Book 6A · Gaozi, Part One

11.1 Gaozi said, “Human nature is like willow wood; rightness is like a cup or bowl. To make humaneness and rightness out of human nature is like making cups and bowls out of willow.”Mencius said, “Can you make cups and bowls by following the willow's natural growth? Or must you cut and injure the willow to make them? If you must injure the willow to make cups and bowls, will you also injure people to make them humane and righteous? Your words will surely lead the world to bring harm upon humaneness and rightness.”

11.2 Gaozi said, “Human nature is like rushing water. Open a channel east, and it flows east; open one west, and it flows west. Human nature is no more divided between good and bad than water is divided between east and west.”Mencius said, “Water may indeed be indifferent to east and west, but is it indifferent to up and down? The goodness of human nature is like water's flow downward. No person lacks goodness, just as no water fails to flow down. Strike water and send it splashing, and it may leap above your forehead; force it through a channel and it may reach a mountaintop. Is that its nature? It happens because of the force applied. When people can be made to do wrong, their nature is likewise forced.”

11.3 Gaozi said, “What is inborn is called nature.”Mencius asked, “Do you mean that ‘inborn’ means ‘nature’ in the same way that ‘white’ means ‘white’?”“Yes.”“Is the whiteness of a white feather the same as that of white snow, and that of white snow the same as that of white jade?”“Yes.”“Then is a dog's nature the same as an ox's, and an ox's the same as a human being's?”

11.4 Gaozi said, “Food and sexual desire belong to nature. Humaneness is within us, not outside; rightness is outside, not within.”Mencius asked, “Why do you say humaneness is within and rightness outside?”“An elder is old, and I treat him as an elder. His age does not reside in me. So if someone is white, I treat him as white, following his whiteness outside me. Thus I call it external.”“That is different. The whiteness of a white horse does not differ from the whiteness of a white person. But is honoring an old horse the same as honoring an old person? Moreover, is rightness found in the elder, or in the one who honors him?”“I love my younger brother but not the younger brother of a man from Qin: love is guided by what pleases me, so I call it internal. I honor an elder of Chu just as I honor one of my own family: honor follows their age, so I call it external.”“Enjoying roast meat from Qin is no different from enjoying our own roast meat. Some things do work that way. Is our enjoyment of roasted meat external too?”

11.5 Meng Jizi asked Gongduzi, “Why do you call rightness internal?”“Because the respect I practice is mine.”“If a villager is a year older than your eldest brother, whom do you respect?”“My brother.”“Whom would you serve wine first?”“The villager.”“Your respect is here, but you treat the elder as there. Surely rightness comes from outside, not within.”Gongduzi could not answer and told Mencius.Mencius said, “Ask him, ‘Whom do you respect more, your uncle or your younger brother?’ He will say, ‘My uncle.’ Ask, ‘If your brother acts as the ritual representative of an ancestor, whom do you respect?’ He will say, ‘My brother.’ Ask, ‘Where has your respect for your uncle gone?’ He will answer, ‘My brother holds the appointed place.’ You can say the same: your ordinary respect is for your brother; your momentary respect is for the villager because he occupies the fitting place.”Hearing this, Meng Jizi said, “At one moment you respect the uncle, at another the younger brother. Surely it is external, not internal.”Gongduzi replied, “In winter you drink warm water, in summer cold water. Does that make drinking external too?”

11.6 Gongduzi said, “Gaozi says, ‘Nature is neither good nor bad.’ Others say it can become either good or bad: thus when King Wen and King Wu arose, people loved goodness, but when the Dark and Cruel Kings arose, people loved violence. Others say some natures are good, others bad: Yao ruled yet Xiang existed, Gu Sou was father to Shun, and Zhou was cousin and ruler to Weizi Qi and Prince Bigan. You say nature is good. Are all these others wrong?”Mencius said, “As for its natural tendencies, human nature can be good: this is what I mean by calling it good. When people do wrong, the fault is not in their natural capacities. Everyone has a heart of compassion, a heart of shame and aversion, a heart of respect and reverence, and a heart that knows right from wrong. Compassion is humaneness; shame and aversion are rightness; respect and reverence are ritual propriety; knowing right from wrong is wisdom. Humaneness, rightness, ritual propriety, and wisdom are not cast into us from outside: we already possess them, but do not reflect on them. Thus it is said, ‘Seek and you will find them; abandon them and you will lose them.’ Some surpass others twofold, fivefold, or beyond all reckoning because the others do not fulfill their capacities. The Odes say, ‘Heaven brought forth the teeming people; every thing has its rule. The people hold to their enduring nature and love this splendid virtue.’ Confucius said, ‘The author of this ode understood the Way! Every thing has its rule, and people hold to what is enduring in them; that is why they love splendid virtue.’”

