Confucius 孔子
5th century BC · Lu, Spring and Autumn China
"The young are to be held in awe. How do we know that those to come will not be the equals of those now?"
子曰：「後生可畏，焉知來者之不如今也？」Analects, book 9 (Zihan)
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Aristotle Ἀριστοτέλης
c. 330 BC · ancient Greece
They love too much and hate too much, and everything else the same way; and they think they know everything and insist on it.
φιλοῦσι γὰρ ἄγαν καὶ μισοῦσιν ἄγαν καὶ τἆλλα πάντα ὁμοίως, καὶ εἰδέναι ἅπαντα οἴονται καὶ διισχυρίζονταιRhetoric, book 2, chapter 12, on the character of the young
Yi Hwang 李滉
1558 · Joseon Korea · When Yi I, twenty-three, came to visit him at Dosan and left after a few days. Yi Hwang was fifty-eight
Sick, I had shut my gate fast and seen nothing of spring. You came and opened my heart, and my mind is awake. Now I know that a man of name is no empty scholar, and I am ashamed that I was not more careful of myself before. Among good grain, do not let the tares ripen fair. The finest dust still harms a mirror newly polished. Strike out the lines of your poem that praise me beyond the truth. Let us each work hard and grow closer day by day.
病我牢關不見春 公來披豁醒心神
已知名下無虛士 堪愧年前闕敬身
嘉穀莫容稊熟美 纖塵猶害鏡磨新
過情詩語須刪去 努力工夫各日親Toegye jip, the first of four poems "For Yi Sukheon"
Han Yu 韓愈
802 · Tang China
A pupil need not be inferior to his teacher, and a teacher need not be wiser than his pupil. Some hear the Way earlier and some later, and each has his own special study. That is all.
弟子不必不如師，師不必賢於弟子。聞道有先後，術業有專攻，如是而已。"On Teachers"
Motoori Norinaga 本居宣長
1790s · Edo Japan · He notes that this was what his own teacher always taught him
If a better idea comes to you later, never hold back just because it differs from your teacher's view.
後によき考への出で来たらんには、必ずしも師の説にたがふとて、な憚りそTamakatsuma, "On not being bound by one's teacher's views"
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