Calling A Deer A Horse
One Chinese idiom that is derived from an incident involving Zhao is "calling a deer a horse" (simplified Chinese: 指鹿为马; traditional Chinese: 指鹿為馬; pinyin: zhǐ lù wéi mǎ), meaning "deliberate misrepresentation for ulterior purposes". The Shiji records that Zhao, in an attempt to control the government, devised a loyalty test for court officials using a deer and horse:
Zhao Gao was contemplating treason but was afraid the other officials would not heed his commands, so he decided to test them first. He brought a deer and presented it to the Second Emperor but called it a horse. The Second Emperor laughed and said, "Is the chancellor perhaps mistaken, calling a deer a horse?" Then the emperor questioned those around him. Some remained silent, while some, hoping to ingratiate themselves with Zhao Gao, said it was a horse, and others said it was a deer. Zhao Gao secretly arranged for all those who said it was a deer to be brought before the law. Thereafter the officials were all terrified of Zhao Gao. (tr. Watson 1993:70)
Read more about this topic: Zhao Gao
Famous quotes containing the words calling a, calling, deer and/or horse:
“What is an artist? A provincial who finds himself somewhere between a physical reality and a metaphysical one.... It’s this in-between that I’m calling a province, this frontier country between the tangible world and the intangible one—which is really the realm of the artist.”
—Frederico Fellini (b. 1920)
“I need not say what match I would touch, what system endeavor to blow up; but as I love my life, I would side with the light, and let the dark earth roll from under me, calling my mother and my brother to follow.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“When shot, the deer seldom drops immediately, but runs sometimes for hours, the hunter in hot pursuit. This phase, known as ‘deer running,’ develops fleet runners, particularly in deer- jacking expeditions when the law is pursuing the hunters as swiftly as the hunters are pursuing the deer.”
—For the State of Maine, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)
“But when his horse had put its hoof
Into a rabbit hole
He dropped upon his head and died.
His lady saw it all
And dropped and died thereon, for she
Loved him with her soul.”
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)