Record of Teaching and Practice
Recorded by the Disciple Huang Shengzeng
Read in English. Switch to Original for word notes, or select text to ask a question.
249 · No Perversity in Thought
Someone asked: “How can the single saying ‘No perversity in thought’ cover the meaning of all three hundred poems?”
The Master said: “Not only the three hundred poems! This one saying can encompass and run through the Six Classics. Even all the words of sages and worthies throughout the world, past and present, can be encompassed by ‘No perversity in thought.’ What further account is there outside this? This is practical work that, once understood, settles a hundred matters.”
250 · The Mind of the Way and the Human Mind
Someone asked about the mind of the Way and the human mind.
The Master said: “‘Following nature is the Way’: this is the mind of the Way. Add the slightest human contrivance, and it is the human mind. The mind of the Way is originally without sound or scent, and therefore it is called subtle. Proceeding according to the human mind produces many places of insecurity, and therefore it is called precarious.”
251 · Teaching without Leaping over Stages
Someone asked: “‘Those below the middle level cannot be spoken to of higher things.’ Even when foolish people are spoken to of higher things, they still fail to advance. How could it be acceptable not to speak to them of such things?”
The Master said: “It is not that the sage never speaks of them. The sage's mind worries that not everyone can become a sage. It is only that people's endowments differ, and teaching cannot leap over stages. Speak at once of nature and the decree to someone below the middle level, and the person will not understand. One must also gradually cut and polish such a person into growth.”
252 · Reading, Remembering, and the Original Constitution
A friend asked: “What if I cannot remember what I read?”
The Master said: “You need only understand it. Why must you remember it? Even wanting to understand it has already fallen into the second rank. You need only make your own original constitution clear. If you merely want to remember, you will not understand. If you merely want to understand, you will not make your own original constitution clear.”
253 · The River’s Unceasing Vitality
Someone asked: “Does ‘What passes is like this’ speak of the vivid vitality of one's own mind and nature?”
The Master said: “Yes. Only by constantly applying the work of extending innate moral knowing is there vivid vitality, only then is it like that river's water. If there is even a momentary interruption, it no longer resembles Heaven and Earth. This is the utmost point of learning. Even the sage is only like this.”
254 · Seeing Life and Principle Clearly
Someone asked about the passage on people of resolve and benevolence.
The Master said: “It is simply that worldly people all regard their bodily life too heavily. Without asking whether they ought to die or ought not to die, they insist on twists and accommodations to preserve themselves. In this way they discard Heaven's principle. Hardening the mind and harming principle, what will they not do?
“If one violates Heaven's principle, one is no different from birds and beasts. Even stealing continued life in the world for hundreds or thousands of years would only mean being a bird or beast for hundreds or thousands of years. Students must see such matters clearly. Bi Gan and Longfeng could complete their benevolence simply because they too saw them clearly.”
255 · Praise and Blame Come from Outside
Someone asked: “Shusun Wushu slandered Zhongni. How could even a great sage fail to escape slander?”
The Master said: “Slander comes from outside. How could even a sage escape it? What matters is simply cultivating oneself. If one really and firmly is a sage or worthy, even if everyone slanders one, their words cannot touch the truth of one. It is like floating clouds covering the sun: how could they damage the sun's light?
“But if one is respectful in appearance and solemn in countenance, without firmness or integrity, then even if no one says a word, one's hidden evil must finally be exposed one day. Thus Mencius says: ‘There is slander that comes from seeking completeness, and praise one never expected.’ Praise and blame lie outside. How can they be avoided? The question is simply how one's own cultivation stands.”
256 · Quiet Cultivation without Dislike of Affairs
Liu Junliang wanted to sit quietly in the mountains. The Master said: “If you seek stillness with a mind weary of external things, you will instead nurture an arrogant and lazy qi. If you are not weary of external things and then nourish yourself in a quiet place, that is good.”
257 · The Sage Does Not Bind Everyone into One Shape
Wang Ruzhong and Shengzeng sat attending the Master. Holding a fan, the Master told them: “Use your fans.” Shengzeng rose and replied: “I dare not.”
The Master said: “The sages' learning is not this sort of binding and suffering. It is not putting on the appearance of a practitioner of the learning of the Way.”
Ruzhong said: “One can glimpse this in the passage where Zhongni and Zeng Dian speak of their aspirations.”
The Master said: “Yes. Look at that passage: how expansive and inclusive the sage's bearing is! As teacher he asked his disciples about their aspirations, and the other three all composed themselves before answering. As for Zeng Dian, he was so free and airy that he paid no attention to those three and went on playing his se. What an unconventional bearing! When he came to speak of his aspiration, he did not even answer the teacher's stated topic, but gave wholly unconventional words.
“Had it been Yichuan, he might have rebuked and scolded him. Yet the sage praised and approved him. What a bearing! In teaching people, the sage does not bind them all into one identical pattern. With the boldly unconventional, he completes them through their unconventionality; with the scrupulously restrained, through their restraint. How could people's abilities and dispositions be identical?”
258 · Simple Guidance and the Desire for Breadth
The Master said to Lu Yuanjing: “When you were young, Yuanjing, you too wanted to explain the Five Classics, and your resolve loved breadth. But when the sage teaches people, he fears only that they will not be simple and easy. Everything he says is a rule of simplicity and ease. Look at this with today's mind that loves breadth, and it instead seems as if the sage's teaching were mistaken.”
259 · The Living Line of the Sages’ Learning
The Master said: “Confucius never acted without knowing. Master Yan, whenever there was something not good, never failed to know it. This is the true living line of the sages' learning.”
260 · Resolve with Nothing Else Hanging upon It
He Tingren, Huang Zhengzhi, Li Houbi, Ruzhong, and Dehong were sitting in attendance. The Master looked at them and said: “Your learning fails to advance simply because you have not established resolve.”
Houbi rose and replied: “I, Gong, too wish to establish resolve.”
The Master said: “It is hard to say you have established none. It is only not yet the resolve that you must become a sage.”
He replied: “I wish to establish the resolve that I must become a sage.”
The Master said: “If you truly have the resolve of a sage, there will be nothing in innate moral knowing that you do not fully fulfill. Leave the slightest other thought hanging upon innate moral knowing, and it is not the resolve that you must become a sage.”
