The Way of Heaven and Other Fantasies Told in the manner of the Chinese

Los Angeles: Philosophical Research Society, 1946. First Edition. 8vo. Cream colored paper covered boards stamped in orange and black. 185 pp. A clean, tight, beautiful copy, almost as new but for a little bowing at the fore-edge of the front cover.. Illustrations by K. Alexander. This little collection of stories presents a delicate literary problem. According to the proprieties of the occasion it is necessary first to determine the exact nature of the narrations. Deliberation reveals certain facts which require thoughtful attention. The accounts which follow are not fables for the reason that a fable often relates to animals humanized in their moral or intellectual qualities. It would be equally untrue to refer to these writings as myths, for mythology is concerned with divine beings and the conduct of those beings as preserved in the religions histories of old times. It would be equally inappropriate to refer to these productions as legends, for legendry records the events of celebrated heroes, or the folklore associated by tradition with unusual places and circumstances.