Chapter 28 4. Moderation and Contrary

Taoism preaches Taoism, Confucianism preaches morality. The highest state of virtue is moderation.Confucius said—— The doctrine of the mean is virtue, and it is so perfect! So, what is moderation? Medium means not going to extremes; mediocrity means not singing high-profile. The first sentence is easy to understand.Confucius has a famous saying, "Too much is not enough".In other words, if one thing is overdone, it is equivalent to not doing it, and it may be even worse.what should i doNot absent, not offside, not over the top, not left behind.Everything is just right, that is the golden mean.

Just be human. Being human is hard.For a person, simplicity is good, sincerity is good, and frankness is also good.But if there is no cultivation at all, it will be vulgar, vulgar, and rude.According to Confucius, this is called "Quality wins Wen Zeye".On the contrary, if you are too embellished and refined, you will inevitably be pretentious and appear hypocritical.According to Confucius, this is called "Wen wins quality and history". So what? Gentle and polite. Binbin means both style and quality, half of the family, and suitable cooperation.This principle applies not only to elegance and simplicity, but also to culture and martial arts, hardness and softness, and all contradictory and opposing sides.So Confucius said—

Gentle and polite, then a gentleman. This is "middle". Say "yong" again. Once, someone asked Confucius: How about repaying grievances with virtue? Confucius asked: How to repay virtue? That is to say, you repaid your enmity with kindness, may I ask, what do you use to repay kindness?Of course, you can also "return kindness with kindness".However, both kindness and hatred are repaid with kindness, is it fair? unfair. Of course, repaying grievances with virtue and repaying virtue with virtue are not necessarily contradictory.Because a person's kindness does not necessarily repay hatred.The problem is that such a high moral standard cannot be achieved by most people.If you can't do it, but you advocate it, that is to sing high-profile.As a result, only hypocrites can be created.

However, repaying grievances with virtue cannot be done, and repaying grievances with grievances cannot be advocated.Because the result of repaying grievances with grievances is endless retribution.This begs the question: what should we do? Confucius said eight words—— Repay grievances with straightness, and repay virtue with kindness. Repaying grievances directly means repaying you how you think you should and can repay, so repay in that way.This kind of repayment may be repaying grievances with kindness, or repaying grievances with grievances, or it may be neither virtuous nor grievances, simply not repaying.As for which one it is, it all depends on whether it should be possible or not.

This is what everyone can do, so it is "yong". Yong, just don't sing high-profile. So we have to ask, whose idea is to repay evil with virtue? Lao Tzu. So, is Lao Tzu singing a high profile? No, reverse the tone. Indeed, Lao Tzu does not sing high-profile.His idea is that water flows to low places, and people also hide in low places.How can this be high-profile?But it is exactly the opposite.This kind of contradictory tone abounds in Laozi.For example, everyone said that the weak are prey to the strong, and he said that the weak survive; everyone said that men should be masculine, and he said that it is not as good as femininity;In short, it is counterproductive.Irony may seem counterintuitive, but it is actually natural.This is Lao Tzu's way of thinking.

Therefore, morality is not moral, righteousness is not righteous, and sentimentality is ruthless. These are counter-tones. However, singing the opposite tune is to obtain the righteous way.Therefore, we can neither talk about repaying grievances with grievances (this is a positive tune), nor can we talk about repaying grievances with virtue (not the right way), only repaying grievances with virtue.Repay grievances with virtue, repay grievances, and gain virtue. This is the way of heaven. It's a pity that the way of heaven is far away, but the way of humanity is close, so Confucius wanted to repay his grievances directly.It can be seen that Confucius said the mean because he talked about humanity; Lao Tzu sang the opposite because he talked about the way of heaven.So, is there any way of heaven and humanity?

Of course, Xunzi is.

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