Monday, January 15, 2007

A Small King

More than 2,000 years ago, there was a small country next to the Han Dynasty in ancient China. One day an ambassador of the Han went to see the king of that country. The king asked the ambassador one naive question:

Which is the larger country, mine or yours?

Then the ambassador said nothing.

This is the king who doesn't know the world. Who is the person like that king in our world?

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

WHO?

Anonymous said...

I had never heard this parable before. Very good. Reminds us not to be supercilious.

Taro said...

Dear Anonymouses,

Thank you for your comments. This parable is from the very large history book, Shiji, written by Si Ma Qian, one of the most respected and the greatest historians in the world. See the detail, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sima_Qian

Yes, I here want to say that we always have to remind us not to be supercilious. Because I would like this lesson to be one of the themes in my blog, I introduced it to you.

By the way, the old parables from China are very interesting. I like them very much. When I see them, I often think the the history of China is great.