PETER OWEN LIMITED 50 Old
Brampton
Road London, S.
Ezra Pound - Confucian Analects
?
?
?
?
---------~------------- --
? ~
CONFUCIAN ANALECTS
translated and introduced by
EZRA VPOUND
PETER OWEN LIMITED
London
? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? PETER OWEN LIMITED 50 Old Brampton Road London, S. W. 7
The Analects
Translated by EZRA POUND
NOTE TO THIS NEW VERSION
After Confucius' death, when there was talk of re- gr. ouped, Tsang declined, saying: "Washed in the Kiang and Han, bleached in the autumn sun's-slope,* what whi? teness can add to that whiteness, what candour? " (Mencius III, 1; IV, 13. )
The friend who hoped to find beauty in this translation will not find the beauty of the Odes, nor the coherence of the Pivot. The Analects are neither a continuous narrative, 1ior a collection of fancy ideas. It is an error to seek aphoriis1ns and bright sayings in sente,nces that should be considered rather as definitions of words, and a number of them shoitld be taken rather as lexicography, as eza1nples of how Kung had used a given expression in de1fin? ing a nw. n or a condition.
Points define a periphery. What the reader can find here is a set of measures whereby, at the end of a day, to learn whether the day has been worth living. The trans- lation succeeds in its moderate aim if it gives the? fi(JJVour of laconisni and the sense of the live man speaking.
After finishing it I turned back to Pauthier's French, and have included a number of his phrases as footnotes (marked P), sometimes as alternaitive interpretation, some- times for their o? iun sake even when I do not think he is nearer the original meaning.
2
*yang : bright, positive. Definite illustration of why one wants
a bilingual edition. The usage of terms by any great stylist is, or should be, determined by the Four Books.
5
Printed in Great Britain by 11,osrombe Printing Co. (1933) Ltd. , 1 Haviland Road, Bour11emoitth MCMLVI
? ? ? ? ? CONFUCIAN ANALECTS
The few dictionary references [M] are to R. H. Mathews' Chinese-English Dictionary (Cambridge, Har- vard University Press, 1947, 4th ed. }, that being the one most easily obtainable at the moment.
During the past half-century (since Legge's studies) a good deal ? of light has been shed on the subject by Fenollosa (Written Character as a Medium for Poetry), Frobenius (Erlebte Erdteile) and Karlgren (studies of sacrificial bone inscriptions).
E. P.
PROCEDURE
The root of Confucian teaching and its definition are given irr The Adult Study (Confucius' summary and Tseng's comment) and the Pivot (Tzse Sze's three state-
ments on Metaphysics, Politics and Ethics).
The Analects have no such coherence or orderly sequence; they ar. e the oddments which Kung's circle found indispensible, and for 2,500 years the most intelli- gent men of China have tried to add to them or to sub- tract. After a millenium they found that Mencius' work could not be subtracted. And the study of the Confucian philosophy is of greater profit than that of the Greek because no time is wasted in idle discussion of errors. Aristotle gives, may we say, 90% of his time to errors, and the Occident, even before it went off for seven or inore centuries into an otiose discussion of fads and hair- cuts (vide "The Venerable" Bede), had already started befuddling itself with the false dilemma : Aristotle OR Plato, as if there were no other roads to serenity.
Mencius never has to contradict Confucius; he carries the Confucian sanity down into particulars, never snared into rivalry by his flatterers.
Given the tradition that the Analects contain nothing superfluous, I was puzzled by the verses re length of the night-gown and the predilection for ginger. One must take them in the perspective of Voltaire's: "I admire Confucius. He was the first man who did not receive a divine inspiration. " By which I mean that these trifling details were useful at a time, and in a world, that tended to myths and to the elevation of its teachers into divinities. Those passages of the Analects are, as I see it, there to insist that Confucius was a Chinaman, not born of a dragon, not in any way supernatural, but remarkably possessed of good sense.
He liked good music, he collected The Odes to keep 7
? ? ? ? ? ? ? CONFUCIAN ANALECTS
his fo11owers from abstract discussion. That is, The Odes give particular instances. They do not lead . to exaggerations of dogma. Likewise he collected the His- toric DocumentsJ asserting, quite truly, that he had invented nothing. Without Kung no one would discover that his teaching, or at any rate the root and the seed, are there in the " History Classic. "
The London Times has recently hit a new low in neg- lecting Kung's habit of summary. Anyone so unfortunate as to have the Times' critique of Kung's anthology thrust before them must, indeed, tingle with a slight warmth of irony. Kung said : " There are 300 Odes and their meaning c. an be gathered into one sentence : Have no twisty thoughts. "
Some translators think of everything, positively of everything, save what the original author was driving at.
BOOK ONE
I
8
EZRA POUND.
2. 'I'o have friends coming in from far quarters, not a delight?
3. Unruffled by men's ignoring him, also indicative of high breed.
II
1. Few filial and brotherly men enjoy cheeking their superiors, no one averse from cheeking his superiors stirs up public disorder.
2. 1~he real gentleman goes for the root, when the root is solid the (beneficent) process starts growing, filiality and brotherliness are the root of manhood, increasing with it.
