Peeping Through the Door and the Narrowness of a Partial View

Widening only slightly, the second line still sees through an aperture. Legge's translation shows one peeping out from a door and remarks that the view would be advantageous if it were merely the firm correctness of a woman, with the Little Symbolism adding that such peeping may also be a matter of shame. The gendered framing belongs to the period of the text; the mechanism being described is the narrowness of the opening rather than the character of whoever stands behind it.

A yielding stroke correctly occupies the second, even place and holds the centre of the lower trigram Kun, the strongest structural position any of the four soft lines can claim. It corresponds to the strong fifth line above, so a genuine line of sight to the ruling position exists here. What limits it is the doorway, an angle of view sufficient for a domestic scope and insufficient for the public one this hexagram is concerned with.

Read against the first line, the second is an advance. The lad saw only the outward form; this line sees the right thing through too small a frame. That distinction is what makes the verdict conditional rather than dismissive. Correctness of position secures a partial view, and the hexagram will spend three further lines widening it.