11.7 Mencius said, “In years of plenty young people are usually dependable; in famine years they are often violent. It is not that Heaven endowed them with different capacities, but that circumstances have submerged their hearts. Sow and tend barley in the same soil at the same time, and it grows vigorously, ripening around the summer solstice. If crops differ, it is because the soil varies in richness, rain and dew nourish them differently, or people tend them unequally. Things of the same kind resemble one another. Why doubt this only of human beings? Sages are of the same kind as we are. Longzi said, ‘Even if I do not know a person's feet when I make shoes, I know I am not making baskets.’ Shoes resemble one another because feet throughout the world resemble one another. Human mouths share their tastes: Yi Ya discovered before I did what pleases my mouth. If people's tastes differed by nature, as a dog's or horse's nature differs from mine, why would everyone regard Yi Ya as the standard of taste? Their agreement with Yi Ya shows their mouths are alike. So too with hearing: everyone regards Shi Kuang as the standard of music, showing their ears are alike. So too with sight: all recognize Zidu's beauty; those who cannot see it have no eyes. Thus mouths share a liking for flavors, ears for sounds, and eyes for beauty. Does the heart alone have nothing on which all agree? What do hearts agree upon? Principle and rightness. The sage discovered first what my own heart approves. Principle and rightness delight my heart as meat from grain-fed animals delights my mouth.”

11.8 Mencius said, “The trees on Ox Mountain were once lovely. But the mountain stood near a great city, and axes cut its trees. How could they remain lovely? New shoots grew each night and day, nourished by rain and dew, but cattle and sheep grazed them, leaving the mountain bare. People see it bare and suppose it never had timber. Is that truly the mountain's nature? And is there not a heart of humaneness and rightness within human beings? The way people let go of their good heart is like axes cutting down the trees. If it is cut down each morning, how can it remain lovely? In the renewal of the night and the freshness of dawn, people's loves and aversions come close to others'—but by day their actions fetter and destroy that growth. When this happens again and again, the qi of the night can no longer sustain the heart. Without that qi, a person is not far from a beast. Observers see a beastlike person and think that person never possessed good capacities. Is that truly human nature? Nourish a thing and it will grow; deprive it of nourishment and it will wither. Confucius said, ‘Grasp it and it stays; let it go and it vanishes. It comes and goes without fixed time; no one knows its home.’ Was he not speaking of the heart?”

11.9 Mencius said, “It is no wonder the king is unwise. Take even the easiest plant in the world to grow: expose it to the sun for a day and to frost for ten, and it cannot grow. I see the king rarely; as soon as I withdraw, those who chill him arrive. What can I do with whatever shoots may have grown? Consider the game of go. It is a minor art, but no one masters it without unwavering attention. Yi Qiu is the finest go player in the state. Suppose he teaches two people: one attends to him with a single mind; the other listens, but imagines a swan approaching and thinks of taking up a bow with a corded arrow to shoot it. Though they learn together, the second does not match the first. Is he less intelligent? No.”

11.10 Mencius said, “I desire fish, and I also desire bear's paw. If I cannot have both, I give up the fish and take the bear's paw. I desire life, and I also desire rightness. If I cannot have both, I give up life and choose rightness. Life is something I desire, but there is something I desire more; that is why I will not preserve it by any means whatsoever. Death is something I hate, but there is something I hate more; that is why I will not escape every danger. If people desired nothing more than life, why would they not use every means that could preserve it? If they hated nothing more than death, why would they not do everything to escape danger? Yet there are ways to live that they refuse, and ways to escape peril that they reject. Thus there is something they desire more than life and something they hate more than death. It is not only the worthy who have this heart: all people have it, but the worthy do not lose it.“A basket of rice and a bowl of soup may mean life to one who receives them and death to one who does not. Offer them with a shout of contempt, and even a traveler on the road refuses; kick them toward a beggar, and even he disdains them. Yet people accept a stipend of ten thousand measures without asking whether it accords with ritual propriety or rightness. What does such a stipend add to me? The beauty of a mansion, provision for wives and concubines, or gratitude from the destitute people I know? Once I would have died rather than accept it; now I accept it for a beautiful mansion. Once I would have died rather than accept it; now I accept it to provide for wives and concubines. Once I would have died rather than accept it; now I accept it to win the gratitude of the destitute I know. Can I not stop? This is called losing one's original heart.”

