天长地久

Wang Bi (226–249 EC)

James Legge (1891)

Heaven is long-enduring and earth continues long. The reason why heaven and earth are able to endure and continue thus long is that they do not live of, or for, themselves. Therefore the sage puts his own person last, and yet it is found in the foremost place; he treats his person as if it were foreign to him, and yet that person is preserved. Is it not because he has no personal and private ends, that therefore such ends are realised?