When Dehong first heard this, his mind seemed not to accept it. On hearing the discussion reach this point, he involuntarily broke into an apprehensive sweat.
261 · The Numinous Essence of Creation
The Master said: “Innate moral knowing is the numinous essence of creation and transformation. Generating Heaven and Earth, forming spirits and Di, the Sovereign—all issue from this numinous essence. It truly has no counterpart among things. If people recover it completely, without the slightest deficiency, they will naturally dance with hands and feet without realizing it. I do not know what other joy between Heaven and Earth could replace it.”
262 · Why the Teaching Turned from Quiet Sitting
A friend gained an insight in quiet sitting and hurried to ask the Master. He replied:
“When I lived at Chu, I saw that students mostly busied themselves with conceptual understanding and disputes carried between mouth and ear, without benefit to actual attainment. I provisionally taught them quiet sitting. For a time they glimpsed something and obtained fairly quick results.
“After a while they gradually developed the disease of loving stillness and disliking movement, drifting into withered deadness. Some devoted themselves to obscure interpretations and marvelous awakenings to impress people's hearing. Thus recently I speak only of extending innate moral knowing.
“Once innate moral knowing is clear, you may apprehend it in a quiet place or refine yourself amid affairs as you wish. The original constitution of innate moral knowing originally has neither movement nor stillness. This is the guiding point of learning. From my time at Chuzhou until now, I too have revised this teaching several times. Only the three characters ‘extend innate moral knowing’ are free of disease. Only after the physician has experienced a broken arm can he discern the principles of other people's illnesses.”
263 · Do the Work without Hurrying It
A friend asked: “In practical work I wish to keep this knowing continuous at every moment. Yet in all my responses to what affects me, I feel I cannot watch over everything. If I turn to handling the affairs themselves, I feel the knowing is lost again. What should I do?”
The Master said: “This is simply not yet recognizing innate moral knowing truly. There is still a division between inner and outer. The practical work here does not obey people's impatient minds. Recognize the guiding point of innate moral knowing correctly and go on applying effort plainly and honestly. It will naturally become penetrating. On reaching this, both inner and outer are forgotten. How could mind and affairs fail to be one?”
264 · Understanding Cannot Supply the Actual Fullness
He also said: “Unless practical work penetrates this genuine working, how can there be fullness and radiance? Even if you can penetrate it, it cannot be supplied by your cleverness and conceptual understanding. The dregs within the breast must be wholly transformed, without the slightest residue clinging. Only then will it do.”
265 · Innate Moral Knowing Is the Clear Teacher
The Master said: “‘What Heaven decrees is called nature’: the decree is nature. ‘Following nature is called the Way’: nature is the Way. ‘Cultivating the Way is called teaching’: the Way is teaching.”
Someone asked: “How is the Way teaching?”
He said: “The Way is innate moral knowing. Genuine knowing is originally complete and whole. What is right, return to right; what is wrong, return to wrong. In right and wrong, simply follow it, and there is no point that is not right. This innate moral knowing is itself your clear teacher.”
266 · Substance and Practical Work Can Be Named Either Way
Someone asked: “Does ‘seeing and hearing nothing’ speak of the original constitution, and ‘caution and apprehension’ of practical work?”
The Master said: “Here you must trust that the original constitution is originally seeing and hearing nothing, and also originally caution and apprehension. Caution and apprehension have never added the slightest thing to seeing and hearing nothing. When you truly see this, it is also acceptable to say, ‘Caution and apprehension are the original constitution; seeing and hearing nothing is practical work.’”
267 · Knowing Day and Night
Someone asked about “comprehending the Way of day and night and knowing.”
The Master said: “Innate moral knowing originally knows day and night.”
The questioner asked again: “When a person is deeply asleep, innate moral knowing no longer knows.”
He said: “If it did not know, how could one answer as soon as called?”
“If innate moral knowing constantly knows, how can there be deep sleep?”
“Resting as darkness approaches is also the constant principle of creation and transformation. At night Heaven and Earth are undifferentiated, forms and colors disappear, ears and eyes have nothing seen or heard, and all the openings close. This is the time when innate moral knowing gathers and concentrates into oneness. When Heaven and Earth open, the various things emerge into life, a person's ears and eyes awaken to seeing and hearing, and all the openings open. This is the time when the wondrous functioning of innate moral knowing issues into life.
“One can see that the human mind is one body with Heaven and Earth, and therefore above and below flows together with them. People now do not know how to rest. At night they either sink into dull sleep or into deluded thinking and troubled dreams.”
“How should practical work be applied during sleep?”
The Master said: “Knowing day is knowing night. In the daytime innate moral knowing responds fittingly without obstruction; at night it gathers and concentrates into oneness. If there are dreams, they are anticipatory signs.”
Reading note: The current source uses 画 for day in its opening, and the daytime clause still has the difficult 无所赌闻. The English reads the opening of sight and hearing from the paired day/night contrast; the Chinese remains unchanged.
268 · Night Qi amid Busy Affairs
He also said: “Innate moral knowing as it emerges in the night qi is the original constitution, because it is free of the admixture of material desires. Students must make themselves constantly like the night qi even when affairs and things are numerous and disturbing. This is ‘comprehending the Way of day and night and knowing.’”
269 · Emptiness without a Private Aim Added
The Master said: “The schools of immortality speak of emptiness. Could the sage add the slightest solidity to emptiness? The Buddhists speak of nothingness. Could the sage add the slightest being to nothingness?
“But the immortality schools' talk of emptiness comes from nourishing life, and the Buddhists' talk of nothingness comes from escaping the bitter sea of birth and death. These add a little intention to the original constitution. It is no longer the original character of their emptiness and nothingness, and there is an obstruction to the original constitution.
“The sage simply restores the original character of innate moral knowing and adds not the slightest intention. The emptiness of innate moral knowing is Heaven's great vacancy. The nothingness of innate moral knowing is the formlessness of that great vacancy. Sun, moon, wind, thunder, mountains, rivers, people, and things—all that has appearance, image, shape, and color—function and flow within the formless great vacancy, without ever obstructing Heaven.
