The Eighty-One Chapters
All Eighty-One Chapters
The complete Tao Te Ching in a fresh English rendering of the Wang Bi received text (王弼本), each chapter read by the five lenses. Click any card to dive in.
Book I · The Way
chapters 1–37What can be spoken is already not the Way
“The Way that can be spoken is not the eternal Way.”
Opposites are not in the world but in the cut you make
“So being and non-being generate each other.”
Do not stoke the wanting you will then have to police
“and nothing is left ungoverned.”
The empty source that never runs dry
“The Way is empty, yet use it: it never fills up.”
Impartial as a bellows, the system feeds itself
“they treat the ten thousand things as straw dogs.”
The generative low place that never runs out
“The spirit of the valley never dies.”
Why what outlasts everything never works for itself
“Thus the sage puts their own self last, and the self comes first.”
Water wins by taking the low place
“The highest good is like water.”
Stop before the brim, and step back at the top
“The work done, oneself withdrawn — that is the Way (Tao) of heaven.”
Can you hold the One without gripping it?
“can you do it without cleverness?”
The use is in the emptiness
“It is the emptiness at its center that makes the cart useful.”
Bandwidth, not appetite: why more signal blinds
“So the sage attends to the belly, not to the eye,”
The self that can be wounded is the self that holds you
“Favor and disgrace are both alarming;”
The pattern you can hold but never see
“Look for it and you do not see it: call it the unseen.”
Muddy water clears if you let it stand
“Who can be muddy, and through stillness slowly grow clear?”
Watch the whole turning return to its root
“To return to the root is called stillness;”
The best ruler leaves no fingerprints
“When trust runs short, there is no trust in return.”
The named virtues are the smoke, not the fire
“When the great Way is abandoned, benevolence and righteousness appear.”
Cut the virtues you can name, recover the ground they stood on
“see the unbleached silk, embrace the uncarved block (pu),”
I alone am muddled, and that is the point
“Mine is the mind of a fool — so muddled!”
The reliable signal inside the blur
“and within it there is something to be trusted.”
Bend, and you stay whole
“Bend, and you stay whole;”
Even a storm cannot keep it up all day
“Where trust falls short, there is no trust given back.”
On tiptoe you cannot stand
“Stand on tiptoe and you do not stand steady”
Something formed before heaven and earth, and it follows only itself
“the Way follows what is so of itself (ziran).”
The heavy is the root of the light
“The heavy is the root of the light; stillness is the master of restlessness.”
The good walk leaves no track
“Good walking leaves no track or trace;”
Know the bright, keep to the dark
“and you return again to the uncarved block (pu).”
The world is a sacred vessel you cannot hold by force
“Whoever acts on it ruins it, whoever grasps it loses it.”
Force rebounds: the system bites back at whoever pushes it
“Such matters tend to rebound.”
Even a victory is held as a funeral
“A victory in war is conducted by the rites of mourning.”
Names begin, and the wise know where to stop
“To know when to stop is how to come to no harm.”
The harder mastery is the one that faces inward
“To overcome others takes force; to master oneself is strength.”
The Way is great because it never claims to be
“It clothes and feeds the ten thousand things, yet lords over none.”
The signal too plain to taste, and why the world comes to it
“Hold to the great image, and the world comes to you.”
The turn is already loaded into the swing
“The soft and weak overcome the hard and strong.”
Does nothing, yet leaves nothing undone
“The Way (Tao) is eternally without forcing (wu wei), yet nothing is left undone.”
Book II · The Power
chapters 38–81When the road is lost, you get rules
“So the great person dwells in the thick, not the thin;”
The One that holds the parts together
“lords and kings attained the One and so set the world right.”
The system runs by turning back and by yielding
“Reversal is the movement of the Way (Tao).”
The Way looks like its opposite
“The bright Way seems dim”
The generative cascade, and the harmony that holds it
“So a thing may be diminished, and thereby increased,”
The soft rides down the hard
“By this I know the benefit of acting without forcing (wu wei).”
What you chase costs more than it returns
“Know when you have enough, and you meet no disgrace;”
The greatest things look like their own lack
“Clarity and stillness set the world right.”
When the wanting stops, the horses come home
“No calamity is greater than not knowing when one has enough.”
Knowing the world without leaving the room
“The farther one goes, the less one knows.”
Subtract until there is nothing left to force
“In pursuit of the Way (Tao), daily decrease.”
The ruler who keeps no mind of their own
“The sage has no fixed mind of their own; they take the mind of the people as their mind.”
The one who keeps no death-ground
“Because they leave no ground for death to take hold.”
It gives birth and claims nothing
“It gives birth, yet does not possess;”
Hold the mother, know the children
“To see the small is called insight (ming);”
The broad road and the by-path
“this is called the swagger of robbery.”
What is well planted scales by being itself at every level
“What is well planted is not uprooted.”
The infant's grip and the limits of force
“Its bones are soft, its sinews weak, yet its grip is firm.”
The one who knows holds no handle on the world
“Those who know do not speak;”
Govern by stepping out of the loop
“I have no business, and the people enrich themselves”
The looser the rule, the truer the people
“There is no fixed standard.”
Govern by spending less, and the reserve runs deep
“the Way (Tao) of long life and lasting vision.”
Govern as you cook a small fish — by not poking it
“Governing a great state is like cooking a small fish.”
The great state lies low, and everything flows to it
“A great state is a low-lying confluence,”
The shelter that turns no one away
“The Way (Tao) is the innermost refuge of the ten thousand things.”
Meet the hard while it is still soft
“Plan for the difficult while it is still easy;”
Act on it before it arrives
“A journey of a thousand miles begins beneath your feet.”
Why the wise ruler does not make the people clever
“to govern a state with cleverness is the curse of the state”
Why the low place rules
“Rivers and seas can be king to the hundred valleys because they are good at lying below them.”
The three treasures: why holding back is what holds together
“not daring to be first in the world, and so I can become the vessel that lasts.”
The best fighter never fights
“This is called the virtue of not contending.”
The one who grieves wins
“the one who grieves wins.”
Easy to know, impossible to practice
“My words are very easy to understand, very easy to practice.”
Knowing the edge of what you know
“To know that you do not know is best;”
When dread arrives, the loop has already broken
“And so: they let that go and take hold of this.”
The net that loses nothing
“it does not summon, yet things come of themselves (ziran);”
Who takes the executioner's place cuts their own hand
“There is always the one in charge of killing, who kills.”
The famine the ruler feeds
“The people make light of death because they chase life too richly.”
The living are supple; the dead are stiff
“So the hard and strong belong to death;”
Heaven draws down the high and lifts the low
“The Way of heaven takes from excess and adds to lack.”
Nothing is softer than water, and nothing wears down the hard so surely
“True words seem to say the opposite.”
Hold the tally, make no claim
“So the sage holds the left half of the tally”
A small state that has stopped scaling
“Let there be tools enough for tens and hundreds, yet left unused.”
The giving that fills the giver
“the more they give to others, the more they have”