Government in the Tao Te Ching

When reading the poems from the Tao Te Ching, I thought it was especially interesting that that poems 57-60 focused on government since that was a new theme for the poems, and one fairly distant from the other themes discussed in the poems. I thought the ways that the poems shaped the ‘ideal government’ was especially interesting, especially upon reflecting on the ways that we might see these ideals in our society today. For instance, in 59, it is noted that “governing people and serving heaven/is like living off the land” (ll. 1-2) meaning that the government is meant to serve the people first. I think that this idea is a really common one in our own society, with the idea of the ‘government for the people, by the people.’ I also thought that 59’s idea of “there is nothing that cannot be overcome./There is no limit” (ll. 5-6) sounded very much like the ideal of the ‘American Dream,’ of pulling yourself up by the bootstraps and achieving anything if you put your mind to it and work hard enough. 59 expressed this idea very concisely in the next lines, stating “You can become the country/And the country’s mother/And nourish and extend it” (ll. 7-9). Those who were able to achieve ‘the American Dreamk’ ended up giving all the immigrants who ended up coming to America hopes about what it could and should be like here, and those who had succeeded were then able to lift up those newcomers, spreading throughout the country and becoming the ideal that we imagine for America today.