Confucius: Doing

Confucius was Chinese teacher, editor, politician, and philosopher. Explore interesting quotes on doing.
Confucius: 538   quotes 94   likes

“Don't do unto others what you don't want done unto you.”

Confucius

Variant: What you do not want done to yourself, do not do to others.
Source: The Analects, Other chapters, Chapter XVː23

“I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand.”

Confucius

Xunzi in the Xunzi (book)
Misattributed, Chinese

Understanding , Forgetting

“I do not open up the truth to one who is not eager to get knowledge, nor help out any one who is not anxious to explain himself.”

Confucius

§ 7
The Analects, Chapter I, Chapter VII
Context: I do not open up the truth to one who is not eager to get knowledge, nor help out any one who is not anxious to explain himself. When I have presented one corner of a subject to any one, and he cannot from it learn the other three, I do not repeat my lesson.

Truth , Knowledge , Help

“It is only he who is possessed of the most complete sincerity that can exist under heaven, who can give its full development to his nature. Able to give its full development to his own nature, he can do the same to the nature of other men.”

Confucius

The Analects, The Doctrine of the Mean
Context: It is only he who is possessed of the most complete sincerity that can exist under heaven, who can give its full development to his nature. Able to give its full development to his own nature, he can do the same to the nature of other men. Able to give its full development to the nature of other men, he can give their full development to the natures of animals and things. Able to give their full development to the natures of creatures and things, he can assist the transforming and nourishing powers of Heaven and Earth. Able to assist the transforming and nourishing powers of Heaven and Earth, he may with Heaven and Earth form a ternion.

Men , Nature , Sincerity

“To see what is right and not do it is the worst cowardice.”

Confucius

The Analects, Chapter I, Chapter II
Variant: To see what is right, and not to do it, is want of courage or of principle.
Context: To worship to other than one's own ancestral spirits is brown-nosing. If you see what is right and fail to act on it, you lack courage.
Variant To see what is right, and not to do it, is want of courage or of principle.

“A youth is to be regarded with respect. How do we know that his future will not be equal to our present?”

Confucius

Source: The Life and Wisdom of Confucius

Youth , Future

“If you don't want to do something, don't impose on others”

Confucius

“When a person should be spoken with, and you don't speak with them, you lose them. When a person shouldn't be spoken with and you speak to them, you waste your breath. The wise do not lose people, nor do they waste their breath.”

Confucius
People , Personality

“When you have faults, do not fear to abandon them.”

Confucius

Source: The Analects, Other chapters

Fear

“If there were an honorable way to get rich, I’d do it, even if it meant being a stooge standing around with a whip. But there isn’t an honorable way, so I just do what I like.”

Confucius book Analects

Source: Analects of Confucius

Way

“Tsze-Kung asked, “Is there one word with which to act in accordance throughout a lifetime?” The Master said, “Is not reciprocity such a word? What you do not want done to yourself, do not do to others.”

Confucius

Source: The Analects

“It is soft, smooth and shining—like intelligence. Its edges seem sharp but do not cut—like justice. It hangs down to the ground—like humility. When struck, it gives a clear, ringing sound—like music. The strains in it are not hidden and add to its beauty—like truthfulness.’ What imagination!”

Confucius

Confucius extolled Jade's virtues this way. Cited in Awake! magazine 1987, 9/22.
Source: The Analects, Other chapters

Truth , Justice , Beauty , Music

“To know that we know what we know, and that we do not know what we do not know, that is true knowledge.”

Confucius

As quoted in Walden (1854) by Henry David Thoreau, Ch. 1
Attributed

Knowledge

“When one cultivates to the utmost the principles of his nature, and exercises them on the principle of reciprocity, he is not far from the path. What you do not like when done to yourself, do not do to others.”

Confucius

Source: The Doctrine of the Mean

Exercises , Nature

“Only after Winter comes do we know that the pine and the cypress are the last to fade.”

Confucius

Source: The Analects, Other chapters

Winter

“How abundantly do spiritual beings display the powers that belong to them! We look for them, but do not see them; we listen to, but do not hear them; yet they enter into all things, and there is nothing without them.”

Confucius

Source: The Doctrine of the Mean