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4.16 The Master said, “A gentleman takes as much trouble to discover what is right as lesser men take to discover what will pay.”
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4.11 The Master (Confucius) said, “Where gentlemen set their hearts upon virtue, the commoners set theirs upon the soil. Where gentlemen think only of punishments, the commoners think only of exemptions.”
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The Master said: “The noble person practices inclusive integrity — they embrace all with impartial care, avoiding factional alliances. The petty person forms exclusive cliques — they bond through self-interest, lacking ethical consistency.