A Thousand Pieces of Gold (6 page)
Read A Thousand Pieces of Gold Online
Authors: Adeline Yen Mah
My grandfather told me that when he was a boy growing up in Shanghai he saw many large red boxes placed at major street corners. Each had four gilded characters written on its surface:
jing xi zi zhi,
“respect and cherish written words.” Workmen with bamboo poles patrolled the streets picking up any stray pieces of paper with writing, and painstakingly placed them in the red containers. The contents of these boxes were burned at regular intervals at a special shrine in the Temple of Confucius. These paper-burning ceremonies were solemn occasions resembling high mass at a Catholic cathedral, with music and incense. Candidates who had successfully passed the imperial examination were the only ones allowed to participate. They would prostrate themselves in worship and pray to Heaven until all the paper had been reduced to ashes. On their way out, they would further show their respect by placing a donation into a separate red box labeled
yi zi qian jing,
“one written word is worth a thousand pieces of gold.”
I
n 1949 many Shanghai entrepreneurs fled south to Hong Kong to escape the Communists. Like Prime Minister Li Si 2200 years earlier, my father also left his home and traveled to a distant place in search of better opportunities and a fresh start. My siblings and I did not realize it then, but my father’s move destined us to become part of the 55 million Chinese living and working outside of China. From then on, we became itinerant immigrants.
At the age of fourteen, I won an international writing competition, which convinced my father to send me from Hong Kong to London for higher education. Three years later, while waiting for medical school to begin, I applied for a summer accounting job advertised in the evening newspaper. Over the phone the manager sounded eager to hire me. He gave me directions to his firm and asked if I was ready to start work that day. As soon as he saw my Chinese face, however, his attitude changed. Avoiding my eyes, he told me that the position had just been filled. He was a nice man because I could hear the embarrassment in his voice as he repeated the lie. One part of him knew that I would be a good worker and was reluctant to let me go. Nevertheless, he sent me away.
Throughout the long period of my training at medical school in London, I knew in my heart that if I were to remain in England after graduation, I would never be given the same opportunities as my British classmates. In order to secure a decent career, I realized I had to go elsewhere after graduation. Because of my dismal childhood, the feeling of being discriminated against was only too familiar. I had decided long ago that life was unfair and that a person needed to find ways of overcoming adversity herself. Even so, the bias I was encountering in Britain was far less than the blatant prejudice I had endured for so many years at my own home under my stepmother.
After graduating from medical school, I went back to Hong Kong. To my shock and dismay, I came across more prejudice. My colleagues resented me because I was not Cantonese and was a graduate of an English (rather than Hong Kong) medical school. The fact that we were all Chinese simply meant that they could be more open in their intolerance. They nicknamed me “Imported Goods” and told me to my face that I was a “foreigner.” No matter how hard I tried to please, I remained an outsider.
My last refuge was America. Even before I set foot on American soil, I was already being helped by an American who was a total stranger. The medical secretary of the Philadelphia hospital where I had applied for a job turned out to be kinder to me than my own parents. As soon as I wrote to her, she immediately advanced me the airfare from Hong Kong to New York against my future earnings, whereas my millionaire father and stepmother simply turned down my request for a loan. In America I found that my gender and ethnic origin were still a hindrance, but the country was large and the people were generous. However, despite these favorable considerations, I did come across one instance of ugliness.
In the 1970s there were few board-qualified and fully trained physicians specializing in anesthesia. Therefore, my services were in demand. A Catholic order that owned a large and prestigious private hospital in Los Angeles encouraged me to apply for a position in obstetric anesthesia. In due course, I was interviewed. As
soon as I sat in front of the white, male, and arrogant head of the department of anesthesia, that familiar childhood feeling of being picked on came flooding back.
“Despite what you have been told by the nuns who own this hospital,” he began, “our medical group is not looking for more anesthesiologists.”
Taken aback, I said somewhat lamely, trying to please the godlike figure in front of me, “I thought I might be given a chance to fill in during sick leaves and vacations.”
“Look!” he replied icily. “No one in our group ever gets sick or takes a vacation. Do you understand?”
I stared back at him in silence, and he added, “Have I made myself perfectly clear?”
I nodded and prepared to leave. In those days anesthesia jobs were plentiful. His rejection did not devastate me because I knew that I would be able to find a position elsewhere. As I bade him good-bye, however, I was seized by a sudden impulse. With my hand on the doorknob, I turned to him and asked, “Have you ever heard of the Chinese proverb ‘binding your feet to prevent your own progress’?”
