"Kung Fu": TV Series, The Chalice

#18 (Prod #166203) "The Chalice"
Teleplay By:: William Kelley (also #10, 37 & 38, 50 & part of 51)
Directed By:: Jerry Thorpe (also pilot & #1, 2, 3, 4, 16 & 40) (also Exec. Prod.)
First Broadcast: ABC, October 11, 1973
Guest Stars: William Smith Special Guest Star: Gilbert Roland
Regular Cast: David Carradine, Philip Ahn, Keye Luke, Radames Pera

Near the ocean Caine promises a dying priest to return a chalice that priest had stolen which has just been stolen from him by four hooligans who are also being hunted for the Gatling gun they'd previously stolen. The flashbacks show how Caine was helped by a Catholic priest while he was being hunted by the Imperial police after killing the Emperor's nephew.

"Does not a work of art belong forever to the artist?" - Caine

"You own nothing that you may be owned by nothing." - Caine (relates to his teaching as stated in #9 "The Praying Mantis Kills")

"'I must return the stolen chalice for him.' - Caine
'You? Why?'
'I understand him.'" - Caine

"...a wise man walks with his head bowed, humble like the dust." - Master Kan (from pilot)

"The universe contains a certain pebble called the earth and many men have formed an attachment to it no less foolish than your own." - Master Kan, on Caine's attachment for the pebble he wanted to be able to take out of the Master Kan's hand

"What is hell?" - Caine, when asked if he believes in hell

"I do not wish to die. Nor to see others die needlessly." - Caine

"I will do as I say. No man need kill or be killed." - Caine

"Perhaps." - Caine, when told he is about to be killed

"...may his passing in its violence not wake the tigers of outrage, the dragons of vengeance. May it rather, in its sadness, wake nothing but the dove in us - the lamb in others - so that together in the bond of compassion, we may rejoice in the memory of Master Po...." - Master Kan

"You remain a Shaolin priest. Nothing is diminished; nothing is undone." - Master Kan to Caine after the killing of the Emperor's nephew

"Now, you must leave us forever and I cannot say which is the greater grief to my heart." - Master Kan, comparing his feelings on Po's death and Caine's leaving

"I saw no way to avoid it." - Caine, when told he hadn't seemed adverse to fighting

William Smith had thought he had had a chance to get the role of Caine in this series (according to Carradine's Spirit/Shaolin p. 18^*2* and Anderson's KF Book^*2*).

Strangely, though this village is near the ocean, the nearest US Marshal is said to be in Santa Fe (and both KF books say this takes place in New Mexico although there are no beaches in this state).

The stone Caine puts on the grave is not the pebble he took out of Kan's hand or the one he took off Po's grave.