Two

ACTIVATING THE GENUINE

“ACTIVATING THE Genuine” is the second of the eight “root” or foundational chapters of the text and serves as a companion to chapter 1, “Originating in the Way,” in its overarching cosmology and self-cultivation themes. While “Originating in the Way” is very much indebted to the Laozi, “Activating the Genuine” is thoroughly steeped in the Zhuangzi, three of whose authorial voices recognized by A. C. Graham are powerfully represented in its pages.¹

All the principal themes of chapter 2 are found in the Zhuangzi, although they are not, in all cases, intended to be understood in the same way as in the source text. These themes include cosmogony, the precariousness of life, the existence of archaic utopias governed by spiritually perfected sage-rulers, the devolution of history and the degradation of spiritual realization that have occurred over time, the nature of perfected human beings, the Way as the source of the entire universe, the spiritual perfection of sages who through apophatic inner cultivation return to the wellsprings of the spirit that lie deep within human nature, and the importance of the right balance of nature and destiny in the human ability to attain sage-rulership and spiritual fulfillment.

The Chapter Title

The title of this chapter is “Chu zhen” , which we translate as “Activating the Genuine.” The word chu is a verb meaning “to begin,” “to undertake,” “to move,” and “to set in motion.”² “To activate” also falls within this range of meanings and best fits the current context, because the chapter assumes that the reader will actively pursue a program of self-cultivation whose ultimate goal is realizing zhen. Zhen is a noun and an adjective meaning “real” or “genuine.” The “genuine” of the title is one of a number of metaphors used in the chapter to refer to the dao, or Way, and its various aspects. (Others include the Unhewn, the Great Clod, and the Great Ancestor.) In this context, the Genuine is the deepest layer of our intrinsic nature, that which is grounded in the Way itself. To activate it is to attain Potency. The Way lies in all of us as the ground of our existence but usually remains outside our awareness because human beings have been led astray by their senses into desiring material things and power and fame. By following such apophatic inner-cultivation practices as outlined in the Zhuangzi and other early sources, like “Inward Training” (Nei ye) in the Guanzi, human beings are able to realize the Way in terms of their concrete daily experiences. To do this is to “Activate the Genuine.” The term zhen also occurs in the compound zhenren “Genuine Persons.” In earlier Daoist lore and in the text of the Huainanzi itself, three paragons of human perfection are described in terms that overlap and are to some extent interchangeable: the sage (shengren), the Perfected (zhiren), and the Genuine (zhenren). All are people who have discovered the Way that lies within them.

Summary and Key Themes

The principal themes of this chapter are various aspects of Potency and its attainment. As such, they complement the principal themes in chapter 1, which explore the nature of the Way and how it operates in the world. These themes in chapter 2 are the nature of human perfection, its different categories, the methods to attain it, its role in rulership, the tendency of human beings and human societies to fall away from it, and how attaining it relates to fate. Chapter 2, however, may be best known for its extended analysis of explicit stages of cosmogony that is essentially a detailed commentary on the famous infinite regress of stages of cosmogony from Zhuangzi’s “Qiwulun.”³ The crucial difference is that while the author of chapter 2 of the Zhuangzi is satirizing the attempt to ascertain a cosmogony (“there is not yet having begun to have not yet beginning,” and so on), the authors of chapter 2 of the Huainanzi see these mock stages as real stages of a cosmogonic process and attempt to specify the conditions of each stage. Rarely in the history of Chinese philosophy— or of any major world philosophy—has the first commentary on a set of ideas been so diametrically opposed to the original author’s intended meaning. This passage is important, therefore, because it provides the oldest extant attempt by classical Chinese thinkers to detail a cosmogony in philosophical terms.⁴

The chapter moves on in section 2.2 to musings on the relativity and brevity of human existence that are variations on themes in the inner chapters of the Zhuangzi, especially chapters 2 and 6. This passage’s debt to the Zhuangzi extends to using the image of the Great Clod as a metaphor for Earth and reflecting on the strange quasi reality of dreams, substituting a man’s transforming into a tiger and eating his brother for the Zhuangzi’s butterfly dream. The point of the section is that life is precarious and perspectives constantly change. Hence our most profound attachment, self-identity, is far from fixed and secure in a world of constant change.

The rulership of spiritually perfected human beings in a hoary past is first broached in the next passage (2.3), one reminiscent of the ideal primitive society envisioned in chapters 8 through 11 of the Zhuangzi. The Huainanzi’s version contains a significant difference, however: the rulers are not reluctant minimalists, as in the Zhuangzi, but are mystically adept sages engaged in government. The authors of the Huainanzi wish to emphasize that despite its simple and impoverished appearance, the primitive state they envision is a society rich in a harmony that transcends material concerns. This theme reemerges at the end of the chapter.

Notions of human perfection loom large in “Activating the Genuine.” This theme is pursued in considerable detail in sections 2.4 through 2.6, beginning with a description of a group of adepts simply referred to as “the Perfected” (zhiren). These are rare human beings who have directly experienced the Way and carry it with them throughout their daily activities. Whether in comfortable or in difficult straits, they never lose their awareness of the Way, which is a constant within them just as the pine and cypress trees retain their foliage through the cold winter months as well as the warm summers.⁵ They remain indifferent to beauty of form and music, riches and high station, because the Way is present in them despite all these temptations and transformations. They are like the luster of the jade of Kunlun, which can withstand three days and nights in a charcoal-fired oven without being diminished one iota. They thus maintain a profound awareness of the Way and remain unhindered by physical or geographical limitations.

Because of the centrality of the Way in the phenomenal world, the sages (shengren) seek the Way that lies within them by entrusting their spirits to a deep inner realm called the “Numinous Storehouse” and by “peering into Dark Obscurity.” Thus experiencing the Way, they use it without using it; they know of it without objectifying it. By doing this, they “activate the Genuine” within themselves. As explained in sections 2.7 and 2.8, when sages depart from the world, they retreat into an introvertive mystical experience that derives from turning consciousness completely inward and withdrawing to “wander outside the dust and dirt and freely roam in the activity of the effortless.” As we read in 2.9:

For this reason, sages inwardly cultivate the techniques of the Way and do not adorn themselves externally with Humaneness and Rightness. They are unaware of the demands of the ears and eyes and wander in the harmony of Quintessential Spirit.

This is to experience what is called “Potency.”

People who fall away from the Way and those who have never realized it are said to “lack the Utmost Essence internally” (2.9). When they perceive and interact with the phenomenal world, they cannot avoid becoming enslaved to material things. The psychospiritual devolution of individual consciousness is paralleled in the historical devolution of human society. When the Way and Potency are abandoned, Humaneness and Rightness are established and human society is on the path of losing the unitary consciousness of the sage and thus headed for ruin. The authors of chapter 2 trace this decline from an “age of Utmost Potency” when sages governed in accord with the Way, when all people existed together in a harmonious union and all things flourished, through the times of Fuxi, the Divine Farmer, and the houses of Xia and Zhou, down to the decadent present age (2.10).

The remedy for this disorder is the “learning of the sages,” which seeks to return human nature to its origins and the mind to its inherent emptiness in order to counteract “the vulgar learning of the age” that destroys Potency and intrinsic nature, vexes the Five Orbs, and belabors perception with external things (2.10). Particularly singled out as examples of this vulgar learning are Confucians, who seek nothing but fame for themselves and obsess over the picky minutiae of morally hollow values (2.12). In contrast to this inferior learning, the authors of “Activating the Genuine” assert that true contentment does not lie in these external things but in the internal satisfaction of wandering carefree at the boundaries of Something and Nothing, of life and death.

To the authors of chapter 2, all humans possess innate natures that contain the tendencies of the senses to clearly perceive their sense objects. Only sages use their nature to cultivate their innermost potential. How do they do this? They work with the spirit, the basis of consciousness which in turn is the storehouse of the mind. Its tendency to be still and calm is disrupted by desires caused by the senses’ engagement with the many and various objects of the world. Sages discipline their senses and thoughts through an apophatic process of meditation in which they empty out the contents of consciousness until they can reconnect with the clear, bright, and tranquil spirit. With the spirit now present in their consciousness, they are able to mirror all external things with perfect clarity and not be enticed by sensory pleasures and self-aggrandizing goals. In so doing, they are united with the Way. Thus even if they were offered possession of the entire world and were widely praised, they would have no desire for such worldly things.

In section 2.12, the authors of “Activating the Genuine” criticize the disciples of Confucius and Mozi, who teach the techniques of Humaneness and Rightness yet cannot personally practice their own teachings. In contrast, when adepts break through to their own basic nature through the practice of apophatic inner cultivation, Humaneness and Rightness spontaneously result. This is the Way of the Genuine: they cannot be lured by profit, beauty, wisdom, and courage. Such rare cultivated human beings are conjoined with the Way even as they interact in the human realm. Only through inner cultivation are they truly able to govern the world.

