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This short tale addresses the background story behind the Chinese idiom 一暴十寒, which literally translates to "One day of sun, ten days of frost", and which means "to bust butt for a little while and then get lazy", or "to only work for a short time and then fail". The story below really applies to the latter meaning. Though this is categorized as advanced, upper-intermediate readers could surely tackle this. <!--more-->
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<h4>一暴十寒</h4>
<strong>战国</strong>时，有个叫<strong>孟轲</strong>的人，大家称他为<strong>孟子</strong>。孟子<strong>善于</strong>通过打比方来发表议论。

当时，有人<strong>指责</strong>孟子不尽力帮助齐王。孟子便解释说:“比如说，天下有些易活的植物，假如把它放在太阳下晒一天，然后再把它放在<strong>阴冷</strong>的地方冻十天，即使是<strong>生命力</strong>再强的植物也会死。我见到齐王的机会<strong>少之甚少</strong>，即使给了他些良好的影响与帮助，我一离开，一些和我主张不同的人，又带给他许多不好影响。我怎么能使齐王的思想、品质好起来呢？”
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During the Warring States Period, there was a man named Meng Ke [Mencius], who everyone called MengZi. Menzi was very good at creating analogies to foster discussion.　

At that time, there was a person who criticized Mencius for not trying harder to help the King of Qi. Mencius explained plainly, saying, "Take this as an example: there are some plants that live well on this earth [lit: under heaven], but if you take them and put them in the sun for a day, then you take them and put them in the gloom and cold to freeze for ten days, even if their vitality is strong they're still going to die.  My opportunities to see the King of Qi have been less and less, so even if I give him some good influence and help, as soon as I leave, some people that don't advocate the same things I do will influence him negatively. [That being the case,] how can I improve the quality of the King of Qi's thinking?"
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