Listen for the Tao, and there is nothing to be heard!
But use it, and you will find that it is inexhaustible.
36
If a thing is capable of being contracted, no doubt is was previously expanded;
It a thing is capable of being weakened, no doubt it was previously strengthened.
Exaltation precedes abasement.
He who would take must first give.
This is the Secret Law,
Whereby the soft and the weak overcome the hard and the strong.
Leave the fish in the depths of the water, out of harm's way;
And leave the nation's sharpest weapons where they cannot be seen.
37
The Tao is eternally inactive;
Yet nothing is left undone.
If kings and princes grasped this truly
All creatures would develop of themselves.
And if, as they developed, desires stirred within them,
I would curb them by the Simplicity-without-a-name.
This Simplicity-without-a-name leads to detachment from desire;
Detachment from desire leads to stillness.
And in this way the world, of itself, would reach Peace.
38
The highest power is not aware of itself as a power;
Hence its power.
The inferior power clings to the appearance of power:
Hence its lack of power.
The highest power works by non-action and has no ulterior aims.
The inferior power acts and claims recognition.
The highest loving-kindness acts without motive.
The highest justice acts with motive.
The highest ritual of convention and respectability acts, and if there is no response, force is used to compel respect.
Therefore: Whan the Tao is lost, power appears;
When power is lost, loving-kindness appears;
When loving-kindness is lost, justice appears;
When justice is lost, ritual appears.
Ritual is but the sahdow of faith and loyalty, and the beginning of confusion.
Prediction of what is to come is doubtless an offshoot of the Tao, but the beginning of ignorant folly.
Therefore, he who is truly great holds to the substance and not to the shadow;
He holds to the main stem and not to the offshoot.
Thus he disregards That and nurtures This.
39
These things have from the beginning attained Unity:
Earth, through Unity, is firm;
Spirits, through Unity, are active;
The Valley, through Unity, is brimming;
All creatures, through Unity, multiply;
Kings and princes, through Unity, govern the world;
Yes: in all these things works Unity.
If Heaven through Unity were not clear, it would be rent;
If Earth through Unity were not firm, it would topple over;
If Spirits through Unity were not active, they would shrivel away;
If the Valley through Unity were not brimming, it would dry up;
If all creatures through Unity did not multiply, they would die out;
If kings and princes through Unity did not govern the world, they would be overthrown.
For nobility has its roots in humility,
And the high is built on a foundation that is low.
Thus kings and princes speak of themselves as "ophans," "the lonely ones," "the unworthy";
In this way they acknowledge that their might is rooted in the lowly? Surely this is so?
For without the component parts of a waggon there is no waggon.
The sages of old sought to be neither the isolated single gem, nor yet the common stone among other stones.
40
The movement of the Tao is a returning.
The chief method of the Tao is non-striving.
All manifestations have their source in Being:
Being has its source in Non-Being.
41
When a man of highest wisdom is told about the Tao;
He is eager to follow it.
When a man of middling wisdom is told about the Tao,
At times he follows it, at times he loses touch with it.
When a man of no wisdom is told about the Tao,
He laughs aloud;
If he did not laugh at it, it could not rightly be named the Tao.
For as a maekr of proverbs has truly siad:
"Enlightenment in the Tao seems like darkness;
Progress in the Tao seems like regress";
Evenness in the Tao seems like roughness;
The highest virtue seems like the emptiness of a valley.
The purest white seems murky;
The most exalted virtue seems inadequate;
The strongest virtue seems unstable;
The most steadfast nature seems variable.
For "the greatest square of all has no angles;
The largest vessels are late brought to perfection;
The highest note is scarcely heard;
The greatest image has no shape."
The Tao, in its secrecy, is nameless;
Yet it is the Tao which is behine everyhting and brings all things to completion.
42
From the Tao was born the One;
From the One was born the Two;
From the Two was born the Three;
And from the Three all things proceeded.
All creatures have the shadow at their backs and embrace the light;
And the everlasting breath of life unites them.
What men hate is to be orphaned, lonely, unworthy;
But do not kings and princes often so describe themselves?
"For things by being diminished may be increased,
And by being increased, diminished."
What others teach, I will teach too.
"Those who are foolhardy and violent do not come to a natural end."
On this maxim I too will base my teaching.
43
The most yielding thing in the world
Masters the hardest thing in the world.
Its nothingness can penetrate even the impenetrable.
That is how I know the value of non-action.
But teaching without the use of words;
And action that is non-action -
How few in the world achieve this!
44
Your fame, or yourself - which is the nearer to you?
Your self, or your possessions - which is the more precious to you?
Acquiring, or losing - which is the worse to you?
He who sets his heart on things will spend wastefully;
He who hoards greatest treasure will risk greatest loss.
Therefore, to be content with enough is to risk no humiliation.
He who knows when to be still escapes harm.
He will endure.
45
The greatest perfection seems inadequate,
But it is unfailing in its usefulness;
What is brimful seems empty,
But it is inexhaustible in its usefulness.
The completely straight seems crooked, the greatest skill seems awkward,
The greatest eloquence seems like stammering.
Activity overcomes cold,
But stillness overcomes heat.
Only by purity and stillness will the world be governed.
46
When the Tao is reigning on the earth,
Racehorses are harnessed to dung-carts;
When the Tao is not reigning on the earth,
War-horses are bred even in the fields outside the city walls.
There is no greater fault than yielding to uncurbed desire;
There is no greater unhappiness than discontent with what one has,
No greater calamity than greed and craving.
For "the content that comes from bwing content is an enduring content."
