先修身齐家，再平天下
First Cultivate Yourself, Then Bring Peace to the World

＊培德女中9年级　吴星烨　文

By Shirley Wu, 9th grader of Developing Virtue Girls School

Everyone wants world peace, but this is not a goal that can be easily achieved. For example, friends squabble over the smallest matters. In our daily lives, there are millions of things that bother us and billions of problems to solve. Between countries there are similar difficulties too, so people gather together to solve tough situations. Some countries even fight each other due to different viewpoints and misunderstandings. This warfare and uproar causes the world to be in a constant state of unrest. How is it possible for this world to be peaceful?

世界和平人人都想，却不易得到。就拿最简单的事来说吧，两个好朋友可以为芝麻绿豆小事而争吵；日常生活中有数不清解决不了的琐事；国与国之间也面临同样的问题，甚至不惜作战，带给世界许多惶恐不安。

I think human nature is a mixture of good and bad, thus we are born into this world. If human nature was 100% pure and full of goodness, then we would be way off in Heaven already. Most people have more of an evil nature than a good nature. Causing a person to decline is way easier than improving a person.

我认为人性是善恶夹杂的，所以才生到这个污浊的世界上。如果人性纯善，就不会生在这个世上了。多数人的「恶习」比「善习」似乎多，因此堕落；跟向善比，向恶不知容易多少倍！

Notice that kids are pure, there is no sense of 'evilness' in them. However, as kids grow older, they gain more and more secular knowledge. Their environment contaminates their minds; their evil seeds start to develop. These angelic creatures thus lose their honesty and purity. Sometimes we even discover that our good deeds did not come from real good intentions.

譬如小孩子，原本天真无邪，在他们身上找不到一丝「恶」，但随着时间成长，「知识」渐开，受到染污，心中的「恶习」种子被周围环境引发出来，就不再天真坦诚了，有时发现连自己的一些「善」都不真实。

As I grow older, I notice the dark side of myself, and my pretense in hiding it. There seems to be a dark small room in me that stores all the self-contradictions and bad habits. Everyone has that ugly little storeroom in himself. If we have the courage to open that room and let the light shine through, then we can know ourselves, change ourselves, purify ourselves; then we can give ourselves some room to breathe. 

拿我自己来说吧，越长大越发现自己黑暗的一面，不喜欢别人看见自己懒惰、爱生气、自私、妒嫉、孤僻的一面，也没有勇气面对自己的黑暗面，只知掩饰躲藏；心里像有间黑暗的小房间，堆满了矛盾和不好的习性，不去清理。如果我有勇气打开那扇门，让善的正的力量进去，用圣贤教导我们的智慧去清理干净，这样改变自己，净化自己，不也是一种解脱吗？

If we want world peace, then we've got to start from the most fundamental level, or else this task is next to impossible. Evil is more effortlessly developed than good. We should apply more effort in improving ourselves first, pacifying our mind, and then benefiting the world. If we cannot make the world peaceful, at the very least we can make the environment around us peaceful. This might be a more practical way of bringing peace to the world.

不从根本上解决问题，而要求世界和平，几乎不可能，因为「恶」比「善」容易被引发出来，但是和平仍然可以是我们努力的目标。这世界上还是有善法有好人，我们能培养自己的品德，让自己内心的世界先和平，再去地利益世界。我们一时或许没有能力「平天下」，就先从「修身齐家」开始，至少不要与「恶」的力量同流合污。所以我认为以圣贤的教导，先修正自己的行为，是比较实际的做法。