The praise of the Abyss

"What you cannot see by looking at it, is called plainness. What you cannot hear by listening to it, is called rareness. What you cannot get by grasping it, is called minuteness. These three cannot be examined, and therefore they blend into Unity. Above it is not bright, below it is not obscure. Boundless in its operation, it cannot be named. Returning, it goes home into nothing. This I call the appearance of non-appearance, the form of nothing. This is what baffles investigation. Would you go before it, you cannot see its face. Would you go behind it, you cannot see its back. But to have such an apprehension of the Tau which was from of old as to regulate present things, and to know their beginning in the past; this I call having the clue of Tau."