"
"You are not a match for him, I grant you," said the Master. "You are
not his match."
Tsai Yu, a disciple, used to sleep in the daytime. Said the Master, "One
may hardly carve rotten wood, or use a trowel to the wall of a
manure-yard! In his case, what is the use of reprimand?
"My attitude towards a man in my first dealings with him," he added,
"was to listen to his professions and to trust to his conduct. My
attitude now is to listen to his professions, and to watch his conduct.
My experience with Tsai Yu has led to this change.
"I have never seen," said the Master, "a man of inflexible firmness."
Some one thereupon mentioned Shin Ch'ang, a disciple. "Ch'ang," said he,
"is wanton; where do you get at his inflexibleness?"
Tsz-kung made the remark: "That which I do not wish others to put upon
me, I also wish not to put upon others." "Nay," said the Master, "you
have not got so far as that."
The same disciple once remarked, "There may be access so as to hear the
Master's literary discourses, but when he is treating of human nature
and the way of Heaven, there may not be such success."
Tsz-lu, after once hearing him upon some subject, and feeling himself as
yet incompetent to carry into practice what he had heard, used to be
apprehensive only lest he should hear the subject revived.
Tsz-kung asked how it was that Kung Wan had come to be so styled Wan
(the talented).
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