All existing things are really one. We regard those that are beautiful and rare as valuable, and those that are ugly as foul and rotten. The foul and rotten may come to be transformed into what is rare and valuable, and the rare and valuable into what is foul and rotten.

The perfect man uses his mind as a mirror. It grasps nothing. It regrets nothing. It receives but does not keep.

The wise man knows that it is better to sit on the banks of a remote mountain stream than to be emperor of the whole world.

If there is existence, there must be non-existence. And if there was a time when nothing existed, there must have been a time before that - when even nothing did not exist. Suddenly, when nothing came into existence, could one really say whether it belonged to the category of existence or non-existence?

There are no greater adversaries than yin and yang, because nothing in Heaven or on Earth escapes them. But it is not yin and yang that do this, it is your heart that makes it so.

He who dreams ... does not know he is dreaming... . Only when he awakens does he know he has dreamt. But there is also the great awakening (ta-chiao), and then we see that [everything] here is nothing but a great dream. Of course, the fools believe that they are already awake-what foolishness! Confucius and you, both of you, are dreams; and I, who tell you this, am also a dream.

To go outside what your charge was, and to try to solve everything yourself, is dangerous.