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Confucius Scolds His Students

When his disciple Zai Yu slept during the day, Confucius said: “Rotten wood cannot be carved. A wall of dung cannot be plastered.” (朽木不可雕也，粪土之墙不可杇也) The Ji family was richer than the Duke of Zhou, and his disciple Ran Qiu collected taxes to make it richer still. Confucius told his students: “He is no follower of mine. Little ones, beat the drums and attack him. It is permitted.” (非吾徒也，小子鸣鼓而攻之，可也)

Both lines are in the Analects, and both became set phrases. Dictionaries define 朽木不可雕 as a person who cannot be trained, or a matter ruined beyond rescue, and 鸣鼓而攻之 as to announce someone’s faults and denounce them.

The Emperor’s Reply

In a reply to the official Tian Wenjing, the Yongzheng Emperor wrote: “This is the kind of man I am! This is my temperament! This is the kind of emperor I am!” (朕就是这样汉子！就是这样秉性！就是这样皇帝！) It is one of the best-known lines in the emperor’s replies to the memorials of his officials.

Tian Wenjing could not keep the reply. Under the Qing memorial system, he had to return it to the emperor together with his original memorial. He was also not allowed to quote the emperor’s words in a public document.

Fifty Meters From the Rightists

On January 12, 1958, at a Party conference in Nanning, Mao Zedong attacked the policy against “rash advance” (反冒进) that the leadership had followed in 1956. “When the rightists attacked,” he said, “some of our comrades were thrown to a point only fifty meters from the rightists.” The speech is recorded in the 1968 collection Long Live Mao Zedong Thought.

Premier Zhou Enlai stated his position at the conference and also made a self-criticism to Mao in private. In May 1958, at the second session of the Eighth Party Congress, Zhou and Chen Yun made formal written self-criticisms on the matter.

The Vocabulary of Lecturing

训话 A talk of instruction. A speech in which a superior teaches and warns subordinates.

训斥 To instruct and rebuke. To teach and reproach someone sternly.

挨批 To suffer criticism. To be criticized by someone above.

The Vocabulary of Overstepping

没大没小 No big and no small. To ignore the courtesy owed by the young to the old and by the low to the high.

顶嘴 To push back with the mouth. To argue back, usually to an elder or a superior.

犯上 To offend those above. To defy one’s elders or superiors.

老几 Which number among the siblings. Used in a rhetorical question, as in 你算老几, it shows contempt. The other person counts for nothing.

Baoyu Is Beaten

In chapter 33 of Dream of the Red Chamber, Jia Zheng has heard a string of charges against his son Baoyu. He orders: “Gag him and beat him hard, to death!” (堵起嘴来，着实打死) The servants press Baoyu onto a bench and strike him about ten times with a heavy board. Jia Zheng thinks the blows too light. He kicks the servant aside, takes the board himself and strikes thirty or forty more times.

When his guests try to stop him, he blames them for spoiling the boy. The chapter title says that the unworthy son, for his many faults, receives a heavy beating.

Five Kinds of Remonstrance

Confucius said: “A loyal minister remonstrates with his ruler in five ways. The first is by guile. The second is blunt and plain. The third is with a humble manner. The fourth is direct. The fifth is by allusion. One measures the ruler and acts accordingly. I would follow remonstrance by allusion.” The passage is in the Family Sayings of Confucius (孔子家语).

An old commentary in the same text explains the fifth way, fengjian (风谏). It stays noncommittal and keeps the speaker clear of blame and harm.

You Meng and the King’s Horse

King Zhuang of Chu loved a horse and dressed it in embroidered silk. When it died of overfeeding, he wanted to bury it with the rites of a high official. He decreed: “Anyone who remonstrates about the horse will die.” The court entertainer You Meng went in and wept aloud. An official’s burial was too mean, he said. The horse should be buried as a ruler, in a coffin of carved jade.

“Then the lords will all know that Your Majesty despises people and values horses.” The king asked: “Is my fault as great as this?” You Meng proposed burying the horse as livestock, in human stomachs. The king sent it to the palace kitchen. The Records of the Grand Historian say that You Meng “often remonstrated through jokes” (常以谈笑讽谏).

Xiren’s Conditions

In chapter 19 of Dream of the Red Chamber, the maid Xiren tells Baoyu that her mother and brother plan to buy her out next year. If he truly wants her to stay, she says, he must agree to two or three things. “Not two or three,” he answers. “Two or three hundred, and I will agree.”

She asks him to at least appear to enjoy study, and to stop mocking monks and Daoists and playing with rouge.

The narrator explains that the talk of leaving was a ruse. She used it first to test his feelings and to curb his temper.

Criticism Through Poetry

The Great Preface to the Book of Songs explains one of its kinds of poem, feng (风). “Those above use it to transform those below. Those below use it to criticize those above. It leads with art and remonstrates indirectly. The one who speaks is not guilty, and the one who hears is warned enough.” (上以风化下，下以风刺上，主文而谲谏，言之者无罪，闻之者足以戒)

The last line lives on as the saying 言者无罪，闻者足戒. Dictionaries define it this way: the person who raises an opinion is not at fault, and the person who hears it should take it as a warning.