III
1. He said : Elaborate phrasing about correct appear- ances seldom means manhood.
IV
1. Tseng-tse said : I keep an eye on myself, daily, for three matters : to get to the middle of mind when plan- ning with men; to keep faith with my friends; lest I teach and not practice.
v
1. He said : To keep things going in a state of ten thousand cars : respect what you do and keep your \Vord, keep accurate accounts and be friendly to others, employ the people in season. [Pr. obably meaning public works are not to interfere with agricultural production. ]
9
He said : Study with the seasons winging past, is
1.
not this pleasant?
? ? ? ? ? ? CONFUCIAN ANALECTS
VI
1. He said : Young men should be filial in the home, and brotherly outside it; careful of what they say, but once said, stick to it; be agreeable to everyone, but develop friendship (further) with the real men; if they have any further energy left over, let them devote it to culture.
VII
1. Hsia-tze said: Gives weight to real worth and takes beauty lightly [or "amid changing appearances"], puts energy into being useful to his father and mother, and his whole personality into serving his prince; keeps his word with his friends; call him unaccomplished, I say that he is accomplished.
VIII
1. He said : A gentleman with no weight will not be revered, his style of study lacks vigour.
2. First : get to the middle of the mind ; then stick to
your \vord.
3. Friendship with equals.
4. Don't hesitate to correct errors. IX
1. Tseng-tse said: Look clearly to the end, and follow it up a long way; the people acting on conscience will get back to the solid.
BOOK ONE
XI
\. He said : During a father's lifetime, do what he wants; after his death, do as he did. If a man can go along like his father for three years, he can be said to be carrying-on filially.
XII
1. Yu-tze said : Gentleness (easiness) is to be prized
in ceremony, that was the antient kings' way, that was beautiful and the source of small actions and great.
2. But it won't always do. If one knows how to be easy and is, without following the details of ceremony, that won't do.
XIII
1. Yu-tze said: When keeping one's word comes near to justice one can keep it; when respect is almost a ceremony it will keep one far from shame and disgrace. Starting with not losing one's relatives, one can found a
x xv
1. Tze-Chin asked Tze-Kung: When the big man
gets to a country he has to hear about its government, does he ask for what's given him or is it just given?
2. Tze-Kung said : The big man is easy-going and
kindly, respectful in manner, frugal, polite, that's how
1. Tze-King said: Poor and no flatterer, rich and not high-horsey, what about him?
He said: Not like a fellow who is poor and cheerful,
or rich and in love with precise observance.
2. Tze-King said: It's in the Odes, "as you cut and then file; carve and then polish. " That's like what you mean?
11
he gets it.
men's.
His mode of going after it differs from other
10
line with honour.
perhaps too bold. ]
[This reading will be dsputed and is
XIV
1. He said : A gentleman eats without trying to stuff himself, dwells without seeking (total) quietude, attends to business, associates with decent people so as to adjust his own decencies; he can be said to love study.
? ? ? ? CONFUCIAN ANALECTS
3. Ts'ze here, one can begin to discuss the Odes with him; gave him the beginning and he knew what come<l (after it).
XVI
1. He said : Not worried that men do not know me, but that I do not understand men.
BOOK TWO
I
1. Governing by the light of one's conscience is like the pole star which dwells in its place, and the other stars fulfill their functions respectfully.
II
1. He said : The anthology of 300 poems can be gathered into the one sentence : Have no twisty thoughts.
III
1. He said : If in governing you try to keep things levelled off in order by punishments, the people will, shamelessly, dodge.
2. Governing them by looking straight into one's
heart and then acting on it (on conscience) and keeping
order by the rites, their sense of shame will bring them
not only to an external conformity but to an organic order.
IV
1. He said : At fifteen I wanted to learn.
2. At thirty I had a foundation.
3. At forty, a certitude.
4. At fifty, knew the orders of heaven.
5. At sixty, was ready to listen to them.
6. At seventy, could follow n1y own heart's desire
without overstepping the T-square.
v
1. Mang-I-tze asked about filiality. He said : Don't disobey. *
*P. expands the . single word wei to mean: s'opposer a. ux principes de la raison, making the sentence equivalent to Gilson's statement of Erigena : Authority comes from right reason-anticipating the "rites" . (light and dish of fecundity) a few lines further down.
13
12
- --------. . ,,. -------
---------------------------
? ? ? ? ? ? CONFUCIAN ANALECTS
2. Fan Ch'ih was driving him and he said : Mang-
Sun asked me about filiality, I said: it consists in not
disobeying (not opposing, not avoiding).
3. Fan Ch'ih said: How do you mean that? He said :
"While they are alive, be useful to them according to the
-proprieties; when dead, bury them according to the rites, . make the offerings according to the rites.
VI
1. Mang Wu the cider asked about filiality. He said :
. A father or inother is only worried as to whether a child is sick.
VII
1. Tze-Yu asked about filiality. He said: Present-day
-filial piety consists in feeding the parents, as one would a dog or a horse; unless there is reverence, what difference is there?
