Once upon a time, a young person was walking along a road while eating a pear. Then an old doctor approached from the opposite direction.
The old doctor said to the young person, “Though tasty, the pear should not be eaten too much. It is good for the teeth, but too many will be bad for the spleen.” Hearing the old man’s words, the youngster put the pear away and took several dates from his pocket, saying, “So, I can eat dates but not pears, in order to protect my spleen. How about eating dates.”
The old doctor replied, “The date has the function of nourishing the spleen, but eating dates too much will be bad for the teeth, so they should not be eaten in quantity.”
After hearing what the old man said, the young man looked at the dates in his hand, hesitated, and did not know how to proceed.
After thinking for a while, he said, “What do you think of this way? When eating pears, we only chew them with our teeth, and spit them out instead of swallowing them. And when eating dates, we swallow them whole instead of chewing them. By doing this, both my teeth and my spleen will be unhurt.” His words made the old doctor at a loss whether to laugh or cry. He did not know how to respond.
This story is excerpted fromZhanyuan Jingyu. It is used to describe those who mechanically take in what they study without understanding and analyzing what they are being taught.