“The sage simply follows innate moral knowing as it issues into function. Heaven, Earth, and the myriad things are all within the functioning and flowing forth of my innate moral knowing. When has some further thing ever arisen outside innate moral knowing that could create an obstruction?”
Reading note: The repeated parenthetical 仙 in the current source does not create a second school or a repeated English name.
270 · Nourishing the Mind in Affairs
Someone asked: “The Buddhists also devote themselves to nourishing the mind. Yet in the end their teaching cannot govern the world. Why?”
The Master said: “We Confucians, in nourishing the mind, have never left affairs and things behind. Simply following the naturalness of Heaven's standard is itself practical work. The Buddhists, however, want entirely to cut off affairs and things. They regard the mind as an illusory appearance and gradually enter empty silence, as if they had not the slightest involvement with the world. That is why they cannot govern the world.”
271 · Shared Virtue and Divergent Doctrine
Someone asked about heterodox doctrines. The Master said: “What is shared with ordinary, unlearned men and women is called shared virtue. What differs from ordinary, unlearned men and women is called a divergent doctrine.”
272 · The Unmoved Mind and Accumulating Rightness
The Master said: “The difference between Mencius's unmoved mind and Gaozi's unmoved mind lies only in the slightest degree. Gaozi applied effort only to keeping the mind unmoved. Mencius directly understood the place where this mind originally is unmoved.
“The original constitution of the mind is originally unmoved. Only because one's conduct does not accord with rightness does it become moved. Mencius did not discuss whether the mind moved or did not move; he simply accumulated rightness. When everything one does is right, this mind naturally has nothing by which it can be moved.
“Gaozi, however, merely wanted this mind not to move. That meant seizing and gripping this mind, instead obstructing its root of ceaseless generation. This is not merely without benefit: it also harms it.
“Mencius's work of accumulating rightness naturally nourishes fullness, without deficiency or hunger. It is naturally free in every direction and vividly alive. This is the vast, overflowing qi.”
273 · Do Not Put Nature Inside and Things Outside
He also said: “The root of the disease discussed in Mencius can be seen in the claim that nature is neither good nor not good. Speaking of nature as neither good nor not good is not in itself a great error. But Gaozi fixed upon it. Thus he had a nature that was neither good nor not good inside. He then looked for good and evil in the affecting of things, and thus had a thing outside. Seeing them as two sides brought error.
“Neither good nor not good: nature originally is like this. If one awakens to it, this one statement exhausts it, and there is no further division between inner and outer. Gaozi saw a nature inside and a thing outside. This shows where his understanding of nature was not yet penetrating.”
Reading note: The compressed opening 孟子病源 is read as the disease under discussion in the Mencius argument. The remainder explicitly names Gaozi; the English does not silently substitute his name into the opening.
274 · The Responsive Opening of the Shared Body
Zhu Bensi asked: “Human beings have empty responsiveness, and therefore innate moral knowing. Do such things as plants, tiles, and stones also have innate moral knowing?”
The Master said: “Human innate moral knowing is the innate moral knowing of plants, tiles, and stones. If plants, tiles, and stones lacked human innate moral knowing, they could not be plants, tiles, and stones. Is this true only of plants, tiles, and stones? Without human innate moral knowing, Heaven and Earth, too, could not be Heaven and Earth.
“Heaven, Earth, the myriad things, and people are originally one body. Its most refined responsive opening is the small point of clear responsiveness in the human mind. Wind, rain, dew, thunder, sun, moon, stars and constellations, birds, beasts, plants, mountains, rivers, earth, and stones are originally only one body with people.
“Thus grains, birds, beasts, and the like can all nourish people, and medicinal plants and stones can treat illness. It is only because they share this one qi that they can communicate with one another.”
275 · The Flower in the Mountains
The Master was visiting Nanzhen. A friend pointed to a flowering tree among the rocks and asked: “You say there is no thing in the world outside the mind. A flowering tree like this blooms and falls of itself deep in the mountains. What connection does it have with my mind?”
The Master said: “Before you looked at this flower, the flower and your mind returned together to stillness. When you come and look at it, its colors at once become clear. Then you know that this flower does not lie outside your mind.”
276 · One Body and Different Degrees of Care
Someone asked: “The great person is one body with things. Why, then, does the Great Learning still speak of greater and lesser depth of care?”
The Master said: “It is precisely that principle naturally has degrees of depth. For example, the person is one body, yet uses hands and feet to shield head and eyes. Is this deliberately wishing to treat hands and feet lightly? The principle of the matter requires it.
“Animals and plants are alike objects of love, yet one can bear using plants to nourish animals. People and animals are alike objects of love, yet the mind can bear slaughtering animals to nourish parents, provide sacrifices, and entertain guests. Close kin and a passerby are alike objects of love. Yet if a basket of food or bowl of soup means life when obtained and death when not obtained, and both cannot be saved, one would rather save close kin than the passerby. The mind can bear this too. This is what principle requires.
“But as between one's own person and close kin, one must not make a further separation of self and other, greater and lesser depth. Being benevolent toward the people and loving things all issue from here. If one can bear to violate this, there is nothing one will not bear.
“The Great Learning's degrees of depth are the natural coherent order of innate moral knowing and cannot be overstepped. This is called rightness. Following this coherent order is called ritual propriety; knowing it is called wisdom; being of this coherent order from beginning to end is called trustworthiness.”
277 · The Senses and the Mind Have No Separate Body
He also said: “The eyes have no body of their own: they take the colors of the myriad things as their body. The ears have no body of their own: they take the sounds of the myriad things as their body. The nose has no body of its own: it takes the smells of the myriad things as its body. The mouth has no body of its own: it takes the tastes of the myriad things as its body. The mind has no body of its own: it takes the right and wrong of its responses to Heaven, Earth, and the myriad things as its body.”
278 · The Last Attachment to Life and Death
Someone asked about not being of two minds over a short or long life.
The Master said: “In the work of learning, one may have almost entirely shed reputation, profit, desires, and preferences. Yet if the slightest thought of life and death still clings, something in the whole constitution has not yet been dissolved and released.
“The thought of life and death comes with people from the root of bodily life, and is therefore difficult to remove. If one sees through and passes beyond this point, only then can this mind's whole constitution flow without obstruction. Only then is it the learning of fully realizing nature and reaching the decree.”
