The Three Strategies三略

Book One — The Upper Strategy上略

Sixty-four passages, and the whole book is a book of quotation. The Upper Strategy cites the Military Prognostications nineteen times, and most of what it says in its own voice is commentary on what it has just quoted — so to read the Upper Strategy is to read the surviving fragments of a lost book. The Military Prognostications is in no imperial catalogue; nineteen passages quoted here are all of it that is left. “The soft can subdue the hard, the weak can subdue the strong” is one of them, and so is “under a fragrant bait there is always a dead fish; under a heavy reward there is always a brave man.” The opening sentence states the programme without preamble: take hold of the hearts of the heroes. The closing pages list ten marks of a state about to fall — the ruined state, the state’s traitors, the source of disorder, the root of disorder — and not one of them is about how to fight. The Qing imperial catalogue thought the book “shallow in sense, unlike an ancient book,” and Zheng Yuan called it warmed-over Laozi, “slow and rambling, of no practical use.” Against that stands a fact: an edict of Emperor Guangwu of AD 51, preserved in the biography of Zang Gong in the History of the Later Han, quotes this book at length and by the name Record of the Yellow Stone Elder — not only “the soft can subdue the hard, the weak can subdue the strong,” but three consecutive passages of what is now the Lower Strategy. Both cases have evidence behind them; the colophon sets out what there is.

The method of the commander lies in taking hold of the hearts of the heroes: salary those who have earned it, and let your purpose reach the whole body of your men. Share what the multitude likes and nothing you attempt will fail; share what the multitude hates and nothing you attack will stand. A state governed and a house at peace mean you have won men; a state lost and a house broken mean you have lost them. Every creature that draws breath wants to attain what it wants. (The book opens on winning men, not on waging war, and never leaves that ground.)

The Military Prognostications says: “The soft can subdue the hard, the weak can subdue the strong.” The soft is virtue; the hard is injury. The weak is what men will help; the strong is what resentment attacks. (The Military Prognostications is a lost work; nineteen passages quoted in this book are all that survives. This is the most famous of them — Emperor Guangwu’s edict of AD 51 quotes it by name. In the last clause the Siku plain text and Liu Yin’s commentary both read “the strong is what men attack,” making an exact antithesis with the line before. The 1604 Fushimi printing has “resentment” in its text, but carries a later hand’s marginal note on the opening leaf — “the Exposition has resentment, the Direct Explanation has men” — so a Japanese reader had already recorded this variant four hundred years ago. And the edict of AD 51 goes straight on: “the weak is what humaneness helps, the strong is what resentment settles upon” — the first-century quotation has the same word. The base text’s reading is kept.)

There is a place to set out softness and a place to apply hardness; a use for weakness and an occasion to add strength. Hold all four, and judge which the case requires. (This is the corrective to the passage before: softness is not a policy of softness. The sentence the whole passage rests on is the last one.)

When neither end is shown, no one can know you. Be like heaven, earth and the spirits, moving with things; be without constant form, changing as the enemy changes. Do not act first; move only in answer. So you can plan without limit and help heaven’s authority to its work, settling the eight directions and quietly pacifying the nine tribes. A planner of this kind is teacher to emperors and kings. (Laozi’s refusal to take the lead, put to military use. This is the sort of passage Zheng Yuan meant when he called the book warmed-over Laozi.)

Hence the saying: “Everyone covets strength; few can hold to the small. He who can hold to the small keeps his life.

The sage keeps this in mind and meets events with it. Unrolled, it fills the four seas; rolled up, it does not fill a cup. It needs no house to be lodged in and no city wall to be guarded; hidden in the breast, it makes enemy states submit.” (Great enough to have no outside, small enough to have no inside. The base text runs this and the previous passage together; the division here follows Liu Yin’s, so a continuation quotation mark is supplied at the head of the second, in the ordinary way.)

The Military Prognostications says: “The state that can be soft and also hard grows ever brighter; the state that can be weak and also strong grows ever more distinguished. A state purely soft and weak will be pared away; a state purely hard and strong will perish.” (The word doing the work is purely.)

