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The sole concern of learning is to seek one’s original heart.

Mencius

To lay hold of the mean without taking into account the occasion is like grasping one thing only.
MENCIUS

Oneself Understand
Is it only the mouth and belly which are injured by hunger and thirst? Men’s minds are also injured by them.
MENCIUS

Food Hunger Injury Men Mindset
The tendency of mans nature to good is like the tendency of water to flow downward.
MENCIUS

Flow Human Nature Water
Only those who develop their minds and spirits to the utmost can serve Heaven and fulfill their own destinies.
MENCIUS

Destiny Development Heaven Mindset
The way of learning is none other than finding the lost mind.
MENCIUS

Lost Mindset Way
The best things in life come in threes, like friends, dreams, and memories.
MENCIUS

Dream Friendship Life Material Memories
Mankind fears an evil man but heaven does not.
MENCIUS

Evil Heaven Men Reality
All people have the common desire to be elevated in honour, but all people have something still more elevated in themselves without knowing it.
MENCIUS

Deep Desire People Philosophy
He who attends to his greater self becomes a great man, and he who attends to his smaller self becomes a small man.
MENCIUS

Leadership Men Spirituality
Truth uttered before its time is dangerous.
MENCIUS

Honesty Time Truth
When one by force subdues men, they do not submit to him in heart. They submit because their strength is not adequate to resist.
MENCIUS

Force Heart Men Power Resistance
When Heaven is about to confer a great office upon you, it first exercises your mind with suffering and your sinews and bones with toil.
MENCIUS

Greatness Heaven Suffering
It is not difficult to govern. All one has to do is not to offend the noble families.
MENCIUS

Authority Difficult Family Government
The disease of men is that they neglect their own fields and go to weed the fields of others.
MENCIUS

Avoid Destroy Hate Man
Incessant falls teach men to reform, and distress rouses their strength. Life springs from calamity, and death from ease.
MENCIUS

Born Fall Men Philosophy Spirituality Spring
Virtue alone is not sufficient for the exercise of government; laws alone cannot carry themselves into practice.
MENCIUS

Alone Enough Exercise Government Law Practice Virtue

The sole concern of learning is to seek one’s original heart.

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The sole concern of learning is to seek one’s original heart.

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