Zhuangzi

"Cease striving. Then there will be transformation."

"People who excuse their faults and claim they didn't deserved to be punished - there are lots of them. But those who don't excuse their faults and admit they didn't deserve to be spared - they are few."

"If a man, having lashed two hulls together, is crossing a river, and an empty boat happens along and bumps into him, no matter how hot-tempered the man may be, he will not get angry. But if there should be someone in the other boat, then he will shout out to haul this way or veer that. If his first shout is unheeded, he will shout again, and if that is not heard, he will shout a third time, this time with a torrent of curses following. In the first instance, he wasn't angry; now in the second he is. Earlier he faced emptiness, now he faces occupancy. If a man could succeed in making himself empty, and in that way wander through the world, then who could do him harm?"

"The little child learns to speak, though it has no learned teachers - because it lives with those who know how to speak."

"You should find the same joy in one condition as in the other and thereby be free of care, that is all. But now, when the things that happened along take their leave, you cease to be joyful. From this point of view, though you have joy, it will always be fated for destruction."

"Today, I went to sleep under a plum tree. There, I dreamed I was a butterfly, flying so pleasently. Then, I fell asleep, and the dream ended. Now- I have to ask myself - am I Zhuang Zi who dreamed of a butterfly? Or am I that butterfly, dreaming I am Zhuang Zi?"

"If a man crosses a riverand an empty boat collides with his own skiff,Even though he be bad tempered man He will not become very angry. But if he sees a man in the boat,He will shout at him to steer clear. If the shout is not heard, he will shout again, and yet again, and begin cursing. And all because someone is in the boat. Yet if the boat were empty,He would not be shouting, and not angry. If you can empty your own boat Crossing the river of the world,No one will oppose you, No one will seek to harm you"

"Yet the stupid believe they are awake, busily and brightly assuming they understand things, calling this man ruler, that one herdsman – how dense! Confucius and you are both dreaming! And when I say you are dreaming, I am dreaming, too. Words like these will be labeled the Supreme Swindle."

"Rewards and punishment is the lowest form of education."

"I cannot tell if what the world considers ‘happiness’ is happiness or not. All I know is that when I consider the way they go about attaining it, I see them carried away headlong, grim and obsessed, in the general onrush of the human herd, unable to stop themselves or to change their direction. All the while they claim to be just on the point of attaining happiness."

"Forget the years, forget distinctions. Leap into the boundless and make it your home!"

"A path is made by walking on it."

"The wise man knows that it is better to sit on the banks of a remote mountain stream than to be emperor of the whole world."