The Tao Teh King: A Short Study in Comparative Religion: Chapter LXXIII

The Tao Teh King: A Short Study in Comparative Religion, by C. Spurgeon Medhurst, [1905], at sacred-texts.com

CHAPTER LXXIII.

The recklessly rash die. The cautiously courageous live. Of these two courses it is uncertain which is advantageous and which is disadvantageous, for who can explain why heaven disapproves? Therefore even the Holy Man feels a difficulty here. 1 This is the way of heaven—

Goodwill, which surely overcomes.

Silence, which certainly responds. 2

Without being summoned, spontaneously arriving.

Acting leisurely, but planning effectively.

Heaven's net spreads everywhere, wide in mesh, yet losing nothing. 3

"Merry and bright are the waves to-day,
They dance round our boat like children at play;
But though wild winds should rise and dark waters roar,
Till our light bark be cast a wreck on the shore;
Still the strength which awes us is not found here,
But beneath where all is calm and clear;
Where feeling the weight of the law's behest,
In the depths of the ocean is calm and rest."
(Vantia Bailey.)

Footnotes

121:1 The higher the knowledge, the greater the responsibility, the narrower the path.

121:2 "Look at heaven there," answered Confucius, "does it speak? And yet the seasons run their appointed courses and all things in nature grow up in their time. Look at heaven there: does it speak?"—Confucian Analects.

121:3

"Though the mills of God grind slowly
Yet they grind exceeding small.
Though with patience he stands waiting,
With exactness grinds he all." Friederich von Logau.—Longfellow's translation.

"Und alles ist Frucht, and alles is Samen."—Schiller.

Next: Chapter LXXIV