Lao Tzu Quotes
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The river and the sea can be kings of a hundred valleys, because they lie below them.
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We hammer wood for a house, but it is the inner space that makes it liveable.
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If your virtue is especially radiant, it can be possible to open a pathway to the subtle realm and receive these celestial teachings directly from the immortals.
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Not praising the deserving prevents envy.
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The new life created by the final integration is self-aware yet without ego, capable of inhabiting a body yet not attached to it, and guided by wisdom rather than emotion. Whole and virtuous, it can never die.
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Be merciful, moderate, and modest.
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The truly great man dwells on what is real and not what is on the surface.
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What should be shrunken must first be stretched.
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All streams flow to the sea because it is lower than they are. Humility gives it its power. If you want to govern the people, you must place yourself below them. If you want to lead the people, you must learn how to follow them. The Master is above the people, and no one feels oppressed. She goes ahead of the people, and no one feels manipulated. The whole world is grateful to her. Because she competes with no one, no one can compete with her.
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The men who are great live with that which is substantial, they do not stay with that which is superficial; they abide with realities, they do not remain with what is showy. The one they discard, the other they hold.
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Be still like a mountain and flow like a great river.
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The most fundamental seems fickle.
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Worlds and particles, bodies and beings, time and space: All are transient expressions of the Tao.
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There was something formless and perfect before the universe was born. It is serene. Empty. Solitary. Unchanging. Infinite. Eternally present. It is the mother of the universe. For lack of a better name, I call it the Tao. It flows through all things, inside and outside, and returns to the origin of all things. The Tao is great. The universe is great. Earth is great. Man is great. These are the four great powers. Man follows the earth. Earth follows the universe. The universe follows the Tao. The Tao follows only itself.
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What is firmly rooted cannot be pulled out.
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The eternal void is filled with infinite possibilities.
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Accomplish but do not boast, accomplish without show, accomplish without arrogance, accomplish without grabbing, accomplish without forcing.
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What Heaven detests, who knows why? Even the sage considers it difficult.
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Trying to understand is like straining through muddy water. Be still and allow the mud to settle.
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When the palace is magnificent, the fields are filled with weeds, and the granaries are empty.
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The universe is deathless; Is deathless because, having no finite self, it stays infinite. A sound man by not advancing himself stays the further ahead of himself, By not confining himself to himself sustains himself outside himself: By never being an end in himself he endlessly becomes himself.
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Those who know don't talk. Those who talk don't know. Close your mouth, block off your senses, blunt your sharpness, untie your knots, soften your glare, settle your dust. This is the primal identity. Be like the Tao. It can't be approached or withdrawn from, benefited or harmed, honored or brought into disgrace. It gives itself up continually. That is why it endures.
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The more laws and restrictions there are, The poorer people become. The sharper men's weapons, The more trouble in the land.
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Understand this if nothing else: spiritual freedom and oneness with the Tao are not randomly bestowed gifts, but the rewards of conscious self-transformation and self-evolution.