Inability to exercise the functions of will is TAO. "Whatsoever is not said in all sincerity, is wrongly said. And not to be able to rid oneself of this vice is only to sink deeper towards perdition. "Those who do evil in the open light of day,--men will punish them. Those who do evil in secret,--God will punish them. Who fears both man and God, he is fit to walk alone. The term here used for "God" means strictly those "spirits" which are the avenging emissaries of the Deity. Those who are devoted to the internal, To self-culture. in practice acquire no reputation. Those who are devoted to the external, strive for pre-eminence among their fellows. Practice without reputation throws a halo around the meanest. But he who strives for pre-eminence among his fellows, he is as a huckster whose weariness all perceive though he himself puts on an air of gaiety. "He who is naturally in sympathy with man, to him all men come. But he who forcedly adapts, has no room even for himself, still less for others. And he who has no room for others, has no ties. It is all over with him. "There is no weapon so deadly as man's will. Excalibur is second to it. There is no bandit so powerful as Nature. The interaction of the Positive and Negative principles, which produces the visible universe. In the whole universe there is no escape from it. Yet it is not Nature which does the injury. It is man's own heart. "TAO informs its own subdivisions, their successes and their failures. What is feared in subdivision is separation. From the parent stock of TAO. What is feared in separation, is further separation. So that all connection is severed. Thus, to issue forth without return, this is development of the supernatural. To issue forth and attain the goal, this is called death. To be annihilated and yet to exist, this is convergence of the supernatural into ONE. To make things which have form appear to all intents and purposes formless,--this is the sum of all things. Man's final triumph over matter. "Birth is not a beginning; death is not an end. There is existence without limitation; there is continuity without a starting-point. Existence without limitation is _Space_. Continuity without a starting-point is _Time_. There is birth, there is death, there is issuing forth, there is entering in. That through which one passes in and out without seeing its form, that is the Portal of God. "The Portal of God is Non-Existence. All things sprang from Non-Existence. Existence could not make existence existence. It must have proceeded from Non-Existence, The idea of existence, independent of its correlate, cannot be apprehended by the human intellect. And Non-Existence and Nothing are ONE. If all things sprang from non-existence, it might be urged that non-existence had an objective existence. But non-existence is nothing, and nothing excludes the idea of something, making subjective and objective nothings ONE.