Chapter 14

We look at it and cannot see it, so we call it “the Even.” We listen for it and cannot hear it, so we call it “the Soundless.” We reach for it and cannot grasp it, so we call it “the Subtle.” These three qualities defy description, so we merge them and speak of them as One.

Its upper side is not bright; its lower side is not dark. Endlessly active, yet it cannot be named, and it returns again to nothingness. This is called the form of the formless, the image of the imageless; this is called the elusive and indefinable.

Meet it, and you do not see its face; follow it, and you do not see its back. When you can grasp the ancient Tao to guide what exists today, and can know how things were at the beginning, this is called grasping the thread of the Tao.