The fable of the Foolish Old Man who removed the mountains, Yugong yi shan, comes from the book Liezi. On June 11, 1945, Mao Zedong closed the Seventh Party Congress with a speech of that title. He used the fable to urge the Party to keep digging until it had removed the two mountains of imperialism and feudalism.
He called on the Party: “Be resolute, fear no sacrifice and overcome every difficulty to win victory.” The speech became one of the “three constantly read articles,” with “Serve the People” and “In Memory of Norman Bethune.”