PETER OWEN LIMITED 50 Old Brampton Road London, S. W. 7
The Analects
Translated by EZRA POUND
NOTE TO THIS NEW VERSION
After Confucius' death, when there was talk of re- gr. ouped, Tsang declined, saying: "Washed in the Kiang and Han, bleached in the autumn sun's-slope,* what whi? teness can add to that whiteness, what candour? " (Mencius III, 1; IV, 13. )
The friend who hoped to find beauty in this translation will not find the beauty of the Odes, nor the coherence of the Pivot. The Analects are neither a continuous narrative, 1ior a collection of fancy ideas. It is an error to seek aphoriis1ns and bright sayings in sente,nces that should be considered rather as definitions of words, and a number of them shoitld be taken rather as lexicography, as eza1nples of how Kung had used a given expression in de1fin? ing a nw. n or a condition.
Points define a periphery. What the reader can find here is a set of measures whereby, at the end of a day, to learn whether the day has been worth living. The trans- lation succeeds in its moderate aim if it gives the? fi(JJVour of laconisni and the sense of the live man speaking.
After finishing it I turned back to Pauthier's French, and have included a number of his phrases as footnotes (marked P), sometimes as alternaitive interpretation, some- times for their o? iun sake even when I do not think he is nearer the original meaning.
2
*yang : bright, positive. Definite illustration of why one wants
a bilingual edition. The usage of terms by any great stylist is, or should be, determined by the Four Books.
5
Printed in Great Britain by 11,osrombe Printing Co. (1933) Ltd. , 1 Haviland Road, Bour11emoitth MCMLVI
? ? ? ? ? CONFUCIAN ANALECTS
The few dictionary references [M] are to R. H. Mathews' Chinese-English Dictionary (Cambridge, Har- vard University Press, 1947, 4th ed. }, that being the one most easily obtainable at the moment.
During the past half-century (since Legge's studies) a good deal ? of light has been shed on the subject by Fenollosa (Written Character as a Medium for Poetry), Frobenius (Erlebte Erdteile) and Karlgren (studies of sacrificial bone inscriptions).
E. P.
PROCEDURE
The root of Confucian teaching and its definition are given irr The Adult Study (Confucius' summary and Tseng's comment) and the Pivot (Tzse Sze's three state-
ments on Metaphysics, Politics and Ethics).
The Analects have no such coherence or orderly sequence; they ar. e the oddments which Kung's circle found indispensible, and for 2,500 years the most intelli- gent men of China have tried to add to them or to sub- tract. After a millenium they found that Mencius' work could not be subtracted. And the study of the Confucian philosophy is of greater profit than that of the Greek because no time is wasted in idle discussion of errors. Aristotle gives, may we say, 90% of his time to errors, and the Occident, even before it went off for seven or inore centuries into an otiose discussion of fads and hair- cuts (vide "The Venerable" Bede), had already started befuddling itself with the false dilemma : Aristotle OR Plato, as if there were no other roads to serenity.
Mencius never has to contradict Confucius; he carries the Confucian sanity down into particulars, never snared into rivalry by his flatterers.
Given the tradition that the Analects contain nothing superfluous, I was puzzled by the verses re length of the night-gown and the predilection for ginger. One must take them in the perspective of Voltaire's: "I admire Confucius. He was the first man who did not receive a divine inspiration. " By which I mean that these trifling details were useful at a time, and in a world, that tended to myths and to the elevation of its teachers into divinities. Those passages of the Analects are, as I see it, there to insist that Confucius was a Chinaman, not born of a dragon, not in any way supernatural, but remarkably possessed of good sense.
He liked good music, he collected The Odes to keep 7
? ? ? ? ? ? ? CONFUCIAN ANALECTS
his fo11owers from abstract discussion. That is, The Odes give particular instances. They do not lead . to exaggerations of dogma. Likewise he collected the His- toric DocumentsJ asserting, quite truly, that he had invented nothing. Without Kung no one would discover that his teaching, or at any rate the root and the seed, are there in the " History Classic. "
The London Times has recently hit a new low in neg- lecting Kung's habit of summary. Anyone so unfortunate as to have the Times' critique of Kung's anthology thrust before them must, indeed, tingle with a slight warmth of irony. Kung said : " There are 300 Odes and their meaning c. an be gathered into one sentence : Have no twisty thoughts. "
Some translators think of everything, positively of everything, save what the original author was driving at.
BOOK ONE
I
8
EZRA POUND.
2. 'I'o have friends coming in from far quarters, not a delight?
3. Unruffled by men's ignoring him, also indicative of high breed.
II
1. Few filial and brotherly men enjoy cheeking their superiors, no one averse from cheeking his superiors stirs up public disorder.
2. 1~he real gentleman goes for the root, when the root is solid the (beneficent) process starts growing, filiality and brotherliness are the root of manhood, increasing with it.
III
1. He said : Elaborate phrasing about correct appear- ances seldom means manhood.
IV
1. Tseng-tse said : I keep an eye on myself, daily, for three matters : to get to the middle of mind when plan- ning with men; to keep faith with my friends; lest I teach and not practice.
v
1. He said : To keep things going in a state of ten thousand cars : respect what you do and keep your \Vord, keep accurate accounts and be friendly to others, employ the people in season. [Pr. obably meaning public works are not to interfere with agricultural production. ]
9
He said : Study with the seasons winging past, is
1.
not this pleasant?