The way of governing a state rests on the worthy and on the people. Trust the worthy as your own heart and use the people as your own limbs, and no plan will go astray. (The base text has a graph meaning “sent away” where both witnesses have “lost, gone astray”; the two are near-identical in form and the reading is corrected here.)

Then wherever you go, it is as limbs following one another and joints coming to one another’s aid — the way of heaven itself, and so deft that there is no seam in it.

The essential thing in army and state is to read the mind of the multitude, and then to set the hundred businesses in motion. (What follows is the most nearly regulation-like passage in the book. Liu Yin cut it into six sections and this page follows him.)

Those in danger — settle them. Those in fear — make them glad. Those who have defected — bring them back. Those with a grievance — allow for it. Those who bring complaint — look into it. Those of low station — make them honoured. The overbearing — hold them down. Those set against you — cut them off. (For “those with a grievance” both witnesses read “those wronged,” which runs on better into the next clause.)

The greedy — let them have their fill. The ambitious — set them to work. The timid — cover for them. The able planner — keep him close.

The slanderer — check what he says. The defamed — restore his name. The rebellious — remove him. The unruly — break him.

The self-satisfied — take him down a degree. Those who come over — welcome them. Those who submit — settle them. Those who surrender — release them. (For “settle them” both witnesses read “spare their lives.”)

Take a stronghold and hold it; take a defile and block it; take a hard place and garrison it; take a city and divide it up; take land and parcel it out; take goods and scatter them among the men. If the enemy moves, watch him; if he draws near, guard against him; if he is strong, put yourself below him; if he is at ease, leave him alone; if he presses, wait him out; if he is brutal, soothe him; if he is perverse, arraign him in the name of right; if he is united, set his people against one another. (Divide, parcel, scatter — nothing is kept. The next passage says as much outright.)

If he raises troops with the current, thwart him; where there is momentum to be used, break him with it; if he puts words abroad, let them pass; and when the net is spread on four sides, gather him in.

Having got it, do not own it. Having occupied it, do not garrison it. Having stormed it, do not stay. Having set someone up, do not take his place.

The doing is yours, the having is your officers’; who is to say where the profit lies? Let others be feudal lords, and be the Son of Heaven yourself. Let the cities look to their own defence and the officers to their own places. (A cold paragraph, and a deliberate one.)

The world can honour its ancestors; few can stoop to those below. To honour ancestors is what makes a kinsman; to stoop to those below is what makes a ruler.

To stoop to those below is to keep them at plough and loom and not rob them of the season; to tax lightly and not drain their means; to levy labour sparingly and not wear them out. Then the state is rich and households are content, and only then do you choose officers to shepherd them.

What is meant by “officers” is the heroes. Hence: net the heroes and the enemy state is impoverished.

The heroes are the trunk of the state; the common people are its root. Get the trunk, gather in the root, and government runs without complaint.

The essential thing in using troops is to hold ceremony high and salary heavy. Ceremony held high brings men of intelligence; salary held heavy makes men of principle careless of death. So do not grudge money in salarying the worthy, and do not let the hour pass in rewarding merit: then the strength below you is joined in one and the enemy state is worn down.

The way of employing men: honour them with rank and let them see wealth, and officers come of themselves; receive them with ceremony and urge them with duty, and officers will die for you. (For “let them see wealth” both witnesses read “provide for them with wealth.”)

A general must eat the same food as his men and share the same danger before he can take the enemy on; then his army has whole victory and the enemy is wholly at his disposal.

Once there was a good general to whom a jar of wine was given. He had it poured into the river and drank from the stream with his men. One jar of wine cannot flavour a river; yet the men of the three armies wanted to die for him, because that taste had after all reached them. (The base text omits the word “troops” after “used”; both witnesses have it, and it is supplied.)

The Military Prognostications says: “Until the army’s well is sunk, the general does not speak of thirst. Until the army’s tents are pitched, the general does not speak of weariness. Until the army’s stove is lit, the general does not speak of hunger. In winter he wears no fur, in summer he plies no fan, in rain he raises no canopy.” This is called a general’s courtesy. (For “stove” the base text has the simplified form; both witnesses have the older one, restored here.)