Reading note: The source opens with 天寿; the English reads the short/long-life expression used repeatedly in the preceding letters, without changing that character.
279 · Searching Out the Roots of Private Desires
A friend asked: “I wish, during quiet sitting, to search out one by one the roots of love of reputation, beauty, wealth, and the like, sweeping them away and clearing them out. I fear this may be cutting into flesh to create a sore.”
The Master said sternly: “This is my prescription for treating people. It truly can remove the root of their disease. Even someone of much greater capacity may still find it useful after more than ten years. If you do not use it, put it aside for the time being. Do not spoil my prescription!”
The friend was ashamed and apologized. A little later the Master said: “This is probably not your own idea. It must be someone among us with a little understanding who made this statement and misled you.” Everyone seated there was startled into apprehension.
280 · Where Is My Whisk?
A friend asked about practical work lacking earnestness. The Master said: “I have already exhausted the work of learning in one statement. Why is it that the more we speak today, the farther away we go, without touching the root?”
The friend replied: “I have heard your instruction on extending innate moral knowing. Yet it still needs to be made clear through discussion.”
The Master said: “Once you know extending innate moral knowing, what further discussion will make it clear? Innate moral knowing is originally clear. Apply effort solidly: that is enough. Unwilling to apply effort, you only turn about in language, growing more confused the more you speak.”
“I am precisely seeking clarification of the work of extending it.”
“This too you must seek for yourself. I have no separate method to tell you. Long ago there was a Chan teacher. Whenever someone came to ask about the teaching, he simply raised his whisk. One day his disciple hid the whisk to test how he would present the teaching. The teacher looked for it and could not find it, so he simply raised his empty hand.
“This innate moral knowing of mine is the whisk for presenting the teaching. Set it aside, and what is there left to raise?”
A little later another friend asked about the crucial point of practical work. The Master looked aside and said: “Where is my whisk?” At once everyone seated there sprang into joyful understanding.
281 · Sincerity Does Not Prize Foreknowledge
Someone asked about utmost sincerity and foreknowledge.
The Master said: “Sincerity is actual principle. It is simply the one innate moral knowing. The flowing of actual principle's wondrous functioning is spirit; the point where it begins to stir is the incipient. ‘Sincerity, spirit, and the incipient: this is called sagehood.’
“The sage does not prize foreknowledge. Even a sage cannot escape everything in the coming of calamity and good fortune. The sage simply knows the incipient and responds penetratingly to change.
“Innate moral knowing has no before and after. Simply know the incipient present now, and one matter understood settles a hundred. If there is a mind set on knowing beforehand, it is a private mind and contains the intention to pursue benefit and avoid harm. Master Shao's insistence on foreknowledge was ultimately a point where the mind concerned with benefit and harm was not yet exhausted.”
282 · No Knowing, Nothing Not Known
The Master said: “Having no knowing yet leaving nothing unknown: the original constitution is originally like this. For example, the sun never has an intention to illuminate things, yet naturally leaves no thing unilluminated. Without deliberate illumination yet leaving nothing unilluminated: this is originally the sun's constitution.
“Innate moral knowing originally has no knowing, yet now you insist that it have knowing. It originally leaves nothing unknown, yet now you doubt whether there is something it does not know. This is simply insufficient trust.”
283 · Clarity Already Belongs to Everyone
The Master said: “‘Only the sage under Heaven can be perceptive, clear, penetrating, and wise’: how mysterious and marvelous this used to seem! Now I see that it is originally something everyone possesses. The ears are originally perceptive; the eyes originally clear; the mind's thinking originally penetrating and wise. The sage is simply able to fulfill this as one, and the point of ability is precisely innate moral knowing.
“Ordinary people cannot fulfill it simply because they do not extend their knowing. How clear, simple, and easy it is!”
284 · Far-Reaching Consideration and Contrivance
Someone asked: “How do Confucius's far-reaching consideration and the Duke of Zhou's continuing through the night differ from anticipating and contriving?”
The Master said: “Far-reaching consideration does not mean drifting vaguely into thoughts. It simply means preserving this Heaven's principle. Heaven's principle in people's minds extends through antiquity and the present without beginning or end. Heaven's principle is innate moral knowing. A thousand thoughts and ten thousand deliberations seek only to extend innate moral knowing.
“The more precisely one reflects, the more refined and clear innate moral knowing becomes. If one does not reflect precisely, but casually responds as affairs arise, genuine knowing becomes coarse. If one merely clings to affairs and drifts vaguely in thought, calling it far-reaching consideration, there will inevitably be blame and praise, gain and loss, and human desires mixed within it. That is anticipating and contriving.
“The Duke of Zhou's thinking through the night was only the work of ‘being cautious where nothing is seen, apprehensive where nothing is heard.’ Once you see this, its bearing naturally differs from anticipating and contriving.”
285 · The World Returning to Benevolence
Someone asked: “‘Once one overcomes oneself and returns to ritual propriety, the world returns to benevolence.’ Master Zhu explains this as a result or sign of attainment. What do you think?”
The Master said: “Sages and worthies simply pursue learning for themselves. They value practical work, not results as signs. The benevolent person takes all things as one's body. Inability to be one body comes only from not forgetting private self-concern. Obtain the constitution of benevolence completely, and the whole world returns within my benevolence. This is the meaning of ‘the eight wildernesses are all within my gates.’ That the world also approves one's benevolence is contained within it.
“Likewise, ‘no resentment in the state, no resentment in the household’ means simply that one oneself does not resent, as in ‘not resenting Heaven and not blaming people.’ Yet the state and household having no resentment toward me is contained within it too. It is only not where the chief weight lies.”
286 · Skill and Strength Are Not Two Undertakings
Someone asked: “On Mencius's account of skill and strength, sagehood and wisdom, Master Zhu says: ‘The three masters had strength to spare but insufficient skill.’ What do you think?”
The Master said: “The three certainly had strength and also skill. Skill and strength are really not two undertakings. Skill lies precisely in the application of strength. Strength without skill would be only brute strength.
