Page:Zhuang Zi - translation Giles 1889.djvu/349

CAP. XXIV.] Cultivation of duty towards one's neighbour in order to put an end to war is the origin of all fighting. If your Highness starts from this basis, the result can only be disastrous.


 * Why try to "do" anything?

"Everything that is made good, turns out bad.


 * The artificial is impermanent.

And although your Highness should make charity and duty to one's neighbour, I fear they would be spurious articles. For the inward intention would appear in the outward manifestation. The adoption of a fixed standard


 * I.e. of the personal standard of individuals. See pp. 305, 306.

would lead to complications. And revolutions within lead to fighting without. Surely your Highness would not make a bower into a battlefield, nor a shrine of prayer into a scene of warfare!


 * This, of course, refers to the mind.

"Have nothing within which is obstructive of virtue. Seek not to vanquish others in cunning, in plotting, in war. If I slay a whole nation and annex the territory in order to find nourishment for my passions and for my soul,—irrespective of military skill, wherein does the victory lie?


 * "What shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?"

"If your Highness will only abstain, that will be