A certain Grand Secretary, who had once held high office in the Ming Dynasty, served in the Grand Secretariat, and later defected to rebels, bore a notoriously poor reputation.

Upon retiring to his ancestral village, he constructed a grand hall in honor of his ancestors. On the day the hall was completed, someone secretly hung a plaque within it, inscribed with the four characters: "Elder of Three Dynasties." Alongside it hung a couplet: the upper line read, "One, two, three, four, five, six, seven," and the lower line read, "Filial piety, fraternity, loyalty, faith, propriety, righteousness, integrity."

The Grand Secretary pondered the couplet endlessly, utterly failing to grasp its meaning. Someone eventually offered a hint, explaining, "The upper line has forgotten the character for 'eight,' and the lower line is missing the character for 'shame.' Together, this means: 'The Grand Secretary is a son of a bitch and shameless.'"