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- Lǎozǐ:
Lǎozǐ (Chinese: 老子), or Lao Tzu, the designation of the Chinese author of the celebrated treatise called Dào Dé Jīng, and the reputed founder of the religion called Daoism. The Chinese characters composing the designation may mean either "the Old Son", which commonly assumes with foreigners the form of "the Old Boy" or "the Old Philosopher". The latter significance was attached to them by John Chalmers in his translation of the treatise published in 1868 under the title of The Speculations on Metaphysics, Polity, and Morality, of "the Old Philosopher," Lau-tsze. The former is derived from a fabulous account of Lǎozǐ in the Shénxiān Zhuàn; "The Account of Spirits and Immortals", of Gé Hóng in the 4th century CE. According to this, his mother, after a supernatural conception, carried him in her womb sixty-two years (or seventy-two, or eighty-one—ten years more or fewer are of little importance in such a case), so that, when he was born at last, his hair was white as with age, and people might well call him "the old boy". The other meaning of the designation rests on better authority. We find it in the Kǒngzǐ Jiāyǔ, or "Narratives of the Confucian School", compiled in the 3rd century CE from documents said to have been preserved among the descendants of Confucius, and also in the brief history of Lǎozǐ given in the historical records of Sīmǎ Qiān (about 100 BCE). In the latter instance the designation is used by Confucius, and possibly it originated with him. It should be regarded more as an epithet of respect than of years, and is equivalent to "the Venerable Philosopher".