Cultivating a Good Life in Early Chinese and Ancient Greek Philosophy: Perspectives and Reverberations 1350049573, 9781350049574

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Cultivating a Good Life in Early Chinese and Ancient Greek Philosophy

Also available from Bloomsbury Comparative Philosophy without Borders, edited by Arindam Chakrabarti and Ralph Weber Landscape and Travelling East and West: A Philosophical Journey, edited by Hans-Georg Moeller and Andrew K. Whitehead Wisdom and Philosophy: Contemporary and Comparative Approaches, edited by Hans-Georg Moeller and Andrew K. Whitehead

Cultivating a Good Life in Early Chinese and Ancient Greek Philosophy Perspectives and Reverberations Edited by Karyn Lai, Rick Benitez, and Hyun Jin Kim

BLOOMSBURY ACADEMIC Bloomsbury Publishing Plc 50 Bedford Square, London, WC1B 3DP, UK 1385 Broadway, New York, NY 10018, USA BLOOMSBURY, BLOOMSBURY ACADEMIC and the Diana logo are trademarks of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc First published in Great Britain 2019 Copyright © Karyn Lai, Rick Benitez and Hyun Jin Kim, 2019 Karyn Lai, Rick Benitez and Hyun Jin Kim have asserted their right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as Editors of this work. Cover design: Irene Martinez Costa Cover image © Getty Images All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publishers. Bloomsbury Publishing Plc does not have any control over, or responsibility for, any third-party websites referred to or in this book. All internet addresses given in this book were correct at the time of going to press. The author and publisher regret any inconvenience caused if addresses have changed or sites have ceased to exist, but can accept no responsibility for any such changes. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress. ISBN: HB: 978-1-3500-4957-4 ePDF: 978-1-3500-4958-1 eBook: 978-1-3500-4959-8 Typeset by Deanta Global Publishing Services, Chennai, India

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Contents Introduction  Karyn Lai, Rick Benitez, and Hyun Jin Kim 1 Part One Harmony, Balance, Beauty: Understanding Conceptions of Cultivation 3   1   2   3   4   5

Cultivation and Harmony: Plato and Confucius  Rick Benitez 7 Cultivating Noble Simplicity (Euētheia): Plato  Lee M. J. Coulson 20 The Beauty Ladder and the Mind-Heart Excursion: Plato and Zhuangzi  Wang Keping 32 Awareness and Spontaneity: Three Perspectives in the Zhuangzi  Lisa Raphals 49 Understanding ‘Dao’s Patterns’: Han Fei  Barbara Hendrischke 68

Part Two Doubt, Predicament, Conflict: Cognitive, Affective, and Epistemic Difficulties 81  6 Skepsis and Doubt: Ancient Greece and the East  Yasuhira Yahei Kanayama 85   7 Wisdom and Cognitive Conflict: Benign Perplexity in the Outlines of Scepticism  Per Lind 104   8 Understanding Fortune and Misfortune in a Good Life: ‘Solon’ and ‘Confucius’  Hyun Jin Kim and Karen Kai-Nung Hsu 132   9 Emotion and Self-Cultivation: Marcus Aurelius and Mengzi  Jesse Ciccotti 149 10 Dislodging Mundane Wisdom: The Inner Chapters of the Zhuangzi and the New Testament Gospels  Lauren F. Pfister 162 Part Three Here, Now, Ever-after: How to Practise and Achieve a Good Life 175 11 12 13

Knowing How to Act: Aristotle  Sophie Grace Chappell 177 Learning to Be Reliable: Confucius’ Analects  Karyn Lynne Lai 193 Auditory Perception and Cultivation: The Wenzi 文子  Andrej Fech 208

vi Contents 14 15

Cultivation and the Arts of Writing: Liu Xie  Will Buckingham 221 Death and Happiness: Han China  Mu-Chou Poo 237

List of Contributors Index

253 255

Introduction Karyn Lai, Rick Benitez, and Hyun Jin Kim

What does it take to live well? Ancient Chinese and Greek philosophy present accounts or models of life lived well: a Confucian junzi, a Daoist sage and a Greek phronimos. Philosophical discussions in these traditions bring to light pictures of a good life. Yet, living well is not simply about having the right kinds of goals nor is it just about how particular activities are performed. A richer account of a good life is enhanced by understanding how it is cultivated. The contributors to this volume explored these issues at a conference held at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia, from 15 to 18 January 2016. The rigorous but convivial cross-tradition discussions on the conference theme ‘In pursuit of wisdom: Ancient Chinese and Greek perspectives on cultivation’ have enriched, challenged, and broadened our thinking on the ways to a good life. In this volume, the contributors articulate and build on some of these insights by investigating processes associated with cultivating or nurturing the self in order to live such lives. What is involved in developing practical wisdom, nurturing the exercise of reason, cultivating equanimity, fostering reliability, learning to respond fittingly, developing a knack, and so on? Living a good life also requires gaining some reflective distance from conventional values and pursuits in order to re-orientate oneself towards authentic, grounded, or embedded views of life. A good life can involve attunement with, and sometimes rejection of, existing institutions, frameworks, and relationships. How do we refine our capabilities, including our emotions, understanding, wisdom, and sensory capacities? How does practice allow us to act both spontaneously and reliably, yet not merely habitually? How do we live lives that incorporate beauty and harmony? How do our beliefs about death and the afterlife, as well as burial practices, reflect our perspectives on life? These questions are explored in this volume, drawing on cross-traditional insights to deepen our understanding of cultivation. We examine early Chinese and ancient Greek perspectives of cultivation both because they provide effective distance from contemporary values and because they offer an array of reflections and motivating arguments that may still be useful to us today. Our primary aim is not to understand one perspective by way of the other, nor to provide a historical account of the transmission of ideas. Rather, our interest is in the cultivation of a good life per se. Thus, the orientation of this volume is not fundamentally comparative. Where comparisons are made (and several of the essays are comparative), the point is that comparison can sharpen a conception of cultivation, either through contrast or by means of additional contexts, examples, or analogies.

2 Cultivating a Good Life Where comparisons are not made, we still expect the presentation of Chinese and Greek thinking on related issues to provoke reflection, including reflection about the way that a cultural perspective might influence the conception of a good life. Other civilisations besides China and Greece may present similar value for reflection, but these two seem both independently rich enough and sufficiently similar to each other for the purpose of jointly enhancing thinking about cultivation. This book is arranged in three sections that comprise a dialectic of cultivation. The first part – Harmony, Balance, Beauty – sets out basic positive ideals of what is to be cultivated. The second – Doubt, Predicament, Conflict – explores the inevitable cognitive and epistemic difficulties that result from application of these ideals to practical life. The third – Here, Now, Ever-After – concerns putting wisdom about a good life into practice, both immediately and across a full lifetime. Taken together, the sections of the book provide both cognitive and practical insight into the nature of a good life. In bringing the conference and this volume together, we wish to thank New College – and especially its attentive conference administrator, Edwina Hine – for hosting the conference. The conference was supported by grants from two sources: an Australian Research Council DECRA (Discovery Early Career Researcher Award) granted to Hyun Jin Kim for the project The Transfer of Global Hegemony: Geopolitical Revolutions in World History, and a Conference Subvention Grant awarded by the School of Humanities and Languages, the University of New South Wales, Australia. Finally, we are grateful to the participants at the conference for their inspiring ideas, their smiles and contributions at early morning and late afternoon papers, and the ongoing friendships. Note on the cover image.  We sought an image of a tree for its allusions to wisdom. More specifically, we wanted not just any tree but a Moreton Bay Fig because it signifies an Australian context, which is where we live. It has profound significance for the three of us, with our roots in different parts of the world, now working and living in Australia. And the book is a result of international collaborative work, involving colleagues who came to Australia to discuss these ideas with us. The photo captures the physical context within which the book’s discussions arose, and suggests the continuous activity and interconnectedness that we think the cultivation of a good life involves. K. L, R. B, H. J. K

Part One

Harmony, Balance, Beauty: Understanding Conceptions of Cultivation The chapters in this part explore how the themes of harmony, balance, and beauty are manifest in ancient Greek and Chinese philosophy. They reveal the complexity of harmony, situating the individual within social, ethical, political, and cosmological contexts. Maintenance of harmony in these domains may require compromises on the part of individuals as he or she learns to balance competing loyalties and adjudicate between norms, practices, and ideals. Balance is required in expressions of human agency at a range of levels: between (a life of) simplicity and complexity, between a norm-driven life and one that is more spontaneous, and between emotional reactions and cultivated responses. In the views of individual thinkers across both traditions, the themes of harmony and balance incorporate a sense of beauty. Beauty is found not only in our appreciation of the aesthetic elements in life, but also in patterns, proportions, and pictures of spiritual and intellectual freedom. Rick Benitez explores the conception of harmony between individual and society in both Plato and Confucius. He first shows how certain background conceptions of harmony lead both Plato and Confucius to the idea that the cultivation of a harmonious life only makes sense within the context of a flourishing society. The apparent differences between Plato and Confucius can be softened by recognising that Confucius thought Chinese civilisation provided a proper foundation for such a society, whereas Plato did not think Greek civilisation provided such a foundation. Thus, where Confucius is socially conservative, Plato is a social reformist. Both philosophers, however, share the view that when customs and habits are rectified, the true harmony of the person is to be found in conformity to socially established practices. True wisdom, then, is cultivated through reflection on society, and on the rectification and understanding of social practice. Both Plato and Confucius think that the cultivation and practice of music, widely understood as the virtuous expression of society’s most deeply cherished values, shows the greatest wisdom and harmony possible for a person. The greatest music of this sort is expressed not only in philosophy, poetry, and art, but also in civic virtue and public service. Confucian and Platonic harmony is anything but spontaneous – it is a result of a lifetime of training and practice. Lee Coulson examines the concept of simplicity (euētheia) as it appears in Plato, with some additional reflection on simplicity in Chinese philosophy, particularly in

4 Cultivating a Good Life Daoist tradition. Plato sought to rescue Greek culture from the trend of sophistication that captivated its attention from the 5th to the 4th century BCE. During that time, Greek ambitions, especially at Athens, turned from the simple values of a bucolic life to the diverse, extravagant, and acquisitive values of an aspirational society. Plato shows how such aspirations can lead to militarism, enslavement, and division, without providing the sort of satisfaction that money and external goods seem to promise. He recommends a simpler life, one that focuses on goodness of character, which is what the Greek word euētheia literally means. Simplicity brings harmony to the diverse elements in the soul (psychē), and satisfies by ridding the soul of desire that is impossible to fulfil. Plato’s recommendation of a simple life ran counter to the trend of his society, in which simplicity was equated with simple-mindedness, but it resonated with other philosophers’ views, both in Greece and in China, about the best way of life. In many respects these views enhance those expressed in the previous chapter, by providing a concrete expression of harmony. Coulson takes things further still by pointing to connections in Daoism that are not envisaged in the previous chapter. Wang Keping allows space for consideration about how far these connections can be taken, by considering two specific ways in which the cultivation of a good life can be imagined. He looks in detail at the image of ascent to the vision of the Beautiful itself in Plato (which he calls ‘The Beauty Ladder’) and the thought experiment involving the cultivation of spirituality in Zhuangzi (which he calls the ‘Mind—heart excursion’). It is argued that while there are ways in which the Beauty Ladder and the Mind—heart excursion are similar, caution must be taken to observe specific differences within each similarity. For example, both the Beauty Ladder and the Mind—heart excursion have a teleological focus, in that they promote the cultivation of wisdom. But whereas Plato focuses on the acquisition of knowledge, Zhuangzi focuses on the Dao. Furthermore, in Plato, cultivation is grounded on knowing what was previously unknown while in the Zhuangzi it is based on forgetting what ought to be forgotten. Where Plato focuses on rational contemplation, Zhuangzi focuses on intuitive meditation. Plato’s method leads to an accumulation of know-how and meta-cognition, but Zhuangzi’s culminates in self-erasure and empty-mindedness. The identification of these differences between Plato and the Daoists flows rather well into Lisa Raphals’ examination of awareness and spontaneity in Zhuangzi, and provides a point of critical difference Chapter 1 of this part. Raphals identifies and examines a special type of awareness in Zhuangzi that is linked with spontaneity and indirection. This type of awareness is linked closely with embodied cognition, sense perception, and appreciation of desire. In many ways, the kind of spontaneity recommended in the Inner Chapters of the Zhuangzi is diametrically opposed to Platonism. Rather than focusing on abstract reason it focuses on direct appreciation of one’s surroundings; rather than focusing on the control and subjugation of desire it focuses on grasping and channelling one’s desires; rather than focusing on intellection it focuses on sense perception. Acting spontaneously, by being aware of one’s desires, capabilities, and surroundings, is what enables virtuosity in action. This is what enabled Cook Ding to carve oxen with the greatest possible skill. It is not so much ‘knowledge’ as ‘awareness’ – a kind of awareness – that is in the whole body, not just the mind. Raphals shows how the sort of awareness described in the Zhuangzi is consistent

Harmony, Balance, Beauty: Understanding Conceptions of Cultivation

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with contemporary biological, anthropological, and neurophysiological accounts of animal awareness. In the concluding chapter of this part, Barbara Hendrischke turns to Han Fei’s commentary on the Laozi. Hendrischke looks at the way in which Han Fei sought to understand ‘Dao’s patterns’. In this fascinating chapter, readers will see a penetrating observation of poetic text by a philosopher who is both familiar enough with the circumstances in which it was produced and sufficiently removed from its paradigm to shed light on it. Where the Laozi is ambiguous and poetic, Han Fei is precise and rational. Where the Laozi is enigmatic, Han Fei is practical. Where the Laozi’s expression is (apparently) contradictory, Han Fei’s expression is resolute and consistent. Han Fei’s commentary is thus able to reveal the efficacy of the Laozi for living good lives through the recognition and identification of Dao’s patterns. By observing these patterns, Han Fei argues, those who cultivate Dao may become able to resolve political as well as personal problems. The chapters in this part thus identify many of the conceptions of and strategies for cultivation that are discussed and critically examined in the rest of this book. They reveal both deep connections between ancient Greek and Chinese though as well as important differences.

