| What remains placid is quite easy to hold. Not determined happenings can be prepared for well in advance. Before there has been an omen it's easy to lay plans. It's easy to forestall some things that don't are or not yet occur. It's quite easy to plan for and prepare well in advance. [But such forestalling is had by thoughts, and thoughts are airy and can be tender and brittle, to say the least.] And what's brittle is easy to crack. What's tender is easily torn. What's brittle like ice is easy to melt. And what's tiny is easy to scatter. [All the same, reach up to] deal with things in their state of not-yet-being; deal with things well before they appear. Just put things well in shape before disorder and confusion. Put all very well in order before disorder, and next go on to check loss or disorder well. A tree as big as a man's hug grows from a tiny sprout. A tower nine storeys high begins with a clod of earth. Further, the journey of three hundred miles began with ... the feet. A journey of a thousand li begins right where one stands, even with the very first step. Still, he who takes a [visible forestalling] action fails. Who acts, harms; he who grabs, lets slip. And therefore the wise man doesn't act in the open, and so doesn't spoil or harm; yes, he takes seemingly no action and therefore hardly fails. And why is this? It's due to: He who grasps things [often] loses them. He doesn't grasp a lot, he doesn't let slip a lot. Does hardly grab in the open, and so doesn't let slip a lot. He grasps nothing visibly to others, and therefore he doesn't lose much. Whereas people in their handling of affairs often fail when they're about to succeed at their tasks. Such people constantly spoil things when within an ace of completing them. Be as careful at the end as at the start to avert failures at hand. Then there will be no such failures. Heed the end no less than the start, so that your valuable work will not be spoiled and ruined. Therefore the wise man learns to seem unlearned, wants only things that are unwanted. Yes, the wise man publicly desires to have no desire. Therefore the wise man desires no desire - and desires all the same. He doesn't often value rare treasures publicly. He hardly values objects hard to get or find - in public. He says he learns that which is unlearned. He claims he sets no store by products difficult to get, and so teaches things untaught. [It's a trap.] But he also turns all beings back to the very thing they have left behind, so that he can assist in the course of nature somehow. And if so, "the ten thousand creatures" can be restored to their self-sameness, the self-so which is of [some] dao. Yes, he supports all things in some of their natural states. This he does; but hardly presume to interfere all right. He hardly dares to act in the open. So he denies to take any visible action. |
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