11.11 Mencius said, “Humaneness is the human heart; rightness is the human road. To abandon the road and not walk it, to let your heart go and not know how to seek it—how sad! If a person's chicken or dog gets loose, he knows to search for it, but if his heart goes astray, he does not. There is no other way to pursue learning than to seek the heart that has gone astray.”

11.12 Mencius said, “Suppose someone's fourth finger is crooked and cannot straighten, though it causes no pain or inconvenience. If someone could straighten it, its owner would think nothing of traveling as far as Qin or Chu, because that finger differs from other people's. He knows to hate a difference in his finger but not a deficiency in his heart. This is failing to distinguish what matters.”

11.13 Mencius said, “If people wish to grow a paulownia or catalpa as thick as their arms, they know how to tend it. Yet when it comes to themselves, they do not know how to tend themselves. Can they love themselves less than those trees? They simply do not reflect.”

11.14 Mencius said, “People cherish every part of their body and, cherishing every part, nourish every part. Not an inch of skin is unloved, so not an inch is left unnourished. To judge whether a person nourishes well or badly, look within that person: there is no other measure. Among the body's parts some are noble, others base; some great, others small. Do not let the small harm the great, or the base harm the noble. One who nourishes the small becomes a petty person; one who nourishes the great becomes a great person. A gardener who abandons his paulownias and catalpas to tend wild jujubes and thorns is a poor gardener. One who tends a single finger but loses shoulder and back without realizing it is a confused man. People despise one wholly devoted to eating and drinking because he nourishes what is small at the expense of the great. But if he lost nothing through it, could the appetites of mouth and belly be regarded as mere inches of skin?”

11.15 Gongduzi asked, “All are equally human, yet some become great people and others petty people. Why?”Mencius said, “Those who follow their greater part become great; those who follow their lesser part become petty.”“Why, if all are equally human, do some follow the greater part and others the lesser?”“The faculties of ears and eyes do not think; things obscure them. When things come into contact with these faculties, they simply draw them along. The heart's faculty is to think; by thinking it gains understanding, and without thinking it does not. Heaven gave this to us. Establish first what is great in yourself, and the lesser part cannot take it away. That alone is how one becomes great.”

11.16 Mencius said, “There are honors bestowed by Heaven and honors bestowed by people. Humaneness, rightness, loyalty, trustworthiness, and delighting in goodness without weariness are Heaven's honors. Dukedoms, ministries, and other high offices are human honors. The ancients cultivated Heaven's honors, and human honors followed. People today cultivate Heaven's honors to seek human honors; once they obtain those, they abandon Heaven's. That is utter confusion. In the end they will surely lose everything.”

11.17 Mencius said, “The desire for honor is common to us all. Everyone possesses something honorable within, but does not reflect on it. What other people honor is not true honor: what Zhao Meng can make honorable he can make contemptible. The Odes say, ‘Drunk with wine and filled with virtue.’ To be filled with humaneness and rightness is to cease desiring another man's rich food; to bear a good name and far-reaching reputation is to cease desiring another man's embroidered robes.”

11.18 Mencius said, “Humaneness overcomes inhumanity as water overcomes fire. Yet people who practice humaneness today are like someone trying to extinguish a cartload of burning wood with a cup of water. When the fire is not put out, they say water cannot overcome fire. They thus give greater support to inhumanity, and in the end they will surely perish.”

11.19 Mencius said, “The five grains are the finest of seeds. But if they fail to ripen, they are not as good as barnyard grass. So too with humaneness: what matters is bringing it to maturity.”

11.20 Mencius said, “When Yi taught archery, he always required students to aim with the bow fully drawn; the students too had to aim for that. When a master craftsman taught others, he always used compass and square; his students too had to use them.”