6

1

Cultivation and Harmony: Plato and Confucius Rick Benitez

Introduction Herbert Fingarette (1983: 3) once said that the concept of happiness ‘simply does not appear’ in Confucius. This is an overstatement, but it underscores an important point. Fingarette was referring to happiness as an affective state—‘feeling happy’. Although there is evidence that on occasion Confucius was concerned about this affective state,1 it cannot be said to have been his primary ethical preoccupation. Rather, the primary concern of Confucianism is the cultivation and practice of a good human life (hereafter just ‘cultivation’). The observance of li (proper conduct) is fundamental to cultivation, whether or not that leads to a feeling of happiness. Likewise for Plato. For him eudaimonia, a term often translated as happiness, was not an affective state. Plato explicitly discusses affective states and their claim to be what makes life worth living. He repudiates the view that ‘pleasure, joy, delight or anything of that sort’ makes a human life good (Philebus 11b).2 For Plato, eudaimonia was constituted by the maintenance of relationships, both interpersonal and intrapersonal, which facilitate intrinsically human functions.3 As scholars have pointed out, Plato saw these relationships in terms of observing the rule of law; that is, in a manner not dissimilar to the Confucian observance of li (Morrow 1960: 570–72; Klosko 2006: 246– 51; Nightingale 1999: 100–22). In this chapter I will abandon talk about happiness (as an affective state) in both Plato and Confucius in favour of talk about cultivation. I think that for both Plato and Confucius what makes a person cultivated has to do with harmony and being musical. I will begin by discussing conceptions of harmony in general and the way Platonic and Confucian conceptions of harmony fall under them. After that I shall turn to the role of harmony in their conceptions of personal and communal welfare, and finally to the practice of harmony in the cultivation of a good life.

Harmony in general In the background to both Platonic and Confucian ethics lies a general conception of cosmic harmony, as exemplified in balance, repetition, and unification of diverse

8 Cultivating a Good Life elements or processes. In the West, these notions go back to Anaximander’s claim that the opposites – hot, cold, wet, and dry – pay for their transgressions against each other by being balanced out over time (fragment 1).4 In Chinese philosophy the most basic beliefs attributed to the so-called Yin-Yang School reveal a conception of balanced opposition at the deepest level of reality. In both early China and ancient Greece, early theories of nature emphasised the cycle of the seasons and the transmutation of basic elements. These cycles and interdependencies represent conceptions of temporal and compositional equilibrium that I will call the ‘Greater Harmony’, or the harmony of the universe at the most general level. Within the Greater Harmony, as exemplified in both early Chinese and ancient Greek thought, there are lesser and lesser harmonies, the pattern of temporal and compositional equilibrium being repeated endlessly at ever smaller levels. Musical harmony, in the narrow sense of an acoustical phenomenon brought about by ratios of tones, is one of these lesser harmonies; it was investigated earnestly by Pythagoreans, who saw in music the opportunity to discover the mathematics of the Greater Harmony of the universe. Early thinking in both China and Greece displays a strong tendency towards this sort of macrocosm–microcosm analogising. In early Greek medicine, for example, the first theories of health emphasised the balance of four ‘humours’ – blood, phlegm, yellow bile, and black bile. Chinese medicine may have begun with a similar balance theory involving yin/yang and the five elements in different bodily systems or ‘meridians’. And of course there is the famous ‘five-flavour theory’, part medicinal, part culinary, still in use in China today. Naturally, there are many different ideas of what constitutes harmony, and many different approaches to its realisation. A good example is found in the ways that different harmony theorists approach conflict. Some treat conflict as incongruent with nature, as a sign of some localised anomaly. They seek either to find a deeper harmony that resolves the incongruency – as the Pythagoreans discovered that incommensurate lengths could be rationalised in terms of commensurate areas constructed upon them – or, where possible, to restore balance through direct action – as in an ancient Greek prescription to cure itching, thought to result from internal coldness, by the external application of heat (Plato, Philebus 46d–47a). Other harmony theorists are so thoroughgoing that they construe conflict itself as part of the Greater Harmony. Both Heraclitus, and Laozi seem to have thought of conflict as a vital part of the universal dynamic. For them, war, friction, and turmoil are inevitable; the wise person neither hastens nor delays them.5 Within this general domain of ancient harmony theories, I want to focus on three points that will be useful for appreciating Platonic and Confucian views of cultivation. First, both Plato and Confucius are naturalists as opposed to relativists or constructivists about harmony. By that I mean that for them harmony really exists, and is to be discovered in nature. The Greater Harmony is real and objective; it is to be pursued as the model and basis of all other harmony. There is a right music – the one that really is in harmony with the Greater Harmony – and a wrong music – the modes, tunes, and balances that ignorant people sometimes prefer. Plato favours the Dorian and Phrygian modes over the Ionian and Lydian, because the former are more suited to virtue (Republic 398–400). Likewise, Confucius speaks of his preference for the music of the Shao over the music of Zhen (Analects 3.25, 17.18), apparently also on moral grounds.

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Second, as a corollary to their naturalism, both Plato and Confucius are what might be called ‘nested harmony theorists’. That is, they accept the macrocosm– microcosm analogy. Thus, within the Great Harmony of the universe there is the harmony of society, and within the harmony of society there is the harmony of character. Each of the lesser harmonies is dependent upon the larger one. To be sure, Plato’s geometrical conception of reality allows him to pursue this aspect of harmony with a mathematical precision and fervour not found in Confucius,6 but the important thing here is what naturalism and the nesting analogy commit both philosophers to. For both there is a right organisation of society, one that produces the most harmonious balance, and likewise there is a right temperament of the individual, and this is necessarily the one best adapted for harmonious functioning in the best society. Thus, there is for Plato and Confucius no issue of the individual versus society. Conflict between individual and society is a sign of disharmony in one or the other or both. Third, both Plato and Confucius favour resolution of discord. They do not acquiesce in ‘creative tension’ as some of their predecessors did. War is not the ‘father of all things’ for Plato as it is for Heraclitus (fragment 53), nor is ‘calamity the ground of fortuity’ for Confucius as it is for Laozi (Dao De Jing II.58, translation Hansen). For Plato it is absurd to speak of harmony as embedding conflict; harmony is a matter of ‘resolving the discord’ (Symposium, 187a). In a similar vein Confucius says, ‘when the people keep their several places, there will be no poverty; when harmony prevails, there will be no scarcity of people; and when there is such a contented repose, there will be no rebellious upsettings’ (Analects 16.1).7 There are differences between Plato and Confucius, of course. For example they approach resolution in different manners and degrees. Plato takes a more active approach to resolution than Confucius does. He is a political reformer of the first order, and some of the reforms he suggests involve radical transformations of the society in which he lived.8 Culturally, he is iconoclastic, even to the point of recommending that the works of Homer be banned from his ideal city (Republic 606–07). Although Plato hopes to achieve a resolution of all social disharmony, the means by which he would effect such resolution are anything but gentle. By contrast, Confucius’ cautious, conservative approach to social change looks mild. ‘In serving your father and mother’, he says, ‘you ought to dissuade them from doing wrong in the gentlest way’ (Analects 4.18). Rather than criticise poetry, he venerates it, saying ‘be stimulated by the Odes’, (Analects 8.8) and ‘unless you study the Odes you will be ill-equipped to speak’ (Analects 16.13). Indeed he says of the Odes that they may be summed up in one phrase, ‘swerving not from the right’ (Analects 2.2). It seems to me that this difference may be softened. Both philosophers show signs that their attitudes might be similar under similar conditions. Plato, for example, believed that much of the blame for the decline of Athenian culture lay with moral failings inculcated in and reinforced by the Greek poets. But he praises the art and music of Egypt for reflecting a morally upright culture that lasted 10,000 years (Laws 656– 7). In Laws he recommends that the work of poets be modelled upon the success of the Egyptians,9 and hopes to establish a canon of poetic works that, if I may put it in Confucian terms, would not swerve from the right.

10 Cultivating a Good Life Confucius, of course, was a great admirer of the moral accomplishments of his own cultural predecessors. As Fingarette points out: For [Confucius], the li and the tao represent deeply authenticated norms for conduct, rather than historically persistent forms of actual conduct. The significance of their origin in antiquity, in the golden age of the Chou or even earlier, was that they were norms whose authenticity was vouched for by their having been accepted in virtuous and wise regimes, regimes governed by men who (Confucius presumed) saw clearly and deeply into the meaning of human existence, and who lived the truths they saw. (Fingarette 1983: 335)

According to Zhong-qi Cai, Confucius felt similarly about music. Thus he ‘takes the Shao to be a supreme example of aesthetic and moral perfection’ (Cai 1999: 328). Nevertheless, says Cai, Confucius ‘would certainly have been sympathetic to the idea of censoring works that failed to meet his moral-aesthetic standards. His desire to do away with the songs of Zheng is a clear indication of how he would censor poetry if he were in an official position to do so’ (Cai 1999: 333). Some support for this view may be found in Confucius’ statement that, ‘After I returned from Wei to Lu, music was rectified, odes and hymns [were] put to their proper use’ (Analects 9.15). It is hard to imagine Confucius ever advocating reforms as radical as Plato’s.10 Nevertheless, in judging the content of poetry, Plato and Confucius both expect moral rectitude above all things. As Confucius says, ‘faced with what is right, to leave it undone shows a lack of courage’ (Analects 2.24). Once poetry is made harmonious with right action, both philosophers wholeheartedly endorse its role in moral education. Plato and Confucius also appear to differ in the degree of harmonisation they expect. Plato’s admiration of Parmenidean monism led him to adopt a view of perfection that involves the greatest possible resolution of difference. He sometimes refers to the Forms as ‘monads’ or ‘henads’, units that are ‘ever the same and ever in the same’ (Philebus 15b). Earthly items, on his view, ‘want to be like’ the Forms in this way ‘but fall short’ (Phaedo 74d). Only as a matter of necessity does Plato accept that the diverse elements of the cosmos, the polis, and the psyche cannot be reduced to perfect unity. Harmony, then, for Plato, stands in as a surrogate for simplicity (Philebus 64d–65a) and the closer any harmony approaches to unity, the better. Confucius’ view is fundamentally different. According to Confucius, the junzi ‘seeks harmony, not sameness’ (Analects 13.23). Although some have suggested that Confucian harmony, like Platonic harmony, aims at simplicity (Cai 1999: 332), it seems to me that what they really mean by ‘simplicity’ is non-excessiveness, something that is actually consistent with diversity. In one passage Confucius does say, ‘I hate purple that usurps red’, (Analects 17.18) and the usual gloss is that, since purple is a mixed colour, whereas red is pure, he is indicating a preference for simplicity in something like the Platonic sense. But this passage, so interpreted, seems to me to have few genuine parallels elsewhere in Confucius,11 whereas attacks on excessiveness are common. And it is not just vicious excess which must be avoided, but excess of virtue as well (Analects 7.38, 15.21, 13.23). As Cai points out (1999: 320), ‘Confucius stresses that his virtues are never developed to a fault’. The

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final balance that constitutes Confucian harmony, it seems to me, cannot be specified with precision, but it is not aimed at reduction to unity. Despite these differences, the similarities between the Platonic and Confucian general conceptions of harmony are substantial, and place them in remarkably similar positions with regard to the cultivation of a moral person. To see this more clearly, let us first examine in detail the implications of Platonic and Confucian views for communal and personal harmony.

Communal and personal harmony I suggested earlier that because of their general views about harmony there is no issue of individual versus society in either Plato or Confucius. In fact, I think their position is even stronger than this. There is no important role for a concept of ‘self ’ in Plato, nor, so far as I can tell, in Confucius. Indeed, Plato’s view of the soul (an entity which survives countless transmigrations through different living animals, keeping only the memory of universal, a priori truths) implies that personal individuality is insignificant. Socrates is not concerned on his dying day that he should be immortal, but rather that truth and knowledge should be.12 Likewise for Confucius, ‘the individual is neither the ultimate unit of true humanity nor the ultimate ground of human worth’ (Fingarette 1983: 332). Even the ‘model person’, the junzi, is not to be understood in terms of individuality: ‘the junzi is a person actually engaged in li relationships with other persons; and it is the pattern, when observed by others, that has for other human beings the magical evocative power of true humanity actualized’ (Fingarette 1983: 343). For both Plato and Confucius, an individual separated from any actual or possible society would not even be recognisable as a genuinely human being. That, I think, is one of the reasons why neither of these philosophers has an affective conception of happiness: individual subjective happiness has no significance for them. At the same time, what we call society is not for them an abstract emptiness into which all of humanity is dissolved, but a living, breathing organism that both constitutes and is constituted of persons. Some recent authors have tried to move away from this interdependence of person and community. Unable to imagine a condition in which people lack individuality, they seek to create a space for the individual within a concept of incidental harmony. According to Sor-Hoon Tan, Chinese philosophy views the cosmos as an open-ended process, constituted by innumerable processes and sub-processes of individual organisms, of activities of individuals – there are processes within processes within processes, sub-processes within sub-processes, processes within sub-processes and vice-versa. Interaction occurs within one level as well as across different levels. Each unfolding in its own way, they interweave, attract or repel, affect and are affected by one another. Harmony could emerge spontaneously in these processes, in which there is order in diversity, without conformity to fixed patterns or rules, and in which participants enhance one and other and produce novelty without losing their respective individuality. (Tan 1999: 107)

12 Cultivating a Good Life Although Tan recognises the possibility of greater and lesser harmonies that I spoke of earlier, his description of the cosmos unfolding in spontaneous, patternless, novel aggregations of individuals is essentially atomistic. It fits neither Plato nor Confucius. Plato, in fact, was a great enemy of the view that the universe arises as a result of spontaneity and chance (see Philebus 28d ff.; Laws 889a ff.) Similarly, although Confucius is generally circumspect about the ‘Way of Heaven’, he refused to speak at all about disorder (Analects 7.21). His occasional analogies between macrocosm and microcosm strongly suggest he believed there were fixed patterns which governed both natural and moral phenomena. For example, he says, ‘The rule of virtue can be compared to the Pole Star, which commands the homage of the multitude of stars without leaving its place’ (Analects 2.1). Or again, when he is thinking of giving up speech, he compares his intention to the operation of the heavens, saying, ‘What does Heaven ever say? Yet there are the four seasons going round and there are the hundred things coming into being’ (Analects 17.19). This remark strongly suggests both orderly process and necessity in nature. A more accurate, but still somewhat misleading, description of personal and communal harmony of the sort found in both Plato and Confucius can be obtained from Chenyang Li, who writes, Harmony, as understood in Confucianism, can occur at various levels. It can take place within the individual. A person can harmonize various parts of his or her body, the mind-heart, and various pursuits in life into a well-functioning, organic whole. Harmony can take place between individuals at the level of the family, the community, the nation, and the world. This may include harmony between societies, harmony within a society with different ethnic groups (or political parties), harmony within the same ethnic group with different kin, and harmony among the same kin. Harmony also can take place between human beings and the natural universe. Confucianism does not exclude intrapersonal harmony, which Daoism emphasizes, but Confucianism puts tremendous weight on interpersonal harmony, such as the harmony between ruler and minister, between parent and child, between husband and wife, between siblings, and between friends. It also places tremendous weight on the harmony between human society and the natural world. Its ultimate goal is to achieve a grand harmony throughout the cosmos. (Li 2006: 587)

