Chinese virtue

Chapter 24 Rende
In China, there have been five virtues since ancient times, and "benevolence" is the first of the five virtues.This Chinese character is composed of two parts, "person" and "two". According to the literal meaning, it seems that the word "benevolence" is used in the communication between two people.

As mentioned above, people speculate that "benevolence" may be a bridge to promote communication between the two, but in fact, the meaning of "benevolence" does not reflect in the life of Chinese people.In fact, many careful people have already understood, so we don't go into this issue.But there are still many people who assert arbitrarily that there is no "benevolence" in Chinese people. This view is completely wrong.Mencius once said: "Everyone has compassion." One of the most influential thoughts on Chinese people is Buddhist thought, and the other is Confucian thought.Buddhism teaches people to be kind, and Confucianism teaches people to be modest.The nature of Chinese people is to be practical, so Chinese people often seize many opportunities to do good deeds and do a lot of good deeds.

There are many charitable organizations in China, such as nursery schools, leprosy hospitals, nursing homes, free schools and so on.We can't really know what kind of charity these shantangs have done, because China has never conducted a decent census.The British priest Li Xiushan once conducted a detailed investigation on Chinese charities. He said that there are currently 8000 charities of different sizes in Hankou City, Hubei Province, and these organizations invest more than [-] pounds each year to do good deeds.

However, China's population is too large, and there are simply not enough charities, especially in big cities, where many such organizations are needed.

Every time a disaster strikes and the people suffer from famine, porridge sheds will be set up in some places to give porridge and clothes to the people.Not only the government, but many rich and noble families among the people will also do such charitable deeds. These Chinese philanthropists have spent a lot of family money for such activities. This behavior is very commendable and really touching.Of course, some places have to do such good deeds, because only by pacifying the panicked victims to the greatest extent, they will not take radical actions, such as grabbing food and stealing.

In addition to the charitable organizations mentioned above, every province in China has set up an organization called "Hometown Association". The corpses of foreigners who died in foreign countries were transported back to their hometowns for burial. This organization has a certain nature of protection, and the Chinese also think it is very good to set up such a protection organization.

There are many books in China that guide people to be good. These books teach people to be responsible for their own good and evil deeds, and to speak out boldly whether they are good or evil.Because the Chinese believe that after a person dies, these things will be recorded in the "Book of Life and Death" in the underworld, and what he did during his lifetime will be repaid in his life in the next life.The Chinese are persistently working hard for the afterlife, because they believe that the afterlife is the expansion and extension of this life.As mentioned in the previous chapters, Chinese people are very practical, so they keep doing good deeds and accumulating virtue, the purpose is to get good rewards when they come.Of course, doing good deeds with clear motives often has unintended consequences.The following example can exactly illustrate this point: In April 1889, the local officials in Hangzhou tried to raise some taxes on the tea in teahouses in order to relieve the victims of the flood.For these people in the ancient city of Hangzhou, this kind of behavior is like the tea tax imposed by Bostonians in 4, which is not a good deed.These officials also issued some announcements, trying to induce the people: "If you do good, you will be rewarded." The government hopes to use this method to gain the support of the people.As a result, the people in the city and the teahouse merchants united to resist this kind of "good deed" imposed on them.It is very rare in China that the whole city resists "good rewards" with the same hatred and hatred.

Among the charitable acts of the Chinese, there are several very common ones.For example, bury abandoned corpses in the wild, buy coffins for poor people who have died, buy some birds and fish to release them, vaccinate the poor for free, give free books to encourage people to do good deeds, and give free plasters to the sick, etc. wait.But, in my opinion, there are very few acts of kindness that are truly done out of kindness.Some people stand by the river and buy all the fish caught by the fishermen and release them. There are many similar practices, and everyone is imitating these "good deeds".Because this kind of kindness itself has no effect on oneself, it is much easier than helping those who come to ask for help to solve their problems.

For the Chinese who value practicality in everything, as long as the released birds and fish are freed, their good deeds will be completed, and it has nothing to do with them if others catch them.Because their good deeds have already been done, these "accumulating virtue" activities do not include the obligation to provide these released creatures with a good living space and ensure their survival.

