The Master said, "I have been the whole day without eating,

26. THE DANGER OF SPECIOUS WORDS, AND OF IMPATIENCE. 小不忍 is not 'a little impatience', but impatience in little things; 'the hastiness', it is said, 'of women and small people'.

27. IN JUDGING OF A MAN, WE MUST NOT BE GUIDED BY HIS BEING GENERALLY LIKED OR DISLIKED. Comp. XIII. 24.

28. PRINCIPLES OF DUTY AN INSTRUMENT IN THE HAND OF MAN. This sentence is quite mystical in its sententiousness. The 翼注 says—'道here is the path of duty, which all men, in their various relations, have to pursue, and man has the three virtues of knowledge, benevolence, and fortitude, wherewith to pursue that path, and so he enlarges it. That virtue remote, occupying an empty place, cannot enlarge man, needs not to be said.' That writer's account of 道here is probably correct, and 'duty unapprehended', 'in an empty place', can have no effect on any man; out this is a mere truism. Duty apprehended is constantly enlarging, elevating, and energizing multitudes, who had previously been uncognizant of it. The first clause of the chapter may be granted, but the second is not in accordance with truth.

29. THE CULPABILITY OF NOT REFORMING KNOWN FAULTS. Comp. I. 8. Choo He's commentary appears to make the meaning somewhat different. He says:—'If one having faults can change them, he comes back to the condition of having no faults. But if he do not change them, then they go on to their completion, and will never come to be changed.'

30. THE FRUITLESSNESS OF THINKING, WITHOUT READING. Comp. II. 15, where the dependence of acquisition and reflection on each other is set forth.—Many comm. say that Conf. merely transfers the things which he here mentions to himself for the sake of others, not that it ever was really thus with himself.

and the whole night without sleeping:—occupied with thinking. It was of no use. The better plan is to learn."