Perhaps many people have encountered such a type of person, they like to expose people's shortcomings, take fun of others as pleasure, and watch others embarrass or embarrassment, and they have a sense of accomplishment. However, this kind of person will not succeed every time, and when he encounters someone who is smart and wise, he will suffer a loss, and in the end he will only be embarrassed. For example, King Chu Ling in the Spring and Autumn Period.
In the Spring and Autumn Period, the state of Chu became stronger and stronger, so the monarch of the state of Chu also became arrogant, disdainful of the envoys of other countries, and even ridiculed, no, the state of Qi sent an envoy named Yan Ying to visit the state of Chu, and did not escape the ridicule and ridicule of the king of Chu Ling.
Yan Ying is short in stature and not good-looking, this is his first impression on everyone, but Yan Ying has superior wisdom and profound knowledge, which cannot be reflected in the first impression, and King Chu Ling only saw Yan Ying's appearance, so he sarcastically said: "Why did King Qi send someone like you to visit Chu State, is there no one in Qi Country?"”
Going to someone else's house as a guest not only did not receive warm hospitality, but was snubbed and ridiculed, and no one could swallow this breath, but this Yan Ying was very calm, I saw that he was neither humble nor arrogant, and said: " The king didn't know that there were three hundred streets in the capital of Qi Guoguang alone, full of people, thousands, if everyone raised their sleeves, they could completely cover the sun in the sky, just like a cloudy day, if everyone walked on the street, they would touch their shoulders with their shoulders, and even the tips of the toes of the people behind would touch the heels of the people in front."
After listening to Yan Ying's words, King Chu Ling was half skeptical, and asked: "Since there are so many people in the Qi country, why don't you send a decent person, but instead send a person like you who is not good-looking", Yan Ying was not angry at all when he heard this, but said slowly: "The king doesn't know, there is a rule in the Qi country, that is, the appearance of the envoy and the country of the envoy are matched, and a person like me who is short and ugly can only be sent to the state of Chu." ”
King Chu Ling originally wanted to give Yan Ying a dismount, but he didn't expect to be teased, and in the end, it was King Chu Ling himself who was embarrassed.
However, this story has also derived an idiom, that is: "shoulder to shoulder", which describes a large number of people and very crowded.
Let's take a look at the original dialogue between the clever Yan Ying and the self-proclaimed smart King Chu Ling:
The king said, "There is no one in Qi?"Yan Zi said: "Linzi three hundred Lu, Zhang Yuan into yin, sweat into rain, shoulder to shoulder, what is no one?."From the Western Han Dynasty Liu Xiang's "Yanzi Spring and Autumn Period: Miscellaneous Chapters".