King Hui of Liang, Part One梁惠王上

Mencius had an audience with King Hui of Liang. The king said, "Venerable sir, you did not count a thousand li too far to come. Surely you too have something that will profit my country?"

Mencius answered, "Why must the king speak of profit? There is benevolence (仁) and righteousness (義), and that is all. If the king says, 'How shall I profit my country?' then the great officers say, 'How shall I profit my house?' and the officers and the common people say, 'How shall I profit myself?' When those above and those below strive against each other for profit, the country is in danger.

In a state of ten thousand chariots (萬乘), the one who kills his ruler is always a house of a thousand chariots. In a state of a thousand chariots, the one who kills his ruler is always a house of a hundred chariots. To hold a thousand out of the ten thousand, or a hundred out of the thousand, cannot be called a small share. Yet if righteousness is put behind and profit is put first, they are not satisfied until they have seized the rest.

There has never been a benevolent man who cast off his own parents, and never a righteous man who put his own ruler last. Let the king speak only of benevolence and righteousness. Why must he speak of profit?"

Mencius had an audience with King Hui of Liang. The king stood beside his pond, looked round at the wild geese and the deer, and said, "Does a worthy man also enjoy such things?"

Mencius answered, "Only a worthy man enjoys them. One who is not worthy does not enjoy them even when he has them. The Shi says, 'He began the Spirit Tower (靈臺), he measured it and he laid it out. The people fell to the work and finished it in a few days. He said do not hurry, yet the people came like children to their father. The king was in the Spirit Park (靈囿), where the doe lay at rest. The doe was sleek, the white birds were bright. The king was at the Spirit Pond (靈沼), and ah, it was full of leaping fish.'

King Wen raised his tower and dug his pond by the strength of the people, and the people were glad and took delight in it. They called his tower the Spirit Tower and his pond the Spirit Pond, and they rejoiced that there were deer and fish there. The men of old took their joy together with the people, and so they were able to enjoy.

The Tang shi says, 'When will this sun perish? I will perish together with you.' If the people wish to perish along with him, then though he has towers and ponds and birds and beasts, how can he enjoy them alone?"

King Hui of Liang said, "For my country I give all my heart, and nothing less. When the harvest fails in Henei I move its people to Hedong and move grain into Henei, and when the harvest fails in Hedong I do the same. I look at the government of the neighboring states, and no one takes such care as I do. Yet the people of the neighboring states grow no fewer and my people grow no more. How can this be?"

Mencius answered, "The king loves war, so let me use war for a likeness. The drums roll, the blades have already met, and then men throw down their armor, drag their weapons and run. One stops after a hundred paces, another stops after fifty paces. If the one who ran fifty paces laughs at the one who ran a hundred, what would you say?"

The king said, "That will not do. He only fell short of a hundred paces. He ran as well."

"If the king knows this, then do not hope that your people will grow more numerous than those of the neighboring states.

If the seasons of farming are not disturbed, there is more grain than can be eaten. If close nets are kept out of the ponds, there are more fish and turtles than can be eaten. If the axe goes into the hills and forests only in season, there is more timber than can be used. When grain and fish are more than can be eaten and timber is more than can be used, this lets the people nourish the living and bury the dead with no regret. To nourish the living and bury the dead with no regret is the beginning of the kingly way (王道).

Plant mulberries on a homestead of five mu, and a man of fifty can wear silk. Raise fowls and pigs and dogs and do not let their season pass, and a man of seventy can eat meat. Do not take away the season of a field of a hundred mu, and a household of several mouths need not go hungry. Attend to the teaching of the schools, and repeat to them the duty of filial piety and respect for elders, and the gray haired will not carry loads on their backs or on their heads along the roads. When men of seventy wear silk and eat meat, and the common people are neither hungry nor cold, there has never yet been a ruler who failed to become king.

Dogs and pigs eat the food of men and no one thinks to check it. The starved lie dead on the roads and no one thinks to open the granaries. When a man dies it is said, 'It was not I, it was the harvest.' How does this differ from stabbing a man to death and saying, 'It was not I, it was the weapon'? Let the king not blame the harvest, and then the people of all under heaven will come to him."

King Hui of Liang said, "I wish to receive your teaching with a quiet mind."

Mencius answered, "Is there any difference between killing a man with a club and killing him with a blade?"

"There is no difference."

"Is there any difference between killing with a blade and killing with government?"

"There is no difference."

"There is fat meat in the kitchen and there are fat horses in the stable, while the people look hungry and the starved lie dead in the fields. This is to lead beasts on to devour men. Men hate it even when beasts devour one another. If a man becomes father and mother to the people and governs them, and yet cannot keep himself from leading beasts on to devour men, where is his being father and mother to the people?

