The story of King Yan Zhao buying the bones of a thousand-mile horse with thousands of gold, and Tian Ji racing the horse

In ancient times, there was a king who loved the thousand-mile horse most. He sent people to search everywhere, but they couldn't find it for three years. A courtier heard that there was a precious thousand-mile horse somewhere in the distance, and told the king that as long as he gave him one thousand taels of gold, he would be able to buy the horse back. The king was very happy, so he sent his ministers with one thousand taels of gold to buy it. Unexpectedly, when the courtiers arrived, Chollima had already fallen ill and died. The courtier thought that it would be hard to explain when he went back with empty hands, so he took half of the gold he brought and bought the horse bones.

The courtier presented the horse bones to the king. The king was furious and said, "I want you to buy a live horse. Who asked you to spend money to buy back useless horse bones?" The courtier did not panic. He said hurriedly: "People have heard that you are willing to spend money to buy a dead horse. Are you afraid that no one will bring a live horse?"

The king was doubtful and no longer blamed the courtiers. As soon as the news spread, everyone thought that the monarch really loved the horse. Within a year, several thousand-mile horses were sent from all directions.

After Guo Wei told this story, he said: "The king must recruit talented people, so you might as well try me as a horse bone."

After hearing this, King Yan Zhao Inspired by this, after returning home, he immediately sent someone to build a very exquisite house for Guo Wei to live in, and he also asked Guo Wei to be his teacher. Talented people from all over the world heard that King Yan Zhao was recruiting talents sincerely, and they rushed to Yan State to ask for an audience. The most famous among them is Le Yi, a native of Zhao. King Zhao of Yan worshiped Le Yi as his minister, and asked him to rectify the country's affairs and train troops. As expected, the country of Yan became stronger day by day.

Tian Ji's horse racing

One day, King Qi asked Tian Ji to race with him, and stipulated that each person should choose one horse from his own top, middle and bottom horses to race; It was stipulated that every horse coming to the race would be rewarded with a thousand taels of gold, and every horse lagging behind would be paid a thousand taels of gold.

At that time, King Qi’s horses of each rank were stronger than Tian Ji’s horses of the same rank. Therefore, if Tian Ji used his own superior horse to compete with King Qi’s superior horse, he would use his own superior horse to compete with King Qi’s superior horse. If a medium horse competes with the King of Qi's medium horse, or if his inferior horse competes with the King of Qi's inferior horse, Tian Ji will lose three times, and therefore lose three thousand taels of gold. But in the end, Tian Ji did not lose, but won a thousand taels of gold. What's going on?

It turned out that before the horse race, Tian Ji’s adviser Sun Bin gave him an idea, asking Tian Ji to use his inferior horse to compete with the King of Qi’s superior horse, and to use his superior horse to compete with Qi’s superior horse. The king's middle-grade horse competed with his own medium-grade horse against the king's inferior horse. Of course Tian Ji's low-grade horse will lose, but both the high-grade and medium-grade horses will win. Therefore, Tian Ji not only did not lose three thousand taels of gold, but also won one thousand taels of gold.