? ? ? ? ? ? CONFUCIAN ANALECTS
VI
1. He said : Young men should be filial in the home, and brotherly outside it; careful of what they say, but once said, stick to it; be agreeable to everyone, but develop friendship (further) with the real men; if they have any further energy left over, let them devote it to culture.
VII
1. Hsia-tze said: Gives weight to real worth and takes beauty lightly [or "amid changing appearances"], puts energy into being useful to his father and mother, and his whole personality into serving his prince; keeps his word with his friends; call him unaccomplished, I say that he is accomplished.
VIII
1. He said : A gentleman with no weight will not be revered, his style of study lacks vigour.
2. First : get to the middle of the mind ; then stick to
your \vord.
3. Friendship with equals.
4. Don't hesitate to correct errors. IX
1. Tseng-tse said: Look clearly to the end, and follow it up a long way; the people acting on conscience will get back to the solid.
BOOK ONE
XI
\. He said : During a father's lifetime, do what he wants; after his death, do as he did. If a man can go along like his father for three years, he can be said to be carrying-on filially.
XII
1. Yu-tze said : Gentleness (easiness) is to be prized
in ceremony, that was the antient kings' way, that was beautiful and the source of small actions and great.
2. But it won't always do. If one knows how to be easy and is, without following the details of ceremony, that won't do.
XIII
1. Yu-tze said: When keeping one's word comes near to justice one can keep it; when respect is almost a ceremony it will keep one far from shame and disgrace. Starting with not losing one's relatives, one can found a
x xv
1. Tze-Chin asked Tze-Kung: When the big man
gets to a country he has to hear about its government, does he ask for what's given him or is it just given?
2. Tze-Kung said : The big man is easy-going and
kindly, respectful in manner, frugal, polite, that's how
1. Tze-King said: Poor and no flatterer, rich and not high-horsey, what about him?
He said: Not like a fellow who is poor and cheerful,
or rich and in love with precise observance.
2. Tze-King said: It's in the Odes, "as you cut and then file; carve and then polish. " That's like what you mean?
11
he gets it.
men's.
His mode of going after it differs from other
10
line with honour.
perhaps too bold. ]
[This reading will be dsputed and is
XIV
1. He said : A gentleman eats without trying to stuff himself, dwells without seeking (total) quietude, attends to business, associates with decent people so as to adjust his own decencies; he can be said to love study.
? ? ? ? CONFUCIAN ANALECTS
3. Ts'ze here, one can begin to discuss the Odes with him; gave him the beginning and he knew what come<l (after it).
XVI
1. He said : Not worried that men do not know me, but that I do not understand men.
BOOK TWO
I
1. Governing by the light of one's conscience is like the pole star which dwells in its place, and the other stars fulfill their functions respectfully.
II
1. He said : The anthology of 300 poems can be gathered into the one sentence : Have no twisty thoughts.
III
1. He said : If in governing you try to keep things levelled off in order by punishments, the people will, shamelessly, dodge.
2. Governing them by looking straight into one's
heart and then acting on it (on conscience) and keeping
order by the rites, their sense of shame will bring them
not only to an external conformity but to an organic order.
IV
1. He said : At fifteen I wanted to learn.
2. At thirty I had a foundation.
3. At forty, a certitude.
4. At fifty, knew the orders of heaven.
5. At sixty, was ready to listen to them.
6. At seventy, could follow n1y own heart's desire
without overstepping the T-square.
v
1. Mang-I-tze asked about filiality. He said : Don't disobey. *
*P. expands the . single word wei to mean: s'opposer a. ux principes de la raison, making the sentence equivalent to Gilson's statement of Erigena : Authority comes from right reason-anticipating the "rites" . (light and dish of fecundity) a few lines further down.
13
12
- --------. . ,,. -------
---------------------------
? ? ? ? ? ? CONFUCIAN ANALECTS
2. Fan Ch'ih was driving him and he said : Mang-
Sun asked me about filiality, I said: it consists in not
disobeying (not opposing, not avoiding).
3. Fan Ch'ih said: How do you mean that? He said :
"While they are alive, be useful to them according to the
-proprieties; when dead, bury them according to the rites, . make the offerings according to the rites.
VI
1. Mang Wu the cider asked about filiality. He said :
. A father or inother is only worried as to whether a child is sick.
VII
1. Tze-Yu asked about filiality. He said: Present-day
-filial piety consists in feeding the parents, as one would a dog or a horse; unless there is reverence, what difference is there?
VIII
1. Tze-Hsia asked about filiality. He said: The trouble is with the facial expression. Something to be done, the junior takes trouble, offers food first to his elders, is that all there is to filiality?
IX
1. He said : I have talked a whole day with Hui and he sits quiet as if he understood nothing, then I have watched what he does. Hui is by no means stupid.
x
BOOK TWO
XI
1. If a man keep alive what is old and recognize
novelty, he can, eventually, teach.
