Complete your task. Seek no reward. Make no claims. Without faltering fully choose to do what you must do.

For all things difficult to acquire, the intelligent man works with perseverance.

. . . These are notions of the mind, which is like a knife, always chipping away at the Tao, trying to render it graspable and manageable. But that which is beyond form is ungraspable, and that which is beyond knowing is unmanageable. There is, however, this consolation: She who lets go of the knife will find the Tao at her fingertips.

Those who make their living by collecting taxes cause the people to starve; when the people starve, the tax collectors, having no one to tax, starve also

The highest tone is hard to hear.

The True Person avoids extremes, self-indulgence, and extravagance.

The Way of Tao is this: It strives not, but conquers; It speaks not, but all is made clear; It summons not, but its house is crowded; It contrives not, but the design is perfect.