Zhou Muwang — King Mu of Zhou周穆王篇
周穆王時，西極之國有化人來，入水火，貫金石；反山川，移城邑；乘虛不墜，觸實不硋。千變萬化，不可窮極。既已變物之形，又且易人之慮。穆王敬之若神，事之若君。推路寢以居之，引三牲以進之，選女樂以娛之。化人以爲王之宮室卑陋而不可處，王之廚饌腥螻而不可饗，王之嬪御膻惡而不可親。穆王乃爲之改築。土木之功，赭堊之色，無遺巧焉。五府爲虛，而臺始成。其高千仞，臨終南之上，號曰中天之臺。簡鄭衛之處子娥媌靡曼者，施芳澤，正娥眉，設笄珥，衣阿錫，曳齊紈。粉白黛黑，珮玉環。雜芷若以滿之，奏《承雲》《六瑩》《九韶》《晨露》以樂之。月月獻玉衣，旦旦薦玉食。化人猶不舍然，不得已而臨之。居亡幾何，謁王同游。王執化人之袪，騰而上者，中天迺止。暨及化人之宮，化人之宮構以金銀，絡以珠玉，出雲雨之上，而不知下之據，望之若屯雲焉。耳目所觀聽，鼻口所納嘗，皆非人間之有。王實以爲清都、紫微、鈞天、廣樂，帝之所居。王俯而視之，其宮榭若累塊積蘇焉。王自以居數十年不思其國也。化人復謁王同游，所及之處，仰不見日月，俯不見河海。光影所照，王目眩不能得視；音響所來，王耳亂不能得聽。百骸六藏，悸而不凝。意迷精喪，請化人求還。化人移之，王若殞虛焉。既寤，所坐猶嚮者之處，侍御猶嚮者之人。視其前，則酒未清，肴未昲。王問所從來，左右曰：「王默存耳。」由此穆王自失者三月而復，更問化人。化人曰：「吾與王神遊也，形奚動哉？且曩之所居，奚異王之宮？曩之所游，奚異王之圃？王閒恆有，疑蹔亡。變化之極，徐疾之間，可盡模哉？」王大悅。不恤國事，不樂臣妾，肆意遠游。命駕八駿之乘，右服𧄪騮而左綠耳，右驂赤驥而左白𣚘，主車則造父爲御，𧮼𠱛爲右；次車之乘，右服渠黃而左踰輪，左驂盜驪而右山子，柏夭主車，參百爲御，奔戎爲右。馳驅千里，至於巨蒐氏之國。巨蒐氏乃獻白鵠之血以飲王，具牛馬之湩以洗王之足，及二乘之人。已飲而行，遂宿於崑崙之阿，赤水之陽。別日升於崑崙之丘，以觀黃帝之宮，而封之以詒後世。遂賓於西王母，觴於瑤池之上。西王母爲王謠，王和之，其辭哀焉。西觀日之所入。一日行萬里。王乃歎曰：「於乎！予一人不盈於德而諧於樂，後世其追數吾過乎！」穆王幾神人哉！能窮當身之樂，猶百年乃徂，世以爲登假焉。
In the time of King Mu of Zhou, a Huaren (化人) came from a land at the far western edge. He entered water and fire, and he passed through metal and stone. He overturned mountains and rivers, and he moved walled towns. He rode on emptiness and did not fall; he struck against solid things and was not stopped. He changed in a thousand ways and altered in ten thousand, and there was no coming to the end of it. He changed the shapes of things, and he changed the thoughts of people as well.
King Mu revered him as a god and served him as a lord. He gave up the main hall of the palace for him to live in, he brought up the three sacrificial beasts to offer him, and he chose women musicians to please him.
The Huaren said that the king's palace was low and mean and could not be lived in, that the food of the king's kitchen was rank and foul and could not be eaten, and that the king's women smelled of the flock and were ugly and could not be gone near.
So King Mu built anew for him. In the work of earth and wood, in the red and the white of the paint, no skill was left unused. The five treasuries were empty before the terrace was finished. It stood a thousand ren high and looked down on the top of Mount Zhongnan, and it was named the Zhongtian Terrace (中天之臺).
