Xun Kuang Quotes
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If knowledge and foresight are too penetrating and deep, unify them with ease and sincerity.
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When a man sees something desirable, he must reflect on the fact that with time it could come to involve what is detestable. When he sees something that is beneficial, he should reflect that sooner or later it, too, could come to involve harm.
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Whether the gentleman is capable or not, he is loved all the same; conversely the petty man is loathed all the same.
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Sacrifices are concerned with the feelings of devotion and longing.
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Now it is human nature to want to eat to ones fill when hungry, to want to warm up when cold, to want to rest when tired. These all are a part of people's emotional nature.
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I once tried standing up on my toes to see far out in the distance, but I found that I could see much farther by climbing to a high place.
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When you concentrate on agriculture and industry and are frugal in expenditures, Heaven cannot impoverish your state.
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Learning proceeds until death and only then does it stop. ... Its purpose cannot be given up for even a moment. To pursue it is to be human, to give it up to be a beast.
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Human nature is what Heaven supplies.
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Thus, anybody who follows this nature and gives way its states will be led into quarrels and conflicts, and go against the conventions and rules of society, and will end up a criminal.
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If an action ... involves little profit but much righteousness, do it.
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Therefore, a person should first be changed by a teacher's instructions, and guided by principles of ritual. Only then can he observe the rules of courtesy and humility, obey the conventions and rules of society, and achieve order.
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I once tried thinking for an entire day, but I found it less valuable than one moment of study.
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When you locate good in yourself, approve of it with determination. When you locate evil in yourself, despise it as something detestable.
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I say that human nature is the original beginning and the raw material, and deliberate effort is what makes it patterned, ordered, and exalted.
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Those whose character is mean and vicious will rouse others to animosity against them.
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If the impulse to daring and bravery is too fierce and violent, stay it with guidance and instruction.
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The straightening board was created because of warped wood, and the plumb line came into being because of things that are not straight. Rulers are established and ritual and rightness are illuminated because the nature is evil.
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If the quickness of the mind and the fluency of the tongue are too punctilious and sharp, moderate them in your activity and rest.
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A person who is transformed by the instructions of a teacher, devotes himself to study, and abides by ritual and rightness may become a noble person, while one who follows his nature and emotions, is content to give free play to his passions, and abandons ritual and rightness is a lesser person.
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Quarreling over food and drink, having neither scruples nor shame, not knowing right from wrong, not trying to avoid death or injury, not fearful of greater strength or of greater numbers, greedily aware only of food and drink - such is the bravery of the dog and boar.
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A questioner asks: If human nature is evil, then where do ritual and rightness come from? I reply: ritual and rightness are always created by the conscious activity of the sages.
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Since the nature of people is bad, to become corrected they must be taught by teachers and to be orderly they must acquire ritual and moral principles.
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Thus, that one can find no place to walk through the breadth of the earth is not because the earth is not tranquil but because the danger to every step of the traveler lies generally with words.