During former French president Valery Giscard d'Estaing’s visit to Qufu, Shandong province in 2004, he recited a few pieces of famous instruction from Confucius in Chinese, such as "devoted and love antiquity" (信而好古) to express his respect for the wise men in the past.

The whole sentence by Confucius is "To relate and not to invent, devoted and love antiquity, I strive to be like Lao Zi (a famous Chinese philosopher) and Peng Zhu (an official during the Shang Dynasty), to pass down the essence of ancient works."

The Temple of Confucius in Qufu, first built in 478 BC, is the prototype of some 2,000 Confucian temples all over the world, including Japan, the Republic of Korea, the United States, Singapore and Vietnam.[Photo/IC]

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