Zhuang Zhou Quotes

To try to govern the world by doubling the number of sages would merely double the profits of the great robbers. If you create pounds and ounces to measure them with, they’ll steal the pounds and ounces and use them to rob you further. If you make scales and balances to regulate them with, they’ll steal the scales and balances and use them to rob you more. If you create tallies and seals to enforce their reliability, they’ll steal the tallies and seals and use them to rob you too. If you create ideals of humankindness and responsible conduct to regulate them with, why, they’ll just steal humankindness and responsible conduct and use them to rob you all the more. How do I know this is so? He who steals a belt buckle is executed, but he who steals a state becomes a feudal lord.

Celui qui craint de mourir n'est qu'un enfant perdu à la recherche de sa maison.

It can be passed on, but not received.
It can be obtained, but not seen.
可傳而不可受，可得而不可見.

The man of spirit, on the other hand, hates to see people gather around him. He avoids the crowd. For where there are many men, there are also many opinions and little agreement. There is nothing to be gained from the support of a lot of half-wits who are doomed to end up in a fight with each other.

The man of spirit is neither very intimate with anyone, nor very aloof. He keeps himself interiorly aware, and he maintains his balance so that he is in conflict with nobody. This is your true man! He lets the ants be clever. He lets the mutton reek with activity. For his own part, he imitates the fish that swims unconcerned, surrounded by a friendly element, and minding its own business.

The true man sees what the eye sees, and does not add to it something that is not there. He hears what the ears hear, and does not detect imaginary undertones or overtones. He understands things in their obvious interpretation and is not busy with hidden meanings and mysteries. His course is therefore a straight line. Yet he can change his direction whenever circumstances suggest it.

The one who is scared of dying is but a lost child looking for his home

Thus, the Radiance of Drift and Doubt is the sage’s only map. He makes no definition of what is right but instead entrusts it to the everyday function of each thing. This is what I call the Illumination of the Obvious.

Tian Kaizhi said, “In Lu there was Shan Bao — he lived among the cliffs, drank only water, and didn’t go after gain like other people. He went along like that for seventy years and still had the complexion of a little child. Unfortunately, he met a hungry tiger who killed him and ate him up. Then there was Zhang Yi — there wasn’t one of the great families and fancy mansions that he didn’t rush off to visit. He went along like that for forty years, and then he developed an internal fever, fell ill, and died. Shan Bao looked after what was on the inside and the tiger ate up his outside. Zhang Yi looked after what was on the outside and the sickness attacked him from the inside. Both these men failed to give a lash to the stragglers.

The mountain tree plunders itself. The candle fat scorches itself. The cinnamon tree is edible, and thus it gets chopped down. The lacquer tree is useful, and thus it is cut down. Everyone knows how useful usefulness is, but no one seems to know how useful uselessness is.

If you have insight, you use your inner eye, your inner ear, to pierce to the heart of things, and have no need of intellectual knowledge.

He set forth his intractable ideas but was never partisan or restricted to his own subjective stance. He moved alone with the spirit of heaven and earth, and did not exalt himself above all things. He did not dispute right and wrong, but sought to live peacefully with the prevalent views.

Atlar karada yaşar, ot yer ve su içer. Memnun olduklarında boyunlarını birbirine dolayıp birbirlerine sürtünürler. Sinirlendiklerinde dönüp birbirlerini çiftelerler. Bunların hepsi atların içgüdüleridir. Ama atlar boyunduruk altına alınıp süslendiklerinde çıtaları kırmayı, boyunlarını kaldırmayı, vahşi davranmayı, tükürmeyi ve dizginlerini ısırmayı bilirler. Bu nedenle atların insanlara karşı koyacak kadar kurnaz olması Bo Le'nin hatasıdır.

Hükümdar Hexu'nun zamanında insanlar ne yapacaklarını ve nereye gideceklerini bilmeden hayatlarını boşa harcardı. Karınları toktu ve mutluydular. İnsanların yapabileceği tek şey buydu. Bilgeler dünyaya gelince, dünyayı düzeltmek için müzik ve törenleri icat ettiler; bilgi ve servet için sonsuz çaba göstermeye başlayan insanların kalbini rahatlatmak için insanlığı ve doğruluğu artırdılar. Bu da bilgelerin hatasıdır.

All men know the use of the useful, but nobody knows the use of the useless!

Flow with whatever may happen, and let your mind be free: Stay centered by accepting whatever you are doing. This is the ultimate.

Good fortune is lighter than a feather,
But no one knows how to carry it;
Misfortune is heavier than the earth,
But no one knows how to escape it.
(p. 40)

Heaven, Earth and I live together. All things and I comprise an inseparable Oneness.