For governing people, for serving Heaven
Nothing can improve upon moderation.
Truly
Having moderation means you awoke early.
Awaking early means your De is redoubled. 5
Redoubled De means you overcome everything.
Overcoming everything means you are beyond limits.
Being beyond limits means you can hold the state.
Holding the state’s mother means you can endure a long time.
We call this being deeply rooted with a solid trunk 10
The longevity and ongoing awareness of Dao.
***
NOTES
line 9: A variation of this line appears in poem 52.[1]
COMMENTARY
As he does with poems 57 and 58, Laozi opens poem 59 with the theme of government. Tellingly, he compares government to serving Heaven, a reminder that both are necessary and must be done correctly. And the secret to correctness is moderation, an essential concept which here makes its only explicit appearance in the Dao De Jing. Those who don’t need to be taught moderation, but rather have the natural gift for it, are described with Laozi’s lovely metaphor of awaking early. And having gotten that head start, the development of their personality is naturally intensified, and their functionality clarified – which is the redoubling of De, enabling them to overcome everything. Such limitlessness can empower them to hold the state, but only the ruler who holds Dao will know longevity and ongoing awareness.
FOOTNOTE
1. I keep wondering if there is a line missing from the original of poem 59, even though it reads the same way in both the BCE-era silk and bamboo texts of the Dao De Jing. For that matter, throughout the poems, Laozi is not shy about breaking rhyme schemes or rhythmic patterns when he needs to make a point. Yet here, the parallel structure used in lines 4–8, with the last phrase of one line becoming the first phrase of the next line, is significantly disrupted: The ending phrase of line 8, hold the state, becomes hold the state’s mother in line 9. The internal connection is to poem 52 – the state’s mother here being the world’s mother there, namely Dao. Nevertheless, lines 1–5 of poem 52 incline me to wonder if there was an earlier version of poem 59, with a line 8A:
Being beyond limits means you can hold the state.
Holding the state means you can attain the state’s mother.
Attaining the state’s mother means you can endure a long time.
Links To:
The Classic of Dao and De by Laozi: Contents
For more on Daoism, see:
Film Dreams: Frank Capra
Music: KALW Radio Show #3, Ancient China in 20th-Century Music
Music: SFCR Radio Show #8, Daoism in Western Music, part 1
Music: SFCR Radio Show #9, Daoism in Western Music, part 2
NICOLE V. GAGNÉ 