The highest virtue

Guiding Meaning: That from which Heaven and Earth proceed and by which the classes of things exist has the Way as its origin, virtue as its beginning, spiritual illumination as its source, and Great Harmony as its ancestor. The Way has depths and subtleties, virtue thickness and thinness, spirit clarity and turbidity, harmony higher and lower degrees. The clear becomes Heaven; the turbid, Earth; yang becomes male, yin female. People and things receive different allotments: natures refined or coarse, lives long or short, feelings beautiful or ugly, intentions great or small. Some become petty people, some noble people; through change, division, and separation they fall into several grades. Thus there are people of the Way, virtue, benevolence, righteousness, and ritual. May one ask what conduct makes their names so different? Zhuangzi says: 'Empty, without being or action, opening and guiding all things: these are people of the Way. Clear and still, responding to circumstances and doing what is not done: people of virtue. Loving all things universally and bestowing without limit: people of benevolence. Ordering names and rectifying realities, handling affairs fittingly: people of righteousness. Humbly withdrawing and yielding, preserving harmony through respect: people of ritual.' All five delight in long life, honor substantial virtue, and value a lofty name, each carefully guarding feelings and nature. Thus rulers of highest virtue embody the Way and endure. Their spirit accords with transformation; their virtue moves in mysterious darkness. The world takes them as kings without anything seen or heard. Virtue returns to all things, and all say, 'Naturally so.' Rulers of lower virtue embody virtue in their conduct. Their spirit travels with transformation; their virtue matches august Heaven. The world takes them as kings, with something seen or heard. Virtue flows to all things and returns again to the ruler. Why?

Rulers of highest virtue receive in their nature the Way's finest subtlety and in their destiny the One's refined mystery. Nature and destiny are identical with spontaneity; feelings and intentions embody spiritual illumination; movement accords with Great Harmony; taking and rejecting agree with Heaven's heart. Spirit has no thoughts, purpose no concerns. Their perception is mysterious and marvelous, silent, empty, and void [one transmitted adjective is uncertain]. Moving, they seem formless; still, unborn. Their achievement resembles Heaven and Earth, their affairs those of infants. Leaving form behind and concealing intention, they join the Way. Dark, undifferentiated, and [missing character], the world does not know them. Expansive beyond ordinary bounds, they soar to the utmost distance. Yin and yang serve them; ghosts and spirits deliberate for them. Their persons change with the Way, rising and descending without limit, advancing, withdrawing, shifting, always together with transformation. Thus serene and nonactive, their virtue fills the mysterious realm; mysteriously silent and solitary, their transforming influence flows without limit. Their kindness cannot be measured, their substance cannot be fathomed. They encompass the great expanse and benefit ten thousand states. Knowledge cannot match their transformation; words cannot guide their customs. The world murmurs and looks upward, all receiving their transformation and clothed in their harmony. Such is primal nonbeing: utterly so, yet none knows who brings it about [the final transmitted wording is uncertain].

Rulers of lower virtue receive in their nature the Way's upright qi and in their destiny the One's lower and middle grades. Nature and destiny resemble spontaneity; feelings and intentions approach spiritual illumination; movement comes near Great Harmony; taking and rejecting embody utmost virtue. They entrust spirit to the great emptiness and hide their roots in mysterious darkness. In movement they return to softness and weakness; in stillness to peace and harmony. They sustain all within the four seas, personally regarding them as brothers. They are intimate without harmonizing, respectful without deferential display [the wording is paradoxical as transmitted]. Heaven, Earth, people, and things communicate mysteriously in undifferentiated wholeness.

Rulers of highest benevolence are pure and clear in nature, bright and broadly penetrating. Mind and intention are empty and still; spirit and qi harmonious and compliant. They encompass Heaven and Earth, leaving nothing outside. '[Missing character] acts and obtains the essentials': through being they know nonbeing, nourish life and dwell in virtue, loving the people like children. Illuminating things and meeting change, they respond like echoes and follow like shadows. They regulate Heaven's divisions and name Earth's patterns, distinguish what suits people and things, and open the gates of knowledge and precedent. They initiate affairs and blessings to benefit the people, attend to the interior and treat the exterior more briefly, guiding through affection. They accumulate thought and deepen inquiry to illuminate distant lands. Laws and prohibitions are fair and harmonious, commands lenient and gentle, measures timely, and the world rejoices. Thunder does not strike violently; wind and rain do not arise abruptly; plants do not wither; people do not die young. Creatures walking on tiptoe or breathing through beaks all enjoy their lives; flying and creeping beings all find their places. The old and weak roam in groups; the strong farm and tend mulberries. People live to see great-great-grandchildren, with yellow hair and renewed teeth. The ruler is like a parent, the people like infants. Virtue flows through the four seas: he possesses but does not take.