47
Without going out of his own door
A man may know the world;
Without looking out of his own window
A man man know the Tao of Heaven.
For the farther one goes
The less one knows.
Thus it is with the Sage:
He does not go forth, and yet he attains his goal;
Although he does no look around him, he is able to give things their names;
Without fuss he brings all to completion by Non-action.
48
He who goes in search of knowledge adds to himself day after day;
He who seeks the Tao sheds something form himself day after day,
Shedding more and more,
Until he attains Non-action.
By Non-acton there is nothing that cannot be done.
The Kingdom can only be achieved by not interfering;
Those who busy themselves interferingly are not capable pf achieveing the Kingdom.
49
The Sage's self is not a self for itself;
He makes the people's self his self.
I am good to the good;
To the bad I am also good.
For how shall Virtue express itself if not in goodness?
I am candid to the candid;
To those who are not frank I am also candid.
How shall Virtue express itseld if not in candour?
The Sage, always absorbing, lives in stillness in the world,
But his heart is open to receive the conflicting impressions of the world.
And the people of the world gaze at him round-eyed and agape,
And he treats them as children.
50
To go out from life is to enter death.
The Knights of Life are thirteen;
The Knights of Death are thirteen.
And most men in living create thirteen vulnerable spots within themselves.
How is that?
Because they are so avid of life.
I have heard that he who has control of his life may walk throughout the land and meet neither tiger nor rhinoceros;
He may pass through a battle-field indifferent to weapons and armour.
For the rhinoceros would find in him no place to drive its horn;
The tiger would find no place to thrust its claws;
The weapon no place to insert its blade.
How is that?
Because such as he have no vulnerable spots.
51
The Tao gave birth to them;
Virtue nourished them,
Gave to each its form,
Brought each to perfection,
And gave to each its power.
Therefore among all created things there is not one which does not honour the Tao and reverence Virtue.
And if the Tao is thus honoured and Virtue thus reverenced,
It is not because an edict went forth.
It has always been so.
Thus: The Tao gave birth to them, nourished them,
Made them grow, protected them, perfected them.
To rear them and not possess them,
To quicken them and lay no claim to them,
To govern them and not be dependent on them -
Such is the Mysterious Power.
52
The source of all manifested things in the universe
May be caled the Mother.
Hw who knows his kinshp with the Mother
Will know his kinship with the children twoo.
He knows the children but clings the close to the Mother.
And though his body may decay,
He himself will never perish.
"Close your mouth; keep t all the doors,
And your vigour shall last to the end."
Open your mouth, busy yourself with numberless affairs,
And there is no help for you.
To see the smallest is to have clear vision;
To hold fast to the gentlest is to be strong.
Use your light to light you to the light within,
And no harm can ever befall you.
This is called: Holding to the Never-changing.
53
Let me have the good sense to keep to the Great Highway of Tao;
Only if I go straying into side-turnings shall I have anything to fear.
The Highway is fine and smooth and easy,
But men preger the bypaths.
There the royal palaces are spick and span -
But se how the weeds have sprung up in the fields!
See how empty the granaries are!
Where garments are much bedecked and embroidered,
Where sharp swords hang from every belt,
Where there is gluttony in food and drink,
Where riches are over-abundant -
There you will find that brigandage is rife.
Not so on the Great Highway of Tao!
54
That which is firmly implanted by the Tao will not be uprooted.
That which is firmly grasped by the Tao will not be unloosened.
As, through the Tao, Ancestral Sacrifices continue from children to grandchildren for countless generaitons,
So, if you cultivate the Tao in your self, your power will be true power;
If you cultivate the Tao in your family, your family through ts power will enjoy abundance;
If you cultivate the Tao in your village, your village through its power will grow in strength;
If you cultivate the Tao in your country, your country through its power will flourish;
If you cultivate the Tao in the community its power will be seen everywhere in the world.
For by looking into one's self one may become aware of others;
Through one's own family one may become aware of other families;
Through one's own village one may become aware of other villages;
Through one's own country one may become aware of other countries;
Through contemplating the community one may become aware of the Great Society of Mankind.
How do I know that the Great Society of Mankind may be so governed?
By This.
55
The man who is endowed in full measure with the spiritual power of harmlessness may be compared to a child.
Venomous insects do not sting him,
Nor savage beasts assail him;
Birds of prey leave him unharmed.
His bones are soft and his sinews are weak,
But his grip is firm and sure.
Though inocent of sexual union, yet he is fully formed,
And thus is his vitality unimpaired.
Though he cry all day long, his voice does not grow harsh;
His functioning is perfectly harmonious.
To know such harmony as this is to be aware of the Never-changing;
To be aware of the Never-changing is to know Illumination.
But to lust after greater fullness of life is to invite calamities.
For if desire plays the tyrant over the life-breath, hardening sets it.
When vigour reaches its climax, shall not decay ensue?
Such forcing is against the Tao.
And that which is against the Tao quickly passes away.
56
He who knows the Tao does not talk about it;
He who talks about the Tao does not know it.
He whose lips are closed,
Who has t the doors of the senses,
Who tones down that which dazzles
And knows himself lowly as the dust -
Is it not he who has attained to perfect equanimity?
Such a one cannot be be encroached upon;
Nor can he be repelled;
He cannot be benefitted,
Nor can he be harmed;
He cannot be exalted,
Nor can he be cast down.
Is not this perfect equanimity the most valuab;e of all things under the sun?
57
"The government of a country is best achieved by carrying out the rules.
The winning of wars is best achieved by the employment of artful strategy."
But the winning over of the community is best achieved by non-interference.
How do I know that this is so?
