Note 6 — Chapter IX · The Islands of the Blest
Reading edition
Lieh Tze, alleged to be an early Taoist writer,6 but whose writings, or those writings attributed to him, were forged in the first or second century A.D., has located the islands to the east of the gulf of Chihli in that fathomless abyss into which flow all the streams of the earth and the river of the Milky Way. Apparently this abyss is the Mythical Sea which was located beyond the eastern horizon—a part of the sea that surrounds the world. Into this sea or lake, according to the ancient Egyptian texts, pours the celestial river, along which sails the barque of the sun-god. The Nile was supposed by the Ancient Egyptians to be fed by the waters above the firmament and the waters below the earth. The Pyramid Texts, when referring to the birth of Osiris as “new water” (the inundation), say: