guilty of an act or a word that was in any way discreditable. In another famous passage it is narrated that "A man who wanted to see Confucius called on him. Confucius, not wishing to see him, sent to say he was sick. When the servant with the message went to the door, Confucius took up his musical instrument and sang aloud purposely to let the visitor hear it and know that he was not really sick."[266] It is interesting to note that in citing this little story as evidence of Confucius's lack of veracity, Prof. Legge omits to quote the second part of the passage,[267] though it ought to be obvious to the most casual reader that it was only for the sake of the remark about the music that the story was preserved in the Confucian canon at all. So far from proving that Confucius could tell a lie, it goes to show that even in small matters of everyday social intercourse Confucius's nature was superior to all the little "white lies" and deceptions that are and no doubt always have been continually practised in "Society." Probably in his day, as in our own, it was considered more polite to an unwelcome visitor to plead indisposition or absence from home as an excuse for not admitting him than to send him the blunt message, "You are not wanted: go away!" Confucius, however, wishing to make it quite clear to his visitor that the plea of sickness was merely a social subterfuge and was not intended to deceive (as a lie must surely be), took up his musical instrument and played it in his visitor's hearing. So far from this passage proving that Confucius had an inadequate regard for the truth, it will perhaps strike a good many people as indicating that untruth and insincerity were abhorrent to Confucius's nature: and this was undoubtedly the impression that the disciple who remembered and recorded the incident wished to convey.