11.1 Gaozi said, “Human nature is like willow wood; rightness is like a cup or bowl. Making kindness and rightness from human nature is like making cups and bowls from willow wood.”Mencius said, “Can you follow the willow's nature when making a cup or bowl from it? Or must you cut and damage the wood first? If you must damage willow wood to make cups and bowls, will you also damage human beings to make kindness and rightness? Your words will surely lead people everywhere to bring harm on kindness and rightness.”

11.2 Gaozi said, “Human nature is like rushing water. Open a channel to the east and it flows east; open one to the west and it flows west. Human nature has no preference for goodness or badness, just as water has no preference for east or west.”Mencius said, “Water has no preference for east or west. But does it have no preference for up or down? Human nature tends toward goodness as water flows downward. No human being lacks this tendency toward goodness, and no water fails to flow downward. Strike water and make it splash, and it can rise over your head. Force it along in a channel, and it can flow up a mountain. Is that water's nature? The force makes it happen. The conditions that lead people to do bad things work the same way on their nature.”

11.3 Gaozi said, “What is born is what we call nature.”Mencius asked, “Do you mean it just as we call white what is white?”“Yes.”“Is the whiteness of a white feather the same as the whiteness of white snow, and that of white snow the same as the whiteness of white jade?”“Yes.”“Then is the nature of a dog the same as that of an ox, and an ox's nature the same as a human's?”

11.4 Gaozi said, “Food and sexual desire belong to human nature. Kindness comes from within, not from outside; rightness comes from outside, not from within.”Mencius asked, “Why do you say that kindness is internal and rightness external?”Gaozi said, “When someone is older than I am, I treat him as an elder. His age does not come from me. It is like calling him white because he is white: I respond to what is outside me. So I call it external.”“That is not the same,” Mencius said. “The whiteness of a white horse is no different from that of a white person. But is honoring an old horse no different from honoring an old person? And is rightness found in the elder, or in the act of honoring him?”Gaozi said, “I love my own younger brother but not the younger brother of a man from Qin. That is because loving him pleases me, so I call kindness internal. But I respect an elder from Chu just as I respect an elder of my own family. I respond to his age, so I call rightness external.”Mencius said, “If I enjoy roasted meat prepared by a man from Qin, it is no different from enjoying roasted meat of my own. Other things too can work like that. Does that mean enjoying roasted meat is external?”

11.5 Meng Jizi asked Gongduzi, “Why do you say rightness comes from within?”“I act on my own respect, so I call it internal.”“If a villager is one year older than your oldest brother, which one do you respect?”“My brother.”“Which one would you serve a drink to first?”“The villager.”“You respect one man but give priority to the other. Surely respect is external, not internal.”Gongduzi could not answer, and he told Mencius. Mencius said, “Ask him, ‘Do you honor your uncle or your younger brother?’ He will say, ‘My uncle.’ Then ask, ‘If your younger brother represents an ancestor in a ceremony, whom do you honor?’ He will say, ‘My younger brother.’ Ask, ‘What happened to honoring your uncle?’ He will say, ‘My brother holds the ceremonial position.’ Then you say, ‘That is why I give the villager priority: my regular respect goes to my brother, but for the moment I show respect to the villager.’”When Jizi heard this, he said, “You respect the uncle when appropriate and the brother when appropriate. Surely it comes from outside, not within.”Gongduzi replied, “In winter we drink warm water and in summer cool water. Does that mean what we drink is external to us too?”

11.6 Gongduzi said, “Gaozi says, ‘Nature is neither good nor bad.’ Others say, ‘Nature can become good or bad. That is why people favored goodness when King Wen and King Wu arose, but favored violence when King You and King Li arose.’ Still others say, ‘Some people have good natures, others bad ones. Yao had Xiang under his rule, Gusou had Shun as his son, and Zhou had Weizi Qi and Prince Bigan as relatives and subjects.’ You say human nature is good. Are all those people wrong?”Mencius said, “If you look at what comes naturally to human beings, they can become good. That is what I mean by ‘good.’ When people do bad things, the fault does not lie in their natural abilities. Everyone has a heart capable of compassion, of feeling shame and disapproval, of respect, and of judging right and wrong. Compassion is kindness; feeling shame at wrong is rightness; respect is proper conduct; judging right and wrong is wisdom. Kindness, rightness, proper conduct, and wisdom do not come from outside and attach themselves to us; we already have them, though we do not think about them. That is why it is said, ‘Seek and you will find them; abandon them and you will lose them.’ Some people become twice as good as others, some five times as good, and some better beyond measure, because others fail to develop their abilities fully. The Book of Songs says, ‘Heaven gave birth to its many people; with each thing comes its rule. The people hold to their constant nature and love this fine virtue.’ Confucius said, ‘The writer of this song understood the Way. Every thing has its rule, and since people possess a constant nature, they love this fine virtue.’”

