The five elements--water, metal, earth, fire, and wood

quote:
From: Secrets of the Tao Te Ching, Mantak Chia and Tao Huang, page 46-47

In Chinese philosophy, the universe is composed of the five elements--water, metal, earth, fire, and wood--each of which has a yin and yang mode. All natural forms are expressions of these elements. Traditionally, the five seasonal changes (spring, summer, late summer, fall and winter) produce five colors (green, red, yellow, white and black) and five flavors (sour, bitter, sweet, tart, and salty). They activate the five tones (call, laugh, sing, cry, and moan), the five facial organs (eyes, ears, nose, mouth and tongue), and the five primary internal organs (liver, heart, spleen, lungs, and kidneys). All these fives are conceived within the bodily five elements (a body with two arms and two legs), expressed with five emotions (anger, joy, worry, sorrow, and fear); and manifested with five fingers. Lao Tzu acknowledges the interaction with the fives of the universe: five colors blind the eyes, five flavors dull the pilate, five tones deafen the ears. The Taoist approach is to mindfully find the middle way as we navigate the stimulation of our encounters with all the forms of the world.

quote:
From: http://www.traditionalmedicine.net.au/laotsu.htm

Lao Tzu was a Government Archivist and contemporary of Confucius, who lived about 400 BC. He formulated a natural and ecological philosophical system which promoted the concept of health and prosperity through the awareness and observance of the natural cosmic cycles.
He stated that all things in the universe were governed by an immutable law, the "Tao". He wrote a book named "Tao Te Jing", or the classic of the Tao, in which the Tao is represented as containing within itself "the quintessence of the truth of the universe".

In his philosophy he went beyond the Cartesian/Newtonian principles of cause and effect, and presented a clear interrelationship of events in the universe which were both their own cause and effect, i.e. moved in cyclical patterns..