Junzi Xunzi 非十二子 Wrong Twelve Zi Embellish Twisted Explanations

'Today's generation is fake... it embellishes twisted explanations of topics that it knows nothing about... its writings are adulterous... its speech spews incoherent claims of sciences and physics that cannot possibly be true of Nature's Way... the multitude are deceived confused stupid... an elegant house built on a precipitous cliff is a confusion of the laws of Nature... in this manner the people do not know right-wrong self-governing... the person's place of confusion is his character!'

Each new generation bemoans the older generation, as the older generation also bemoans the new generation. If an individual lives long enough, he too will bemoan a new generation.

Xunzi's generations were little different than today's generations... all generations have believed in the twisted explanations of their eras' versions of 'science', all generations have adulterous writings, and all generations have done and will continue to do the very things that Xunzi bemoaned.

And of course Xunzi twisted a few explanations himself.

The one item of Xunzi's that stands-out of greatest importance, is the idea of 'right wrong self-govern'. Self-thinking, self-participation in ones own life, and self-choosing of what is right and wrong, are the basics of self-governing. Following the herd, and believing in what the herd believes in, is not self-governing.

He who does not self-govern, he is one of the 'deceived confused stupid multitude'.

Most all known translations of 治 use the idea of 'government rule'. 治 has the idea of 'water, river' + 'private, I, myself, personal' + 'mouth, hole'. Most all known ancient Chinese texts make sense if 治 is translated as a form of 'self-govern' (or even 'cure'), but do not make sense if translated as 'government rule'.

Which part of 'private, I, myself, personal' implies 'other people, public, rulers, governments'?

It is each person's choice, to self-govern, or to self-govern oneself to be governed by other people.

Worthy of a smile is Xunzi's comment of 'embellish'. Embellish embellish, embellishing the embellishing... all academic translations of the ancient Chinese texts embellish embellish. An excellent example is of the 1928 public domain translation by Homer Dubs Ph.D., of whom was a Christian, a Christian missionary, and an Oxford University sinology department employee. Note that Dubs' translation is so extremely embellished, that if it were not for the first few concepts being vaguely related to the original text, it would then appear that Dubs' 'translation' is of a different book entirely. "They take advantage of the present generation ; they gloss over unorthodox teachings ; they beautify evil ideas, so that they make the country wicked and confused ; they are hypocritical and deceitful, paltry and insignificant ; they cause the country to be chaotic, not knowing that there is anyone who preserves the distinction between right and wrong, good and bad government..."

Of whom is worthy of being believed? Oneself, or, to do as the 'deceived confused stupid multitude' have always done, that of believing the embellishing-embellishing twisting-twisting explanations of academicians'?