Tao Te Ching

“Herein lies a difference between Buddhism and Taoism. In Buddhism, this return to Nirvana is connected with a complete annihilation of the ego, which, like the world, is only illusion. In Taoism, the goal is to preserve in a transfigured form, the idea of the person, the 'traces' left by experience. That is the Light symbolized in our text by the Golden Flower.”

— Richard Wilhelm 1873 – 1930 CE
Translator bridging East and West
from Introduction to Secret of the Golden Flower