VOLUME VI, CHAPTER 5, SECTION 12

VOLUME VI, CHAPTER 5, SECTION 12

There Are Plenty of Good People to Step In, and the Law Is Not Piled High

The sections before invited the illiterate-in-the-law out of the door of holding the law, that iron of barred for life, and set up the rule for choosing the one who holds the law going forward, resting on that heart, hold a license, be reviewed yearly, be reforged. This section undoes your last solid worry, invite the illiterate-in-the-law all out, choose so strictly besides, and those positions holding the ruler, who fills them? Left empty? There is not the least need to fret, there are plenty of good people, lined up. And then it tells a thing about the law itself, that the law is not piled high, but laid down few and clear, lighting the exact spot.

This worry of yours is, invite the illiterate-in-the-law out of the door of holding the law, choose the one who holds the law going forward by that heart, so strictly, and those positions holding the ruler, who fills them? And besides, it was said, the honest, the ones who read the intent, were all along crowded out by the machine, so where are there ready people who read the intent to hold the law? There is not the least need to fret. There are plenty of good people, lined up, waiting to step in. And it is precisely because there is this batch that those hardest irons of the sections before can be welded dead.

Where do these good people come from? The same as the fourth chapter, look back at that fire of the first volume, this great AI turning, how many people it culled off their former posts. Among them there are plenty of good people, of character, of that heart, solid and clean. It is not that they are of no use, it is that the work they used to do was taken over by AI, and they, the person, their character, that heart, are not the least diminished. So this batch of good people, of character, of that heart, for a time without a post, serves as the reserve.

And among them, and among the honest all along crowded out of the legal machine, there are exactly the ones fit to hold the law. Those who read the intent, whose eyes fall first on the living person, who hold that intent of protecting people. In their day they could not recite the dead letter as fast as the others, and by that way of testing the letter, were counted less able, crowded out, pressed down. Now the choosing rests not on testing the letter but on that heart, and exactly these, with that heart, that read the intent, can be chosen in, get a license, and step into those positions holding the ruler.

You see, with this, the difficulties on both ends are undone together. That fire of the first volume culled a batch of good people, fretting over how to settle them. This chapter invites out a batch of the illiterate-in-the-law, frees up a batch of positions holding the ruler, fretting over who fills them. Join the two ends, and the good people culled, and the honest who read the intent long crowded out, exactly fill the freed positions. The difficulty on one end undoes the difficulty on the other. This is that same wondrous joining as the fourth chapter, the person with no post filling the position with no person, two fretful deadknots canceling each other.

And it is precisely because there is this batch lined up, talent more than can be used, that those irons before can be welded dead. If there were no one to replace them, that iron of barred for life could not be set hard, invite them all out and no one to hold the law, and only to invite the dead-letter ones back. But now there are plenty of good people who read the intent, lined up, and you may as well invite the illiterate-in-the-law all out, with no fear of no one to take over, and that iron of barred for life stands.

And more, with this, that force of the honest being crowded out is bent around. Before, the machine tested the letter, and the dead-letter ones rose, and the ones who read the intent were crowded out. Now, the choosing rests on that heart, on reading the intent, and the ones who read the intent, hold that heart, can rise, sit into the positions they ought to sit in. Those who read the intent, pressed down in their day, unable to rise, can now, by that heart, rise up aboveboard. Test-the-letter-and-you-rise is bent into read-the-intent-and-you-rise. This one bending, and that machine, at the root, is changed, and the ones it chooses up are no longer the dead-letter ones, but the ones carrying that heart, reading the intent. The people in the machine are changed a crop, and that ruler of the law turns back, of itself, to protecting people.

With who-fills-the-positions eased, let me tell one more thing about the law itself, how it ought to be laid down. Here is where this chapter differs most from the way of the world. The way of the world is to pile the law high. The more tangled things get, the more clauses are added, one supplement on another, one rule on another, until the law books are piled into mountains, and no ordinary person can read to the end of them, and even the ones who hold the law cannot hold them all. And the more it is piled, the more corners there are for the dead-letter ones to pick at, the more cracks for the harming of people to hide in. Piling the law high does not protect people better, it gives the illiterate-in-the-law more dead letter to hold, more corners to harm people from.

This book does not pile the law high. It lays the law down few, and clear. Not a heap piled high, but a few lines that light the exact spot. Lay down plain, clear, that people-protecting bottom line, few lines, that every ordinary person can read, can understand, can see where the line is, and every one who holds the law can hold in his heart, measure by. Where the intent is clear and the line is plain, a few lines are enough to protect people well, and there is no need for those mountains of clauses.

Why few and clear, rather than piled high? Follow the reasoning. The intent of the law is to protect people, and it leads people to keep themselves in check. To keep himself in check, a person has to first see the line clear. A few clear lines, and everyone sees where the line is, and keeps to it of himself. Mountains of clauses, and no one can see the line clear, and to keep oneself in check is out of the question, and instead it gives the dead-letter ones endless corners to harm people from. So laying the law few and clear is not laying it thin, it is laying it so that it can truly lead people to keep themselves in check, truly protect people. This joins the whole book, the highest reach of the law is that there is next to no need for it, everyone with character keeps himself in check. The fewer and clearer the law, the more it can pair with character, and lead people to keep themselves in check of themselves, and the closer it draws to that highest reach. Pile it high, and it goes the other way, the thicker the law, the more the harming of people, the more character is not raised, and the farther from that highest reach.

So the law is laid down few and clear, lighting the exact spot, and not piled into a heap. This is again that turn of the way of telling at the head of this chapter, from the warm, wide great principle onto the precise line. The law is exactly a few precise lines, each lighting an exact spot of the people-protecting bottom line, clear, plain, that everyone sees and keeps to. Not a mountain of clauses, murky, tangled, that no one can see to the end of, and that gives the harming of people its cover.

This section, then, eases two things. There are plenty of good people who read the intent, lined up to step in, so that iron of barred for life stands, and read-the-intent-and-you-rise is bent in. And the law is laid down few and clear, lighting the exact spot, not piled high, so that everyone sees the line and keeps himself in check, and the dead-letter ones lose their corners. The next section takes up the heaviest, warmest thing of this chapter, the ones already harmed by that chain, the ground, the crushed, the robbed, the hounded, how they are saved, given back, cleared, remembered, healed, and not one left out.

Credit to the ancestors; the mistakes are mine: Tiger Lyon.