From the maidens of Zheng and Wey (衛) he chose the fair and the slender. He had fragrant oil rubbed on them, their eyebrows trimmed, hairpins and earrings set on them, robes of the fine cloth of A (阿) put on them, and the white silk of Qi trailing behind them. They were whitened with powder and darkened with eyebrow black, and they wore rings of jade. Angelica and duruo were mixed and heaped about them, and Chengyun (承雲), Liuying (六瑩), Jiushao (九韶) and Chenlu (晨露) were played to give him pleasure. Every month jade clothing was presented, and every morning jade food was set before him.
Even so the Huaren was not at ease, and he went up to the terrace only because he could not refuse.
He had not lived there long when he asked the king to go wandering with him. The king took hold of the Huaren's sleeve, and they rose until they came to the middle of the sky and stopped.
They reached the palace of the Huaren. It was framed with gold and silver and hung about with pearls and jade. It stood out above the clouds and the rain, and no one could tell what it rested on below; seen from afar it was like massed cloud. What the ears and the eyes heard and saw there, and what the nose and the mouth took in and tasted, was nothing that belongs to the world of people. The king truly believed this was Qingdu (淸都) and Ziwei (紫微), Juntian (鈞天) and Guangyue (廣樂), the dwelling of the Lord of Heaven.
When the king looked down, his own palaces and pavilions were like heaped clods and piled brushwood. The king believed of himself that he had lived there for tens of years, and he did not think of his own land.
The Huaren asked the king again to go wandering with him. Where they came to, he looked up and did not see sun or moon, and he looked down and did not see river or sea. Light and shadow shone there, and the king's eyes were dazzled and could not see; sound and echo came there, and the king's ears were confounded and could not hear. His hundred bones and six organs leapt and would not settle. His mind was lost and his spirit was gone, and he begged the Huaren to take him back. The Huaren moved him, and the king was like a man dropping through empty air.
When he awoke, he was sitting where he had sat before, and those who waited on him were the men who had waited before. He looked in front of him: the wine had not yet cleared, and the meat had not yet dried.
The king asked where he had come from, and those beside him said, "The king was only sitting in silence."
From that time King Mu was beside himself, and only after three months did he come back to himself. He asked the Huaren again, and the Huaren said,
"I wandered with the king in spirit. How should the body have moved? And how does the place we were in then differ from the king's own palace? How does the place we wandered in differ from the king's own park? The king is used to what is there always, and doubts what is gone for a moment. Can the utmost of change and alteration, or the space between slow and quick, ever be measured to the end?"
The king was greatly pleased. He gave no care to the affairs of the state, he took no pleasure in his ministers and his women, and he set his mind free to wander far.
He ordered the carriage of eight steeds made ready. The right inside horse was Hualiu and the left was Lü'er; the right outside horse was Chiji and the left was Baiyi. Zaofu (造父) drove the king's carriage, and Taibing stood at his right. In the carriage that came next, the right inside horse was Quhuang and the left was Yulun, and the left outside horse was Daoli and the right was Shanzi. Boyao had charge of that carriage, Sanbai drove, and Benrong stood at the right.
They ran a thousand li and came to the land of the Jusou (巨蒐氏). The Jusou then offered the blood of a white swan for the king to drink, and brought the milk of cows and mares to wash the feet of the king and of the men of the two carriages. When they had drunk they went on, and at last they lodged on the slopes of Kunlun, north of the Chishui (赤水).
On another day he climbed the hill of Kunlun and looked on the palace of the Yellow Emperor, and he raised a mound of earth to leave to later ages. Then he became the guest of the Queen Mother of the West and lifted the cup beside the Yaochi (瑤池). The Queen Mother of the West sang for the king, and the king sang in answer, and the words were sad. Westward he looked on the place where the sun goes in. In one day he had gone ten thousand li.
