When kindness loses its principles, it may be worse than evil
Socrates said: Ignorance is immorality.
—The good of ignorance is not true good.
-1- Blind kindness is “ignorance and ignorance”
In life, we often meet such people. Many people always go to release the tortoises in groups, put the tortoises into the water, and drown them alive. The release of poisonous snakes resulted in other people being bitten; the release of many animals from other places resulted in damage to local species and affected the ecological environment.
There are always some people who, after hearing about some folk remedies, recommend them to patients everywhere as if they have found a treasure.
I thought that what I gave was full of hope, but what the patient got in the end was great despair.
-2- Blind kindness is “moral kidnapping”
There is such a passage in “Journey to the West: Conquering the Demons”:
After a villager was eaten by a monster, the priest grabbed a hideous fish and said, “This is the monster that eats people.”
Xuanzang told the villagers: “This is not the murderer.”
The Taoist priest scolded righteously: “A good father was killed by a monster, and you still say such things, you…you are a bastard.”
The victim’s wife was extremely angry: “Have you ever killed your husband?”
So, the angry villagers hang Tang Seng up.
When kindness becomes compulsion, it is no longer kindness. It is in the name of love that human beings have committed countless crimes. As Luo Xiang said: “Sometimes it is good wishes that lead people to hell on earth.”
True kindness should be enlightenment and tolerance, not “I am right, you must listen to me”.
-3- Blind kindness is “no distinction between right and wrong”
Things like this happen to us every day:
Your roommate took away your money for no reason. When you are angry, someone will always stand up and say: “Oh, he may be in a hurry, don’t be so stingy.”
You are often bruised and swollen by your husband, and when you propose divorce, someone will always stand up and say: “For the sake of the child, please bear with it!”
After the hateful traffickers are caught, when you clap your hands and applaud, someone will always stand up and say, “It’s all because of poverty, otherwise, who would want to do such a thing?”
This kind of false virgin who does not distinguish between right and wrong has excessive sympathy for everything, ignores logic, facts, and justice, and praises unprincipled giving and forgiveness. This kind of unprincipled kindness is the greatest “evil” in the world. Its harm is that it not only confuses the public’s correct judgment on things, but also encourages real evil.
Hayek said: “When goodness loses its principle, it may be worse than evil.”
-4- Blind kindness is “stupid masochism”
After graduating from university, Xiaoying shared a flat with her female colleague. But that girl was spoiled and spoiled since she was a child, and from the first day of the co-rental, Xiaoying played the role of an old lady. And that girl doesn’t buy vegetables, cook, wash dishes, or clean the room, just like a princess.
Once, Xiaoying fell ill and lay in bed for three days, and the house was in chaos for three days. On the fourth day, Xiaoying couldn’t bear it anymore, got up and cleaned the house, and washed the dishes. Two hours later, the girl came back with takeaway, and after finishing eating, she threw the dishes and chopsticks into the sink again with a bang.
Xiaoying finally lost her temper. As a result, the girl went around telling others that Xiaoying was so unreasonable that she couldn’t tolerate even such a small matter.
Xiaoying burst into tears with anger. I said to her: You have suffered because of yourself.
This kindness is to pay for other people’s shamelessness.
Bo Bonnie said: “Kindness is very precious, but kindness does not grow teeth, that is weakness.”
There is nothing wrong with kindness, but it cannot be bottomless. If you have no bottom line, he has no principles.
This is how power is born, and so is arrogance. All the condescension and all the bullying came about in this way.
The kinder the person, the higher the bottom line. Before things go bad, learn to moderate “zero tolerance”.
-5- Advanced kindness is a kind of wisdom
What should goodness be?
The baby turtle crawled to the beach and was attacked by a seagull. A kind man drives the seagulls away and releases the baby turtles into the sea. The other little turtles got the wrong safety signal and rushed out of the nest. As a result, a large group of seagulls were besieged, and the little turtles were destroyed.
Is this person doing good or evil?
High-level kindness is a kind of wisdom, and it is the best choice to make after a complete cognition of the basic facts of things and a detailed examination of the development laws of things.
To be a kind person, but also to be a wise person. Goodness without wisdom sometimes becomes an accomplice to evil. What is kinder than kindness is wisdom.
-6- Advanced kindness is an ability
“Book of Jin” records: Xi Chao, a minister of the Eastern Jin Dynasty, and his father, Xi Min, have very different personalities. Xi Chao formed an alliance with General Huan Wen to seek imperial power. Because his father was loyal to the royal family, he didn’t dare to let his father know.
