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"If right principles are to have their course, it is so destined," said the Master; "if they are not to have their course, it is so destined. What can Liu do against Destiny?"
"There are worthy men," said the Master, "fleeing from the world; some from their district; some from the sight of men's looks; some from the language they hear."
"The men who have risen from their posts and withdrawn in this manner are seven in number."
Tsz-lu, having lodged overnight in Shih-mun, was accosted by the gate-keeper in the morning. "Where from?" he asked. "From Confucius," Tsz-lu responded. "That is the man," said he, "who knows things are not up to the mark, and is making some ado about them, is it not?"
When the Master was in Wei, he was once pounding on the musical stone, when a man with a basket of straw crossed his threshold, and exclaimed, "Ah, there is a heart that feels! Aye, drub the stone!" After which he added, "How vulgar! how he hammers away on one note!—and no one knows him, and he gives up, and all is over!
"What determination!" said the Master. "Yet it was not hard to do."
Tsz-chang once said to him, "In the 'Book of the Annals' it is stated that while Ku-tsung was in the Mourning Shed he spent the three years without speaking. What is meant by that?"
"Why must you name Ku-tsung?" said the Master. "It was so with all other ancient sovereigns: when one of [Pg 82] them died, the heads of every department agreed between themselves that they should give ear for three years to the Prime Minister."
"When their betters love the Rules, then the folk are easy tools," was a saying of the Master.
Tsz-lu having asked what made a "superior man," he answered, "Self-culture, with a view to becoming seriously-minded."
"Nothing more than that?" said he.
"Self-culture with a view to the greater satisfaction of others," added the Master.
"That, and yet no more?"
"Self-culture with a view to the greater satisfaction of all the clans and classes," he again added. "Self-culture for the sake of all—a result that, that would almost put Yau and Shun into the shade!"
To Yuen Jang, [31] who was sitting waiting for him in a squatting (disrespectful) posture, the Master delivered himself as follows: "The man who in his youth could show no humility or subordination, who in his prime misses his opportunity, and who when old age comes upon him will not die—that man is a miscreant." And he tapped him on the shin with his staff.
Some one asked about his attendant—a youth from the village of Kiueh—whether he was one who improved. He replied, "I note that he seats himself in the places reserved for his betters, and that when he is walking he keeps abreast with his seniors. He is not one of those who care for improvement: he wants to be a man all at once."
[30] Confucius had now retired from office, and this incident occurred only two years before his death.
[31] It is a habit with the Chinese, when a number are out walking together, for the eldest to go first, the others pairing off according to their age. It is a custom much older than the time of Confucius.
Duke Ling of Wei was consulting Confucius about army arrangements. His answer was, "Had you asked me about such things as temple requisites, I have learnt that business, but I have not yet studied military matters." And he followed up this reply by leaving on the following day.
After this, during his residence in the State of Ch‘in, his followers, owing to a stoppage of food supply, became so weak and ill that not one of them could stand. Tsz-lu, with indignation pictured on his countenance, exclaimed, "And is a gentleman to suffer starvation?"
"A gentleman," replied the Master, "will endure it unmoved, but a common person breaks out into excesses under it."
Addressing Tsz-kung, the Master said, "You regard me as one who studies and stores up in his mind a multiplicity of things—do you not?"—"I do," he replied; "is it not so?"—"Not at all. I have one idea—one cord on which to string all."
To Tsz-lu he remarked, "They who know Virtue are rare."
"If you would know one who without effort ruled well, was not Shun such a one? What did he indeed do? He bore himself with reverent dignity and undeviatingly 'faced the south,' and that was all."
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 [Pg 84] 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 K 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 Hi Calendar. Have the State carriages like those of the Yin princes. Wear the Chow cap. For your [Pg 85] 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 Hwi of Liu-hi, and could not stand in his presence.
"Be generous yourself, and exact little from others; then you banish complaints.
