The Tao of Love and Sex

137 Pages·1991·2.706 MB·English

by  Jolan Chang

Love and food are equally
Vital to our sanity and survival
Ko Tzu
THE TAO OF LOVE
A
N
The Ancient Chinese Way to Ecstasy by JOLAN CHANG
D

Foreword and Postscript by Joseph Needham
S
E
X

A Dutton Paperback
E. P. DUTTON
NEW YORK
First published 1977
Text copyright © Jolan Chang 1977
Translation copyright © Jolan Chang 1977
For information contact: E.P. Dutton, 2 Park Avenue,
New York, N.Y. 10016
All Rights reserved
Printed in the U.S.A.
No part of this publication may be reproduced or
transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic
or mechanical, including photocopy, recording or any
information storage and retrieval system now known or
to be invented, without permission in writing from the
publisher, except by a reviewer who wishes to quote
brief passages in connection with a review written for
inclusion in a magazine, newspaper or broadcast.
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
[Library of Congress Catalog Number]
76-54578
ISBN: 0-525-47453-6
109 8 7 6 5 4
Contents
Foreword by Joseph Needham, F.R.S., F.B.A., Late Master of Gonville
and Caius College, Cambridge 9
Preface 11
Chapter One : The Tao of Loving 15
1. What is Tao? 18
2. The similarity between ancient and modem sex studies 20
3. Ejaculation reconsidered 21
4. The harmony of Yin and Yang 25
5. The similarity of ancient and modern in the theory of harmony and happiness 26
6. Nei tan (inner elixir) and wai tan (outer elixir) 27
Chapter Two : Understanding The Tao of Loving 30
1. Three basic concepts of the Tao 30
2. The role of women 30
3. Importance of love-making 30
4. How to observe female satisfaction 32
5. Misconceptions of the Tao 33
(a) Coitus reservatus
(b) Male continence
(c) Karezza
(d) The mysticism of coitus reservatus
(e) Tantric arts or Tantrism
(f) Imsak
Chapter Three : Ejaculation Control 35
1. The true joy of loving 37
2. The locking method 39
3. The modern locking method 41
4. Masters and Johnson's squeeze technique 41
5. Ancient Chinese squeeze technique 42
6. Advice for more experienced men 42
7. Ejaculation frequency 43
8. Individual variations 44
9. Not enough ejaculation 45
10. Premature ejaculation? 45
Chapter Four : A Thousand Loving Thrusts 47
1. Male capacity can be greatly improved 48
2. Types of thrusts 49
3. Depths of thrusts 50
4. Thrusting sequences 52
5. Sexual gymnastics 52
6. Master Sun's versatile methods 53
Chapter Five : Love Positions 56
1. Four basic positions and twenty-six variations 56
2. Finding one's own positions 58
3. Changing positions 61
4. Female superior positions 61
5. Advantages of female superior position 61
6. Variations in the female superior position 62
7. Back entry 62
8. Experimentation is the key 63
Chapter Six : Erotic Kissing and The Tao 64
1. The yin essence 64
2. Erotic kissing and oral sex 65
3. Advantages of erotic kissing 66
4. Nipple kissing 66
5. Improving erotic kissing 68
Chapter Seven : Evolution and Debasement of The Tao of Loving 70
1. Emphasis on female satisfaction 70
2. The Han Dynasty 71
3. From Sui to Ming Dynasty 73
4. Superstitions and vampirism 73
5. Some confusing notions 74
6. How the Tao of Loving almost disappeared 11
7. The age of agony and frustration 77
Chapter Eight : The Conquest of Impotence 79
1. Unreasonable fear of impotence 79
2. How to overcome impotence 81
3. Soft entry method 81
4. Security 83
5. Size and shape of the phallus (and development exercises) 83
6. Modern attitudes 84
7. Wu Hsien's method 86
Chapter Nine : Longevity and The Tao of Loving 88
1. Love-making and longevity 88
2. Modern cult of youth 89
3. Ejaculation in middle life 91
4. Ejaculation control and longevity 92
5. A brief history of longevity in China 93
Chapter Ten : May - September Relationships 96
1. Society's prejudice 96
2. Young woman - older man relationships 97
3. Older man-older woman relationships 97
4. The attraction is not always one-sided 98
5. Advantages of older woman - young man relationships 98
6. Personal hygiene 100
7. Conclusions 101
Chapter Eleven : Breathing, T'ai Chi Ch'uan and The Tao of Loving 102
1. Proper breathing 102
2. Breathing exercises 102
3. Improving the organs 103
4. T'ai Chi Ch'uan 105
5. Tai Chi as a means of self-defence and a superb exercise 105
6. Diet 106
Chapter Twelve : Learning The Tao 107
1. Sensory development 108
2. Learning to communicate 110
3. The Tao is not only for men 110
4. The importance of the right partner 111
5. Male orgasm - the Tao of Loving way 113
6. Some questions answered 113
Summing Up : Some Personal Experiences 117