There is a Chinese saying that goes, "It is difficult to open the door of benevolence; it is even more difficult to close the door of benevolence." What are the results of these good deeds, and what troubles these good deeds will cause themselves, etc. No one can It is expected, so the best thing to do is to carefully do good deeds that don't get you into trouble.There was once a missionary living in China who promised a local gentry to cure cataracts for a blind beggar.When the beggar regained his light, the squires said that the missionary should hire the beggar to visit the church gate because he had cured the blind beggar so that he could no longer beg for sympathy.Also, there are many examples in China of a kind old woman who rarely communicates with others entertains some old women she thinks are nice, and is likely to be deceived by these people in the end.We have to say that not all Chinese people do good deeds from the heart.

There will always be disasters like dams bursting or famines happening in China.When a disaster occurs, government officials always rush to the disaster area to help the suffering people.But they will not take any long-term measures to prevent the recurrence of disasters, but only adopt some palliative methods to solve the immediate problems.Not only that, but their assistance to the victims is also very incomplete, and they often stop assistance at critical times.For example, when spring comes, the bodies of these disaster victims are already weak to a certain extent due to long-term travel and poverty-stricken life, and they are very easy to get sick.At this time, the government does not take any measures to cure the disease, but to give these victims a little money so that they can go back to their hometowns and live as before.The government's reason for doing this is that the disaster relief funds have been distributed. If these victims can return to their hometowns and continue to do farm work, they will no longer have to worry about food during the harvest.But if the victims are still wandering around when the weather gets warmer, they are likely to die from the plague.For the government, a small number of disasters are better than a large number of people dying.

There is also a typical charity activity in China called "Laba Congee".Like other charities, this soup kitchen is only on the surface.On the eighth day of the twelfth month of the lunar calendar, many people who do not have the opportunity to do good deeds will prepare some porridge for charity.

Within a day, they will give the prepared Laba porridge to those who come to beg for porridge.But these porridges are very cheap and very unpalatable.But these don’t matter, for the porridge givers, this kind of activity is just a way to do good deeds.In a good year, even the poor people in the countryside eat better than these porridges, so no one will drink these porridges.However, these "good people" have no intention of exchanging for better porridge. If no one comes to drink porridge for a whole day, they will pour the porridge into broken jars to feed the pigs.For these "good people", no matter whether someone comes to eat or not, they have done a perfect thing, which is enough to prove that he is a benevolent and generous person.If it catches up with the disaster year and the food production drops, these "good people" will not have such kind deeds. When asked the reason, they will reply: "I can't afford charity."

As we said in previous chapters, beggars can be seen almost everywhere in China.Some people give alms to these beggars simply to be able to "insure".These beggars organized a "beggar gang" in the city. This gang is stronger than other fighting forces, because they have no money, and they may even lose their lives at any time, so they have no fear.If a beggar, with "diligence due" like the Geneva arbiter, always begs like a shopkeeper who does not give alms, the shopkeeper will face a large group of victims and beggars.And the beggars will continue to raise their requirements, if not satisfied, the shopkeeper will not be able to do business.These businessmen know what the result of rejecting beggars is, so there are always people giving charity to these beggars.

Disaster victims are also often given alms by people.In the examples mentioned above, we should be able to find that the purpose of Chinese people's charity is not to really want to help others, but to get rewards for the givers themselves.Those who do good deeds are only doing things for a better life in the future.

When it comes to the shortcomings of Chinese charitable activities, we have to pay attention, no matter how urgent the matter is, no matter how big the disaster is, the relief materials will be exploited and squeezed by the declining Chinese government.These exploitative departments have careful plans, so evidence of these misappropriation of disaster funds is difficult to find.Even if the situation is very critical, such as a large-scale famine, these government departments will ignore the suffering people and collect the relief money into their own pockets.

And people's attention is all attracted by the disaster situation and the victims, and they will not pay attention to the situation of disaster relief materials at all.The common people don't know how much the disaster relief funds are, and they don't know where they are used. In this case, the result is obvious.

Chinese people's understanding of Western civilization is basically all the bad aspects, and they know very little about the good aspects.For the Chinese, it is a very remarkable thing that Christian charities are spread all over the world.Perhaps many Chinese people will guess what the purpose behind these charities is.Maybe the Chinese will finally notice that the character "仁" does not use "heart" as the radical like other characters expressing emotion. It has neither "vertical heart side" nor "heart character bottom".

Therefore, Chinese people's "benevolence" does not come from the heart, and we have already seen the results of this.

The Chinese don't understand that charity should be an "instinct", a kind of activity from the heart, rather than doing some good deeds for a certain purpose.Chinese people will only truly understand "benevolence" and do real "good deeds" only after a long period of subtle influence.

(End of this chapter)