知過必改
zhī guò bì gǎi
"If one knows one's errors, one must correct them"
You don't generally see 過 used as "fault" or "error" or "shortcoming" in
modern Chinese, where it's typically a marker of a past event, or used
in phrases like 過生日, "to celebrate a birthday."
This line offers unquestionably solid advice, and like a lot of good advice, it's easily ignored. All of us are aware of our shortcomings, but it's a lot easier to live with them than to deal with them.
It's not only a personal admonition; it can be applied to institutions as well. I can imagine civil servants in imperial China referencing this line to comment upon the inefficiencies of a particular department, for example, or chiding subordinates with it (which I guess turns it back into a personal admonition).
You don't even have to go back in history to apply it on a bigger scale. America is fully aware of its errors, yet makes no effort to correct
them. It's apparently easier to let kids get murdered than to stop teenagers from
buying firearms, or to make cops do something other than stand around and demand respect from civilians. What happened in Uvalde the other day is proof of that.
微臣
史大偉
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