Download PDF THE ESSENTIAL CONFUCIUS The Heart of Confucius' Teachings in Authentic I Ching Order A Compendium of Ethical Wisdom by Thomas Cleary

Sinopsis

Confucius worked for the revitalization of culture in its role as a means of cultivating human feelings and maintaining the integrity and well-being of a people. He envisioned a social order guided by reasonable, humane, and just sensibilities, not by the passions of individuals arbitrarily empowered by hereditary status, and warned of the social consequences if men in positions of power considered personal profit and advantage over public humanity and justice. Confucius believed in the regeneration of public and private conscience through education and the influence of unifying cultural ideals. Confucius believed that the conduct of the affairs of a nation would benefit from maximum participation in government by cultivated people whose intellects and emotions had been developed and matured by conscious culture. As an educator, he helped people study a variety of subjects such as history, political science, sociology, literature, music, etiquette, and philosophy to deepen the human understanding. This study, he believed, could help people prepare themselves to take on deliberate social responsibility.

Content 

1. Good people strengthen themselves ceaselessly 
2. Good people support others with enriched virtue 
3. Good people order and arrange 
4. Good people nurture character with fruitful action 
5. Good people enjoy life 
6. When they do things, good people plan first 
7. Good people embrace the populace and nurture the masses 
8. Ancient kings set up myriad realms and associated with their representatives 
9. Good people refine cultured qualities 
10. Good people distinguish above and below and settle the ambitions of the people 
11. The ruler administers the way of heaven and earth and assists the proper balance of heaven and earth, thereby helping the people 
12. Good people are parsimonious with power and avoid trouble; they are not susceptible to material inducements 
13. Good people distinguish things in terms of categories and groups 
14. Good people stop evil and promote virtue, obeying Heaven and accepting its order 
15. Good people decrease what is too much to add to what is too little, assessing things and dealing impartially 
16. Ancient kings made music to honor virtue, offering it in abundance to God; thereby they shared it with their ancestors 
17. Good people go inside and rest when the sun goes down 
18. Good people inspire others and nurture virtue 
19. Leaders draw on limitless resources of education and thought to embrace and protect the people without bound 
20. Ancient kings set up education after examination of the region and observation of the people 
21. Ancient kings clarified penalties and proclaimed laws 
22. Good people clarify governmental affairs without presumptuous adjudication 
23. Those above secure their homes by kindness to those below 
24. Ancient kings shut the gates on the winter solstice; caravans did not travel, the ruler did not inspect the provinces 
25. Ancient kings promoted growth appropriate to the time and nurtured myriad beings 
26. Good people become acquainted with many precedents of speech and action in order to accumulate virtue 
27. Good people are careful about what they say and moderate in eating and drinking 
28. Good people can stand alone without fear and can leave society without distress 

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