That proverb,
guo zu bu qian,
was a phrase first used by the King of Qin’s minister, Li Si, in the third century
B.C.E.
Like the brain drain into the United States today, a similar flow of talent was happening 2200 years ago. Qin was the richest state of that era, and talented scholars from all the other states flocked there to seek employment. Their success caused such resentment among Qin’s native people that they eventually persuaded the king to expel all non-Qin scholar-officials. Reluctant to relinquish his post, Li Si wrote a letter to the King of Qin protesting his deportation. He complained that Qin’s new exclusionary policy was akin to “binding your feet to prevent your own progress.”
Li Si was a commoner from a humble family from southern Chu (presentday southeastern Henan Province). During that time of constant warfare, talented young men would seek out famous writers and philosophers to be their teachers. After a period of study, the young scholars would travel from state to state and try to attach themselves as advisers to the rulers. These scholar-bureaucrats were called
shih.
Their functions were comparable to the tasks performed by political scientists and cabinet ministers today.
As a teenager, Li Si worked as a petty district clerk for a few years. He wanted to save up enough money to study under Xun Zi, an outstanding
Confucian scholar who lived about 600
li
(200 miles) away, at that time considered a great distance. Even at that early stage of his life, Li Si had the foresight to conclude from observing the behavior of the rats around him that a man’s fate (like that of the rat) depended very much on where he chose to live.
After completing his studies, Li Si did not wish to go back to his native state of Chu. Recognizing that Qin was becoming increasingly powerful, Li Si, like many gifted scholars from the other states, decided that he would travel there to seek employment. On leaving, he said to his teacher, Xun Zi,
“I have heard that one should not hesitate when the right moment dawns. Now is the time. The King of Qin wishes to devour the other states and rule them. This is the opportunity for the common man to rise. It is the golden period of the wandering scholar. One who does not move and decides to remain passive at this juncture is like a bird or deer that will merely look at a tempting morsel of meat but not touch it. There is no greater ignominy than lowness of position, nor deeper pain than penury. Therefore, I shall go west to give advice to the King of Qin.”
Xun Zi, knowing that he himself was a Confucian moralist whereas his pupil was a realist, said to him,
“You and I think at cross-purposes. What you consider an advantage is a disadvantageous advantage. The true advantage is what I call benevolence and righteousness. These are the two essential qualities with which to conduct a government. Under such a government, the people have affection for their ruler. They celebrate their prince and are willing to die for him. Therefore it has been said: ‘Of governing matters, generals and commanders should come last.’ Although the state of Qin has been triumphant for four generations, it has lived in constant terror that the other states will unite and destroy it some day. Now you are seeking not for what should come at the beginning (that is, benevolence and righteousness) but what should come at the end (that is, generals and commanders). My conclusion is that your generation is confused.”
In 247
B.C.E.
Li Si traveled from his village home to Xianyang, the capital of Qin. There he found that the King of Qin had just died. He sought out Prime Minister Lu Buwei and became one of Lu’s 3000 houseguests. Impressed with Li Si’s literary talent, Lu Buwei took him under his wing
and introduced him to thirteen-year-old King Zheng, who had just ascended the throne following the death of his father. According to
Shiji,
this was Li’s advice to the boy king:
“The little man is one who discards his opportunities, but great feats are achieved only by giants who can profit from the mistakes of others and single-mindedly complete their mission….
“Many feudal lords of the other six states are already paying allegiance to Your Majesty, as if they were your prefectures. With the might of Qin and Your Majesty’s great ability, conquering the other states would be as easy as wiping dust from the surface of a kitchen stove. Qin possesses sufficient power at present to annihilate the other rulers, found a single empire, and rule the world. This is the chance of ten thousand generations. If you should let go of this opportunity, the various nobles might form a great alliance against you from north to south and rediscover their power. Against that union you will never prevail, even if you were the Yellow Emperor himself.”
Lu Buwei as well as the boy king were impressed by Li Si’s presentation, so much so that they conferred upon him the office of senior scribe.
Shiji
tells us,
The king listened carefully to Li Si’s plans and secretly recruited agents, provisioned them with gold and precious jewels, and commissioned them to go from state to state lobbying the feudal lords and ministers of note. They were instructed to reward those whose submission could be bought with gold. As for those who would not acquiesce, they were to be killed with sharp swords.
