Tao Te Ching (Le Guin Translation) : A Book About the Way and the Power of the Way

Notes
Concerning This Version This is a rendition, not a translation. I do not know any Chinese. I could approach the text at all only because Paul Carus, in his 1898 translation of the Tao Te Ching, printed the Chinese text with each character followed by a transliteration and a translation. My gratitude to him is unending. To have the text thus made accessible was not only to have a Rosetta Stone for the book itself, but also to have a touchstone for comparing other English translations one with another. If I could focus on which word the translators were interpreting, I could begin to understand why they made the choice they did. I could compare various interpretations and see why they varied so tremendously; could see how much explanation, sometimes how much bias, was included in the translation; could discover for myself that several English meanings might lead me back to the same Chinese word. And, finally, for all my ignorance of the languag... (From : TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)

Book 2, Chapter 81 : Telling it True
True words aren’t charming, charming words aren’t true. Good people aren’t contentious, contentious people aren’t good. People who know aren’t learned, learned people don’t know. Wise souls don’t hoard; the more they do for others the more they have, the more they give the richer they are. The Way of heaven profits without destroying. Doing without outdoing is the Way of the wise. The next little country might be so close the people could hear cocks crowing and dogs barking there, but they’d get old and die without ever having been there. (From : TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)

Book 2, Chapter 80 : Freedom
Let there be a little country without many people. Let them have tools that do the work of ten or a hundred, and never use them. Let them be mindful of death and disinclined to long journeys. They’d have ships and carriages, but no place to go. They’d have armor and weapons, but no parades. Instead of writing, they might go back to using knotted cords. They’d enjoy eating, take pleasure in clothes, be happy with their houses, devoted to their customs. (From : TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)

Book 2, Chapter 79 : Keeping the Contract
After a great enmity is settled some enmity always remains. How to make peace? Wise souls keep their part of the contract and don’t make demands on others. People whose power is real fulfill their obligations; people whose power is hollow insist on their claims. The Way of heaven plays no favorites. It stays with the good. (From : TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)

Book 2, Chapter 78 : Paradoxes
Nothing in the world is as soft, as weak, as water; nothing else can wear away the hard, the strong, and remain unaltered. Soft overcomes hard, weak overcomes strong. Everybody knows it, nobody uses the knowledge. So the wise say: By bearing common defilements you become a sacrificer at the altar of earth; by bearing common evils you become a lord of the world. Right words sound wrong. (From : TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)

What is Complete
The valley spirit never dies. Call it the mystery, the woman. The mystery, the Door of the Woman, is the root of earth and heaven. Forever this endures, forever. And all its uses are easy. (From : TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)

Being Different
How much difference between yes and no? What difference between good and bad? What the people fear must be feared. O desolation! Not yet, not yet has it reached its limit! Everybody’s cheerful, cheerful as if at a party, or climbing a tower in springtime. And here I sit unmoved, clueless, like a child, a baby too young to smile. Forlorn, forlorn. Like a homeless person. Most people have plenty. I’m the one that’s poor, a fool right through. Ignorant, ignorant. Most people are so bright. I’m the one that’s dull. Most people are so keen. I don’t have the answers. Oh, I’m desolate, at sea, adrift, without harbor. Everybody has something to do. I’m the clumsy one, out of place. I’m the diffe... (From : TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)

Daring to Do
Brave daring leads to death. Brave caution leads to life. The choice can be the right one or the wrong one. Who will interpret the judgment of heaven? Even the wise soul finds it hard. The way of heaven doesn’t compete yet wins handily, doesn’t speak yet answers fully, doesn’t summon yet attracts. It acts perfectly easily. The net of heaven is vast, vast, wide-meshed, yet misses nothing. (From : TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)

Hardness
Living people are soft and tender. Corpses are hard and stiff. The ten thousand things, the living grass, the trees, are soft, pliant. Dead, they’re dry and brittle. So hardness and stiffness go with death; tenderness, softness, go with life. And the hard sword fails, the stiff tree’s felled. The hard and great go under. The soft and weak stay up. (From : TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)

Lowdown
Lakes and rivers are lords of the hundred valleys. Why? Because they’ll go lower. So they’re the lords of the hundred valleys. Just so, a wise soul, wanting to be above other people, talks to them from below and to guide them follows them. And so the wise soul predominates without dominating, and leads without misleading. And people don’t get tired of enjoying and praising one who, not competing, has in all the world no competitor. (From : TheAnarchistLibrary.org.)