Li is right to point out all the various levels of harmony. Unlike Tan, Li recognises all of these levels of harmony as intimately related; they do not simply emerge and disappear as eddies within a great current. Li also notes that the aim of Confucianism is to promote accord across all levels. He notices that the harmony of mind and heart is necessary to a well-functioning organic whole. Nevertheless, Li fails to recognise the organic whole that is the community, and continues to talk about individuals as though they have ultimate identity and meaning apart from the community. Yet Confucius said that, ‘on no occasion does a man realise himself to the full … though mourning for ones parents may be an exception’ (Analects 19.17). This almost paradoxical statement of ‘self-realisation’ suggests that an individual can never be separated from

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interpersonal relations. The Confucian philosopher Xunzi delicately describes the way in which music and the rites unite inner and outer harmony. ‘Music’, he says, ‘works from within, and rites work from without. They join together to shape both the inward and outward aspects of men, thus turning them into refined moral beings and eventually making the entire world peaceful’.13 Plato, it must be said, pursues the analogy of inter- and intrapersonal harmonies with a vengeance. For him the inner organisation of the animal is a replica of the outer organisation of the cosmos. In particular, the inner organisation of the psyche is a replica of the outer organisation of the polis. In the Republic, he famously describes the beautiful city, Kallipolis, as replicating the elements of a well-ordered soul.14 In Kallipolis, Guardians, Auxiliaries, and Craftsmen, respectively, carry out the function of Reason, Spirit, and Appetite in public life, according to what Nicholas Smith has called the ‘3–3 Specification’ of Plato’s analogy (Smith 1999: 32). As Smith rightly points out, the 3–3 specification is only an image of the balance to be found in the just soul and the just city. Some of the complexity involved in balancing the elements in the soul can be discerned from books VIII and IX of the Republic, which describes souls and states in disharmony. Plato’s discussions of the timocrat, the plutocrat, the democrat, and the tyrant all show that the elements of personality and society are correspondingly complex. Nevertheless, the correspondence of microcosm and macrocosm is exact. A comparison in Laws shows that Plato’s analogy between psychic and political organisation is so thoroughgoing that it is sometimes difficult to tell whether he is speaking of a constitution or a personality. In the context of a sustained discussion about akrasia, the prima facie paradoxical situation of a person failing to master himself, the Athenian suddenly begins to speak about internal discord in social rather than psychological terms. He presents the image of a large, dysfunctional family in which a cohort of unruly brothers takes control, and he considers what sort of judge should be appointed over them. Which of these [sc. judges] would be better, then: the one who executed all of the bad brothers, and set the better ones up to rule over themselves, or the one who made the good to rule, but allowed the bad to live so long as they were willing to be ruled? Or, could we pick a third, virtuous judge, if there were such a person, who could take this single quarrelling clan, and, without killing anyone, reconcile them for the rest of time, and by establishing laws for them, be able to secure their friendship with one another. (Laws 627d–628a)

Is the Athenian speaking here literally about social harmony, or metaphorically about harmonising the diverse elements of personality? I do not think the matter has or needs a decision. The point is that for Plato, justice looks the same whether our gaze is intra- or interpersonal. In the Republic, Socrates says, But justice is not about doing something external to oneself, but about what is internal – that is, what truly concerns oneself and one’s own – not allowing each part of the soul to do the work of another in itself or to meddle with each other, but

14 Cultivating a Good Life to establish and rule and arrange well the things that really belong to one. [The just person] becomes a friend to himself and artlessly harmonises the three [parts of the soul] like the three harmonic limits – the low, high and middle – and whatever others happen to be between these. (Republic 443c9–d7)

It is true that Socrates here emphasises what is within, but we make a mistake if we think that he is contrasting the individual to society. What he wants us to see is that the organisation we find externally just is a projection of what lies within; it is truly our own and should be befriended and harmonised with the same care that we have for what we narrowly think of as our person. The reason for regarding what is within in the first place is because it will lead us to collapse the distinction between inner and outer, whereas focus on the external will only sustain it. Tu Weiming described a similar collapse of inner and outer in Confucius. He said, ‘The more one penetrates in to one’s inner self, the more one will be capable of realizing the true nature of one’s human-relatedness’ (Tu 1976: 27). This is the point of view, I think, from which we need to see the practice of harmony in both Plato and Confucius. The programme of musical education they propose is designed to promote the cultivation, not of the moral individual, but of the moral person, where the term ‘person’ does not distinguish between individual and society.

Plato and Confucius on the practice of harmony I turn finally to the practice of Harmony in Plato and Confucius, with attention to the recommendations of both about education in music. Plato explicitly devotes large portions of the Laches, Protagoras, Symposium, Republic, and Laws to the discussion of music and musical education from the earliest childhood until the end of life. David Cooper (2009: 643) remarks that, by contrast, Confucius says little about education of the young, but it is clear that Confucius is very much concerned with the role of music in moral development from beginning to end. When he says, ‘Be stimulated by the Odes, take your stand on the rites, and be perfected by music’ (Analects 8.8), he is not implying that the Odes, the li, and music are separate domains; rather they go hand in hand in moral development.15 Becoming ‘perfected by music’ is not a reference to studying music as the last part of a curriculum, but to becoming truly musical as a result of earlier study and practice. Music, in this end-defining sense is what finally harmonises and integrates a person. Yet, as Wang points out, ‘musical education’, in the broad sense of the assimilation of culture, is thought of by ‘all Confucians’ as ‘the means to achieve this end’ (Wang 2009: 660). In this broad sense, the term ‘music’ means much the same for Plato as it does for Confucius. For them, music is, as Kenneth DeWoskin somewhat academically put it, the ‘repository of normative social values’ (DeWoskin 1983: 199). Importantly, not just any social values will do. As Plato puts it, music should expose the learner to whatever it is that makes a person genuinely good, having the excellence befitting a human being without any conflict whatsoever (Laws 770a5–771e1). Accordingly, the curriculum requires rectification if it is to achieve its objective. This involves the

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amendment and improvement of the cultural repository, either through censorship or edition, as I mentioned earlier. But amendment and improvement can only be carried out by those whose musical education has already been perfected: there must be a positive feedback loop that starts with mastery of the existing repository. Becoming correct in one’s training is a necessary condition to correcting one’s training at a later stage. Both Plato and Confucius are aware of this double sense of rectification. Although Plato is adamant that the works of the poets need to be rectified in order to be used in education, he places enormous emphasis on the rectification of character through education in poetry. While Confucius, as we have seen, shows concern that music should be set straight, he is also aware that lacking a proper understanding in the first place, that sort of rectification cannot occur. Thus, when he says, ‘If something has to be put first, it is, perhaps, the rectification of names’ (Analects 13.3), he is referring, not to the development of a philosophical semantics, but simply to learning how to speak accurately and precisely using the conventional semantics, for: When names are not correct, what is said will not sound reasonable; when what is said does not sound reasonable, affairs will not culminate in success; when affairs do not culminate in success, rites and music will not flourish. (Analects 13.3)

As with Plato, a certain kind of preliminary correctness is required in order to bring about character that can improve itself. For both Plato and Confucius, musical development starts here, with rigorous and pervasive attention to the rectification of character according to the best standards available. But this education is never merely habituation to social values; it is always directed towards an understanding of social values that will transcend them and improve upon them. For Plato you might say it is directed towards turning the mind’s eye so that it will see for itself (Republic 518e). For Confucius you might say it is pointing out one corner of a square so that one will notice the other three (Analects 7.8). Even the beginnings of such a musical education are, to use Karyn Lai’s terms, ‘mature’ and ‘meta-ethical’: although the skills required for creative activity are ‘acquired only through continuous and rigorous practice’, such practice is from the beginning directed towards flexibility to improve moral action (Lai 2006: 72). Again, social welfare and personal welfare, or happiness, are intimately interconnected. Cai overstates the differences between Plato and Confucius when he says, ‘What [Confucius] wants his pupils to cultivate … is primarily moral harmony … whereas the Platonic intellectual harmony culminates in the cognition of the absolute truth’ (Cai 1999: 319). For both philosophers, the cultivation of harmony is moral and intellectual, each end being for the sake of the other, continuously. It is as crucial to see the cognitive element in Confucius’ attitude to music as it is to see the active moral dimension in Plato. The rectification of character through continuous rigorous practice leads, in fact, to a special kind of understanding. Through constant acquaintance with natural and moral harmony, one comes gradually to understand the underlying ‘organisational principles controlling music, the motion of the stars and planets, physical bodily

16 Cultivating a Good Life functions and the relationships between various levels and offices of the state’ (Huang and Allen 2000: 34). What the philosopher comes to realise, however, is that these are not abstract principles, but principles generated and sustained in understanding itself. And that is the moment at which a person grasps that she belongs to the understanding of understanding. Plato is far more explicit in his awareness of this self-reflexive cognitive act than Confucius ever is. In the Philebus he emphasises that ‘the intelligence in us’ should regard itself as but an aspect of ‘intelligence in general’ (30a–31a), and that it should operate in the same way, namely as a dēmiourgos or artist (27b1), harmoniously combining all that is required for good order, wherever possible mitigating disorder and discord. It turns out that one of the things that intelligence must produce is the most harmonious life for an intelligent being, a task that involves balancing itself harmoniously against the other ingredients necessary to life (Philebus 61e–64). I think this is what Confucius means when he speaks of ‘perfect[ing] yourself through music’ (Analects 8.8). At least, it implies that, like Plato, he thinks the best life is achieved as a work of art in which artist and artefact are one. Yet if the understanding of understanding is not expressed in Confucius, it certainly seems to be expressed in the work of his successors. David Cooper points out that for Xunzi music leads ‘to appreciation of the rational, harmonious order in everything. … In attaining to this understanding, the junzi is already “carrying out the Way”, and already – by “mak[ing] clear the nature of music” as a vivid embodiment of rational order – possessed of virtue’ (Cooper 2009: 650). This sense of understanding, which understands its own role in the production of genuine harmony, is crucial to the final stage of musical development: performance. The performance of the master musician is the fulfilment of virtuosity. He or she must achieve a harmony that is different from the mathematical ratios of musical theory. Her medium is material, temporal, and circumstantial. It has qualities that can never even be specified in perfectly mathematical terms. The virtuoso must respond to physical reality by creating the best harmony she can create, using the necessities imposed by the medium. She must improvise, not for the sake of improvisation, but because harmony requires it. If she imposes a false rigidity, or crudely copies an abstraction, she will fail. If her performance succeeds, she will have created something unique, marvellous, and temporary. Because she embodies harmony in her person, she is capable of realising harmony in the world, or rather, in some small way, of making the world. In Timaeus, Plato’s Demiurge makes the universe like this. Though he uses the Forms as models, he cannot simply stamp them onto the mother of all becoming. The living, moving, cosmos he makes is in many ways bizarre in comparison to the pure simple structures of abstract concepts. Nevertheless, as Plato tells us in a phrase that astonishes us with its impossibility, it is a ‘moving image of eternity’ (Timaeus 37d). It is a virtuoso performance. Because humans can appreciate harmony, they can enhance the world still further. In the later dialogues, Plato suggests that philosophers and statesmen should become artists like the Demiurge, albeit within lesser spheres. Philosophers inevitably must convey meaning through images. They create worlds in speech. Since the people they converse with are of different types, these worlds must be

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adapted and improvised in the best possible way if they are to convey understanding. Plato’s own dialogues are virtuoso artworks made on this model. Likewise, statesman must always decide judgements and devise legislation that is appropriate to creating a world in community. In Laws, Plato describes the lawgiver as the painter of a constitution, trying to paint in such a miraculous way that he might bring his creation to life, caring for it and improving it for as long as he lives (769a–771a). Always, the philosopher and the statesman must be attentive to the production of real harmony, not mere novelty, originality, or individuality. In Confucius, the junzi is perfected by music. He doesn’t use an ox-knife to kill a chicken (Analects 17.4). Instead, he pays attention to due intervals (Analects 1.1). He does not copy or impose. Instead, he agrees without being an echo (Analects 13.23). He is flexible (Analects 1.8). Yet he follows his heart’s desire without overstepping the line (Analects 2.4). He is not invariably for or against anything, yet he is on the side of what is moral (Analects 4.10). As Fingarette remarked, ‘One who does expend the effort to learn the li ultimately becomes skilled in imaginatively combining and recombining the forms in ways suited to the circumstances, doing so in a critical rather than a slavish way, with spontaneity and elegance creatively’ (Fingarette 1983: 345). Nevertheless, the emphasis on spontaneity, elegance, and creativity can be misleading. Ironically, the Platonic and Confucian view of morally developed persons as virtuoso artists looks like a recommendation to express our individuality, and that is music to our ears. In modern life we admire style. We praise creativity. We encourage artistry and originality. Yet neither Confucius nor Plato would praise any of these things for their own sake, but when and only when they are employed to produce better harmony. When they do that, they open our eyes to a greater, richer, healthier world than we had ever seen before. That is the contribution of virtuosity to happiness. It increases the prospect of welfare for any that can see. For Plato and Confucius, any other contribution, I think, would be unrecognisable.

Conclusion I have tried here to outline what I think are deep similarities between Plato and Confucius about cultivation and harmony. If what I have said is correct, it undercuts some of the familiar platforms of difference between ‘East’ and ‘West’. For example, I would not characterise Plato as concerned only with the ‘rational order’ any more than I would characterise Confucius as concerned with the ‘aesthetic order’; nor would I say that Plato is the ‘truth-seeker’, while Confucius is the ‘way-seeker’.16 On my understanding, their views about cultivation and harmony show them to be concerned with reason, art, and action in ways that require the integration of all three. The real gulf may lie between these two philosophers and ourselves, just in case we find it impossible to abandon a conception of happiness that binds it to an individual’s subjective states. I think such a conception is ultimately trivial. Between Plato and Confucius there is a great deal to sort out, disagree over, test, and probe. But it is in that space where I think a really worthwhile conception of cultivation can be found, and on the better days, revealed.

