Methods of Government, explained by Mr. Lao Tzu

Mr. Lao Tzu,I am glad to save this allowter to you and I wish you to stay in good health. existence myself interested in the art of state governance I could not fail to be travel by your outstanding writings. Philosophers with such profound views as you pass are rare, so, desiring to further dispute legitimate ideas about government and administration I have found nothing violate than to write this permitter to you and thusly invite you to discussion. Please accept this letter calmly as it is due to a philosopher, for I have not wished to contest your wisdom, but besides to share several(prenominal) views which I have bring forthed via prospicient years of struggles and dangers. My approximately sincere desire is to have an advice with you because truth is sprout in discussion. Thereto let me pass to my debate.In your famous Tao Te Ching you writeIf you want to be a great attractor, you must go over to follow the Tao. Stop trying to control. Let go of fixed plans and con cepts, and the world give govern itself1.I admire this argument but I put it in a little other focussing for I think that it is better to be adventurous than cautious, because stack is a woman, and she needs to be trounce and dominated2. That what you call Tao I use to call raft. Fortune is something what we can not control, but we can do good from it. Every ruler has a Fortune, but not all of them are fortunate, because some of them are adapted to benefit from fortune and others are not. And to benefit from Fortune one has to feel it and take effort to obtain every possible necessary result from lucky events. Thats why I say that Fortune loves young. The young can better feel it and they are faster in using it. Using your monetary value I can say, that Tao flows by itself outside of our will. The one who feels the flow of Tao and moves with it will win3. But in browse to win he has to move in the direction he needs only using Tao because in case he moves with Tao he will l ose his aim of sight and will be a prisoner of circumstances.Another piece of your writing which attracted my attention isIf a country is governed with tolerance, the people are comfortable and honest. If a country is governed with repression, the people are depressed and crafty. When the will to power is in charge, the higher the ideals, the lower the results. fork up to leave people happy, and you lay the groundwork for misery. Try to make people moral, and you lay the groundwork for vice.4I agree with you entirely that a ruler is everlastingly an example for his subjects, however, I would like to notice, that ruling only by example is a much too vague basis for power. There are always people who do not accept any virtues and who are willing to overthrow even the most perfect ruler, at least to take his place. So I think that except for example a ruler is to inspire love and fear to the people, and at that fear is more important than love, because love is unstable and does not depend on rulers will, and fear is an instrument which is always available for a ruler5. Moreover, I believe that a ruler is to incur evil and forget about virtues in some cases. I mean those vices without which he might hardly save the state because, if one considers everything well, one will find that something that appears a virtue, if followed, would be his ruin, and that some other thing that appears a vice, if followed, results in his security and well-being6.You address about love and fear not as of methods of ruling, but as of rulers qualities when you write that When the Master governs, the people are hardly aware that he exists. Next best is a leader who is loved. Next, one who is feared. The worst is one who is despised.7As I have already mentioned, I believe, that fear is a better foundation for power than love, but now I would like to speak exactly of the rulers qualities. To my opinion a ruler is not to be good or bad, he is to be reasonable. What whole kit and boodl e good once can be not so good next time. Fortune, or Tao as you call it, may change, so the best ruler is the one who skillfully adapts to the situation and never freezes in his qualities. The ruler has to deal with different people who have different desires and so it is hardly possible for him to be same for all. A ruler has not to follow an ideal, but he is to be realistic8.You call upon princes to let things happen as they happen when you sayCenter your country in the Tao and evil will have no power. Not that it isnt there, but youll be able to step out of its way.9Let me used a term which I am used to and call Fortune that what you call Tao. I believe that this argument is weak, because it assumes that the country is ideal. And what about the countries which are not ideal and which are not in conformity with fortune? I would compare her to one of those raging rivers, which when in flood overflows the plains, sweeping international trees and buildings, bearing away the soil f rom place to place everything flies before it, all yield to its violence, without being able in any way to withstand it and yet, though its nature be such, it does not follow therefore that men, when the live becomes fair, shall not make provision, both with defenses and barriers, in such a manner that, rising again, the waters may pass away by canal, and their force be neither so unrestrained nor so dangerous. So it happens with Fortune, who shows her power where valour has not prepared to resist her, and thither she turns her forces where she knows that barriers and defences have not been raised to oblige her10. So a ruler does have to act in order to bring his principality to perfectness and make it protected even from Fortune itself.Let me conclude my modest letter by this. Hope you were not tire while reading it and you will find it possible to answer my most humble writing.Cordially yours humble servant,Niccol di Bernardo dei MachiavelliWorks Cited1. Lao Tsu, Tao Te Ching, 25th-Anniversary Edition, Vintage, 19972. Machiavelli. The Prince. Oxford Oxford University Press, 19983. Mary G. Dietz, Trapping The Prince Machiavelli and the Politics of Deception, The American Political erudition Review, Vol. 80, No. 3 (Sep., 1986), pp. 777-7994. David Hall, scuttlebutt on the Lao Tzu by Wang Pi by Ariane Rump, Wing-tsit Chan, philosophy East and West, Vol. 31, No. 1 (Jan., 1981), pp. 97-981 Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching, 25th-Anniversary Edition, Vintage, 1997. Verse 57 2 Niccolo Machiavelli. The Prince. Oxford Oxford University Press, 1998, p.- 83 3 Lao Tzu dows not speak so directly, but it is usually mentioned by commentators. For example see David Hall, Commentary on the Lao Tzu by Wang Pi by Ariane Rump, Wing-tsit Chan, Philosophy East and West, Vol. 31, No. 1 (Jan., 1981), pp. 97-98 4 Lao Tzu, 58 5 See Niccolo Machiavelli, chap. XVII 6 Lao Tzu, 58 7 Lao Tzu, 17 8 For this Machiavellis argument see Mary G. Dietz, Trapping The Prince Machiavelli and the Politic s of Deception, The American Political Science Review, Vol. 80, No. 3 (Sep., 1986), pp. 777-799 9 Lao Tzu, 60 10 Niccolo Machiavelli, p.- 119