Topics · Life & Self
Wisdom about peace & letting go.
What people have learned about peace & letting go the hard way, and what the classics said about it first.
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From the library
Be still, and know that I am God.
Nothing can bring you peace but yourself.
The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.
Now cracks a noble heart. Good night, sweet prince, and flights of angels sing thee to thy rest.
The Tao, considered as unchanging, has no name.
Her ways are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are peace.
Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee.
Nothing can bring you peace but the triumph of principles.
Governing a great state is like cooking small fish.
When a man’s ways please the Lord, he maketh even his enemies to be at peace with him.
Men come forth and live; they enter (again) and die.
If a wise man contendeth with a foolish man, whether he rage or laugh, there is no rest.
Words that are strictly true seem to be paradoxical.
Deceit is in the heart of them that imagine evil: but to the counsellors of peace is joy.
The soft overcomes the hard; and the weak the strong.
He that is void of wisdom despiseth his neighbour: but a man of understanding holdeth his peace.
Gravity is the root of lightness; stillness, the ruler of movement.
Even a fool, when he holdeth his peace, is counted wise: and he that shutteth his lips is esteemed a man of understanding.
It is by avoiding such indulgence that such weariness does not arise.
I do not know whose son it is. It might appear to have been before God.
The great Tao (or way) is very level and easy; but people love the by-ways.
All-pervading is the Great Tao! It may be found on the left hand and on the right.
The sage has no invariable mind of his own; he makes the mind of the people his mind.
Of every ten three are ministers of life (to themselves); and three are ministers of death.
(The Tao) which originated all under the sky is to be considered as the mother of them all.
I would make the people return to the use of knotted cords (instead of the written characters).
In the Way of Heaven, there is no partiality of love; it is always on the side of the good man.
Therefore the place of what is firm and strong is below, and that of what is soft and weak is above.
The movement of the Tao By contraries proceeds; And weakness marks the course Of Tao's mighty deeds.
If princes and kings were able to maintain it, all things would of themselves be transformed by them.
How do I know that this effect is sure to hold thus all under the sky? By this (method of observation).
When the people do not fear what they ought to fear, that which is their great dread will come on them.
Who is content Needs fear no shame. Who knows to stop Incurs no blame. From danger free Long live shall he.
There are few in the world who attain to the teaching without words, and the advantage arising from non-action.
When these two do not injuriously affect each other, their good influences converge in the virtue (of the Tao).
And when (one with the highest excellence) does not wrangle (about his low position), no one finds fault with him.
Fishes should not be taken from the deep; instruments for the profit of a state should not be shown to the people.
Thus we may see, Who cleaves to fame Rejects what is more great; Who loves large stores Gives up the richer state.
Therefore the sage manages affairs without doing anything, and conveys his instructions without the use of speech.
Who can take his own superabundance and therewith serve all under heaven? Only he who is in possession of the Tao!
The relation of the Tao to all the world is like that of the great rivers and seas to the streams from the valleys.
The Tao in its regular course does nothing (for the sake of doing it), and so there is nothing which it does not do.
Thus it is that firmness and strength are the concomitants of death; softness and weakness, the concomitants of life.
He who knows (the Tao) does not (care to) speak (about it); he who is (ever ready to) speak about it does not know it.
To know and yet (think) we do not know is the highest (attainment); not to know (and yet think) we do know is a disease.
Wherever a host is stationed, briars and thorns spring up. In the sequence of great armies there are sure to be bad years.
Constant action overcomes cold; being still overcomes heat. Purity and stillness give the correct law to all under heaven.
With all the sharpness of the Way of Heaven, it injures not; with all the doing in the way of the sage he does not strive.