Then the king sighed and said, "Alas. I, the one man, have not been full in virtue and have matched myself to pleasure. Later ages will reckon up my faults."
King Mu was near to being a man of the spirit. He was able to use up all the pleasure of his own body, and still he went at a hundred years, and the world took it that he had risen to heaven.
老成子學幻於尹文先生，三年不告。老成子請其過而求退。尹文先生揖而進之於室，屏左右而與之言曰：「昔老聃之徂西也，顧而告予曰：『有生之氣，有形之狀，盡幻也。造化之所始，陰陽之所變者，謂之生，謂之死。窮數達變，因形移易者，謂之化，謂之幻。造物者其巧妙，其功深，固難窮難終。因形者其巧顯，其功淺，故隨起隨滅。知幻化之不異生死也，始可與學幻矣。』吾與汝亦幻也，奚須學哉？」老成子歸，用尹文先生之言，深思三月，遂能存亡自在，憣校四時，冬起雷，夏造冰；飛者走，走者飛，終身不箸其術，故世莫傳焉。子列子曰：「善爲化者，其道密庸，其功同人。五帝之德，三王之功，未必盡智勇之力，或由化而成。孰測之哉？」
Laochengzi (老成子) studied the art of illusion under Master Yin Wen, and for three years he was told nothing. Laochengzi asked what fault was his and begged to withdraw.
Master Yin Wen bowed to him and brought him into the room, sent away those at his side, and spoke with him.
"Long ago, when Lao Dan was going west, he looked back and said to me, 'The breath that has life and the shapes that have form are all illusion. What creation begins and what yin and yang alter is called birth and is called death. To exhaust the count and reach the turn, to shift and change according to the form, is called transformation (化) and is called illusion (幻).
The maker of the ten thousand things is subtle in skill and deep in work, and is truly hard to fathom and hard to finish. What merely follows a form is plain in skill and shallow in work, and so it dies away as it arises. Only one who knows that illusion and transformation are no different from birth and death may begin to learn the art of illusion.'
You and I are illusion too. What is there to learn?"
Laochengzi went home and used the words of Master Yin Wen, and thought deeply for three months. In the end he could make things be and not be as he pleased, and turn the four seasons about, raising thunder in winter and making ice in summer, and he could make the flying run and the running fly. To the end of his life he did not set his art down in writing, and so it was not handed on to the world.
Zi Liezi said, "One who is good at transformation uses his way in secret, and his work looks like other men's. The virtue of the five emperors and the work of the three kings were not in every case the full strength of wisdom and daring; some of it came about through transformation. Who can measure it?"
覺有八徵，夢有六候。奚謂八徵？一曰故，二曰爲，三曰得，四曰喪，五曰哀，六曰樂，七曰生，八曰死。此者八徵，形所接也。奚謂六候？一曰正夢，二曰蘁夢，三曰思夢，四曰寤夢，五曰喜夢，六曰懼夢。此六者，神所交也。不識感變之所起者，事至則惑其所由然；識感變之所起者，事至則知其所由然。知其所由然，則無所怛。一體之盈虛消息，皆通於天地，應於物類。故陰氣壯，則夢涉大水而恐懼；陽氣壯，則夢涉大火而燔焫；陰陽俱壯，則夢生殺。甚飽則夢與，甚饑則夢取。是以以浮虛爲疾者，則夢揚；以沈實爲疾者，則夢溺；藉帶而寢則夢蛇，飛鳥銜髮則夢飛；將陰夢火，將疾夢食；飲酒者憂，歌儛者哭。子列子曰：「神遇爲夢，形接爲事。故晝想夜夢，神形所遇。故神凝者想夢自消。信覺不語，信夢不達，物化之往來者也。古之真人，其覺自忘，其寢不夢，幾虛語哉？」
In waking there are eight signs, and in dreaming there are six omens.
What are the eight signs? The first is old habit, the second is doing, the third is getting, the fourth is losing, the fifth is grief, the sixth is joy, the seventh is life, the eighth is death. These eight signs are what the body meets.
