When a country is in harmony with the Tao, the factories make trucks and tractors. When a country goes counter to the Tao, warheads are stockpiled outside the cities. There is no greater illusion than fear, no greater wrong than preparing to defend yourself, no greater misfortune than having an enemy. Whoever can see through all fear will always be safe.
The way of the superior person is threefold; virtuous, they are free from anxieties; wise they are free from perplexities; and bold they are free from fear.
It is the reformer who is anxious for the reform, and not society, from which he should expect nothing better than opposition, abhorrence and even mortal persecution.
He spake of love, such love as spirits feel In worlds whose course is equable and pure; No fears to beat away, no strife to heal,- The past unsighed for, and the future sure.
Never have anything to do with likes and dislikes. The absence of what one likes is painful, as is the presence of what one dislikes. Therefore don't take a liking to anything. To lose what one likes is hard, but there are no bonds for those who have no likes and dislikes. From preference arises sorrow, from preference arises fear, but he who is freed from preference has no sorrow and certainly no fear.
... War is for everyone, for children too.
I wasn't going to tell you and I mustn't.
The best way is to come uphill with me
And have our fire and laugh and be afraid.
A heap of broken images, where the sun beats, And the dead tree gives no shelter, the cricket no relief, And the dry stone no sound of water. Only There is shadow under this red rock, (Come in under the shadow of this red rock), And I will show you something different from either Your shadow at morning striding behind you Or your shadow at evening rising to meet you; I will show you fear in a handful of dust.