Human nature is nourished by tranquillity; Potency is attained through emptiness; when external things do not disturb our internal realization of spirit, our nature attains suitable and harmonious expression in the world. Regrettably, many disturbances to our consciousness make this kind of realization very difficult to attain. Worries are generated daily by common occurrences so that our attention becomes absorbed in petty things and misses the significant ones. The spirit is easy to muddy and difficult to clarify. If even petty things disturb it, how much worse is it when the entire age disturbs the spirit? Under these circumstances, “How difficult it is to achieve even a moment of equanimity!”

In the chapter’s concluding section (2.14), the authors admit that the ability to govern sagaciously depends not only on how the ruler cultivates his nature but also on the times in which he lives. In ancient times of great Potency, even hermits were able to attain their sagely Way. In the evil times of the Xia dynasty when royal cruelty was rampant and the natural world was in disarray, history recorded no sages, not because there were none but because the conditions did not allow them to achieve their Ways. So embodying the Way does not rest entirely with a person’s effort, it also depends on the era in which he lives. Thus even though the great sages of the past were able to nourish and realize the deepest aspects of their natures, the very fact that they were able to govern was their destiny. Only when nature meets destiny can it be effective.

Sources

As mentioned earlier, the principal source for “Activating the Genuine” is the Zhuangzi, whose vision of spiritual perfection is taken directly from the inner chapters of that work attributable to Zhuang Zhou himself. The apophatic techniques it suggests to achieve that spiritual perfection derive ultimately from Guanzi’s “Inward Training.” The ideal Daoist utopias of chapter 2 are closely reminiscent of those in the “Primitivist” chapters (8–11) of the Zhuangzi. The overall vision of sage-rulership in chapter 2 of the Huainanzi seems to owe much to the “Syncretist” final stratum of the Zhuangzi (12–15, 33), which advocates government led by rulers who have perfected themselves through Daoist inner-cultivation methods. Although phrases, paraphrases, and passages from the Zhuangzi abound in “Activating the Genuine,” they are never attributed or often understood in precisely the same sense as they are in the Zhuangzi (for example, the cosmogonic regress that begins this chapter). This indicates that the text of the Zhuangzi was well known at Liu An’s court but was not fixed into a final form or regarded as canonical by the authors who toiled there. It was influential but not canonical like the Laozi,⁶ direct quotations from which are invariably attributed to their source.⁷ When material that we now find in the extant Zhuangzi is used in the Huainanzi, it is virtually never attributed to the Zhuangzi.⁸

The Chapter in the Context of the Huainanzi as a Whole

Chapter 2 is based primarily on the Zhuangzi, whereas chapter 1 is based primarily on the Laozi. chapter 2 also focuses on Potency, complementing the first chapter’s focus on the Way. The visions of human perfection through the attainment of this Potency resonate throughout the text, especially in chapters 7, 8, 12, and 14. Chapter 7, “The Quintessential Spirit,” seems so close to this chapter in its vocabulary and concern for attaining spiritual perfection and its indebtedness to the Zhuangzi that it might have been written by the same hand. The concept of rulership by sages who cultivated themselves according to the apophatic inner-cultivation practices discussed in chapter 2 also informs other chapters throughout the work. The theme that the sage, however cultivated, cannot arise within a society unless the time is right is a frequent refrain in the text—for example, in 6.9, 8.6, 10.82, and 19.5.

The juxtaposition of “Originating in the Way” and “Activating the Genuine” at the beginning of the Huainanzi appears to have been a deliberate attempt to privilege not only their arguments but also their primary sources, the Laozi and the Zhuangzi, as linked foundations for cosmology and self-cultivation in the entire work. We find another reflection of this linkage in chapter 12, “Responses of the Way,” which contains more than fifty short illustrative narratives, almost every one of which is capped by a quotation from the Laozi. About 20 percent of the material in the illustrative narratives themselves is closely similar or parallel to passages in the Zhuangzi.⁹ This heavy reliance on the Laozi and Zhuangzi materials seems deliberate, especially when combined with the following comment on chapter 12, “Responses of the Way,” in the Huainanzi’s postface (chapter 21, “An Overview of the Essentials”): “‘Responses of the Way’ . . . investigates the reversals of ill and good fortune, benefit and harm, testing and verifying them according to the techniques of Lao and Zhuang.”¹⁰ [21/225/19–20]

Thus the Zhuangzi seems to be one of the main sources for this chapter’s vision of the attainment of Potency and human perfection through apophatic inner-cultivation practices, a vision that the authors link to chapter 1’s cosmology of the Way based on the Laozi. When seen in light of this juxtaposition of the first two chapters of the Huainanzi, the reference in “An Overview of the Essentials” to “the techniques of Lao and Zhuang” may provide evidence of the authors’ attempt to build a new—or reflect an extant—intellectual tradition.

 

Harold D. Roth

 

1. These three voices are the authentic writings of Zhuang Zhou, the “Primitivist,” and the “Syncretist.” The Zhuangzi is a layered text, written by several hands over a period of time, and some of its latest portions might be roughly contemporaneous with the Huainanzi. See Angus C. Graham, “How Much of Chuang Tzu Did Chuang Tzu Write?” in A Companion to Angus C. Graham’s Chuang Tzu: The Inner Chapters, by Harold D. Roth, Monographs of the Society for Asian and Comparative Philosophy, no. 20 (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 2003), 58–102. Indeed, the text may have been edited into something like its received form at the court of Huainan; see Harold D. Roth, “Who Compiled the Chuang Tzu?” in Chinese Texts and Philosophical Contexts: Essays Dedicated to Angus C. Graham, ed. Henry Rosemont Jr. (La Salle, Ill.: Open Court Press, 1991), 79–128.

2. Grand dictionnaire Ricci de la langue chinoise, 7 vols. (Paris: Institut Ricci, 2001), 2:109, lists the primary meanings of chu as “commencer, entreprendre; bouger, mettre en movement.”

3. Charles LeBlanc, “From Cosmology to Ontology Through Resonance: A Chinese Interpretation of Reality,” in Beyond Textuality: Asceticism and Violence in Anthropological Interpretation, ed. Gilles Bibeau and Ellen Corin (Paris: Mouton de Bruyter, 1995), 57–77; Michael Puett, “Violent Misreadings: The Hermeneutics of Cosmology in the Huainanzi,” Bulletin of the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities 72 (2000): 29–47.

4. A few texts of the Warring States period, including the Chu silk manuscript and the Guodian text Taiyi sheng shui (The Grand One Generates Water), contain what might be termed mythological cosmogonies.

5. See 2.4. This is evidently an allusion to Analects 9.27: “The Master said, ‘When the year becomes cold, then we know how the pine and the cypress are the last to lose their leaves.’” The next line in the Huainanzi makes explicit the comparison with the sage.

6. Roth, “Who Compiled the Chuang Tzu?”

7. As we point out in both the general introduction and the introduction to chap. 12, the Laozi is one of only four sources that are almost invariably attributed in the Huainanzi; the others are the Odes, the Documents, and the Changes.

8. If the Zhuangzi had been edited into something like its final form before or during the decade in which the Huainanzi was being composed (150–140 B.C.E.), it seems likely that it would have been considered a canonical source by the Huainan masters, given its influence in some of the Huainanzi chapters, particularly 2 and 7. Had that been the case, it then seems likely that passages quoted from the Zhuangzi would have been attributed to their source. The lack of such attribution is one reason that I concluded that the fifty-two-chapter Zhuangzi that represented the text in its most complete original form was compiled at Liu An’s court after the Huainanzi was completed in 139 B.C.E. See n. 1.

9. See the introduction to chap. 12.

10. That is, Laozi and Zhuangzi.

Two

2.1

[1] There was a beginning.

[2] There was not yet beginning to have “There was a beginning.”

[3] There was not yet beginning to have “There was not yet beginning to have ‘There was a beginning.’”

[4] There was Something.

[5] There was Nothing.

[6] There was not yet beginning to have “There was Nothing.”

[7] There was not yet beginning to have “There was not yet beginning to have ‘There was Nothing.’”¹

 

[1] What is called “There was a beginning”:

Pell-mell: not yet manifest;

buds beginning, sprouts emerging;

not yet having shape or outline.

Undifferentiated, wriggling, it is on the verge of desiring to be born and flourish but not yet forming things and categories.

 

[2] [What is called] There was not yet beginning to have “There was a beginning”:

The qi of Heaven beginning to descend;

the qi of Earth beginning to ascend;

yin and yang mixing and meeting;

mutually roaming freely and racing to fill the interstices of time and space,

enveloping Potency and engulfing harmony;

densely intermingling;

desiring to connect with things but not yet having formed boundaries and bodies.

 

[3] [What is called] There was not yet beginning to have “There was not yet beginning to have ‘There was a beginning’”:

Heaven engulfing harmony but not yet letting it fall;

Earth embracing the vital energy but not yet letting it rise;

empty and still,

inert and isolated,

Nothing and Something were a matched pair.

