In the original, these lines rhyme.
"The shrewd grow weary, the wise grieve. Those who are without abilities have no ambitions. With full bellies they roam happily about, like drifting boats, not caring whither they are bound."
There was a man of the Chêng State, named Huan. He pursued his studies at a place called Ch'iu-shih. After three years only, he had graduated as a Confucianist; and like a river which fertilises its banks to a distance of nine li, so did his good influence reach into three families.
His father's, his mother's, and his wife's.
He caused his younger brother to graduate as a Mihist. But inasmuch as in the question of Confucianism versus Mihism,
The philosophy of Mih Tzŭ, who taught the doctrine of universal love, etc. See pp. [17], [440].
the father took the side of the Mihist, at the end of ten years Huan committed suicide.
Then the father dreamed that Huan appeared to him and said, "It was I who caused your son to become a Mihist. Why give all the credit to him who is but as the fruit of an autumn pine?"
Various interpretations of this simile are given: none satisfactory. E.g. (1) Like a dry cone. (2) Which another has planted and reared.