The Heaven and the Earth (4)

1 Emperor Yao’s teacher was Xu You whose teacher was Nie Que. Nie Que followed Wang Ni whose teacher was Bei Yi.

2 Someday Emperor Yao asked Xu You, “Your teacher is Nie Que who must be a man of perfect practice. I want to invite him as the king to rule the country. If he refuses, I will ask Wang Ni to persuade him. What do you think?”

3 Xu You shook his head. “No. If so, the country will go into mess and people will suffer. Listen, for many years I have followed him and know him well. Nie Que is wise, agile and subtle. His talent is excellent. Nobody doubts these. However, he relies too much on his wisdom and forgets that the operation essence is Tao.

4 Nie Que would like to correct his error whereas he doesn’t know the reason why he makes mistake. Therefore, the old errors being corrected and the new one comes out. If he were the king, many problems would emerge.

5 He pays much attention on tactics and thinks that human can exceed the Heaven. He only adopts his own ideas. If he thinks it should be done, he does it immediately without retractation and compromise.

6 He is always disturbed and bounded by the objective environment. To handle the objective environment, he would be in a terrible fix. The environment is varying, so he seldom focuses on one thing. His attention shifts from one trivial matter to another. How can a man like him be consigned a country to?

7 Even so, he is completely competent as a local official though his practice is deficient to be a king. Believe me; never invite him to be the king.

8Anyone, who wants to rule a country by his own ideas and thoughts, would disorder the country, make people suffer and eventually bring disaster to himself. Never let it be.”