The vital energy pervaded and greatly penetrated Dark Obscurity. [2/10/14–19]

 

[4] [What is called] “There is Something”:

Speaks of the flourishing of the myriad things. The roots, trunks, branches, and leaves were verdant and abundant, bountiful and brilliant. [Insects] wriggled and moved, crawled and walked, crept and gasped. [All these things] could be touched, grasped, and enumerated.

 

[5] [What is called] “There is Nothing”:

Look at it; you do not see its form;

listen to it; you do not hear its sound.

Reach for it, and you cannot grasp it;

gaze at it, and you cannot fathom it.

Collected and fused,

floodlike and expansive,

It is something whose brilliance cannot be penetrated by any instrument.

 

[6] [What is called] There was not yet beginning to have “There was Nothing”:

Encloses Heaven and Earth,

smelts the myriad things,

greatly penetrates the chaotic and obscure

Deeply impenetrable, vast and great, it can have no exterior;

as fine as the tip of a hair, as sharp as a point, it can have no interior.

A space without containment, it generated the root of Something and Nothing.

 

[7] [What is called] “There was not yet beginning to have ‘There was not yet beginning to have ‘There was nothing.’”

Heaven and Earth had not yet split apart;

yin and yang had not yet been carved out;

the four seasons had not yet differentiated;

the myriad things had not yet been generated.

Enormously peaceful and tranquil,

silently clear and limpid,

none saw its form.

It was like Resplendent Light asking Not Something, who was withdrawn and had lost himself: “I can [conceive of] having Nothing, but I cannot [conceive of] not having Nothing. If I could reach [the state of] Not Nothing, how could even the most marvelous surpass this?”² [2/10/21–27]

2.2

The Great Clod

loads me with a body,

burdens me with a life,

eases me with old age,

rests me with death.

That I found it good to live is the very reason why I find it good to die.

[You can] hide a boat in a ravine,

hide a fishing net in a marsh:³

people call this “secure.”

However, in the middle of the night, a strong man can put [the boat] on his back and run off with it, and the sleeper does not know about it. It is appropriate to hide small things within the large. But if you do so, your thing just might vanish from you. But if you hide the world in the world, then there is nothing that can conceal its form. [2/10/29–2/11/2]

How can it be said that things are not grandly indiscriminate? You once happen on the shape of a human being and are especially pleased. But humanity has a thousand alterations and ten thousand transformations, never reaching its limit, wearing out and then renewing; should not your joy be incalculable?⁴ Compare it to a dream:

In a dream we become a bird and fly into the sky.

In a dream we become a fish and disappear into the deep.

When we are dreaming, we do not know it is a dream; only after we awaken do we realize it is a dream. Only when we have a great awakening do we realize that this present moment is the ultimate dream.⁵ In the beginning before I was born, how could I have known the joy of being alive? Now in this moment when I have not yet died, how can I know that death is not also joyful?

In ancient times, Gongniu Ai suffered from a cyclical illness:⁶ every seven days he would transform into a tiger. His older brother opened his door and entered to spy on him, and when he did, the tiger snatched and killed him. Thus,

his [outer] patterns and markings became those of a beast;

his fingernails and teeth shifted and changed;

his consciousness and mind altered;

his spirit and form transformed.

When he was a tiger, he did not know that he had ever been a human being. When he was a human being, he knew nothing about being a tiger. These two alternated in opposition, yet each found joy in the form it took. Cleverness and the confusion displace [each other] endlessly, and who knows from what they spring?⁷ [2/11/4–10]

When water approaches winter, it congeals and becomes ice.

When ice welcomes spring, it melts and becomes water.

Ice and water shift and change in the former and latter positions as if they were running around in an eternal circle; which has the time to know bitterness or joy? Thus

The body is damaged by the privations of cold, heat, aridity, and dampness: the body weakens, yet the spirit remains strong.

The spirit is damaged by the distress of joy, anger, rumination, and worry: the spirit becomes exhausted, yet the body has reserves.

Therefore,

when you skin a worn-out horse after it dies, it is like desiccated wood;

when you skin a young dog after it dies, it still twitches.

Thus,

those who have been murdered, their ghosts haunt;

those who reach their [allotted] time, their spirits go silent.⁸

Neither of these has their spirit and form expire simultaneously.

In the use of their mind, sages lean on their natures and rely on their spirits. They [nature and spirit] sustain each other, and [so sages] attain their ends and beginnings. Thus when they sleep, they do not dream, and when they awaken, they are not sad. [2/11/12–16]

2.3

Among the people of antiquity were some who situated themselves in the chaotic and obscure. Their spirit and vital energy did not leak out to their exteriors. The myriad things were peaceful and dispassionate and so became contented and tranquil. The qi of [baleful comets such as] “magnolias,” “lances,” “colliders,” and “handles”⁹ was in every case blocked and dissipated so that they were unable to cause harm. At that time, the myriad peoples were wild and untamed, not knowing East from West;

they roamed with their mouths full,

drummed on their bellies in contentment.

In copulation they followed the harmony of Heaven;

in eating they accorded with the Potency of Earth.

They did not use minute precedent or “right and wrong” to surpass one another. Vast and boundless, this is what we call “Grand Order.” And so those in high station

directed [ministers] on their left and right and did not pervert their natures;

possessed and pacified [the people] and did not compromise their Potency.

Thus,

Humaneness and Rightness were not proclaimed, and the myriad things flourished.

Rewards and punishments were not deployed, and all in the world were respected.

Their Way could give rise to great perfection, but it is difficult to find a quantitative measure for it. Thus,

Calculating by days there is not enough;

calculating by years there is surplus.¹⁰ [2/11/18–23]

Fish forget themselves in rivers and lakes.

Humans forget themselves in the techniques of the Way.¹¹

The Genuine of antiquity stood in the foundation of Heaven and Earth, were centered in uninterrupted roaming, embraced Potency, and rested in harmony. The myriad things were to them like smoke piling higher.¹² Which of them would willingly create discord in human affairs or use things to trouble their nature and destiny? [2/11/25–26]

2.4

The Way has both a warp and a weft linked together. [The Perfected] attain the unity of the Way and join with its thousand branches and ten thousand leaves. Thus

because they have it in high position, they can promulgate their decrees;

because they have it in low position, they can forget their baseness;

because they have it in poverty, they can take pleasure in their work;

because they have it in distress, they can be settled amid danger.

When the great cold arrives, frost and snow descend: only then do we understand the vigor of pine and cypress;¹³

Withstanding difficulties, walking into danger, with profit and harm arrayed before them: only then do we understand how sages do not lose the Way.

Thus those who are able to

wear on their heads the Great Circle [of Heaven] will traverse the Great Square [of Earth];

mirror Vast Purity will contemplate Great Luminosity;

stand amid Vast Peace will be situated in the great hall;

roam amid Dark Obscurity will have the same brilliance as the sun and moon.

Thus,

they take the Way as their pole;

Potency as their line;

Rites and Music as their hook;

Humaneness and Rightness as their bait;

they throw them into the rivers;

they float them into the seas.

Though the myriad things are boundless in numbers, which of them will they not possess? [2/11/28–2/12/4]

2.5

Even those who narrowly rely on skewed techniques, who control the human realm, who seek profit above and below according to the customs of the age in order to grope for and link together the subtleties of things: even such people will achieve their ambitions and fulfill their desires. How much more will this be so of those who embrace the precious Way, forget the [emotions associated with the] hepatic and choleric orbs, abandon hearing and seeing, float solitarily beyond the boundless and do not become embroiled with worldly things, who within linger in the realm of the Formless and harmonize with Heaven and Earth? [2/12/4–6]

For such people, they stop perception and embrace Vast Simplicity.

They view benefit and harm as dust and dirt,

view life and death as day and night.

Thus,

when their eyes see the form of the imperial chariot adorned with jade and ivory;

when their ears hear the sounds of “White Snow”¹⁴ and [the note] pure jue;¹⁵

these things are unable to disorder their spirit.

When they climb the thousand-ren gorge

or peer at a very steep cliff;

these are unable to disturb their harmony.

This is just like the jade of Bell Mountain:¹⁶ if you roast it in a charcoal furnace for three days and three nights, its color and luster will not alter. They [sages] have attained the Quintessence of Heaven and Earth.¹⁷

For these reasons,

if life is not enough to motivate them, how could benefit be enough to move them?

If death is not enough to stop them, how could harm be enough to frighten them?

They are clear about the division between life and death

and penetrate the distinction between benefit and harm.

Though you offer them the greatness of the world in exchange for a single hair from their arm, none of this will catch their attention. [2/12/8–12]

The significance of nobility and baseness to their persons is like the brief passing of a swift breeze.

