靜靜悄悄 Silent And Still
這大聖喜喜歡歡走將進去，一程一節，看不盡無邊的景致。直入裡面，更沒個人兒，靜靜悄悄的，雞犬之聲也無。心中暗道：「這聖賢想是不在家了。」这大圣喜喜欢欢走将进去，一程一节，看不尽无边的景致。直入里面，更没个人儿，静静悄悄的，鸡犬之声也无。心中暗道：「这圣贤想是不在家了。」
逐句解 Line by line
The Great Sage went in delighted, stretch by stretch and stage by stage, and could not take in all the endless scenery.
看不盡 needs a hand at the tone rule. 盡 is raised to jìn, a falling tone, and 不 in front of a falling tone must become bú — but the automatic rule runs on the reading 盡 starts with, so it has to be corrected. This is the third of the chapter's four such places. 喜喜歡歡 is a doubled doubling and 一程一節 is stage by stage.
He went straight inside, and there was not a soul, all silent and still, not even the sound of a cock or a dog.
悄 is qiǎo, not the qiāo a modern dictionary gives first — a reading settled at the previous chapter's close and sealed there twice. And 雞犬之聲 is a quotation. The 道德經 ends its picture of the ideal small state with 雞犬之聲相聞, the sound of cocks and dogs heard from village to village — the noise of ordinary contented life. Here there is none of it. The text is describing a Daoist paradise by the absence of the one sound Laozi used to define one.
He said to himself, "The sage must not be at home."
暗道 is to say inwardly — the standard way this book renders thought. And after ten lines of cosmic scenery, the Great Sage Equal to Heaven concludes that she is out.
The comedown is deliberate and very funny. A hundred and four characters of auspicious haze reaching the Milky Way, and then a man walking through an empty house thinking nobody is in.
The silence is the interesting part, because the text defines it by a quotation. 雞犬之聲相聞 is from the 道德經 — Laozi's picture of the good small state is one where you can hear the neighbouring village's poultry. Take that away and you have not got peace, you have got somewhere nobody lives. Whether the narrator means it as praise or as a slight chill is left entirely open.
And 看不盡, could not see it all to the end, is doing quiet work too. He has come here on a deadline to beg a favour, and what the prose reports is that he could not take in all the scenery. Pilgrim's capacity for being distracted by a nice view is one of the steadiest things about him.