The Tao of Emerson (8 page)

He that thinks most will say the least.

The less a man thinks or knows about his virtues,

   the better we like him.

To finish the moment, he finds the journey’s end
   in every step of the road;
To him, the greatest number of good hours is wisdom.

For it is only the finite that has wrought
   and suffered;
The infinite lies stretched in smiling repose.

A state may be ruled by measures of correction;
Weapons of war may be used with crafty dexterity;
But the kingdom is made one’s own
   only by freedom from action and purpose
.

How do I know that it is so? By these facts
—
In the kingdom, the multiplication of prohibitive enactments
   increases the poverty of the people;
The more implements to add to their profit that the people have
,
   
the greater disorder is there in the state and clan;
The more acts of crafty dexterity that men possess
,
   the more do strange contrivances appear; The more display there is of legislation
,
   the more thieves and robbers there are
.

Therefore, a sage has said, “I will do nothing of purpose
,
   and the people will be transformed of themselves
.
I will be fond of keeping still
,
   and the people will of themselves become correct. I will take the trouble about it
,
   and the people will themselves become rich;
I will manifest no ambition
,
   and the people will of themselves attain
   to the primitive simplicity.”

We live in a very low state of the world
   and pay unwilling tribute to governments
   founded in force.

The tendencies of the times favor
   the idea of self-government
And leave the individual, for all code,
   to the rewards and penalties of his own constitution.

Therefore, all public ends look vague and quixotic
   beside private ones.
For any laws but those which men
   make for themselves are laughable.

Hence, the less government we have the better,
   the fewer laws, and the less confided power.
The power of love, as the basis of the state,
   has never been tried.

We must not imagine that all things
   are lapsing into confusion,
If every tender protestant be not compelled
   to bear his part in certain social conventions: Nor doubt that roads can be built,
Letters carried, and the fruit of laborers secured
   when the government of force is at hand.
Could not a nation of friends devise a better way?

The government that seems the most unwise
,
Oft goodness to the people best supplies;
That which is meddling, touching everything
,
Will work but ill, and disappointment bring
.

Misery!
—
happiness is to be found by its side!
Happiness!
—
misery lurks beneath it!
Who knows what either will come to in the end?

Shall we then dispense with correction?
The method of correction shall by a turn
   become distortion
,
And the good in it shall by a turn become evil
.
The delusion of the people on this point
   has indeed subsisted for a long time
.

Therefore the sage is like a square
,
Which cuts no one with its angles;
Like a corner, which injures no one with its sharpness
.
He is straightforward, but allows himself no license;
He is bright, but does not dazzle
.

Our time is too full of activity and performance.
The world is governed too much;
Things have their laws, as well as man;
   and refuse to be trifled with.

In changing moon, in tidal wave,
Glows the feud of Want and Have,
Mountain tall and ocean deep
Trembling balance duly keep.

An inevitable dualism bisects nature.
The reaction, so grand in the elements,
   is repeated within small boundaries.
Every excess causes a defect;
Every defect an excess.
Every sweet hath its sour, every evil its good.

A wise man will extend this lesson
   to all parts of life;
When he is pushed, tormented, defeated,
He has a chance to learn something,
   is cured of the insanity of conceit,
   has got moderation and real skill.

For regulating the human and rendering service to the heavenly
,
   there is nothing like moderation
.

It is only by this moderation that there is effected
   an early return to man’s normal state
.
That early return is what I call the repeated accumulation
   of the attributes of the Tao
.
With that repeated accumulation of those attributes, there comes
   a subjugation of every obstacle to such return
.
Of this subjugation we know not what shall be the limit;
And when one knows not what the limit shall be
,
   he may be the ruler of a state
.

He who possesses the mother of the state may continue long
.
His case is like that of the plant, of which we say
   that its roots are deep and its flower stalks firm
—
This is the way to secure that its enduring life
   shall long be seen
.

By your own act you teach the beholder
   how to do the practicable.
According to the depth from which you draw
   your life,
Such is the depth not only of your strenuous effort,
   but of your manners and presence.
Leave the military hurry and adopt the pace of nature.
Her secret is patience.
Have the self-command you wish to inspire.
Your teaching and discipline must have
   the reserve and taciturnity of nature.
Say little; do not snarl; do not chide;
   but govern by the eye.
See what they need and the right thing is done.

Governing a great state is like cooking small fish
.

Let the kingdom be governed according to the Tao
,
And the manes of the departed will not manifest
   their spiritual energy
.
It is not that those manes have not that spiritual energy
,
   but it will not be employed to hurt men
.
It is not that it could not hurt men
,
   but neither does the ruling sage hurt them
.

When these two do not injuriously affect each other
,
Their good influences converge in the virtue of the Tao
.

