Follow us on Facebook to receive important updates Follow us on Twitter to receive important updates Follow us on sina.com's microblogging site to receive important updates Follow us on Douban to receive important updates
Chinese Text Project
Back Forward
Daoism -> Zhuangzi -> Outer Chapters -> Knowledge Rambling in the North -> 1.2

黃帝Knowledge then asked Huang-Di, saying,
'I and you know this;
those two did not know it;
?」 which of us is right?'
黃帝 The reply was,
'Dumb Inaction is truly right;
Heedless Blurter has an appearance of being so;
I and you are not near being so.
(As it is said), "Those who know (the Dao) do not speak of it;
those who speak of it do not know it;"
聖人 and "Hence the sage conveys his instructions without the use of speech."
The Dao cannot be made ours by constraint;
its characteristics will not come to us (at our call).
Benevolence may be practised;
Righteousness may be partially attended to;
by Ceremonies men impose on one another.
Hence it is said,
"When the Dao was lost, its Characteristics appeared.
When its Characteristics were lost, Benevolence appeared.
When Benevolence was lost, Righteousness appeared.
When Righteousness was lost, Ceremonies appeared.
。』Ceremonies are but (the unsubstantial) flowers of the Dao, and the commencement of disorder."
Hence (also it is further said),
"He who practises the Dao, daily diminishes his doing.
He diminishes it and again diminishes it,
till he arrives at doing nothing.
。』Having arrived at this non-inaction, there is nothing that he does not do."
Here now there is something, a regularly fashioned utensil
- if you wanted to make it return to the original condition of its materials,
would it not be difficult to make it do so?
Could any but the Great Man accomplish this easily?
'Life is the follower of death,
and death is the predecessor of life;
but who knows the Arranger (of this connexion between them)?
The life is due to the collecting of the breath.
When that is collected, there is life;
when it is dispersed, there is death.
Since death and life thus attend on each other,
why should I account (either of) them an evil?
'Therefore all things go through one and the same experience.
(Life) is accounted beautiful because it is spirit-like and wonderful,
and death is accounted ugly because of its foetor and putridity.
But the foetid and putrid is transformed again into the spirit-like and wonderful,
and the spirit-like and wonderful is transformed again into the foetid and putrid.
Hence it is said,
天下。』 "All under the sky there is one breath of life,
聖人。」 and therefore the sages prized that unity."'


Enjoy this site? Please help.Site design and content copyright 2006-2024. When quoting or citing information from this site, please link to the corresponding page or to https://ctext.org. Please note that the use of automatic download software on this site is strictly prohibited, and that users of such software are automatically banned without warning to save bandwidth. 沪ICP备09015720号-3Comments? Suggestions? Please raise them here.