Ji, the Ultimate, is the honoring of the sage.
Guanyinzi said: When the sage governs the world, he does not judge worthiness and folly by himself; so he treats people as worthy according to their worthiness and as foolish according to their folly. He does not judge right and wrong by himself; so he treats affairs as right according to their rightness and as wrong according to their wrongness. Knowing that past and present are fundamentally the same, he sometimes puts the past first and sometimes the present. Knowing that inner and outer are fundamentally the same, he sometimes puts the inner first and sometimes the outer. Since nothing in the world can burden him, he bases himself on humility; since nothing in the world can be outside him, he embraces it with emptiness; since nothing in the world can make things hard for him, he acts with ease; since nothing in the world can block him, he adapts with expedience. Centering the world with this, he can establish the rites; harmonizing the world with this, he can compose music; making the world impartial with this, he can manage wealth; encompassing the world with this, he can resist insult; following the world with this, he can establish laws; observing the world with this, he can make implements. The sage does not govern the world by his single self; he governs the world by means of the world. The world credits the achievement to the sage, and the sage leaves the achievement to the world. That is why, when Yao, Shun, Yu, and Tang governed the world, the world all said, “It is what is so of itself.” He said: Heaven covers everything; there is giving life and there is killing, yet heaven has no love or hate. The sun shines on everything; there is the beautiful and the ugly, yet the sun has no favor or neglect.
He said: The Tao of the sage is the mandate of heaven; the sage cannot make it his Tao by himself. The virtue of the sage accords with the times; the sage cannot make it his virtue by himself. The affairs of the sage are the doings of people; the sage cannot make them his affairs by himself. Therefore the sage does not possess the Tao, does not possess virtue, and does not possess affairs.
He said: The sage knows that the self has no self, so he joins with others through benevolence. He knows that affairs have no self, so he weighs them with righteousness. He knows that the mind has no self, so he restrains it with ritual. He knows that knowledge has no self, so he illuminates it with wisdom. He knows that speech has no self, so he keeps it with good faith.
He said: In the Tao of the sage, sometimes benevolence is taken as benevolence, sometimes righteousness is taken as benevolence, and sometimes ritual, wisdom, or good faith is taken as benevolence. Benevolence, righteousness, ritual, wisdom, and good faith each contain all five. The sage unites them without being stuck to any, and the world cannot find a name for him.
He said: Do not look at the sage through his conduct, for the Tao leaves no traces. Do not look at the sage through his words, for the Tao has no words. Do not look at the sage through his abilities, for the Tao is non-action. Do not look at the sage through his appearance, for the Tao has no form.
He said: Conduct, however eminent, does not escape high and low; words, however impartial, do not escape right and wrong; abilities, however divine, do not escape skill and clumsiness; appearance, however extraordinary, does not escape beauty and ugliness. The sage borrows these to show himself to the world; only when the world lets them sink into the dark unknown does it see the sage.
He said: The sage learned from bees to establish ruler and ministers, from spiders to make nets, from the bowing rat to institute rites, and from fighting ants to set up armies. The multitude learn from the worthy, the worthy learn from the sage, and the sage learns from the myriad things. Only because the sage is one with things is he without self.
He said: The sage speaks of “the Tao.” He sees heaven and earth, people and things, as all being my Tao: he leads them and follows them, begins them and ends them, colors them green and yellow, hatches and shelters them. He does not love the Tao or cast away things, does not honor the gentleman or despise the petty man. The worthy speaks of “things.” Every thing is different: daily he removes some and daily he grants others, shortens them and lengthens them, straightens them and squares them; this is changing things. He does not know that the sage disdains mixing and separating, dividing and allotting—these he does for the sake of others, not for himself.
He said: The sage and the multitude are the same in food, drink, and clothing; the same in houses, boats, and carriages; the same in wealth and rank, poverty and lowliness. The multitude are always the same as the sage, and the sage is always the same as the multitude. Those who look up to his loftiness and extol his greatness—are they right, or are they not?
He said: A fish that wants to be different from other fish leaves the water, leaps onto the bank, and dies. A tiger that wants to be different from other tigers leaves the mountains, enters the marketplace, and is caught. The sage is not different from the multitude; it is only that things cannot confine him.
