Xiaoli — Ability and Effort效力篇

The chapters Cheng cai and Liang zhi spoke only of knowing and learning and did not speak of talent and force. When a man has knowing and learning, then he has force. The clerk takes the ordering of affairs for his force, and the Confucian scholar takes learning for his force. Someone asked Yang Ziyun, "There is force that can lift the great cauldron and raise the flowered banner. Is there anything like this in knowledge and virtue too?" He answered, "A hundred men."

Now to be a hundred men in knowledge and virtue is to be a match for those who lift the great cauldron and raise the flowered banner. The strong man who has much force lifts cauldrons and raises banners; the Confucian scholar who has much force is widely versed and reaches through. Therefore to be widely versed and to reach through is the force of the Confucian scholar, and to lift the heavy and pull up the firm is the force of the strong man. The Zicai says, "When the strong man has a king, he opens up the worthy, and he leads and transforms the people."

This says that the worthy man too is stout and strong in rite and right, and so he can open up the worthy, and he leads and transforms the people. To transform the people needs rite and right, and rite and right need writing. "If, when he has acted, he has force to spare, then he uses it to learn writing." To be able to learn writing is the proof of having force. Ask: "Can the Confucian who expounds one classic be called a man who has force?"

The answer: he is not a man who has force. Pang Shaodu of Chenliu, whenever he recommended for clerk one of the students, would always say, "Wang Jia so-and-so has the talent of a hundred men."

The governor did not hold him so able and made no answer. Shaodu said again, "What I said was still too little. Wang Jia so-and-so has the talent of a million men."

The governor grew angry and said, "A clerk I favor speaks wildly."

Shaodu said, "The clerk does not reach through one classic or one piece of writing, and cannot tune one word of a teacher. The students can expound a million chapters and phrases. Is that not talent and knowledge of a million men!"

The governor had nothing to answer. Now Shaodu's words are the truth, and yet they do not go far enough. Why? The students can hand down a million words, but they cannot look at antiquity and the present, and they hold in trust to the teacher's method; so though their words and expositions are many, in the end they are not called broad. What came before Yin and Zhou is set down here and there in the Six Classics, and the Confucian scholar cannot expound it. The affairs of Qin and Han the Confucian scholar has not seen, for his force is too poor to look at them.

Zhou took the two ages before it for its mirror, and Han takes Zhou and Qin for its mirror. What has come down since Zhou and Qin the Confucian scholar does not know, and though Han would look at it, the Confucian scholar has no force. Let the Confucian scholar look widely, and he becomes a literary scholar. The literary scholar has more force than the Confucian scholar; and by Shaodu's words, the literary scholar has the talent of ten million men.

Zengzi said, "The gentleman may not be other than broad and firm, for his burden is heavy and his road is long. He takes humaneness for his own burden. Is that not heavy! He stops only after death. Is that not long!"

Speaking from this, what the Confucian holds is heavy beyond all else, and where his will would arrive is far beyond all else. He bears a heavy burden on his body, and to the end of his death he is not weary and does not fail; his force alone is much. Now Zengzi bore humaneness and the Confucian scholar bears learning; what they bear is not the same, but the weight is equal. A weight of one picul one man lifts; ten piculs and upward two men cannot raise. In the world many lift a burden of one picul, and few have the force to raise ten piculs. What the Confucian scholar bears is not merely the weight of ten piculs. Where the force of the land is full, grass and trees grow thick, and the yield of one acre matches the share of five acres of middling field. In a field of seedlings men know that where much grain comes out the force of the land is full; they do not know that where much writing comes out talent and knowledge are thick, and so they lose the truth of the principle of the thing. Now the force of the literary scholar surpasses the Confucian scholar; how much more the clerk? To be able to raise up the worthy and recommend the officer, this the world calls having much force. But to be able to raise up the worthy and recommend the officer is to send up writings and draw up records; and the man who can send up writings and draw up records is the literary scholar.

The literary scholar need not be one of the students; the worthy and accomplished man who uses writing is one. Gu Ziyun and Tang Zigao sent up a hundred memorials, and there was force to spare in their brushes; they spoke to the full and did not shrink, and their writing did not break off or run short. None but men of talent and knowledge could do it. Confucius was a man of much force in the age of Zhou. He made the Spring and Autumn and cut down the Five Classics, and of the hidden books and the fine writings there was none that he did not settle. Where the mountain is great the clouds are many, and Taishan rains over all under Heaven before a morning is done. That being so, the worthy man has the knowledge of cloud and rain, and what he pours out in writing is ten thousand tablets and more. He may be called a man of much force.