The impact of blame and praise on their selves is like an encounter with mosquitoes and gnats. [2/12/14]

2.6

To grasp the intensely bright and not blacken it,

act with the perfectly pure and not sully it,

rest in profound obscurity and not darken it,

sit at the pivot of Heaven and not destroy it,

to be unobstructed by the Mengmen or Zhonglong mountains,¹⁸

unhindered by swift currents, deep chasms, or the depths of Lüliang,¹⁹

unimpeded by the obstructions of Taihang, Shijian, Feihu, or Gouwang.²⁰

Only those who embody the Way are able to not be defeated [by these things].

For these reasons, their persons reside on rivers and seas, and their spirits roam under the palace gateway.²¹ Had they not attained the One Source, how could they have reached this point? [2/12/14–18]

For these reasons, residing with the Perfected

makes families forget their poverty,

makes kings and dukes scorn honors and riches

and delight in poverty and baseness,

makes the brave deflate their anger

and makes the greedy diminish their desires.

They sit and do not teach;

they stand and do not dispute.

When they are empty, they go;

when they are full, they return.

Thus they do not speak and can quench others with harmony.

For these reasons, [those who embody] the Utmost Way take no action.

Now a dragon, then a snake,

they expand and contract,

coil and uncoil,

and alter and transform with the seasons.

Outside, they follow prevailing customs;

inside, they guard their nature.

Their ears and eyes are not dazzled.

Their thoughts and reflections are not entangled.

Those who in this way lodge their spirit maintain the simple in order to roam in vast purity, draw into compliance the myriad things, and cause the many excellences to germinate.

For these reasons,

the spirit will depart those who belabor their spirit;

the spirit will lodge with those who rest their spirit.

The Way emerges from the One Source, penetrates the Nine Gateways,²² is scattered through the Six Crossroads,²³ and is displayed in the domain of the boundless. It is still and silent and thereby empty and nonexistent. It is not that it acts on things; it is that things act on themselves. For these reasons, when affairs comply with the Way, it is not that the Way has accomplished them, but that the Way has impelled them.²⁴ [2/12/19–25]

2.7

That which Heaven overspreads,

that which Earth bears up,

that which is included in the six coordinates,

that which is animated by the yin and the yang;

that which is moistened by the rain and the dew;

that which is supported by the Way and its Potency:

These all are born from a single father and mother, and all partake of a single harmony.

For these reasons,

the locust and the elm, the orange and the grapefruit, together are brothers;

the You Miao [people] and the [people of] San Wei are joined as a single family.²⁵

When your eyes see the flight of wild geese and swans,

when your ears hear the sounds of the qin²⁶ and the se,²⁷

and your mind is in the midst of Yanmen,²⁸

Within your single person, your spirit divides and splits up within the six coordinates so that in a moment you travel ten million miles.²⁹

For these reasons,

when viewed from the perspective of their difference, [things as close as] the hepatic and choleric orbs can be as different as Hu [northern “barbarians”] and Yue [southern “barbarians”].

When viewed from the perspective of their similarities, the myriad things are a single set.³⁰

The Hundred Traditions³¹ have different theories, and each has its own origins. For example, the relationship of Mo[zi],³² Yang [Zhu],³³ Shen [Buhai],³⁴ and [Lord] Shang³⁵ to the Way of Governing is like that of an individual [umbrella] rib to the whole canopy and like that of an individual spoke to the whole chariot wheel. If you have any one of them, you can complete the number; if you are missing any one of them, it will not affect the utility [of the whole]. Each one thought that he alone had a monopoly [on true governing]; he did not understand the genuine disposition of Heaven and Earth. [2/12/27–2/13/6]

When a smith forges an implement and the metal flies out of the forge, it must be either an overflow or discard. When it hits the ground, it will harden and take the form of something. Although its shape may have some small use, it cannot be treasured as much as the Nine Tripods of the house of Zhou,³⁶ how much more the case when compared to the one who has molded them? And when compared to the Way, their distance is even greater. [2/13/8–10]

When the myriad things differentiate and branch off, when the hundred affairs proliferate and diverge, all have their foundation in a single root, despite their ten million branchings. Those that receive are not what gives [i.e., the Way]. What gives does not receive, and yet there is nothing it does not give. That of which there is nothing that it does not give is like thick rain clouds that accumulate, piling up and spreading they make rain, profoundly soaking the myriad things yet not getting wet themselves. [2/13/12–14]

A good archer has the standard of the sight and the target in the same way as the carpenter has the calibrations of the compass and the square. Each has ways of determining perfection. However, Xi Zhong³⁷ could not be Feng Meng,³⁸ and Zaofu³⁹ could not be Bo Le.⁴⁰ Each had articulated a single corner but did not comprehend the full domain of the myriad techniques.⁴¹ [2/13/16–17]

If you dye silk black in ferrous sulfate, it will become blacker than the ferrous sulfate;

if you dye [fabric] blue in indigo, it will become bluer than the indigo.⁴²

Ferrous sulfate is not black; indigo is not blue.⁴³

Although [the fabrics] have surpassed⁴⁴ their mother [i.e., the original dye], they are not able to transform back. What is the reason? This [would be] comparable to their [color’s] becoming fainter with every turn [in the dye bath].⁴⁵ How much more is this so of those things that have not yet begun to be fashioned and transformed by ferrous sulfate and indigo?⁴⁶ Even if you were to etch their transformations onto metal and stone, inscribe them onto bamboo and silk, how could we ever enumerate them? [2/13/19–21]

From this perspective, no thing is not generated from something, and the small and great roam as companions.

The tip of an autumn hair [may be minute], but slip it into space in which there is no gap and it becomes [in effect] enormous.

If you take the thinness of a reed and insert it into something where there is no crack, it becomes [in effect] bulky.

[That which] lacks [even] the fineness of an autumn hair or the thinness of a reed, [extending] unboundedly to the four end points, pervading the Limitless: nothing can stop or impede it. It is exquisitely refined and doubly marvelous. It lifts and lowers the myriad things, harmonizes the nine alterations and transformations: how can anything in Heaven and Earth suffice to explain it?

A fast wind can snap trees, yet it cannot pull out feathers or hair. From the height of a cloud terrace, a person who falls will break his spine and shatter his skull, but for a mosquito or a gnat, it is high enough to take flight from it. Now we, alike with centipedes and worms, mount the Mechanism of Heaven,⁴⁷ and we receive our form as part of the same set [of living things], but it is the things that fly and are light and that are tiny and minute that find [their form] sufficient to escape with their lives. How much more is this so for that which has no category? Looked at from this perspective, it is even more apparent that what has no form generates what has form. [2/13/23–28]

2.8

For these reasons, sages entrust their spirits to the Numinous Storehouse and return to the beginning of the myriad things.

They peer into Dark Obscurity

and listen to the soundless.

In the midst of Dark Obscurity, they alone see luminescence.

In the midst of the silent and still, they alone shine forth.

Their use of it is in not using it;

only by not using it are they able to use it.

Their knowing of it is in not knowing it;

only by not knowing it are they able to know it.

If Heaven were not stable, the sun and moon would have no support.

If Earth were not stable, the grasses and trees would have nowhere to be planted.

If what is established within your person is not tranquil, “that’s it!” and “that’s not!” cannot take form. For these reasons, only when there is a Genuine Person is there Genuine Knowledge. If what I grasp is not clear, how do I know that what I call knowledge is not ignorance? [2/14/1–5]

Now to accumulate wisdom and multiply generosity,

gather up love and concentrate kindness.

With a glorious reputation, love and protect the myriad people and hundred clans, causing them to be joyful and delight in their natures; this is Humaneness.

To achieve great merit,

establish an illustrious name,

support ruler and minister,

correct superiors and inferiors,

distinguish kin from stranger,

sort out the noble and the base,

preserve the endangered kingdoms,

continue the broken [ancestral] lines.

To break off the rebellious and control the disorderly, revive destroyed ancestral temples, and establish those with no descendants; this is Rightness.

To block off the nine orifices,

to store up the attention of the mind,

to discard hearing and vision,

to return to having no awareness,

to vastly wander outside the dust and dirt and freely roam in the activity of effortless, to inhale the yin and exhale the yang, and to completely harmonize with the myriad things; this is Potency.

For these reasons,

when the Way is scattered, there is Potency.

When Potency leaks away, there is Humaneness and Rightness.

When Humaneness and Rightness are established, the Way and its Potency are abandoned.⁴⁸ [2/14/7–11]

2.9

Take a tree of a hundred hand spans in diameter, cut it down, and make it into sacrificial goblets. You

engrave them with knives and awls,

sprinkle them with blue and yellow.

[They are] elaborately adorned and brilliantly inlaid,

[with] dragons, snakes, tigers, and leopards,

intricately finished with patterns and designs.

Yet as soon as one breaks, it [is discarded] in a ditch. Comparing a sacrificial goblet to what is discarded in the ditch, though as to ugliness and beauty they are different, yet in having lost the nature of wood, they are equal.

