Translation Comparison

Forget the vain mincing of words and see: if there is a chasm in his way, he goes around the chasm, if a rock stands in front of him, he avoids it, if the sand is too fine, brittle, he looks elsewhere for something more solid, and then always returns in the same direction. If the hard membrane of the salt marsh breaks under his muddy carts, you can see him whirling and turning, freeing his animals from the hole, groping for the solid ground, but then soon returning in good order again in the original direction. If one of the load-carrying animals collapses, they stop, pick up the broken crates, transfer them to another animal, tighten the knot on the creaking rope so that they don't slip, and then continue on the same road. It happens that the person who guided them dies. They flock around him. They are buried in the sand. They argue. Then they find another one, make it their leader, and start again, after the same star. Thus, the caravan, like a heavy stone on an invisible slope, necessarily moves in a direction that is the master of its will.