“Compare the three to archers: one can shoot on foot, one on horseback, and one at a distance. Their ability to send the arrow as far as needed can all be called strength; their hitting the mark can all be called skill. But the archer on foot cannot shoot on horseback, and the mounted archer cannot shoot at a distance. Each has a particular excellence. Here their capacities and strengths have different limits. Confucius excels in all three.
“Yet Confucius's harmony reaches its utmost only in what Liuxia Hui attains; his purity reaches its utmost only in what Boyi attains; his responsibility reaches its utmost only in what Yi Yin attains. When has he added the slightest thing beyond them? If one says ‘the three had strength to spare but insufficient skill,’ their strength would instead surpass Confucius's.
“Skill and strength simply elucidate the meaning of sagehood and wisdom. Recognize what the original constitution of sagehood and wisdom is, and it will become clear of itself.”
287 · Before and After Heaven
The Master said: “‘Preceding Heaven, yet Heaven does not oppose it’: Heaven is innate moral knowing. ‘Following Heaven, yet attending to Heaven's times’: innate moral knowing is Heaven.”
288 · The Great Compass and Square
“Innate moral knowing is simply the mind that distinguishes right and wrong. Right and wrong are simply liking and disliking. Liking and disliking alone exhaust right and wrong. Right and wrong alone exhaust the myriad affairs and changes.”
He also said: “The two words right and wrong are a great compass and square. Skill in their use rests with the person.”
289 · The Remaining Point of Light
“The sage's knowing is like the sun in a clear blue sky; the worthy's like the sun in a sky of floating clouds; the fool's like the sun in a dark, overcast sky. Although they differ in darkness and brightness, their ability to distinguish black and white is one.
“Even in the dark night, one can dimly distinguish black and white. This is where the sun's remaining light has not been exhausted. The work of learning through difficulty also simply begins with precise examination from this point of brightness.”
290 · Natural Feelings and Attachment
Someone asked: “Knowing is compared to the sun and desires to clouds. Although clouds can obscure the sun, they too are the one qi of Heaven and ought to exist. Are desires not likewise part of the human mind and things that ought to exist?”
The Master said: “Joy, anger, sorrow, fear, love, aversion, and desire are called the seven feelings. All seven ought to be present in the human mind. One must simply recognize innate moral knowing clearly.
“For example, sunlight cannot be fixed to a direction or location. Wherever a crack admits light, sunlight is present. Even if clouds and mist fill every side, colors and forms remain distinguishable in the great vacancy: this is also where sunlight has not been extinguished. One cannot, because clouds obscure the sun, tell Heaven not to generate clouds.
“When the seven feelings follow their natural flowing, they are all functions of innate moral knowing, and cannot be divided into good and evil. There must simply be no attachment. If there is attachment in any of the seven feelings, all are called desires and all obscure innate moral knowing. Yet as soon as attachment arises, innate moral knowing can itself become aware. With awareness the obscuration goes and its constitution is restored. Only when one can examine and penetrate this point is the practical work simple, easy, and thorough.”
291 · The Sage Does Not Refuse Difficult Effort
Someone asked: “The sage's knowing from birth and acting at ease are spontaneous. How can there be practical work?”
The Master said: “The two words knowing and acting are themselves practical work. There are only differences of depth and shallowness, difficulty and ease. Innate moral knowing is originally refined and clear. For example, in wishing to serve parents filially, someone who knows from birth and acts at ease simply follows this innate moral knowing and truly fulfills filial devotion. Someone who knows through learning and acts with a ready sense of its benefit simply examines and awakens constantly, striving to follow this innate moral knowing in fulfilling filial devotion.
“As for someone who knows through difficulty and acts through effort, the obscuration and confinement are deep. Although wishing to follow this innate moral knowing in filial devotion, one is blocked by private desires and cannot do it. One must add the work of doing a hundred times what others do once, and a thousand times what others do ten times, before one can follow this genuine knowing to fulfill filial devotion.
“Although the sage knows from birth and acts at ease, the sage's mind does not dare take itself as right and is willing to do the work of knowing through difficulty and acting through effort. Yet those who know through difficulty and act through effort want to calculate how to perform the affairs of knowing from birth and acting at ease. How could they succeed?”
292 · Joy within Grief
Someone asked: “Joy is the original constitution of the mind. I do not know whether, on meeting a great calamity and grieving and weeping, this joy is still present.”
The Master said: “One must have a full cry before there is joy. Without crying there would be no joy. Even while crying, the place where this mind is at ease is joy. The original constitution has never moved.”
293 · One Bamboo Garden without Identical Branches
Someone asked: “Innate moral knowing is only one. King Wen composed the Judgments, the Duke of Zhou attached the line statements, and Confucius expounded the Changes. Why did each see principle differently?”
The Master said: “How could sages be confined to a dead pattern? What matters is that they issue from the same innate moral knowing. What harm is there if each gives an explanation?
“Take a garden of bamboo. So long as they share this form of branches and joints, that is the great sameness. If you insist that every branch and joint be identical in height and size, it is no longer the marvelous handiwork of creation and transformation. Simply go and nourish innate moral knowing. If innate moral knowing is shared, differences do no harm. If you refuse to apply effort, you have not even put forth a bamboo shoot. Where will you find branches and joints to discuss?”
294 · Shun and Gusou: A Father and Son Reconciled
Among the local people, a father and son were in litigation and came to appeal to the Master. An attendant wished to stop them, but the Master heard them. Before the words were finished, father and son embraced, wept bitterly, and left.
Chai Mingzhi asked: “What did you say to make them feel remorse so quickly?”
The Master said: “I said that Shun was the world's most unfilial son, and Gusou the world's most affectionate father.” Mingzhi was astonished and asked for explanation.
The Master said: “Shun constantly took himself to be greatly unfilial, and therefore could be filial. Gusou constantly took himself to be greatly affectionate, and therefore could not be affectionate. Gusou remembered only: ‘I raised Shun from infancy. Why has he never brought me delight?’ He did not know that his own mind had already been moved by his later wife. Still thinking himself affectionate, he became less and less able to be affectionate.
“Shun thought only of how his father loved him when raising him in infancy: ‘If he does not love me today, it is only because I cannot fulfill filial devotion.’ Daily he considered where he failed to fulfill filial devotion, and therefore became more and more filial. When Gusou finally reached delight, this was simply recovering this mind's originally affectionate constitution. Thus later generations call Shun a son of great filial devotion through past and present, and Gusou too was completed as an affectionate father.”
