The Tao Te Ching, chapter by chapter

The Tao Te Ching is a Chinese text of about 5,000 characters, arranged in 81 short chapters, traditionally attributed to Lao Tzu. Every chapter here is given in James Legge's 1891 translation, which is in the public domain, with plain-language commentary and one thing to try.

Legge is used throughout for a reason worth stating plainly: it is free to read and free to quote in full. It is not the most beautiful English version. The most admired modern renderings are in copyright, which means a book quoting them could not point you at the complete text, and pointing you at the complete text is the whole idea.