Zhi Wanders North莊子 外篇 知北遊

Zhi wandered north to the banks of the Dark Water, climbed the hill of Yinfen, and there happened to meet Wuweiwei.

Zhi said to Wuweiwei, "There is something I wish to ask you. What thought and what pondering will let me know the Way? Where should I dwell and what should I follow to be at ease in the Way? What should I go along with and what road should I take to gain the Way?"

He asked three times, and Wuweiwei did not answer. It was not that he would not answer. He did not know how to answer.

Zhi got no answer to his question. He came back south of the White Water, climbed the height of Hujue, and saw Kuangqu there. Zhi put the same words to Kuangqu.

Kuangqu said, "Ah. I know it. I was going to tell you, but in the middle of it I forgot what I meant to say."

Zhi got no answer to his question. He went back to the palace of the sovereign, saw the Yellow Emperor, and asked him.

The Yellow Emperor said, "Only with no thought and no pondering do you first know the Way. Only with no dwelling and no following are you first at ease in the Way. Only with no going along and no road do you first gain the Way."

Zhi asked the Yellow Emperor, "You and I know it, and those two do not. Which of us is right?"

The Yellow Emperor said, "Wuweiwei is truly right, and Kuangqu is close to it. You and I are in the end not near it.

Now those who know do not speak, and those who speak do not know. So the sage practices the teaching that has no words. The Way cannot be brought to you, and virtue cannot be arrived at. Benevolence can be made, righteousness can be marred, and rites make men false to one another.

So it is said, 'When the Way was lost, then came virtue. When virtue was lost, then came benevolence. When benevolence was lost, then came righteousness. When righteousness was lost, then came rites. Rites are the flower of the Way and the head of disorder.'

So it is said, 'One who practices the Way takes away day by day. He takes away and takes away again until he reaches doing nothing, and doing nothing there is nothing he does not do.'

Now that he has already become a thing, he wishes to go back to the root. Is that not hard? The one who finds it easy is the great man alone.

Life is the companion of death, and death is the beginning of life. Who knows the thread of them?

The life of a man is breath gathered. When it gathers there is life, and when it scatters there is death. If death and life are companions of each other, what have I to grieve over? So the ten thousand things are one.

This is to call what men find beautiful divine and wonderful, and what they hate rank and rotten. The rank and rotten change again into the divine and wonderful, and the divine and wonderful change again into the rank and rotten.

So it is said, 'Through all the world there is one breath and nothing more.' That is why the sage prizes the one."

Zhi said to the Yellow Emperor, "I asked Wuweiwei, and Wuweiwei did not answer me. It was not that he would not answer me. He did not know how to answer me. I asked Kuangqu, and Kuangqu meant to tell me and did not tell me. It was not that he would not tell me. He meant to tell me and forgot it. Now I ask you, and you know it. Why do you say you are not near it?"

The Yellow Emperor said, "That one is truly right because he does not know. This one is close to it because he forgot. You and I are in the end not near it because we know it."

Kuangqu heard of this and held the Yellow Emperor to be a man who knows words.

Heaven and earth have great beauty and do not speak. The four seasons have a clear law and do not argue. The ten thousand things have a finished pattern and do not explain.

The sage is one who is rooted in the beauty of heaven and earth and reaches through to the pattern of the ten thousand things. For this reason the perfect man does nothing and the great sage makes nothing. This means that they have looked to heaven and earth.

Now that spirit light, utterly fine, goes along with all those changes. Things are already dead and alive, square and round, and no one knows their root. Spread out on every side, the ten thousand things have stood firm from of old.

The six directions are vast, yet nothing leaves their inside. An autumn hair is small, yet it waits upon this to form its body. Nothing in the world does not sink and rise, and nothing stays its old self a whole life long. Yin and yang and the four seasons move in their courses, and each gets its order.

Dim, as though gone, yet present. Ample, without form, yet wondrous. The ten thousand things are nourished by it and do not know it. This is called the root, and by it heaven may be seen.

Nie Que asked Pi Yi about the Way, and Pi Yi said, "Straighten your body and make your seeing one, and the harmony of heaven will come. Draw in your knowing and make your measuring one, and the spirit will come to lodge in you.

Virtue will become your beauty and the Way will become your dwelling. You will stare like a newborn calf and not look for the reason of it."

Before the words were done, Nie Que had fallen asleep.

Pi Yi was greatly pleased. He went off singing, and said, "His body is like dry bones and his mind like dead ashes. Truly this is real knowing, and he does not hold himself up with the old. Dim and dark, he has no mind, and there is no planning with him. What kind of man is he?"

Shun asked Cheng, "Can the Way be gained and held?"

He said, "Your own body is not yours. How could you hold the Way?"

Shun said, "If my body is not mine, whose is it?"

He said, "It is a shape entrusted to you by heaven and earth. Your life is not yours either. It is harmony entrusted by heaven and earth. Your nature and your allotted span are not yours. They are compliance entrusted by heaven and earth. Your sons and grandsons are not yours. They are a cast skin entrusted by heaven and earth.

