Confucius Quotes
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Study the past, if you would divine the future.
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Only after Winter comes do we know that the pine and the cypress are the last to fade.
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What you do not want done to yourself, do not do to others.
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In a district of ten families, there must be someone as honorable and sincere as I, but none as fond of learning.
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The Superior Man is all-embracing and not partial. The inferior man is partial and not all-embracing.
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Some are born with knowledge, some derive it from study, and some acquire it only after a painful realization of their ignorance. But the knowledge being possessed, it comes to the same thing. Some study with a natural ease, some from a desire for advantages, and some by strenuous effort. But the achievement being made, it comes to the same thing.
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A hammer shatters glass but it also forges steel.
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When you have become one with the Great Universal, you will have no partiality, and when you are part of the process of transformation, you will have no rigidity.
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Music is the one thing in which there is no use trying to deceive others or make false pretenses.
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Don't make to others what you don't want them to make to you.
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Thought, unassisted by learning, is dangerous.
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Only by perfect virtue can the perfect path, in all its courses, be made a fact.
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Wherever you go, go with all your heart.
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If what one has to say is not better than silence, then one should keep silent.
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Desire to have things done quickly prevents their being done thoroughly.
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When a man comes to me, I accept him at his best, not at his worst. Why make so much ado? When a man washes his hands before paying a visit, and you receive him in that clean state, you do not thereby stand surety for his always having been clean in the past.
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What is God-given is called nature; to follow nature is called Tao (the Way); to cultivate the way is called culture. Before joy, anger, sadness and happiness are expressed, they are called the inner self; when they are expressed to the proper degree, they are called harmony. The inner self is the correct foundation of the world, and the harmony is the illustrious Way. When a man has achieved the inner self and harmony, the heaven and earth are orderly and the myriad of things are nourished and grow thereby.
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Never do to others what you would not like them to do to you.
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Return good for good; return evil with justice.
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Care not for want of place; care for thy readiness to fill one. Care not for being unknown, but seek to be worthy of note.
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For one word a man is often deemed to be wise, and for one word he is often deemed to be foolish. We should be careful indeed what we say.
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The superior man loves his soul; the inferior man loves his property.
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In ancient times, those who wished to illuminate the world with virtue first brought order to their nations. Wishing to order well their nations, they first harmonized their families. Wishing to harmonize their families, they first cultivated themselves. Wishing to cultivate themselves, they first rectified their minds. Those who wished to rectify their minds first made their intentions sincere.
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Let a man be stimulated by poetry, established by the rules of propriety, and perfected by music.