Mencius 4B.31

When the philosopher Zeng dwelt in Wu Cheng, there came a band from Yue to plunder it. Someone said to him, 'The plunderers are coming - why not leave this?' Zeng on this left the city, saying to the man in charge of the house, 'Do not lodge any persons in my house, lest they break and injure the plants and trees.' When the plunderers withdrew, he sent word to him, saying, 'Repair the walls of my house. I am about to return.' When the plunderers retired, the philosopher Zeng returned accordingly. His disciples said, 'Since our master was treated with so much sincerity and respect, for him to be the first to go away on the arrival of the plunderers, so as to be observed by the people, and then to return on their retiring, appears to us to be improper.' Shen You Xing said, 'You do not understand this matter. Formerly, when Shen You was exposed to the outbreak of the grass-carriers, there were seventy disciples in our master's following, and none of them took part in the matter.'

When Zi Si was living in Wei, there came a band from Qi to plunder. Some one said to him, 'The plunderers are coming - why not leave this?' Zi Si said, 'If I go away, whom will the prince have to guard the State with?'

Mencius said, 'The philosophers Zeng and Zi Si agreed in the principle of their conduct. Zeng was a teacher - in the place of a father or elder brother. Zi Si was a minister - in a meaner place. If the philosophers Zeng and Zi Si had exchanged places the one would have done what the other did.'