Zhongni said, 'The one who first made wooden figures for the grave, will he not be left without descendants?' He said it because those figures were made in the likeness of men and were used. How then can the king let these people starve to death!"

King Hui of Liang said, "There was nothing under heaven stronger than the state of Jin (晉), as you know, venerable sir. Yet when it came to my own time we were beaten by Qi in the east and my eldest son died there. In the west we lost seven hundred li of land to Qin (秦), and in the south we were disgraced by Chu. I am ashamed of this, and for the sake of the dead I wish to wash it away once. What should I do?"

Mencius answered, "With land a hundred li square a ruler can still become king. If the king gives the people a benevolent government, if he lightens punishments and makes taxes light, if the ground is plowed deep and the weeding made easy, and if the young men in their free days cultivate filial piety and respect and loyalty and good faith, so that at home they serve their fathers and elder brothers and abroad they serve their elders and their superiors, then they can make clubs and beat the hard armor and the sharp weapons of Qin and Chu.

Those rulers take away the farming season of their own people, so that they cannot plow and weed and support their fathers and mothers. Their parents freeze and starve, and their brothers and their wives and children are scattered. They have sunk their own people in the pit. If the king goes and punishes them, who will stand against the king? So it is said, 'The benevolent have no enemy.' Let the king not doubt it."

Mencius had an audience with King Xiang of Liang, and when he came out he said to others, "Seen from afar he did not look like a ruler of men, and when I drew near I saw nothing in him to stand in awe of. Then all at once he asked, 'Where will all under heaven be settled?' and I answered, 'It will be settled in oneness.'

'Who can make it one?' he asked, and I answered, 'The one who does not love killing men can make it one.'

'Who will give himself to him?' he asked, and I answered this. 'There is no one under heaven who will not give himself. Does the king know the young grain? If there is drought in the seventh and eighth months, the grain withers. When heaven gathers the clouds thick and the rain comes pouring down, the grain rises up strong. When it is so, who can hold it back?

Now among those who shepherd men under heaven there is not one who does not love killing men. If there were one who did not love killing men, all the people under heaven would stretch their necks and look to him. If it were truly so, the people would turn to him as water runs downward, and who could hold back that pouring flood?'"

King Xuan of Qi asked, "May I hear of the deeds of Duke Huan of Qi and Duke Wen of Jin?"

Mencius answered, "Among the followers of Zhongni there was no one who spoke of the deeds of Duke Huan and Duke Wen, and so nothing was handed down to later ages. Your servant has not heard of them. If I must speak, shall I speak of the kingly way (王道)?"

"What must a ruler's virtue be, that he can become king?"

"If he guards the people and so becomes king, no one can stop him."

"Can one such as I guard the people?"

"You can."

"How do you know that I can?"

"Your servant heard it from Hu He. The king was sitting in the hall when a man led an ox past below it. The king saw it and said, 'Where are you taking the ox?' The man answered, 'We are going to smear its blood on a bell.' The king said, 'Let it go. I cannot bear to see it tremble and go to the place of death with no guilt on it.' The man answered, 'Then shall we give up smearing the bell?' The king said, 'How can that be given up? Take a sheep instead.' Did this happen?"

"It did."

"With that heart you have enough to become king. The people all took it that the king was sparing his goods, but your servant knew from the first that the king could not bear it."

The king said, "It is so. There were indeed such people. Qi may be narrow and small, but would I grudge a single ox? It was only that I could not bear to see it tremble and go to the place of death with no guilt on it, and so I had a sheep put in its place."

"Let the king not wonder that the people thought him grudging. He put a small thing in place of a great one. How could they know? If the king pitied it for going to the place of death with no guilt on it, what is there to choose between an ox and a sheep?"

The king laughed and said, "What heart was that, truly? I did not grudge the goods and put a sheep in its place. Yet it is fitting that the people call me grudging."

"Do not take it to heart. That is the very art of benevolence (仁). You saw the ox and you did not see the sheep. Toward birds and beasts the gentleman is such that, having seen them alive, he cannot bear to see them die, and having heard their cry, he cannot bear to eat their flesh. This is why the gentleman keeps far from the kitchen."

The king was pleased and said, "The Shi says, 'Another man has a heart, and I measure it out.' That is said of you, my master. I did the thing, and when I turned back and searched for my own heart I could not find it. You have spoken of it, and there is a stirring in my heart. Why is it that this heart accords with the kingly way?"

"Suppose a man told the king, 'My strength is enough to lift three thousand catties, but not enough to lift one feather. My sight is keen enough to examine the tip of an autumn hair, but I cannot see a cartload of firewood.' Would the king allow it?"

"I would not."

