高僧傳 4.31

4.31

Dun had previously lived in Wushan in Yuyao, and on famous festive days he would still return to the Wu valley. Someone asked him the reason, and he replied: 'In the past, Xie An frequently came to visit me, always staying for ten days or more. Now, wherever I look and whatever touches my feelings, thoughts of him are inevitably stirred.' Later, falling gravely ill, he moved back into the Wu valley. On the fourth day of the intercalary fourth month in the first year of the Taihe era of the Jin dynasty, he died at his residence at the age of fifty-three. He was buried right in the Wu valley, where his tomb still remains; some say he died in Shan, which is uncertain. Xi Chao wrote a preface and biography for him, Yuan Hong wrote an inscription and eulogy, and Zhou Tanbao composed an elegy. Sun Chuo's 'Treatise on Daoists and Worthies' compared Dun to Xiang Ziqi, stating: 'Zhi Dun and Xiang Xiu had an elegant taste for the Zhuangzi and Laozi. Though the two men lived at different times, their demeanor and tastes were mysteriously identical.' His 'Treatise on Illustrating the Way' also says: 'Zhi Daolin's understanding was clear and his nature compliant, yet he did not oppose external things. His mysterious Way was profound and helpful, according with his spiritual disposition. This is the reason why those of far-reaching currents returned to the source, and why the ordinary masses failed to awaken.' Later, when the eminent scholar Dai Kui passed by Dun's tomb, he sighed: 'His virtuous reputation is not yet distant, yet the trees over his grave are already dense. May his spiritual essence continue unbroken and not perish together with the physical breath.'