He is with them in safety and with them in danger. So his men can be joined and cannot be parted, can be used and cannot be worn out — because the kindness was laid down beforehand and the thinking was agreed beforehand. Hence: never tire of laying down kindness, and take ten thousand with one.

The Military Prognostications says: “What gives a general his authority is his orders. What makes a battle a whole victory is the discipline of the army. What makes the men careless of death is that they are under command. So the general issues no order he must call back, and keeps faith in reward and punishment as heaven and earth keep faith: then he can use men, and when the men are under command he may cross the border.” (For “careless of death” both witnesses read “careless of battle.”)

It is the general who commands the army and holds the advantage; it is the multitude who wins the victory and beats the enemy. So a disordered general must not be given an army to keep, and a disaffected multitude must not be sent to attack. The city is not stormed, the town not reduced. Both come to nothing, and then the strength of the men is spent; the strength spent, the general is isolated and the multitude is at odds; in defence nothing holds, in battle they run. This is called a stale army. (Where the base text has a graph meaning “ride,” which makes no sense, both witnesses have one meaning “at odds, disaffected,” answering “disordered general” in the clause before; the reading is corrected here.)

An army gone stale, and the general’s authority will not run. The general without authority, and the men make light of punishment. The men making light of punishment, and the ranks break. The ranks broken, and the men desert. The men deserting, and the enemy has his opening. The enemy with his opening, and the army is destroyed. (Seven stages, each hooked to the last — the book’s favourite figure.)

The Military Prognostications says: “A good general commands his army as leniently as he treats himself; he pushes the benefit outward and lets the kindness down, and the strength of his men is new every day. In battle they break out like wind; in attack they go like a river through a dyke.” So his men can be seen and cannot be withstood, can be submitted to and cannot be beaten. Because he goes ahead of them himself, his troops are the finest under heaven.

The Military Prognostications says: “An army has reward for its outer side and punishment for its lining.” When reward and punishment are clear, the general’s authority runs. When officials are well chosen, the men obey. When the worthy are employed, enemy states are afraid. (The base text’s “wrapping” is unintelligible; both witnesses have “lining,” which pairs with “outer side.”)

The Military Prognostications says: “Where a worthy man goes, nothing stands before him. So an officer may be deferred to but not treated with arrogance; a general may be made glad but must not be left anxious; a plan may be deep but must not be doubted.”

Let officers grow arrogant and those under them stop obeying; let the general be anxious and inside and outside cease to trust one another; let the plan be doubted and the enemy state takes heart. March out to attack in that condition and you will only bring on disorder.

The general is the life of the state. If the general can win, the state is secure.

The Military Prognostications says: “A general must be able to be clear, to be still, to be even-handed, to be orderly; able to take remonstrance, to hear a suit, to receive men, to take up what is said; able to know the customs of a country, to map its rivers and hills, to mark its hard passages, and to hold military authority.” (Twelve times “able.”)

Hence: “The intelligence of the humane and worthy, the deliberation of the sage, the words of the man carrying firewood, the talk of the great hall, the history of rises and falls — all of these a general ought to hear.” A general who thinks of men of ability the way a thirsty man thinks of water will find that plans come to him. (“The man carrying firewood” is the peasant; “the great hall” is the court. High and low set side by side.)

If the general refuses remonstrance, the heroes disperse; if his plans are not followed, the planners defect; if good and bad count the same, men of merit grow slack; if he goes his own way, blame is left at his door; if he vaunts himself, few below him will achieve anything; if he believes slanderers, hearts turn away; if he is greedy for money, corruption cannot be stopped; if his mind is on his household, the men grow licentious.

One of these, and the multitude will not obey. Two, and the army has no standard. Three, and those below him run. Four, and the calamity reaches the state.

The Military Prognostications says: “Let the general’s planning be close, the men’s minds be one, and the attack be quick.” Planning close, and treacherous hearts are shut out. Minds one, and the will of the army holds together. Attack quick, and the enemy’s preparations cannot be laid. An army with these three cannot have its plan taken from it.

Let the general’s plan leak and the army has no momentum. Let the outside see the inside and the calamity cannot be checked. Let money into the camp and every sort of treachery gathers. A general with these three will certainly be beaten.