1. He said : Watch a man's means, what and how.
2. See what starts him.
3.
? ~
CONFUCIAN ANALECTS
translated and introduced by
EZRA VPOUND
PETER OWEN LIMITED
London
? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? PETER OWEN LIMITED 50 Old Brampton Road London, S. W. 7
The Analects
Translated by EZRA POUND
NOTE TO THIS NEW VERSION
After Confucius' death, when there was talk of re- gr. ouped, Tsang declined, saying: "Washed in the Kiang and Han, bleached in the autumn sun's-slope,* what whi? teness can add to that whiteness, what candour? " (Mencius III, 1; IV, 13. )
The friend who hoped to find beauty in this translation will not find the beauty of the Odes, nor the coherence of the Pivot. The Analects are neither a continuous narrative, 1ior a collection of fancy ideas. It is an error to seek aphoriis1ns and bright sayings in sente,nces that should be considered rather as definitions of words, and a number of them shoitld be taken rather as lexicography, as eza1nples of how Kung had used a given expression in de1fin? ing a nw. n or a condition.
Points define a periphery. What the reader can find here is a set of measures whereby, at the end of a day, to learn whether the day has been worth living. The trans- lation succeeds in its moderate aim if it gives the? fi(JJVour of laconisni and the sense of the live man speaking.
After finishing it I turned back to Pauthier's French, and have included a number of his phrases as footnotes (marked P), sometimes as alternaitive interpretation, some- times for their o? iun sake even when I do not think he is nearer the original meaning.
2
*yang : bright, positive. Definite illustration of why one wants
a bilingual edition. The usage of terms by any great stylist is, or should be, determined by the Four Books.
5
Printed in Great Britain by 11,osrombe Printing Co. (1933) Ltd. , 1 Haviland Road, Bour11emoitth MCMLVI
? ? ? ? ? CONFUCIAN ANALECTS
The few dictionary references [M] are to R. H. Mathews' Chinese-English Dictionary (Cambridge, Har- vard University Press, 1947, 4th ed. }, that being the one most easily obtainable at the moment.
During the past half-century (since Legge's studies) a good deal ? of light has been shed on the subject by Fenollosa (Written Character as a Medium for Poetry), Frobenius (Erlebte Erdteile) and Karlgren (studies of sacrificial bone inscriptions).
E. P.
PROCEDURE
The root of Confucian teaching and its definition are given irr The Adult Study (Confucius' summary and Tseng's comment) and the Pivot (Tzse Sze's three state-
ments on Metaphysics, Politics and Ethics).
The Analects have no such coherence or orderly sequence; they ar. e the oddments which Kung's circle found indispensible, and for 2,500 years the most intelli- gent men of China have tried to add to them or to sub- tract. After a millenium they found that Mencius' work could not be subtracted. And the study of the Confucian philosophy is of greater profit than that of the Greek because no time is wasted in idle discussion of errors. Aristotle gives, may we say, 90% of his time to errors, and the Occident, even before it went off for seven or inore centuries into an otiose discussion of fads and hair- cuts (vide "The Venerable" Bede), had already started befuddling itself with the false dilemma : Aristotle OR Plato, as if there were no other roads to serenity.
Mencius never has to contradict Confucius; he carries the Confucian sanity down into particulars, never snared into rivalry by his flatterers.
Given the tradition that the Analects contain nothing superfluous, I was puzzled by the verses re length of the night-gown and the predilection for ginger. One must take them in the perspective of Voltaire's: "I admire Confucius. He was the first man who did not receive a divine inspiration. " By which I mean that these trifling details were useful at a time, and in a world, that tended to myths and to the elevation of its teachers into divinities. Those passages of the Analects are, as I see it, there to insist that Confucius was a Chinaman, not born of a dragon, not in any way supernatural, but remarkably possessed of good sense.
He liked good music, he collected The Odes to keep 7
? ? ? ? ? ? ? CONFUCIAN ANALECTS
his fo11owers from abstract discussion. That is, The Odes give particular instances. They do not lead . to exaggerations of dogma. Likewise he collected the His- toric DocumentsJ asserting, quite truly, that he had invented nothing. Without Kung no one would discover that his teaching, or at any rate the root and the seed, are there in the " History Classic. "
The London Times has recently hit a new low in neg- lecting Kung's habit of summary. Anyone so unfortunate as to have the Times' critique of Kung's anthology thrust before them must, indeed, tingle with a slight warmth of irony. Kung said : " There are 300 Odes and their meaning c. an be gathered into one sentence : Have no twisty thoughts. "
Some translators think of everything, positively of everything, save what the original author was driving at.
BOOK ONE
I
8
EZRA POUND.
2. 'I'o have friends coming in from far quarters, not a delight?
3. Unruffled by men's ignoring him, also indicative of high breed.
II
1. Few filial and brotherly men enjoy cheeking their superiors, no one averse from cheeking his superiors stirs up public disorder.
2. 1~he real gentleman goes for the root, when the root is solid the (beneficent) process starts growing, filiality and brotherliness are the root of manhood, increasing with it.
