— The Sayings of Confucius (tr. Lionel Giles, 1910)
About this quote
हिन्दी में
क्या वही ज्ञानी नहीं जो न पहले से छल की आशंका रखता है और न दूसरों की नीयत पर शक करता है, फिर भी छल सामने आते ही उसे तुरंत पहचान लेता है?
What it means
The claim is about timing, not attitude. Two abilities that ordinary life treats as one thing — being hard to fool, and being distrustful — are pulled apart and given opposite values: the first is wisdom, the second is merely the price most people pay to get it. The sage pays nothing in advance and still arrives on time.
It is worth keeping because it sets a standard almost nobody meets, and does so as a question rather than a rule. The line is often quoted as encouragement to trust people, but it is not advice; it describes a capacity. Read honestly, trusting is the easy half — you only qualify if the recognition actually comes when it is needed.
What it teaches you
The next time you conclude that someone is being dishonest, check whether you can name the specific thing that told you — a number that changed, a question that got walked around — or whether you came in already expecting it. Count the other direction as well: the people you suspected who turned out to be straight with you are mistakes in your judgement, not proof that you were being careful.
अर्थ और सीख
कथन के अनुसार बुद्धिमान वह है जो पहले से किसी पर शक नहीं करता, फिर भी धोखा सामने आते ही उसे पहचान लेता है। यहाँ शक को समझदारी नहीं माना गया है, बल्कि समझ की कमी को ढकने का तरीका माना गया है। सीख यह है कि किसी पर अविश्वास करने से पहले देखें कि उसका ठोस कारण आपके सामने मौजूद है या वह केवल आपकी पहले से बनी धारणा है।
Where it comes from
A portrait of shrewdness without cynicism. The person described does not walk into every room braced for betrayal, nor does he read hidden motives into ordinary behaviour — and yet, when deceit actually surfaces, he sees it at once. Suspicion is presented not as a sharpened perception but as a substitute for it.
Preserved in The Sayings of Confucius as rendered into English by Lionel Giles in 1910. The rhetorical question — “Is not he a sage who…” — is Giles’s phrasing and reads formally to a modern ear. No further source detail accompanies the citation.