"Now your kindness is enough to reach the birds and beasts, and yet its effect does not reach the people. Why is this alone so? If one feather is not lifted, it is because strength is not used. If the cartload of firewood is not seen, it is because sight is not used. If the people are not guarded, it is because kindness is not used. So the king's failure to be king is not doing, not being unable to do."

"How do the shape of not doing and the shape of not being able differ?"

"To take Mount Tai under your arm and leap over the North Sea, and say to others, 'I am not able' — that is truly not being able. To break off a branch for an elder, and say to others, 'I am not able' — that is not doing, not being unable. So the king's failure to be king is not of the kind of taking Mount Tai under the arm and leaping the North Sea. The king's failure to be king is of the kind of breaking off a branch.

Serve your own elders as elders and let it reach the elders of others. Love your own young as young and let it reach the young of others, and all under heaven can be turned on your palm. The Shi says, 'He set the pattern for his wife, it reached his brothers, and so he governed his house and his state.' It means only taking this heart and laying it upon those others. So if kindness is carried outward it is enough to guard the four seas, and if kindness is not carried outward a man cannot guard his own wife and children. The reason the men of old rose so far above others was nothing else. They were good at carrying outward what they did, and that is all.

Now your kindness is enough to reach the birds and beasts, and yet its effect does not reach the people. Why is this alone so? Weigh a thing, and then you know light from heavy. Measure it, and then you know long from short. All things are so, and the heart is so most of all. Let the king measure it.

Or is it that the king will be glad at heart only after he has raised his armies, put his officers and ministers in danger, and made enemies of the other lords?"

The king said, "No. How could I be glad at that? I would do it to seek what I greatly desire."

"May I hear what the king greatly desires?"

The king laughed and did not speak.

"Is it that rich and sweet food is not enough for your mouth? That light and warm clothing is not enough for your body? Or that fine colors are not enough for your eyes, that sounds are not enough for your ears, that your favorites are not enough to serve before you? The king's ministers can all supply these. Would the king do it for such things?"

"No. I would not do it for those."

"Then what the king greatly desires can be known. You wish to widen your lands, to receive the court of Qin and Chu, to stand over the central states and hold the tribes of the four quarters in peace. To seek such a desire by such means is like climbing a tree to look for fish."

The king said, "Is it as bad as that?"

"It is worse, I fear. If you climb a tree to look for fish, you get no fish, but no harm follows after. To seek such a desire by such means, and to give all your heart and strength to it, must bring disaster afterward."

"May I hear it?"

"If the men of Zou fought the men of Chu, who does the king think would win?"

"The men of Chu would win."

"Then the small certainly cannot match the great, the few certainly cannot match the many, and the weak certainly cannot match the strong. Within the seas there are nine lands of a thousand li square, and Qi, when all is gathered, holds one of them. To subdue eight with one, how does it differ from Zou matching itself against Chu? Why not go back to the root?

If now the king sets out his government and spreads benevolence, so that all under heaven who would serve wish to stand in the king's court, all who plow wish to plow in the king's fields, all merchants wish to store their goods in the king's markets, all travelers wish to set out on the king's roads, and all under heaven who hate their own rulers wish to run to the king and lay their case before him — if it is so, who can stop it?"

The king said, "I am in the dark and cannot go further than this. I ask you, my master, to help my will and teach me clearly. I am not quick, but let me try it."

"To have no settled livelihood and still to keep a settled heart is possible only for the scholar. As for the people, if they have no settled livelihood they will therefore have no settled heart. And if they have no settled heart, there is nothing they will not do, loose and crooked and depraved and extravagant. Then when they have fallen into crime, to go after them and punish them is to net the people. How can a benevolent man in office net the people?

So a clear sighted ruler orders the livelihood of the people, and makes sure that looking up it is enough to serve their fathers and mothers, and looking down it is enough to keep their wives and children. In good years they are full all the year round, and in bad years they escape death. Then he leads them onward to the good, and so the people follow him easily.

The way the people's livelihood is ordered now is such that looking up it is not enough to serve their fathers and mothers, and looking down it is not enough to keep their wives and children. In good years they suffer all the year round, and in bad years they do not escape death. This is a state where they fear that even escaping death is beyond them. What leisure have they for ritual and right conduct?

If the king wishes to do this, why not go back to the root? Plant mulberries on a homestead of five mu, and a man of fifty can wear silk. Raise fowls and pigs and dogs and do not let their season pass, and a man of seventy can eat meat. Do not take away the season of a field of a hundred mu, and a household of eight mouths need not go hungry. Attend to the teaching of the schools, and repeat to them the duty of filial piety and respect for elders, and the gray haired will not carry loads on their backs or on their heads along the roads. When the old wear silk and eat meat, and the common people are neither hungry nor cold, there has never yet been a ruler who failed to become king."