So you walk and do not know where you are going, you stay and do not know what you hold to, you eat and do not know the taste. It is the strong breath of heaven and earth. How then could it be gained and held?"

Confucius asked Lao Dan, "Today you are at leisure. I venture to ask about the utmost Way."

Lao Dan said, "Fast and abstain, wash your mind clean, cleanse your spirit white as snow, and smash your knowing. The Way is deep and dark and hard to speak of. For you I will tell the rough outline of it.

Brightness is born of darkness. What has pattern is born of the formless. Spirit is born of the Way, and the root of form is born of the seed. The ten thousand things give birth to one another through form.

So those with nine openings are born from the womb, and those with eight openings are born from the egg. Its coming leaves no track, its going has no edge. It has no gate and no room, and it opens on four sides, wide and bright.

One who meets this is strong in his four limbs, open and quick in his thought, sharp in ear and clear in eye. His use of mind is not wearied, and his answering of things has no fixed direction.

Heaven cannot but be high, earth cannot but be wide, the sun and moon cannot but move, the ten thousand things cannot but flourish. Is this not the Way?

And wide learning is not always knowing, and skill in argument is not always wisdom. The sage has cut these away.

What is added to and grows no fuller, what is taken from and grows no less, this is what the sage keeps. Deep and deep, like the sea. Towering and towering, ending and beginning again.

It moves and measures the ten thousand things and is never used up. Then is the way of the gentleman a thing outside it? The ten thousand things all go to it for their stock and it is never used up. Is this not the Way?

In China there is a man, neither yin nor yang. He dwells between heaven and earth, is a man only for a while, and will go back to his source.

Seen from the root, the living are things of gathered breath. Though there is long life and early death, how far apart are they? It is a moment's talk. How could it be enough to judge the right and wrong of Yao and Jie?

Fruits of the tree and fruits of the vine have their pattern, and though the order of men is hard, there is a way in which they are ranked one after another. The sage meets this and does not go against it, passes it and does not hold on to it.

To tune oneself and answer is virtue. To pair with things and answer is the Way. It is how emperors have arisen and how kings have stood up.

Man's life between heaven and earth is like a white colt passing a crack. In a moment it is over.

Pouring out, bursting forth, there is nothing that does not come out. Flowing away, growing still, there is nothing that does not go in. Already changed, they are born. Changed again, they die. Living things grieve at this, and mankind mourns it.

Loosen the bow case of heaven, break open the bag of heaven, and then in a tangle and a turning the soul goes, the body follows after it, and this is the great returning.

That the formless becomes form and that form becomes the formless is what all men alike know. It is not what one on the way to arriving works at. It is what the crowd discuss together. He who has arrived does not discuss it, and he who discusses it has not arrived.

Clear sight does not meet it, and arguing is not as good as silence. The Way cannot be heard, and hearing is not as good as stopping the ears. This is called the great gain."

Dongguozi asked Zhuangzi, "This thing called the Way, where is it?"

Zhuangzi said, "There is nowhere it is not."

Dongguozi said, "You must point to a place."

Zhuangzi said, "It is in the mole cricket and the ant."

He said, "How can it be so low?"

He said, "It is in the weeds and the wild grass."

He said, "How can it be lower still?"

He said, "It is in tiles and bricks."

He said, "How can it be worse still?"

He said, "It is in dung and piss."

Dongguozi did not answer.

Zhuangzi said, "Your question, sir, did not reach the substance of the thing. It is like asking the market inspector about testing a pig with the foot. The lower down he treads, the plainer it shows.

Only do not say that it must be so. There is nothing that escapes from things. The utmost Way is like this, and great words are the same. All round, everywhere, altogether: these three have different names but one reality, and what they point to is one.

Let us wander together in the palace where nothing at all is. Let us join and talk there, with no ending and no exhausting. Let us do nothing together. Let us be calm and still, far off and clear, tuned and at leisure.

My will is already empty. It goes nowhere, and I do not know where it arrives. It goes and comes, and I do not know where it stops. I have gone and come and do not know where it ends. I roam in the wide and open, and great knowing enters there and does not know where it is exhausted.

What makes things be things has no border with things, and yet things have borders. That is what is called the border of things. It is the border of the borderless and the borderlessness of the border.

Men speak of filling and emptying, of withering and dying. What makes filling and emptying is not filling and emptying. What makes withering and dying is not withering and dying. What makes root and branch is not root and branch. What makes gathering and scattering is not gathering and scattering."

E Hegan studied together with Shennong under Laolongji. Shennong was leaning on his armrest with the door shut, sleeping in the daytime.

At noon E Hegan pushed the door open, came in, and said, "Laolong is dead."

Shennong, leaning on his armrest, took up his staff and rose. Then with a clack he let the staff fall, laughed, and said, "Heaven knew that I was narrow and idle and rash, and so the master cast me off and died. That is the end of it, master. You died without ever setting out your wild words for me."

Yan Gangdiao heard of this and said, "One who embodies the Way is the man the gentlemen of the world are bound to.

