VOLUME III, SEMESTER 3, CHAPTER 31, SECTION 1
The earliest society, labor flowed whole
The chapters before weighed labor clear. But weighed clear is not enough. One same share of labor, nailed onto one man and forbidden to stir, and free to shift from here to there, are two wholly different worlds. This chapter speaks of the flow of labor. First go back to the earliest society, and look at what it was like when labor could flow whole.
One, first say clear what the flow of labor is
Whether labor flows or not speaks of this one thing: the one share of labor in a man’s hand, the one body of skill, whether it can shift freely from here to there, from this work to that work, from this position to that position.
Take a likeness. You can till the field, and you also wish to go learn to beat iron. In the age where labor flows, you set down the hoe, and you can go to the smithy as an apprentice, and no man bars you. In the age where labor does not flow, your father tills the field, so you must till the field, and to go beat iron there is no door at all, you are nailed onto this position of tilling, your whole life. So too, a slave, the whole body of his force belongs to the master’s ordering, and he himself cannot shift it one bit, and this is labor that cannot flow at all. A man who today can freely change his work, freely learn a new skill, his one share of labor shifts about very freely.
Hold this telling apart. Whether labor can flow settles whether a man, this whole life, is locked to one position, or can, by his own skill, walk to the place he ought to go. This matter is more at the root than the weighing of labor.
Two, the earliest society, labor flowed whole
You may hold that labor flowing free is a thing of very late days, a freedom only the modern society gave. Just the reverse. At man’s earliest, labor flowed whole.
Think of that earliest kind of small small band. A crowd of men together, living by the hunt, by gathering fruit, by taking fish. In here, who goes to hunt, who tends the fire, who gathers fruit, who minds the children, is not nailed down. Today you are strong of body, you go to hunt. Tomorrow you turn your ankle, you stay and tend the fire, and another goes in your place. The thing that can be done, any man can set his hand to. The thing he cannot, watched twice and he can. No man is nailed to one work, and no man holds one work and will not let go. Labor, in this small crowd, flows here and flows there, and flows to wherever it is needed.
Why is the earliest the most flowing. Because the things then were simple. The hunt, the gathering, the tending of fire, are not skills of ten and more years to learn, they are things any sound man can take up. The thing once simple, and a man can fill any position at any time, and labor can shift at any time. That was an age without a threshold, and without a lock. Labor was like water, flowing to wherever is low, filling wherever is short.
Three, the great Way walks, choose the worthy and the able
Such an age, where labor flowed free and each man’s talent was used to the full, the ancestors kept in mind, and gave it a rating of the highest. That most famous passage in the Book of Rites speaks of exactly this. When the great Way walked, all under heaven was held in common, and the worthy and the able were chosen. So runs the line in the Book of Rites, the Movement of the Rites.
Put it plain. When the great Way walked, when that greatest reasoning ran through all under heaven. All under heaven was held in common, all under heaven is the common holding of all under heaven, not the private goods of one house, one surname. The worthy and the able were chosen, choosing and putting men to use went by the worthy and the able. Fix your eye on these four words, choose the worthy and the able. It says that in that ideal age, which position a man could reach went by whether he was worthy, whether he was able, not by who his father was, not by his birth.
Is this not the free flow of labor. You have the skill, and you can be raised to the position you ought to reach. You have not the skill, and you step down. The position stands open to all, and labor can, by the worthy and the able, flow free to the place it ought to go. The Book of Rites calls this the walking of the great Way, and sets it in the highest place. Mark it. The best age in the heart of the ancestors is exactly an age where labor flows free, where every man rises by his own skill. This is on one line with Mozi from before, have the ability and be raised.
Four, but this flowing too has its narrow
Yet do not think the earliest flowing too fair. That it flowed is true. But the reach of its flowing was very narrow, very small.
That small crowd of men, just those few tens, few hundreds. Labor could flow, and it flowed only among these few tens of men, these few simple works. You could shift from the hunt to the tending of fire, but shift as you would, you could not get out of this small ring, and could do nothing complex. Because the things were just those few, and the men just those few. Its flowing was free, but its heaven and earth were sorely small. Like a drop of water in a small bowl, it can shake free, but it cannot shake out of the bowl.
This brings out one deep reasoning. The whole free flow is bound together with the simple, with the small. The thing once simple, and every man can take it up, and labor can of course flow free. But the thing once complex, a skill of ten and more years to learn, and now labor does not flow so easily. You cannot till the field yesterday and run the numerical machine today. The road man walked after was to make the things more and more complex, more and more large, the heaven and earth wider and wider. Yet right in this widening, that earliest, whole flowing was, bit by bit, locked up. The next section goes to look at how labor came to be locked.
Five, what this section set, crossing to the next
Good. This section set two things firm.
The first, what the flow of labor is: the one share of labor in a man’s hand, the one body of skill, whether it can shift freely from this position to that. This matter is more at the root than the weighing of labor, it settles whether a man is locked to a position, or can by his skill walk to the place he ought to go. The second, at man’s earliest society labor flowed whole, because the things were simple and every man could take them up. The ancestors called this age where each man’s talent was used to the full, where the worthy and able were chosen, the walking of the great Way, and set it in the highest place.
The position this section set is: labor flowing free is man’s most ancient state, and the state the ancestors held in the highest regard. Yet it is bound together with the simple, with the small, and its heaven and earth are sorely narrow.
So when man made the things more and more complex, the heaven and earth more and more large, how was that earliest free flow, step by step, locked up. What thing nailed a man to the position he was born into. The next section goes to look at this one lock: standing. And to look at what pried it open.
Credit to the ancestors; the mistakes are mine: Tiger Lyon.
Section 2, Standing nailed labor down, the examination pried one crack