蒙 → 損
Hexagram 4: Youthful Folly → Hexagram 41: Decrease
Changing Lines
This transformation involves 1 changing line (line 1).
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.
Trigram Changes
Yilin Verse
忉忉怛怛，如將不活。黍稷之恩，靈輒以存。
Grieving and anguished, as if one cannot survive. But the grace of millet and grain—Ling Zhe is thereby preserved.
— Jiao Yanshou, Yilin (Forest of Changes), 1st century BCE
Commentary
A spring beneath the mountain trembles with mortal dread. Anguished and terrified, as though one will not survive. Yet the grace of millet and grain — Ling Zhe lives because of it. According to the Zuo Zhuan, Zhao Dun of Jin once fed a starving man by the roadside. That man, Ling Zhe, later became a palace guard. When Duke Ling of Jin plotted to assassinate Zhao Dun, Ling Zhe turned against his own lord to save his benefactor, repaying the debt of a single meal. From Youthful Folly to Decrease, the transformation reveals that sacrifice sustains life. The mountain diminishes so the lake may receive; a bowl of millet, given at cost to oneself, returns as salvation when all seems lost.
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