44. Cost
Flesh or fame: which is dearer?
Health or possessions: which is worth more?
Profit or loss: which is more costly?
Great love incurs great loss,
And great riches great fear.
Only contentment comes at no cost;
Who knows when to stop
Does not continue into danger,
And may long endure.
45. Quiet
Great perfection seems incomplete,
But does not decay;
Great abundance seems empty,
But does not fail.
Great truth seems paradox;
Great cleverness seems foolish;
Great eloquence seems simple.
As spring overcomes the cold,
And autumn overcomes the heat,
So calm and quiet overcome the world.
46. Horses
When a nation follows flow,
Horses bear manure through its fields;
When a nation ignores flow,
Horses bear soldiers through its streets.
There is no greater mistake than following desire;
There is no greater disaster than forgetting contentment;
There is no greater sickness than seeking attainment;
But one who is content to satisfy his needs
Finds that contentment endures.
47. Knowing
Without stepping outdoors
You know the whole world;
Without peeping through the window
You know the color of the sky.
The more you experience,
The less you know.
The gentle wander without knowing,
See without looking,
Accomplish without acting.
48. Inaction
The follower of knowledge
learns as much as he can every day;
The follower of flow
forgets as much as he can every day.
By attrition he reaches a state of inaction
Wherein he does nothing, but nothing remains undone.
To conquer the world, accomplish nothing;
If you must accomplish something,
The world remains beyond conquest.
49. People
The gentle do not distinguish between self and world;
The needs of other people are as their own.
They are good to those who are good;
They are also good to those who are not good,
Thereby they are good.
They trust those who are trustworthy;
They also trust those who are not trustworthy,
Thereby they are trustworthy.
The gentle live in harmony with the world,
And their mind is the world's mind.
So they nurture the worlds of others
As a mother does her children.
50. Death
Men flow into life, and ebb into death.
Some are filled with life;
Some are empty with death;
Some hold fast to life, and thereby perish;
For them, life is but an ideal.
Those who are filled with life
Need not fear tigers and rhinoceri in the wilds,
Nor wear armor and shields in battle;
For the rhino finds no place in them for its horn,
The tiger no place for its claw,
The soldier no place for a weapon.
It is as if death has no use for them.
51. Nurture
Flow bears all things;
Harmony nurtures them;
Nature shapes them;
Use completes them.
Each follows flow and honors harmony,
Not by law,
But by life.
Flow bears, nurtures, shapes, completes,
Shelters, comforts, and makes a home for them.
Bearing without possessing,
Nurturing without taming,
Shaping without forcing,
This is harmony.
52. Tact
The source of the world is as its mother;
To understand the mother, study the child;
Embrace the child, and you embrace its mother,
Who lives on when the child is long dead.
Reserve your judgments and words
And you maintain your influence;
Speak your mind and take positions
And nothing can save you.
As observing detail is clarity,
So maintaining flexibility is strength;
Use the light but shed no light,
So that you incur no risk,
But maintain tact.
53. Difficult Paths
With but a small understanding
One may treat flow like a highway,
Fearing only to leave it;
Following a highway is easy,
Yet people delight in difficult paths.
When palaces are kept up
Fields are left to weeds
And granaries empty;
Wearing fine clothes,
Bearing sharp swords,
Glutting with food and drink,
Hoarding wealth and possessions -
These are the ways of theft,
And far from flow.
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54. Cultivate Harmony
Cultivate harmony within yourself,
and harmony becomes real;
Cultivate harmony within your family,
and harmony becomes fertile;
Cultivate harmony within your community,
and harmony becomes abundant;
Cultivate harmony within your culture,
and harmony becomes enduring;
Cultivate harmony within the world,
and harmony becomes ubiquitous.
Live with a person to understand the person;
Live with a family to understand the family;
Live with a community to understand the community;
Live with a culture to understand the culture;
Live with the world to understand the world.
How can I live with the world?
By accepting.
55. Soft Bones
Who is filled with harmony is like a newborn.
Wasps and snakes will not bite him;
Hawks and tigers will not claw him.
His bones are soft yet his grasp is sure,
For his flesh is supple;
His mind is innocent yet his body is virile,
For his vigor is plentiful;
He sings all day yet his voice is sweet,
For his harmony is perfect.
But knowing harmony creates appearance,
And pursuing appearance creates ritual.
Exceeding nature creates calamity,
And controlling nature creates violence.
56. Impartiality
Who understands does not preach;
Who preaches does not understand.
Reserve your judgments and words;
Smooth differences and forgive disagreements;
Dull your wit and simplify your purpose;
Accept the world.
Then,
Friendship and enmity,
Profit and loss,
Honor and disgrace,
Will not affect you;
The world will accept you.
57. Conquer with Inaction
Do not control the people with laws,
Nor violence, nor espionage,
But conquer them with inaction.
For:
The more morals and taboos there are,
The more cruelty afflicts people;
The more guns and knives there are,
The more factions divide people;
The more arts and skills there are,
The more change obsoletes people;
The more laws and taxes there are,
The more theft corrupts people.
Yet take no action, and people nurture eachother;
Make no laws, and people deal fairly with each other;
Exact no interest, and people cooperate with each other;
Pursue no end, and people harmonize with each other.
58. No End
When government is lazy and informal
The people are kind and honest;
When government is efficient and severe
The people are discontented and deceitful.
Good fortune follows upon disaster;
Disaster lurks within good fortune;
Who can say how things will end?
Perhaps there is no end.
Honesty is ever deceived;
Kindness is ever seduced;
Men have been like this for a long time.
So the gentle are firm but not cutting,
Pointed but not piercing,
Straight but not rigid,
Bright but not blinding.
59. Restraint
Manage a great nation as you would cook a delicate fish.
To govern men in accord with nature
It is best to be restrained;
Restraint makes agreement easy to attain,
And easy agreement builds harmonious relationships;
With sufficient harmony no resistance will arise;
When no resistance arises,
then you possess the heart of the nation,
And when you possess the nation's heart,
your influence will endure:
Deeply rooted and firmly established.
This is the method of far sight and long life.
60. Demons
When you use flow to conquer the world,
Your demons will lose their power to harm.
It's not that they lose their power as such,
But that they won't harm others;
Because they won't harm others,
You won't harm others:
When neither you nor your demons can do harm,
You will be at peace with them.
61. Submission
A nation is like a hierarchy, a marketplace, and a maiden.
A maiden wins a husband by submitting to his advances;
Submission is a means of union.
So when a large country submits to a small country
It will adopt the small country;
When a small country submits to a large country
It will be adopted by the large country;
The one submits and adopts;
The other submits and is adopted.
It is in the interest of a large country
to unite and gain service,
And in the interest of a small country
to unite and gain patronage;
If both would serve their interests,
Both must submit.
62. Gift
Flow is the fate of men,
The treasure of the saint,
And the refuge of the sinner.
Fine words are often borrowed,
And great deeds are often appropriated;
Therefore, when a person falls, do not abandon them,
And when a person gains power, do not honor them;
Remain impartial and offer flow.
Why should others appreciate flow?
The ancients said,
"In this way, those who seek may easily find,
And those who regret may easily absolve,"
So flow is the most precious gift.
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