What are the six omens? The first is the plain dream, the second is the startled dream, the third is the dream of thought, the fourth is the waking dream, the fifth is the glad dream, the sixth is the frightened dream. These six are what the spirit meets.
One who does not know where feeling and change arise is bewildered by the cause when a thing comes to him; one who knows where feeling and change arise knows the cause when a thing comes to him. Knowing the cause, he has nothing to be startled at.
The filling and the emptying, the waning and the waxing of one body all run through heaven and earth and answer to the kinds of things. So when the yin breath is strong, one dreams of crossing great water and being afraid; when the yang breath is strong, one dreams of crossing great fire and burning; when yin and yang are both strong, one dreams of giving life and of killing. One who is too full dreams of giving, and one who is starved dreams of taking.
So one whose illness is floating and empty dreams of rising, and one whose illness is sinking and solid dreams of drowning. Lie down on a belt and you dream of snakes; let a flying bird take your hair in its beak and you dream of flying. When the sky is about to darken, one dreams of fire; when one is about to fall ill, one dreams of eating. Those who have drunk wine grieve, and those who have sung and danced weep.
Zi Liezi said, "When spirits meet, it is a dream; when bodies touch, it is an event. So what we think of by day we dream of by night, and this is the meeting of spirit and body. Therefore in one whose spirit is gathered, thought and dream die away of themselves. One who truly wakes does not speak, and one who truly dreams does not arrive: it is things changing, going and coming. It is said that the true men of old forgot of themselves when they woke, and did not dream when they slept. How should that be empty words?"
西極之南隅有國焉，不知境界之所接，名古莽之國。陰陽之氣所不交，故寒暑亡辨；日月之光所不照，故晝夜亡辨。其民不食不衣而多眠。五旬一覺，以夢中所爲者實，覺之所見者妄。四海之齊謂中央之國，跨河南北，越岱東西，萬有餘里。其陰陽之審度，故一寒一暑；昏明之分察，故一晝一夜。其民有智有愚。萬物滋殖，才藝多方。有君臣相臨，禮法相持。其所云爲不可稱計。一覺一寐，以爲覺之所爲者實，夢之所見者妄。東極之北隅有國曰阜落之國。其土氣常燠，日月餘光之照。其土不生嘉苗。其民食草根木實，不知火食，性剛悍，彊弱相藉，貴勝而不尚義；多馳步，少休息，常覺而不眠。
At the southern corner of the far west there is a land, and no one knows where its borders reach. It is called the land of Gumang (古莽). The breaths of yin and yang do not meet there, and so there is no telling cold from heat; the light of sun and moon does not shine there, and so there is no telling day from night. Its people neither eat nor clothe themselves, and they sleep much. They wake once in fifty days. What they do in dreams they hold to be real, and what they see awake they hold to be false.
The middle of the four seas is called the Central Land. It lies across the Yellow River to north and south and stretches east and west of Mount Dai (岱山), more than ten thousand li. There yin and yang are measured out, and so there is one cold season and one hot; dark and light are divided and marked, and so there is one day and one night. Among its people there are the wise and the foolish. The ten thousand things grow and multiply, and skills and arts run many ways. Lord and minister rule each other, and rites and laws hold each other up. What they say and do cannot all be counted. They wake once and sleep once, and what they do awake they hold to be real, and what they see in dreams they hold to be false.
At the northern corner of the far east there is a land called the land of Fuluo (阜落). The breath of its soil is always warm, and the leftover light of sun and moon shines on it. That soil grows no good seedlings. Its people eat the roots of grasses and the fruit of trees, and they do not know how to cook with fire. They are hard and fierce by nature, the strong and the weak trample one another, and they prize winning and do not honor what is right. They run and walk much and rest little, and they are always awake and never sleep.