For this reason,

the words of one whose spirit pours away are elaborate;

the conduct of one whose Potency is blocked is artificial.

If you lack the Utmost Essence internally, yet perceive words and conduct externally, you will not be able to avoid becoming enslaved to material things. If in your choosing and rejecting your conduct is artificial, this is to seek Essence externally. If Essence leaks out completely but conduct is not curbed, this disturbs the mind and agitates the spirit, confusing and disordering the source.

What you preserve is not stable: outwardly you are steeped in the fashionable customs of the age.

Your mistakes are already made: inwardly your pure clarity is sullied.

Thus you are apprehensive to the last, never knowing a moment of contentment. [2/14/13–18] For this reason, sages inwardly cultivate the techniques of the Way and do not adorn themselves externally with Humaneness and Rightness. They are unaware of the demands⁴⁹ of the ears and eyes and wander in the harmony of the Quintessential Spirit.

Those who are so,

below survey the three springs,

above inspect the nine heavens,

broadly span the six coordinates,

bind and unite the myriad things,

Such are the wanderings of the sages.

The Genuine flow into utmost emptiness and wander in the wilds of extinction;

they ride the gryphon and follow the sphinx;⁵⁰

they gallop beyond the bounds [of the world];

and rest beneath the roof [of the cosmos].⁵¹

They use ten suns as a lamp and command the wind and rain.

They subjugate the Duke of Thunder,⁵²

employ Kuafu,⁵³

take Mi Fei⁵⁴ as a concubine,

take the Weaver Girl as a wife.⁵⁵

What between Heaven and Earth could be worthy of their ambition? Thus,

Emptiness and Nothingness are the lodging place of the Way;

equilibrium and simplicity are the basic fabric of the Way. [2/14/20–24]

When people belabor their spirits and disturb their essence, rationally searching for things externally, they all lose their spiritlike brilliance and expel it from its abode. Thus one who has frozen will use a double robe in spring, and one who has suffered heatstroke will hope for a cool breeze in autumn. When there is sickness within, it will always leave its complexion externally. The sweet osmanthus relieves cataracts;⁵⁶ the snail cures iritis; both these are medicines that can treat the eye. If people take these without cause, it will certainly obscure their vision. [2/14/26–2/15/1]

2.10

That by which the sages overawe the world has never been surpassed by the Genuine.

That by which the worthy condescend to the vulgar has never been noticed by the sages.

Now,

a puddle in an ox’s footprint will not have [even] a one-foot carp;

a piled-earth hillock will not have [even] a tree one fathom in height.⁵⁷

Why is this so? Because their limits are narrow and small and cannot accommodate what is grand and large. How much more is this true of what cannot envelope these very things? This is even further from the grandeur of mountains and abysses. When human beings grapple with the age, inevitably their form becomes entangled and their spirit depletes; thus they cannot avoid exhaustion. If I can be bound and harnessed, it is certainly because my destiny is grounded externally [to myself]. [2/15/1–4]

In an age of Utmost Potency, [people]

contentedly slept in boundless realms

and moved [between] and lodged in indeterminate dwellings.

They clasped Heaven and Earth and discarded the myriad things. They took primal chaos as their gnomon and floated freely in a limitless domain. For this reason, the sages [merely] inhaled and exhaled the qi of yin and yang, and none of the myriad living things failed to flourish as they acknowledged [the sages’] Potency in harmonious compliance. At this time nothing was directed or arranged; separately and autonomously [things] completed themselves. Mixed and merged, simple and undispersed, they blended into a unity, and the myriad things were greatly abundant. For this reason, even if you had the knowledge of [Archer] Yi there was nothing for which to use it.⁵⁸

When the age declined, in the reign of Fuxi, his Way was obscure and indistinct. He contained Potency and embraced harmony, broadcasting them subtly and comprehensively, yet even so knowledge first stirred and sprouted. [The people] all wanted to part from their childlike and ignorant mind and awareness appeared in the midst of Heaven and Earth; thus their Potency was vexed and could not be unified.

Coming to the age of the Divine Farmer and the Yellow Emperor,⁵⁹ they

split and sundered the Great Ancestor,

examining and directing Heaven and Earth,

enumerating the Nine Vacancies,

and demarcating the Nine Boundaries.⁶⁰

They clasped yin and yang,

kneaded the hard and the soft,

split the branches, and sorted the leaves.

The myriad things and hundred clans were each given structure and rule. At this, the myriad people all were alert and awake, and there were none who did not straighten up to listen and look. Thus they were orderly but could not be harmonized.

Coming down to the age of Kun Wu⁶¹ and the descendants of the Xia,

desires attached to things;

hearing and sight were lured outward,

[so that] nature and destiny lost their [proper] attainment.

Coming down to the house of Zhou, decadence dispersed simplicity; [people] deserted the Way for artifice; they were miserly of Potency in conduct; and cleverness and precedence sprouted. When the Zhou house declined, the kingly Way was abandoned. The Confucians and Mohists thus began enumerating their Ways and debating, dividing up disciples, and reciting. From then on, broad learning cast doubt on the sages; elaborate deceit tyrannized the masses. They played and sang and drummed and danced, embroidering the Odes and Documents to purchase fame and praise in the world. They

proliferated rituals of ascending and descending,

adorned costumes of aprons and caps.

The assembled masses were insufficient for the extremes of their alterations; the collected wealth [of the world] was insufficient to meet their expenses. At this, the myriad people first forgot the trail and abandoned the path; all wanted to practice their own knowledge and artifice, seeking to force conditions⁶² on the age and crookedly acquire fame and profit. For this reason, the common people were unleashed to profligacy and lost the root of the Great Ancestor. The [current] age being bereft of nature and destiny is the product of gradual decline; its origins are distant. [2/15/6–20]

For this reason,

the learning of the sage:

seeks to return nature to its origin

and to set the mind to roaming in emptiness.

The learning of the knowledgeable:

seeks to connect nature to the great expanse [of the world]

and to awaken to stillness and quiescence.

The vulgar learning of the age is not like this.

It tugs at Potency

and drags at nature.

Internally it vexes the five orbs;

externally it belabors the ears and eyes.

Then one begins to pick at the wriggling and curling minutiae of things; moving and swaying with Humaneness, Rightness, Ritual, and Music. You lord your conduct and project your cunning over the world, seeking title, fame, and reputation from the age. This I am too ashamed to do. [2/15/22–25]

For this reason, having the world does not compare with being content. Being content does not compare with wandering carefree through the ends and beginnings of things and penetrating the frontier between Something and Nothing. [Those who are] thus

are not more encouraged if the whole age praises them;

are not more melancholy if the whole age contradicts them.

They are firm in the boundary between life and death and comprehend the guiding pattern of honor and disgrace. Though raging fires and flooding waters wreak havoc throughout the world, their spirit remains undiminished in their breasts. Those who are like this view the realm of the world as flying feathers and floating twigs. How could they be willing to busily make things their affairs? [2/16/1–4]

2.11

The nature of water is clear, yet soil sullies it.

The nature of humans is tranquil, yet desires disorder it.

What human beings receive from Heaven are [the tendencies]

for ears and eyes [to perceive] colors and sounds,

for mouth and nose [to perceive] fragrances and tastes,

for flesh and skin [to perceive] cold and heat.

The instinctive responses are the same in everyone, but some penetrate to spiritlike illumination, and some cannot avoid derangement and madness. Why is this? That by which they [these tendencies] are controlled is different.

Thus,

the spirit is the source of consciousness. If the spirit is clear, then consciousness is illumined.

Consciousness is the storehouse of the mind. If consciousness is impartial, then the mind is balanced.

No one can mirror himself in flowing water, but [he can] observe his reflection in standing water because it is still.

No one can view his form in raw iron, but [he can] view his form in a clear mirror because it is even.

Only what is even and still can thus give form to the nature and basic tendencies of things. Viewed from this perspective, usefulness depends on what is not used. Thus when the empty room is pristine and clear, good fortune will abide there.⁶³

If the mirror is bright, dust and dirt cannot obscure it.

If the spirit is clear, lusts and desires cannot disorder it.

To work at reclaiming the Quintessential Spirit once it has already overflowed externally is to lose the root and seek it in the branches. If external and internal do not tally and you desire to interact with things; if you cover your mysterious light and seek to know [things] with the ears and eyes; this is to discard your brilliance and follow your blindness. This is called “losing the Way.” When the mind goes somewhere, the spirit swiftly lodges there. By returning the spirit to emptiness, this lodging dissolves and is extinguished.⁶⁴ This is the wandering of the sage. [2/16/6–15]

Thus those in antiquity who ordered the world invariably penetrated the basic tendencies of nature and destiny. Their taking and giving were not necessarily the same, [but] they were as one in uniting with the Way.