11.7 Mencius said, “In years of plenty, many young people behave well; in years of famine, many become violent. Heaven has not given them different natural abilities. Their circumstances overwhelm their hearts. Consider barley: sow it and weed it in the same kind of soil and at the same time, and it grows quickly and ripens at the summer solstice. If some plants differ, that is because of differences in rich and poor soil, rain and dew, or the care people give them. Members of one kind are generally alike. Why doubt that when it comes to people? Sages are of the same kind as we are. Longzi said, ‘If someone makes sandals without knowing what feet are, I still know the sandals will not turn out like baskets.’ Sandals are alike because feet everywhere are alike. People's mouths agree in what tastes good. Yi Ya was simply the first to recognize the tastes my mouth shares with others. If each person's taste were as different from another's as a dog's or a horse's nature is from ours, why would everyone look to Yi Ya in matters of taste? That people look to him shows their tastes are alike. The same goes for hearing: everyone looks to Shi Kuang for music, showing that their ears are alike. The same goes for sight: everyone recognizes Zidu as handsome. Anyone unable to see his beauty has no eyes. So mouths agree on tastes, ears agree on sounds, and eyes agree on what looks beautiful. Could hearts alone have nothing they agree on? What do hearts agree on? Principles and rightness. Sages are the first to discover what my heart agrees with. Principles and rightness please my heart just as the meat of grass-fed and grain-fed animals pleases my mouth.”

11.8 Mencius said, “Mount Niu once had beautiful trees. But it stood near a large city, and people cut its trees with axes. Could it remain beautiful? It still grew new shoots by day and night, watered by rain and dew. But cattle and sheep grazed there, leaving it bare. People who saw it bare thought it had never had trees. Was that the mountain's nature? The same is true of what is within people. Surely people have hearts capable of kindness and rightness. But losing their good hearts is like cutting down the trees with axes. How can a forest remain beautiful if it is cut every morning? In the quiet of night, people recover some freshness, and in the calm of early morning their likes and dislikes differ little from those of others. But what they do during the day chokes that growth again. After repeated choking, the strength gained at night is not enough to keep it alive. Without that strength, they become little different from animals. Those who see them acting like animals think they never had the capacity for good. Is that truly human nature? Anything grows if properly nourished, and anything declines if that nourishment is lost. Confucius said, ‘Hold it and it remains; let it go and it disappears. It comes and goes at no fixed time, and no one knows where it lives.’ He must have meant the heart.”

11.9 Mencius said, “There is no need to be surprised that the king lacks wisdom. Even the easiest plant in the world to grow cannot live if exposed to the sun for one day and then left in the cold for ten. I rarely see the king, and as soon as I leave, those who chill his resolve come to him. What can I do if any good growth has begun? Playing the board game yi is a small skill, but no one can learn it without full attention. Yi Qiu is the best player in the whole state. Suppose he teaches two men. One concentrates and listens to every word. The other seems to listen but keeps thinking a wild goose is about to fly by and imagines taking up a bow with a corded arrow to shoot it. Though they study together, the second will not match the first. Is he less intelligent? No.”

11.10 Mencius said, “I want fish, and I also want bear's paw. If I cannot have both, I give up fish and choose bear's paw. I want to live, and I also want to do what is right. If I cannot have both, I give up life and choose rightness. I want life, but I want some things more than life; that is why I will not do just anything to stay alive. I hate death, but I hate some things more than death; that is why I do not avoid every danger. If people wanted nothing more than life, what method of saving themselves would they refuse? If they hated nothing more than death, what would they not do to escape danger? Yet there are ways to survive that people do not use, and ways to escape danger that they refuse. So people want some things more than life and hate some things more than death. Worthy people are not alone in feeling this: everyone feels it, though worthy people do not lose that feeling.“A basket of food and a bowl of soup may save someone's life. Yet a traveler will not accept them if offered with a shout of contempt, and even a beggar will refuse them if they are kicked toward him. But someone may accept a salary of ten thousand measures without asking whether it is right. What does that salary add to me? Am I taking it for a beautiful house, for the comfort of my wife and concubines, or to make people I know who are poor and struggling feel grateful to me? I once refused it even at the cost of my life, but now take it for a beautiful house. I once refused it even at the cost of my life, but now take it for the comfort of my wife and concubines. I once refused it even at the cost of my life, but now take it so that needy people I know will thank me. Can I not stop doing that? That is what it means to lose your original heart.”

