Chinese sayings: 32 (以渴服馬 / 以渴服马）

 

以渴服馬 / 以渴服马

yǐ kě fú mǎ 

“use thirst subjugate horse”

Another saying where the meaning is immediately obvious from the literal breakdown:  starve the horse of water and, by this means, force it to submit to the human — used in training wild horses, presumably.

使馬忍渴受訓，從人驅遣。比喻用苛政治民，不能使人真心順服。

出自《韓非子·外儲說右下》。

(Google translate) Making horses endure thirst and be trained to follow the orders of men. This is a metaphor for using harsh laws to control people, which cannot make them truly obedient.  

From Han Feizi’s Outer Collection of Sayings

韓非(子) / Han Fei(zi): born c.280 BCE, died 233 BCE; Legalist philosopher and statesman; wrote essays about autocratic governments, among other things.

The original intention of the saying was to comment on harsh governance which does not win the people over.

I try to take on a lighter view of life for my blogs, as there’s already so much horribleness out there that I don’t need to add my voice to it, I feel.  Stresses me out too, thinking about those issues.  The reason I started this blogspot in the first place was to stop myself from having a nervous breakdown when I was packing up 26 years of teaching material after being made redundant, feeling aggrieved and betrayed (yes, very much politics, as I had an impeccable track record for teaching).

This saying about thirst and forcing horses into subjugation reminds me of a TV wild life documentary film in the late 70s or early 80s about how Africans in different parts of Africa find water the traditional way.

The documentary film gave two examples.

Africans in Region X would go around in the dry land, looking closely at what look like dried-out sticks protruding from the soil.  Some of these are not sticks at all but the lateral roots of a tuber which the African can dig out and grate, then squeeze out the liquid to drink.  This is the quicker method, although he might not find this tuber for a long time, it’s true.  He’d also need to keep looking for more tubers.

Africans in Region Y where there are baboons will tap into [sorry, couldn’t resist the word play!] the baboons’ knowledge of underground water sources.  The process might take a lot longer than the tuber-finding one, but they only need to do it once, as they’ll know where the underground water is after the first patient entrapment of the baboon.

Why baboons?  According to this documentary, they know where to find underground water, but they are very secretive about this knowledge and guard it fiercely.  They are also, however, very inquisitive creatures.

The process is as follows:

1. The African finds an anthill, of which there are plenty around.  He makes sure that the baboon is around to witness him throwing some groundnuts into the anthill through one of its holes.  The hole must be big enough for the free hand to go through, but too small for a clenched hand to be retracted.  It must also be low enough for the hand to touch the ground inside the anthill once it’s gone through.
2. The man goes away.  The baboon approaches the anthill, puts its hand through the hole, rummages around the bottom of the anthill, finds the nuts, grasps a handful, and tries to retract the hand, except that it’s now clenched, so it’s too big to go through the hole.  The greedy baboon refuses to let go of the prized nuts, so it ends up being trapped by the anthill.
3. The man returns, which forces the baboon to release the nuts for fear of being captured, so it’s now able to pull its hand out of the anthill.  He ties the baboon to a tree, scatters lumps of salt on the ground, and goes away.
4. The baboon eats the salt, and builds up a great thirst.  
5. When the man returns and releases the baboon, it’s so thirsty that it heads straight for the underground water source that it knows, not caring if it’s being followed.

The second man might’ve had to spend a few days and go through a few steps, not to mention investing in some salt, but once he’s discovered the water source, he has the knowledge for keeps.