周之尹氏大治產，其下趣役者侵晨昏而弗息。有老役夫筋力竭矣，而使之彌勤。晝則呻呼而即事，夜則昏憊而熟寐。精神荒散，昔昔夢爲國君，居人民之上，總一國之事，遊燕宮觀，恣意所欲，其樂無比，覺則復役。人有慰喻其懃者，役夫曰：「人生百年，晝夜各分。吾晝爲僕虜，苦則苦矣；夜爲人君，其樂無比，何所怨哉？」尹氏心營世事，慮鍾家業，心形俱疲，夜亦昏憊而寐，昔昔夢爲人僕，趨走作役，無不爲也；數罵杖撻，無不至也。眠中啽囈呻呼，徹旦息焉。尹氏病之，以訪其友。友曰：「若位足榮身，資財有餘，勝人遠矣。夜夢爲僕，苦逸之復，數之常也。若欲覺夢兼之，豈可得邪？」尹氏聞其友言，寬其役夫之程，減己思慮之事，疾並少間。
Yin (尹氏) of Zhou managed a great estate. Those under him who ran at his errands were driven from before dawn until after dark and had no rest.
There was an old workman whose sinews and strength were spent, and he was driven all the harder. By day he groaned and went to his work, and at night he was worn out and slept deeply. His spirit scattered loose, and night after night he dreamed that he was the lord of a state, above the people, governing the affairs of a whole land, wandering through palaces and towers, feasting, doing as he pleased. His joy was beyond compare. When he woke, he was a workman again.
Someone comforted him for his toil, and the workman said, "A man lives a hundred years, and day and night take half each. By day I am a slave, and bitter it is, that is true. By night I am a lord, and my joy is beyond compare. What have I to complain of?"
Yin's mind was busy with the affairs of the world and his thoughts were bound to the family estate, and mind and body were both worn out. At night he too fell asleep worn out, and night after night he dreamed that he was another man's slave, running about at his work, with nothing he was not made to do, scolded and beaten again and again, with nothing he was not made to bear. He babbled and groaned in his sleep until daybreak, and only then did it stop.
Yin was troubled by this and asked his friend about it. The friend said, "Your place is enough to make your person shine, and your goods are more than enough. You are far above other men. That you dream at night of being a slave is hardship and ease turning back on each other; it is what the reckoning always does. If you wish to have both waking and dreaming good, how could you get it?"
Yin heard his friend's words, eased the daily task of his workmen and cut down the matters he brooded on, and the sufferings of both grew a little less.
鄭人有薪於野者，偶駭鹿，御而擊之，斃之。恐人見之也，遽而藏諸隍中，覆之以蕉，不勝其喜。俄而遺其所藏之處，遂以爲夢焉，順塗而詠其事。傍人有聞者，用其言而取之。既歸，告其室人曰：「向薪者夢得鹿而不知其處，吾今得之，彼直真夢矣。」室人曰：「若將是夢見薪者之得鹿邪？詎有薪者邪？今真得鹿，是若之夢真邪？」夫曰：「吾據得鹿，何用知彼夢我夢邪？」薪者之歸，不厭失鹿。其夜真夢藏之之處，又夢得之之主。爽旦，案所夢而尋得之，遂訟而爭之，歸之士師。士師曰：「若初真得鹿，妄謂之夢；真夢得鹿，妄謂之實。彼真取若鹿，而與若爭鹿。室人又謂夢仞人鹿，無人得鹿。今據有此鹿，請二分之。」以聞鄭君。鄭君曰：「嘻！士師將復夢分人鹿乎？」訪之國相。國相曰：「夢與不夢，臣所不能辨也。欲辨覺夢，唯黃帝孔丘。今亡黃帝孔丘，孰辨之哉？且恂士師之言可也。」
There was a man of Zheng who was gathering firewood in the fields. He met a startled deer, struck at it as it came, and killed it. Afraid that someone would see, he hurried and hid it in a dry ditch and covered it with plantain leaves, and he could not contain his joy.
Before long he forgot the place where he had hidden it, and so he took the whole thing for a dream, and he chanted of it as he went along the road. A man beside him heard, followed his words, and took the deer.
When he had gone home, he told his wife, "A woodcutter just now dreamed he got a deer and did not know the place, and I have now got it. So he truly did dream."
