A great country is like the lower regions of a river:
A place where all the streams of the world unite.
She is the mother of the world.
The peaceful and feminine
always overpowers the masculine.
Being peaceable, one takes the lower position.
Tao Teh Ching, 61. Translation by Hua-Ching Ni.
The yielding are preserved whole.
The crooked become straight.
The empty become filled.
The depleted are renewed.
What has little will gain.
What has much will become confused.
[. . .]
Indeed, the ancient teaching that
"the yielding are preserved whole" is no empty saying.
Tao Teh Ching, 22. Translation by Hua-Ching Ni.