Cultivating and Viewing
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善建者不拔，善抱者不脫，子孫祭祀不輟。修之於身，其德乃真；修之於家，其德有餘；修之於鄉，其德乃長；修之於國，其德乃豐；修之於天下，其德乃普。故以身觀身，以家觀家，以鄉觀鄉，以國觀國，以天下觀天下。何以知天下之然哉？以此。
One who plants well is not uprooted; one who holds well is not pried loose; and the offerings of children and grandchildren never cease. Cultivate it in yourself, and its virtue will be true; cultivate it in your family, and its virtue will have more than enough. Cultivate it in your village, and its virtue will last long; cultivate it in your country, and its virtue will be rich; cultivate it in the world, and its virtue will be everywhere. So use the self to measure the self, the family to measure the family, the village to measure the village, the country to measure the country, and the world to measure the world. How do I know the world is so? By this.
A ladder of practice from the self to the whole world, each rung measured by its own kind.
The chapter’s test is the honest one: each scale, from the self to the world, is checked against its own kind, like with like, instead of against an outside standard.
Heshang Gong’s own print is inconsistent here, a small sign of the printer’s hand: in the same clause it writes the word for “village” two ways, 以郷觀鄉 (both shown here in the standard form).
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