Note 4 — THE SAYINGS OF CONFUCIUS (continued 2)

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.