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Tao Te Ching · 41 of 81

Chapter 41

Scholars of the highest class, when they hear about the Tao, earnestly carry it into practice. Scholars of the middle class, when they have heard about it, seem now to keep it and now to lose it. Scholars of the lowest class, when they have heard about it, laugh greatly at it. If it were not (thus) laughed at, it would not be fit to be the Tao.

Therefore the sentence-makers have thus expressed themselves:—

‘The Tao, when brightest seen, seems light to lack; Who progress in it makes, seems drawing back; Its even way is like a rugged track. Its highest virtue from the vale doth rise; Its greatest beauty seems to offend the eyes; And he has most whose lot the least supplies. Its firmest virtue seems but poor and low; Its solid truth seems change to undergo; Its largest square doth yet no corner show A vessel great, it is the slowest made; Loud is its sound, but never word it said; A semblance great, the shadow of a shade.’

The Tao is hidden, and has no name; but it is the Tao which is skilful at imparting (to all things what they need) and making them complete.

Asked of Guide

Why do people laugh at the Tao in this chapter?

Lao Tzu says scholars of the lowest class “laugh greatly at it” because the Tao appears absurd to those who judge by common sense and visible success. The chapter lists paradoxes—“Its highest virtue from the vale doth rise,” “Its firmest virtue seems but poor and low”—to show the Tao’s ways run counter to ordinary measures of value.

The laughter signals a necessary misunderstanding: the Tao is “hidden, and has no name,” and it operates by quiet, contrary effects—imparting what things need and making them complete. This same edge appears in Chuang Tzu, who treats paradox and obscurity as signs that deeper reality evades straightforward praise or ridicule.

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Echoes elsewhere

Chuang Tzu · Taoism42. 1. The Tâo produced One; One produced Two; Two produced Three; Three produced All things. All things leave behind them the Obscurity (out of which they have come), and go forwa The Aquarian Gospel of Jesus the Christ · Esotericand yet he makes all things to grow; he brings in season both the seed time and the harvest time. 25. And Tao Great was One; the One became the Two; the Two became the Three, the T corpus-hermeticum · Hermeticismbe] one. For that from One all things depending, 4 and flowing down from it,—when they are seen as separate, they’re thought to be as many as they possibly can be; but in their uni The Sayings of Lao Tzu · Taoismuse the terms "lonely," "friendless," "of small account." Is not this making humility their base? Thus it is that "Some things are increased by being diminished, others are diminis