You do not refrain from wearing fur in summer because you cherish it but because it is too hot for your person.

You do not refrain from using a fan in winter to conserve it but because it is too cold for comfort.

The sages

assess their bellies and eat;

measure their frames and dress.

They compose themselves, that is all; from whence can the mind of greed and dissipation arise?

Thus,

a person who can have the world is invariably someone who will not strive for it.

A person who can possess fame and praise is invariably someone who will not scurry in search of them.

The sage has broken through to it. Having broken through to it, the mind of lust and desire is external [to him]. [2/16/17–21]

2.12

The disciples of Confucius and Mozi all teach the techniques of Humaneness and Rightness to the age, yet they do not avoid destruction. If they personally cannot practice [their teachings], how much less may those they teach?⁶⁵ Why is this? Because their Way is external. To ask the branches to return to the roots: if even Xu You could not do it, how much less the common people? If you genuinely break through to the basic tendencies of nature and destiny, so that Humaneness and Rightness adhere [to your actions], how then can choosing and discarding suffice to confuse your mind? [2/16/23–25]

If

the spirit has no obstruction and the mind has no burden,

if they are pervasively comprehending and minutely penetrating,

calm and quiescent and free of tasks,

without any congealing or stagnancy,

attentive in empty stillness,

then

power and profit cannot lure them;

logicians cannot delight them;

sounds and colors cannot corrupt them;

beauty cannot debauch them;

wisdom cannot move them;

courage cannot frighten them;

This is the Way⁶⁶ of the Genuine. Those who are like this shape and forge the myriad things and in their being human are conjoined with what creates and transforms.

Amid Heaven and Earth,

in space and time,

nothing can destroy or impede them.

What generates life is not life;

what transforms things is not transformation.⁶⁷

Their spirits:

cross Mount Li or the Taihang [Mountains] and have no difficulty;

enter the Four Seas or the Nine Rivers and cannot be trapped;

lodge in narrow defiles and cannot be obstructed;

spread across the realm of Heaven and Earth and are not stretched.

If you do not penetrate to this [point],

though your eyes enumerate a group of one thousand sheep,

though your ears distinguish the tones of the eight winds,

your feet perform the “Northern Bank”⁶⁸ dance;

your hands execute the “Green Waters”⁶⁹ rhythm;

your intelligence encompasses Heaven and Earth;

your brilliance illuminates the sun and moon;

your disputations unknot linked jewels;

your words add luster to jade and stone;

These will still be of no aid to governing the world. [2/16/27–2/17/6]

2.13

Tranquillity and calmness are that by which the nature is nourished.

Harmony and vacuity are that by which Potency is nurtured.

When what is external does not disturb what is internal, then our nature attains what is suitable to it.

When the harmony of nature is not disturbed, then Potency will rest securely in its position.

Nurturing life so as to order the age,

embracing Potency so as to complete our years,

This may be called being able to embody the Way.

Those who are like this:

Their blood and pulse have no sluggishness or stagnation;

their five orbs have no diseased qi;

calamity and good fortune cannot perturb them;

blame and praise cannot settle on them like dust;

thus can they reach the ultimate. [However,] if you do not have the age, how can you succeed? If you have the right character but do not meet your time, you will not even be able to safeguard your person. How much less so one who is without the Way! [2/17/8–11]

Moreover, the instinctive responses of human beings are for

the ears and eyes to respond to stimulus and movement,

the mind and awareness to recognize worry and happiness.

The hands and feet to rub at pains and itches and to avoid cold and heat.

This is how we interact with things.

If a wasp or a scorpion stings your finger, your spirit cannot remain placid.

If a mosquito or a gadfly bites your flesh, your nature cannot remain settled.

The worries and calamities that come to disturb your mind are not limited to the poisonous bites of wasps or scorpions or the annoyance of mosquitoes and gadflies, yet you want to remain tranquil and vacuous. How can it be done?

The ears of one whose eyes are examining the tip of an autumn hair will not hear the sound of thunder and lightning.

The eyes of one whose ears are harmonizing the tones of jade and stone will not see the form of Mount Tai.

Why is this? They are attending to what is small and forgetting what is big. Now the arrival of the myriad things, pulling and plucking at my nature, grabbing and grasping at my feelings, is like a spring or fountain, even if one wanted to not be ruled [by them], could this be achieved? [2/17/13–18]

Now a person who plants a tree irrigates it with springwater and beds it in fertile soil. If one person nurtures it and ten people harvest it, there will certainly be no spare splinters;⁷⁰ how much less if the entire kingdom hacks at it together? Though one wanted it to live for a long time, how could this be accomplished?

If you leave a basin of water in the courtyard to settle for one full day, you will still not be able to see your eyebrows and lashes. If you muddy it with no more than one stir, you will not be able to distinguish square from circular. The human spirit is easy to muddy and difficult to clarify, much like the basin of water. How much more so when an entire age stirs and disturbs it; how can it attain a moment of equanimity? [2/17/20–23]

2.14

Antiquity was an age of Utmost Potency.

Merchants prospered in their markets;

farmers rejoiced in their work;

grandees rested secure in their posts;

and scholar-recluses practiced⁷¹ their Way.

At this time,

winds and rains were not destructive;

grasses and trees did not die prematurely;

the Nine Tripods doubled the flavor [of offerings];⁷²

pearls and jade were lustrous;

the Luo River gave forth the “Crimson Writings”;

the Yellow River gave forth the “Green Chart.”⁷³

Thus Xu You, Fang Hui, Shan Juan, and Pi Yi⁷⁴ all attained their Way. Why was this? The rulers of the age had the mind that desires to benefit the world; thus the people could enjoy their ease. The talent of the four masters did not make them able to be wholly good, just like [people] of the current age. Yet no one [today] can match their brilliance, because they encountered the era of Tang and Yu.⁷⁵

 

Coming to the age of [King] Jie of Xia and [King] Djou of Yin,⁷⁶ they

cooked people alive,

condemned remonstrators,

created the “roasting beam,”⁷⁷

forged the “metal pillar,”⁷⁸

opened the heart of a worthy man,⁷⁹

cut off the feet of a talented knight,⁸⁰

minced the daughter of the marquis of Gui,

pulverized the bones of the earl of Mei.⁸¹

During this time,

tall mountains collapsed;

three rivers dried up;

flying birds snapped their wings;

running beasts lost their hooves.

How could it be that at this time alone there were no sages? However, they could not fulfill their Way because they did not meet their age.

The heavenly bird flies above one thousand ren.

The beast runs into the dense forest.

[Yet] calamity still reaches them; how much more so for the common people of ordinary households? Seen from this [perspective], embodying the Way does not rest entirely with us; it is indeed also tied to the era [in which we live]. [2/17/25–2/18/4]

When the capital of Liyang became a lake in one night,⁸² those of courageous strength and sage wisdom shared the same fate with the cowardly and unworthy.

When on top of Mount Wu, a chance wind let loose fire, the [great] gaoxia trees and the glossy ganoderma⁸³ died along with the oxtail-southernwood trees and moxa.

Thus,

the river fish does not have clear eyes;

young crops do not live an entire season.

This is the way they were born. Thus,

if the age is orderly, the foolish alone will not be able to disorder it.

If the age is chaotic, the wise alone will not be able to bring it to order.

To blame yourself for the Way’s not being practiced while trapped in a corrupt age is like double-hobbling [the famous horse] Qiji⁸⁴ and asking him to travel a thousand li. If you put an ape in a cage, it will be just like a pig. It is not that it is no longer clever or agile but that it has nowhere to give free rein to its ability. When Shun was farming in Tao, he could not profit his village. When he faced south as king, his Potency spread through the Four Seas. It could not be that his Humaneness increased; his position was fortuitous and his strategic position advantageous.

For the ancient sages,

their harmony and tranquillity were their nature;

their achieving their ambition and practicing the Way were their destiny.

For this reason,

when nature meets destiny, only then can it be effective;

when destiny attains nature, only then can it be clarified.

Neither bows of cudrania tree [wood]⁸⁵

nor the crossbows of Xizi⁸⁶

could be shot without a string.

Neither the boats of Yue

nor the skiffs of Shu

could float without water.

If now

the dart and line were shot above;

the net and snares were spread out below;

Even if [a bird] wanted to soar, how could it attain the force [to do so]? Thus the Odes says,

“I pick and pick the chickweed,

yet do not fill my shallow basket.

I sigh for the one I cherish,

posted to the ranks of Zhou.”⁸⁷

This speaks of longing for distant ages. [2/18/6–14]

 

Translated by Harold D. Roth and Andrew Meyer

 

1. Lau (HNZ 2/10/15) mistakenly omits this line, although it is present in all other editions. Thanks to our colleague Judson Murray for pointing this out. Also, we see no need to insert the character you at the beginning of the chapter.

2. This is a shortened and somewhat altered version of a passage in Zhuangzi 22 “Knowledge wandered North” (ZZ 22/63/1–3). See Mair 1997, 220. Another version of this anecdote appears in 12.45.

