Original Text
The dazzling array of colors can easily confuse the eyes; the chaotic and noisy tones can easily harm the ears; the rich and fragrant flavors can easily spoil the palate; wild galloping and hunting can easily drive the mind to madness; rare and precious goods can easily lead to loss of integrity and theft. Therefore, the sage seeks only sustenance and warmth, not the external temptations of pleasure and luxury. Thus, one should discard external allure to ensure a simple and content life.
Guide
The eyes can see a myriad of colors, the ears can hear a cacophony of sounds, and the mouth can taste rich foods; beauty, music, and delicacies are what most people pursue throughout their lives, but Laozi points out that overindulgence in these leads to blindness, deafness, and a dulled palate. The pursuits of the nobility of his time, such as hunting and rare goods, would drive the heart mad and corrupt behavior, so in life, spontaneity does not mean indulgence, and following the Way does not mean lawlessness.
Analysis
This chapter reveals the dialectical relationship between "living for the belly" and "living for the eyes," pointing out the harm of material desires to humans. Through the various damages caused by colors, sounds, flavors, hunting, and rare objects to the body and mind, it leads to the author's own view: indulging in sensory pleasures dulls one's perception and deviates one's conduct from the right path. Laozi firmly rejects this lifestyle and advocates an attitude of "living for the belly, not for the eyes," essentially reducing the relationship between "benefit" and "use" from the previous chapter to the science of the human body. This demonstrates Laozi's micro-epistemology based on the "Way." However, in this chapter, Laozi continues to cite examples that hinder the mind from reaching the state of "nothingness." When the eyes lose their ability to discern things, confusion arises.
In Buddhism, human sensory organs are specifically divided into six categories: eyes, ears, nose, tongue, body, and mind. These six organs respectively perceive the six worldly realms of form, sound, smell, taste, touch, and phenomena. It is precisely because of perceiving these six realms that humans generate the six consciousnesses of joy, anger, sorrow, happiness, worry, and thought. It is the existence of these six consciousnesses that fills our originally calm inner world with boundless desires. When desires are fulfilled, we become ecstatic; when they are not, our emotions sink into depression, our hearts suffer torment, and our souls feel a painful urge to escape the body, as if jumping into a sea of fire from which it is hard to break free. Thus, our originally clear and bright mind becomes covered with a thick layer of dust, and even our once sharp senses become numb and dull.
"Five colors blind the eye" - here "five" is not an exact number, nor does "five colors" specifically refer to black, white, yellow, green, and blue; it is an indefinite concept broadly meaning a dazzling array of colors and vibrant hues. "Blind the eye" does not mean physical blindness but refers to things that dazzle and confuse, causing our eyes to lose the ability to discern the essence of things. The function of the eyes is to observe, and once what we observe becomes indistinguishable between truth and falsehood, we often fall into a state of bewilderment.
After understanding the principle that "the five colors blind the eyes," it is not difficult to comprehend that "the five tones deafen the ears." A single melody can refresh the mind and relax the spirit, offering an indescribable aesthetic pleasure. However, once the most beautiful sounds are mixed with others, the melody becomes discordant, and the pleasure instantly turns into painful torment. This is the best explanation for why people living in the noisy city yearn to return to a pastoral life.
When understanding "the five flavors dull the palate," we can refer to the explanations of the two preceding sentences. The human tongue has the ability to perceive various food flavors, keenly tasting sour, sweet, bitter, spicy, and other tastes; however, indulging excessively in a variety of exquisite dishes numbs the tongue and impairs the sense of taste, making it unable to distinguish different flavors. The tongue is specifically designed to enjoy delicacies, but once it loses the ability to appreciate fine tastes, it becomes a loss to us.
"Racing through fields and hunting game makes the mind go wild." Hunting was once a vital means of survival for early humans and the first productive activity they undertook, with human animal nature most vividly confirmed in the hunt. Looking at the entire development of human hunting activities, it is clear that hunting has always been a bloody and violent act of killing and plunder, a barbaric and uncivilized behavior that drives people to madness and cruelty, and such a psychological state of madness and cruelty is the root of social unrest.
So, what are "rare and valuable goods"? Why is it said that such goods can harm one's actions? According to Laozi, rare and precious items like gold, silver, jewels, fine clothes, delicacies, jade discs, bronze vessels, feathered ornaments, and weapons, precisely because of their scarcity and value, strongly stir people's greedy desire to possess them. Driven by this desire, people's behavior suddenly becomes strange and abnormal, such as thieves climbing over roofs and walls, breaking into houses, and even disregarding human life; powerful officials scheming against each other, engaging in intrigue and deception. From the above explanation, we can clearly see that the reason "five colors," "five flavors," and "five sounds" harm us is that they stimulate our desires, causing them to expand infinitely.
Finally, Laozi puts forth the idea that "the sage acts for the belly, not for the eye," a remarkably clear statement that defines the sage's way of life: satisfying only the basic need of filling the stomach, rather than the desire of the eyes to appreciate external objects. This view of Laozi is not an opposition to enjoying life, but a warning to pursue enjoyment in moderation and not to indulge one's greed without limit. He hopes that people can have ample food and clothing, achieving inner tranquility and peace, rather than seeking the satisfaction of external desires. A person who greedily satisfies their external desires will develop a sense of self-alienation, and their spirit will inevitably become increasingly empty. Therefore, Laozi reminds us to completely abandon the temptations of various external desires, always maintain inner purity and contentment, in order to live freely and happily. Yet in life, faced with a world overflowing with material desires, many cannot resist the temptation of material goods, thus sparing no expense to satisfy their desires for sound and sight, watching themselves degenerate and sink, even heading down the path of destruction. Clearly, the values and morals of these people have become severely distorted. Hence, in an era of highly advanced civilization, we must listen quietly to Laozi's teachings.