When the world speaks of force it always praises Wu Huo; then Dong Zhongshu and Yang Ziyun are the Wu Huo of writing. King Wu of Qin lifted a cauldron with Meng Shuo and could not bear it; his veins snapped and he died. If a man of little writing were to make the thoughts of his breast well up as Dong Zhongshu and the rest did, he would surely not bear it, and there would be the calamity of snapped veins. In the time of Wang Mang the chapters and phrases of the Five Classics were all cut down to two hundred thousand, and Guo Lu, a disciple of the erudites, was settling the old expositions by night and died beneath the candle; he could not bear his close thinking, his veins snapped and his breath grew less. The son of the Yan clan had once raced past Confucius on the road, but he was poor and weary and worn to the end, his hair went white and his teeth fell out. Now with talent that came near to the sage there was still the disaster of falling down; Confucius had force to spare and Yan Yuan could not bear it. When talent and force are not alike, then knowledge and wisdom do not come up to each other. Press yourself ten times and a hundred times over, and you vomit blood within, lose your soul and go mad, and at last your breath is cut off. To write a tablet of five lines and to send up a record of ten words — for the man whose talent is poorer even the force of brush and ink is the harder; how much more to join phrase to phrase and knot chapter to chapter until the pieces reach ten and a hundred! His force alone is much. The waters of the Jiang and the He run and well up and slip and leak; measure the ground, and it is long and far, yet there is no stream that dries up, because the source is full. To know that where the flow of the Jiang and the He is far the source within the ground is full, and not to know that in the man of ten thousand tablets the talent within his breast is thick, is to be a man led astray. So when you look at the feet of a fine horse, they are no different from the hooves of common horses; but let it tread the level plain and gallop, and the track of a thousand li can be seen in a moment. Now the feet of a horse and the hands of a man are one and the same thing; to praise the feet of the fine horse and not to recommend the hands of the man of letters is not to know the kind. He who can discuss the force of sinews and see what is to be ranked with what can take the man who has the force of writing and set him up in the court. Therefore the man who has the force of writing must help a chief who has force, and only then can he make his force into merit. To have force and no help is to make force into calamity. How is this proved? A long and huge thing only a man of strong force can lift. A carriage with a heavy load only a strong ox can pull. When the loaded carriage goes up a slope, the strong ox draws in front and the man of force pushes behind, and only so can it climb over. If the ox is thin and the man worn out, the loaded carriage goes backward and falls into the pit, and there is the ruin of breaking and overturning. The literary scholar holds the Way of the former kings in his breast and keeps the words of the hundred schools in his mouth, and the difficulty of pushing and drawing him is not merely the weight of a loaded carriage. If the man who recommends and brings him forward is worn and thin and has no force, then in the end he draws back and hides away in a cave in the rocks.

The He rises from Kunlun and the Jiang starts from Minshan, and the force of the water is full and great; the brimming stream, as it soaks downward, grows fuller still, and if it does not get broad banks and low ground it cannot flow through and enter the Eastern Sea. If the banks are narrow and the land is lifted up, the ditches burst and the water scatters over hillock and waste. The knowledge of the literary scholar has something like this. His writing brims over; but if he does not meet a chief with force to draw him up and recommend him, he too will be cast away and left below a crossbar gate. How then could he climb to the court of a sage ruler and discuss and speak of the business of government? The light of a fire, if it is not lifted up, does not give light. Here is a man whose knowledge is like a granary and whose virtue is like a mountain. His force is so heavy that he cannot lift himself and must wait for men to lift him; and if no one helps him, he holds that full and lofty force in his arms and hides deep in the lanes. When will he ever come through? Wu Huo and Xia Yu were men of much force in antiquity: their bodies could carry a thousand jun and their hands could break a horn and straighten a hook; but set them to lift themselves, and they could not leave the ground. The man whose knowledge and ability fill his breast ought to be at the king's gate tower, but he must wait for a three-inch tongue and a one-foot brush before he can move of himself. He cannot advance himself; and having advanced he cannot make himself secure, but waits for men to move him and waits for men to make him secure. When the Way is heavy and the knowledge great, place and ground are hard to fit. A small stone that clings to a mountain the force of the mountain can hold; and lying among the sand hills, a small stone is light and slight and can be secure of itself. But when it comes to a great stone, the sand and the earth do not cover it and the mountain cannot hold it, and set at the edge of a steep and dangerous place it must fall down among the pits and valleys. When the weight of great knowledge meets a chief of small talent, with no help of sand and earth to left and right, then though it stands in a high place the chief will not be able to hold it, and there is the trouble of the great stone falling down. Or a man cuts firewood on the mountain: light and small wood he can bind up together, but when it comes to a great tree of ten spans around and more, he draws it and it does not move, he pushes it and it does not shift, and then he leaves it in the mountain forest and takes up the small wood he has bound and goes home. Arguing from this, the man whose knowledge and ability are great is like the trees of ten spans and more. That the force of men cannot raise and recommend him is like the firewood cutter not being able to push and draw the great tree. That Confucius wandered everywhere and had no place to stay was not that the sage's talent was not bright; his Way was great and hard to carry out, and men could not use him! So Confucius was of the kind of the huge tree in the mountain.

