This chapter is a collection of illustrative anecdotes for use in Yangist disputation, some of them actually applied in the ‘Robber Chih’ dialogues. Most can be found in the Lü-shih ch’un-ch’iu and other extant sources; some items are Confucian, one is from the Tillers,13 and the first two are evidently different versions of a single story. The editor added no comments of his own, but many of his extracts from the Lü-shih ch’un-ch’iu already had Yangist comments which he left intact.
The anecdotes fall into two series, each in chronological sequence.
FIRST SERIES
These stories illustrate the point that life and health are more important than possessions and that you can be happy in poverty.
Yao resigned the empire to Hsü Yu. Hsü Yu refused it. Next he resigned it to Tzŭ-chou Chih-fu.
‘It might not be a bad idea to make me Son of Heaven,’ said Tzŭ-chou Chih-fu. ‘However, at the moment I am worried about a serious ailment. I’m going to put it right, and haven’t time just now to put the empire right.’
The empire is the most important thing of all, but he would not harm his life for the sake of it, and how much less for anything else! Only the man who cares nothing for the empire deserves to be entrusted with the empire.
Shun resigned the empire to Tzŭ-chou Chih-po.
‘At the moment I am worried about a serious ailment,’ said Tzŭ-chou Chih-po. ‘I’m going to put it right, and haven’t time just now to put the empire right.’
So though the empire is the greatest of the tools a man can use, he would not barter away life for it. This is where the man who possesses the Way is quite different from the vulgar.
Shun resigned the empire to Shan-chüan.
‘All Space and Time are the court in which I stand,’ said Shan-chüan. ‘In the winter days I wear furs, in the summer days vine-cloth and hemp. In spring I plough and sow, and my body is strong enough for the labour; in autumn I harvest and store, and the yield is sufficient to rest and feed me. I start work with the sunrise, retire with the sunset. As I go my rambling way between heaven and earth, my heart has all it needs to satisfy it. What does the empire matter to me? Alas, that you should so misunderstand me!’
So he would not accept. Then he left and went deep into the mountains, and no one knows where he settled.
Shun resigned the empire to his friend the farmer of Stone Door.
‘What a fidgety person our Emperor is!’ said the farmer of Stone Door. ‘He’s a fellow who can’t help working too hard.’
He decided that the Power in Shun was inadequate. Then he and his wife loaded up their belongings, he on his back, she on her head, and leading his children by the hand he went over the sea, and to the end of his life never came back.
When the Great King Tan-fu was settled in Pin, the Ti tribes attacked him. He offered them tribute in hides and silks but they would not accept, in horses and hounds but they would not accept, in pearls and jades but they would not accept; what the Ti wanted was the land. Said Tan-fu
‘To send to their deaths the younger brothers and the sons of those with whom I live, I could not bear to do that. Get on as best you can here, all of you. What difference does it make whether you are subjects to me or to the Ti? I have heard too that one does not let a means of nurture do harm to what it nurtures.’
So he departed from them staff in hand. The people followed in a procession behind him. Then he founded a state at the foot of Mount Ch’i.
The Great King Tan-fu may be pronounced capable of honouring life. One capable of honouring life, however rich and noble, will not let the nurturing of his own person do it injury; however poor and mean, he will not for the sake of gain tie his body by involvements. The men of the present age who occupy high office and an honoured estate all fail at this over and over again. Are they not deluded, when at the sight of gain they so lightly bring ruin on their own persons?
The men of Yüeh three times in succession murdered their lord. The King’s son Sou, expecting it to happen to him, fled away to Cinnabar Cave, and the state of Yüeh was without a lord. When they looked for Prince Sou he was nowhere to be found, until they tracked him down in Cinnabar Cave. Prince Sou would not come out, but the men of Yüeh smoked him out with mugwort and rode him back in the royal chariot.
As Prince Sou was pulling himself by the strap up into the chariot, he looked up to Heaven and cried:
‘A king! A king! Why couldn’t they leave me alone?’
It was not that Prince Sou hated being a king, he hated the troubles of being a king. One may say of such a man as Prince Sou that he would not for the sake of a state do injury to life; and the result was that he was the very man whom the people of Yüeh wanted as their lord.
Han and Wei were in conflict and raiding each other’s borders. When Tzŭhua-tzŭ visited Marquis Chao-hsi, the Marquis looked worried.
‘Let’s suppose’, said Tzŭ-hua-tzŭ, ‘that the empire were to draw up a document in my lord’s presence, and this is how it was worded: “If you grasp this with your left hand you shall lose your right, if you grasp it with your right hand you shall lose your left; but whoever does grasp it shall possess the empire.” Would you be able to do it?’
‘I would not.’
‘Very good. You may see by this that having both your arms is more important than having the empire. Likewise your whole person is more important than your two arms. And Han after all is far less important than the empire, and the land you are contending for now far less important than Han. Are you really going to distress your person and do injury to life worrying and fretting that you can’t get it?’
