Tsze-ch'in asked Tsze-kung, saying, 'When our master
comes to any country, he does not fail to learn all about its
government.
Does he ask his information? or is it given to him?'
2. Tsze-kung said, 'Our master is benign, upright, courteous,
temperate, and complaisant, and thus he gets his information. The
master's mode of asking information! - is it not different from that
of other men?'
CHAP. XI. The Master said, 'While a man's father is alive, look
at the bent of his will; when his father is dead, look at his conduct.
If for three years he does not alter from the way of his father, he
may be called filial.'
CHAP. XII. 1. The philosopher Yu said, 'In practising the rules of
propriety, a natural ease is to be prized. In the ways prescribed by
the ancient kings, this is the excellent quality, and in things small
and great we follow them.
2. 'Yet it is not to be observed in all cases. If one, knowing
how such ease should be prized, manifests it, without regulating it
by the rules of propriety, this likewise is not to be done.'
CHAP. XIII. The philosopher Yu said, 'When agreements are
made according to what is right, what is spoken can be made good.
When respect is shown according to what is proper, one keeps far
from shame and disgrace. When the parties upon whom a man
leans are proper persons to be intimate with, he can make them his
guides and masters.'
CHAP. XIV. The Master said, 'He who aims to be a man of
complete virtue in his food does not seek to gratify his appetite, nor
in his dwelling place does he seek the appliances of ease; he is
earnest in what he is doing, and careful in his speech; he frequents
the company of men of principle that he may be rectified: - such a
person may be said indeed to love to learn.'
CHAP. XV. 1. Tsze-kung said, 'What do you pronounce
concerning the poor man who yet does not flatter, and the rich man
who is not proud?' The Master replied, 'They will do; but they are
not equal to him, who, though poor, is yet cheerful, and to him, who,
though rich, loves the rules of propriety.'
2. Tsze-kung replied, 'It is said in the Book of Poetry, "As you
cut and then file, as you carve and then polish." - The meaning is
the same, I apprehend, as that which you have just expressed.'
3. The Master said, 'With one like Ts'ze, I can begin to talk
about the odes. I told him one point, and he knew its proper
sequence.'
CHAP. XVI. The Master said, 'I will not be afflicted at men's
not knowing me; I will be afflicted that I do not know men.'
BOOK II. WEI CHANG.
CHAP. I. The Master said, 'He who exercises government by
means of his virtue may be compared to the north polar star, which
keeps its place and all the stars turn towards it.'
CHAP.
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