(Translated by Sherwin Lu)

     The Yellow Emperor asks his ministers: 
    “I am the one person running all the affairs under heaven. Now I would like to cultivate uprightness and bring about fairness among people. What should I do? ”
     Guo Tong answers:
“Without the threat of getting punished by law for unfair acts, there would be no fairness.  Without a ranking system consistent with the truly existing disparities among people in character and ability, there would be no uprightness. We need to look up and down for the supreme law between heaven and earth and apply it to human affairs. There indeed exists such a constant law, by virtue of which we get to know the distinction between darkness and light, between Yin and Yang. We see on earth high mountains and low-lying waters; we see the black and the white, the vicious and the virtuous. The Earth nourishes life in a non-assertive way while the Heaven keeps everything in dynamic balance. Non-assertiveness vs. dynamics, nourishing vs. restraining – each complements and promotes the other. While each side has an identity, put together, they make a whole. With both Yin and Yang co-existing, all changes become possible. As to humans, some are too weak to do one single job, whereas some others are strong enough for more than one hundred. People vary in moral character and capabilities, just as all things do in constitution. To manage them accordingly is the sure way leading to success.”

     The Yellow Emperor continues to ask:
    “People depend on Heaven and Earth for life and food just as children look to their parents. Now I would like to cultivate uprightness and bring about fairness among them. Whom should I start with?”
     Guo Tong answers:
    “Only rigorous laws will protect fairness; only consistency between status and performance will cultivate uprightness. This means the high and the low should be correctly distinguished; and the rich and the poor naturally differentiated. This ranking system was followed in old times but was corrupted later. You can restore it, starting with me.”
    Then, Guo Tong changes into coarse clothes, picks up a pottery bowl and starts panhandling all over the places to show the extreme case of poverty.