Li’s advice closely echoed King Zheng’s own inclinations. From then on, the young king made every effort to weaken and sever the various alliances between the different states by bribery, threats, espionage, and negotiation. Meanwhile, the other states were themselves enmeshed in a tangle of intrigue directed against one another as well as against Qin.
Shiji
records one such incident:
The King of Haan came up with the idea of preoccupying the state of Qin with massive construction projects so as to slow its military expansion. He therefore dispatched the water engineer Zheng Guo to see King Zheng of Qin. Engineer
Zheng successfully persuaded the king to build a canal between the Jing River and the Lo River for irrigation purposes. The terrain between the two rivers was hilly and uneven. The canal was 300
li
[90 miles] long and required the construction of a tunnel beneath the hills.
The massive project involved years of hard labor and hundreds of thousands of workers. It was only partially completed when the king discovered that Engineer Zheng was a spy working for the state of Haan. The king was about to execute the engineer when the latter said, “It is true that this scheme was meant to harm you. However, if you should allow the canal to be constructed, it will be of tremendous benefit to your state in the future. By this scheme, I have extended the life of the state of Haan for only a few years; but my project will benefit the state of Qin for ten thousand generations.”
The king changed his mind and allowed the work to continue. When completed, the canal irrigated over 500,000 acres of previously arid land with water full of rich sediment. The interior of Qin became fertile and productive without dry years. Qin grew rich and powerful and was able to conquer all the other states. The canal was named Zheng Guo Canal after the engineer who built it.
The plot of the Zheng Guo Canal was uncovered at about the same time as the rebellion instigated against the king by Lao Ai. Members of the royal family and other Qin nobles had long been resentful of the high offices held by foreign officials from other states. Now they pointed out to the king that all the ring bearers in the recent conspiracies were not natives of Qin. They warned the king that the non-Qin scholars-officials who came ostensibly to serve Qin were mostly spies working on behalf of their own sovereigns. Their true purpose was to cause chaos within Qin. The nobles convinced the king to sign an order expelling all visiting scholars from Qin.
On finding his name on the list of those to be banished, Li Si wrote a powerful memorial to the throne pleading against the ordinance. He began by pointing out that several ancient kings in the past had profited greatly from the use of foreign scholars. According to
Shiji,
Li’s letter continued:
At present, Your Majesty collects jade from the Kun Mountains, enjoys the treasures of Shui and Ho, dangles pearls bright as the moon, and wears a Tai-oh
sword on his belt. He rides horses from Xian-li and waves banners decorated with green phoenixes. He plays on drums made by stretching the skin of crocodiles. Of all these treasures, not one was produced by Qin. Yet Your Majesty delights in them. May I ask why?
If only products from Qin are allowed in Qin, then these luminous jades that brighten the night would not decorate your court; and art objects made from rhinoceros horns or elephants’ tusks would no longer be available. Beautiful girls from Zheng and Wei would not fill your inner palaces; and the fastest-running horses would be absent from your stables.
The music of Qin used to consist of the beating of earthenware pitchers, pounding on jars, plucking of the strings of the
zheng,
and thumping on bones while crying Wu! Wu! Such was Qin’s method of pleasing the ear and the eye.
Today, the people of Qin seem to have abandoned this ancient way of making music and adopted the lilting melodies of Zheng and Wei. Once more, may I ask the reason why?
The answer is because we choose to enjoy whatever is best and pleases us most!
However, this appears not to be the case when it comes to the selection of men. Without considering their qualifications or capability, let alone their honesty or deceitfulness, non-Qin scholars are being stripped of their office and sent away.
Can it be that feminine beauty, music, pearls, and jade are perceived as being weightier and of higher importance, while human beings are of less concern? [Note that Li Si considers women as commodities rather than human beings.] Such is not the conduct to govern that which lies within the four seas, nor the correct strategy to adopt for controlling the feudal lords….
By blindly driving out all foreign officials without first determining their loyalty, you are forcing them to use their talents to serve the rulers of other states. Your policy is tantamount to
guo zu bu qian,
“binding your feet to prevent your own progress.” It will cause future scholars to turn away form Qin and retreat before ever thinking of turning westward. Hence you will be providing weapons to bandits and preparing banquets for robbers.
Of products that are not produced in Qin, there are many that should be treasured. Of scholars that were not originally from Qin, there are numerous who are loyal and true. In the long run, your ordinance will harm your own people and benefit your enemies. It is definitely not the way toward stability and safety for your state.