Rulers of highest righteousness are peaceful, harmonious, upright in nature, and understand feelings. They examine benefit and harm, discerning, wise, and perceptive. Their hearts resemble compass and square, their intentions ruler and scales, calm as water and straight as a plumb line. They like to undertake great achievements and establish magnificent titles, delight in initiating blessings and hate initiating calamity. Holding authority and managing change, they assess the age, exalt benevolence and encourage righteousness to preside over the people. Following the patterns of Heaven and Earth, they regulate what suits all things. They serve parents as though attending spirits and tread among the people as though approaching a deep abyss. Extending virtue to all states, they judge through the mean: authoritative without violence, harmonious without excess, strict without cruelty, discerning without harshness. Tracing beginnings and determining endings, they establish their position to govern the people. Their advance and retreat flow with the times; bending and stretching accompany transformation. Affairs change with tasks and ritual changes with custom. Commands are trustworthy, regulations and distinctions clear. Their main framework is not [missing character]; their laws are correct without excess. Ministers decide all affairs, while the ruler alone determines power and authority. The court is upright and attentive to the Way; goodness is manifested to expose wrongdoing. They establish five standards and mark skin and flesh. Honoring origin and beginning, they always accord with names, making decisions according to due divisions and cutting according to principle. Authority rises and influence expands, awe shakes all within the seas; setting themselves aside and following others, they benefit people without harshness. Evils as tiny as mustard seeds are demoted; beauties as fine as autumn hairs are promoted. Applied within to the royal house and without to people and things, they inherit abuses and adapt, preserve what is perishing and reconnect what is broken. They support the weak and raise the young; benevolent virtue revives. Those possessing territory transmit it to heirs, and descendants continue.

Rulers of highest ritual are harmonious in nature and gentle in feeling, their hearts [missing character] and their intentions desirous. They model undertakings on yin and yang and issue commands with the seasons. They organize myriad changes and net human hearts, exalt rulers and fathers, lower ministers and sons. They rectify superior and inferior, clarify ranks, order elders and juniors, distinguish husband and wife, harmonize human relationships, and regulate friendship. All return to prescribed systems, with graded categories of affairs. The constrained and regulated are praised and enrolled; the unbridled cut down and demoted. They range among the overbearing, envelop customs, and guide through a middle course. Following hearts and desires, they moderate them with harmony, constrain feelings and prohibit natural inclinations, erecting barriers before impulses sprout. They bind the age and fasten customs so that excess is impossible. They cut off what people cannot [the transmitted phrase is unclear] and expend troublesome effort; disorder becomes governable and danger settled. Knowledge and artifice spread, while pure honesty disappears, the great Way vanishes, and benevolent virtue fails to flourish. Heaven's heart is not satisfied, the four positions lose their constancy, thunder destroys and breaks, and all things suffer premature injury. Fathers and sons mourn, yet Heaven does not harmonize; day and night are mournful, yet the age is not transformed. Bells and chimes resound, yet customs do not change; refined melodies are intoned, yet manners do not shift. Humility and yielding do not win the world's trust; keeping soft and abiding with the female do not win its affection. Ranks and rewards do not bring worthy people down; rolling up sleeves and holding the jade tablet upright do not bring noble people. Why? Abundant words and beautiful appearances are not accompanied by sincere hearts.

Thus the foundation of emperors and kings begins with the Way. When the Way is lost, virtue follows; when virtue is lost, benevolence; when benevolence is lost, righteousness; when righteousness is lost, ritual; when ritual is lost, disorder. These five are guided through one body, yet rulers possess them in differing degrees. Therefore what they do is not what they desire, and what they seek is not what they obtain: they pursue thin trivialities instead of spontaneity. Ritual's affairs set inside and outside at odds, making flowers flourish while substance is destroyed, branches rise while roots decay. Ritual is thinner than loyalty, expedient power lighter than authority, trust inferior to righteousness, attainment short of benevolence. It is the last stage of government and the origin of disorder, where deceit begins and angry contention finds its cause. Thus making ritual and music, changing calendars and attire, regulating advance and retreat and imposing deportment, establishing constant measures for movement, and predicting future affairs to clarify gains and losses are the flower of the Way and the tip of virtue: methods for one time and arts for one locality. They cannot meet endless ages or communicate with the customs of distant regions. Hence they generate calamity and disorder, foolishness and confusion.

How can this be shown? Zhuangzi says: 'Heaven and Earth's responses depend on affairs; affairs respond to change; change has no fixed time.' Therefore affairs cannot be arranged beforehand and changes cannot be planned in advance, just as pain cannot be rubbed before it comes or an itch scratched before it arises. The five flavors cannot be blended by raw measures, nor zithers tuned by feet and inches. Thus the subtlest subtlety cannot be spoken, and the most marvelous marvel cannot be transmitted. The culmination of loyalty and trust cannot be adorned by ritual, nor can calculations preserve timely harmony and proper sequence. Thus perception is broad [the source corrects 'transmit' to 'broad'; the passage is discontinuous]. Seek the causes of calamity, disorder, trouble, and blame in oneself; toward others have no deliberate intention concerning the hundred auspicious signs and ten thousand blessings.