A general without forethought, and the planners leave. A general without courage, and the men are afraid. A general who acts rashly, and the army has no weight. A general who passes on his anger, and the whole army is in fear.

The Military Prognostications says: “Forethought and courage are what a general values; action and anger are what he employs. These four are a general’s plain warning.” (The base text has a graph that is a copyist’s corruption of “plain, clear”; both witnesses have the right one. Forethought and courage are what he is; action and anger are what he does with it — and doing it badly produces the faults of the passage above.)

The Military Prognostications says: “Where an army has no money, officers do not come; where an army has no reward, officers do not go.”

The Military Prognostications says: “Under a fragrant bait there is always a dead fish; under a heavy reward there is always a brave man.” (The most widely quoted sentence in the book. It is not a compliment: the dead fish is the other half of it.)

So ceremony is what officers come home to, and reward is what they die for. Hold out what they come home to and show them what they die for, and the man you are looking for arrives.

But if you show ceremony and then regret it, officers do not stay; if you promise reward and then regret it, officers cannot be used. Never tire of ceremony and reward, and officers will compete to die.

The Military Prognostications says: “A state about to raise troops first deepens its kindness; a state about to attack and take first feeds its people.” To beat many with few is a matter of kindness; to beat the strong with the weak is a matter of the people.

So a good general keeps his officers no worse than he keeps himself, and can make three armies of one mind, and the victory is whole.

The Military Prognostications says: “The essential thing in using troops is first to make out the enemy’s condition: look at his stores, measure his grain, divine his strength and weakness, observe his season and ground, and watch for his gaps.”

So a state with no military emergency that is yet moving grain is a state run dry; people with the colour of weeds in their faces are a people in want. Grain carried a thousand li, and there is hunger in the soldiers’ faces; firewood cut and grass gathered before the fire is lit, and the army never has a full night’s meal.

Carry grain a thousand li and there is not a year’s food; two thousand, not two years’; three thousand, not three years’ — this is called an empty state. The state empty, and the people are poor; the people poor, and high and low are not close. The enemy attacking outside and the people robbing inside: this is called certain collapse. (For “two thousand” and “three thousand” Liu Yin’s text has “two hundred” and “three hundred,” as does the Fushimi printing, which also carries a later hand’s small “hundred” beside the first figure. The Siku plain text agrees with the base. Three witnesses, two readings; the base is kept.)

The Military Prognostications says: “When those above act cruelly, those below turn harsh; when taxes are heavy and levies frequent and punishments have no limit, the people prey on one another — this is called a ruined state.” (Ten passages follow, each naming a symptom of a state about to fall. None of them is about war.)

The Military Prognostications says: “Greedy within and clean without; taking a name by false repute; making the public purse into private favour so that high and low are confused; grooming the person and composing the face to get high office — this is called the opening for theft.”

The Military Prognostications says: “When the officials form factions and each promotes his own; when the crooked are recommended and the humane and worthy held down; when the public is turned aside for the private and colleagues sneer at one another — this is called the source of disorder.”

The Military Prognostications says: “When powerful clans gather the treacherous and men without office are honoured; when a man has weight and is not cowed and they hang together like creeper on creeper; when private favour is planted and the power of those in office taken away; when the people below are abused until the country is in uproar and the ministers dare not speak — this is called the root of disorder.”

The Military Prognostications says: “When generation after generation practises fraud, embezzles from the public office, advances and retreats only for its own convenience, and twists the wording of documents to endanger its lord — this is called the state’s traitors.”

The Military Prognostications says: “When officials are many and the people few; when high and low are barely distinguishable and strong and weak plunder one another; when no one is fit to restrain them, so that even the good are drawn in — the state pays for it.”

The Military Prognostications says: “When the good are not advanced and the bad are not removed; when the worthy are in hiding and the unfit are in office — the state suffers for it.”

The Military Prognostications says: “When the branches grow great and hold the ground by faction; when the base ride over the honourable and grow greater with time; when those above cannot bring themselves to cut them off — the state comes to grief by it.”

