When Authority Overreaches Its Bounds — Tao Te Ching

Lao Tzu asks a sharp question about fear and power. The people do not fear death; to what purpose is it to frighten them with death? If the people were always in awe of death, and he could always seize wrongdoers and put them to death, who would dare do wrong? When life is already unbearable, threatening death loses its grip.

There is always One who presides over the infliction of death. He who would inflict death in the room of him who so presides may be described as hewing wood instead of a great carpenter. Seldom is it that he who undertakes the hewing, instead of the great carpenter, does not cut his own hands.

The metaphor is about overreach: taking a role that belongs to a higher order. Amateur execution of ultimate power injures the one who grasps it. Know the limit of your legitimate authority before you force an outcome you cannot hold.