| Cultivation of the Right...: |
Generally, the principle on which ministers serve their prince are dependent, in most cases, on what the ruler likes. If the ruler likes law, then the ministers will make law their principle in serving; if the prince likes words, then the ministers will make words their principle in serving. If the prince likes law, then upright scholars will come to the front, but if he likes words, then ministers full of praise for some and blame for others will be at his side. If public and private interests are clearly distinguished, then even small-minded men do not hate men of worth, nor do worthless men envy those of merit. For when Yao and Shun established their rule over the empire, they did not keep the benefits of the empire for themselves, but it was for the sake of the empire that they established their rule. In making the imperial succession dependent on worth and ability, they did not intend to alienate fathers and sons from one another, and to conciliate distant people, but they did it because they had a true insight into the ways of order and disorder. So, too, the Three Kings conciliated people by righteousness, and the five Lords Protector rectified the feudal lords by law; that is, in all these cases, none took for himself the benefits of the empire. They ruled for the sake of the empire, and thus, when those who held positions had corresponding merit, the empire enjoyed their administration and no one could harm it. But, nowadays, princes and ministers of a disorderly world each, on a small scale, appropriates the profits of his own state, and each exercises the burden of his own office, for his private benefit. This is why the states are in a perilous position. For the relation between public and private interests is what determines existence or ruin. |