Postscript by Joseph Needham : Address for Caius College
(Whit Sunday, 1976) 121
Bibliography I: Chinese Texts 131
Bibliography II: English Texts 132
Index 135
List of Illustrations
Studying the Yin Yang Symbol (British Museum) 14
Young noble on horseback (British Museum) 22
Lady (British Museum) 31
One of a series of four paintings on a caul or oiled paper, perhaps originally part of a
lantern hanging in a 'Flower Garden' - late Yuan period, 1280-1367 (Collection
Charles Ratton, Paris) 40
Two more in the same series (Jean Pierre Dubosc Collection, Paris) 51,59
Amorous games in a 'Flower Garden' - painting on silk after Ch'iu Ying, early sixteenth
century (Louis Bataille Collection, Paris) 67, 75
Lovers reading an Erotic Book - painting on silk from an album of the K'ang-hsi period,
1662-1722 (C.T. Loo Collection, Paris) 85
Penetrating the Cords of the Lute - painting on silk from an album of the K'ang-hsi
period, 1662-1722 (C.T. Loo Collection, Paris) 90
The Attack from the Rear, or 'The Leaping White Tiger' - painting on silk from an
album of the K'ang-hsi period, 1662-1722 (C.T. Loo Collection, Paris) 99
In the Garden on a Rocky Seat - painting on silk from an album of the K'ang-hsi period,
1662-1722 (C.T. Loo Collection, Paris) 104
Pair of lovers in a boat - Chinese album painting in colour, nineteenth century
(Copyright Roger Peyrefitte; from Erotic Art of the East, Weidenfeld & Nicolson)
112
Sun S'su-Mo (Collection of Joseph Needham) 107, 117
Man and Lady with Lute (British Museum) 119
Acknowledgments
The author and publishers would like to thank all those who have given permission for
copyright illustrations to be reproduced in this book.
Illustrations from the C.T. Loo Collection, Collection Charles Ratton, Jean Pierre
Dubosc Collection and Louis Bataille Collection are all from The Clouds and the Rain,
original editor Office du Livre, Fribourg. Illustrations from the British Museum are re
produced by courtesy of the Trustees of the British Museum.
Bamboo decorations throughout are adapted from The Mustard Seed Garden Manual
of Painting 1679-1701.
Thanks are also due to Joseph Needham for permission to reproduce the illustration
on the title page and other pictures from his collection and to Theology magazine for
permission to include Joseph Needham's Address for Caius Chapel (Whit Sunday, 1976).
Foreword
VERY FEW WESTERN SCHOLARS HAVE EVER GIVEN ANY STUDY TO
traditional Chinese sexology. Yet the subject itself is necessarily one of
absorbing interest for every adult human being; and Chinese culture in
particular, with its unique genius for combining the rational and the
romantic, would be expected to have important things to say about it.
Apart from the admirable Henri Maspero, one of the greatest of such
scholars was Robert van Gulik (quoted from time to time in this book)
whom I first met during the war in 1942. He was going out to Chungking
as Charge d'Affaires of the Netherlands, while I was on the way to my post
as Scientific Counsellor at the British Embassy there. Later on, if my
memory is right, I made the speech at his wedding to Miss Shui Ssu-Fang,
which was held in our Science Co-operation mess. Still later, after the war,
when I had become involved with Taoism and its search for longevity and
immortality, he and I had a long correspondence in which I think I per
suaded him that there was nothing perverse or pathological in the sexual
techniques described and prescribed by the Taoist adepts. This fitted in
with his own conviction, derived from a deep knowledge of the literature,
that Chinese sex life through the centuries had been remarkably healthy,
free from the aberrations of sadism and masochism,1 but immensely skilled
in happy variation and mutual donation. The present book is entirely in this
tradition.
My own copy of the greatest Chinese sexological collection, the Shuang
Mei Ching An Ts'ung Shu, edited by Yeh Te-Hui, had been bought, as I recall
with pleasure, from a woman bookseller, in the Liu Li Ch'ang in Peking in
1952. Since then I have again devoted study to these topics, since the
important nei tan or 'inner elixir' part of Chinese alchemy had a great deal
to do with sexual techniques which, it was believed, would prolong life and
lead perhaps to material immortality.2
1 With the exception of the fetichism of the bound-feet custom, unknown before the tenth century,
and today entirely a thing of the past.
2 This account will be appearing before long in collaboration with Dr Lu Gwei-Djen, in Vol. 5,
Part 5 of Science and Civilisation in China (Cambridge University Press).