Be satisfied with praise.
Great renown follows great harm.
While nowhere is there nothing to dwell on,
See that there's nothing to dwell on.
I see nowhere to go, so I stay here.
Who stays here wants nothing?
I'm glad that, one day, no one will want me.
Abandon this and you will live forever.
other readings further drafts from the same generation
deeper strata where the meaning thins
the original
The grandest forms of active force
From Tao come, their only source.
Who can of Tao the nature tell?
Our sight it flies, our touch as well.
Eluding sight, eluding touch,
The forms of things all in it crouch;
Eluding touch, eluding sight,
There are their semblances, all right.
Profound it is, dark and obscure;
Things' essences all there endure.
Those essences the truth enfold
Of what, when seen, shall then be told.
Now it is so; 'twas so of old.
Its name--what passes not away;
So, in their beautiful array,
Things form and never know decay.
How know I that it is so with all the beauties of existing things? By
this (nature of the Tao).