III
1. He said : Elaborate phrasing about correct appear- ances seldom means manhood.
IV
1. Tseng-tse said : I keep an eye on myself, daily, for three matters : to get to the middle of mind when plan- ning with men; to keep faith with my friends; lest I teach and not practice.
v
1. He said : To keep things going in a state of ten thousand cars : respect what you do and keep your \Vord, keep accurate accounts and be friendly to others, employ the people in season. [Pr. obably meaning public works are not to interfere with agricultural production. ]
9
He said : Study with the seasons winging past, is
1.
not this pleasant?
? ? ? ? ? ? CONFUCIAN ANALECTS
VI
1. He said : Young men should be filial in the home, and brotherly outside it; careful of what they say, but once said, stick to it; be agreeable to everyone, but develop friendship (further) with the real men; if they have any further energy left over, let them devote it to culture.
VII
1. Hsia-tze said: Gives weight to real worth and takes beauty lightly [or "amid changing appearances"], puts energy into being useful to his father and mother, and his whole personality into serving his prince; keeps his word with his friends; call him unaccomplished, I say that he is accomplished.
VIII
1. He said : A gentleman with no weight will not be revered, his style of study lacks vigour.
2. First : get to the middle of the mind ; then stick to
your \vord.
3. Friendship with equals.
4. Don't hesitate to correct errors. IX
1. Tseng-tse said: Look clearly to the end, and follow it up a long way; the people acting on conscience will get back to the solid.
BOOK ONE
XI
\. He said : During a father's lifetime, do what he wants; after his death, do as he did. If a man can go along like his father for three years, he can be said to be carrying-on filially.
XII
1. Yu-tze said : Gentleness (easiness) is to be prized
in ceremony, that was the antient kings' way, that was beautiful and the source of small actions and great.
2. But it won't always do. If one knows how to be easy and is, without following the details of ceremony, that won't do.
XIII
1. Yu-tze said: When keeping one's word comes near to justice one can keep it; when respect is almost a ceremony it will keep one far from shame and disgrace. Starting with not losing one's relatives, one can found a
x xv
1. Tze-Chin asked Tze-Kung: When the big man
gets to a country he has to hear about its government, does he ask for what's given him or is it just given?
2. Tze-Kung said : The big man is easy-going and
kindly, respectful in manner, frugal, polite, that's how
1. Tze-King said: Poor and no flatterer, rich and not high-horsey, what about him?
He said: Not like a fellow who is poor and cheerful,
or rich and in love with precise observance.
2. Tze-King said: It's in the Odes, "as you cut and then file; carve and then polish. " That's like what you mean?
11
he gets it.
men's.
His mode of going after it differs from other
10
line with honour.
perhaps too bold. ]
[This reading will be dsputed and is
XIV
1. He said : A gentleman eats without trying to stuff himself, dwells without seeking (total) quietude, attends to business, associates with decent people so as to adjust his own decencies; he can be said to love study.
? ? ? ? CONFUCIAN ANALECTS
3. Ts'ze here, one can begin to discuss the Odes with him; gave him the beginning and he knew what come<l (after it).
XVI
1. He said : Not worried that men do not know me, but that I do not understand men.
BOOK TWO
I
1. Governing by the light of one's conscience is like the pole star which dwells in its place, and the other stars fulfill their functions respectfully.
II
1. He said : The anthology of 300 poems can be gathered into the one sentence : Have no twisty thoughts.
III
1. He said : If in governing you try to keep things levelled off in order by punishments, the people will, shamelessly, dodge.
2. Governing them by looking straight into one's
heart and then acting on it (on conscience) and keeping
order by the rites, their sense of shame will bring them
not only to an external conformity but to an organic order.
IV
1. He said : At fifteen I wanted to learn.
2. At thirty I had a foundation.
3. At forty, a certitude.
4. At fifty, knew the orders of heaven.
5. At sixty, was ready to listen to them.
6. At seventy, could follow n1y own heart's desire
without overstepping the T-square.
v
1. Mang-I-tze asked about filiality. He said : Don't disobey. *
*P. expands the . single word wei to mean: s'opposer a. ux principes de la raison, making the sentence equivalent to Gilson's statement of Erigena : Authority comes from right reason-anticipating the "rites" . (light and dish of fecundity) a few lines further down.
13
12
- --------. . ,,. -------
---------------------------
? ? ? ? ? ? CONFUCIAN ANALECTS
2. Fan Ch'ih was driving him and he said : Mang-
Sun asked me about filiality, I said: it consists in not
disobeying (not opposing, not avoiding).
3. Fan Ch'ih said: How do you mean that? He said :
"While they are alive, be useful to them according to the
-proprieties; when dead, bury them according to the rites, . make the offerings according to the rites.
VI
1. Mang Wu the cider asked about filiality. He said :
. A father or inother is only worried as to whether a child is sick.
VII
1. Tze-Yu asked about filiality. He said: Present-day
-filial piety consists in feeding the parents, as one would a dog or a horse; unless there is reverence, what difference is there?
