To Take By Treachery And Seize By Bullying

Mi You-ren was a Sung Dynasty calligrapher and painter. He especially liked to copy the works of ancient artists, and his copies were almost exactly like the real thing. One time, after having borrowed and copied and old painting, he took the original along with his copy to the owner, and asked him which was which. Because Mi You-ren was so skilled at his work, the owner could not tell the two paintings apart, and took the copy home, thinking that it was the original. By replacing original masterpieces with his own copies in this way, Mi You-ren obtained many famous old paintings.

Although Mi You-ren was very clever, in the end, he was discovered. And becaose of this, he was looked down on by all of the people of his time.

"To Take by Trickery and Seize by Bullying" is now a for-character idiom in Chinese which refers to using dishonest means to obtain what one doesn't deserve.

巧取豪奪

米友仁是宋代非常有名的書畫家，他擅長的是山水畫和行書。在他年輕時，比較喜歡臨摹古人的書畫，而且非常喜愛古代名人的作品。有一次，在漣水時曾向別人借來一幅松牛圖，花了好幾天工夫才將畫臨摹下來。然後他把真畫留下，把臨摹的給了人家，可是過了兩三天，畫主就找他要真本。他疑惑地問畫主：「你是怎麼發現的？」畫主笑了笑說：「我的真畫從牛的眼睛裡能看到牧童的影子，而你的卻看不到。」米友仁聽了只得把真畫還給人家，喜歡名畫的他常常這樣，因此獲得了很多名貴的真本古畫。當時的人把他這種行為叫做巧偷豪奪，後來又引申為巧取豪奪。