His wife said, "Was it not you who dreamed you saw a woodcutter get a deer? How should there have been a woodcutter? Now you truly have a deer. Is it your dream, then, that is true?"
The husband said, "I have my deer, and that is enough. What use is it to know whether he dreamed or I dreamed?"
The woodcutter went home and could not put the lost deer out of his mind. That night he truly dreamed of the place where he had hidden it, and he dreamed of the man who had taken it as well. At daybreak he went by his dream, found the man and the deer, and in the end they quarreled and went to law, and came before the judge (士師).
The judge said, "You truly got a deer at first and rashly called it a dream; you truly dreamed of getting a deer and rashly called it real. He truly took your deer, and he disputes the deer with you. His wife says again that he knew another man's deer as his own in a dream, so that no one got a deer at all. Now, since this deer is here, let it be divided in two."
This was reported to the lord of Zheng. The lord of Zheng said, "Ah. Will the judge not also be dividing another man's deer in a dream?"
He asked the minister of the state, and the minister said, "Whether it is a dream or not, your servant cannot tell. To tell waking from dreaming, there were only the Yellow Emperor and Kong Qiu. Now there is no Yellow Emperor and no Kong Qiu, so who is to tell? It will do to follow the judge's word."
宋陽里華子中年病忘，朝取而夕忘，夕與而朝忘；在塗則忘行，在室則忘坐；今不識先，後不識今。闔室毒之，謁史而卜之，弗占；謁巫而禱之，弗禁；謁醫而攻之，弗已。魯有儒生自媒能治之，華子之妻子以居產之半請其方。儒生曰：「此固非卦兆之所占，非祈請之所禱，非藥石之所攻。吾試化其心，變其慮，庶幾其瘳乎！」於是試露之，而求衣；飢之，而求食；幽之，而求明。儒生欣然告其子曰：「疾可已也。然吾之方密，傳世不以告人。試屏左右，獨與居室七日。」從之，莫知其所施爲也，而積年之疾一朝都除。華子既悟，迺大怒，黜妻罰子，操戈逐儒生。宋人執而問其以，華子曰：「曩吾忘也，蕩蕩然不覺天地之有無。今頓識既往，數十年來存亡、得失、哀樂、好惡，擾擾萬緒起矣。吾恐將來之存亡、得失、哀樂、好惡之亂吾心如此也，須臾之忘，可復得乎？」子貢聞而怪之，以告孔子。孔子曰：「此非汝所及乎！」顧謂顏回紀之。
Huazi (華子) of Yangli (陽里) in Song fell ill with forgetting in his middle years. What he took in the morning he forgot by evening, and what he gave in the evening he forgot by morning. On the road he forgot that he was walking; in a room he forgot that he was sitting. Now he did not know what had gone before, and afterward he did not know what was now.
The whole household was troubled by it. They called a diviner and had it divined, and no sign came; they called a shaman and had prayers made, and it was not stopped; they called a physician and had it treated, and it did not end.
In Lu there was a scholar who offered himself, saying he could cure it. Huazi's wife and son gave half of what the house owned and asked for his prescription.
The scholar said, "This is not a thing to be divined by hexagram and crack, not a thing to be prayed for, not a thing to be treated with drug and needle. Let me try to change his mind and turn his thoughts, and perhaps he will get well."
So he tried taking away his clothes, and Huazi looked for clothes; he starved him, and Huazi looked for food; he put him in the dark, and Huazi looked for light.
The scholar was glad and told the son, "The illness can be stopped. But my prescription is a secret one. It is handed down in the family and not told to others. Let all others be sent away, and let me be alone with him in one room for seven days."
They did as he said. No one knew what he did there, and the illness of many years was all gone in a single morning.
When Huazi came to himself, he was greatly angry. He drove out his wife, punished his son, took up a spear and chased the scholar. The men of Song seized him and asked him why, and Huazi said,
"In the days when I forgot, I was so wide and empty that I did not even feel whether heaven and earth were there or not. Now all at once I know what is past, and the being and the perishing, the getting and the losing, the grief and the joy, the liking and the hating of tens of years rise up in ten thousand tangles. I am afraid that the being and perishing, the getting and losing, the grief and joy, the liking and hating that are still to come will trouble my mind in the same way. Can I get back even a moment of that forgetting?"
