Page:The sayings of Confucius; a new translation of the greater part of the Confucian analects (IA sayingsofconfuci00confiala).pdf/47

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GOVERNMENT AND PUBLIC AFFAIRS

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worthy men and single them out for promotion?—Promote those that you know, was the reply. As for those that you do not know, will not their claims be brought before you by others?

Tzǔ Lu said: The Prince of Wei is waiting, Sir, for you to take up the reins of government. Pray what is the first reform you would introduce?—The Master replied: I would begin by defining terms and making them exact.^[1]—Oh, indeed! exclaimed Tzǔ Lu. But how can you possibly put things straight by such a circuitous route?—The Master said: How unmannerly you are, Yu! In matters which he does not understand, the wise man will always reserve his judgment. If terms are not correctly defined, words will not harmonise with things. If words

↑ The hidden meaning of this saying is made clear by the context to be found in Ssǔ-ma Ch'ien's biography of Confucius. The Prince of Wei at this time was the young man mentioned on p. 128 as holding the throne against his own father. By so doing he had in some sort inverted the relationship which should have subsisted between them, and each was in a false position, the father being deprived of his proper parental dignity, and the son no longer "doing his duty as a son" (see p. 41). Confucius then is administering a veiled rebuke to the young ruler, for in saying that the first reform necessary is the correct definition of names, he implies in effect that the terms "father" and "son," among others, should be made to resume their proper significance. An alternative rendering of chêng ming as "rectification of the written character," though backed by the great authority of M. Chavannes, can only be described as feeble and far-fetched, and has been ably confuted by Herr Franke in the T'oung Pao for July, 1906.

[1] The hidden meaning of this saying is made clear by the context to be found in Ssǔ-ma Ch'ien's biography of Confucius. The Prince of Wei at this time was the young man mentioned on p. 128 as holding the throne against his own father. By so doing he had in some sort inverted the relationship which should have subsisted between them, and each was in a false position, the father being deprived of his proper parental dignity, and the son no longer "doing his duty as a son" (see p. 41). Confucius then is administering a veiled rebuke to the young ruler, for in saying that the first reform necessary is the correct definition of names, he implies in effect that the terms "father" and "son," among others, should be made to resume their proper significance. An alternative rendering of chêng ming as "rectification of the written character," though backed by the great authority of M. Chavannes, can only be described as feeble and far-fetched, and has been ably confuted by Herr Franke in the T'oung Pao for July, 1906.

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