If in the above sentence he may be thought to fall short of the highest elevation, there are some among his apothegms, the point and excellence of which have, perhaps, never been surpassed. Take for instance these:—"The superior man is catholic and no partizan. The mean man is a partizan and not catholic." "Learning without thought is labor lost; thought without learning is perilous" (Ibid., ii. 14, 15). Or these:—"I will not be afflicted at men's not knowing me; I will be afflicted that I do not know men" (Ibid., i. 16). "A scholar, whose mind is set on truth, and who is ashamed of bad clothes and bad food, is not fit to be discoursed with" (Ibid., iv. 9). "The superior man is affable, but not adulatory; the mean is adulatory, but not affable" (Ibid., xiii. 23). "Where the solid qualities are in excess of accomplishments, we have rusticity; where the accomplishments are in excess of the solid qualities, we have the manners of a clerk. When the accomplishments and solid qualities are equally blended, we then have the man of complete virtue" (Lun Yu, vi. 16). Lastly, I will quote one which, with a slight change of terms, might have emanated from the pen of Thomas Carlyle: "There are three things of which the superior man stands in awe:—He stands in awe of the ordinances of heaven; he stands in awe of great men; he stands in awe of the words of sages. The mean man does not know the ordinances of heaven, and _consequently_ does not stand in awe of them. He is disrespectful to great men. He makes sport of the words of sages" (Ibid., xvi. 8). These, and various other recorded sayings, go far to explain, if not to justify, the unbounded admiration of his faithful follower, Tsze-kung: "Our Master cannot be attained to, just in the same way as the heavens cannot be gone up to by the steps of a stair. Were our Master in the position of the prince of a State, or the chief of a family, we should find verified the description _which has been given of a sage's rule_:—he would plant the people, and forthwith they would be established; he would lead them on, and forthwith they would follow him; he would make them happy, and forthwith _multitudes_ would resort to _his dominions_; he would stimulate them, and forthwith they would be harmonious. While he lived, he would be glorious. When he died, he would be bitterly lamented. How is it possible for him to be attained to?" (Ibid., xix. 25.) SECTION II.—LAÒ-TSÉ.[13]