Now in the Way he had not gained one part in ten thousand of the tip of an autumn hair, and even so he knew enough to hide his wild words and die. How much more one who embodies the Way?

Look at it and there is no form, listen to it and there is no sound. In the talk of men it is called dark and dark. What is used to discuss the Way is not the Way."

Then Taiqing asked Wuqiong, "Do you know the Way?"

Wuqiong said, "I do not know."

He asked Wuwei too, and Wuwei said, "I know the Way."

He said, "In your knowing of the Way, is there a reckoning?"

He said, "There is."

He said, "What is that reckoning?"

Wuwei said, "The Way I know can be made noble and can be made base, can be bound up and can be scattered. This is how I know the reckoning of the Way."

Taiqing put these words to Wushi and said, "If it is so, then between Wuqiong's not knowing and Wuwei's knowing, which is right and which is wrong?"

Wushi said, "Not knowing is deep and knowing is shallow. Not knowing is inside and knowing is outside."

At this Taiqing sighed within himself and said, "Is not knowing then knowing? Is knowing then not knowing? Who knows the knowing that does not know?"

Wushi said, "The Way cannot be heard, and if you hear it, it is not the Way. The Way cannot be seen, and if you see it, it is not the Way. The Way cannot be spoken, and if you speak it, it is not the Way. Know that what gives form to form is itself without form. The Way does not fit a name."

Wushi said, "One who answers when he is asked about the Way does not know the Way. And even the one who asks about the Way has never heard the Way.

The Way has no question, and a question has no answer. To ask what has no question is a blocked question. To answer what has no answer is to have no inside.

With no inside to meet a blocked question, such a man does not look out upon the universe and does not know the great beginning within. For this reason he does not pass beyond Kunlun and does not wander in the Great Void."

Guangyao asked Wuyou, "Sir, do you exist? Or do you not exist?"

Guangyao got no answer to his question, and he looked closely at the shape and face of him. It was deep and empty. He looked at it all day and did not see it, listened and did not hear it, grasped at it and did not get it.

Guangyao said, "This is the utmost. Who can reach this? I can have nothing, but I cannot yet be without nothing. When nothing has become something, what could I follow to reach here?"

The Grand Marshal's man who hammered belt hooks was eighty years old, and he did not miss by a hair. The Grand Marshal said, "Is this skill? Or do you have the Way?"

He said, "I have something I hold to. From the age of twenty I loved hammering belt hooks. I did not look at other things, and if it was not a belt hook I did not examine it.

This is how one who uses a thing borrows from what he does not use and so keeps its use long. How much more with that which is never not used. What thing does not draw its stock from it?"

Ran Qiu asked Zhongni, "Can what was before heaven and earth be known?"

Zhongni said, "It can. The past is as the present."

Ran Qiu lost his question and withdrew. The next day he saw him again and said, "Yesterday I asked, 'Can what was before heaven and earth be known?' and you said, 'It can. The past is as the present.' Yesterday I was clear, and today I am dark. I venture to ask what this means."

Zhongni said, "Yesterday you were clear because the spirit in you received it first. Today you are dark because you look for it with what is not spirit, is that not so?

There is no past and no present, no beginning and no end. To say there are sons and grandsons when there are as yet no sons and grandsons, can that be?"

Ran Qiu could not answer.

Zhongni said, "Enough. Do not answer. Life does not give life to death, and death does not put life to death. Do death and life wait upon something? They both have that which makes them one body.

Is what was born before heaven and earth a thing? What makes things be things is not a thing. In the coming forth of things, nothing can come before things, and it is still as though there were things. It is still as though there were things, and there is no end to it.

That the sage's love of men has in the end no ending is also taken from this."

Yan Yuan asked Zhongni, "I once heard you say, master, 'There is no sending off and no welcoming.' I venture to ask about that wandering."

Zhongni said, "The men of old changed on the outside and did not change within. The men of today change within and do not change on the outside. One who changes along with things is the one who does not change. He is at ease in changing and at ease in not changing, at ease in rubbing along with things, and he is sure not to do too much with them.

Such were the park of Xiwei, the garden of the Yellow Emperor, the palace of Youyu, and the house of Tang and Wu. Men called gentlemen, who take the Confucians and the Mohists for their masters, grind against one another with right and wrong. How much more the men of today?

The sage dwells among things and does not harm things. One who does not harm things cannot be harmed by things either. Only one who harms nothing can send others off and welcome them.

The hills and the woods! The banks and the fields! How they make me glad and joyful. Yet before the joy is done, sorrow comes after it. I cannot ward off the coming of sorrow and joy, and I cannot stop their going.

How sad. The men of the world are no more than the inn of things.

A man knows what he has met and does not know what he has not met. He can do what he can do and cannot do what he cannot do. Not knowing and not being able are what no man escapes. And to labor at escaping what no man escapes, is that not sad too?

The utmost words leave words behind, and the utmost doing leaves doing behind. To make level what knowing knows is shallow indeed."