# It's better to bow your head and admit your mistake than to raise your head and defend yourself

**Published by:** [不就是感冒](https://paragraph.com/@0xb7b9f924bdd958642fa1c058b4441c33cb9403e0/)
**Published on:** 2022-02-27
**URL:** https://paragraph.com/@0xb7b9f924bdd958642fa1c058b4441c33cb9403e0/it-s-better-to-bow-your-head-and-admit-your-mistake-than-to-raise-your-head-and-defend-yourself

## Content

Fan Chunren, Minister of the Northern Song Dynasty, was known as "prime minister in cloth". Fan Zhongyan's second son. Although fan Chunren is less accomplished in literature than his father, he has a bearing that ordinary people can't imagine. Cheng Yi, a great scholar, has always had contacts with fan Chunren. One day, Cheng Yi visited fan Chunren, who had just left office. Talking about the past, fan Chunren seemed very nostalgic for his time as prime minister. Cheng Yi disagreed and said bluntly, "don't you feel ashamed that you handled a lot of things improperly in those years?" Fan Chunren didn't know what Cheng Yi meant. Cheng Yi explained: "in the second year of your term of office, there was a mob looting of food in Suzhou. You should have spoken out in front of the emperor, but you didn't say anything, resulting in many innocent people being punished." Fan Chunren quickly bowed his head and apologized: "yes, I should have spoken for the people!" In the third year of the reign of Wu Caoxiang, you reported that the people were hungry for many times, but you ignored them Fan Chunren felt very guilty: "this is really my dereliction of duty!" Since then, Cheng Yi pointed out many of fan Chunren's mistakes, and fan Chunren admitted his mistakes one by one. After many days, the emperor summoned Cheng Yi to ask about politics. Cheng Yi talked freely about some policies to govern the country and stabilize the country. After hearing this, the emperor was amazed and said with emotion: "you have the style of fan Chunren in those days!" Cheng Yi was unwilling for the emperor to compare himself with fan Chunren. He couldn't help asking, "has fan Chunren ever spoken to the emperor?" The emperor ordered someone to carry a box, pointed to it and said, "it's full of memorials of fan Xiang's speech in that year." Cheng Yi opened the memorials as if he believed it or not. Only then did he find out what he accused fan Chunren of the other day. In fact, he had already spoken, but it was not well implemented for some reasons. Cheng Yi blushed and made a special trip to apologize the next day. Fan Chunren laughed: "those who don't know are innocent. You don't have to." Fan Chunren once summarized himself: "if you know how to forgive others, you can't accept them all." Forgiveness is to forgive others with the heart of forgiving yourself. In the face of other people's unnecessary blame, it's better to bow your head and admit your mistake than to raise your head and defend. A humble confession is often more powerful than a defiant excuse

## Publication Information

- [不就是感冒](https://paragraph.com/@0xb7b9f924bdd958642fa1c058b4441c33cb9403e0/): Publication homepage
- [All Posts](https://paragraph.com/@0xb7b9f924bdd958642fa1c058b4441c33cb9403e0/): More posts from this publication
- [RSS Feed](https://api.paragraph.com/blogs/rss/@0xb7b9f924bdd958642fa1c058b4441c33cb9403e0): Subscribe to updates