The Five Bonds tell you whom you must answer to; the Five Constant Virtues (五常) tell you how to be a person.
These five characters are a ruler. Before sleep, ask yourself: today, was I benevolent? Was I right? Did I keep propriety? Was I discerning? Did I keep my word?
You need not score full marks on every count — but the string must be there in your heart, ready to sound. Once a person stops measuring themselves, they begin to slide — and while they slide, they do not even know it.
The I Ching (周易) speaks of "great virtue carrying great things" (厚德载物). Four characters, one truth: how much fortune you can carry depends on how deep your virtue runs.
Thin virtue in a lofty position, small wisdom plotting great designs, slight strength bearing heavy loads — a small horse pulling a big cart. On flat ground it may just manage; up the first slope it overturns.
Consider those who:
At root it is all virtue unequal to position. Not bad luck — their chassis simply could not bear the load.
So the saying holds: if you want a good future, first become a good person. Not because heaven rewards you, but because you are the kind of person who deserves it — and can keep it.
The opening line of the Taishang Ganying Pian (太上感应篇), the classic of moral retribution: "Fortune and misfortune have no gate of their own; we summon them ourselves." (祸福无门，惟人自召)
Fortune and misfortune keep no door. They do not break in from outside; you call them to you.
If you habitually seek something for nothing and shun honest work, that is the signal you send out — and such people, such events, are what answer. If you are upright, keep the rules, hold a line, the dirty business can never get near you.
This is not mysticism; it is cause and effect. What you plant today is what stands in the field three or five years on — nothing is left out.
This line is a ruler for yourself, never a gavel for judging others. To see someone in misfortune and say "they asked for it" is not understanding the principle; it is using the principle to wound.