Aphorisms and quotes. Book on the way of life

The “Book on the Way of Life” by Lao Tzu, called “Tao de Jing” in Chinese, occupies after the Bible the second place in the world in the number of foreign translations. The origin of this book and the personality of its author are shrouded in many legends, about which the famous translator Vladimir Malyavin talks in detail in his preface. The word “Tao” itself means the path, and moreover, the path of the universe, life and human perfection at the same time. And “de” is the inner fullness of life, invisible, but firmly binding all living things. The main secret of Lao Tzu seems to be paradoxical: in order to become yourself, you need to eliminate your private I in order to have power, you need not to desire it, etc. And the secret of reading Lao Tzu is to comprehend the inner depth of the meaning that wisdom inspires, revealing a different and opposite meaning in each judgment.
Reading the “Book on the Way of Life” will be fruitless if it does not detect the unnecessaryness of abstract ideas, does not lead to a coup in the very method of perception of the world