The Military Prognostications says: “When a flatterer is at the top and the whole army is in dispute; when he draws authority to himself and every move of his goes against the many; when he neither advances nor retreats but only keeps himself agreeable; when he does everything himself and every act is a claim to credit; when he slanders the virtuous and talks up nonentities; when good and bad are all one so long as they agree with him; when business is held up and orders do not get through; when harsh regulations are invented and the old ways changed — a lord who employs a flatterer will certainly suffer for it.” (The longest passage in the book: sixteen clauses.)

The Military Prognostications says: “When the treacherous praise one another and so screen the ruler’s sight; when blame and praise rise together and so stop the ruler’s hearing; when each takes the side of his own — so the ruler is made to lose his loyal men.”

So when the ruler hears a dissenting word, he looks for what it is growing from. When the ruler engages scholars and worthies, the treacherous depart. When he employs men of long standing, ten thousand matters fall into order. When he calls men out of their caves, officers give him the truth. When he takes counsel with the woodcutter, the work is worth recording. Let him not lose the hearts of men, and his virtue spreads and increases. (The book’s first sentence was “take hold of the hearts of the heroes”; the scroll closes on “let him not lose the hearts of men.”)

Book Two — The Middle Strategy中略

Twenty-one passages, the shortest of the three, and the only one in which the book turns round and describes itself. The first half quotes the Military Dispositions five times — another lost book, of which again only what is quoted here survives. Then the text breaks off and says: “the Three Strategies was written for an age in decline,” and sets out, book by book, what the Upper, Middle and Lower Strategies are for. That is an unusual thing for an early Chinese book to do: write its own abstract, in its own middle chapter. What follows is more unusual still. “When the high birds are gone the good bow is put away; when the enemy state is destroyed the planning minister is finished.” This is not about winning battles. It is about surviving one’s own side afterwards — “a minister who understands the Middle Strategy thoroughly can keep both his achievement and his life.” That sentence is where the Three Strategies sits in the literature of Chinese warfare: it writes the meritorious servant a way out. The scroll ends with four words — and so rulers keep it secret.

The Three Sovereigns said nothing, and their influence flowed through the four seas; so the world did not know whom to thank. (Four descending grades follow — sovereign, emperor, king, hegemon — each one less than the last.)

The emperor takes his body from heaven and his rule from earth; he speaks and gives orders, and the world is at peace. His ministers yield the credit to one another, the four seas are transformed, and the people do not know why it is so. So he need not wait on ceremony and reward to use a minister; merit is a good thing and does no harm. (For “his ministers” both witnesses read “ruler and ministers.” The phrase “a good thing and does no harm” returns once more below.)

The king governs men by the Way; he brings hearts down and makes wills submit, lays out standards against decay, brings the four seas to assembly, and does not let the king’s office lapse. He has arms and armour ready, and yet no trouble of battle. The lord does not suspect the minister, the minister does not suspect the lord; the state is settled and the lord is safe, and a minister who withdraws on a point of duty can likewise do good and no harm. (Both witnesses omit “has” before “arms and armour.”)

The hegemon governs his officers by leverage, binds them by good faith, and employs them by reward. Let the good faith weaken and the officers draw away; let the reward fall short and they will not obey. (The descent ends here. What follows — the five passages from the Military Dispositions — is the hegemon’s way of handling men.)

The Military Dispositions says: “When the army marches out, the general must have it in his own hands. If advance and retreat are worked from within the palace, the thing will hardly succeed.”

The Military Dispositions says: “Use the clever, use the brave, use the greedy, use the stupid. The clever delight in establishing merit, the brave in having their way, the greedy race after gain, the stupid have no regard for death. Use each according to the passion he actually has: this is the finest leverage in war.” (It does not propose to improve anybody. It proposes to put each man where his nature already points.)

The Military Dispositions says: “Do not let a fluent man discuss the enemy’s merits, for fear he unsettle the multitude. Do not put a kind man in charge of money, for fear he give too much away and men attach themselves to him.”

The Military Dispositions says: “Forbid the shamans and diviners; they are not to divine the army’s fortune for officers and men.” (One sentence, and a weighty one — an explicit refusal of divination is rare in a military book.)