‘Excellent! Many have advised me, but no one ever said this to me before.’
We may say that Tzŭ-hua-tzŭ knew the important from the unimportant.
The lord of Lu heard that Yen Ho was a man who had won the Way, and sent a messenger to approach him with presents. Yen Ho kept to himself in a mean quarter, wore a sackcloth coat and fed his cows with his own hands. When the lord of Lu’s messenger arrived Yen Ho himself came to the door.
‘Is this the house of Yen Ho?’
‘It is.’
The messenger handed over the presents.
‘I’m afraid you may have heard the name wrong’, Yen Ho replied, ‘and it will get you into trouble. You had better confirm it.’
The messenger went back to confirm his instructions. When he came looking for him again he did not find him in.
It will be seen that it is by no means the case that someone like Yen Ho hates wealth and rank. As the saying goes: ‘The most genuine in the Way is for supporting one’s own person, its left-overs are for running a state, its discards are for ruling the empire.’ Seen from this viewpoint, the achievements of emperors and kings are the left-over deeds of the sage, they are not the means by which he keeps his person whole and nurtures life. How sad that so many of the worldly gentlemen of today endanger their persons or throw away their lives sacrificing themselves for mere things! Whenever the sage is prompted to act, he will be sure to scrutinise both why and how he is acting. Now suppose we have a man who uses the pearl of the Marquis of Sui as a crossbow pellet to shoot at a sparrow 10,000 feet high in the air. The worldly would laugh at him of course. Why? – Because what he is utilising is more important than what he aims at. And is not life much more important than the pearl of the Marquis of Sui?
Master Lieh-tzŭ was living in distress, with the pinch of hunger in his face. There was a visitor who spoke of him to Tzŭ-yang of Cheng.
‘Lieh-tzŭ is known as a knight who has the Way. While living in your state he has fallen into distress. Might not people think that you are uninterested in men of talent?’
Tzŭ-yang at once ordered an official to send him grain. Lieh-tzŭ when he saw the messenger bowed twice and refused it. The messenger left, Lieh-tzŭ went in. His wife gazed after the departing man and said beating her breast
‘I had heard that the wife and children of anyone who has the Way live in ease and joy. Now our faces are pinched with hunger, yet when his lordship notices and sends you grain you refuse to take it. What a fate is mine!’
With a smile Lieh-tzŭ said to her
‘It was not that his lordship knew me himself, it was on another man’s word that he sent me grain. Should he ever find me deserving of punishment, it would again be on another man’s word. This is why I did not accept.’
Finally it turned out that the people rose in rebellion and killed Tzŭ-yang.
When King Chao of Ch’u lost his state, his mutton butcher Yüeh was one of those who fled with him. When King Chao regained the state, he intended to reward all who had been loyal to him, even mutton butcher Yüeh.
‘His Majesty lost the state, I lost my job,’ said Yüeh. ‘His Majesty regained the state, I regained my job. My title and salary are already restored, why mention a reward?’
‘Make him accept,’ said the King.
‘That His Majesty lost the state was no fault of mine, so I would not have presumed to offer myself for punishment. That His Majesty regained the state is not to my credit, so I do not presume to claim a reward.’
‘Bring him here,’ said the King.
‘By the law of the state of Ch’u, only men who are being richly rewarded for great deeds are admitted to the presence. Now I was neither clever enough to save the state nor brave enough to die fighting the invaders. When the army of Wu entered Ying I was scared of trouble and fled from the invaders, it wasn’t that I deliberately threw in my lot with His Majesty. Now His Majesty desires to grant me an audience which would be a flouting of the law and a breach with precedent; that is not going to make the world think well of me.’
Said the King to his marshal Tzŭ-chi
‘Mutton butcher Yüeh has a mean and humble position, but the point he is making is a very lofty one. On my behalf promote him to a placement with three banners.’
‘A placement with three banners’, said Yüeh, ‘is more exalted I know than a mutton butcher’s stall, and a salary of 10,000 chung is more lavish than a mutton butcher’s earnings. But how could I be so greedy for title and salary as to let my sovereign become notorious for indiscriminate liberality? I cannot claim to deserve it, I want to go back to my mutton butcher’s stall.’
He never did accept.
Yüan Hsien was dwelling in Lu, in a house 50 cubits by 50 cubits, thatched with growing grass, with a bramble door which let in the wind and had a mulberry stalk for hinge, two rooms which had jars with the bottoms out for windows, and rags stuffing the holes. On the damp floor under the leaking roof he sat straight-backed singing to the zither.
Tzŭ-kung with a team of tall horses, and robed in white over royal blue, in a high-fronted carriage too grand to squeeze into the lane, went to call on Yüan Hsien. Yüan Hsien in a cap split down the middle and heel-less sandals leaning on a goosefoot staff answered the door.