PETER OWEN LIMITED 50 Old Brampton Road London, S. W. 7
The Analects
Translated by EZRA POUND
NOTE TO THIS NEW VERSION
After Confucius' death, when there was talk of re- gr. ouped, Tsang declined, saying: "Washed in the Kiang and Han, bleached in the autumn sun's-slope,* what whi? teness can add to that whiteness, what candour? " (Mencius III, 1; IV, 13. )
The friend who hoped to find beauty in this translation will not find the beauty of the Odes, nor the coherence of the Pivot. The Analects are neither a continuous narrative, 1ior a collection of fancy ideas. It is an error to seek aphoriis1ns and bright sayings in sente,nces that should be considered rather as definitions of words, and a number of them shoitld be taken rather as lexicography, as eza1nples of how Kung had used a given expression in de1fin? ing a nw. n or a condition.
Points define a periphery. What the reader can find here is a set of measures whereby, at the end of a day, to learn whether the day has been worth living. The trans- lation succeeds in its moderate aim if it gives the? fi(JJVour of laconisni and the sense of the live man speaking.
After finishing it I turned back to Pauthier's French, and have included a number of his phrases as footnotes (marked P), sometimes as alternaitive interpretation, some- times for their o? iun sake even when I do not think he is nearer the original meaning.
2
*yang : bright, positive. Definite illustration of why one wants
a bilingual edition. The usage of terms by any great stylist is, or should be, determined by the Four Books.
5
Printed in Great Britain by 11,osrombe Printing Co. (1933) Ltd. , 1 Haviland Road, Bour11emoitth MCMLVI
? ? ? ? ? CONFUCIAN ANALECTS
The few dictionary references [M] are to R. H. Mathews' Chinese-English Dictionary (Cambridge, Har- vard University Press, 1947, 4th ed. }, that being the one most easily obtainable at the moment.
During the past half-century (since Legge's studies) a good deal ? of light has been shed on the subject by Fenollosa (Written Character as a Medium for Poetry), Frobenius (Erlebte Erdteile) and Karlgren (studies of sacrificial bone inscriptions).
E. P.
PROCEDURE
The root of Confucian teaching and its definition are given irr The Adult Study (Confucius' summary and Tseng's comment) and the Pivot (Tzse Sze's three state-
ments on Metaphysics, Politics and Ethics).
The Analects have no such coherence or orderly sequence; they ar. e the oddments which Kung's circle found indispensible, and for 2,500 years the most intelli- gent men of China have tried to add to them or to sub- tract. After a millenium they found that Mencius' work could not be subtracted. And the study of the Confucian philosophy is of greater profit than that of the Greek because no time is wasted in idle discussion of errors. Aristotle gives, may we say, 90% of his time to errors, and the Occident, even before it went off for seven or inore centuries into an otiose discussion of fads and hair- cuts (vide "The Venerable" Bede), had already started befuddling itself with the false dilemma : Aristotle OR Plato, as if there were no other roads to serenity.
Mencius never has to contradict Confucius; he carries the Confucian sanity down into particulars, never snared into rivalry by his flatterers.
Given the tradition that the Analects contain nothing superfluous, I was puzzled by the verses re length of the night-gown and the predilection for ginger. One must take them in the perspective of Voltaire's: "I admire Confucius. He was the first man who did not receive a divine inspiration. " By which I mean that these trifling details were useful at a time, and in a world, that tended to myths and to the elevation of its teachers into divinities. Those passages of the Analects are, as I see it, there to insist that Confucius was a Chinaman, not born of a dragon, not in any way supernatural, but remarkably possessed of good sense.
He liked good music, he collected The Odes to keep 7
? ? ? ? ? ? ? CONFUCIAN ANALECTS
his fo11owers from abstract discussion. That is, The Odes give particular instances. They do not lead . to exaggerations of dogma. Likewise he collected the His- toric DocumentsJ asserting, quite truly, that he had invented nothing. Without Kung no one would discover that his teaching, or at any rate the root and the seed, are there in the " History Classic. "
The London Times has recently hit a new low in neg- lecting Kung's habit of summary. Anyone so unfortunate as to have the Times' critique of Kung's anthology thrust before them must, indeed, tingle with a slight warmth of irony. Kung said : " There are 300 Odes and their meaning c. an be gathered into one sentence : Have no twisty thoughts. "
Some translators think of everything, positively of everything, save what the original author was driving at.
BOOK ONE
I
8
EZRA POUND.
2. 'I'o have friends coming in from far quarters, not a delight?
3. Unruffled by men's ignoring him, also indicative of high breed.
II
1. Few filial and brotherly men enjoy cheeking their superiors, no one averse from cheeking his superiors stirs up public disorder.
2. 1~he real gentleman goes for the root, when the root is solid the (beneficent) process starts growing, filiality and brotherliness are the root of manhood, increasing with it.
III
1. He said : Elaborate phrasing about correct appear- ances seldom means manhood.
IV
1. Tseng-tse said : I keep an eye on myself, daily, for three matters : to get to the middle of mind when plan- ning with men; to keep faith with my friends; lest I teach and not practice.
v
1. He said : To keep things going in a state of ten thousand cars : respect what you do and keep your \Vord, keep accurate accounts and be friendly to others, employ the people in season. [Pr. obably meaning public works are not to interfere with agricultural production. ]
9
He said : Study with the seasons winging past, is
1.
not this pleasant?