The Military Dispositions says: “A man of principle is not to be employed with money. For the man of principle will not die for one who is not humane, and the clever man will not plan for a benighted lord.” (Set this against “the greedy race after gain” above: the greedy are handled with money, and the man of principle is exactly the one who cannot be.)

A ruler may not be without virtue: without virtue his ministers rebel. He may not be without authority: without authority he loses his hold.

A minister may not be without virtue: without virtue he has no means of serving his lord. He may not be without authority: without authority the state is weak — yet with too much of it he brings himself down. (The seed of the second half of the scroll, where the subject becomes how to survive.)

So the sage kings governed the age by watching rise and decline and weighing gain and loss, and made their institutions accordingly: two divisions for a feudal lord, three for a regional chief, six for the Son of Heaven. When the age falls into disorder, rebellion is born; when the king’s favour is exhausted, those bound by oath fall to killing one another.

Where virtue is matched and power is even and neither can overturn the other, then one takes hold of the hearts of the heroes and shares the likes and dislikes of the many, and only then adds the arts of contrivance. For without stratagem there is no settling a doubt; without the unexpected there is no breaking a conspiracy or ending a raid; without secret scheming there is no success. (“Without secret scheming there is no success” is said without apology, and is one of the things the book has been held against.)

The sage takes his model from heaven, the worthy from earth, the clever from antiquity. (The hinge. From here the book speaks about itself.)

And so the Three Strategies was written for an age in decline. The Upper Strategy sets out ceremony and reward, distinguishes the treacherous from the heroic, and marks what succeeds and what fails. The Middle Strategy grades conduct and examines the arts of contrivance. The Lower Strategy expounds the Way and virtue, examines safety and danger, and makes plain the guilt of injuring the worthy. (A book writing its own abstract in its own middle chapter is a rare thing. So is a book saying openly that it was written for a bad age.)

So a ruler who understands the Upper Strategy thoroughly can employ the worthy and take his enemies; one who understands the Middle Strategy can manage his generals and command the multitude; one who understands the Lower Strategy can see where rise and decline come from and make out the ordering principle of a state.

A minister who understands the Middle Strategy thoroughly can keep both his achievement and his life. (A single sentence standing alone. The ruler uses the same book to manage his generals; the minister uses it to stay alive.)

When the high birds are gone, the good bow is put away; when the enemy state is destroyed, the planning minister is finished. “Finished” does not mean he loses his life; it means his authority is taken and his power abolished. (The proverb is already in Fan Li’s letter to Wen Zhong in the Records of the Historian. This is the most famous passage in the book, and the reason it is so often said to have been written for Zhang Liang.)

He is enfeoffed at court and raised to the height a subject can reach, so as to display his merit; given a good fief in the central provinces, so as to enrich his house; given beauties and rare things, so as to please his heart. (Three things given — and the passage before has just said what is taken.)

A multitude once brought together cannot be scattered in a day; authority once handed over cannot be taken back in a day. The hour when the army is dismissed and the troops disbanded is the hinge of survival and ruin. So he is weakened by a title and stripped by a fief: this is called the hegemon’s strategy. Hence the hegemon’s conduct, argued over, always comes out mixed. (Both witnesses invert “authority” to “authoritative power.” The book’s own verdict on the hegemon is that no clean account of him can be given.)

The power to keep the altars of state and net the heroes is what the Middle Strategy is; and so rulers of the age keep it secret. (Both witnesses read “rulers of power” rather than “rulers of the age,” which follows on from the clause before. The base reading is kept.)