That Duke Huan gathered the feudal lords nine times and set all under Heaven right at one stroke was the force of Guan Zhong. Guan Zhong had force and Duke Huan could raise him; they may be called stout and strong. Wu could not use Zixu and Chu could not use Qu Yuan; the force of the two men was heavy and the two rulers could not raise it. When you raise a thing and cannot master it, you may leave it on the ground and go; but at times men are angered and hack it apart with the axe, and this is what brought harm upon Zixu and Qu Yuan.

The fish in the deep swallow one another in turn; each measures what his mouth can hold and only then swallows it down, and what the mouth cannot take chokes him and will not go down. So Shang Yang spoke three times to Duke Xiao, and what he spoke last was used, because the first two were hard to use and the last one easy to carry out. Look at Guan Zhong making the law clear and Shang Yang plowing and fighting: they were truly not what a weak and poor ruler could use. In the time of the Six States, when a minister of worth and talent entered Chu, Chu grew weighty; when he left Qi, Qi grew light; when he worked for Zhao, Zhao was whole; when he turned from Wei, Wei was wounded. Han used Shen Buhai and carried out his three tallies, and for some fifteen years no soldiers crossed its borders; when it could not use him and did not look into his book either, its soldiers were broken and its army shattered, and the state was swallowed into Qin. In the ages of Yin and Zhou the tracks of disorder followed one upon another and the calamities of ruin stood shoulder to shoulder. Was it that their hearts did not wish to govern? Their force was weak and their wisdom poor, and they could not take in words that went to the root. Therefore when a thing is heavy, one man's foot cannot tread it down; when it is great, one man's palm cannot push it.

The worthy minister has the excellence of being hard and strong, and the foolish ruler has the poorness of not being equal to it; and for these to seek each other is for bird and fish to go about together. The blade of Ganjiang, if a man does not push and drive it, cannot wound even a gourd; the arrow of Sushen, if the trigger does not move and let it fly, cannot pierce even the plain silk of Lu. It is not that the talent of a Ganjiang or a Sushen is wanting; it is that there is no master to push and drive and to let fly. If they cannot pierce and wound a gourd or the silk of Lu, how look for the merit of cutting down banners and piercing hides? So the force that draws a bow cannot draw a strong crossbow: the crossbow's force is five piculs, and if it is drawn with three piculs the sinews snap and the bones break and it cannot be raised. Therefore when force is not equal to a strong draw, there is the calamity of turning bad and breaking the spine; and when knowledge cannot use the worthy, there is the ruin of wounding virtue and destroying one's name.

Those who discuss affairs do not say that the talent is great and the Way heavy and that those above cannot use it; they say that the man is unworthy and cannot come through by himself. The man who comes through by himself does not lift when his belt is cut; the man who sells himself does not answer when the price is low. Look at all the things that men use: they must be used by a man, and only then are merit and force set up. What makes the chisel go into the wood is the mallet striking it; what makes the spade able to dig the ground is the sole of the foot treading it. What makes all the tools that have edge and blade able to cut and hack and split and pare is that a hand can grasp them and force can push and draw them. Han Xin left Chu and entered Han; Xiang Yu could not make him secure, and Gaozu could hold him. If a man can use what is good in another and can make his person secure, then he can measure his force and tell his merit apart. Fan Kuai and Li Shang had the merit of attacking cities and fighting in the field, but when Gaozu carried out the enfeoffments he came first to Xiao He; that is, he ranked Xiao He with the hunter and put Fan Kuai and Li Shang with the hunting dogs. Now Xiao He sat at ease and Fan Kuai and Li Shang ran hard; and that the enfeoffment did not come to those who ran hard but came first to the one who sat at ease is because Xiao He made knowledge his force, while Fan Kuai and Li Shang made force their merit. What let Xiao He set Fan Kuai and Li Shang to work was that he entered Qin and gathered up the documents. When all the generals were picking up gold, He alone took up the books, and sitting still he knew the lie of the land in Qin, and so he could plan what would help and what would harm. That the generals ran hard was because He drove them. Therefore Shusun Tong fixed the ceremonies and Gaozu was honored by them; Xiao He made the statutes and the house of Han was at peace by them. Look at the merit of the ceremonies and the statutes: it is weightier than fighting in the field, and the force that cuts off heads does not come up to honoring the ruler. So to break the sod and plant grain is the force of the farmer; to attack and fight with courage is the force of the soldier; to frame and to hew is the force of the craftsman; to handle documents and settle the registers is the force of the assistant recorder; to discuss the Way and deliberate on government is the force of the worthy Confucian. There is no man born without force, but that by which he makes his force may be honored or lowly. Confucius could lift the bar of the north gate, but he did not show himself by his force; he knew that the force of sinew and bone is not as glorious as the force of humaneness and right.