‘O, how you have deteriorated!’ said Tzŭ-kung.
‘As I have heard it, lack of means is called “poverty”, proving incapable of living by the Way one was taught is called “deteriorating”. The trouble with me now is poverty, not deterioration.’
Tzŭ-kung shuffled his feet and looked embarrassed. Said Yüan Hsien with a smile
‘To be on the lookout for worldly prospects, make friends in some gang which can help me along, do my learning with others in mind and my teaching thinking only of myself, and while corrupting Goodwill and Duty put on a splendid show with my carriages and horses, are things I could not bear to do.’
NOTE Yüan Hsien and Tzŭ-kung were both disciples of Confucius (as was Tseng-tzŭ in the next story).
When Tseng-tzŭ lived in Wey his quilted gown was down to the lining, his face was swollen and blotched, his hands and feet calloused. He did not light a fire once in three days, did not have a coat cut once in ten years. When he straightened his cap the chin-band snapped, when he pulled on his lapels his elbows showed through the sleeves, when he got into his shoes they burst at the heels.
With shuffling steps he would sing the Hymns of Shang. The sound filled heaven and earth, as though from bells and stone chimes. The Son of Heaven could not get him as a minister, the lords of the states could not get him as a friend. So when nurturing your intent forget the body, in nurturing the body forget profit, in perfecting the Way forget the calculations of the heart.
Said Confucius to Yen Hui
‘Hui, come here! Your family is poor, your station humble. Why not take office?’
‘I prefer not to take office. I have 50 mou of fields out in the country, enough to provide porridge and gruel, and 10 mou on the edge of town, enough to keep me in silk and hemp. Strumming on the zither is all the amusement I need, and in the Way I studied under you, sir, I find all my happiness. I prefer not to take office.’
Confucius solemnly composed his face.
‘Excellent, that resolve of yours! I have heard it said: “The man who knows when he has enough does not let himself be tied for the sake of profit; the man who understands where satisfaction lies is not afraid of losses; the man who is disciplined in his private conduct is not ashamed to lack position.” I have been chanting the words for a long time, and now at last in you I see an example of it. You have done me a service.’
The Chung-shan Prince Mou said to Chan-tzŭ
‘My body is here by the river and the sea, but my heart lingers on under the city gate-towers of Wei. What’s to be done?’
‘Give weight to life. See life as heavy and profit will be light to you.’
‘Well though I know it, still I am unable to conquer myself.’
‘If you cannot conquer yourself, let go. Are there not aversions which are from the daemonic in us? To be unable to conquer oneself, yet force oneself not to let go, this is what they call “being wounded twice over”. Men who wound themselves twice over are the sort that never live long.’
Mou of Wei was a prince of 10,000 chariots, and to hide away in the caves of the cliffs was harder for him than for a commoner. Even though he had not attained the Way, we may say that he had the idea of it.
When Confucius was caught with no way out between Ch’en and Ts’ai, for seven days he did not eat a cooked meal, he had no grain in his soup of herbs, he was haggard in the face, but he strummed and sang inside the house. While Yen Hui picked vegetables, Tzŭ-lu and Tzŭ-kung were saying to each other
‘Twice our Master was chased out of Lu, he had to scrape away his footprints in Wey, he had a tree chopped down over him in Sung, he had no way to turn in Shang and Chou, and here between Ch’en and Ts’ai they have him surrounded. His life is at the mercy of anyone, he is outside the protection of the law. To be singing and strumming his zither, never a pause in the sound – is a gentleman so without shame?’
Yen Hui had no answer for them. He went in and told Confucius. Pushing away his zither, Confucius sighed deeply.
‘Tzŭ-lu and Tzŭ-kung are petty people. Call them in, I shall speak to them.’
The two men entered. Said Tzŭ-lu
‘To be in these straits I would call getting nowhere.’
‘What words are these? For a gentleman, to have access throughout the Way is what is meant by getting somewhere, to make no progress in the Way is what is meant by getting nowhere. At present in embracing the Way of Goodwill and Duty I come upon the troubles of a disordered age, what has that to do with getting nowhere? So in looking inwards I have unhindered access to the Way, and in confronting difficulties I do not lose the Power in me. After great cold comes, after frosts and snows fall, that is when I know that the pines and cypresses are thriving. These narrows of Ch’en and Ts’ai, are they not a blessing to me?’
Confucius with a flourish resumed his strumming on the zither and sang. Tzŭ-lu with a swagger took up his shield and danced. Said Tzŭ-kung:
‘I never knew that heaven is so high, that earth is so firm under my feet.’
The men of old who had grasped the Way were happy whether they got anywhere or not. Their happiness had nothing to do with failure or success. Wherever the Way is grasped, failure and success belong with the cycles of cold and heat, wind and rain. Therefore Hsü Yu was content on the north bank of the Ying, and Kung-po lived satisfied on the summit of Mount Kung.