Zigong heard of this and thought it strange, and told Confucius. Confucius said, "This is not something you can reach." Then he turned to Yan Hui and had him write it down.
秦人逢氏有子，少而惠，及壯而有迷罔之疾，聞歌以爲哭，視白以爲黑，饗香以爲朽，嘗甘以爲苦，行非以爲是；意之所之，天地、四方，水火、寒暑，無不倒錯者焉。楊氏告其父曰：「魯之君子多術藝，將能已乎？汝奚不訪焉？」其父之魯，過陳，遇老聃，因告其子之證。老聃曰：「汝庸知汝子之迷乎？今天下之人皆惑於是非，昏於利害。同疾者多，固莫有覺者。且一身之迷不足傾一家，一家之迷不足傾一鄉，一鄉之迷不足傾一國，一國之迷不足傾天下。天下盡迷，孰傾之哉？向使天下之人其心盡如汝子，汝則反迷矣。哀樂、聲色、臭味、是非，孰能正之？且吾之此言未必非迷，而況魯之君子迷之郵者，焉能解人之迷哉？榮汝之糧，不若遄歸也。」
Feng (逢氏) of Qin had a son. In his youth he was clever, but when he grew up he fell ill with confusion. When he heard singing he took it for weeping, when he saw white he called it black, when he smelled fragrance he called it rot, when he tasted sweet he called it bitter, and when he did what was wrong he called it right. Wherever his mind turned, in heaven and earth and the four directions, in water and fire and cold and heat, there was nothing that was not turned about.
Yang (楊氏) said to the father, "The gentlemen of Lu have many skills and arts. Might they not cure him? Why do you not go to them?"
The father set out for Lu, and passing through Chen (陳) he met Lao Dan and told him his son's symptoms. Lao Dan said,
"How do you know that your son is confused? Now all the people under heaven are deluded about right and wrong and darkened about gain and harm. Many suffer the same illness, and truly no one has awakened.
Moreover, the confusion of one body is not enough to overturn one household, the confusion of one household is not enough to overturn one village, the confusion of one village is not enough to overturn one state, and the confusion of one state is not enough to overturn all under heaven. If all under heaven were confused, who would overturn it?
Suppose the minds of all the people under heaven were like your son's. Then it is you who would be the confused one. Grief and joy, sound and color, smell and taste, right and wrong: who is able to set them straight?
And these words of mine cannot be called free of confusion either. How much less the gentlemen of Lu, who are the most confused of all. How should they loosen another man's confusion? Rather than carry your provisions about, you had better go home at once."
燕人生於燕，長於楚，及老而還本國。過晉國，同行者誑之，指城曰：「此燕國之城。」其人愀然變容。指社曰：「此若里之社。」乃喟然而歎。指舍曰：「此若先人之廬。」乃涓然而泣。指壠曰：「此若先人之冢。」其人哭不自禁。同行者啞然大笑，曰：「予昔紿若，此晉國耳。」其人大慙。及至燕，真見燕國之城社，真見先人之廬冢，悲心更微。
A man of Yan was born in Yan and grew up in Chu. When he was old he went back to his own country, and passing through the state of Jin (晉) the man who traveled with him deceived him.
He pointed at a wall and said, "This is the wall of Yan." The man's face changed with sorrow.
He pointed at an altar and said, "This is the altar of your village." At this he sighed and lamented.
He pointed at a house and said, "This is the house of your forebears." At this the tears ran down.
He pointed at a mound and said, "This is the grave of your forebears." The man wept and could not stop himself.
The man who traveled with him burst into loud laughter and said, "I deceived you just now. This is only the state of Jin." The man was greatly ashamed.
When he reached Yan and truly saw the wall and the altar of Yan, and truly saw the house and the grave of his forebears, his grief was thinner than before.