Cara Soror, 
34 
The Tao 
(1) 
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law. 
This is the hardest question you have yet put to me: to 
explain the Tao. The only proper answer would be Silence, 
trusting to the slow dispersion and absorption of the 
disturbance created by your asking it. In that sentence there 
lies, really, the whole explanation; but I see well enough that 
it won't do for you. You are not yet old or wise enough to 
understand that the only way to clear muddy water is to 
leave it alone. Still, you doubtless expect me to tell you just 
how that comes to pass; I will not disappoint you. First of 
all, what is the Tao? No proposed equivalent in any other 
language comes within a billion light-years of giving even an 
approximation. For one thing, it is itself a paradox; for 
another, it has several meanings which are apparently quite 
distinct. For instance, one sinologist calls it "Reason"; 
another, "The Way"; another "Tat" or "Shiva". These are all 
true in one sense or another. My own "White Hope" (see The 
Book of Thoth) is to identify it with the Qabalistic Zero. 
This last attribution is useful, as I will show presently, for 
hard practical reasons; it is an assumption which indicates the 
method of the Old Wise One who approaches the Tao. 
As you know, the supreme classic of this subject is The 
Tao Teh King; and I must suppose that you have read this in 
at least one of the several translations, else I should have to 
start by pushing my own version at you. (This has been ready 
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