3. Emending the word “mountain” to “fishing net,” following the interpretation of Yu Yue to the parallel passage in Zhuangzi. See Guo Qingfan , Zhuangzi jishi , ed. Wang Xiaoyu (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1961), 244. We do not accept Wang Shumin’s proposal to emend “mountain” to “cart” . See Lau, HNZ, 11n.1.

4. This entire section to this point is found almost verbatim in ZZ 6/16/25. See Graham 1982, 86; and Mair 1997, 55.

5. These lines are found almost verbatim in ZZ 2/7/1. See Graham 1982, 59–60; and Mair 1997, 22–23.

6. Gongniu Ai is what might colloquially be called a “weretiger.” Gao You explains that this was a hereditary malady of the Gongniu clan. According to Gao, the ordinary transformation was evidently only psychological and temporary, but if the afflicted actually did eat human flesh, he would transform into a “real tiger.” Those who refrained from eating human flesh would become human again. Gao You may be overinterpreting the HNZ text, however. See Zhang Shuangdi 1997, 1:151n.13, 152n.14.

7. This last phrase appears almost verbatim in ZZ 2/3/30. See Graham 1982, 50; and Mair 1997, 13. The point of the section is that life is precarious and perspectives constantly change. Hence our most profound attachment, self-identity, is far from fixed and secure.

8. This evidently refers to a state of dementia perceived in some who reach advanced age. In other words, they have lived on past their destined time, so their bodies live on but their spirits are inactive.

9. These four sobriquets derive from the perceived shapes of ill-augured comets.

10. The utopia envisioned in this section is quite similar to that found in the “Primitivist” chapters of Zhuangzi (ZZ 8–11/12), but with a significant difference: it is governed by mystically adept sages who actively govern. This suits the overall syncretic vision of the text, which implicitly rejects the Primitivist call for a return to a simple agrarian society. The point of this passage is if you use a momentary materialist perspective to evaluate their society, it will seem impoverished, but if you observe it over a longer duration, you will understand that it embodies a harmony that transcends material concerns.

11. These two sentences appear also in ZZ 6/18/26. See Graham 1982, 88.

12. This line parallels ZZ 11/26/27, in which the author explains how an exemplary person would appear:

sitting still as a corpse he will look majestic as a dragon, from the silence of the abyss he will speak with a voice like thunder, he will have the promptings which are daemonic and the veerings which are from Heaven, he will have an unforced air and do nothing, and the myriad things will be like smoke piling higher and higher. (Graham 1982, 212, italics added)

13. This is evidently an allusion to Analects 9.27: “The Master said, ‘When the year becomes cold, then we know how the pine and the cypress are the last to lose their leaves.“‘

14. According to Gao You, “White Snow” was a song played by the ancient music master Shi Kuang that made spirits descend. See Zhang Shuangdi 1997, 1:165n.15. See also 6.1.

15. Jue is the third note in the Chinese pentatonic scale. In traditional Chinese music theory, notes had “pure ” and “muddy ” modulations, the latter being equivalent to the former flattened by one half-tone. For more on these terms, see app. B. The mention here of “pure jue” evidently alludes to an anecdote in which Shi Kuang declared that “pure jue” was the most melancholy of notes. See Hanfeizi, “Ten Faults” (HFZ 10/15/12).

16. Gao You claims that “Bell Mountain” is an alternative sobriquet for Mount Kunlun. Xu Shen says that it is “a terrain in the northern reaches, where there is no sun, which produces beautiful jade.” Tao Fangqi deduces from this and other evidence that Bell Mountain must be north of Yanmen . See Zhang Shuangdi 1997, 1:166n.17.

17. Following the emendation of Yu Yue. See Lau, HNZ, 12n.3.

18. The text here contains the line “only those who embody the Way are able to be undefeated.” We accept its deletion by Wang Niansun (Lau, HNZ, 12n.9) as an intrusion from the commentary, where it must have explained the line “To rest at the pivot of Heaven and not be destroyed.”

19. According to Gao You, Lüliang is the name of a river near Pengcheng (modern-day Xuzhou). See Zhang Shuangdi, 1:168n.26.

20. Taihang (Great Array) is a mountain range straddling the frontier between modern Shanxi and Hebei provinces. According to Gao You, Shijian (Rocky Torrent) is the name of a deep gorge, though he gives no location. Also according to Gao You, Feihu (Flying Fox) and Gouwang (Angular View) are the names of narrow valleys, the former in Dai Prefecture and the latter at Yanmen. Wang Niansun argues that Gouwang is a mistake for Gouzhu , the name of a pass mentioned in chap. 4, a judgment with which Lau agrees. See Zhang Shuangdi 1997, 1:168–69n.27.

21. The “palace gateway” (weique ) is the gate to a palace from which edicts are hung. The meaning here is dual: (a) although one’s body is in the mundane world, one’s consciousness inhabits a transcendent plane of awareness; and (b) although one’s person may be on the periphery of the empire, one’s character is suited to the halls of power.

22. According to Gao You, these are the gates of Heaven. See Zhang Shuangdi 1997, 1:174n.1.

23. Gao You treats this as a figurative synonym for the six coordinates . Zhang Shuangdi, 1997, 1:174n.1, takes issue with his reading, but if Gao is right that the “Nine Gateways” are celestial, this image must be a terrestrial counterpart.

24. Disregarding Lau’s (HNZ 2/12/25) proposed addition of .

25. The You Miao are identified as the San Miao (Three Miao Tribes), a frontier people from the south who were banished by the legendary sage-emperor Shun for some unspecified fault. The people of San Wei are from a mountain (Three Dangers Mountain) in the area of Dunhuang in Gansu Province. The idea is that the Way is able to make peoples as different as these two tribes into the same family.

26. The qin , commonly but misleadingly translated as “lute,” was a stringed instrument which in the Warring States and Han periods had a wooden sounding board attached to a thinner neck, with five to ten strings secured to the top of the neck and stretched over a wide bridge on the sounding board, beyond which they were attached to individual tuning pegs. As the qin later evolved in the post-Han period, the “neck” eventually disappeared, and the instrument consisted of the sounding board only, tapering from a wider end to a narrower one.

27. The se , sometimes translated as “zither,” was a stringed instrument with a wide, hollow wooden sounding board and (usually) twenty-five strings that passed over fixed bridges at each end of the sounding board and were secured by pegs. The instrument was tuned by means of individual movable bridges. The se was popular in ancient China but fell into neglect after the Han period.

28. Yanmen (Wild Goose Gate) is a mountain pass in the district of Yangguo, in the far north, to which geese fly.

29. Another of the psychological functions of the spirit is imagination. The text argues for a parallel between how the one Way embraces Heaven and Earth, the six coordinates, yin and yang, the rain and the dew; and how the spirit embraces different perceptions, thoughts, and imaginations.

30. Similar to ZZ 5/113/14.

31. For a discussion of the “schools” of early Chinese thought, see 27–28.

32. Mo Di (also known as Mozi [fl. ca. 450 B.C.E.]) was an influential philosopher whose teachings stressed frugality and “Heaven’s Will” and stood opposed to those of Confucius. A text bearing his name survives.

33. Yang Zhu (fl. ca. 400 B.C.E.) was a philosopher famous for declaring that he would not sacrifice one hair from his arm to save the empire. Little is known of his life, and no writings reliably attributable to him are extant. Graham and some others regard the first two chapters of the Lüshi chunqiu as products of Yang Zhu’s followers but there is not universal agreement on this. See Angus C. Graham, “The Background of the Mencian Theory of Human Nature,” in Studies in Chinese Philosophy and Philosophical Literature (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1986), 13.

34. Shen Buhai (ca. 385–337 B.C.E.) was a native of Hann who served as prime minister under Marquis Zhao. He advocated basic reforms to increase the efficiency of government, such as the technique of “form and names” (xingming, see app. A) for the disciplined employment of civil officials. A text bearing his name survives in fragments.

35. Lord Shang (also known as Shang Yang , Wey Yang, and Gongsun Yang [ca. 390–338 B.C.E.]) was a native of Wey who was employed as prime minister by Duke Xiao of Qin. He is credited with having increased the power of Qin through the institution of basic reforms, including a reliance on strict written laws and rewards and punishments. A text bearing his name survives but is generally regarded as a later attribution.

36. The Nine Tripods were a fabled set of sacrificial bronze tripods that served as talismans and regalia of the Zhou kings.

37. Xi Zhong was a cartwright of legendary skill.

38. Feng Meng was an archer of legendary skill.

39. Zaofu was a charioteer of legendary skill.

40. Bo Le was a horse breeder of legendary skill and expertise.

41. This argument follows that found in Zhuangzi 33 in assessing the relative value of the Hundred Traditions.

42. A similar statement is found in the opening line of Xunzi 1 (XZ 1/3/3): “Though blue dye comes from the indigo plant, it is bluer than indigo” (Knoblock 1988, 1:135).

