The Wisdom of Confucius: with Critical and Biographical SketchesConfucius
ReligionEastern
The Wisdom of Confucius: with Critical and Biographical Sketches
Confucius
Ethics -- China; Philosophy, Chinese
Tsz-chang was consulting him about making way in life. He answered,
"Be true and honest in all you say, and seriously earnest in all you
do, and then, even if your country be one inhabited by barbarians,
South or North, you will make your way. If you do not show yourself
thus in word and deed how should you succeed, even in your own
district or neighborhood?--When you are afoot, let these two counsels
be two companions preceding you, yourself viewing them from behind;
when you drive, have them in view as on the yoke of your carriage.
Then may you make your way."
Tsz-chang wrote them on the two ends of his cincture.
"Straight was the course of the Annalist Yu," said the Master--"aye,
straight as an arrow flies; were the country well governed or ill
governed, his was an arrow-like course.
"A man of masterly mind, too, is Kü Pih-yuh! When the land is being
rightly governed he will serve; when it is under bad government he is
apt to recoil, and brood."
"Not to speak to a man," said he, "to whom you ought to speak, is to
lose your man; to speak to one to whom you ought not to speak is to
lose your words. Those who are wise will not lose their man, nor yet
their words."
Again, "The scholar whose heart is in his work, and who is
philanthropic, seeks not to gain a livelihood by any means that will
do harm to his philanthropy. There have been men who have destroyed
their own lives in the endeavor to bring that virtue in them to
perfection."
Tsz-kung asked how to become philanthropic. The Master answered him
thus: "A workman who wants to do his work well must first sharpen his
tools. In whatever land you live, serve under some wise and good man
among those in high office, and make friends with the more humane of
its men of education."
Yen Yuen consulted him on the management of a country. He answered:--
"Go by the Hiá Calendar. Have the State carriages like those of the
Yin princes. Wear the Chow cap. For your music let that of Shun be
used for the posturers. Put away the songs of Ch‘ing, and remove far
from you men of artful speech: the Ch‘ing songs are immodest, and
artful talkers are dangerous."
Other sayings of the Master:--
"They who care not for the morrow will the sooner have their sorrow.
"Ah, 'tis hopeless! I have not yet met with the man who loves Virtue
as he loves Beauty.
"Was not Tsang Wan like one who surreptitiously came by the post he
held? He knew the worth of Hwúi of Liu-hiá, and could not stand in his
presence.
"Be generous yourself, and exact little from others; then you banish
complaints.
"With one who does not come to me inquiring 'What of this?' and 'What
of that?' I never can ask 'What of this?' and give him up.
"If a number of students are all day together, and in their
conversation never approach the subject of righteousness, but are fond
merely of giving currency to smart little sayings, they are difficult
indeed to manage.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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