Twenty-six centuries ago, Lao-tze already noted that freedom from one’s own ideas is the mark of the “moderate man,” as my English translation puts it. We could change this adjective to prudent, wise, superior. If there is one trait that distinguishes low, immature, unevolved natures, it is attachment to what they think and believe. From this attachment, —these chains,— which can only be interpreted as a manifestation of vanity and stupid presumption, the days go by, and time does not improve the plastered being, the being hostile to everything new and different. Moderation, if we were to define it in the sense used in this passage from the Tao Te Ching, would be the capacity to give in and accept what is different—an unimaginable virtue for the presumptuous who considers himself to be the center of the universe.
Freedom From One’s Own Ideas