18 Cultivating a Good Life

Notes 1 It is often pointed out that music (which has a central place in Confucius) and joy (evidently an affective state) are both denoted by the same ideograph (Tan 1999: 108; Huang and Allen 2000: 35; Wang 2009: 657). In this connection, Cai points to the well-known story about Confucius not eating meat after he heard the music of the Shao (Analects 7.14). He writes, ‘Nowhere else in the Analects is Confucius to such an extent overwhelmed with joy or sadness, or admiration or disgust’ (Cai 1999: 328). Others have pointed to concern with joy in later Confucian texts. Gier, for example, cites Mengzi’s claim that ‘the joy of virtue is so infectious that when it arises one cannot stop it, “and when one cannot stop it, then one begins to dance with one’s feet and wave one’s arms without knowing it”’ (4a27). Gier admits that ‘one cannot imagine Confucians ever reaching the frenzied state of a Dionysos or a Shiva’, but says that ‘this passage paints a far more dynamic picture of them than is ordinarily assumed’ (Gier 2001: 294). Wang (2009: 656–60) discusses Xunzi’s Yue Lun (‘Discourse on Music’) in response to Mozi’s Fei Yue (‘Condemnation of Music’). These instances of attention to affect, however, constitute the exception that proves the rule: for the most part, Confucianism is not about feeling happy. 2 All translations of Greek texts in this chapter are my own. 3 See especially Republic, books I and IV. 4 All fragments of the Presocratics cited in this chapter are numbered according to the system in H. Diels and W. Kranz Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker. 5 See Heraclitus fragments 53, 80. See Dao De Jing II.69. 6 Plato’s microcosms are, as it were, isomorphic duplicates of their respective macrocosms: living animals are organic replicas of the living cosmos; the well-ordered soul is a composite replica of the well-ordered society, with the same number of parts functioning in the same way. For Plato there are worlds within worlds within worlds. See Phaedo 180e–113e, Phaedrus 247c–249d. 7 All translations of Confucius’ Analects, unless otherwise noted, are from the version by D. C. Lau (1979). 8 For example consider the three great ‘waves of ridicule’ that Socrates, in Plato’s Republic, says he must face for his arguments about the equal education and training of women (Republic 450–7), the community of women and children (Republic 457–72), and the rule of society by philosophers (Republic 472–4). 9 See Nightingale (1999), who comments at length on Plato’s admiration of Egyptian law and culture. 10 There is a doubtful tradition that Confucius edited thousands of poems from the Odes (see Cai 1999: 331), but a basis for the story may be present in the passages about rectification. 11 The most plausible parallel is Analects 13.27, but no interpretation of simplicity is given there. Another possibility could be Analects 3.23, but in that passage harmony merely starts in unison, and does not return it. Analects 6.2, which initially praises simplicity, goes on to state that simplicity can be carried too far. 12 See Phaedo 91b: ‘As for you, if you will take my advice, you will think very little of Socrates, and much more of the truth.’ It should be noted that none of the proofs of immortality offered in the Phaedo (or indeed anywhere else in Plato) offer any hope of individual immortality. 13 Xunzi, Discourse on Music, translation Knoblock, quoted in Wang (2009: 660). 14 See Republic 368c7–d7 and book IV passim.

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15 For this idea, see also Analects 3.3, 11.26, 13.3, 14.12, 17.11. 16 For these distinctions, see Hall and Ames (1998: 180).

References Cai, Z. (1999). ‘In Quest of Harmony: Plato and Confucius on Poetry’, Philosophy East and West, 49: 317–45. Chong, K.-C. (1999). ‘The Practice of Jen’, Philosophy East and West, 49: 298–316. Cooper, D. (2009). ‘Music, Education, and the Emotions’, Journal of Chinese Philosophy, 36: 642–52. Cooper, J. M., ed. And D. S. Hutchison, assoc. ed. (1997). Plato: Complete Works. Indianapolis, IN: Hackett Publishing Company. DeWoskin, K. (1983). ‘Early Chinese Music and the Origins of Aesthetic Terminology’, in S. Bush and C. Murck (eds), Theories of the Arts in China. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 187–214. Diels, H. and W. Kranz, eds. (1951–2). Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker. Berlin: Wiedmann. Fingarette, H. (1983). ‘The Music of Humanity in the Conversations of Confucius’, Journal of Chinese Philosophy, 10: 331–56. Gier, N. F. (2001). ‘Dancing Ru: A Confucian Aesthetics of Virtue’, Philosophy East and West, 51: 280–305. Hall, D. and R. Ames (1998). Thinking from the Han. Albany: State University of New York Press. Huang, H. and Sohn Allen Ramona (2000). ‘Transcultural Aspects of Music: What did Confucius Say?’ The American Music Teacher, 49: 33–8. Klosko, G. (2006). The Development of Plato’s Political Theory, second edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Lai, K. (2006). ‘Li in the Analects: Training in Moral Competence and the Question of Flexibility’, Philosophy East and West, 56: 69–83. Lau, D. C., trans. (1979). Confucius: The Analects. London: Penguin. Li, C. (2006). ‘The Confucian Ideal of Harmony’, Philosophy East & West, 56: 583–603. Morrow, G. (1960). Plato’s Cretan City. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Nightingale, A. (1999). ‘Plato’s Lawcode in Context: Rule by Written Law in Athens and Magnesia’, The Classical Quarterly, (ns) 49: 100–22. Smith, N. D. (1999). ‘Plato’s Analogy of Soul and State’, Journal of Ethics, 3: 31–45. Tan, S.-H. (1999). ‘Experience as Art’, Asian Philosophy, 9: 107–22. Tu, W. (1976). Centrality and Commonality: An Essay on Chung-yung. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press. Wang, K. (2009). ‘Mozi Versus Xunzi on Music’, Journal of Chinese Philosophy, 36: 653–65.

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Cultivating Noble Simplicity (Euētheia): Plato Lee M. J. Coulson

Thucydides’ History of the Peloponnesian War (Dent 1910) records the factional stasis at Corcyra in 427 BCE, and the dire perversion of words and deeds in a society beset by political disorder. Words had to change their ordinary meaning and to take that which was now given them. Reckless audacity came to be considered the courage of a loyal ally; prudent hesitation, specious cowardice; moderation was held to be a cloak for unmanliness; ability to see all sides of a question inaptness to act on any. Frantic violence became the attribute of manliness; cautious plotting, a justifiable means of self-defence. (Th. 3.82.4)

Adherence to traditional ethical standards yielded to ‘the lust for power arising from greed and ambition’ (Th. 3.82.8). And ‘every form of iniquity took root in the Hellenic countries … the ancient simplicity (euētheia) of which nobility had the greatest share was ridiculed and vanished and society became divided into camps in which no man trusted his fellow’ (Th. 3.83.1).1 Thucydides’ alarm at the decline of noble simplicity forms the starting point for my assessment of its cultivation in Plato. Before engaging with the seeds and fruits of Platonic cultivation, let us then consider what Thucydidean euētheia is. Translations of Th. 3.83.1 vary somewhat from Dent’s. Benjamin Jowett translates kai to euēthes, ou to gennaion pleiston metechei as ‘the simplicity which is so large an element in a noble nature’ (Jowett 1881) and C. F. Smith translates as ‘that simplicity, which is the chief element of a noble nature’ (C. F. Smith 1894). Gregory Crane’s reading – ‘that good nature, of which nobility has the greatest share’ (Crane 1998, 100) – reflects euētheia’s etymology of eu + ēthos (good disposition), and a recent Jeremy Myott translation has it as, ‘that simplicity of spirit, which is such an important part of true nobility’ (Myott 2013). In light of these translations, it is reasonable to conclude that for Thucydides euētheia is an essential element of a good and noble nature, it is a noble simplicity. Each translator agrees that Thucydides greatly regrets the demise of this noble simplicity, and Martha Nussbaum’s commentary on 3.83.1 helps to explain why: ‘noble character [euētheia] … is here contrasted with suspiciousness and the inability to trust’ (Nussbaum 1986, 405).



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Since trust is a necessary condition for a just society, it is little wonder that Thucydides laments the disregard and loss of the very quality that secures it. Smith’s reading notes that euētheia ‘is cited by grammarians (Photius, Thomas Mag., Moeris) as furnishing a characteristic example of the original meaning of the word’ (C. F. Smith 1894). Thus, Thucydides’ use of euētheia was provocative, since it reversed the term’s predominantly negative connotations of foolish naiveté. Eric Csapo considers this ‘the improbable step of advancing intractable simplemindedness as a positive virtue’ (Csapo 2011, 121–2). Mary Williams similarly contends that Thucydidean euētheia is ‘a positive virtue’. She writes: ‘The parallels in language between [1.84–85.2] and that of the “ancient simplicity” (3.83.1) suggest that Thucydides is deliberately linking his own definition of virtuous character with the words of Archidamus [who says such character involves courage, good order, planning, self-control, honor and courage]’ (Williams 1998, 96). Clifford Orwin likewise attributes virtue to Thucydidean euētheia. Orwin believes that Thucydides’ ‘interest in the “ancient simplicity” is not because he clings to the supposed values of his class. It is from his awareness of the dependence of decent politics on traditional virtue grounded in piety’ (Orwin 2000, 865). His comments tell how the loss of euētheia’s traditional virtue can threaten ‘decent politics’, and why some might champion its civility in order to avert a vicious polity. Indeed, Csapo concludes that ‘from the time of Thucydides we can detect a nostalgia for the “noble simplicity” that once characterized good men, but was vanishing in a world where faith and trust were no longer possible because the absolute standard of the good that once governed morality had given way to relativism and the individual calculation of advantage’ (Csapo 2011, 121). Some commentaries on Th. 3.83.1 associate Thucydides and Plato. Consider Simon Hornblower’s remark that suggests they shared an abhorrence of sophistry: ‘The sentence [3.83.1] is of the first importance; it is a clear, absolute, and conservative authorial rejection of the “relativistic” moral teaching of certain of the sophists, whose outlook is too often wrongly ascribed to Th. merely because (as his speakers show) he was familiar with the various moves in their games’ (Hornblower 2003, 487). And E. C. Marchant directly references Plato in his comments on 3.83.1 where he believes the use of to euēthes ‘in the earliest, good sense of the word’ is reflected at Republic 400e (Marchant 1909).2 Marchant thus suggests that Plato’s resuscitation of euētheia advances the noble simplicity implied in Thucydides.3 Plato’s resuscitation of the term euētheia is not completely straightforward, however. Instances of euēth- root words in the early and transitional Platonic dialogues present negative, ironic, and affirmative uses of euētheia. Instances of the standard pejorative use persist (e.g. Euthd. 279d). Interestingly, sometimes the pejorative uses are delivered in speeches by sophisticated thinkers, who might be expected to follow convention. A good example can be seen at Republic 343d, where Thrasymachus says to Socrates: ‘You must look at the matter, my most simple-minded (euēthestate) Socrates, in this way: that the just man always comes out at a disadvantage in his relation with the unjust’. Thrasymachus then disdainfully uses euētheia to affirm the clever advantage of the unjust: ‘Injustice rules all those who are simple (euēthikos), in every sense of the word and just’ (343c). And in response to Socrates’ question, Is justice a vice?,

22 Cultivating a Good Life Thrasymachus responds: ‘No, [justice is] a most noble simple-mindedness (gennaia euētheia) or goodness of heart’ (348c). Putting the pejorative use in the mouth of sophists sets up an ironic contrast with other uses of the term by Plato. For example, irony is evident in the Phaedo, where Socrates contrasts himself as ‘simpleminded’ compared to the ‘wise’ physikoi. He says: Well, now, that is as far as my mind goes; I cannot understand these other ingenious theories of causation. If someone tells me that the reason why a given object is beautiful is that it has a gorgeous color or shape or any other such attribute, I disregard all these other explanations—I find them all confusing—and I cling simply and straightforwardly and no doubt foolishly to the explanation that the one thing that makes that object beautiful is the presence in it or association with it, in whatever way the relation comes about, of absolute beauty. (100c–d)

This does not imply that Socrates is really simple-minded. Rather, that there is an innocent simplicity to his thinking, in contrast to the artful subtleties of the ‘wise’, but this simplicity is a virtue, not a vice. Plato’s ironic use of euētheia disrupts its euphemistically negative connotations and hints at the case for its positive meaning which he puts in Republic III. At 399c–e, Socrates explains the comparative benefits of simple Dorian (cf. La. 193e) and Phrygian harmonies, and then discusses ways to attune an embodied soul, noting that metric feet of good and orderly rhythm oppose ‘illiberality, and insolence or madness or other evils’ (400b). He advises that the disposition of the soul determines a person’s demeanour. Gracefulness and gracelessness are attendant upon the good rhythm and the bad … good rhythm and bad rhythm accompany the one fair diction, assimilating itself thereto, and the other the opposite … rhythm and harmony follow the words (logos) and … the manner of the diction, and the speech … follow and conform to the disposition of the soul. (400c–d)

Having asserted that good grace, rhythm, and speech conform to a suitably disposed soul, Plato’s Socrates then describes and unambiguously extols authentic euētheia: Good speech (eulogia), then, good accord (euharmostia), and good grace (euschēmosunē), and good rhythm (eurhythmia) wait upon (akoloutheō) good disposition (euētheia), not that weakness of head which we euphemistically style goodness of heart (euētheia), but the truly good and fair disposition (eu te kai kalōs to ēthos) of the character and the mind (400d–e).

Like Thucydides, Plato explicitly disrupts the habitually negative construal of euētheia’s simplicity. He segregates ‘that weakness of head which we euphemistically style goodness of heart’ from his positive construal of euētheia: ‘the truly good and fair disposition of the character and the mind’, which guides good speech, accord, grace, and rhythm. Nonetheless, ‘goodness of heart’ is a commendable quality of



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authentic euētheia. As James Adam notes, Plato refers rather to a euphemistically pejorative interpretation of euētheia’s ‘goodness of heart’ to be a ‘weakness of head’ (Adam 1902, note R. 400e), such as where sophists employ euētheia to ironically deride Socrates’ ‘goodness of heart’. In this passage, Plato isolates the root components of the term euētheia – eu and ēthos – in the phrase ‘the truly good and fair disposition (tēn hōs alēthōs eu te kai kalōs to ēthos)’.4 Put this way, the term expresses the spirit of Thucydidean euētheia. As Republic 400e concludes, Socrates affirms the vital importance of cultivating euētheia: ‘Must not our youth pursue these [euētheia’s goods] everywhere if they are to do what it is truly theirs to do?’ For Paul Shorey this is an instruction to youth ‘that their special task is to cultivate true euētheia in their souls’ (Shorey 1969, note R. 400e). The Republic is often read merely as a plan for Plato’s utopian city of Kallipolis. However, this city of words is perhaps more usefully explored as a practical guide to empowering the ‘divine governing principle’ (R. 590d) of the beautiful ‘city within’ (R. 592b).5 The philosophical ramifications of authentic euētheia support this. Indeed, for Anne Wersinger these passages present euētheia as ‘the thought which equips the character in excellence (aretē) and beauty’ (Wersinger 2007, 56–7). In these passages, then, Plato urges the cultivation of that psychological state where ‘rhythm and harmony find their way to the inmost soul and take strongest hold upon it’ (R. 401d). For Plato, cultivating euētheia prepares the ground for dialectic to germinate the seeds that yield a well-lived life.6 Plato extols the virtue of euētheia again in Laws III. There the Athenian tells of a mythic prelapsarian society that offers the ideal conditions to form a noble and virtuous character. [These people were neither] excessively poor, nor were they constrained by stress of poverty to quarrel one with another … a community which has no communion with either poverty or wealth is generally the one in which the noblest characters will be formed; for in it there is no place for the growth of insolence and injustice, of rivalries and jealousies. So these men were good, both for these reasons and because of their simple-mindedness (euētheia), as it is called for … none of them had the shrewdness (sophia) of the modern man to suspect a falsehood. … [They were] ignorant of arts in general and especially of the arts of war as now practised by land and sea, including those warlike arts which, disguised under the names of law-suits and factions, are peculiar to cities, contrived as they are with every device of word and deed to inflict mutual hurt and injury; and that they were also more simple (euēthesteroi) and brave and temperate and in all ways more righteous. (679b–e)

