The sage in our age

For White, the biggest challenge in the translation is reproducing the rhythm of the original text.

"Chinese characters can be arranged neatly, each expressing a single idea and each taking roughly the same time to pronounce," he explains. "English words, however, differ in length, and sometimes several English words are needed to translate one Chinese character."

White tried to find solutions that were both accurate and still showed a beauty of symmetry, such as: "The wise delight in water, the benevolent in hills. The wise are active, while the benevolent are still. The wise enjoy life, while the benevolent achieve longevity."

He believes Confucius' recommendations for personal conduct, such as, "do not do unto others what you would not have them do to you", are applicable to solving today's problems.

However, he also sees Confucius' emphasis on the importance of hierarchy as not being that in tune with the modern world.