Tsz-chang asked if it were possible to forecast the state of the country ten generations hence.  The Master replied in this manner:  “The Yin dynasty adopted the rules and manners of the Hia line of kings, and it is possible to tell whether it retrograded or advanced.  The Chow line has followed the Yin, adopting its ways, and whether there has been deterioration or improvement may also be determined.  Some other line may take up in turn those of Chow; and supposing even this process to go on for a hundred generations, the result may be known.”

Other sayings of the Master:—­

“It is but flattery to make sacrificial offerings to departed spirits not belonging to one’s own family.

“It is moral cowardice to leave undone what one perceives to be right to do.”

[Footnote 2:  Of Lu (Confucius’s native State).]

[Footnote 3:  Head of one of the “Three Families” of Lu.]

BOOK III

Abuse of Proprieties in Ceremonial and Music

Alluding to the head of the Ki family, [4] and the eight lines of posturers [5] before their ancestral hall, Confucius remarked, “If the Ki can allow himself to go to this extent, to what extent will he not allow himself to go?”

The Three Families [6] were in the habit, during the Removal of the sacred vessels after sacrifice, of using the hymn commencing,

  “Harmoniously the Princes
    Draw near with reverent tread,
  Assisting in his worship
    Heaven’s Son, the great and dread.”

“How,” exclaimed the Master, “can such words be appropriated in the ancestral hall of the Three Families?”

“Where a man,” said he again, “has not the proper feelings due from one man to another, how will he stand as regards the Rules of Propriety?  And in such a case, what shall we say of his sense of harmony?”

On a question being put to him by Lin Fang, a disciple, as to what was the radical idea upon which the Rules of Propriety were based, the Master exclaimed, “Ah! that is a large question.  As to some rules, where there is likelihood of extravagance, they would rather demand economy; in those which relate to mourning, and where there is likelihood of being easily satisfied, what is wanted is real sorrow.”

Speaking of the disorder of the times he remarked that while the barbarians on the North and East had their Chieftains, we here in this great country had nothing to compare with them in that respect:—­we had lost these distinctions!

Alluding to the matter of the Chief of the Ki family worshipping on Tai-shan, [7] the Master said to Yen Yu, “Cannot you save him from this?” He replied, “It is beyond my power.”  “Alas, alas!” exclaimed the Master, “are we to say that the spirits of T’ai-shan have not as much discernment as Lin Fang?”

Of “the superior man,” the Master observed, “In him there is no contentiousness.  Say even that he does certainly contend with others, as in archery competitions; yet mark, in that case, how courteously he will bow and go up for the forfeit-cup, and come down again and give it to his competitor.  In his very contest he is still the superior man.”