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Daoism -> Zhuangzi -> Miscellaneous Chapters -> The Old Fisherman -> 3

The stranger replied,
'Like seeks to like,
and (birds) of the same note respond to one another
- this is a rule of Heaven.
Allow me to explain what I am in possession of, and to pass over (from its standpoint) to the things which occupy you.
What you occupy yourself with are the affairs of men.
天子諸侯When the sovereign, the feudal lords, the great officers, and the common people,
these four classes, do what is correct (in their several positions),
we have the beauty of good order;
and when they leave their proper duties, there ensues the greatest disorder.
When the officials attend to their duties,
and the common people are anxiously concerned about their business,
there is no encroachment on one another's rights.
Fields running to waste; leaking rooms;
insufficiency of food and clothing;
taxes unprovided for;
want of harmony among wives and concubines;
and want of order between old and young
- these are the troubles of the common people.
Incompetency for their charges;
inattention to their official business;
want of probity in conduct;
carelessness and idleness in subordinates;
failure of merit and excellence;
祿 and uncertainty of rank and emolument:
these are the troubles of great officers.
No loyal ministers at their courts;
the clans in their states rebellious;
want of skill in their mechanics;
articles of tribute of bad quality;
late appearances at court in spring and autumn;
天子 and the dissatisfaction of the sovereign:
諸侯 these are the troubles of the feudal lords.
Want of harmony between the Yin and Yang;
unseasonableness of cold and heat,
affecting all things injuriously;
諸侯 oppression and disorder among the feudal princes,
their presuming to plunder and attack one another,
to the injury of the people;
ceremonies and music ill-regulated;
the resources for expenditure exhausted or deficient;
the social relationships uncared for;
and the people abandoned to licentious disorder:
天子 these are the troubles of the Son of Heaven and his ministers.
Now, Sir, you have not the high rank of a ruler, a feudal lord, or a minister of the royal court,
nor are you in the inferior position of a great minister, with his departments of business,
and yet you take it on you to regulate ceremonies and music,
and to give special attention to the relationships of society,
with a view to transform the various classes of the people:
is it not an excessive multiplication of your business?
And moreover men are liable to eight defects,
and (the conduct of) affairs to four evils;
of which we must by all means take account.
To take the management of affairs which do not concern him
is called monopolising.
To bring forward a subject which no one regards
is called loquacity.
To lead men on by speeches made to please them
is called sycophancy.
To praise men without regard to right or wrong
is called flattery.
To be fond of speaking of men's wickedness
is called calumny.
To part friends and separate relatives
is called mischievousness.
To praise a man deceitfully, or in the same way fix on him the character of being bad,
is called depravity.
Without reference to their being good or bad,
to agree with men with double face,
in order to steal a knowledge of what they wish,
is called being dangerous.
Those eight defects
produce disorder among other men
and injury to one's self.
君子 A superior man will not make a friend of one who has them,
nor will an intelligent ruler make him his minister.
To speak of what I called the four evils:
To be fond of conducting great affairs,
changing and altering what is of long-standing,
to obtain for one's self the reputation of meritorious service,
is called ambition;
to claim all wisdom and intrude into affairs,
encroaching on the work of others, and representing it as one's own,
is called greediness;
to see his errors without changing them,
and to go on more resolutely in his own way when remonstrated with,
is called obstinacy;
when another agrees with himself, to approve of him,
and, however good he may be, when he disagrees, to disapprove of him,
is called boastful conceit.
These are the four evils.
When one can put away the eight defects,
and allow no course to the four evils,
。」 he begins to be capable of being taught.'


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