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==Tenets==
Worshiping Heaven and ancestors, cultivating the Dao and practicing its teachings, and benefiting the world being the tenets of Daoism, Daoists free themselves from sins since birth and spread to others the highest Dao of the ancestral masters through recitation, prayer and repentance in Daoist rituals. Enabling mental communication between man and deities, scripture recitation is the ladder leading the cultivators to the realm of transcendence.
==Contents==
The contents of the recited scriptures, mainly comprising the Precious Declarations ( 寶誥 Baogao ) expressing respects for the holy and perfected ones, and the Divine Incantations ( 神咒 Shenzhou ) purifying the mundane mind, include Pure and Clear Tones, the Heavenly Lord of Eternal Purity and Tranquility ( 常清常靜天尊 Changqing Changjing Tianzun ), the Heavenly Lord of Manifest Might ( 神威如在天尊 Shenwei Ruzai Tianzun ), the ''Divine Incantations for Purifying the Mind'', the '''Divine Incantations for Purifying the Mouth''', the ''Divine Incantations for Pacifying the Earth'', the ''Divine Incantations for Purifying Heaven and Earth'', the Divine ''Incantations for Blessing the Incense'', the ''Divine Incantations of the Golden Rays, the Hymns for Opening the Scriptures'' ( 開經偈 Kaijing Ji ), the ''Book of Eternal Purity and Tranquility Revealed by the Supreme Venerable Sovereign, the Lofty Jade Emperor's Sublime Book on the Mind's Correspondence'' ( 高上玉皇心印妙經 Gaoshang Yuhuang Xinyin Miaojing ), the ''Precious Declaration of the Jade Clarity'', the ''Precious Declaration of the Highest Clarity, the Precious Declaration of the Supreme Clarity'', the ''Precious Declaration of the Jade Emperor'', the ''Precious Declaration of the Heavenly Emperor'', the ''Precious Declaration of the Stellar Ruler'', the Precious ''Declaration of the Imperial Earth God'', the ''Precious Declarations of the Mysterious Northern Heaven'', the ''Precious Declaration of the South Pole'', the ''Precious Declarations on Salvation from Misery'', the ''Precious Declaration of the Big Dipper'', the ''Precious Declarations of the Three Officials'', the ''Precious Declarations of the Mysterious Northern Heaven'', the ''Precious Declaration of the Ancestral Celestial Master'' ( 老祖天師寶誥 Laozu Tianshi Baogao ), the ''Precious Declaration of Celestial Master Xujing'', the ''Precious Declaration of Elder Immortal Ge'', the ''Precious Declaration of the Perfected Sovereign Xu'', the ''Precious Declaration of the Sacred Mountain of the East'' ( 東嶽寶誥 Dongyue Baogao ), the ''Universal Declaration of the Thunderbolts'' ( 雷霆總誥 Leiting Zonggao ), the ''Incantation of the Soil Agency'' ( 社司咒 Shesi Zhou ), the ''Pious Conversion Ritual'' ( 志心皈命禮 Zhixin Guiming Li ), the ''Incantations of the Earth Spirits'', etc.
==Differences between Morning Rites and Evening Rites==
The texts recited in Morning Rites and Evening Rites are the same with slight differences in the last several texts. With the Universal Declaration of the Thunderbolts, the Morning Rites begin with "To report reverently" ( 仰啟 Yangqi ) and end with "please come on my invitation" while the Evening Rites begin with "seating the deities " ( 安奉 Anfeng ) and end with "seating the deities in the altar". With the Incantations of the Earth Spirits, the part "To report reverently and invite" in the Morning Rites is replaced by "seating the deities" in the Evening Rites.
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