The comparative adjective euēthesteroi is chosen to describe Greek progenitors who were ‘simpler’ but in virtue of that also ‘more brave and temperate and in all ways more righteous [than modern man]’ (679e).7 Significantly, the harmonious environment conducive to a nobly virtuous life eschews the excess that begets ‘the growth of insolence and injustice, of rivalries and jealousies’. The goodness of the noblest euēthesteroi derives from this social circumstance together with their

24 Cultivating a Good Life simplicity. This is significant, as it implies that euētheia originates in the belief that harmony and simplicity are necessary to cultivate, and keep, a truly noble and good disposition. Perhaps Plato also infers that as the euēthesteroi have not been subjected to human depravity (cf. Euthd. 279d: R. 409a: Dem. 61.21: Arist. Rh. 2.12.7: Din. Orat. 73.2.5), or the sophists’ ‘wrong words … [that] infect the soul with evil’ (Phd. 115d), they have no need of philosophical refinement (understood as the ‘removal of evil from the soul’ Sph. 227d). The noble euēthesteroi might therefore personify the Platonic apotheosis of the human virtues that are sufficient for moral goodness (R. 427b, 434e, 449a; Lg. 859d–e). Laws 679c speaks to the broad function of noble simplicity in Plato juxtaposed to what might challenge and violate it. The nobly simple euēthesteroi’s disposition is commended by contrasting it with contemporary cunning: ‘none of them [the euēthesteroi] had the shrewdness (sophia) of the modern man to suspect a falsehood’. Context implies that here sophia is used in a pejorative way that expresses disapproval of sophistic cleverness. Thus, Plato’s positive use of euētheia is contrasted with negative uses of sophia, understood as false or pretentious wisdom.8 In this way, Plato challenges what he regards as the spurious attribution of wisdom to the ignorant. A similar distinction between simple and sophisticated wisdom appears at Theaetetus 176c–d. This passage contrasts godlike righteousness (real wisdom) with cunning cleverness (false wisdom): To become like God (homoiōsis theōi) is to become righteous and holy and wise. … [But] the reason generally advanced for the pursuit of virtue and the avoidance of vice – namely, in order that a man may not seem bad and may seem good – is not the reason why the one should be practiced and the other not. … God is in no wise and in no manner unrighteous, but utterly and perfectly righteous, and there is nothing so like him as that one of us who in turn becomes most nearly perfect in righteousness. It is herein that the true cleverness of a man is found and also his worthlessness and cowardice; for the knowledge of this is wisdom or true virtue, and ignorance of it is folly or manifest wickedness; and all the other kinds of seeming cleverness and wisdom are paltry when they appear in public affairs and vulgar in the arts. (Tht. 176c–d)

At Laws 679c, the term sophia signifies a paltry, ‘seeming cleverness and wisdom’, antithetical to the euēthesteroi’s ‘wisdom’since they are ‘in all ways more righteous’. The ‘kinds of seeming cleverness and wisdom [that] are … vulgar in the arts’ are probably evident in Plato’s censure of ‘those warlike arts which, disguised under the names of law-suits and factions … contrived as they are with every device of word and deed to inflict mutual hurt and injury’ (Lg. 679d). Those ‘most nearly perfect in righteousness’ are like god, hence the euēthesteroi naturally lack the cunning to practice vulgar, warlike arts. Relating Theaetetus 176c–d to Laws 679c–d plausibly shows that for Plato noble simplicity implies the ‘true cleverness’ that knows ‘to become like God is to become righteous and holy and wise’. The euēthesteroi myth in Laws III is a Platonic invention. Nonetheless, it serves the essential function of encouraging the love of simple wisdom and truth.



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Notably, Plato equates truth with simplicity. In the passage of the Cratylus in which Socrates gives the etymology of Apollo’s name, he says that with respect to truth and simplicity (to haploun, 405c2) – which, he says, ‘are the same’ (tauton, 405c3) – Apollo may be most rightly called ‘Aploun’ (from haploun, simple). The identity of simplicity and truth is also evident in Plato’s association of both with God, who is ‘altogether simple and true in deed and word’ (R. 382e).9 Platonic philosophy seeks to hearten the soul’s harmonious simplification and combat the discord which endangers that aim. Therefore, Plato intends to mitigate malevolent complexity and resuscitate the noble virtue of euētheia. However, challenging the complex and championing the simple was doubtless an arduous task in a society besotted with rapid gratification and the adornments of status (cf. Phdr. 250a, Prt. 339b-347b, Tht. 177a). So Plato encourages tenacious efforts to prevent corporeal appetites and sophistry from overruling the soul’s rational discernment. He stresses the need to exercise self-restraint in order to know and cultivate the soul’s true affections, for where ‘desires have been taught to flow in the channel of learning … they will be concerned … with the pleasures of the soul in itself, and will be indifferent to those of which the body is the instrument … [they] will be temperate and by no means greedy for wealth’ (R. 485d–e). Intemperance complicates and constricts knowing ‘the pleasures of the soul in itself ’. Souls crippled by embodiment risk becoming irredeemably dammed. Sophistry that stirs and serves unfettered appetites starves the soul’s true affections, which can be fatal. For Plato, then, having the philosophical courage to purify, simplify, and unify an embodied soul can literally save its life. Plato encourages the scrutiny of contemporary society, and his sociological observations probably revealed that the appeal of the complex is pervasive and persuasive. It offers an engaging immediacy of choice that titillates and entices mortal appetites into a web of anticipation. Indifferent outcomes are readily assuaged by the latest release of projected expectations. Labyrinthine complexity is thus charmingly disarming in and of itself, a perversely anodyne appeal that conjures illusions of happiness which mitigate the anguish of authentic aporia. The lure of many, proximate choices telescopes a moral agent’s prospect horizons by foreshortening the scale of considered consequences. This self-calming salve negates the fear of error and responsibility by ignoring the reality of repercussions. Consequently, those infatuated with impulsive gratification tend to act in a constricted space-time continuum of vacuous indulgence that induces a psychosis we might term spatiotemporal insanity. In Platonic terms, spatiotemporal insanity can be understood as looking only to the immediate horizon of mechanical gratification while ignoring the risk of damaging the embodied soul’s longterm welfare. This folly habitually authorises short-term pleasure and curtails the long thoughts which nurture a soul’s innate yearning for understanding and reason. Thus, a tripartite soul can flourish only where it is sufficiently above humanity’s consumptive mechanisation to have the perspective necessary to differentiate its true affections from potentially lethal fascination. The dense complexity that Plato decries corrupts by propagating ignorance: evils that obfuscate the truth required to harmonise the embodied soul in accord with its divine governing principle. The influence of false wisdom is especially malevolent

26 Cultivating a Good Life where it excites and sanctions appetites that obstruct an intuitive yearning for purity and simplicity. Plato wants would-be philosophers to love real wisdom and truth, to avoid a sham intellectual sovereignty that validates the craving for triumph and booty (what we might term infantilised aspiration). Those overruled by unrestrained appetites forsake the rational balance of their ‘natural indwelling intelligence’ (R. 530c), and that repudiation can trigger a rapid decline to irrational, vicious indifference. Platonic philosophy thus fosters a genuine self-mastery capable of ‘tasting or experiencing the sweetness of the pleasure of learning the true natures of things’ (R. 582b), especially of our soul and self. The magnification that can deconstruct the constructed self demands sharp focus and reflection that may reveal one’s real place on the scale of a compound nature. For until that is known one cannot admit to living in caves of ignorance and long to leave them. Plato’s insistence that we acknowledge our soul and know our self motivates the exertions and practices which continually abet ‘union with divine virtue’ (Lg. 904e). Indeed, that recognition and attainment is the basis of a well-examined life. The comprehension and governance of a soul’s functional parts determines its level on the scales of pure simplicity or ignorant complexity. Where an embodied soul can be the knower and the known, truth can ‘guide and convert the soul to the contemplation of true being’ (R. 525a). Eliminating opinions and beliefs which inhibit that contemplation is a fundamental aim of Platonic philosophy. If a soul’s ontological truth is known (however fleetingly), it can query and refute the conviction that human existence is merely phenomenological. A soul’s host might then sufficiently awaken to know the uplifting cohesive truth of divinely simple and noble nature and so apprehend ‘the true rhythm and harmony of being’ (R. 413e). Such knowledge can facilitate ‘a kind of beautiful order and a continence of certain pleasures and appetites’ (R. 430e), for ‘self-knowledge is temperance … “Know thyself!” and “Be temperate!” are the same’ (Chrm.164de). The better we know our self and acquire ‘a continence of certain pleasures and appetites’ the sooner we observe the patterns of complexities that hinder temperance. That is not to say, however, that Plato advocates the annihilation or fanatical suppression of appetites since his intent is to cultivate the rational poise that tempers a well-lived and balanced life. Those on the Platonic path of cultivation can undergo diverse productive transformations. Being the subject and object of knowledge might psychologically advance and elevate a soul to revitalise its intuitive impulse, forestall decline, or reinstate a courageous commitment to virtue. Plato acknowledges the difficulty of sustaining that commitment and practice (cf. Phdr. 250ab, Prt. 339b-347b, Tht. 177a), despite the promises of pre- and postmortem happiness for those willing to undertake the arduous task: ‘He who lives well is blessed and happy, and he who does not the contrary’ (R.  354a). Where one forgoes something appealing in pursuit of their rational aim they can experience sorrow. Perhaps, for Plato such sadness might not occur where the seeker gains an equivalent or greater satisfaction from an act of self-reflective restraint that cultivates the epistemic conditions for genuine sovereignty. Naturally, there are various intensities of action and sustainability on the way of self-transformation. The prospect of earnest philosophical progress devoid of sadness is unrealistic, as indeed



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are notions that sorrow is not a customary aspect of Platonic philosophy. However, that does not negate the claim that where unhappiness may ensue from moral agent’s decisions it might be averted by the sweet pleasure of intelligent discernment and the happy reality of self-mastery. Humans have long asked the philosophical questions that Plato poses about how best to live. Is it more advantageous to be wise than ignorant, to hunt the pleasures of unfettered desire or cultivate the fruits of temperance? A number of ancient philosophies claimed that virtuous living was a source of happiness, and counselled those seeking a well-lived life to live simply and in harmony with cosmic, divine, or heavenly nature. Platonic philosophy wants to produce noble and good people by encouraging them to live just lives in happy harmony with their soul’s simply divine nature. In keeping with Thucydides, Plato attributes nobility and goodness to the character of euētheia, a noble psychological simplicity. Cultivating noble simplicity thus has a critical function in Plato, as it is part and parcel of the truly good and fair disposition of character and mind requisite to a Platonically well-lived life. The idea that virtuous accord with cosmic harmony entails the cultivation of a good and noble simplicity is not confined to Classical Greece. Comparable themes also appear in ancient Chinese philosophy. Wang Keping notes that ‘Lao Zi makes simplicity a characteristic of the Dao’ (Wang 1998, 25), and Chenyang Li argues that in Daoist philosophy ‘only simplicity gets us closer to nature and to the Dao’ (Li  2014,  35). Both remarks recall the venerable Neoplatonic philosopher Proclus: ‘Virtue is something simple and very similar to the divine itself … to approach as closely as possible to [the One] … [one] must flee the life that is the opposite of simplicity’ (K49.25: Lamberton 2012, 17). Proclus’ analysis is also pertinent to Li’s reading of a quote attributed to the Daoist sage Guangchengzi (TTM 37): ‘Yi may also he interpreted to mean “simplicity” … [and] it is reasonable to assume that this understanding of the “One” as simplicity implies the ideal of wuwei. According to this interpretation, the purpose of wuwei is to achieve and to maintain harmony in the world’ (Li 2014, 53). Yi can be etymologically understood as justice or righteousness, and has the Confucian connotation of a disposition to do good and live well. It is particularly suggestive of the most righteous euēthesteroi’s noble simplicity, and Platonic euētheia, that truly good and fair disposition of character and mind. Furthermore, we might see a semblance of Confucianism in Plato’s concept of the ‘One’, simple, harmonising living cosmos, and Li’s gloss that ‘the “One” as simplicity implies the ideal of wuwei … [and that the] purpose of wuwei is to achieve and to maintain harmony in the world’. Noting that wuwei is widely understood as effortless action, perhaps the term conveys a meaning similar to the state of a rational moral agent’s equipoise. The comments of Wang, Li, and other scholars evidence a marked similarity between ancient Chinese philosophies’ construal of psychological simplicity and the function of the noble simplicity represented in Thucydides and Plato. The ancients who loved wisdom and truth were primarily concerned with discovering and teaching authentic insights that helped humans to live in right harmony with the nature of reality. Their human schooling sought to rouse the intuitive

28 Cultivating a Good Life knowledge that affirms eternal and essential truths. If each person can know realities and truths that transcend mortal existence those timeless principles cannot originate in humanity. That tenet might invoke the existence of a simplex cosmos whose good nature holds all natures as an integrated unity of natural particulars. This infers the possibility of communion between the universe’s dynamic elements. Consider Carone’s view that the Laws depicts the cosmos as an entity of interacting parts, which discloses the ‘importance of our taking responsibility (aitia) as rulers (archontes) over the parts (moria) that have been allotted to us in this complex universe (903 bc, 904 c7), and that we too share with the cosmic mind the administration of not just our part, but also the entire system (896 e–897 b)’ (Carone 2005, 187). Hence, primal ways of cultivation might teach that humans ought to resist living as a merely mechanical function of this realm, and responsibly accept that their human mien can perturbate or harmonise the ‘entire system’ of this ‘complex universe’. The autopoietic function of that system does not need for each of its parts to persist. In Platonic psychology that means souls might not necessarily survive embodiment, or indeed that humanity is cosmically indispensable. Philosophical traditions evolve in the alien worlds of antiquity that have no modern correlates. Yet, some attempt to disengage and segregate the common principles that meaningfully synthesise nature and man by claiming philosophies are aetiologically dependent on a particular religion, doctrine, or culture. Admittedly, truth-seekers use different words to describe concepts that are before and beyond human ken, and a word’s distinctive sound can matter. Their English counterparts may be universe, cosmos, divinity, heaven, or what you will. Similarly, the monikers used to explain a life principle of thought and action can include soul, heart–mind, conscience, spirituality, right action, and so on. These signifiers provide the verbal scaffolding that helps to convey abstract meaning to cohorts regulated by various mediums of authority. It seems irrational for any proprietor of such transitory terms and mindsets to claim they hold the only torch to illume reality and truth. Before and beyond the complex patterning of place, faith, and party there was a belief in the relationship of human nature to and within the cosmic nature of natures (that is not to infer ancient philosophies can be conflated into a bland humanistic blancmange). The ancients were perhaps primarily concerned with the sway of their advice to elicit truth in the seeker by sufficiently elevating intellection to transcend the verbal constructs of religion, culture, and other ideology. Any culture that claims its philosophy has attained a kind of triumphant human supremacy that contradicts the speculative and probative vitality of genuine philosophical transcendence, and fosters the ignorance of totalitarian intolerance. Ancient philosophies that rouse the love and pursuit of wisdom teach that a well-lived life requires virtue and self-reflection, which I hold entails cultivating the good and fair disposition of noble simplicity. These philosophies also taught that living well in harmony with nature yields benefit. Hence, some may say pursuing that life is a selfish act.10 Yet, the ancients might respond that where such selfishness usefully advantages a simple life it is virtuous, for ‘only simplicity gets us closer to nature’ (Li 2014, 35).