Reading note: The current paragraph varies 治 and 冶 in the questioner's name. The English follows the opening form Mingzhi.
295 · Confucius and the Rustic Questioner
The Master said: “When a rustic came to question Confucius, he never first had stored knowledge with which to answer. His mind was simply empty. He only questioned the two ends of right and wrong that the man himself knew and distinguished them decisively with him. The rustic's mind was then clear.
“The right and wrong the rustic himself knew were his original Heavenly standard. Even with the sage's perceptiveness and clarity, how could the slightest thing be added or subtracted? The man only could not trust himself. Once the Master distinguished the matter decisively with him, it was exhausted without remainder.
“If, while speaking to the rustic, the Master had kept the slightest stored knowledge of his own, he could not have fully exhausted the man's innate moral knowing. The constitution of the Way would then have become two.”
296 · Shun’s Work Was in Himself
The Master said: “‘Steadily advancing in order, not arriving at wickedness’: the received annotation says that Xiang had advanced in rightness and did not reach great wickedness. Yet after Shun was summoned into service, Xiang still made killing Shun his daily business. What wickedness could be greater?
“Shun simply advanced himself in order, letting that order work through a gradual warming influence, without going to correct Xiang's wickedness. Dressing up errors and concealing hidden faults are the usual ways of an evil person. If one insists on pointing out that person's rights and wrongs, one instead provokes the evil disposition.
“That Shun at first brought Xiang to the point of wanting to kill him also came from being too urgent in wanting Xiang to be good. Here lay Shun's fault. After going through this, he came to know that practical work lay only in himself, without blaming others. Thus he achieved harmony. This was where Shun's mind was stirred and nature made enduring, increasing what he could not yet do.
“The ancients' words all came from their own experience, and therefore spoke so closely to the matter. Passed down to later ages, they fit human feelings in every detail. Without going through it oneself, how could one understand all their painstaking concern?”
297 · Ancient Music and the Original Tone
The Master said: “Ancient music has not been made for a long time. Today's theatrical performances still come close to its intention.”
Not understanding, someone asked for explanation. The Master said: “The nine completions of the Shao were one theatrical performance of Shun; the nine changes of the Wu were one theatrical performance of King Wu. All the actual affairs of the sages' lives were spread through music. Thus a person of virtue, on hearing it, knew where it was perfectly good and perfectly beautiful, or perfectly beautiful but not perfectly good.
“Later generations made music merely by composing some words and tunes, wholly disconnected from popular custom and moral transformation. How could that transform people and improve custom? If we now wish to return popular custom to simplicity and sincerity, take today's theatrical performances, remove all the seductive and licentious words and tunes, and retain only stories of loyal ministers and filial children. Make them easy for all the unlearned common people to understand. Without deliberate intention, their innate moral knowing will be moved and awakened. That would benefit moral transformation. Afterward ancient music could gradually be restored.”
Dehong said: “I have sought the original tone and cannot obtain it. I fear ancient music too will be difficult to restore.”
The Master said: “Where do you say the original tone should be sought?”
He replied: “The ancients made pitch pipes to observe qi. I fear this may be the method of seeking the original tone.”
The Master said: “To seek the original tone among reed ashes and millet grains is like fishing for the moon at the bottom of water. How could it be obtained? The original tone must simply be sought in your mind.”
“How is it sought in the mind?”
“When the ancients governed, they first nourished people's minds into peace and harmony, and then made music. For example, if you sing poems here with mind and qi peaceful and harmonious, listeners will naturally be delighted and stirred. This alone is the beginning of the original tone.
“The Documents says, ‘Poetry expresses resolve’: resolve is the root of music. ‘Song prolongs words’: singing is the root of making music. ‘Sound follows prolongation; pitch standards harmonize sound’: pitch standards need only harmonize sound, and harmonizing sound is the root of establishing pitch standards. When was this ever sought outside?”
“What was the intention of the ancients' method of observing qi?”
“The ancients possessed the constitution of center and harmony in making music. My center and harmony originally respond to the qi of Heaven and Earth. Observing the qi of Heaven and Earth and harmonizing with the phoenix's sound merely test whether my qi is truly harmonious. This is something done after pitch standards are established. One does not have to await it before establishing them.
“Now, to observe the pipes with ashes, one must first fix the solstice day. Yet even the zi hour on the solstice day may not be exact. From where would you then obtain exactness?”
Reading note: Both groups of nine in the Shao/Wu comparison follow the current source. They are not silently harmonized with other traditional counts.
298 · Personal Resolution Outlasts Repeated Prompting
The Master said: “Learning also needs someone to point things out and transform one's understanding. Yet this is not equal to resolving and transforming it oneself. Then one understanding settles a hundred matters. Otherwise, even much prompting and transformation will not accomplish it.”
299 · Nourish the Root, Not an Imitated Grandeur
“Confucius's breadth of spirit was immense. There was no business of emperors and kings he did not understand in detail. Yet this too came only from the mind.
“It is like a great tree with so many branches and leaves: only the root has received the work of cultivation and nourishment, and naturally it can be like this. It is not that applying effort to branches and leaves produces the root. Students who learn from Confucius without applying effort in the mind, urgently trying instead to learn that breadth of spirit, have turned the work upside down.”
300 · Patching the Steaming Pot
“When people have faults, they mostly apply effort directly to the faults. This is patching the steaming pot. Its drift must end in dressing up faults.”
301 · The Habitually Busy Mind
“Nowadays, even while eating, when no second affair stands before them, people's minds are constantly caught in restless service. This is only because this mind is accustomed to being busy, and therefore cannot be gathered and held.”
302 · Instruments and Books Give the Mind a Place
“Students cannot be without the qin, the se, and books. Having an occupation in which to dwell, the mind does not let itself go.”
303 · Loving Loftiness and Failing to Forget Oneself
The Master sighed: “Among those in the world who know learning, it is only these failings that cannot be broken through. This is not being good at sharing with others.”
Chongyi said: “This disease is simply loving loftiness and being unable to forget oneself.”
