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Mohism -> Mozi -> Book 5 -> Condemnation of Offensive War III -> 2

王公大人天下諸侯The rulers and lords of to-day are quite different.
They all rank their warriors
and arrange their boat and chariot forces;
they make their armour strong and weapons sharp
in order to attack some innocent state.
Entering the state
they cut down the grain fields
and fell the trees and woods;
they tear down the inner and outer walls of the city
and fill up the ditches and ponds;
they seize and kill the sacrificial animals
and burn down the ancestral temple;
they kill and murder the people
and exterminate the aged and weak;
they move away the treasures and valuables.
The soldiers are encouraged to advance by being told:
"To suffer death is the highest (service you can render),
to kill many is the next,
to be wounded is the lowest.
But if you should drop out from your rank and attempt to sneak away,
』, the penalty will be death without moderation."
Thus the soldiers are put to fear.
Now to capture a state and to destroy an army,
to disturb and torture the people,
聖人 and to set at naught the aspirations of the sages by confusion
- is this intended to bless Heaven?
But the people of Heaven are gathered together
to besiege the towns belonging to Heaven.
This is to murder men of Heaven
and dispossess the spirits of their altars
and to ruin the state and to kill the sacrificial animals.
It is then not a blessing to Heaven on high.
Is it intended to bless the spirits?
But men of Heaven are murdered, spirits are deprived of their sacrifices, the earlier kings are neglected, the multitude are tortured and the people are scattered; it is then not a blessing to the spirits in the middle.
Is it intended to bless the people?
But the blessing of the people by killing them off must be very meagre.
And when we calculate the expense,
which is the root of the calamities to living,
天下 we find the property of innumerable people is exhausted.
It is, then, not a blessing to the people below either.


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