Book Three — The Lower Strategy下略

Thirty-four passages, and not one quotation from the Military Prognostications or the Military Dispositions. The Lower Strategy speaks throughout in its own voice, and it has stopped talking about war. Its subject is that when the worthy leave, the state is finished. The Middle Strategy said that this book “expounds the Way and virtue, examines safety and danger, and makes plain the guilt of injuring the worthy,” and all three are here: virtue and music at the opening; the Way, virtue, humanity, duty and ceremony as one body, and command, order and government as three stages of one thing, in the middle; and at the end four clauses on the worthy — “injure a worthy man and the harm reaches three generations; screen a worthy man and it falls on your own person; envy a worthy man and your name will not survive whole; advance a worthy man and the good fortune flows down to your grandchildren.” Somewhere in the middle stands the only place in the whole book where it says plainly why one fights at all: “The sage king’s use of arms is not for the love of it, but to punish the violent and put down disorder… Weapons are instruments of ill omen, which the way of heaven abhors; to use them only when there is no choice — that is the way of heaven.” The second half of that is almost verbatim Laozi 31. Zheng Yuan called this plagiarism from Laozi. Put the other way: the Three Strategies is Laozi carried into a book about armies. One external fact belongs to this scroll in particular: the edict of AD 51 preserved in the biography of Zang Gong quotes the sixth, seventh and eighth passages below verbatim and consecutively, under the title Record of the Yellow Stone Elder — the hardest evidence there is for dating the Three Strategies falls in the Lower Strategy, not the Upper.

He who can hold up what is falling under heaven will hold what is secure under heaven; he who can take away the sorrow of the world will enjoy the world’s pleasure; he who can rescue the world from calamity will get the world’s good fortune.

So when the benefit reaches the people, worthy men come over; when it reaches the insects, sages come over. Where worthy men come, the state is strong; where sages come, the six directions are made one. (“Reaching the insects” is the old figure for humanity carried as far as it will go.)

Seek the worthy with virtue; bring the sage with the Way. Let the worthy go and the state grows small; let the sage go and the state goes crooked. Small is the stair to danger; crooked is the sign of ruin. (The base text writes “sign” with the graph its simplified form collapses into; both witnesses have the right one.)

The government of the worthy brings men down in the body; the government of the sage brings them down in the heart. The body brought down, you can begin with them; the heart brought down, you can finish with them. The body is brought down by ceremony, the heart by music.

And by music is not meant metal, stone, silk and bamboo: it means that men take pleasure in their families, in their clans, in their work, in their towns, in the government’s orders, in the Way and virtue. Then the ruler of men composes music to regulate it, so that it does not lose its measure. (Six “take pleasure in,” from the household outward. The passage turns music into gladness, and it is the most finely made thing in the book.)

So the lord who has virtue uses music to gladden others; the lord who has none uses music to gladden himself. He who gladdens others lasts long; he who gladdens himself does not last and perishes.

To leave what is near and plan for what is far is labour without result; to leave what is far and plan for what is near is ease with an end to it. An easy government has many loyal ministers; a laborious government has many resentful subjects.

Hence: he whose whole aim is to enlarge his territory lays it waste; he whose whole aim is to enlarge his virtue grows strong. He who can keep what is his own is safe; he who covets what is another’s destroys. A government of destruction is paid for by generations; work carried beyond the measure will fail even if it is finished.

To set oneself aside and instruct others is going against the grain; to set oneself right and so transform others is going with it. Against the grain invites disorder; with it is the essence of good order.

The Way, virtue, humanity, duty and ceremony — these five are one body. The Way is what men tread; virtue is what men obtain in themselves; humanity is what men hold dear; duty is what men owe; ceremony is what men carry out in their persons. Not one of them can be missing. (Ten of the twelve places where the base text writes “one” with the formal banker’s graph are in this scroll; both witnesses have the plain graph, and it is restored. This passage is the frame of the Lower Strategy, and the ground on which Zhen Dexiu said the book “does not run counter to what the Confucians mean.”)

So rising early and going late to bed is the discipline of ceremony; putting down a rebel and avenging a wrong is the decision of duty; the heart that cannot bear another’s suffering is the working of humanity; getting for oneself and getting for others is the road of virtue; keeping men level and each in his place is the transforming work of the Way. (Ceremony, duty, humanity, virtue, the Way — the order of the passage before, reversed.)

What issues from the lord and goes down to the minister is called a command; what is set down on bamboo and silk is called an order; what is taken up and carried out is called government.

Let the command fail and the order does not run; the order not running, government is not upright; government not upright, the Way does not get through; the Way not getting through, the crooked ministers prevail; the crooked prevailing, the ruler’s authority is injured. (For “upright” both witnesses read “established.”)

To go a thousand li to meet a worthy man is a long road; to fetch an unfit one is a short road. And so the enlightened king leaves the near and takes the far, and can therefore bring a work to completion and raise men up, and those below him give their whole strength.

