1. Tzu-chang said, The knight that stakes his life when he sees
danger, who in sight of gain thinks of right, and whose thoughts are
reverent at worship, and sad when he is in mourning, will do.
2. Tzu-hsia said, Goodness, clutched too narrowly; a belief in the
Way which is not honest; can they be said to be, or said not to be?
3. The disciples of Tzu-hsia asked Tzu-chang whom we should choose
as our companions.
Tzu-chang said. What does Tzu-hsia say?
They answered, Tzu-hsia says, If the men be well for thee, go with
them; if they be not well, push them off.
Tzu-chang said. This is not the same as what I had heard. A
gentleman honours worth and bears with the many. He applauds goodness
and pities weakness. If I were a man of great worth, what could I not
bear with in others? If I am without worth, men will push me off: why
should I push other men off?
4. Tzu-hsia said, Though there must be things worth seeing along
small ways, a gentleman does not follow them, for fear of being left at
last in the mire.
5. Tzu-hsia said, He that each day remembers his failings and each
month forgets nothing won may be said to love learning indeed!
6. Tzu-hsia said, By wide learning and singleness of will, by keen
questions and home thinking we reach love.
7. Tzu-hsia said, To master the hundred trades, apprentices work in
a shop; by learning, a gentleman finds his way.
8. Tzu-hsia said, The small man must always gloss his faults.
9. Tzu-hsia said, A gentleman changes thrice. Looking up to him he
seems stern; as we draw near, he warms; but his speech, when we hear
it, is sharp.
10. Tzu-hsia said, Until they trust him, a gentleman lays no burdens
on his people. If they do not trust him, they will think it cruel.
Until they trust him, he does not chide them. Unless they trust him, it
will seem fault-finding.
11. Tzu-hsia said, If we keep within the bounds of honour, we can
step to and fro through propriety.
12. Tzu-yu said, The disciples, the little sons of Tzu-hsia, can
sprinkle and sweep, attend and answer, come in and go out; but what can
come of twigs without roots?
When Tzu-hsia heard this, he said, Yen Yu[173] is wrong. If we teach
one thing in the way of a gentleman first, shall we tire before
reaching the next? Thus plants and trees differ in size. Should the way
of a gentleman bewilder him? To learn it, first and last, none but the
holy are fit.
[Footnote 173: Tzu-yu.]
13. Tzu-hsia said, A servant of the crown should give his spare
strength to learning. With his spare strength a scholar should serve
the crown.
14. Tzu-yu said, Mourning should stretch to grief, and stop there.
15. Tzu-yu said, Our friend Chang[174] can do hard things, but love
is not yet his.
16. Tseng-tzu said, Chang is so spacious, so lordly, that at his
side it is hard to do what love bids.
17. Tseng-tzu said, I have heard the Master say, Man never shows
what is in him unless it be in mourning those dear to him.
18. Tseng-tzu said, I have heard the Master say, In all else we may
be as good a son as Meng Chuang, but in not changing his father's
ministers, or his father's rule, he is hard to match.
19. The Meng[175] made Yang Fu[176] Chief Knight,[177] who spake to
Tseng-tzu about it.
Tseng-tzu said, Those above have lost their way, the people have
long been astray. When thou dost get at the truth, be moved to pity,
not puffed with joy.
20. Tzu-kung said, Chou[178] was not so very wicked! Thus a
gentleman hates to live in a hollow, down into which runs all that is
foul below heaven.
21. Tzu-kung said, A gentleman's faults are like the eating of sun
or moon.[179] All men see them, and when he mends all men look up to
him.
[Footnote 174: Tzu-chang.]
[Footnote 175: The chief of the Meng clan, powerful in Lu.]
[Footnote 176: A disciple of Tseng-tzu.]
[Footnote 177: Or criminal judge.]
[Footnote 178: The tyrant that ended the Yin dynasty.]
[Footnote 179: An eclipse.]
22. Kung-sun Ch'ao of Wei asked Tzu-kung, From whom did
Chung-ni[180] learn?
Tzu-kung said, The Way of Wen and Wu[181] has not fallen into ruin.
It lives in men: the big in big men, the small in small men. In none of
them is the Way of Wen and Wu missing. How should the Master not learn
it? What need had he for a set teacher?
23. In talk with the great men of the court Shu-sun Wu-shu[182]
said, Tzu-kung is worthier than Chung-ni.
Tzu-fu Ching-po told this to Tzu-kung.
Tzu-kung said, This is like the palace wall. My wall reaches to the
shoulder: peeping over you see the good home within. The Master's wall
is several fathoms high: no one can see the beauty of the Ancestral
Temple and the wealth of its hundred officers, unless he gets in by the
gate. And if only a few men find the gate, may not my lord have spoken
the truth?
24. Shu-sun Wu-shu cried down Chung-ni.
Tzu-kung said, It is labour lost. Chung-ni cannot be cried down. The
greatness of other men is a hummock, over which we can still leap.
Chung-ni is the sun or moon, which no one can overleap. Though the man
were willing to kill himself, how could he hurt the sun or moon? That
he does not know his own measure would only be seen the better!
25. Ch'en Tzu-ch'in[183] said to Tzu-kung, Ye humble yourself, Sir.
In what is Chung-ni your better?
[Footnote 180: Confucius.]
[Footnote 181: See Introduction.]
[Footnote 182: Head of the Meng clan.]
[Footnote 183: A disciple of Tzu-kung.]
Tzu-kung said, By one word a gentleman shows wisdom, by one word
want of wisdom. Words must not be lightly spoken. No one can come up to
the Master, as heaven is not to be climbed by steps. If the Master had
power in a kingdom, or a clan, the saying would come true, 'What he
sets up stands; he shows the way and men go it, he brings peace and
they come, he stirs them and they are at one. Honoured in life, he is
mourned when dead!' Who can come up to him?