使我介然有知，行於大道，唯施是畏。
1. If I were suddenly to become known, and (put into a position to) conduct (a government) according to the Great Dào, what I should be most afraid of would be a boastful display.
大道甚夷；而民好徑。
2. The great Dào (or way) is very level and easy; but people love the by-ways.
朝甚除，田甚蕪，倉甚虛。服文綵，帶利劍，厭飲食，財貨有餘；是謂盜夸。非道也哉！
3. Their court(-yards and buildings) shall be well kept, but their fields shall be ill-cultivated, and their granaries very empty. They shall wear elegant and ornamented robes, carry a sharp sword at their girdle, pamper themselves in eating and drinking, and have a superabundance of property and wealth;—such (princes) may be called robbers and boasters. This is contrary to the Dào surely!
Legge's Comments
益証, 'Increase of Evidence.' The chapter contrasts government by the Dào with that conducted in a spirit of ostentation and by oppression.
In the 'I' of paragraph 1 does Lǎozǐ speak of himself? I think he does. Wú Chéng understands it of 'any man,' i.e. any one in the exercise of government;—which is possible. What is peculiar to my version is the pregnant meaning given to 有知, common enough in the mouth of Confucius. I have adopted it here because of a passage in Liú Xiàng's Shuō Yuàn (XX, 13 b), where Lǎozǐ is made to say 'Excessive is the difficulty of practising the Dào at the present time,' adding that the princes of his age would not receive it from him. On the 'Great Dào,' see chapters 25, 34, et al. From the twentieth book of Hán Fēi (12 b and 13 a) I conclude that he had the whole of this chapter in his copy of our Jīng, but he broke it up, after his fashion, into fragmentary utterances, confused and confounding. He gives also some remarkable various readings, one of which (竽, instead of Héshàng Gōng and Wáng Bì's 夸, character 48) is now generally adopted. The passage is quoted in the Kāngxī dictionary under 竽, with this reading.