[3] Legge's rendering, "My doctrine is that of an all-pervading unity," is quite untenable, and no other translator has followed him here. The logic of the passage obviously requires the meaning given above.
[4] This saying should be compared with those on [pp. 91] and 69. It is generally acclaimed as the best epitome of Confucian teaching, yet it was reserved for Mr. Ku Hung-ming, a Chinaman, to give the first correct translation of it in English. The two important words are chung and shu, "conscientiousness" and "charity," for which see notes on [pp. 58] and [69]. Legge's version, "To be true to the principles of our nature and the benevolent exercise of them to others," though ponderous, would seem to have hit the true meaning, had he not spoilt it by a note to the effect that shu is "duty-doing on the principle of reciprocity." It has nothing on earth to do with reciprocity, being in fact that disinterested love of one's neighbour which was preached five hundred years later in Palestine. The other precept, embodied in the word chung, is exactly Shakespeare's "To thine own self be true"—a noble moral conception for which, obscured as it has been by bungling translators, Confucius has never yet received full credit.
[5] The age in which Confucius lived was so given over to the forces of disorder, militarism and intrigue, and the chances of a moral reformer were regarded as so hopeless, that it was a common thing for men of principle to retire from public affairs altogether, and either lead the sequestered life of a hermit or take to some mean employment for a living. The gate-keeper here is said to have been one of this class. Confucius, however, was made of sterner stuff, and it may be claimed that he did ultimately, through sheer force of character, succeed in achieving the "impossible."
[6] The "style" or familiar name of K‘ung Li, the only son of Confucius.
[7] Li here is obviously the name of a book, and not "the rules of propriety" or even "the arts," as Legge and Mr. Ku Hung-ming respectively take it. At the same time, we must be careful not to identify it with the now existing Li Chi or Book of Rites, which did not take shape until a much later period.
[8] Because etiquette would require an acknowledgment of the gift at the donor's house.
[9] This episode is probably to be referred to the year 502 B.C., when Yang Huo, the nominal subordinate of Chi Huan Tzu (himself of usurping tendencies, see Introduction, [p. 15]), was in open rebellion and seemed likely to become master of the whole state of Lu. He was anxious to enlist the prestige of a man like Confucius on his side, but the latter steadily refused to countenance his schemes. In the following year, Yang Huo was ejected from the state, and gratitude impelled the Duke to offer a governorship to Confucius.
[10] Apparently a Taoist, who pinned his faith to Lao Tzŭ's newly enunciated doctrine of inaction.
[11] Also Taoist recluses.
[12] This is said to be a sneer at the restlessness which kept Confucius wandering all over the country, so that no place could be unfamiliar to him.