? ? ? ? ? ? CONFUCIAN ANALECTS
VI
1. He said : Young men should be filial in the home, and brotherly outside it; careful of what they say, but once said, stick to it; be agreeable to everyone, but develop friendship (further) with the real men; if they have any further energy left over, let them devote it to culture.
VII
1. Hsia-tze said: Gives weight to real worth and takes beauty lightly [or "amid changing appearances"], puts energy into being useful to his father and mother, and his whole personality into serving his prince; keeps his word with his friends; call him unaccomplished, I say that he is accomplished.
VIII
1. He said : A gentleman with no weight will not be revered, his style of study lacks vigour.
2. First : get to the middle of the mind ; then stick to
your \vord.
3. Friendship with equals.
4. Don't hesitate to correct errors. IX
1. Tseng-tse said: Look clearly to the end, and follow it up a long way; the people acting on conscience will get back to the solid.
BOOK ONE
XI
\. He said : During a father's lifetime, do what he wants; after his death, do as he did. If a man can go along like his father for three years, he can be said to be carrying-on filially.
XII
1. Yu-tze said : Gentleness (easiness) is to be prized
in ceremony, that was the antient kings' way, that was beautiful and the source of small actions and great.
2. But it won't always do. If one knows how to be easy and is, without following the details of ceremony, that won't do.
XIII
1. Yu-tze said: When keeping one's word comes near to justice one can keep it; when respect is almost a ceremony it will keep one far from shame and disgrace. Starting with not losing one's relatives, one can found a
x xv
1. Tze-Chin asked Tze-Kung: When the big man
gets to a country he has to hear about its government, does he ask for what's given him or is it just given?
2. Tze-Kung said : The big man is easy-going and
kindly, respectful in manner, frugal, polite, that's how
1. Tze-King said: Poor and no flatterer, rich and not high-horsey, what about him?
He said: Not like a fellow who is poor and cheerful,
or rich and in love with precise observance.
2. Tze-King said: It's in the Odes, "as you cut and then file; carve and then polish. " That's like what you mean?
11
he gets it.
men's.
His mode of going after it differs from other
10
line with honour.
perhaps too bold. ]
[This reading will be dsputed and is
XIV
1. He said : A gentleman eats without trying to stuff himself, dwells without seeking (total) quietude, attends to business, associates with decent people so as to adjust his own decencies; he can be said to love study.
? ? ? ? CONFUCIAN ANALECTS
3. Ts'ze here, one can begin to discuss the Odes with him; gave him the beginning and he knew what come<l (after it).
XVI
1. He said : Not worried that men do not know me, but that I do not understand men.
BOOK TWO
I
1. Governing by the light of one's conscience is like the pole star which dwells in its place, and the other stars fulfill their functions respectfully.
II
1. He said : The anthology of 300 poems can be gathered into the one sentence : Have no twisty thoughts.
III
1. He said : If in governing you try to keep things levelled off in order by punishments, the people will, shamelessly, dodge.
2. Governing them by looking straight into one's
heart and then acting on it (on conscience) and keeping
order by the rites, their sense of shame will bring them
not only to an external conformity but to an organic order.
IV
1. He said : At fifteen I wanted to learn.
2. At thirty I had a foundation.
3. At forty, a certitude.
4. At fifty, knew the orders of heaven.
5. At sixty, was ready to listen to them.
6. At seventy, could follow n1y own heart's desire
without overstepping the T-square.
v
1. Mang-I-tze asked about filiality. He said : Don't disobey. *
*P. expands the . single word wei to mean: s'opposer a. ux principes de la raison, making the sentence equivalent to Gilson's statement of Erigena : Authority comes from right reason-anticipating the "rites" . (light and dish of fecundity) a few lines further down.
13
12
- --------. . ,,. -------
---------------------------
? ? ? ? ? ? CONFUCIAN ANALECTS
2. Fan Ch'ih was driving him and he said : Mang-
Sun asked me about filiality, I said: it consists in not
disobeying (not opposing, not avoiding).
3. Fan Ch'ih said: How do you mean that? He said :
"While they are alive, be useful to them according to the
-proprieties; when dead, bury them according to the rites, . make the offerings according to the rites.
VI
1. Mang Wu the cider asked about filiality. He said :
. A father or inother is only worried as to whether a child is sick.
VII
1. Tze-Yu asked about filiality. He said: Present-day
-filial piety consists in feeding the parents, as one would a dog or a horse; unless there is reverence, what difference is there?
VIII
1. Tze-Hsia asked about filiality. He said: The trouble is with the facial expression. Something to be done, the junior takes trouble, offers food first to his elders, is that all there is to filiality?
IX
1. He said : I have talked a whole day with Hui and he sits quiet as if he understood nothing, then I have watched what he does. Hui is by no means stupid.
x
BOOK TWO
XI
1. If a man keep alive what is old and recognize
novelty, he can, eventually, teach.
1. He said : Watch a man's means, what and how.
2. See what starts him.
3.
