The Mare and the Cow

The mare and the cow embody docility as a form of strength. The mare stands at the very gate of the Receptive, in the Judgment of 02 K'un - The Receptive:

THE RECEPTIVE brings about sublime success,
Furthering through the perseverance of a mare.

Wilhelm explains the choice: "The horse belongs to earth just as the dragon belongs to heaven. Its tireless roaming over the plains is taken as a symbol of the vast expanse of the earth. This is the symbol chosen because the mare combines the strength and swiftness of the horse with the gentleness and devotion of the cow." This is not weakness dressed as virtue. The mare is strong and swift; what defines her is that the strength serves.

The cow carries the same teaching into the realm of clarity. The Judgment of 30 Li - The Clinging, Fire ends, "Care of the cow brings good fortune," and the commentary makes the logic explicit: "The cow is the symbol of extreme docility. By cultivating in himself an attitude of compliance and voluntary dependence, man acquires clarity without sharpness and finds his place in the world." Docility is the price of light. In 49 Ko - Revolution (Molting) even the revolutionary begins under this sign, "Wrapped in the hide of a yellow cow," restraining himself utterly before the upheaval, since yellow is the color of the mean and the cow the symbol of docility.

To lose the cow is to lose oneself. The wanderer of 56 Lü - The Wanderer who lets himself go, laughing and jesting, finds that "Through carelessness he loses his cow. Misfortune," and Wilhelm glosses the cow directly as "his modesty and adaptability." In 25 Wu Wang - Innocence (The Unexpected) the placid beast is simply appropriable: "The cow that was tethered by someone Is the wanderer's gain, the citizen's loss." The Taoist parallel runs through Tao Te Ching 10 and 28, keeping to the role of the female: strength that serves is the only strength that endures.