Adaptation by arrangement is Tê. Spontaneous adaptation is Tao, by which sovereigns flourish and princes succeed.
"Man passes through this sublunary life as a white horse passes a crack. Here one moment, gone the next. Neither are there any not equally subject to the ingress and egress of mortality. One modification brings life; then another, and it is death. Living creatures cry out; human beings sorrow. The bow-sheath is slipped off; the clothes-bag is dropped; and in the confusion the soul wings its flight, and the body follows, on the great journey home!
"The reality of the formless, the unreality of that which has form,—this is known to all. Those who are on the road to attainment care not for these things, but the people at large discuss them. Attainment implies non-discussion: discussion implies non-attainment. Manifested, Tao has no objective value; hence silence is better than argument. It cannot be translated into speech; better then say nothing at all. This is called the great attainment."
Tung Kuo Tzŭ asked Chuang Tzŭ, saying, "What you call Tao,—where is it?"
"There is nowhere," replied Chuang Tzŭ, "where it is not."
"Tell me one place at any rate where it is," said Tung Kuo Tzŭ.
"It is in the ant," replied Chuang Tzŭ.
