Shun offered the empire to a friend, a labourer of Shih Hu.
"Sire," said the latter, "you exert yourself too much. The chief thing is to husband one's strength;"—meaning that in point of real virtue Shun had not attained.
Then, husband and wife, bearing away their household gods and taking their children with them, went off to the sea and never came back.
When T'ai Wang Shan Fu was occupying Pin, he was attacked by savages. He offered them skins and silk, but they declined these. He offered them dogs and horses, but they declined these also. He then offered them pearls and jade, but these too they declined. What they wanted was the territory.
"To live with a man's elder brother," said T'ai Wang Shan Fu,
Addressing his own people.
"and slay his younger brother; to live with a man's father and slay his son,—this I could not bear to do. Make shift to remain here. To be my subjects or the subjects of these savages, where is the difference? Besides I have heard say that we ought not to let that which is intended to nourish life become injurious to life."
Alluding to the "territory."
Thereupon he took his staff and went off. His people all followed him, and they founded a new State at the foot of Mount Ch'i.