Analects 14.45: 憲問 (Xian Wen)
Confucius and his disciples · Classical Chinese original · new English translation and commentary by Text Atlas
Overview
Book 14 tests ethical judgment in public life. Salary, courage, accomplished speech, and a reputation for virtue each prove incomplete measures of a person. The arguments about Guan Zhong ask how benefits to many people should weigh against a demand for personal fidelity. Accounts of officeholders, messengers, and failed appeals make responsibility concrete: competent service can sustain a flawed ruler, and a duty to speak can survive refusal. Short sayings turn from judging others toward learning, ability, and the relation between words and deeds. The later encounters press the choice between persistence and withdrawal when others offer no recognition. The dialogue with Zilu gives self-cultivation an expanding aim, ending in peace for all the people; the closing scenes test conduct through bodily bearing and the desire to seem grown before the work is done.
Analects 14.45
子路問君子、子曰、修己以敬。曰、如斯而已乎。曰、修己以安人、曰、如斯而已乎。曰、修己以安百姓。修己以安百姓、堯舜其猶病諸。
Zilu asked about the exemplary person. The Master said, “They cultivate themselves with reverence.” “Is that all?” “They cultivate themselves to bring peace to others.” “Is that all?” “They cultivate themselves to bring peace to all the people. Cultivating oneself to bring peace to all the people—even Yao and Shun found that hard.”
Commentary
ethics The same work with a widening reach Each reply keeps 修己, cultivating oneself, and changes what that cultivation bears on: reverence, other people’s peace, and the peace of all the people. Zilu’s repeated question prompts this widening scope. The final repetition emphasizes the difficulty of the largest aim, even for Yao and Shun. Self-cultivation remains the work throughout; its consequences become public.
Basis: textual-inference
Confidence: high