1. The great learning (adult study, grinding the corn in the head's mortar to fit use) takes root in clarifying the way wherein the intelligence increases through the process of looking straight into one's heart and acting on the results; it's rooted in watching with affection the way people grow; it is rooted in coming to rest, being at ease in perfect equity.
2. Know the point of rest and then have an orderly procedure; having this orderly procedure one can "grasp the azure", that is, take hold of a clear concept; holding a clear concept one can be at peace (internally), being thus calm one can keep one's head in moments of danger; he who can keep his head in the presence of a tiger is qualified to come to his deed in due hour.
3. Things have roots and branches; affairs have scopes and beginnings. To know what precedes and what follows, is nearly as good as having a head and feet.
4. The men of old wanting to clarify and diffuse thorughout the empire that light which comes from looking straight into the heart and then acting, first set up good government in their own states; wanting good government in their states , they fisrt established order in their families; wnating order in their home, they fisrt diciplined themselves; desiring self discipline , they rectified their own hearts; and wanting to rectify their hearts, they sought precise verbal definitions of their inarticulate thoughts (the tones given off by the heart); whishing to attain precise verbal definitions, they set to extend their knowledge to the utmost. This completion of knowledge is rooted in sorting things into organic categories.
5. when things have been classified in organic categories, knowledge moved toward fulfillment; given the extreme knowable points, the inarticulate thoughts were defined with precision (the sun's lance coming to rest on the precise spot verbally). Having attained this precise verbal definition (aliter, this sincerity), they then stabilized their hearts, they disciplined them selves; having attained self-discipline, they set their own houses in order, having order in their homes, they brought good government to their own states; and when their states were well governed, the empire was brought to an equilibrium.
6. From the Emperor, Sun of eaven, down to common man, singly and all together, this self discipline is the root.
7. If the root be in confusion, nothing will be well governed. The solid cannot be swept away as trivial, nor can trash be established as solid. It just doesn't happen. "take not cliff for morass and treacherous bramble."
The great learning, Confucio traduzido por Ezra Pound. Para sentir na liberdade da escuta inspirada por Cornelius Cardew.
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