Page:Zhuang Zi - translation Giles 1889.djvu/352

318 they are not happy. If dialecticians have not their premisses and conclusion, they are not happy. If critics have none on whom to vent their spleen, they are not happy. Such men are the slaves of objective existences.

Those who attract the sympathies of the world, start new dynasties. Those who win the people's hearts, take high official rank. Those who are strong undertake difficulties. Those who are brave encounter dangers. Men of arms delight in war. Men of peace think of nothing but reputation. Men of law strive to improve the administration. Professors of ceremony and music cultivate deportment. Moralists devote themselves to the obligations between man and man.

Take away agriculture from the husbandman, and his classification is gone. Take away trade from the merchant, and his classification is gone. Daily work is the stimulus of the labourer. The skill of the artisan is his pride. If money cannot be made, the avaricious man is sad. If his power meets with a check, the boaster will repine. Ambitious men love change.

Thus, men are always doing something; inaction is to them impossible. They observe in this the same regularity as the seasons, ever without change. They hurry to destruction, dissipating in all directions their vital forces, alas! never to return.

Chuang Tzŭ said, "If archers who aimed at nothing and hit something were accounted good