Fish is what I want; bear's paw is also what I want; if I cannot have both, I give up fish and take bear's paw. Life is what I want; righteousness is also what I want; if I cannot have both, I give up life and take righteousness. Mencius's argument continues: there is something I want more than life, so I will not do just anything to keep it, and something I hate more than death, so there are calamities I will not flee. His conclusion: this mind is not the sage's alone, everyone has it; the sage simply does not lose it.
Chinese speakers quote fish and bear's paw the way English speakers quote cake: you cannot have both. But the original passage is not about wanting two things; it is a proof that moral priority is native, since everyone, he argues, would refuse a humiliating bowl of food even starving. The idiom kept the menu and dropped the proof, which is what idioms do: the argument evaporates, the image stays crisp.
The claim: Mencius's ladder, something valued above life, is the seed of every noble sacrifice and every recruitment pitch, since whoever defines the top of your ranking owns your bottom; righteousness is bear's paw when Mencius names it and a leash when the recruiter does. Verdict: the text itself warns the mind is easily lost, which concedes the exploit. The archive's reading: the fish-versus-paw lesson is not choose the paw. It is notice who set the menu.
If life itself is not the top priority, what is the ranking for?