February 17
Suspend judgement. Follow what appears — it is warm, it seems so — but do not assert that it is so in truth. Where you take back the hasty 'certainly so', calm settles into the soul.
Outlines of Pyrrhonism (freely rendered)
The Tree and the Silent Goose
Suspend judgement. Follow what appears — it is warm, it seems so — but do not assert that it is so in truth. Where you take back the hasty 'certainly so', calm settles into the soul.
On a mountain Zhuangzi saw a large tree with dense foliage. A woodcutter was resting beside it but left it standing. Asked why, he replied that the wood was no use for anything. Zhuangzi told his disciples that for precisely this reason the tree would live out its natural span.
After coming down, they stopped at the house of an old friend. He was delighted by the visit and had a goose killed for the meal. The boy who was to fetch it asked: One of our geese can cackle, the other can't. Which shall I take?
The master of the house said: The one that can't cackle.
