Lingshu · On Courage

The text

The Yellow Emperor asked Shao Yu: Here are people walking together, standing together, equal in years, young or old, even in the thickness of their clothes. Suddenly they meet a fierce wind and a violent rain. Some fall ill, some do not; or all fall ill, or none fall ill. What is the reason? Shao Yu said: What in the Emperor's question is most urgent? The Yellow Emperor said: I wish to hear it all. Shao Yu said: In spring, a green wind; in summer, a yang wind; in autumn, a cool wind; in winter, a cold wind. Of the winds of these four seasons, the illnesses they make are each of a different form. The Yellow Emperor said: How do the winds of the four seasons make a person ill? Shao Yu said: Yellow color, thin skin, weak flesh — they cannot bear the empty wind of spring. White color, thin skin, weak flesh — they cannot bear the empty wind of summer. Green color, thin skin, weak flesh — they cannot bear the empty wind of autumn. Red color, thin skin, weak flesh — they cannot bear the empty wind of winter. The Yellow Emperor said: Does black color not fall ill? Shao Yu said: Black color with thick skin and firm flesh is surely not wounded by the winds of the four seasons. If the skin is thin and the flesh not firm, and the color is not one, then when long-summer arrives and there is empty wind, they fall ill. If the skin is thick and the flesh firm, when long-summer arrives and there is empty wind, they do not fall ill. Those of thick skin and firm flesh must be doubly struck by cold — outer and inner both so — and then they fall ill. The Yellow Emperor said: Good. The Yellow Emperor said: That a person endures pain or does not endure pain is not the divide of courage and cowardice. A brave man who does not endure pain: seeing difficulty, he goes forward; seeing pain, he stops. A coward who endures pain: hearing of difficulty, he fears; meeting pain, he does not move. A brave man who endures pain: seeing difficulty, he does not fear; meeting pain, he does not move. A coward who does not endure pain: seeing difficulty and pain, the eyes turn and the face looks about; he is too afraid to speak; qi is lost, he is startled; the color of the face changes; now as if dead, now as if alive. I have seen it so, and do not know from what it comes. I wish to hear the reason. Shao Yu said: Enduring pain and not enduring pain is the divide of skin thick or thin, flesh firm or brittle, slack or tight. It is not a matter of courage and cowardice. The Yellow Emperor said: I wish to hear from what courage and cowardice come. Shao Yu said: The brave man: eyes deep and fixed; the gaze long, rushing, thrown straight out; the grain of the triple burner runs crosswise; the heart is upright and straight; the liver is large and firm; the gallbladder is full and braced beside it. In anger, qi is full and the chest spreads; the liver rises and the gallbladder lies across; the canthi split and the eyes lift; the hairs rise and the face turns ashen. This is from what the brave man comes. The Yellow Emperor said: I wish to hear from what the coward comes. Shao Yu said: The coward: eyes large and not held in; yin and yang lose each other; the grain of the burner runs lengthwise; the breastbone prominence is short and small; the liver's tether is slack; the gallbladder is not full and hangs loose; the intestines and stomach stand out; below the flanks there is emptiness. Even in a great anger, qi cannot fill the chest. Liver and lung may rise, but qi declines and sinks again, so he cannot stay angry long. This is from what the coward comes. The Yellow Emperor said: When a coward gets wine, his anger does not yield to the brave man's — which zang makes it so? Shao Yu said: Wine is the jing of water and grain, the fluid of cooked grain. Its qi is fierce and swift. When it enters the stomach, the stomach swells and qi rises against the current, filling the chest; the liver floats and the gallbladder lies across. In that moment he is indeed like the brave. When qi declines he regrets. Of the same kind as the brave, he does not know to yield — this is called wine-defiance.

The line

Shao Yu said: The brave man: eyes deep and fixed; the gaze long, rushing, thrown straight out; the grain of the triple burner runs crosswise; the heart is upright and straight; the liver is large and firm; the gallbladder is full and braced beside it.

The note

The same sudden storm: one is brave, one is afraid. Courage is not a slogan. It is in the liver and the eyes, in whether qi fills the chest. Courage, too, is a way of moving.