Chapter 79 of the Laozi

刘骏 Liú Jùn: Those who are not virtuous, I treat them as virtuous people, and thus, they become virtuous. (See ch. XLIX, note 393.) If you seek to pacify great enmities among people, they will not fail to retain some enmity; how could they become virtuous? It is better, says 李斯 Lǐ Sī, to remain indifferent to creatures, and to also forget the good we have bestowed upon them and the harm they have done to us. Let us imitate the one who holds the left side of the contract and asks nothing of others.

苏辙 Sū Zhé: Enmities arise from illusion; illusion emanates from our nature. One who knows his nature (and preserves it in purity) has no illusory views; how could he be subject to enmity? Now, people do not know how to uproot the root (of enmities); they seek to pacify the surface (literally: the branches). Thus, although they are calmed externally, they are never forgotten deep in the heart.

B: This comparison is intended to show that the perfectly sincere man has no disputes with others. He lets them follow their nature and does not provoke their enmity; he gives to each what they desire and demands nothing from anyone.

欧阳修 Ōuyáng Xiū, H, etc. The word 契 qì refers to 'a wooden tablet that could be divided into two parts. Contracts of various kinds were written on it, whether for buying, giving, or lending.' The one who was to give the object of the contract kept the left part of this tablet, and the one who was to come to claim it took the right part. (This is what E expresses by saying: 左契 zuǒ qì 'the left side of the contract serves for giving, the right side serves for taking, that is, for claiming.' When the latter presented himself holding in his hand the right part of the contract, the one who had the left part brought them together, and after verifying the exact correspondence of the lines of writing and the matching of the notches on the two portions of the tablet (which had to fit together like bakers' scales, and the letters engraved on them had to correspond like those of a banknote compared with its stub), he gave the requested object without any difficulty and without showing the slightest doubt about the rights and sincerity of the claimant.

When it is said that the Sage keeps the left side of the contract, it means he makes no demands on anyone and waits for others to come and ask for what they desire from him.

I believe, with 欧阳修 Ōuyáng Xiū, that one must imply 左 zuǒ 'left' (lævus) after 司 sī ('preside over'); literally, 'he who has virtue presides over (the left side of) the 契 qì tablet,' that is, 'the one with virtue holds the left side of the contract.'

E: Laozi means that the Sage merely gives to people and makes no demands for his benefits. When he does good for them, he forgets it; then people also forget the enmity they may have against him.

The words 'he holds the left side of the contract' are equivalent to these: 'he is disposed to give, he thinks to give.'

Literally: he presides over the 彻 chè tax, that is, 'he resembles the one who collects the 彻 chè tax.' The word 彻 chè designated a type of tax, more often called 彻法 chè fǎ (E), which had been established under the Zhou dynasty.

E: The emperor gave the people lands called 公田 gōngtián (which eight families cultivated in common and shared the produce equally), and he demanded a tax equivalent to a tenth of their revenue. This differed greatly from the one who keeps the left side of the contract (and is disposed to give). The one with virtue holds the left side of the contract (as 欧阳修 Ōuyáng Xiū says), that is, he merely gives to people and makes no demands on them.

The one without virtue presides over the 彻 chè tax, that is, resembles the one who collects the 彻 chè tax. Although he gives to people (the emperor gave lands to the people), he never fails to take much from them (the emperor demanded a tenth of the revenue from these lands).

The details above show the reader why I rendered the words 'he holds the left side of the contract' as 'he thinks to give,' and the words 'he presides over the 彻 chè tax' as 'he thinks to ask.' The literal version of the expressions 司契 sī qì 'preside over the contract' and 司彻 sī chè 'preside over the 彻 chè tax' would have been unintelligible. I had to provide their equivalent in my translation, as the commentators did in their paraphrases, while reserving the explanation, as seen above, of the proper meaning of the words 契 qì 'contract' and 彻 chè 'type of tax,' which are taken here in a figurative sense.

E: The virtuous man is content to give to people and makes no demands or requests from them. Although he takes nothing from people, heaven constantly gives to him, that is, constantly bestows its gifts upon him.