Book 8 · Tai Bo 8·7 Page 8 of 30 5-minute read

Confucius in 30 Pages

Broad Shoulders, a Long Road

Is there a load you'd be willing to carry for the rest of your life?

Original

曾子曰：「士不可以不弘毅，任重而道遠。仁以為己任，不亦重乎？死而後已，不亦遠乎？」

In plain words

Zengzi said: “A person of learning must be broad-minded and resolute, for the load is heavy and the road is long. To take up goodness (ren) as one's own task: is that not heavy? To stop only at death: is that not long?”

Key words

士shìA person of learning, set on the Way.
弘毅hóng yì弘: broad, able to hold much. 毅: firm, able to endure.
仁rénHumaneness: the right path of a human life, from sincerity toward the highest good.

Reading it step by step

This is the last page of the first theme. Today's words come not from Confucius but from his student Zeng Shen, known as Zengzi.

Zeng Shen was forty-six years younger than Confucius, who called him “slow.” Once Confucius said to him, “One thread runs through my way,” and Zeng Shen just answered, “Yes,” as if he understood completely. When the others crowded round to ask what it meant, he said, “Confucius's way is loyalty and reciprocity, nothing more.” Not wrong. But “nothing more” made his teacher's way too small. Zeng Shen kept studying all his life, and only in old age did he say what we read today.

First: you need both breadth and resolve. 弘 is breadth: room inside you for people unlike yourself, for failure and misunderstanding. 毅 is resolve: the strength to keep going through long hardship. Breadth without resolve accepts everything but never gets far. Resolve without breadth keeps going, but the road keeps getting narrower.

Second: what is the load? Ren. Zeng Shen finally said it: the one thread running through his teacher's way is ren, humaneness. It can be seen in three steps. First, sincerity: when you are sincere, a strength rises from inside and moves you toward the good before anyone asks. Picture some students on a bus when an old woman gets on. One shuts his eyes, one opens a book, one studies the view.

The bus brakes hard, she falls, and they all leap up: better the jolting of the bus than the jolting of conscience. A sincere person stands before the fall, because only then is the heart at peace. Then, choosing the good and holding to it, in each concrete situation. Finally, resting in the highest good: a life brought to completion. No one can carry this load for you, which is why he calls it “one's own task.”

toward the goodsincerity gives strength to act unasked

choosing the goodpick what's right in each case, and hold to it

the highest gooda life brought to completion

Ren: the one thread running through

Third: how long is the road? “Only death ends it.” Not grim heroics, just honesty: being human has no graduation day. Confucius set his heart on learning at fifteen and reached “never over the line” at seventy. Zeng Shen answered too quickly when young and got it right when old. Slow is fine, as long as you are still on the road.

Why should a person of learning take up such a load? Imagine a coach full of passengers whose driver collapses with a heart attack halfway there. Who should take the wheel? Not the richest, not the most important, not the loudest: whoever knows how to drive. The scholar's load comes from the same place: not from feeling grand, but from knowing the road. If you know it, you cannot just stay in your seat.

Look back over these eight pages. A poor boy chooses learning at fifteen. He does humble work well and finds joy on plain rice and water. He doesn't eat to the full and goes looking for correction. He learns until he forgets meals and age. As a teacher, he sees each student as they are. That is what growing through hardship means.

The load is heavy and the road is long, so be broad, and be steady. In the next theme we step into Confucius' world of people: parents, friends, and the line that ties us to society.

Days 1–4

learn and practise

a heart set at 15

poor when young

joy in plain living

Days 5–8

seek correction

forget to eat

each taught as they are

heavy load, long road

Growing through hardship: learning is where a life turns

One line to carry

A heavy load, a long road: be broad, and be steady.

Today's question

What is the most important load you are carrying now? Does it ask more of your breadth or of your resolve?

Quick check

When Zengzi speaks of a heavy load, what is the load?

Next pageMore Than Feeding Your ParentsPage 9

I · Growing Through Hardship — Learning is where a life turns

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