Advice when you are unhappy is good for your behavior, and good medicine when you are bitter is good for your illness. These two sentences are not from poetry, but from six Confucius' Family Statements. The original text is: good medicine tastes bitter and is good for illness, and advice is good for action when it is not satisfactory. Tang Wu prospered because of admiration, but died because of passivity. There is no argument between monarch and ministers, between father and son, between brothers, between scholars and friends.

Confucius said: Good medicine, though bitter, is conducive to the recovery of illness, while hard advice is conducive to moral conduct in the future. Shang Tang grew up because he dared to face outspoken loyalists, and Xia Jie lost the world because of flattery. If the monarch does not have a minister who dares to speak, his father does not have a son who dares to argue, his brother does not have a brother who can argue with him, and ordinary people do not have a friend who dares to criticize, it seems that there is nothing wrong, but it is actually wrong.

So I said: the monarch's fault, the minister can directly remonstrate; Father's fault, son can excuse, brother's fault, brother should correct, his own fault, friends will find fault with you. In this way, there will be no signs of national subjugation, no bad luck of family division, no big mistakes between father and son, and no friends.

Introduction of Confucius

Confucius (5565438 BC+April 479 BC165438 BC+479 BC), surnamed Kong, was born in Taocheng, Lu in the Spring and Autumn Period, and his ancestral home was Li Yi (now Xiayi County, Henan Province), a great thinker in ancient China.

Confucius initiated private lectures and advocated benevolence, righteousness, courtesy, wisdom and faith. There are 3,000 disciples, including 72 sages. He led some disciples around the world for fourteen years and revised the Six Classics in his later years. After his death, his disciples and re-disciples recorded the words, deeds and thoughts of Confucius and his disciples and compiled The Analects. This book is regarded as a Confucian classic.

The above contents refer to Baidu Encyclopedia-Confucius Family Language.