The Sayings of Confucius: A New Translation of the Greater Part of the Confucian AnalectsConfucius
ReligionEastern
The Sayings of Confucius: A New Translation of the Greater Part of the Confucian Analects
Confucius
Ethics -- China; Philosophy, Chinese
Tzŭ Lu asked about the service due to a prince. The Master said: Use no
deceit, but if you oppose him, oppose him openly.
The Master said: If the ruler cherishes the principle of self-control,
the people will be docile to his commands.[9]
Shun[10] was one who did nothing, yet governed well. For what, in
effect, did he do? Religiously self-observant, he sat gravely on his
throne, and that is all.[11]
In serving your prince, make the actual service your first care, and
only put the emolument second.
The head of the Chi clan was on the point of attacking the small
principality of Chuan-yü. Jan Yu and Chi Lu came to see Confucius,
and said: Our lord is going to have trouble with Chuan-yü.--Confucius
said: Is it not you, Ch‘iu, who are to blame in this? The ancient
kings long ago made Chuan-yü the centre of the worship of the Eastern
Mêng mountain, and moreover it is situated within the territory of
Lu. Its ruler has independent priestly functions.[12] What right have
you to attack it?--Jan Yu replied: It is the will of our master;
we, his ministers, have neither of us any wish to act thus.--Ch‘iu,
said Confucius, Chou Jên[13] had a saying: "If you are capable of
displaying energy, hold office; if not, resign." Of what use is that
minister likely to be, who does not sustain his master in the presence
of danger, or support him when about to fall? Besides, what you say
is wrong. If a tiger or a wild buffalo escapes from its cage, if a
tortoise-shell or jade ornament is smashed in its casket, whose fault
is it, pray?--Jan Yu replied: But Chuan-yü is strongly fortified, and
close to our own town of Pi. If we do not take it now, it will cause
trouble to our descendants in a later generation.--Confucius rejoined:
Ch‘iu, an honest man hates your hypocrite who will not openly avow his
greed, but tries instead to excuse it. I have heard that the ruler of
a state or of a clan is troubled not by the smallness of its numbers
but by the absence of even-handed justice; not by poverty but by the
presence of discontent; for where there is justice there will be no
poverty; where there is harmony there will be no lack in numbers;
where there is content there will be no revolution. This being the
case then, if outlying communities resist your authority, cultivate
the arts of refinement and goodness in order to attract them; and
when you have attracted them, make them happy and contented. Now you
two, Yu and Ch‘iu, are aiding and abetting your master; here is an
outlying community which resists your authority, and you are unable
to attract it. Partition and collapse are imminent in your own State,
and you are unable to preserve it intact. And yet you are planning
military aggression within the borders of your country! Verily I fear
that Chi-sun's [14]troubles will come, not from Chuan-yü, but from the
interior of his own palace.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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