"In truth, the other schools envy the Legalist School," Yan Yukong said.
Everyone nodded.
After everyone had discussed it for a while, Fang Yun continued, "What I want to say is that everyone understands this principle, but everyone wants to wait for someone else to voice it. And so they wait and wait, without end. Today, I will say it aloud. From now on, when you speak of this principle, you need not worry about being attacked on all sides. Let them come at me, Fang Yun."
Many people smiled warmly.
Fang Yun said, "Let us think about this in simple terms. We are all human, and humans inevitably have selfish motives. Different people inevitably have different outlooks on life, different ways of viewing this world, and different standards for judging everything. Even the Sages have their own inclinations. Thus, in this world, absolutely just and fair laws do not actually exist. Surely even members of the Legalist School would not disagree with that?"
Millions of people nodded in unison. This was common knowledge.
Fang Yun said, "Thus, when making laws-or, for that matter, conducting any affairs of government-there are two extremes: absolute impartiality and absolute selfishness. Yet although absolute impartiality sounds good, it is not necessarily perfect. Many utterly selfless decisions can harm individuals. Take the distribution of food in primitive societies, which we discussed earlier. For the community to develop, young and able-bodied adults should receive more food, while the elderly and children should receive less. This is good for the community as a whole, but we cannot call it good for those vulnerable elderly people and children. We cannot say that distributing food this way is wrong, only that the method is imperfect."
"Do perfect laws exist? Perhaps, but we will not discuss them, because once something