CHINESE PROVERBS AND APOTHEGMS.
"It is very difficult to govern women and servants."
[This is a maxim of Confucius, who assigns this reason. "For if you treat them with gentleness and familiarity, they lose all respect; if with rigour you will have continual disturbance.">[
"If the river is deep, which you are to pass on foot, go through it clothed in the ancient manner; if shallow, tuck up your garments."
[The Chinese believe that at first men went naked, or at most loosely clad in the skin of some animal. Vide Mart. Hist. p. 18. This proverb is applied to inculcate the necessity of accommodating one's self to the different circumstances of life.]
"Know when to stop seasonably."
"Learn to be content with what suffices."
["What need have we of riches? (saith a Chinese moralist.) Produce me the man, who, content with a straw cottage, and a little enclosure of canes, employs himself in reading the writings of our wise men, or in discoursing on virtue; who desires no other recreation than to refresh himself with the cool air by moonshine, and whose whole solicitude is to preserve in his heart the love of innocence and of his neighbour." P. Du Halde, 2. 103.]
Similar to this proverb are the Latin, "Quod satis est cui continget nihil amplius optet."
The French, "Qui a assez, n'a plus rien à desirer."
And the English "Enough is as good as a feast."
"Let us love others, as we love ourselves."—Confucius.