We now come to the third division of the system of Feng-shui, the doctrine of nature's breath. Nature, as I have had occasion to remark before, is looked upon by the Chinese observer as a living breathing organism, and we cannot be surprised, therefore, to find the Chinese gravely discussing the inhaling and exhaling breath of nature. 1n fact, with the distinction of these two breaths, the expanding breath, as they call it, and reverting breath, they explain almost every phenomenon in nature. Between heaven and earth there is nothing so important, so almighty and omnipresent as this breath of nature. It enters into every stem and fibre, and through it heaven and earth and every creature live and move and have their being. Nature's breath is, in fact, but the spiritual energy of the male and female principles. Thus at the commencement the congelation of the transforming breath of nature is the change from nothing into being of the male principle. The exhaustion of the transforming breath of nature is the change from existence to non-existence of the female principle of nature. When therefore in the beginning these two principles first issued from "the great absolute," it was then that nature's breath first went forth. But at first nature's breathing was confused and chaotic, so that for some time heaven and earth were not divided, but when nature's breath reverted, and exhalation and inhalation regularly succeeded each other, heaven and earth, the male and female principles, were divided and everything in nature was produced in its proper order. Even now,THE BREATH OF NATURE