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Notes 1 Arguably, this is the first use of euētheia in ancient Greek literature to connote noble simplicity, except perhaps for Herodotus’ account of an incident in Memphis where Syloson gives his coat to then comparatively unknown Darius (Hdt. 3.140.1). 2 Available online at: http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3 A1999.04.0031%3Abook%3D3%3Achapter%3D83%3Asection%3D1. 3 Plato’s familiarity with Thucydides is disputed; nonetheless, I concur with Lucia Prauscello’s view: ‘Personally, I side with the increasing (though by no means universal) scholarly comments that Plato read Thucydides and actively engaged with the text’ (Prauscello 2014, fn. 92). 4 Recall Marchant’s comments on Th. 3.83.1 that to euēthes ‘[is used] in the earliest, good sense of the word, according to its etymology [as expressed at] R. 400e’ (Marchant 1909). Plato’s etymological bent is especially evident in the Cratylus’ explanations of words as encrypted descriptors (cf. 419c, 420d). 5 I concur with P. C. Smith that the Republic is ‘an instrument for the intellectual training and preparation of the power of knowledge in the soul for the ultimate goal of dialectic, cognitively speaking’ (P. C. Smith 2000, 134). 6 I argue elsewhere that the cultivation of euētheia might be envisaged as the cognitive substrate, perhaps seen as a euthuntēria (the levelling top) of the fitting propaideia (preliminary teaching) necessary to found the copingstone of Platonic dialectic (cf. R. 511be, Phdr. 276e–277a). 7 Brisson remarks that Plato uses ‘the adjective euēthes and the noun euētheia to express both goodness and stupidity of character’, and claims ‘by using these two terms, Plato wants to indicate that the goodness of these men is due largely to their stupidity’ (Brisson 1998, 123). Such interpretations misrepresent Plato’s intent. The aim of this passage is to explain that the euēthesteroi epitomise the nobly simple and virtuous character that is likely to be formed in a harmonious environment. The Athenian has already asserted that each good is divinely derived and dependent (cf Lg. 631b). It seems improbable that he would attribute such goodness to stupid people. Moreover the qualification ‘as it is called’ (legomenēn, 679c3) suggests that Plato’s use is different from the conventional one. 8 Plato sometimes equates sophia with conceit (cf. doxosophos, Phdr. 275b; see also R. 459a, 493a–b, Hp. Ma. 283a). 9 This is suggestive of material in the Laozi. For example, like Plato’s divine, the primordial undifferentiated unity of the Laozi is simplicity itself (Wang 1998, 59). Accordingly, Daoist cultivation involves being ‘rid of selfishness and desires in order to return to the primeval state of simplicity and tranquillity’ (Wang 1998, 25). 10 R. E. Allen comments: ‘As Bishop Butler was later to say, the trouble with human beings is not that they’re too selfish, but that they’re not selfish enough. … People are not selfish enough if they think their interests stop at their skin’s edge. Real selfishness, because of the fact of interdependence, involves affirming what is good for those with whom we live, and undertaking the benefit of all. There is in this not contrast between egoism and altruism. That contrast is sunk in a life, and a social order, aimed at justice and proper proportionality, as elements in the Common Good’ (R. E. Allen 1987, 62).

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References Adam, J., ed. (1902). The Republic of Plato. Edited with critical notes, commentary and appendices. Volume II: Books VI-X and indices. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Allen, R. E. 1987. ‘The Speech of Glaucon: On Contract and the Common Good’, in Spiro Panagiotou (ed.), Justice, Law and Method in Plato and Aristotle, 51–62. Berrima. Academic Printing and Publishing. Brisson, L. (1998). Gerard Naddaf (intro. and trans.). Plato the Myth Maker. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. Carone, G. R. (2005). Plato’s Cosmology and its Ethical Dimensions. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Crane, G. (1998). Thucydides and the Ancient Simplicity: The Limits of Political Realism. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press. Csapo, E. (2011). ‘The Economic, Poetics, Politics, Metaphysics, and Ethics of the “New Music”’, in D. Yatromanolakis (ed.), Music and Cultural Politics in Greek and Chinese Societies, Volume 1: Greek Antiquity, 307–14. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Dent, J. M. (1910). Thucydides. The Peloponnesian War. London: E. P. Hornblower, S. (2003). A Commentary On Thucydides. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Jowett, B. (trans. and intro.) (1881). Thucydides Volume 1. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Lamberton, R. (2012). Proclus the Successor on Poetics and the Homeric Poems: Essays 5 and 6 of His Commentary on the Republic of Plato. Society of Biblical Literature. Atlanta, GA. Li, C. (2014). The Confucian Philosophy of Harmony. London: Routledge. Marchant, E. C. (1909). Commentary on Thucydides Book 3. MacMillan. Available online at: http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A 1999.04.0031%3Abook%3D3%3Achapter%3D83%3Asection%3D1 (Accessed 06 August 2017). Myott, J. (edit. and trans.) (2013). Thucydides: The War of the Peloponnesians and the Athenians. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Nussbaum, M. (1986). The Fragility of Goodness: Luck and Ethics in Greek Tragedy and Philosophy. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Orwin, C. (2000). ‘Review Essay On Thucydides’. Political Theory, 28: 6: 865. Prauscello, L. (2014). Performing Citizenship in Plato’s Laws. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Shorey, P. C., (trans. (1969). Plato, Plato in Twelve Volumes, Vols. 5 and 6. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Smith, C. F., trans. (1894). Commentary on Thucydides Book 3: Edited on the basis of the Classen-Steup Edition. Ginn & Company. Available online at: http://www.perseus.tufts. edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.04.0034%3Abook%3D3%3Achapter %3D83 (Accessed 07 August 2017). Smith, P. C. 2000. ‘No Doctrine but ‘Placing in Question’. In Gerald A. Press (ed.), Who Speaks for Plato? Studies in Platonic Anonymity, 113–126. Lantham, MA. Rowman and Littlefield Wang, K. (1998), The Classic of the Dao: A New Investigation. Foreign Languages Press.



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Wersinger, A. G. (2007). Amaury de Cizancourt (trans.), ‘“Socrate, fais de la musique!” Le destin de la musique entre paideia et philosophie’, in F. Malhomme and A. G. Wersinger (eds), Mousikè et Aretè, La Musique et l’éthique de l’Antiquité à l’Âge modern, 45–62. Vrin. Williams, M. F. (1998). Ethics in Thucydides: The Ancient Simplicity. Lanham: University Press of America.

3

The Beauty Ladder and the Mind-Heart Excursion: Plato and Zhuangzi Wang Keping

This chapter looks at two conceptions of a good life, from two different ancient societies. The first is Plato’s analogy of the beauty ladder, which implies a process of cognitive development, and the other is Zhuangzi’s analogy of the mind-heart excursion, which features a process of spiritual cultivation. Even though the modes of thinking in these two alternatives are distinct from each other, they have in common the pursuit of wisdom for the sake of a good life. I explore each of the analogies in detail before considering their similarities and differences. I suggest that there are four general ways in which these two models of a good life are similar, namely, in their teleological focus; their promotion of methods of cultivation staged progressively; their detachment from political involvement; and the tranquillity associated with the respective final stages. Finally, I suggest that the two models present us with alternative pictures of a good life and how that might be cultivated, as well as some ways in which elements of each may be integrated in practice.

Plato’s beauty ladder In Plato’s Symposium the analogy of a ladder is used to indicate a process of cognitive development towards the understanding of beauty. Climbing the ladder can be construed as a kind of pilgrimage that is love-driven and beauty-oriented, beginning with a natural erotic disposition and eventually arriving at the meta-cognitive realm of sublimation infused with noetic insight. The pilgrimage is outlined by Plato as follows: A lover who goes about the love-matters correctly must begin in his youth to devote himself to beautiful bodies. … This is what is to go aright, or be led by another correctly, into the mystery of Love: one begins from beautiful things, and goes always upwards for the sake of that highest beauty. He climbs aloft as on the rungs of a ladder (epanabathmois), from the beauty of one particular body to that of two bodies in cognate relationship, and from the beauty of two bodies to that of

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all bodies; from the personal beauty of souls he proceeds to the beauty in people’s observances and laws, and then up to the beauty of knowledge or science; and at last from the beauty of knowledge to that particular study which is concerned with the beauty in itself and that alone; so that in the end he comes to know the very essence of the beautiful (tou kalou mathēma). In that state of life (entautha tou biou) above all others, a man finds it truly worthwhile to live, as he contemplates essential beauty. (Symposium 210a–211d, adapted from the translations by A Nehamas and Paul Woodruff 1997, and W. R. M. Lamb 1996)

The rungs of the beauty ladder are demarcated by seven classes of beauty extending from the physical to the metaphysical. The ladder represents a hierarchical structure with each subsequent rung denoting increasing difficulty. The analogy here gives rise to at least three fundamental questions: What brings the lover to step on to the ladder? How is it possible for him to climb to the top? And what is the meaning of each class of beauty, in relation to others across the whole process? The answer to the first question, What brings the lover to step on to the ladder?, is ‘the power and courage of Love’ (tēn dynamin kai andreian tou Erōtos, 212b8).1 Love works to instil into animals the desire to beget. They become amorously disposed, first to have union one with another, and next to find food for their young. In order to fulfil this purpose, they are prepared to fight, even the weakest against the strongest, ready to sacrifice their lives or tolerate starvation. As for men, they have similar natural feelings, but act on the promptings of calculation (207a–b). Love is potent because of his erotic disposition, which stems from his Spirit-like genesis. Love was born to the demigoddess, Poverty, and the demi-god, Resource. Begotten during a birthday feast in honour of Aphrodite and staying attendant to the beautiful Goddess, he is a lover bent on beauty (203b–c). With mixed parentage, he inherits a paradoxical disposition that is partly resourceful and partly poverty-stricken. His resourceful dimension is embodied in his infinite longing for all kinds of beauty, and his poverty-stricken counterpart is reflected in his lack of satisfaction with what he possesses. Consequently, he lives in an incomplete state coupled with inexhaustible enthusiasm. This enthusiasm is also manifest in the lives of human beings. Once he has gained sight of beauty, a person is inclined, like Love, to be active and courageous. Driven by such a powerful force, the lover has every desire to ascend the beauty ladder that exposes him to a variety of enticements at different levels. With respect to the second question – How it is possible for the lover to get up to the top of the ladder? – the answer is again linked to Love. As ‘no one could easily find a better helper for human nature (tē anthrōpeia physei synergou ameinō, 212b2–3)’, Love is not denied his Spirit-like genesis, but is nevertheless intimately aligned with human nature. Being spiritual, Love is in a position to permeate human nature, even though the two are not identical. Nevertheless, being the best helper, Love plays an important role in leading humans to discover the path to beauty, because ‘Love is a love for the beautiful’ (Erōs d’ estin erōs peri to kalon, 204b3). Moreover, ‘Love is a lover of wisdom’ (Erōta philosophon einai, 204b4) even though his state is between ‘wise and ignorant’ (sophou kai amathou, 204b5). Why does that matter? Having a share of wisdom, Love is supposed to know or want to know all

34 Cultivating a Good Life the beauties rather than some of them. Having a share of ignorance, he is ready to learn more and explore the unknown. The philosophic nature of Love is directed to the inquiry about both the beautiful and the good because the acquisition of them would secure happiness in the pure sense of this term, for ‘what men love is nothing other than the good’ (allo estin ou erōsin anthrōpoi ē tou agathou, 205e7–8), and to be truly wise requires understanding of the good. Thus, Plato regards Love as ‘the leader’ who ‘leads aright’ at the very beginning of the ladder analogy. An emphasis on the adverb orthōs (‘correctly’) – which is used three times in connection with love-matters (ta erotika, 209e5), and twice in connection with the Greek practice of boy-loving (to paiderastein, 211b5) – is noteworthy. It seems as though Plato applies a principle of correctness to all kinds of love-matters. This principle demands that the act of loving beauty takes place in light of wisdom, with the expectation that acts to be enacted show due consideration of appropriate moderation or self-control. Otherwise, the entire enterprise of love-matters will be spoiled. Third, what is the meaning of each class of beauty in relation to others across the process of ascending the ladder? The love of beautiful bodies (ta kala sōmata, 201a6) is categorised into three steps. Initially, it is the love of the beauty of one particular body. To my understanding, it is engendered by both an erotic agency and philikos agency. Erotic agency tends to focus more on somatic love whereas philiatic agency focuses on friendship. When the two kinds of agency are well balanced, there arises humanus amore or human love that is moderate and prosperous. If the erotic agency becomes dominant, it will give birth to ferinus amore or animal love.2 If this happens, the love of one particular body could become one-sided, inclined towards confrontation, anxiety, and frustration. It is usually the case that filial love tends towards humaneness, whereas erotic love tends towards a more sensuous life. The former can be constructive and rational, whereas the latter is destructive and irrational. On the other hand, if the erotic agency happens to be lacking, lovers may produce no offspring, and may find that the philiatic agency shared between them is not sufficient to sustain their relationship. When balanced love is evoked by philiatic agency proper, it gains considerable depth or profundity. In view of Plato’s principle of rightness, such love tends to be mutual and interactive between the lover and the beloved. It is sustained by the art of love that relies upon mutual contribution to the amorous relationship. Such mutuality resembles the third category of what Plato and Aristotle have said about true friendship (philia), that is, it mirrors the virtuous concerns and moral personalities enjoyed and appreciated among friends or lovers. It goes beyond not merely the first category of friendship based on shared pleasures and hobbies, but also the second category based on mutual utility or practical interests. The second step of the love of bodies involves appreciation of the beauty of two bodies. By means of comparing one with another, the lover observes the similarity between them according to beautiful form (eidei kalon). In a third step, the lover attends to the beauty in all bodies (tois sōmasi kallos). This movement widens the horizon from what is beautiful to the eye to the formal commonality of all beautiful bodies, as appreciated by the human capacity for aesthetic experience. The commonality supplies a master key to all beautiful bodies. It provides a link between the one (principle) and the many (particulars) that is revealed through the formal aspect of all the beautiful bodies.

