守道, “Guarding the Tao.” The chapter shows how it is the guarding of the Tao that ensures a continuance of long life, with vigour and success. The abuse of it and other passages in our Ching helped on, I must believe, the later Taoist dreams about the elixir vitae and life-preserving pills. The whole of it, with one or two various readings, is found in Han Fei (VI 4 b–6 a), who speaks twice in his comments of the book.
Par. 1 has been translated, “In governing men and in serving Heaven, there is nothing like moderation.” But by “Heaven” there is not intended “the blue sky” above us, nor any personal Power above it, but the Tao embodied in our constitution, the heavenly element in our nature. The “moderation” is the opposite of what we call “living fast,” “burning the candle at both ends.”
In par. 2 I must read 復, instead of the more common 服. Its meaning is the same as in 復歸其明 in ch. 52, par. 5. Tê is not “virtue” in our common meaning of the term, but “the attributes of the Tao,” as almost always with Laozi. ↩
居位, “Occupying the Throne;” occupying it, that is, according to the Tao, noiselessly and purposelessly, so that the people enjoy their lives, free from all molestation seen and unseen.
Par. 1, that is, in the most quiet and easy manner. The whole of the chapter is given and commented on by Han Fei (VI 6 a–7 b); but very unsatisfactorily.
The more one thinks and reads about the rest of the chapter the more does he agree with the words of Julien:—“It presents the frequent recurrence of the same characters, and appears as insignificant as it is unintelligible, if we give to the Chinese characters their ordinary meaning.”—The reader will observe that we have here the second mention of spirits (the manes; Chalmers, “the ghosts;” Julien, les démons). See ch. 39.
Whatever Laozi meant to teach in par. 2, he laid in it a foundation for the superstition of the later and present Taoism about the spirits of the dead;—such as appeared a few years ago in the “tail-cutting” scare. ↩
謙德, “The Attribute of Humility;”—a favourite theme with Laozi; and the illustration of it from the low-lying stream to which smaller streams flow is also a favourite subject with him. The language can hardly but recall the words of a greater than Laozi:—“He that humbleth himself shall be exalted.” ↩
爲道, “Practising the Tao.” 貴道, “The value set on the Tao,” would have been a more appropriate title. The chapter sets forth that value in various manifestations of it.
Par. 1 For the meaning of 奧, see Confucian Analects, III ch. 13.
Par. 2 I am obliged to adopt the reading of the first sentence of this paragraph given by Huai-nan, 美言可以市尊, 美行可以加人;—see especially his quotation of it in XVIII 10 a, as from a superior man, I have not found his reading anywhere else.
Par. 3 is not easily translated, or explained. See the rules on presenting offerings at the court of a ruler or the kind, in vol. xxvii of the Sacred Books of the East, p. 84, note 3, and also a narrative in the Tso Chuan under the thirty-third year of duke Hsi. ↩
思始, “Thinking in the Beginning.” The former of these two characters is commonly misprinted 恩, and this has led Chalmers to mistranslate them by “The Beginning of Grace.” The chapter sets forth the passionless method of the Tao, and how the sage accordingly accomplishes his objects easily by forestalling in his measures all difficulties. In par. 1 the clauses are indicative, and not imperative, and therefore we have to supplement the text in translating in some such way, as I have done. They give us a cluster of aphorisms illustrating the procedure of the Tao “by contraries,” and conclude with one, which is the chief glory of Laozi’s teaching, though I must think that its value is somewhat diminished by the method in which he reaches it. It has not the prominence in the later teaching of Taoist writers which we should expect, nor is it found (so far as I know) in Chuang-tzŭ, Han Fei, or Huai-nan. It is quoted, however, twice by Liu Hsiang;—see my note on par. 2 of ch. 49.
It follows from the whole chapter that the Taoistic “doing nothing” was not an absolute quiescence and inaction, but had a method in it. ↩
守微, “Guarding the Minute.” The chapter is a continuation and enlargement of the last. Wu Chʽêng, indeed, unites the two, blending them together with some ingenious transpositions and omissions, which is not necessary to discuss. Compare the first part of par. 3 with the last part of par. 1, ch. 29. ↩
淳德, “Pure, unmixed Excellence.” The chapter shows the powerful and beneficent influence of the Tao in government, in contrast with the applications and contrivances of human wisdom. Compare ch. 19. My “simple and ignorant”