He said: The Tao does not act; one who responds to the world with the Tao is dealing in affairs, not the Tao. The Tao has no direction; one who lodges the Tao in things is dealing in things, not the Tao. The sage can never bring the Tao out to show to people.
He said: As a bell sounds like a bell, and as bell and drum sound together, so are the words of the sage. As a carriage moves like a carriage, and as carriage and boat travel together, so is the conduct of the sage. Only because no one can name it does it silence the words of the world; only because no one can know it does it strip the world of its cleverness.
He said: The centipede eats the snake, the snake eats the frog, and the frog eats the centipede; they eat one another. So it is with the words of the sage: he speaks of the faults of being and nonbeing, then speaks of the faults of neither being nor nonbeing, then speaks of the faults of rejecting neither being nor nonbeing. His speaking is like drawing a saw back and forth; only one who is good at sagehood leaves not a single word behind.
He said: Whether a dragon or a jiao dragon, a snake or a tortoise, a fish or a clam—the dragon can become all of these. The jiao is only a jiao; it cannot become a dragon, nor a snake, a tortoise, a fish, or a clam. The sage is a dragon; the worthy is a jiao.
He said: When one does not dwell in oneself, the forms of things show themselves. One's movement is like water, one's stillness like a mirror, one's response like an echo. Hazy, as if absent; silent, as if clear. Those who are one with it are in harmony; those who grasp at it lose it. He never goes ahead of others, but always follows them.
He said: Blended, boundless, roaming in the Great Beginning! At times he takes himself as gold, at times as jade, at times as dung, at times as earth; at times he soars with things, at times chases after things, at times is a mountain among things, at times an abyss among things. Upright? Expedient? Mad? Foolish?
He said: When a skilled zither player has grief in his heart, the sound is mournful; when he has longing thoughts, the sound lingers; when he has resentment, the sound winds and turns; when he has yearning, the sound wavers. What makes the grief, thought, resentment, and yearning is not the hand, not the bamboo, not the silk strings, not the paulownia wood. It is gained in the heart and answered in the hand; gained in the hand and answered in the instrument. Among people who have the Tao, there is none who does not hit upon the Tao.
He said: That the sage speaks, acts, and thinks is how he is the same as others; that he has never spoken, never acted, and never thought is how he differs from others.
He said: The clearer the mind is about benefit and harm, the less kin live in harmony; the clearer about worthiness and folly, the less friends keep company; the clearer about right and wrong, the less affairs are accomplished; the clearer about beauty and ugliness, the less things accord. Therefore the sage blends them all together.
He said: The foolish and clumsy of the world wrongly invoke the sage to excuse themselves, taking the sage's foolishness and clumsiness as their own explanation. They do not know that the sage is at times foolish and at times clear, at times clumsy and at times skillful.
He said: One who learns from a sage by way of sagehood is a worthy; one who learns from a sage by way of worthiness is a sage. For one who learns from a sage by way of sagehood follows the traces and forgets the Tao, while one who learns from a sage by way of worthiness turns back from the traces and accords with the Tao.
He said: The worthy strive upward and do not see what is below; the multitude drift downward and do not see what is above. The sage passes through both above and below, doing only what is fitting. How could one say that apart from the worthy and the multitude there is some separate sage?
He said: It is the order of the world that the husband leads and the wife follows, the stallion gallops and the mare follows, the cock crows and the hen answers. Thus the sage sets the pattern for speech and conduct, and the worthy is bound by it.
He said: Though the sage's Tao changes like a tiger's stripes, his affairs proceed like a turtle's steps; though his Tao is divided as finely as silk threads, his affairs are laid out like pieces on a chessboard.
He said: What is called the Tao of the sage—how solitary it is! How penetrating it is! How imposing it is! How good it is! Only because it can pair with all the myriad things while no single thing can pair with it can it honor the myriad things.
He said: The rolling up and unfolding of clouds and the flying and soaring of birds all take place in empty space, and so their changes are endless. So it is with the Tao of the sage.