Trey Smith
No-Toes told the story to Lao Tan. "Confucius certainly hasn't reached the stage of a Perfect Man, has he? What does he mean coming around so obsequiously to study with you? He is after the sham illusion of fame and reputation and doesn't know that the Perfect Man looks on these as so many handcuffs and fetters!"I've never met the Perfect Man or Woman. I don't expect that I ever will. Each one of us is a work in progress!
Lao Tan said, "Why don't you just make him see that life and death are the same story, that acceptable and unacceptable are on a single string? Wouldn't it be well to free him from his handcuffs and fetters?"
No-Toes said, "When Heaven has punished him, how can you set him free?"
~ Burton Watson translation ~
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