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A person who is transformed by the instructions of a teacher, devotes himself to study, and abides by ritual and rightness may become a noble person, while one who follows his nature and emotions, is content to give free play to his passions, and abandons ritual and rightness is a lesser person.

— Xunzi Sources of Chinese Tradition (1999)

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More quotes by Xunzi

A questioner asks: If human nature is evil, then where do ritual and rightness come from? I reply: ritual and rightness are always created by the conscious activity of the sages.

Sources of Chinese Tradition (1999)

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Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Xunzi (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.