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Tsze-kung asked about friendship. The Master said, 'Faithfully admonish your friend, and skillfully lead him on. If you find him impracticable, stop. Do not disgrace yourself.'

The subjects of which the Master seldom spoke were-- profitableness, and also the appointments of Heaven, and perfect virtue.

[Literally, "without form or sound," but it is said of course with reference to the enemy.]

So in war, the way is to avoid what is strong and to strike at what is weak.

We can form a single united body, while the enemy must split up into fractions. Hence there will be a whole pitted against separate parts of a whole, which means that we shall be many to the enemy’s few.

The Master said, 'A youth is to be regarded with respect. How do we know that his future will not be equal to our present? If he reach the age of forty or fifty, and has not made himself heard of, then indeed he will not be worth being regarded with respect.'

The Master said, 'In preparing the governmental notifications, P'i Shan first made the rough draft; Shi-shu examined and discussed its contents; Tsze-yu, the manager of Foreign intercourse, then polished the style; and, finally, Tsze-ch'an of Tung-li gave it the proper elegance and finish.'

The philosopher Tsang being ill, he called to him the disciples of his school, and said, 'Uncover my feet, uncover my hands. It is said in the Book of Poetry, "We should be apprehensive and cautious, as if on the brink of a deep gulf, as if treading on thin ice," and so have I been. Now and hereafter, I know my escape from all injury to my person, O ye, my little children.'

The Master said, 'It is all over! I have not seen one who loves virtue as he loves beauty.'

Our courts of justice often send back condemned criminals to be executed upon the place where the crime was committed; but, carry them to fine houses by the way, prepare for them the best entertainment you can--

“Ut, quasi transactis saepe omnibu rebu, profundant Fluminis ingentes, fluctus, vestemque cruentent.”

[See supra, § 2. The repetition of these words in connection with water is very awkward. Chang Yu has the note: "Said either of troops marshalled on the river-bank, or of boats anchored in the stream itself; in either case it is essential to be higher than the enemy and facing the sun." The other commentators are not at all explicit.]

“Ille licet ferro cautus, se condat et aere, Mors tamen inclusum protrahet inde caput”

[That is, as Wang Hsi says: "they predominate alternately."]

There were four things from which the Master was entirely free. He had no foregone conclusions, no arbitrary predeterminations, no obstinacy, and no egoism.

And seeing that no temper of arms is of proof to secure us:--

Tsze-chang asked what constituted intelligence. The Master said, 'He with whom neither slander that gradually soaks into the mind, nor statements that startle like a wound in the flesh, are successful, may be called intelligent indeed. Yea, he with whom neither soaking slander, nor startling statements, are successful, may be called farseeing.'

The Master said, 'A youth is to be regarded with respect. How do we know that his future will not be equal to our present? If he reach the age of forty or fifty, and has not made himself heard of, then indeed he will not be worth being regarded with respect.'

[“We should all look forward to our last day: no one can be called happy till he is dead and buried.”--Ovid, Met, iii. 135]

The Master said, 'The wise are free from perplexities; the virtuous from anxiety; and the bold from fear.'