Xi Chao was critically ill. Knowing that he would die soon, he took out a book box and handed it to his disciples: “If my father is too sad, I will give the book box to him.”
After Xi Chao’s death, Xi Min really became ill with grief, so his disciples handed over the bookcase to Xi Yin, who opened it and found that it contained the letters of Xi Chao and Huan Wen’s conspiracy for imperial power.
Xi Yin was so angry that he jumped up and cursed, and never missed Xi Chao again, and his illness was cured suddenly.
Xi Chao saved his father’s serious illness at the least cost.
That’s what advanced kindness is — it’s not a self-harm, it’s a capability. It is not only the ability to understand the pain of others as pain, but also the ability not to be infected by the kindness of low IQ, not only the ability to put yourself in the shoes of others, but also the ability to deeply understand the evil of human nature. The ability to build on the pain of others is the ability to save others from drowning without drowning yourself.
Socrates said: An ignorant person is not qualified to do good. Ignorant kindness has only the cloak of kindness and lacks the core of kindness. It may not only encourage evil, but also harm itself.
-7- Superior kindness is a vision
During the Spring and Autumn Period, the State of Lu stipulated: “Anyone who travels abroad and sees a Lu State being enslaved abroad can spend money to redeem him, and can go to the treasury for reimbursement after returning home.”
Zigong, a disciple of Confucius, saw Lu people as slaves outside, so he redeemed them with money, but he did not go to the treasury for reimbursement. Many people praised Zi Gong for his noble character. When Confucius found out, he scolded Zi Gong.
Others find it strange: “Isn’t it noble to redeem someone without paying the debt?”
Confucius said: “It’s wrong. Zigong’s actions will lead to more slaves being unable to be redeemed. In the future, when others see Lu people as slaves, they will think this way: ‘After I redeemed them, if I go to pay the debt, my character will not be as good as Zigong. If I don’t pay the debt Well, I can’t afford it.’ So I had to pretend to be deaf and dumb and not to redeem people. Zi Gong’s practice of not paying the debt is actually preventing more slaves from being redeemed, which is harmful.”
That’s what advanced kindness is all about—everything is viewed from many angles. Not only from my own point of view, but also from the point of view of others, and even consider whether there will be a chain reaction of mistakes after doing things. Then it is possible to do one thing best, or to spread true knowledge to others.
Wang Meng said: “Kindness is a kind of vision.”
Society’s greatest enemies are not smart bad guys. Increase the cost of doing evil, and the bad guys will have their own constraints; increase the weight of cooperation, and the bad guys will choose. The most frightening thing is precisely the large number of “good people” who lack common sense, foresight, and wisdom.
The greatest evil in the world often runs rampant in the name of kindness. A Western proverb says: The road to hell is often paved with stones of good intentions.
In this world, there is never a lack of overflowing kindness, but what is lacking is reason and restraint. When kindness runs rampant in the world without principle and restraint, it will become the greatest evil, because it has created countless villains in the name of kindness.
-8-
Your kindness has to be sharp
Be kind, but not blindly kind. Russell said: “If reason does not exist, goodness is meaningless.”
So take care of your kindness, it is better to let it bloom roses and protect its beauty with thorns. As Emerson said: “Your kindness must have a sharp edge—otherwise it is equal to zero.”
In the final analysis, human beings not only have an indelible “angel” nature, but also an innate “devil” gene; people are born with sympathy, compassion, friendliness, and self-motivation, as well as selfishness, greed, jealousy, and laziness. .
The reason why advanced kindness is a kind of wisdom, foresight and ability is because it comes from a deep understanding of human nature and provides the wisdom to strip away the foundation of all hypocrisy.
The conservatism known as “container wisdom” provides just such wisdom, vision and ability: it believes that human nature is imperfect and cannot be perfected, and that both good and evil are hidden in human nature. Only through long-term accumulation, holding on to the good things that have been obtained, and continuously expanding and accommodating them, can we gain enough wisdom to find a social system suitable for human nature.
Conservative thinking keeps people away from radicalism and hypocrisy. It is the most urgent thought in contemporary China. It is not only related to individuals, but even to the direction of the entire society. Conservatism not only has profound insights into human nature, but also a vision about property rights, freedom, life rights, investment, society, order, etc. It is a wise way of thinking.
