Summary: <p>Listen to episode 22 of the Inspirational Living podcast: The Book of Tea | Zen & The Art of Tea Drinking. Edited and adapted from The Book of Tea by Okakura Kakuzō. <br><br><em><strong>Podcast Excerpt:</strong> There is a subtle charm in the taste of tea which makes it irresistible and capable of idealization. Western humorists were not slow to mingle the fragrance of their thought with its aroma. It has not the arrogance of wine, the self-consciousness of coffee, nor the simpering innocence of cocoa. Samuel Johnson draws his own portrait as "a hardened and shameless tea drinker, who for twenty years diluted his meals with only the infusion of the fascinating plant; who with tea amused the evening, with tea solaced the midnight, and with tea welcomed the morning. <br><br>Teaism is the art of concealing beauty that you may discover it, of suggesting what you dare not reveal. It is the noble secret of laughing at yourself, calmly yet thoroughly, and is thus humor itself—the smile of philosophy. All genuine humorists may in this sense be called tea-philosophers---Thackeray, for instance, and of course, Shakespeare. In this imperfect world of ours, it is perhaps in our demure contemplation of the Imperfect that the West and the East can meet in mutual consolation..... <br></em></p>
