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Friday, December 6, 2013

Bit by Bit - Chapter 24, Part 25

Trey Smith

Use the eye to look at the eye, the ear to listen to the ear, and the mind to restore the mind. Do this and your levelness will be as though measured with the line, your transformations will be a form of compliance. The True Man of ancient times used Heaven to deal with man; he did not use man to work his way into Heaven. The True Man of ancient times got it and lived, lost it and died; got it and died, lost it and lived. Medicines will serve as an example. There are monkshood, balloonflower, cockscomb, and chinaroot; each has a time when it is the sovereign remedy, though the individual cases are too numerous to describe.
~ Burton Watson translation ~
As Alan Watts has pointed out, a person cannot look at their own eye with their own eye. Obviously, the author is speaking metaphorically, not literally!

To view the Index page for this series, go here.

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