Judge Someone By His Appearance--Yi Mao Qu Ren

In Spring and Autumn Period, there lived a young man named Zi Yu 字羽.

Single- hearted devotion--Zhuan Xin Zhi Zhi

The Chinese of this idiom story "Single- hearted devotion--Zhuan Xin Zhi Zhi" is 专心致志， and Pin Yin is zhuān xīn zhì zhì.

The Chinese Pot Calling Kettle Black--五十步笑百步

Mencius said to King Hui, "Let's use fighting of a battle as an example. After a fierce engagement, the soldiers threw down their armament and retreated. 

Perfectly Fair and Impartial --Da Gong Wu Si

The Chinese of idiom Perfectly Fair and Impartial --Da Gong Wu Si is 大公无私， Pin Yin dà gōng wú sī。

Confucian Temple and Confucian Grove

Read Buy The Box And Return The Pearls Inside--Mai Du Huan Zhu

More Chinese Stories, Chinese Love Story, and Chinese Fable at Chinese story online，英语故事 

Confucian Temple stands in Qufu City, Shandong Province. It is an an-cestral temple built as a place to offer sacrifices to Confucius,  the famous thinker and educator in ancient China.
Confucius (551 - 479 B. C. ) was from Lu Dukedom in the Later Spring and Autumn Period. His theory on morality, ethics and education has influ-enced not only Chinese educators for over thousands of years but has also af-fected the whole world. Nearly all the Chinese emperors, scholars and histori-ans through the ages worshipped Confucius. Hence, a large-scale Confucian Temple, together with Confucian Mansion, a group of buildings for Confu-cius' later generation and Confucian Groves, his clan cemetery, was built in Confucius' hometown, the capital of the Lu Dukedom. Confucius Temple is one of the three largest ancient building groups which are kept in good condi-tion at this time.

Judge A Person By His Appearance

The Chinese of Judge A Person By His Appearance--Yi Mao Qu Ren is 以貌取人, Pin Yin yǐ mào qǔ rén.
Confucius had many students. It was said that he had more than three thousands students, seventy two of who were capable and virtuous gentlemen. Of course, there were also some bad students. Zai Yu was one of them.
Zai Yu was a good-looking man from state Lu, the home state of Confucius. He was a facile speaker, which impressed Confucius so deeply that the sage even expected him to become a better scholar than Zi Gong, a famous student of Confucius's, at their first meeting. In later years, however, Zai Yu gradually showed his true color: lack of moral and love, and lazy (He slept while other student studying hard).
Even a great educator like Confucius did not know how to teach him. After several times of failure of instructing, Confucius made the famous comment used by later teaches for thousands of years on Zai Yu: "You cannot carve on the mouldered wood", that is, Fools grow without watering in English saying.
Another mistake that Confucius made on judging students was that he overestimated Zi Yu, a student also from state Lu, whose name was Zhan Tai Mei Ming and Courtesy name was Zi Yu, and who was 39 years younger than Confucius.
When Zi Yu came to Confucius and asked to be a student of his, the sage, seeing the ugly face and body of Zi Yu, thought that he had no gift to be a good scholar. Yet, to Confucius's surprise and delight, Zi Yu studied extremely hard and was very good at applying knowledge that he learned from his teacher to real life. At the end of three years, because of his diligence, he exceeded his classmates in both his moral and academic accomplishments.
After returning to his hometown, he soon won the respect of people from all walks of life. When he was invited to give lectures in state Wu, more than three hundreds students followed him everywhere he went. His name was even heard by the rulers of the most influential states.
Learning of this, Confucius was euphoric about his student, but at the same time felt sorry for making a flawed assessment of him at first. He often said to his other students:" Judging a talent by his speech, I was wrong on Zai Yu; Judging a talent by appearance, I am wrong on Zi Yu ".

Background and Writer Comment:

The idiom of Judge A Person By His Appearance--Yi Mao Qu Ren has the same meaning and usage as its English counterpart: "Judge a book by its cover".

The Story of Confucius Two--Retrieve Horse

One day, Confucius went out for a tour. While he were having a rest, his horse run away and ate a farmer's crop in the field. The angry farmer caught the horse and locked it in his yard. After knowing what happened, Confucius asked Zi Gong.