304 · Knowing Excess and Insufficiency
Someone asked: “Innate moral knowing is originally center and harmony. Why, then, is there excess and insufficiency?”
The Master said: “Knowing the point of excess and insufficiency is itself center and harmony.”
305 · The Dislike Known and the Restraint Practiced
“‘What you dislike in those above you’ is innate moral knowing. ‘Do not use it in employing those below you’ is extending knowledge.”
306 · The Capacity Misused by Su Qin and Zhang Yi
The Master said: “Su Qin and Zhang Yi's intelligence was also material for sagehood. In later generations' achievements and writings, many outstanding people and famous masters have merely learned Yi and Qin's old cleverness.
“Yi and Qin's learning was skillful at measuring human feelings. Not one point failed to strike a person's crucial joint, and therefore their persuasions could not be exhausted. They too had glimpsed the wondrous functioning of innate moral knowing. They simply used it for what was not good.”
307 · The Bell before and after It Is Struck
Someone asked about what is not yet aroused and what is already aroused.
The Master said: “It is only because later scholars separated them in their explanations that I have to begin by saying there is no unaroused and aroused, so people may think it through themselves. If I say there is an aroused and an unaroused, listeners will fall into the later scholars' understanding as before.
“If one truly sees that there is no unaroused and aroused, then saying there is an unaroused and an aroused naturally does no harm. There originally are an unaroused and an aroused.”
The questioner said: “The unaroused is never without harmony; the aroused is never without the center. Compare the sound of a bell: before it is struck, one cannot say it does not exist; once it is struck, one cannot say it exists. In the end there is a striking and a not-striking. What do you think?”
The Master said: “Before being struck, it originally shakes Heaven and Earth. Once struck, it is only Heaven's stillness and Earth's silence.”
308 · Accounts of Nature from Different Points
Someone asked: “The ancients' discussions of nature differ. Which should be the settled account?”
The Master said: “Nature has no fixed form, and its discussion has no fixed form. Some speak from the original constitution, some from issuing into function, some from the source, and some from the abuses into which it flows. Taken together, it is only the one nature. People's understanding simply has depth or shallowness. Fix upon one side, and it is no longer right.
“The original constitution of nature originally has neither good nor evil. In issuing into function, it originally can become good or not good. In the abuses into which it flows, it originally becomes fixed as good or evil.
“Compare the eyes: there are eyes in joy and eyes in anger. Looking straight gives the eyes of looking; looking narrowly gives the eyes of peering. Taken together, they are only these eyes. See angry eyes and say there have never been joyful eyes, or see looking eyes and say there have never been peering eyes: these are all fixing upon one side, and one knows they are wrong.
“Mencius discusses nature directly from the source, and also speaks only of its broad outline in this way. Xunzi's account of nature as evil speaks from the abuses into which it flows. One cannot entirely say he is wrong; his understanding is simply not yet refined. Ordinary people have lost the original constitution of the mind.”
The questioner said: “Mencius speaks of nature from the source and wants people to apply effort to making that source thoroughly clear. Xunzi speaks from its resulting abuses, so practical work merely rescues and corrects the downstream end, and becomes laborious.”
The Master said: “Yes.”
309 · Do Not Attach Intention to Subtlety
The Master said: “The more refined practical work becomes, the less one can attach words to it, and the harder it becomes to explain principle. If one fixes intention upon refinement and subtlety, the whole practical work instead becomes obscured and stuck.”
310 · Yang Cihu’s Insight and Attachment
“Yang Cihu was not without insight. Yet he again became attached to seeing it in what has no sound or scent.”
311 · The Ages of the World within One Day
“Within a single day, people pass through the whole world of past and present. They simply do not see it.
“When the night qi is clear, without seeing or hearing, thinking or acting, one's feelings calm and even, this is the world of Emperor Xi. At dawn, when spirit is clear and qi bright, harmonious and reverent, this is the world of Yao and Shun. Before midday, as ritual forms meet and the bearing is orderly, this is the world of the Three Dynasties. After midday, spirit and qi gradually darken, and comings and goings become mixed and disturbing: this is the world of the Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods. Gradually night darkens, all things sleep and rest, and the scene is silent and empty: this is the world in which people disappear and things come to an end.
“Students who truly trust innate moral knowing and are not disordered by qi can constantly be people of the age before Emperor Xi.”
312 · Leaving the Village Worthy’s Concealment Behind
Xue Shangqian, Zou Qianzhi, Ma Zicui, and Wang Ruzhi were sitting in attendance. They remarked with regret that since the Master's campaign against the Prince of Ning, the world's slander and criticism had increased, and each was asked to give the reason.
One said that the Master's achievements, influence, and position grew daily, so the world's envy increased daily. Another said that the Master's learning became clearer daily, so disputes on behalf of the Song scholars also spread daily. Another said that since the Southern Capital, those sharing the purpose and trusting and following him had increased daily, while opposition from every direction grew more forceful.
The Master said: “What you say is certainly all present. But the one point I know in myself is something none of you has yet mentioned.” The friends asked about it.
The Master said: “Before my time in the Southern Capital, there was still a little of the village worthy in me. Now I trust that the true right and true wrong of this innate moral knowing are genuine, and proceed freely according to it, without adding any covering or concealment. Only now have I achieved the disposition of the boldly unconventional. Let the whole world say my conduct does not measure up to my words.”
Shangqian stepped forward and said: “Only when one can trust this is there the true living line of the sage.”
313 · One Question, Different Answers
In the Master's refining of people, a single statement could move them most deeply. One day Wang Ruzhi returned from an outing. The Master asked: “What did you see?”
He replied: “I saw that everyone throughout the streets was a sage.”
The Master said: “You see everyone throughout the streets as sages; everyone throughout the streets in turn sees you as a sage.”
On another day Dong Luoshi returned from an outing and said: “Today I saw something strange.”
The Master said: “What was strange?”
He replied: “I saw that everyone throughout the streets was a sage.”
The Master said: “This too is an ordinary matter. Why regard it as strange?”
Ruzhi's sharp corners had not yet been dissolved, whereas Luoshi had glimpsed an awakening. Thus the question was the same and the answers differed. In both cases the Master turned their own words back to advance them.
