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好逸惡勞

简好逸恶劳 · 繁好逸惡勞

Mandarin · pinyin hào yì wù láo

to love ease and comfort and hate work (idiom)

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Characters in this entry

好: hǎo · good, excellent, fine; well
逸: yì · flee, escape, break loose
惡: Look up this written character
勞: Look up this written character
恶: è · evil, wicked, bad, foul
劳: láo · labor, toil, do manual work

Written characters and their own readings; the entry’s pronunciation is shown above.

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Mandarin tones

4–4–4–2 · hao4 yi4 wu4 lao2

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Read this spelling in Classical texts

Follow a written form into the eight pinned witnesses: Analects, Mencius, Laozi, Zhuangzi, Xunzi, Han Feizi, Sunzi and the Mao Shijing. A match is a place to investigate; it does not prove that a modern dictionary sense fits the passage.

好逸惡勞 · find source passages ↗ · 好逸恶劳 · find source passages ↗

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Compare dictionary sources Wiktionary · 1 sense · 1 Cantonese reading

Rime Cantonese 粵拼

hou3 jat6 wu3 lou4

Cantonese word readings for 好逸惡勞. This lexicon supplies readings, not definitions.

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Wiktionary English definitions · Chinese section

Independent source senses for this spelling, with usage labels retained. Not matched to the pronunciation above.

phrase

(derogatory) to indulge in comfort and despise laboring

Source page · dump 2026-09-02 · Contributors & history

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