蒙 → 臨
Hexagram 4: Youthful Folly → Hexagram 19: Approach
Changing Lines
This transformation involves 2 changing lines (lines 1, 6).
Line 1
初六 發蒙。利用刑人。用說桎梏。以往吝。
Six at the beginning means: To make a fool develop It furthers one to apply discipline. The fetters should be removed. To go on in this way bring humiliation.
Line 6
上九 擊蒙。不利為寇。利禦寇。
Nine at the top means: In punishing folly It does not further one To commit transgressions. The only thing that furthers Is to prevent transgressions.
Trigram Changes
Yilin Verse
鑿井求玉，非卞氏寶。名困身辱，勞無所得。
Digging a well to seek jade; it is not the treasure of Bian. Reputation ruined, body disgraced; labor yields nothing.
— Jiao Yanshou, Yilin (Forest of Changes), 1st century BCE
Commentary
A spring beneath the mountain is diverted into a futile excavation. One drills a well seeking jade, but what emerges is not the treasure of Bian He. Name is disgraced, body humiliated, labor yields nothing. The allusion to Bian He's jade — the He Shi Bi, rejected twice by kings who mistook it for common stone — is inverted here: this seeker finds not misrecognized treasure but genuinely worthless rock. From Youthful Folly to Approach, the transformation carries a warning. Earth above the lake suggests authority drawing near, yet the naif who digs in the wrong place greets that approach empty-handed. Misdirected effort under illusion produces only shame, regardless of how earnestly one labors.
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