Lao-Tzŭ
“Those who speak know nothing;Those who know are silent.”These words, as I am told,Were spoken by Lao-tzŭ.If we are to believe that Lao-tzŭWas himself one who knew,How comes it that he wrote a bookOf five thousand words?
Words in this poem
- wrote v. i.
- To root with the snout. See 1st Root. [OE. wroten. See 1st Root.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Lao-Tzŭ is in the public domain. This text is taken from A Hundred and Seventy Chinese Poems, Project Gutenberg ebook #42290, the Arthur Waley translation; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Various, Lao-Tzŭ, in A Hundred and Seventy Chinese Poems (1918), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #42290, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/waley-chinese/lao-tz.html, id L18873.
Form and metre
Lao-Tzŭ is 8 lines in a single stanza. The metre is iambic trimeter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 78%). 100% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 6.5 syllables. 2 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 25% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.
See other poems in iambic trimeter.
Measured by Laurel's pipeline, not copied from a handbook: how stress and metre are counted, how rhyme is lettered, how a drifted rhyme is found. Where the dictionary cannot confirm a rhyme the letter is withheld, not guessed.
Rhyme words, stanza by stanza
The word that ends each line, lettered by the rhyme it makes; a dash is a line whose rhyme the dictionary could not confirm.
- 1 ---AA--- nothing · silent · told · — · — · knew · book · words
Scansion, line by line
Each line with its syllable count and the stresses the words themselves fix: / stressed, ˘ unstressed, · a syllable the word leaves free and the metre decides. Read against iambic trimeter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| “Those who speak know nothing; | 6 | ····/˘ |
| Those who know are silent.” | 6 | ····/˘ |
| These words, as I am told, | 6 | ······ |
| Were spoken by Lao-tzŭ. | 6 | ·/˘··· |
| If we are to believe that Lao-tzŭ | 9 | ····˘/··· |
| Was himself one who knew, | 6 | ·˘/··· |
| How comes it that he wrote a book | 8 | ········ |
| Of five thousand words? | 5 | ··/˘· |
The reader shows the same poem with its rhymes coloured and a stress row above each line, the notes beside their stanzas, and any word's definition on a tap; the analysis page takes the whole book apart. How every part of this site was made.