Although Shang Yang himself was counterattacked by the conservative forces after the death of Qin Xiaogong, which led to the destruction of his clan, the results of his reforms have been preserved and eventually led Qin to unify the world.
In the process of reading history, I especially like this passage from Shang Yang:
Doubtful deeds have no name, and doubtful deeds have no merit. Moreover, those who have the behavior of an expert will definitely see things that are not in the world; those who have the worry of knowing alone will definitely see themselves as a disadvantage to the people. Fools hide things before they happen, and wise people see things before they happen. People cannot start with worry but can succeed with success. Regarding the most virtuous person, he will not be in harmony with the common people, and the person who achieves great success will not seek publicity. Therefore, the sage can only strengthen the country without following the rules; he can only benefit the people without following the rules.
If you can observe carefully, you will find that various phenomena occurring in modern society all confirm that Shang Yang is correct. What Shang Yang said more than 2,000 years ago will not be outdated today.
Because what he exposes is human nature, and human nature has never changed for thousands of years.
In this passage, the most important ones are the following three sentences.
The first sentence is, Those who have the wisdom of being an expert will definitely have views that are not in the world; those who have the concern of knowing alone will surely benefit the people.
This sentence means that people who behave above ordinary people will definitely be criticized by the world, and people who have unique insights will definitely encounter ridicule from the people.
In the world, most people are mediocre people, a few people are smart and outstanding people, and only a handful of people are geniuses.
The general public often does not understand, follow and admire the behaviors and thoughts of geniuses and smart people that are beyond ordinary people. Instead, they regard them as weirdos or even heretics, and there is a lot of discussion about what they do.
For example, in the 1990s, Jack Ma's promotion of Chinese Yellow Pages was frequently rejected. In the Middle Ages, Copernicus was burned to death by the church for claiming heliocentrism.
Shang Yang also encountered the same situation, "In the year of the Min period, the Qin people said that those who were inconvenienced by the original order numbered thousands."
Isn't the decree promulgated by Shang Yang detrimental to the strength of Qin? Isn't it a good law? However, in the early stages of the implementation of the law, the people did not feel good about it at first. Instead, they found it very inconvenient and uncomfortable, and they went to the capital to oppose it.
To give another example, Geng Yanbo, the former mayor of Datong City, Shanxi Province, has a high reputation among the people. In the eyes of many ordinary people, he is a good official who does practical things.
But he has also been controversial.
In 1995, not long after Geng Yanbo took office as the county magistrate of Lingshi County, he made a surprising decision to invest 50 million yuan to repair the Wang Family Courtyard.
The 50 million yuan at that time was not a small sum, accounting for half of the fiscal revenue of Lingshi County at that time.
Regarding this, the cadres and the masses at the time expressed doubts. They believed that County Magistrate Geng left the coal resources undeveloped and spent so much money to repair a dilapidated Wang family compound. It was a waste of people and money.
Some veteran cadres even went to the Commission for Discipline Inspection to file a complaint against him.
However, with Geng Yanbo’s insistence, the Wang Family Courtyard was restored, recreating the style of the Shanxi merchant residence and becoming a business card of Lingshi County.
Later, when the coal mining industry gradually declined, the Wang Family Courtyard could bring tens of millions of yuan in income to Lingshi County every year, becoming an inexhaustible "gold mine."
His actions and thoughts were not understood by people at the time, but the development of the times proved him correct.
The second sentence is, The fool hides in success, and the wise sees in the beginning.
This sentence means that stupid people don’t understand why things happen after they happen, but smart people foresee the results when things just sprout.
This shows that most people have no ability to foresee everything in this world, and only a few people can truly be far-sighted.
For example, I saw a question on Zhihu before: " The Battle of Stalingrad Why was the Battle of Stalingrad the turning point of the Second World War?
It has been more than 80 years since the Battle of Stalingrad, but many people still don't understand why the Battle of Stalingrad was the turning point of the Second World War.
And in Just after the Battle of Stalingrad, Chairman Mao wrote an article titled "The Turning Point of World War II", which discussed in detail why the Battle of Stalingrad was the turning point of World War II .
At that time, there were still three years before the end of and during World War II.
At that time, politicians, newspapers and public opinion in various European and American countries failed to recognize that the Battle of Stalingrad was the turning point of World War II, and only regarded it as a turning point in World War II. Compared to battle battle of verdun .
Therefore, Chairman Mao concluded at the Seventh National Congress of the Communist Party of China:
Sitting on the podium, if you can't see anything, you cannot be called a leader. Sitting on the command podium, I only see a large number of common things that have appeared on the horizon. They are ordinary and cannot be counted. leadership. Only when a large number of obvious things have not yet appeared, when the mast top has just been exposed, can you see that this is going to develop into a large number of general things, and can grasp it, this is called leadership.
This is the most vivid comment of "Those who know are not yet cute" . The third sentence of
is, People cannot start with worry but can succeed with success.
This sentence means that ordinary people will not consider the beginning of things, but will only enjoy the fruits of their success.
For example, suppose you are the head teacher of a certain class and you want to improve the grades of your classmates, so you develop a study plan that requires you to get up half an hour early to endorse, complete homework strictly, do not get distracted in class, organize exams frequently, etc.
Obviously, this is conducive to improving academic performance.
But when you first implement it, you will definitely hear a lot of complaints and objections from students, and some students will resist it in action.
But you remained unmoved and persisted in implementing it. By the time of the final exam, the scores of most students in the class had improved significantly, and the class ranking jumped to first in the grade.
At this time, those who initially opposed and complained Your classmates will give you a thumbs up and praise you for your wise decision.
This is the principle that "people cannot start with worries but can succeed with success", because human nature is like this, seeking advantages and avoiding disadvantages. There is dependence on short-term interests, doubts about future interests, and it is impossible to give up short-term interests in exchange for long-term interests. Examples like
exist all the time.
For example, in the past few years of epidemic prevention and control, whenever a community is blocked , when the whole city presses the pause button, there are always many people complaining, objecting and scolding because they feel uncomfortable being locked up at home without leaving the house.
But when it is successfully cleared and the smell of fireworks in the streets returns, the masses will cheer and praise the silent success again.
Also, when the transportation department was building roads and bridges, many people complained that the sky was full of dust and it was inconvenient to cross the road. After it is repaired, they will say: "This road is really easy to walk on." ”
Everyone actually knows that it will be better if roads and bridges are built, but when interests are damaged, they can’t help but complain and vent their emotions.
Human nature is like this.
