Legend holds that a border guard refused to let the aging sage Laozi leave China until he wrote down his wisdom - so he did, in eighty-one short verses, and then rode off and was never heard from again. What he left behind became one of the most translated books in human history: a quiet, paradoxical guide to flowing with the natural order of things instead of straining against it.Foundational to Taoist thought and endlessly influential far beyond it, the Tao Te Ching rewards slow, repeated reading. Brief enough to finish in an afternoon, deep enough to return to for a lifetime.
