When the palace is magnificent, the fields are filled with weeds, and the granaries are empty.
Interpretation
A critique of superficial luxury at the expense of essential needs and well-being.
This quote from Laozi highlights the imbalance in society where extravagant displays of wealth and power overshadow the neglected basic necessities of life, like agriculture and food security. It serves as a reminder that true prosperity and stability arise from nurturing the foundational aspects of society rather than pursuing mere opulence.
In practice
During a speech about sustainable development, you could use this quote to emphasize the importance of agriculture.
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.
They stormed and jeered at one another in long meaningless words of about twenty syllables each.
The life of money-making is one undertaken under compulsion, and wealth is evidently not the good we are seeking; for it is merely useful and for the sake of something else.
There exists in our society widespread fear of judging…[B]ehind the unwillingness to judge lurks the suspicion that no one is a free agent, and hence doubt that anyone is responsible or could be expected to answer for what he has done…Who has ever maintained that by judging a wrong I presuppose that I myself would be incapable of committing it?
O, here Will I set up my everlasting rest, And shake the yoke of inauspicious stars From this world-wearied flesh. Eyes, look your last! Arms, take your last embrace! and, lips, O you The doors of breath, seal with a righteous kiss A dateless bargain to engrossing death!
The truth is always an abyss. One must — as in a swimming pool — dare to dive from the quivering springboard of trivial everyday experience and sink into the depths, in order to later rise again — laughing and fighting for breath — to the now doubly illuminated surface of things.
I don't believe in men waiting until they are ready to die before using any of their money for helpful purposes.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.