Keep life and lose those other things; Keep them and lose your life:--which brings Sorrow and pain more near?
The surrounding passage

Or fame or life, Which do you hold more dear? Or life or wealth, To which would you adhere? Keep life and lose those other things; Keep them and lose your life:--which brings Sorrow and pain more near?

The work and its creator

Explore the original at Project Gutenberg ↗

Creator: Laozi (traditional attribution)
Nationality / cultural background: Chinese
Work / edition: 1891 translation

Translation: James Legge · English

Historical public-domain text. Selected passage; line-end whitespace normalised. No generated quotation.

In the source: PART 1.; paragraph 147 in the selected body section

Selected for the Brief on 17 Oct 2026. This date records our selection, rather than when the work was created.