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The three elementary classes of beauty involve first: a particular body, second: multiple bodies, and finally: all bodies. They are all conducive to the genre of somatic aesthetics. This aesthetics in turn nurtures a refined taste for the appreciation of the beautiful bodies. Taste begins with the perception of amorous sensuousness directed at a particular (beloved) body. It proceeds to the recognition of the formal cognateness of two bodies. At the third level, commonality across all bodies is formal. This abstraction is an exercise that nurtures aesthetic wisdom, working to direct a person towards an aesthetic life whereby love of somatic beauty interacts with a creative initiative. The fondness of the Greeks for beautiful bodies belonged to their aesthetic sensibility. They would resort to regular gymnastic training in order to build up fair and masculine bodies. At the same time, they would develop themselves into kaloi k’agathoi as the synthesis of physical beauty and good character. When stepping up to the fourth class, the lover sets a higher value on beauty of souls (tais psychais kallos, 210b7) than on beautiful bodies. The beauty of souls is revealed through what is virtuous in practice. At this stage, loving involves moral judgement through a psychic agency that cultivates the inner world, furthering moral wisdom as part of the philosophic nature of Love, which will in turn elicit good conduct, expose the lover to a moral life, and prevent him from any possible ills and wrongs. Further up, on the fifth step, the lover discovers the beauty contained in observances and laws (tois epitēdeumasi kai tois nomois kalon, 210c3). In comparison with the goods in this category, the beauty of body turns out to be superficial. Here the lover sees goodness, righteousness, and justice in the habit of legal compliance and the validity of laws, both written and unwritten. This form of beauty is grounded in a nomophylaktic agency that calls for the spirit of law-abiding action. When established in society, it contributes to constructing a political community that will secure a good life for its citizens. The capability of perceiving this beauty requires political wisdom that facilitates not only sound judgement in the regime, but generates justice and temperance in the citizens. Accordingly, both social commitment and qualified citizenship are exercised and developed. All this is deployed to procure a lawful or just life that is both approachable and agreeable at the same time. Higher up, on the sixth rung of the ladder, lies the beauty of knowledge (epistēmōn kallos, 210c7). It is the great fruit growing out of the branches of knowledge (tas epistēmas, 210c6). These branches foreshadow the disciplines in the curricula of the Republic and Laws, encompassing art and literature (mousikē), mathematics, geometry, astronomy, harmonics, and philosophy. Arriving at this stage, the climber encounters ‘the great ocean of the beautiful’ (to polu pelagos tou kalon, 210d4), and engages in contemplating the ‘multiple splendours of fair and magnificent discourses’ (pollous kai kalous logous kai megaloprepeis, 210d4–5), from which he harvests ‘a rich crop of thoughts in philosophy’ (dianoēmata en philosophia aphthonō; ibid. 210d5–6), broadens his horizon, and frees himself from the mean and meticulous slavery of a single example to which he used to be attached. In other words, he is no longer smallminded or confined to the beauty of a particular person or observance. Rather, he is driven by an epistemic agency that is always in search of real knowledge, and well prepared to explore further for the knowledge of the very essence of beauty that in turn enhances and upgrades his theoretical wisdom.

36 Cultivating a Good Life Now with this wisdom as his guide, he enters the realm of philosophy comprehensive of various branches of knowledge or sciences, and lives a contemplative life that is, above all, intellect-based. At this point, there arises the divine or extraordinary love oriented towards the particular study of philosophy as love of wisdom, truth, and virtue in all. It continues always in search of perfection. According to Marsilio Ficino (Symposium commentary 6.8), this divinus amore guides the lover towards a contemplative life that lifts him from the sense of sight (aspectus) to the power of thought (mentem). In striking contrast, the humanus amore directs the lover to an active life that focuses on sight while the ferinus amore focuses on a voluptuous life and the sense of touch (tactum). The climber who advances to the top of the ladder gets engrossed in the wondrous vision of ‘the beautiful in its nature’ (tēn physin kalon, 210e5) as the final telos after all the preceding toils. He is persistently motivated by a noetic agency that is centred on insightful reasoning, and thus empowered to go through such an arduous travail in order to gain this metaphysical insight into beauty itself. He seems to have escalated contemplative life to the acme. Suddenly, he discovers eternality, completeness, absoluteness, and purity of beauty itself, and understands that all the multitude of beautiful things become what they are only because they partake of this. He obtains a command of ‘the beautiful learnings’ (ta kala mathēmata, 211c6), and comes to realise the ultimate cause of what is beautiful. The ultimate cause can be considered to be universal in contrast to the particular, which reveals a distinct relationship from the aforementioned one noticed among beautiful bodies at an elementary plane. In addition, the noetic agency not only helps the lover accomplish his ascent, but leads him to develop a divine kind of wisdom as the outcome of the divinus amore. Such wisdom enables him to descry ‘the divinely beautiful itself (to theion kalon, 211e3)’, make contact with truth, beget ‘true virtue’ (aretēn alēthē, 212a5–6), rear it up to win ‘divine friendship’ (theophilei, 212a6), and hold himself immortal in that way. Noticeably, all this creates a kind of life that is truly worthwhile, a life lived in contemplation of beauty itself. And such life is the good life at its best.

Zhuangzi’s mind-heart excursion The analogy of the mind-heart excursion appears in The Great Venerable Master (Da zong shi), a chapter of a text associated with the Daoist thinker, Zhuangzi (c.369–286 BCE). Discussions in this text are often formulated in analogies, fables, myths, or legendary stories. The mind-heart excursion (you xin 游心) is an analogy employed to indicate a process of spiritual cultivation in order to attain – to hear – Dao (wen dao 闻道). In the text, the Dao may refer to a life of freedom. It is described as follows: Nanbo Zikui meets Ru Yu who is old but still looks like a child, and asks him the reason about it. Ru replies that he has acquired Dao (wen dao 闻道). Nanbo wonders if he can learn Dao. Ru answers and explains: ‘No, you can’t. You’re not the right kind of person. Bu Liangyi has the talent of a sage, but doesn’t have the Dao of a sage; I have the Dao of a sage, but don’t have the talent of a sage. I wanted

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to teach him about it so that he might be s true sage. In any case, it should have been easier to teach the Dao of a sage to a man with the talent of a sage. So, with a concentrated mind-heart, I began to enlighten (shou 守) him. When three days passed, he was able to go beyond the human world (wai tianxia 外天下). I went on to enlighten him. When seven days passed, he was able to go beyond external things (wai wu 外物). I again went on to enlighten him. When nine days passed, he was able to go beyond his life (wai sheng 外生). Then he was able to have a clean mind-heart as fresh as dawn (zhao che 朝彻). Afterwards he was able to discern the Independent (jian du 見獨). Subsequently he was able to obscure the distinction between the past and the present (wu gu jin 無古今). Eventually he was able to ignore life and death (bu sheng bu si 不生不死). From this point onward he will live in a realm of “tranquillity amid turmoil” (ying ning 撄宁).’ (Zhuangzi, chapter 6, adapted from the translation by Wang 1999: 97–9)3

Ostensibly, what astonishes and impresses Nanbo is none other than Ru’s state of being that appears so incredible. The portrayal of Ru’s physical appearance implies that he himself enjoys longevity without deliberate life-preservation, and remains in his prime condition beyond any expectation. This being the case, he looks so young and healthy for his old age. His child-like image embodies how hearing Dao keeps him in this ideal state. The magic effect of this kind is a result of spiritual cultivation that frees his mind-heart from cares and worries, exhibiting a good life in the Daoist tradition. The pursuit of such a life is exemplified by the mind-heart excursion that involves seven stages in all, each of which has its own specific characteristics. The number of days for the first three stages of enlightenment is more notional than functional. It is set up only to mean a span of time required for relevant cultivation. It is actually not specific due to the different times taken by individuals; hence the reference to time is dropped in the later stages. The description of the entire experience is supposed to signify at least four factors: (i) the prerequisite to learn Dao, (ii) the approach to Dao, (iii) the progression to attain Dao, and (iv) the outcome of Dao’s attainment.

The prerequisite to learning Dao This prerequisite is twofold in principle. The first relates to the capabilities of a sage while the second to the Dao of the sage. The two are each necessary for the other: while the former serves as the basis, the latter is the guidance. As illuminated in the case of Bu Liangyi, he who has the capabilities of a sage can learn the Dao. Yet, whether or not he can acquire it relies on the condition that he is correctly instructed and enlightened by someone who has the Dao of a sage. Noticeably, Ru Yu has the Dao of a sage, but doesn’t have the talent of a sage. Yet, he proclaims his ability to help Bu obtain the Dao. According to Cheng Xuanying’s interpretation, the capabilities of a sage (sheng ren zhi cai 聖人之才) refer to a capacity for understanding and sensibility, while the Dao of a sage (sheng ren zhi dao 聖人之道) refers to the characteristics of emptiness and detachment resulting from the highest level of cultivation (Guo Xiang and Cheng Xuanying 2013: 139). This means that neither of the two aspects is perfect, because each slants towards only one polarity. Furthermore, in relation to value judgements,

38 Cultivating a Good Life the capabilities of a sage are inferior when compared with the Dao of a sage. The former applies to the handling of matters in social and political realms, while the latter facilitates and guides the ‘inner’ attainment of spiritual enlightenment and mental purification. One is instrumental but dependent, whereas the other is fundamental and independent. Consequently, the latter follows from the former in principle; that is why Ru is the instructor of Bu in this matter. All this follows a presupposed logic peculiar to Zhuangzi’s conceptions of ultimate knowledge (zhi zhi 至知) and true knowledge (zhen zhi 真知), the latter of which is the knowledge of the true person (zhen ren 真人). Ultimate knowledge in the case of humanity consists of the understanding of the respective scope of what heaven and humanity, in their utmost, can do. This understanding is the acme of human knowledge, albeit elusive (Zhuangzi, chapter 6, Wang 1999: 89). Moreover, human life is limited, but all knowledge is limitless. It will only be in vain for a person to attempt to pursue the limitless (ultimate knowledge) with the limited (Zhuangzi, chapter 3, ibid.: 43). Therefore, it would be better for a person to strive for true knowledge rather than the ultimate knowledge. True knowledge is found only in the true person himself or herself (qie you zhen ren er hou you zhen zhi 且有真人而后有真知). The true person knows neither the joy of life nor the sorrow of death. Here the text projects a timeless view of birth and death: the true person was not elated when he was born; he is not reluctant when he dies. Casually he goes to another world; casually he comes back into this world. He doesn’t forget the origin of his life; he doesn’t explore his destiny. He accepts whatever occurs to him. Such a person has an empty mind-heart, a calm countenance and a broad forehead. He is as austere as autumn and as warm as spring. His joy and anger replace one another as naturally as the succession of the four seasons. He aligns with everything in the world, but he stays unfathomable to all. That is why all these may only be achieved by someone whose knowledge has approached the Dao (Zhuangzi, chapter 6, ibid.: 89–90). What the true person knows represents true knowledge, and what the true person does embodies Dao itself. This being the case, when a person is learning to become the true person, he or she is learning to attain Dao. Correspondingly, he or she is learning to acquire true knowledge. Upon becoming the true person, he or she would have attained the Dao, and naturally would have acquired true knowledge, knowledge that concerns the virtue of the true person and the operation of the Dao.

The approach to Dao This approach is reflected in the act of enlightening (shou 守), so as to be in accord with Dao. It is repeatedly emphasised during the entire course of the mind-heart excursion. Other passages in the Zhuangzi also refer to this act. For instance, to be enlightened by Dao is to allow things to develop spontaneously while aligning with the Origin (shou qi zong ye 守其宗也) (Zhuangzi, chapter 5, ibid.: 73). As a person aligns with the Origin, he or she also keeps to the One (wo shou qi yi 我守其一) and lives in harmony with it (Zhuangzi, chapter 11, ibid.: 163). He or she sees clearly the nature of everything because he or she embraces the Root of everything (neng shou qi ben 能守其本) (Zhuangzi, chapter 13, ibid.: 217). ‘The Origin’ (zong 宗), ‘the One’ (yi 一), and ‘the

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Root’ (ben 本) are all names for Dao. The act of aligning with Dao is neither cognitive nor analytical by nature, for it involves neither the apprehension of an object nor of the unknown. Instead, it indicates an intuitive perception of the Dao itself, simultaneously with a self-conscious internalisation of it. Such perception and internalisation have a spiritual component.

The progression to attain Dao In the Zhuangzi, progression towards Dao – the mind-heart excursion – involves seven successive stages, which I describe in turn. In the first, a person moves beyond the concerns of this world. The phrase ‘wai tian xia’ (外天下) means literally to be removed from or ignore all under the sky. It is used here to denote detachment from prevailing social norms or customs, including entanglement with the issues arising within that environment. This stands in contrast to the Confucian view and is one of the key tensions between Confucian and Daoist thought in Chinese intellectual history. The Confucian tradition encourages social engagement and advocates a practical approach to social ills, calling for necessary action to bring order to the world (ping tian xia 平天下).4 By contrast, Daoism seems pessimistic about worldly matters, purporting to favour a more quietist life. The second stage moves beyond external things (wai wu 外物). The Zhuangzi holds that the human condition is drastically problematic because humans are enslaved by external things (ren wei wu yi 人為物役), both tangible and intangible. The tangible refers to material wealth, profit, and the like, while the intangible to fame, social status, and the like. Daoist philosophy holds that such pursuits will generate human desires and ambitions that will in turn render the human mind-heart restless and calculative. It is for this reason that a person needs to free himself from this plight by going beyond these pursuits altogether. More specifically, he does so by disengaging the activity of such faculties as ears, eyes, mouth, nose, and mind-heart which are sensitive to external things, on the one hand, and responsive to related desires, on the other. He is then in a position to develop an unperturbable mentality that renders purification possible. This is how he enters the realm of tranquillity that facilitates his further progression of the mind-heart excursion. The third stage involves transcendence of a particular conception of life (wai sheng 外生). The concern is this: human life is irreducibly physical and therefore bodily preservation is important. However, bodily preservation can be potentially risky if a person pursues longevity for its own sake. Hence the Zhuangzi regards this conception of life as the tumour of sufferings, or the fountainhead of all cares and worries. Correspondingly, death is conceived in terms of ‘cutting off the tumour’ (Zhuangzi, chapter 6, ibid.: 105). To be released from holding on to this conception of life is to have freedom from this troublesome burden. It also means that one will not need to make a distinction between life and death, and that they are instead conceived of as a recurrent cycle, with neither beginning nor ending. The place of this stage in the mind-heart excursion is indicative of the level of difficulty encountered here. After transcending the human world and the external things therein, a person needs to re-examine his view on the personal, bodily life that is so vital to himself.