SECOND SERIES
These are stories, again arranged in chronological sequence, of high-minded men who commit suicide rather than disgrace themselves by accepting a throne or office. Such conduct was widely admired, and the Syncretist ‘Finicky ideas’ mentions a special category of hermits who withdraw from government on moral grounds and ‘wither away or drown themselves’.14 But the Yangist detests them, and is arranging examples to be used as the last of them, the story of Po Yi and Shu Ch’i, is used by Robber Chih.15 Where his main source the Lü-shih ch’un-ch’iu has an approving comment he cuts it out. The series breaks off unexpectedly early, at the very beginning of the Chou, perhaps because of textual mutilation; Robber Chih’s other instances are later.
Shun resigned the empire to his friend Wu-tse the Northerner.
‘What a strange person our Emperor is!’ said Wu-tse the Northerner. ‘From the fields where he belonged he came to hang around the court of Yao. Nor is that the worst of it; he wishes to pollute me too with his disgraceful conduct. I should be embarrassed to see him.’
Then he threw himself into the deeps of Ch’ing-leng.
When T’ang had resolved to smite his lord Chieh, he appealed to Pien Sui to plan the campaign.
‘It is no business of mine,’ said Pien Sui.
‘Who do you think would do?’
‘I would not know.’
Next T’ang appealed to Wu Kuang to plan the campaign.
‘It is no business of mine.’
‘Who do you think would do?’
‘I would not know.’
‘What about Yi Yin?’
‘He is energetic and unscrupulous, that is all I know about him.’
Then T’ang planned the campaign against Chieh with Yi Yin. He defeated him, and resigned the throne to Pien Sui. Pien Sui refused it.
‘When the Emperor smote Chieh’, he said, ‘he was going to plan the campaign with me: certainly he believed me rebellious. Having conquered Chieh he resigns the throne to me: certainly he believes me ambitious. I live on and on in an age of disorder, and twice a man without the Way has come to pollute me with his disgraceful conduct. I cannot bear to hear the same thing over and over again.’
Then he threw himself into the River Ch’ou and died.
Next T’ang resigned the throne to Wu Kuang, saying
‘I have heard it said: “That the wise plan it, the warriors execute it, and the benevolent make the settlement, is the Way of old.” Why not take the throne yourself?’
Wu Kuang refused.
‘To make away with your sovereign is contrary to Duty, to slaughter your people is contrary to Goodwill; and when others have undertaken the hard part, for me to enjoy the profit would not be honesty. I have heard it said: “For deeds contrary to one’s duty one does not accept the Emperor’s favours, in a reign without the Way one does not tread the Emperor’s soil”, far less let him elevate one to honours! I cannot bear that my eyes should go on seeing.’
Then he loaded a stone on his back and drowned himself in the waters of Lu.
Formerly during the rise of the Chou there were two knights who lived in Ku-chu, called Po Yi and Shu Ch’i. The two men said to each other
‘They say that in the West there is a man who seems like someone who would have the Way. Let’s go and take a look at him.’
When they arrived south of Mount Ch’i, King Wu heard of them, and sent his younger brother Tan to go and see them. He made a covenant with them, promising “You shall have income of the second class, office of the first rank”, smeared it with a victim’s blood and buried it.
The two men exchanged glances and smiled.
‘Hmm, strange! This is not what we would call the Way. Formerly when Shen-nung possessed the empire, in the seasonal sacrifices he was perfectly reverent but he did not pray for blessings; his dealings with others were loyal, trustworthy, perfectly orderly, but he did not seek anything from them. He delighted in joining with the correct to correct, with the orderly to order. He did not take advantage of other men’s deterioration to become successful himself, or of others’ degradation to elevate himself, or of the chances of the times to profit himself.
‘Now the Chou seeing the disorder of the Yin come running to correct it. They promote conspiracies and distribute bribes, rely on arms and presume on their authority. A covenant with slaughtered victims is their idea of good faith, they brag of their deeds to please the masses, murder and invade to get their hands on profit. This is to exchange tyranny for a misrule pushed farther still.
‘We have heard that the knight of old, when blessed with orderly times did not shirk his responsibilities, when he chanced on an age of misrule did not save himself by expediencies. Now the empire is in darkness, the Power in the Chou has decayed. Rather than besmirch ourselves by continuing to side with the Chou, better shun them and keep our conduct unsullied.’
The two men went north as far as the mountain of Shou-yang, and then starved to death there.
The attitude to wealth and rank of men like Po Yi and Shu Ch’i is not to recognise any justification at all for accepting them. With their lofty punctiliousness and harsh code of conduct they take a lonely pleasure in their resolve and refuse to be of service to their age. Such was the punctiliousness of the two knights.