To realize that our knowledge is ignorance, This is a noble insight. To regard our ignorance as knowledge, This is mental sickness. Only when we are sick of the sickness Shall we cease to be sick. The Sage is not sick, being sick of sickness; This is the secret of health.

Praise and disgrace cause fear.

The people are hungry: It is because those in authority eat up too much in taxes.

The wise man looks back into the past, and does not grieve over what is far off, nor rejoice over what is near; for he knows that time is without end.

The Way of the Sage is to act but not to compete.

Clay is used to make vases, but it is the emptiness they contain that makes them useful.

When the intelligent and animal souls are held together in one embrace, they can be kept from separating.