Follow us on Facebook to receive important updates Follow us on Twitter to receive important updates Follow us on sina.com's microblogging site to receive important updates Follow us on Douban to receive important updates
Chinese Text Project
Back Forward
Confucianism -> Mengzi -> Liang Hui Wang I -> 7.33

Mencius replied,
'They are only men of education, who, without a certain livelihood, are able to maintain a fixed heart.
As to the people,
if they have not a certain livelihood,
it follows that they will not have a fixed heart.
And if they have not a fixed heart,
there is nothing which they will not do, in the way of self-abandonment, of moral deflection, of depravity, and of wild license.
When they thus have been involved in crime,
to follow them up and punish them
- this is to entrap the people.
How can such a thing as entrapping the people be done under the rule of a benevolent man?
Therefore an intelligent ruler will regulate the livelihood of the people,
使so as to make sure that, for those above them, they shall have sufficient wherewith to serve their parents,
and, for those below them, sufficient wherewith to support their wives and children;
that in good years they shall always be abundantly satisfied,
and that in bad years they shall escape the danger of perishing.
After this he may urge them, and they will proceed to what is good,
for in this case the people will follow after it with ease.
Now, the livelihood of the people is so regulated,
that, above, they have not sufficient wherewith to serve their parents,
and, below, they have not sufficient wherewith to support their wives and children.
Notwithstanding good years, their lives are continually embittered,
and, in bad years, they do not escape perishing.
In such circumstances they only try to save themselves from death, and are afraid they will not succeed.
What leisure have they to cultivate propriety and righteousness?
If your Majesty wishes to effect this regulation of the livelihood of the people,
why not turn to that which is the essential step to it?
Let mulberry-trees be planted about the homesteads with their five mu,
and persons of fifty years may be clothed with silk.
In keeping fowls, pigs, dogs, and swine,
let not their times of breeding be neglected,
and persons of seventy years may eat flesh.
Let there not be taken away the time that is proper for the cultivation of the farm with its hundred mu,
and the family of eight mouths that is supported by it shall not suffer from hunger.
Let careful attention be paid to education in schools,
the inculcation in it especially of the filial and fraternal duties,
and grey-haired men will not be seen upon the roads, carrying burdens on their backs or on their heads.
。」It never has been that the ruler of a State where such results were seen, the old wearing silk and eating flesh, and the black-haired people suffering neither from hunger nor cold, did not attain to the royal dignity.'


Enjoy this site? Please help.Site design and content copyright 2006-2024. When quoting or citing information from this site, please link to the corresponding page or to https://ctext.org. Please note that the use of automatic download software on this site is strictly prohibited, and that users of such software are automatically banned without warning to save bandwidth. 沪ICP备09015720号-3Comments? Suggestions? Please raise them here.