall, into whose composition was poured a little alloy of bell-metal. Often, in the repose of my mid-day, there reaches my ears a confused tintinnabulum from without. It is the noise of my contemporaries.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)