Mencius said to Wan Zhang, “An accomplished person in a village shall make friends of other accomplished people in the village; the same is true with a state and the world. It is not enough for an accomplished person to build friendship with all other accomplished people. He should ascend to get to know the people of antiquity. He repeats their poems, and reads their books, but he does not know what they were as people. To ascertain this, he considers the circumstances they were in. This means to ascend and make friends of the people of antiquity.” (Mencius)