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Laotze
Dao De Jing

English Version by Bob Gonzalez


NINETEEN
Abandon your learning, discard your knowledge, and people will benefit a hundredfold.
Abandon your benevolence, discard your righteousness,
and people will become filial and kind again.
Abandon cleverness, discard profit-seeking and thieves will disappear.
These three recommendations must seem uncivilized and incomplete.
Therefore, let me recommend these:
Be plain, remain simple, end selfishness and reduce desires.

TWENTY
What is the real difference between yes and no?
What is the actual distance between good and evil?
Do you fear what all people fear? Where will this confusion end?
Everyone is so happy, as if at a great festival or climbing a tower in spring.
Only I am still, showing no sign of desire, like an infant that has yet to smile.
I am weary and homeless, it seems.
Everyone has more than enough. Only I seem destitute. I must be a fool, a real dullard.
Ordinary people are so bright. Only I am in the dark.
They appear energetic and ambitious. Only I appear to be drifting, like wind on the sea.
Everyone has a purpose. Only I seem stubborn and ignorant.
I am different from them all. I am nursing at the Great Mother's breast.

TWENTY-ONE
Great excellence emerges from the Way. The Way is elusive and evasive.
Elusive and evasive, inside it are images. Evasive and elusive, inside it are objects.
Dark and obscure, inside it is the Essence. The Essence is real; inside it is the Truth.
From the ancient beginning to the present moment
its name has not been forgotten because it originates all things.
How do I know it originates all things? By this.

TWENTY-TWO
Give way to survive. Bend to become straight.
Empty to be filled. Wear out to be renewed.
Have little and gain. Have much and be confused.
Therefore sages embrace the One
and become examples for the universe.
They do not show off, and therefore are bright.
They are not self-righteous, and therefore are distinguished.
They do not boast, and so receive credit. They abandon pride, and so are long-lived.
Because they do not compete, no one competes with them.
The ancient proverb "Give way to survive" is not spoken in vain.
Use it and live long.

TWENTY-THREE
Be like Nature: use few words.
Heavy winds do not last all morning. A downpour does not last all day.
What creates them? Heaven and Earth.
If Heaven and Earth don't go on all day, why should you?
Those of the Way pursue the Way. The excellent pursue excellence. The lost follow Loss.
The Way embraces those who pursue the Way.
Excellence embraces those who pursue excellence. Loss embraces the lost.
If you do not trust, you will not be trusted.

TWENTY-FOUR
One standing on tiptoe is unsteady. One who strides cannot walk far.
One who shows off is not bright. One who is self-righteous is not distinguished.
One who boasts loses credit. One who is proud is short-lived.
The Way sees these as excess food and bodily tumors.
Those who pursue the Way have nothing to do with them.

TWENTY-FIVE
Before Heaven and Earth, there was something undivided and whole.
Silent and empty, it is independent and constant. Omnipresent, it is unceasing.
It may be the mother of all things. I do not know its name. I call it "the Way."
If forced to describe it, I call it "great." Being great, it flows ever-outward.
Flowing ever-outward, it reaches far. Reaching far, it returns again.
Thus, the Way is great. Heaven is great. Earth is great. Royal people, too, are great.
There are four great things in the universe and the royal person is one of them.
People model themselves after Earth. Earth models itself after Heaven.
Heaven models itself after the Way. The Way is self-so.

TWENTY-SIX
The heavy serves as foundation for the light. Serenity serves as center for activity.
That is why sages, when traveling, always keep their mind on their provisions.
Though there are many breath-taking scenes, they remain calm and unemotional.
How could a leader with great responsibility behave emotionally in public?
Behave frivolously and you will lose your foundation.
Behave emotionally and you will lose your center.

TWENTY-SEVEN
The excellent traveler leaves no tracks. The excellent speaker makes no slips.
The excellent counter uses no tallies. The excellent lock uses no bolt yet cannot be opened.
The excellent bind uses no knot yet cannot be unbound.
In like manner does the sage help save people: no one is abandoned.
In like manner does the sage help preserve things: nothing is wasted.
This is called "practicing the light."
Thus the good one is the bad one's teacher and the bad one is the good one's resource.
Whoever does not respect the teacher or value the resource is lost, no matter how intelligent.
This is the essential mystery.

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