If the Great Way perishes there will morality and duty. When cleverness and knowledge arise great lies will flourish. When relatives fall out with one another there will be filial duty and love. When states are in confusion there will be faithful servants.
Interpretation
The quote suggests that moral values and duties arise in response to the loss of a harmonious way of life.
Laozi's quote reflects on the state of human relationships and moral obligations within society. It implies that when harmony and the 'Great Way' are lost, people tend to cling to morality and duty as a response to chaos and clever deceit. The mention of familial love and loyalty in the face of conflict highlights the importance of maintaining strong bonds in difficult times, suggesting that true virtue emerges from necessity rather than a natural state of being.
In practice
This quote can be used in a discussion on ethics and human behavior in chaotic times.
If you understand others you are smart._x000D_ If you understand yourself you are illuminated._x000D_ If you overcome others you are powerful._x000D_ If you overcome yourself you have strength._x000D_ If you know how to be satisfied you are rich._x000D_ If you can act with vigor, you have a will._x000D_ If you don't lose your objectives you can be long-lasting._x000D_ If you die without loss, you are eternal.
When nothing is done, nothing is left undone.
A good traveler has no fixed plans, and is not intent on arriving.
Knowing others is wisdom, knowing yourself is enlightenment.
In the world there is nothing more submissive and weak than water. Yet for attacking that which is hard and strong nothing can surpass it.
Rule your mind with serenity rather than with force and manipulation.
The subjectivist states his judgements, whereas the objectivist sweeps them under the carpet by calling assumptions knowledge, and he basks in the glorious objectivity of science.
We have to stop and be humble enough to understand that there is something called mystery.
His overriding life necessity was not love, it was his profession…He had come to medicine not by coincidence or calculation but by a deep inner desire. Insofar as it is possible to divide people into categories, the surest criterion is the deep-seated desires that orient them to one or another lifelong activity. Every Frenchman is different. But all the actors the world over are similar.
What we call our data are really our own constructions of other people’s constructions of what they and their compatriots are up to.
There is no reason for believing that any sort of gods exist, and quite good reasons for believing that they do not exist and never have. It has all been a gigantic waste of time and a waste of life. It would be a joke of cosmic proportions if it weren't so tragic.
Magic is the science of the jungle.
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