Discuss the influence of Taoism in T’ao Ch’ien and Li Po’s Poetry

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Discuss the influence of Taoism in T’ao Ch’ien and Li Po’s Poetry
The history of China there was two intellectual schools, the two philosophical schools included Confucianism, and Taoism, which in many ways dominated the region in the twentieth century. These two aspects competed for supremacy, but each one of them served distinctly as a mode of Chinese thinking, which later formed the constructions of Chinese cultural tradition. However, they were deviating in their way of methodology and application approaches the Lao Tzu and Confucius did set their decisive objective to achieve the Tao. Tao was an elusive term, which defied exact translation. The defined Tao is not the external Tao observes Lao Tzu. Lao Tzu is the forefather of Taoism; the knowledge founder warns against defining external Taoism and puts it as Tao to mean the way, the road, and the path. With time, people have transformed the meaning to the truth, nature and the ethical ideologies. To the Confucianist, Tao was a non-concrete principle in which the realm of ethics stayed, and it applied to human relationships and behavior. To modernize the meaning Confucianism looked at the meaning man to more feasible if a man becomes a perfect moral organism through moral law implementation by learning and through adhering to set structured responsibilities and observations. Tao viewed man as a free being which must be allowed to expand and grow instinctively, to live with nature harmoniously with all the other things equal. According to Taoist to cultivate human goodness using education or through academic studies and rules imposed socially or by conventions is a way of restricting the being from the superficial human values which are temporal and material, and it also strips the being the simplicity and primordial purity. To grasp the relationship between Tao Yuanming and Taoism view, it is best that we look at what Tao entails. Both aspects have an almost similar view of man, nature, and society.
During the Han period, Daoism evolved into an organized religion from the early philosophic origins. It is almost the same time when Buddhism was introduced into China, though it did not become popular at once. Following the Daoism period, the Chinese poets were either syncretic, eclectic and could express Confucian, Buddhist, or Daoist views in their work. During the Tang dynasty, three great poets represent the three philosophies. For Buddhism it was Wang Wei, Confucianism it was represented by Tu Fu, and Li Po represented Daoism. Li Po received a Daoist diploma, and it is said that the elixirs of life he took might have contributed to his death. Most of his poetry have urged on yearning for the realm of the immortals and wish to transcend this world. The same poems show Li Po to be far from indifferent to sensual pleasures such as women, song, and wine. Li Po has found Daoist stimulus and mythology as one of the sources to inspiration to his enthusiastic imagination.
Li Po broke so many poetry rules and established his style and give out poetry that was to outlast the Tang Dynasty. Through structure and content, Li Po portrayed the feeling of liberation, Daoism and Buddhist. He was popular for his romantic songs about women...