‘The superior man has nothing to compete for,’ he’s recorded as saying. ‘But if he must compete, he does it in an archery match, wherein he ascends to his position bowing in deference.’ He ‘does not boast of himself’, preferring instead ‘the concealment of his virtue’; he ‘cultivates a friendly harmony’ and ‘lets the states of equilibrium and harmony exist in perfection’. What Confucius calls the ‘inferior man’, meanwhile, could be a description of his showy Western counterpart. This is a person who understands not ‘righteousness’ but ‘profit’. He is ‘aware of advantage’ and ‘seeks notoriety’
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