Abolish one good and every good is weakened; reward one evil and every evil comes home. Let the good have their protection and the evil their punishment, and the state is secure and every good comes to it.

Where the many are in doubt there is no settled state; where the many are confused there is no governing the people. Let the doubt be settled and the confusion undone, and the state can be made secure.

One order against the grain, and a hundred orders come to nothing; one evil act carried out, and a hundred evils are knotted together. So let good be done to a compliant people and severity fall on a violent one, and the order runs without complaint.

To govern the aggrieved by means of the aggrieved is called going against heaven; to govern the vengeful by means of the vengeful is a calamity past saving. Govern the people so as to make them level, and reach that levelness by cleanness, and the people will each have their place and the world will be at rest.

Where those who offend against their superiors are honoured and the greedy and base are rich, even a sage king could not bring about good government.

Where those who offend are put to death and the greedy and base are put away, the work of transformation runs and every evil is dissolved.

Men of clean conduct are not to be got with rank and salary; men of principle are not to be frightened with punishments. (The Siku text inverts “punishments and awe.”)

So the enlightened lord, in seeking the worthy, must first see by what a given man can be brought, and go about it that way. To bring a man of clean conduct, cultivate your ceremony; to bring a man of principle, cultivate your Way. Then the officers can be brought, and your name can be kept.

The sage and the gentleman understand where rise and decline come from, see through to the beginnings of success and failure, make out the pivot of order and disorder, and know the right moment to take office or to leave it.

However hard pressed, they will not take a post in a state that is falling; however poor, they will not eat the salary of a lawless country. (Both witnesses read “the grain of a lawless country.” Compare Analects VIII: “do not enter a state in peril, do not dwell in a state in disorder.”)

He who keeps his name hidden and holds to the Way moves when the hour comes, and may reach the height a subject can reach; and when the virtue is matched in himself, may set up an achievement that stands apart. So his Way is high and his name is known to later ages.

The sage king’s use of arms is not for the love of it; it is to punish the violent and put down disorder. (The three passages that follow are the only place in the book where it says outright why one fights.)

To punish the unrighteous with righteousness is like breaching a river to put out a torch, or like pushing at the edge of a chasm a man who is falling already: the thing must succeed.

That one nevertheless goes slowly and does not press on is because one grudges the further harm to men and things. Weapons are instruments of ill omen, which the way of heaven abhors; to use them only when there is no choice — that is the way of heaven. (The last part is almost verbatim Laozi 31.)

A man is in the Way as a fish is in water: with water he lives, without it he dies. So the gentleman is always in dread of failing the Way. (Both witnesses read simply “the gentleman is always in dread,” without two of the base text’s words.)

Let the powerful hold the offices and the state’s authority weakens; let life and death lie with the powerful and the state’s strength is drained; let the powerful bow their heads and the state can last; let life and death lie with the ruler and the state can be secure. Let the four orders of the people run empty and the state has nothing laid by; let them have enough and the state is at peace. (The base text has an unintelligible graph for “empty”; both witnesses have the right one, which answers “have enough” in the next clause.)

With worthy ministers inside, the crooked are outside; with the crooked inside, the worthy are destroyed. Inside and outside wrongly placed, and the disorder is handed down for generations.

When great ministers suspect the ruler, every kind of treachery gathers. When a minister occupies the ruler’s honour, high and low are confounded; when the ruler does what a minister should, high and low lose their order.

Injure a worthy man and the harm reaches three generations; screen a worthy man and it falls on your own person; envy a worthy man and your name will not survive whole; advance a worthy man and the good fortune flows down to your grandchildren. So the gentleman is urgent in advancing worthy men, and a good name comes to him of itself.

Benefit one and harm a hundred, and the people leave the city walls; benefit one and harm ten thousand, and the state will think of scattering. Take away one and a hundred are the better for it, and men admire the favour; take away one and ten thousand are the better for it, and the government is not disordered. (The book ends here — not on war, but on the arithmetic of one man against ten thousand. All four occurrences of “one” are written with the banker’s graph in the base text and with the plain one in both witnesses and in the Fushimi printing’s last leaf.)