Three Arguments三辯

Mozi (The Book of Master Mo) 墨子 · Mo Di and his disciples · About the 4th century BC · 2 passages · 356 Chinese characters · reading time 1.4 min

Mozi (The Book of Master Mo) The writings of the school that in the Warring States period stood beside the Confucians as one of the "two great companies." It is not the work of one man but what Mo Di and his disciples added generation after generation, and so many chapters set down the same argument in three versions — upper, middle and lower. These are taken as the traces of the branches of the school, each copying it out in its own way. Ten doctrines are the backbone — exalting the worthy, conforming upward with what is right, loving all alike, condemning aggression, thrift in use, thrift in burial, following the will of Heaven, making ghosts clear, condemning music, and condemning fate. "If a man looked on the house of another as on his own house, who would steal?" is in the chapters on loving all alike. The ladder of "Condemning Aggression" — that a man who steals peaches and plums from another's orchard is punished, while a man who attacks another's state is praised — and the three gauges of "Condemning Fate," that to speak without a measure is "like setting the marks of sunrise and sunset upon a turning potter's wheel," stand there too. The last chapter, "Gongshu," is a story. When Chu made cloud ladders to attack Song, Mozi walked ten days and ten nights, met Gongshu Ban, and beat him nine times over with a belt and pieces of wood; and on the way home he met rain and was not let in to shelter inside the gate of that very Song village.

程繁問於子墨子曰：「夫子曰：『聖王不爲樂。』昔諸侯倦於聽治，息於鐘鼓之樂；士大夫倦於聽治，息於竽瑟之樂；農夫春耕夏耘，秋斂冬藏，息於聆缶之樂。今夫子曰『聖王不爲樂』，此譬之猶馬駕而不稅，弓張而不弛，無乃非有血氣者之所能至邪？」子墨子曰：「昔者堯舜有《第期》者，且以爲禮，且以爲樂。湯放桀於大水，環天下自立以爲王，事成功立，無大後患，因先王之樂，又自作樂，命曰《護》，又脩《九招》。武王勝殷殺紂，環天下自立以爲王，事成功立，無大後患，因先王之樂，又自作樂，命曰《象》。周成王因先王之樂，又自作樂，命曰《騶虞》。周成王之治天下也，不若武王；武王之治天下也，不若成湯；成湯之治天下也，不若堯舜。故其樂逾繁者，其治逾寡。自此觀之，樂非所以治天下也。」

Cheng Fan asked Mozi, "Master, you have said, 'The sage kings did not make music.' In old times the lords, when they were weary of hearing cases and governing, rested in the music of bells and drums. The officers and the great officers, when they were weary of hearing cases and governing, rested in the music of the yu pipe and the se zither. The farmers plowed in spring, weeded in summer, gathered in autumn, and stored in winter, and then rested in the music of the earthen drum. Now, Master, you say, 'The sage kings did not make music.' This is like harnessing a horse and never unhitching it, or drawing a bow and never unstringing it. Is this not beyond what one with blood and breath can reach?"

Mozi said, "In old times Yao and Shun had the Diqi (第期), and they took it both for rite and for music. Tang drove Jie out to the great water, went round the world and ascended the throne himself as king, and when his work was done and his merit stood and there was no great trouble to follow, he took up the music of the kings before him and also made music of his own, naming it the Hu (護), and he also put in order the Jiuzhao (九招).

King Wu overcame Yin and killed Zhou, went round the world and ascended the throne himself as king, and when his work was done and his merit stood and there was no great trouble to follow, he took up the music of the kings before him and also made music of his own, naming it the Xiang (象). King Cheng of Zhou took up the music of the kings before him and also made music of his own, naming it the Zouyu (騶虞).

King Cheng of Zhou governed the world less well than King Wu. King Wu governed the world less well than Cheng Tang. Cheng Tang governed the world less well than Yao and Shun. So the more elaborate their music, the less their governing. Looking at it in this way, music is not the means by which the world is governed."

程繁曰：「子曰『聖王無樂』，此亦樂已，若之何其謂聖王無樂也？」子墨子曰：「聖王之命也多寡之。食之利也，以知飢而食之者，智也，因爲無智矣。今聖有樂而少，此亦無也。」

Cheng Fan said, "Master, you say, 'The sage kings had no music,' yet this too is music. How then can you say that the sage kings had no music?"

Mozi said, "What the sage kings ordered was to cut it down and make it little. Take the benefit of eating. To know one is hungry and eat is wisdom, and by that very thing there is nothing left to call wisdom. Now the sages had music, but little of it, and this too is having none."

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