Dehong, Huang Zhengzhi, Zhang Shuqian, and Ruzhong returned from the metropolitan examination in the bingxu year and told the Master about discussing learning along the road, where some believed and some did not.
The Master said: “You carried a sage along to discuss learning with people. Seeing a sage arrive, people were all frightened away. How could your discussions succeed? Only when you can be ordinary, unlearned men and women can you discuss learning with others.”
Dehong also said: “Today it is very easy to see the higher and lower grades of people.”
The Master said: “How do you see that?”
He replied: “You are like Mount Tai standing before them. Anyone who does not know to look up must have no eyes.”
The Master said: “Mount Tai is not as great as the level ground. What is there to see in level ground?”
With one statement the Master cut away and broke open their year-long disease of pursuing externals and loving loftiness. Everyone seated there was apprehensive.
314 · Parting from Zou Qianzhi
In the spring of the gui year, Zou Qianzhi came to Yue to ask about learning. After he had stayed several days, the Master saw him off at Fufeng. That evening the Master and Xiyuan and other friends moved their boat and stayed at Yanshou Temple. Sitting at night by candlelight, the Master remained deeply saddened. He said: “River waves and misty willows—suddenly our old friend is a hundred li away!”
A friend asked: “Why do you think so deeply of Qianzhi?”
The Master said: “Zengzi spoke of ‘having ability yet asking those without it; having much yet asking those with little; having as if not having, being full as if empty; being offended yet not contesting it.’ Someone like Qianzhi comes very close to this.”
Reading note: The source dates this spring 癸末; gui is retained without assigning a modern year or silently replacing the second character. The difficult 宜若虚 is read through the quotation's parallel of fullness and emptiness.
315 · The Four Statements at Tianquan Bridge
In the ninth month of the dinghai year, the Master was recalled to service for the campaign in Si and Tian. As he was about to set out on his commission, Dehong and Ruzhong discussed learning.
Ruzhong cited the Master's teaching:
The constitution of the mind has neither good nor evil.
The movement of intention has good and evil.
Knowing good and knowing evil is innate moral knowing.
Doing good and removing evil is investigating things.
Dehong said: “What does this mean?”
Ruzhong said: “I fear this is not the final expression. If we say the mind's constitution has neither good nor evil, then intention too is intention without good or evil; knowing too is knowing without good or evil; things too are things without good or evil. If we say intention has good and evil, then ultimately the mind's constitution still contains good and evil.”
Dehong said: “The mind's constitution is the nature decreed by Heaven, originally without good or evil. But people have habitual dispositions of mind, and good and evil appear in intentions and thoughts. Investigating, extending, making sincere, rectifying, and cultivating are precisely the work of restoring that constitution of nature. If there originally were no good and evil, there would be no need even to speak of practical work.”
That evening they sat attending the Master at Tianquan Bridge and each presented their view for correction. The Master said:
“I am now about to leave and precisely wanted you to discuss this meaning and break it open. Your two views can well support one another in use. Neither should hold to one side.
“There are originally these two kinds in my receiving of students. People of keen endowment enter through awakening directly at the root and source. The original constitution of the human mind is clear, bright, and unobstructed: it is originally the center before feelings are aroused. For a person of keen endowment, awakening to the original constitution is itself practical work. Self and other, inner and outer, are penetrated together.
“The next group cannot avoid habitual dispositions of mind, and the original constitution is obscured. Thus for the present I teach them solidly to do good and remove evil in intentions and thoughts. When their practical work becomes thoroughly practiced and the dregs have all been removed, the original constitution becomes wholly clear too.
“Ruzhong's view is how I receive people of keen endowment. Dehong's view is how I establish a method for the next group. If you take from one another and put the two to use, people both above and below the middle level can all be led into the Way. If each clings to one side, you will lose people directly before you, and each will leave something unfulfilled in the constitution of the Way.”
Afterward he said:
“When discussing learning with friends in the future, you must never lose my guiding purpose.
The constitution of the mind has neither good nor evil.
The movement of intention has good and evil.
Knowing good and knowing evil is innate moral knowing.
Doing good and removing evil is investigating things.
“Simply follow these words of mine in pointing things out according to each person, and naturally there will be no disease. This is originally practical work that penetrates highest and lowest. People of keen endowment are difficult to encounter in the world. To penetrate the original constitution and practical work completely in one awakening is something Master Yan and Mingdao did not dare claim. How could one lightly expect it of others?
“People have habitual dispositions of mind. If you do not teach them actually to apply the work of doing good and removing evil through innate moral knowing, but merely imagine an original constitution suspended in empty space, all affairs and actions will lack solid reality. It will only nurture an empty silence. This disease is no small matter and must be exposed early.”
That day Dehong and Ruzhong both had an awakening.
316 · The Gathering of Students in Yue
When the Master first returned to Yue, the presence of friends was still sparse. Later, people coming to study from every direction increased daily. After the gui year, those living around him occupied house after neighboring house. In monasteries such as Tianfei and Guangxiang, dozens regularly ate together in a single room. At night there was no space to lie down, and they took turns on the mats. Singing carried through from dusk to dawn.
In the near and distant monasteries of Nanzhen, Yu's Cave, Yangming Cave, and the other mountains, wherever their feet reached, there were places where companions in purpose stayed. Whenever the Master took the teaching seat, listeners sat around him in front, behind, left, and right, often numbering at least several hundred. Sending people off and welcoming arrivals left no empty day in the month. Some stayed in attendance through a change of year, yet he could not remember all their names.
At parting the Master often sighed: “Although you leave, you do not go outside Heaven and Earth. If we share this resolve, I too can forget outward form and resemblance.” Whenever students came out after hearing a discussion, they never failed to leap about and declare their delight.
I once heard senior fellow students say: “Before the Southern Capital, although many friends studied with him, there had never been such abundance as in Yue. This certainly came from teaching over a long time and trust gradually spreading. Yet fundamentally the Master's learning also advanced daily. The workings of his power to move and attract people—‘extending change without force,’ in the source's difficult wording—were themselves different.”
Reading note: The source again writes the year 癸末; no modern year is supplied. The closing 申变无力 is uncertain. Its provisional literal rendering is identified rather than silently replaced with a different phrase.
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