Good, Then True

You see someone do a kind thing and your heart warms. What do you do next?

Original

浩生不害問曰：「樂正子，何人也？」孟子曰：「善人也，信人也。」「何謂善？何謂信？」曰：「可欲之謂善，有諸己之謂信。……樂正子，二之中，四之下也。」

In plain words

Haosheng Buhai asked, “What kind of person is Yuezheng Zi?” Mencius said, “A good person, a true person.” “What do you mean by good? What do you mean by true?” Mencius said, “What the heart finds worth wanting is called good. Having it really in yourself is called true. … Yuezheng Zi stands within the first two, and below the other four.”

Key words

可欲kě yùWorth wanting, for the heart (not the body).
有諸己yǒu zhū jǐReally having it in yourself: actually doing it.
信xìnTrue, real: becoming a real person; goodness that isn't an act.

Reading it step by step

For the next three pages we read a single passage. It is the fullest thing Mencius says about growing a character: six stages, from good and true to beautiful, great, sage and divine. Today we climb the first two.

It starts with a student. Yuezheng Zi was about to take office in the state of Lu, and Mencius was so happy he couldn't sleep. Someone asked what kind of man Yuezheng Zi was. “A good person, a true person,” said Mencius. Then came the follow-up: what do you mean by good, and by true?

First: good is the heart saying “yes.” “What is worth wanting is called good.” The one doing the wanting is the heart, not the body. An American scholar once read it as “steak is desirable, so steak is good”: the right sentence with the wrong subject. On Day 14 we read that rightness pleases the heart. Your mouth loves good food, but no dishes grow in your mouth; the heart loves what is right, but that doesn't mean rightness is already stored inside it.

Our nature doesn't start out good. It leans toward good. Picture a young man on a crowded train quietly giving his seat to an older woman with her arms full of bags. Something in you lights up, though you gain nothing from it. That flicker is “worth wanting.” So when Mencius calls Yuezheng Zi a “good person”, he means something closer to “one who loves the good”. That love is in every heart, not a privilege of the few.

Second: true means having it in yourself. Feeling that something is good is still only seeing it. Doing it yourself is what makes it yours. And not because someone told you to or because people are watching, but because sincerity sets a force moving from the inside. That is what 信 means: not just sincere, but real, a true person.

within: work on yourself

goodthe heart wants it

trueyou really do it

beautiful

beyond: light, transform, reach Heaven

great

sage

divine

Steps 1–2. Yuezheng Zi: “within the two, below the four”

Third: Yuezheng Zi is “within the two, below the four.” Mencius loved this student and still didn't flatter him. He stood on the second step, with four more above. Later Yuezheng Zi tagged along to Qi behind a powerful minister and only called on his teacher the next day: he had been finding lodgings first. Who says you find lodgings before you visit your elders? asked Mencius. No excuses: “I was wrong,” said Yuezheng Zi. So being true isn't a certificate you earn once; you have to keep it, and being able to say “I was wrong” is how you keep it. And the stages are real: you can know where you stand and where the next step is.

Think of the moving clips on your phone: someone holding an umbrella over a delivery rider in a downpour, someone kneeling to tie a child's shoelace. We feel warm, tap “like”, and swipe to the next one. The heart has said yes; the hands haven't moved. That is exactly the gap between good and true.

Today, choose one small thing you truly admire and do a little version of it yourself.

The heart says yes, the hands follow: that is being true.

One line to carry

The heart says yes, the hands follow: that is true.

Today's question

What recently made your heart say “that's good”? What small version of it could you do yourself?

Quick check

In “having it in yourself is called true,” what does “true” mean here?

Next pageBeautiful, Then GreatPage 28

IV · Six Stages of Character — Good, true, beautiful, great, sage, divine

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