43. Accepting Yang Shuda’s emendation of this line. See Lau, HNZ, 13n.12; and Zhang Shuangdi 1997, 1:180n.24. Ferrous sulfate crystals are greenish; the juice of the indigo plant is also greenish in its raw (unoxydized) state. These lines play on the meaning of qing , which embraces a wide range of colors from green through blue to gray.

44. Accepting Yu Chang’s reading of guo , “surpass,” for yu , “encounter.” See Zhang Shuangdi 1997, 1:180n.24.

45. The logic of the passage is this: through successive infusions of ferrous sulfate or indigo, the color of the dyed fabric surpasses (becomes darker than) its “mother” (i.e., the original dye), and this process cannot be reversed. If it could, it would be comparable to an impossible situation in which the color of a dyed fabric got fainter every time it was dipped in the dye bath (the opposite of what actually occurs). But for things that have not yet had the trajectory of their transformation determined (as the color of a fabric is determined by a dye), the possibilities are numberless. See also 16.58.

46. This metaphorically describes the manner in which the Way generates things: the further along the road to differentiation a thing is, the less likely it will be able to return to its source. This recalls the passage in Laozi 28 describing the breaking up of the Uncarved Block to make vessels.

47. Tianji , a metaphorical term for the spontaneous nature and patterns of the cosmos, infused by the Way.

48. This section works out the implications of Laozi 19.

49. Rejecting Lau’s (HNZ 2/14/20) proposed emendation of to .

50. Gao You’s commentary identifies the feilian (gryphon) as a winged, hairy beast and the dunyu (sphinx) as a fabled cat, smaller than a tiger. See Zhang Shuangdi 1:193n.22.

51. Rejecting Lau’s (HNZ 2/14/22–23) emendation of to and to .

52. The Duke of Thunder was the mythical god of thunder. Many of these mythical figures appear in the Chuci. See CC 5/18/10.

53. Kuafu , “Bragging Father,” was a strongman of legend who raced the sun. See also 4.16.

54. Mi Fei was the goddess of the Luo River. See CC 1/3/4 and 5/18/16.

55. The Weaver Girl was the divine daughter of the Heavenly Thearch, who took a humble cowherd as a husband.

56. literally means “a film over a diseased eye,” thus possibly a disease of the cornea rather than (like cataracts) a disease of the lens. According to Gao You, the bark of the osmanthus is boiled to produce a green liquid with which the eye is washed. See Zhang Shuangdi, 1:195n.30.

57. Similar statements appear in 9.11 and 13.14. A zhang , sometimes (as here) translated as “fathom,” is a linear measure of ten Chinese feet (chi ), or approximately seven and a half feet in English measure.

58. This description of the “age of Utmost Potency” is similar in sentiment to ZZ 9/23/28– 9/24/4.

59. The Yellow Emperor, or Yellow Thearch (Huangdi ), was a legendary ruler of high antiquity, said variously to be the original ancestor of the Chinese people and the inventor of the state and of warfare.

60. The “Nine Vacancies” and “Nine Boundaries” are synecdoches for Heaven and Earth. See Zhang Shuangdi, 1:206n.23.

61. Kun Wu was the progenitor of the dynastic line of the Xia. See Zhang Shuangdi, 1:207n.28.

62. , literally, “to bore a round socket for a square peg.”

63. This line occurs in the famous “fasting of the mind” passage in ZZ 4/10/7.

64. When the mind focuses on an external object, energy in the form of Quintessential Spirit (jingshen) is projected onto it from the spirit within. Normatively, as the subject’s attention moves on, this energy should return to the subject and dissolve into the larger internal fund of energy that composes the spirit (vacuity).

65. A similar criticism of Confucians and Mohists appears in 13.7.

66. Rejecting Lau’s (HNZ 2/17/1) emendation of you for .

67. This is a paraphrase of two lines from ZZ 6/17/15, which read : “What kills life is not death; what gives birth to life is not life.” See Lau, HNZ, 17n.1.

68. “Northern Bank” was a song of ancient Chu. Apparently there was a dance that accompanied the music. See CC 9/23/13. “Northern Bank” appears as “Waving Lotuses” .

69. “Green Waters” was the name of a song, perhaps a lost Ode. See Zhang Shuangdi, 1:227–28n.6.

70. Disregarding Lau’s (HNZ 2/17/20) proposed emendation. Wang Niansun argues that “one” and “ten” have been transposed and that this line should read, “If ten people nurture it and one person harvests it,” but the original ordering seems to read well in context.

71. Rejecting Lau’s (HNZ 2/17/25) proposed emendation.

72. Lau (HNZ 2/17/26) proposes that this be amended to “The Nine Tripods were heavy,” deleting the final character “flavor ” . Zhuang Kuiji notes that the Taiping Yulan contains an alternative reading without “flavor” and that the commentary remarks, “When the practice of the Moral Potency of the monarch was clear the tripods were heavy, when he was wicked the tripods were light” (Zhang Shuangdi 1997, 1:225n.3). The elimination of “flavor” here seems to break the parallelism, and the line as written works well thematically in context.

73. The “Crimson Writings” and the “Green Chart” are fabled texts variously understood as the revelations of powerful deities or of Heaven itself, which are said to have appeared at particularly auspicious moments in history to both guide and legitimate the efforts of great sages. These “texts” are alluded to occasionally in pre-Han literature (in Analects 9, Confucius laments, “The [Yellow] River does not give up its chart!”). The lore surrounding them became increasingly elaborate in the Han with the proliferation of wei shu (“weft” texts or apocrypha).

74. Xu You was a legendary hermit, attested to in many early texts, who supposedly refused Yao’s offer of abdication. According to Gao You, Fang Hui , Shan Juan , and Pi Yi all were hermits during the time of Yao. Pi Yi appears in ZZ 7/20/3, 12/30/13, and 22/60/31. Shan Juan appears in ZZ 28/81/15 and 29/90/16 and in LSCQ 15.3/83/6.

75. Tang and Yu —that is, Yao and Shun—the last of the mythical predynastic sage kings. Yao found his sons unworthy and ceded the throne to the commoner Shun; Shun in turn ceded the throne to the flood-tamer Yu .

76. Jie (ca. 1550 B.C.E.) and Djou (ca. 1050 B.C.E.) were the legendary or semilegendary last rulers of the Xia and Shang (Yin) dynasties, famous as exemplars of royal misrule.

77. A device with which King Djou tortured and killed people by making them walk across a red-hot metal beam, it is also mentioned in 10.89, 11.1, 12.35, 15.2, and 21.4. See chap. 11, n. 9.

78. Another torture device. The victim was placed on the metal pillar while fire was stoked below. When the pillar got too hot and the victim fell into the flames, the king would laugh. See Zhang Shuangdi, 1:237n.9.

79. King Djou supposedly ordered this done to Bi Gan, to see whether the heart of a worthy was any different from that of an ordinary man.

80. King Djou ordered this done to a knight who could ford cold streams, to see whether there was something unusual about his marrow. The story is recounted in LSCQ 23.4/152/13.

81. According to Gao You, the earl of Mei recommended the lord of Gui’s daughter to Djou as a great beauty. On seeing her, Djou was displeased, whereupon he had both the daughter and the earl literally cooked into a meat sauce (the verbs translated here as “minced” and “pulverized”). Gao notes an alternative story in which the earl of Mei was punished for remonstrating. See Zhang Shuangdi, 1:237n.11.

82. Liyang was a district in Huainan (in present-day Anhui Province) whose administrative capital was evidently destroyed by some Atlantis-like natural disaster. Gao You recounts a story of an old widow who was warned of the impending disaster. See Zhang Shuangdi 1997, 1:239n.18.

83. Gaoxia is not identified, but it is evidently a plant with fatty or greasy properties. Zizhi is the Japanese glossy ganoderma, related to the fungus known as lingzhi . See “Names of a Selection of Asian Fungi,” at http://www.plantnames.unimelb.edu.au/Sorting/Fungi_Asian.html.

84. Qiji was a legendary thoroughbred said to be capable of traveling a thousand li in a single day.

85. The wuhao , or Cudrania tricuspidata, is related to the mulberry. According to Gao You, its wood makes especially strong bows. See Zhang Shuangdi 1997, 1:241n.28. Its leaves can be fed to silkworms as a substitute for mulberry leaves. See 5.3. The Cudrania is the emblematic tree of the eighth month. See 5.8.

86. Gao You offers two explanations: (a) Xizi was a southern land renowned for its excellent bows, and (b) Xi Ziyang was a great bowyer of Zheng. See Zhang Shuangdi, 1:241n.28.

87. Odes 3, “Juan’er .” Some commentators and translators understand the last line to mean that the narrator has laid down her basket by the side of the road.