Cultivate the Way yourself, and your Virtue will be genuine.

Cultivate it in the home, and its Virtue will overflow.

Cultivate it in the village, and the village will endure.

Cultivate it in the realm, and the realm will flourish.

Cultivate it in the world, and Virtue will be universal.

Lao-tze, Dàodé Jīng, Chap 54. Blakney Trans (1955)

“Hierarchical organization on the one hand, and the characteristics of open systems on the other, are fundamental principles of living nature”

(von Bertalanffry, Problems of Life 1952)