Get out the microscope, because we’re going through this poem line-by-line.
- We're told that good travelers don't leave tracks.
- This is probably a metaphor for the way those who are with the Tao go through life humbly, without raising a bunch of fuss about it.
- We're also told that good speech doesn't seek faults, which could mean that it's useless to spend all your time criticizing other people.
- The sages don't abandon anyone, says the TTC.
- They don't abandon things either, and all this non-abandonment is called enlightenment.
- This stuff is probably not meant literally.
- We doubt the sages took everybody they ever met with them everywhere they went. (Talk about a crowd.)
- We also doubt the sages carried everything they ever came into contact with along with them; that would make them all hoarders, which doesn't seem all that sage-like to us.
- Instead, these lines probably mean that the sages learned from everything and everyone.
- The next lines support this idea, saying you can learn from good people and bad people too.
- Good people who don't realize that they can learn from bad people are destined to be confused.