63. After Completion

In times fol­low­ing a great tran­si­tion, every­thing is press­ing for­ward, striv­ing in the di­rec­tion of de­vel­op­ment and progress. But this press­ing for­ward at the be­gin­ning is not good; it over­shoots the mark and leads with cer­tain­ty to loss and col­lapse. There­fore a man of strong char­ac­ter does not allow him­self to be in­fect­ed by the gen­er­al in­tox­i­ca­tion but checks his course in time. He may in­deed not re­main al­to­geth­er un­touched by the dis­as­trous con­se­quences of the gen­er­al pres­sure, but he is hit only from be­hind like a fox that, hav­ing crossed the water, at the last minute gets its tail wet. He will not suf­fer any real harm, be­cause his be­hav­ior has been cor­rect.

When a woman drove out in her car­riage, she had a cur­tain that hid her from the glances of the cu­ri­ous. It was re­gard­ed as a breach of pro­pri­ety to drive on if this cur­tain was lost. Ap­plied to pub­lic life, this means that a man who wants to achieve some­thing is not re­ceiv­ing that con­fi­dence of the au­thor­i­ties which he needs, so to speak, for his per­son­al pro­tec­tion. Es­pe­cial­ly in times “after com­ple­tion” it may hap­pen that those who have come to power grow ar­ro­gant and con­ceit­ed and no longer trou­ble them­selves about fos­ter­ing new tal­ent. This as a rule re­sults in of­fice seek­ing. If a man’s su­pe­ri­ors with­hold their trust from him, he will seek ways and means of get­ting it and of draw­ing at­ten­tion to him­self. We are warned against such an un­wor­thy pro­ce­dure: “Do not seek it.” Do not throw your­self away on the world, but wait tran­quil­ly and de­vel­op your per­son­al worth by your own ef­forts. Times change. When the six stages of the hexa­gram have passed, the new era dawns. That which is a man’s own can­not be per­ma­nent­ly lost. It comes to him of its own ac­cord. He need only be able to wait.

“Il­lus­tri­ous An­ces­tor” is the dy­nas­tic title of the Em­per­or Wu Ting of the Yin dy­nasty.1 After putting his realm in order with a strong hand, he waged long colo­nial wars for the sub­jec­tion of the Huns who oc­cu­pied the north­ern bor­der­land with con­stant threat of in­cur­sions. The sit­u­a­tion de­scribed is as fol­lows. After times of com­ple­tion, when a new power has arisen and every­thing with­in the coun­try has been set in order, a pe­ri­od of colo­nial ex­pan­sion al­most in­evitably fol­lows. Then as a rule long-drawn-out strug­gles must be reck­oned with. For this rea­son, a cor­rect colo­nial pol­i­cy is es­pe­cial­ly im­por­tant. The ter­ri­to­ry won at such bit­ter cost must not be re­gard­ed as an almshouse for peo­ple who in one way or an­oth­er have made them­selves im­pos­si­ble at home, but who are thought to be quite good enough for the colonies. Such a pol­i­cy ruins at the out­set any chance of suc­cess. This holds true in small as well as in large mat­ters, be­cause it is not only ris­ing states that carry on a colo­nial pol­i­cy; the urge to ex­pand, with its ac­com­pa­ny­ing dan­gers, is part and par­cel of every am­bi­tious un­der­tak­ing.

In a time of flow­er­ing cul­ture, an oc­ca­sion­al con­vul­sion is bound to occur, un­cov­er­ing a hid­den evil with­in so­ci­ety and at first caus­ing a great sen­sa­tion. But since the sit­u­a­tion is fa­vor­able on the whole, such evils can eas­i­ly be glossed over and con­cealed from the pub­lic. Then every­thing is for­got­ten and peace ap­par­ent­ly reigns com­pla­cent­ly once more. How­ev­er, to the thought­ful man such oc­cur­rences are grave omens that he does not ne­glect. This is the only way of avert­ing evil con­se­quences.

Re­li­gious at­ti­tudes are like­wise in­flu­enced by the spir­i­tu­al at­mos­phere pre­vail­ing in times after com­ple­tion. In di­vine wor­ship the sim­ple old forms are re­placed by an ever more elab­o­rate rit­u­al and an ever greater out­ward dis­play. But inner se­ri­ous­ness is lack­ing in this show of mag­nif­i­cence; human caprice takes the place of con­sci­en­tious obe­di­ence to the di­vine will. How­ev­er, while man sees what is be­fore his eyes, God looks into the heart. There­fore a sim­ple sac­ri­fice of­fered with real piety holds a greater bless­ing than an im­pres­sive ser­vice with­out warmth.

Here in con­clu­sion an­oth­er warn­ing is added. After cross­ing a stream, a man’s head can get into the water only if he is so im­pru­dent as to turn back. As long as he goes for­ward and does not look back, he es­capes this dan­ger. But there is a fas­ci­na­tion in stand­ing still and look­ing back on a peril over­come. How­ev­er, such vain self-ad­mi­ra­tion brings mis­for­tune. It leads only to dan­ger, and un­less one fi­nal­ly re­solves to go for­ward with­out paus­ing, one falls a vic­tim to this dan­ger.