A truly
good person doesn’t
dwell on her goodness.
Thus she can be good.
A person of false goodness
never forgets her goodness.
Thus her goodness is
always false.
A truly
good person does nothing,
yet nothing remains undone.
A person of false goodness is forever
doing, yet everything remains
forever undone.
Those who
are interested in service
act without motive. Those who are
interested in righteousness act with
motives of all sorts. Those who are
interested in propriety act, and
receiving no response, they
roll up their sleeves
and use force.
When
Tao is lost,
goodness appears.
When goodness is lost,
philanthropy appears.
When philanthropy is lost,
justice appears.
When justice is lost,
only etiquette
is left.
Etiquette
is the faintest husk
of real loyalty and faith,
and it is the beginning of confusion.
Knowledge of the future is only
a blossom of Tao; to become
preoccupied with it
is folly.
Thus the
sage sets her sights
on the substance and not the
surface, on the fruit and not the
flower. Leaving the one,
she gains the
other.
from The Tao te Ching of Lao Tzu,
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