11.11 Mencius said, “Kindness is a person's heart; rightness is a person's road. How sad to abandon your road and not follow it, or lose your heart and not know how to look for it! If someone loses a chicken or dog, he knows to look for it. But if he loses his heart, he does not look. The whole point of learning is simply to find your lost heart.”

11.12 Mencius said, “Suppose a person's ring finger were bent and would not straighten, though it caused no pain or difficulty. If someone could straighten it, he would travel all the way to Qin or Chu to see that person, because his finger was unlike other people's. He recognizes a fault in his finger, but if his heart is unlike other people's, he does not recognize the fault. That means he cannot judge what really matters.”

11.13 Mencius said, “If people want young trees of paulownia and catalpa to grow, they know how to care for them. But when it comes to themselves, they do not know how to nurture their growth. Do they care less for themselves than for trees? They simply have not thought carefully.”

11.14 Mencius said, “People care for their whole bodies, so they tend them all. They love every inch of their skin and care for every inch. How can we judge whether they do so well? We need only look at their own choices. Some parts of the body matter more than others, and some needs are greater than others. Do not harm what is greater for what is smaller, or what is more important for what is less. Someone who nurtures only the lesser part becomes a petty person; someone who nurtures the greater part becomes a great person. If a gardener neglected his fine parasol and catalpa trees to tend thorn bushes, he would be a poor gardener. If someone cared for one finger while losing his shoulders and back without realizing it, he would be a very confused man. People who care only about food and drink are looked down on because they nourish the smaller part while losing the greater. If someone devoted to eating and drinking lost nothing else, would the mouth and belly really be no more important than an inch of skin?”

11.15 Gongduzi asked, “People are all human beings. Why do some become great people and others petty people?”Mencius said, “Those who follow the greater part of themselves become great people; those who follow the smaller part become petty people.”“Why do some follow the greater part and others the smaller?”“The ears and eyes cannot think. They are drawn to things, and when things meet them they are simply pulled along. The heart, by contrast, can think. If it thinks, it understands; if it does not, it fails to understand. Heaven gave us this ability. Establish what is greater first, and what is smaller cannot take it away. That is how to become a great person.”

11.16 Mencius said, “There are honors granted by Heaven and honors granted by people. Kindness, rightness, loyalty, trustworthiness, and untiring delight in doing good are Heaven's honors. Ranks such as duke, minister, and official are people's honors. People of old cultivated Heaven's honors, and honors from people followed. People today cultivate Heaven's honors in order to gain honors from people. Once they have them, they throw away Heaven's honors. That is terribly confused, and in the end they will lose everything.”

11.17 Mencius said, “Everyone wants to be honored. Everyone already possesses something honorable but fails to consider it. Honor given by others is not true honor: what Zhao Meng raises up, Zhao Meng can bring down. The Book of Songs says, ‘You are filled with wine and satisfied with virtue.’ That means being full of kindness and rightness, so you do not long for other people's rich food. A good name and widely praised character are yours, so you do not long for other people's embroidered clothes.”

11.18 Mencius said, “Kindness overcomes unkindness as water overcomes fire. Yet people who practice kindness today are like someone trying to put out a cartload of burning firewood with one cup of water. When the fire does not go out, they say water cannot overcome fire. This only strengthens unkindness, and in the end everything will be lost.”

11.19 Mencius said, “The five grains are the best crops. But if they do not ripen, they are worth less than weeds. It is the same with kindness: what matters is developing it fully.”

11.20 Mencius said, “When Yi taught archery, he insisted on drawing the bow fully, and his students too had to aim to draw it fully. When a master craftsman teaches, he uses compass and square; his students too must use compass and square.”