Fear, Craft and Avarice
   cannot rear a state;
The more reason, the less government.
In a sensible family, nobody hears
   the words “shall” and “shan’t.”
Nobody commands and nobody obeys
   but all conspire and joyfully cooperate.
The wise know that foolish legislation
   is a rope of sand
   which perishes in the twisting.
The law is only a memorandum.

When the statehouse is the hearth,
   the perfect state is come.

What makes a great state is its being like a low-lying
,
   down-flowing stream
—
It becomes the center to which tend
   all the small states under heaven
.

To illustrate from the case of all females
—
The female always overcomes the male by her stillness
.
Stillness may be considered a sort of abasement
.

Thus it is that a great state, by condescending
   to small states, gains them for itself
,
And that small states, by abasing themselves
   to a great state, win it over to them
.
In the one case the abasement leads to
   gaining adherents
,
In the other case to procuring favor
.

The great state only wishes to unite men together
   and nourish them;
A small state only wishes to be received by, and to serve, the other
.
Each gets what it desires
,
   but the great state must learn to abase itself
.

The excellence of men consists
   in the completeness with which
   the lower system is taken up into the higher—
A process of much time and delicacy.

Those who are capable of humility, of justice,
   of love, of aspiration,
Stand already on a platform that commands
   action and grace.

This is the law of moral and mental gain.
The simplest rise as by specific levity,
   not into a particular virtue,
But into the region of all virtues.

Sympathy, the female force, is more subtle, and lasting,
   and creative.

Tao has of all things the most honored place
.
No treasures give good men so rich a grace;
Bad men it guards and doth their ill efface
.

Its admirable words can purchase honor;
Its admirable deeds can raise their performer above others
.
Even men who are not good are not abandoned by it
.

Why was it that the ancients prized this Tao so much?
Was it not because it could be got by seeking for it
,
And the guilty could escape from the stain of their guilt by it?
This is the reason why all under heaven consider it
      the most valuable thing
.

With a geometry of sunbeams, the soul
   lays the foundation of nature.
Of this pure nature, every man is at some time sensible.

Language cannot paint it with its colors.
It is too subtle, it is indefinable,
   unmeasurable,
But we know that it pervades and contains us.

The truth and grandeur of this thought
   is proved by its scope and applicability,
For it commands the entire schedule
   and inventory of things for its illustration.

It is the way of the Tao to act
   
without thinking of acting;
To conduct affairs without feeling
   
the trouble of them;
To taste without discerning any flavor;
To consider what is small as great
,
   
and a few as many;
And to recompense injury with kindness
.

The master of it anticipates things that are difficult
   while they are easy
And does things that would become great
   while they are small
.
All difficult things in the world are sure to arise
   from a previous state in which they were easy
,
And all great things from one in which they were small

He who lightly promises is sure to keep
   but little faith;
He who is continually thinking things easy
   is sure to find them difficult
.
Therefore the sage sees difficulty
   even in what seems easy
,
And so never has any difficulties
.

Clinging to nature, or that province of nature
   which he knows,
He makes no mistake, but works after her laws,
   and at her own pace.
That man will go far—
For you see in his manners
   that recognition of him by others is
   not necessary to him.
So that his doing, which is perfectly natural,
   appears miraculous.

A sensible man does not brag,
Omits himself as habitually
   as another man obtrudes himself in the discourse.

That which is at rest is easily kept hold of
Before a thing has given indications of its presence
,
   it is easy to take measures against it;
That which is brittle is easily broken;
That which is very small is easily dispersed
.
Action should be taken before a thing
   has made its appearance;
Order should be secured before disorder has begun
.

The tree which fills the arms grew
   from the tiniest sprout;
The tower of nine stories rose from a small heap of earth;
The journey of a thousand li
   commenced with a single step
.

He who acts with an ulterior purpose does harm;
He who takes hold of a thing in the same way
   loses his hold
.
The sage does not act so
,
   and therefore does no harm;
He does not lay hold so
,
   and therefore does not lose his hold
.

The sage desires what other men do not desire
,
   and does not prize things difficult to get;
He learns what other men do not learn, and turns back
   to what the multitude of men have passed by
.
Thus he helps the natural development of all things
,
And does not dare to act with an ulterior purpose of his own
.

Every ultimate fact is only the first
   of a new series.
There is no outside, no inclosing wall,
   no circumference to us.
That which builds is better than
   that which is built.
Cause and effect, means and ends, seed and fruit
   cannot be severed;
For the effect already blooms in the cause,
The end preexists in the means,
The fruit is in the seed.

Our strength grows our weakness;
Whilst a man sits on the cushion of advantages,
   he goes to sleep.

The man who renounces himself,
   comes to himself.
Every step so downward, is a step upward.
Words and actions are not the attributes of
   a brute nature;
They cannot cover the dimensions of
   what is in truth.
The wise man, in doing one thing, does all;
Or, in the one thing he does rightly,
He sees the likeness of all which is done rightly.