40 Cultivating a Good Life The fourth stage, to ‘have a clear mind’ (zhao che 朝彻), can be literally rendered as ‘having a thorough or complete enlightenment at the daybreak’. This stage is more spontaneous than protracted, as though one gets a glimpse of the morning light in supreme brightness and clarity. In the Zhuangzi’s view, this clear-mindedness involves the purification of the mind-heart as it is emptied of wants, desires, ambitions, cares, and worries. It therefore resembles ‘the fasting of the mind-heart’ (xin zhai 心斋) in principle. In chapter 4 of Zhuangzi, the ‘Ways of the Human World’, the fasting of the mind-heart features a distinctive type of emptiness (xu 虚), identified with the natural flow of vital energy (qi 气) that moves freely in the cosmos and embraces everything alike while expecting nothing from them at all. Only when a person is empty in this way can he comprehend and be responsive to the myriad things (wanwu 萬物). As for a person who has not fasted the mind-heart, he remains conscious of himself (Zhuangzi, chapter 4, ibid.:55). Therefore, he is likely to be enslaved by external things qua tantalising attractions or temptations. Conversely, a person who has successfully fasted his mind-heart is on the way to become a true person, free not merely from egoism, but all other forms of bother and disturbance arising from the problematic human world.5 Having a clear, pure, and empty mind-heart, a person has room in the mindheart to accommodate something different: he is now able to ‘see the Independent’ (jian du见独) at the fifth stage. The ‘Independent’ refers to a characteristic of Dao, that is, its self-independence and self-sufficiency. The person who sees it enters a new realm of experiencing Dao. Having done so, he progresses to the sixth stage of ‘obscuring the distinction between the past and the present’ (wu gu jin 無古今). The Dao is not only the origin of all in the process of creation and, being so, it precedes everything. Meanwhile, it is omnipresent as it exists in everything and conditions what they are. Thus the past and the present are unified in the Oneness of Dao. In being unified with Dao, a person has awareness neither of the past nor the present. He seems to get into a timeless state where he perceives the broad sweep of a long history merely by a glimpse of the moon overhead (yi zhao feng yue, wan gu chang kong 一朝风月, 万古长空). Finally, he or she is able to ‘ignore life and death’ (bu sheng bu si 不生不死) at the seventh stage. ‘To ignore life and death’ is to see through the real nature of life and death. It is only by so doing that one can become absolutely and spiritually free. Yet, there arises a question about why the concern with life occurs twice during the excursion. This emphasis may reflect the human preoccupation with this-worldly life. Therefore issues concerning life and death are most difficult to address. Being aware of this need, the Zhuangzi advises the pursuer of Dao to make a double effort to emancipate himself from either the entangled bridle of bodily preservation or the haunting fear of mortality. Accordingly, he ascribes both life and death to vital energy (qi 气) and promotes the following argument: life comes along when vital energy assembles; death occurs when vital energy disperses. The true person understands life and death in the light of Dao. He therefore leaves things to develop spontaneously and settles in a realm where he is no longer bothered by either. Moreover, he is neither elated by the joy of life nor saddened by the sorrow of death. Under such circumstances, he casually goes to another world, and returns to

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this world again. Furthermore, the Zhuangzi recommends such a natural and tranquil stance towards life and death that is based on the belief that ‘the great earth endows me with a physical form to dwell myself in, makes me toil to sustain my life, gives me ease to idle away my old age, and offers me a resting place when I die. Therefore, to live is something good and to die is also something good’ (Zhuangzi, chapter 6, ibid.: 95). It is on this account that Zhuangzi is said to be singing and beating time on a basin when his wife passed away. When criticised by his friend for such a pitiless act, he explains that he was weeping sadly upon her death, but stopped to do so, simply because he realised that his wife had now gone through another transformation, and returned to the vital energy that permeates heaven and earth (Zhuangzi, chapter 18, ibid.: 289).

The outcome of attaining Dao The attainment of Dao is none other than pure tranquillity or serene contemplation. As the Zhuangzi describes, Dao begets life and finishes life, but it was never born and it will never die. Dao exists in everything in the world. There is nothing it does not send off and nothing it does not welcome; there is nothing it does not destroy and nothing it does not complete. This is called ‘tranquillity amid turmoil,’ that is to say, it is a turmoil that has brought tranquillity to perfection. (Zhuangzi, chapter 6, ibid.: 99)

The idea of bringing tranquillity to perfection through turmoil appears paradoxical. Normally, tranquillity is opposed to turmoil. Yet, dialectically, the former comes into being because of the latter. In practice, the merits of tranquillity are highlighted by the demerits of turmoil. A person who perceives and experiences both of them will typically tend to treasure the former while evading the latter. It is by so doing that he further develops tranquillity and retains it in its best possible condition. This reminds us of what Laozi, a figure in the early Daoist tradition, says about the interaction between the muddy and the clear or between the still and the alive. That is, ‘He was merged and indifferent like muddy water. Who could make the muddy gradually clear via tranquillity? Who could make the still gradually come to life via activity? (It was nobody else but him.)’.6 It is assumed that he who can do this has attained Dao. Now he lives in absolute freedom without being disturbed by anything external to the self. In summary, the mind-heart excursion is contemplation-based, involving cultivation with a spiritual dimension. Such Daoist wisdom enables life lived in absolute freedom from all worldly cares, and helps one develop a sense of personhood that is not enslaved to external things. It is by nature more intuitive than epistemological, involving a process that lies somewhere between gradual apprehension and sudden enlightenment. According to this view, gradual apprehension is progressive as it proceeds from the externalised self to one that is internally defined. Sudden enlightenment is spontaneous, drawing our attention to the freedom of the different levels. These two processes work interactively and complementarily to enable a person to attain Dao as the most important pinnacle of Daoist wisdom.

42 Cultivating a Good Life

Comparative models of cultivation Plato’s and Zhuangzi’s models of cultivation differ in their modes of thinking and articulation. When viewed as two alternatives to the good life, they would appeal to different practitioners, and work in characteristically distinct ways. The ascension of the beauty ladder as a process of cognitive development through philosophical learning, for example, has epistemological overtones with nous-based enlightenment. As a rule, it escorts a feeling of joy with the increase in acquiring know-how. These feelings would vary from person to person because it will depend on how high a person can ascend up the ladder. That, in turn, is based on how much he knows about the classes of beauty involved. In this way, knowledge and feelings are intertwined such that a feeling of ecstasy arises when a person gains insight into the essence of beauty in itself. The essence of this kind of beauty serves as a master key (One) to all other types of beauty (Many), for it connotes the universal nature of all other beautiful particulars. According to this view, the ladder analogy also incorporates epistemological scaffolding. The classes of beauty represent a hierarchy of truth-content with relevant values. The higher one goes up the ladder, the more truth-content and values one gathers and, accordingly, the more felicity he experiences. Eventually he is enabled to enter the kingdom of immortality; this is the telos of the pursuit of wisdom. In Plato’s view, immortality does not merely refer to the characteristic property of gods, but also stands for the all-round perfection of becoming divine. In the Symposium, Plato’s idea of becoming divine or godlike is embodied in his formulation of the beauty ladder. The ladder is deployed to focus our attention upwards, ranging from sensational experience to intellectual fulfilment. It appears as though it ascends from earth to heaven, from the physical to the spiritual, from the visible to the invisible, and from the finite to the infinite. In order to ascend to the top, Plato employs beauty (kallos) as a comprehensive term to cover the aesthetic significance of beautiful bodies, the moral meaning of good conduct, compliance – through virtue – with ideal moral law, and the intellectual values of wisdom and truth. The process of ascent begins with the beauty of actual life and ends up with the lover of beauty in the presence of the beautiful itself, a metaphysical Idea. Love is the intermediary, or (to use a symbol) the bridge between life and Idea. According to Stanley Rosen, as the subject matter of the Symposium unfolds, the power of beauty is retained in the flux of being, and serves as the eternal cause of human existence.7 It thus seems to embody the immediate presence of divinity in both humanity and the universe. Thereby beauty in itself shines on its own, at the same time enlightening others. In this context, Beauty is practically equivalent to god. Plato eventually divinises the outcome of ascent by treating the ultimate knowledge of essential beauty in terms of immortality. In this way, he lays bare his hidden concern with the possibility of a human becoming divine. In other dialogues, Plato also advocates the possibility of becoming divine. He affirms that man is given by god the divine gift of reason, and advises that man is to become godlike by taking up the philosophical, or ‘upward’ way. To become godlike is nothing else than to become a real philosopher in the Platonic sense. Hence anyone who studies philosophy sanely by ‘holding always the upward way’ (tēs anō hodou aei hexometha, Republic 621c4–5) is assured to fare well.

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The philosopher portrayed in the Phaedrus is promised to benefit even more. He is said to possess the highest category of soul, and is apt to grow wings that will help him fly back to heaven. Evidently, Plato deploys the beauty ladder to denote the upward way, and applies it to training godlike philosophers who are expected to be intellectually wise and truly virtuous. Such philosophers are models not only for the perfect citizens who can fulfil their social commitments, but for the qualified guardians of the kallipolis, who can take good care of human matters. Interestingly, the beauty ladder commences with a discussion of somatic beauty or somatic aesthetics that is fairly physical and by no means mystical. Yet, as it extends skyward to its top rung, the description of beauty itself is obviously metaphysical and even somewhat mystical, as underlined by the immortal or divine dimension. The mind-heart excursion is a process of spiritual cultivation through serene contemplation in the Daoist sense. It essentially features intuitive perception and spiritual experience rather than cognitive reasoning or epistemological exploration. This is chiefly due to the three factors. The first can be traced back to the Daoist prioritisation of the true person over true knowledge. Moreover, true knowledge ‘has nothing to do with the common sense of knowledge associated with the outer world because of its dominant tendency of mysticism and nihilism’ (Yang 1993: 152–3). The fact is that true knowledge does not concern knowledge in the ordinary sense, for it is directed to the Enlightenment of the inner world. The focal point of Daoist intuitive perception and spiritual experience does not concern the possession of such true knowledge but its embodiment. The second factor relates to the palpable teleological considerations in cultivation, whereby the mind-heart excursion is the pursuit of Dao. It is largely due to this aspect of Daoist thought that the early Daoists, Laozi and Zhuangzi, express a negative view of (conventional) knowledge. They maintain that the Dao, rather than knowledge, is the ground of wisdom for a good life. This sets this view apart from that of Plato and the Platonists, who held a positive conception of knowledge, and who firmly believe that one who knows more is more likely to possess wisdom for a good life. In Daoist philosophy, the gap between the pursuit of Dao and conventional knowledge can be illustrated by what the Laozi claims: ‘the pursuit of learning is to increase day after day’, as it will encourage the acquisition of conventionally bound knowledge of the world, deeming the ‘learned’ as being more capable. In contrast, ‘the pursuit of the Dao is to decrease day after day. It deceases and decreases again until one gets to the point of take-no-action. He takes no action, and yet nothing is left undone’ (Laozi, chapter 48, trans. Wang 2008: 83). This line of thought is also expressed in the Zhuangzi. While the text is sceptical of knowledge, it emphasises Dao for its incomparable power of subtlety, creativity, and inexhaustibility. In the Zhuangzi, Dao is real, yet inert and formless. It can be acquired by the mind-heart, but it cannot be taught by words. It is its own source, begetting heaven and earth and giving birth to ghosts and spirits. It is above the zenith but does not seem high; it is beneath the nadir but does not seem low; it came into being before the universe but does not seem long ago; it was there before time immemorial but does not seem old (Zhuangzi, chapter 6, trans. Wang 1999: 95–7). Detectable in this passage are the metaphysical, theological, and cosmological features of Dao. They are expressed through rhetorical hyperbole,

44 Cultivating a Good Life mystical and seemingly incomprehensible. Yet, if one shifts her conventional mode of thinking to that recommended by the text, he or she may find that alignment with Dao is primarily ‘inner’, intuition-based subjectivity and spirituality. The inner dimension is not only indispensable to the transformation of the true person but, providing the self is completely emptied (xu 虚), it can also encompass the external world. All this points to the telos of attaining Dao. The third element arises from an underlying preoccupation with the highest realm of human life. This realm is characterised primarily by spiritual cultivation through empirical artistry and acuity rather than cognitive and intellectual ability. In the Zhuangzi, spiritual cultivation, the first priority, is aimed at the attainment of Dao. In another sense, it also aims at a complete self-consciousness of the original nature of humankind. It is thus embodied in the in-depth experience of the oneness of the true self with heaven, earth and all things, which will conduce to a mental concentration to converge the self with the cosmos. At this point, one is engaged in free play with the spirit or the vital energy of the cosmos without being attached to external things. He is then exposed to a spiritual feeling of being broad-minded and engages in free wandering. (Cui 1992: 302. Trans. by author)

Identifying with the Dao as such, the true person is also presented as a metaphorical or symbolic figure, deployed to appeal to those who happen to be curious but who are also prepared to seek the true knowledge of Dao. It is noteworthy that, in the Zhuangzi, the true person appears to be primarily wise and mystical. This may be an overstatement, especially as one aspect of the true person turns out to be more accessible than commonly assumed. For instance, the true person in ancient times did not dream when he slept; he did not worry when he was awake; he did not mind his food when he ate; he inhaled deeply when he breathed. His breath rose from the heels, while the breath of ordinary men rises from the throat. (Zhuangzi, chapter 6, Wang 1999: 89) The true person enjoys such mental serenity that he is free from disturbances and worries. He lives simply, happily and naturally as he wholeheartedly concentrates on Dao itself. This passage’s focus on his breath may seem peculiar. However, the exercise of breathing (qi gong 气功) in this passage sees such control as ordinary practice in daily life. In spite of their differences, is there any way in which the two models of cultivation may complement each other? I suggest the answer is positive, even though there are subtle differences, in the four ways I describe below. I focus on the following four points: the teleological pursuit, the method of cultivation, detachment from political life and tranquillity. I discuss each in turn. First, it cannot be denied that both pictures of a good life are teleologically directed, notwithstanding the fact that they are motivated by contrastive conceptions and approaches. Quite coincidentally and similarly, the beauty ladder covers seven steps to reach the greatest insight, and so does the mind-heart excursion to achieve the ultimate Dao. In order to arrive at the final destination of self-sublimation, both

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suggest trajectories to guide a person from an ‘outer’ to an ‘inner’ world through either cognitive development or spiritual cultivation. The staged progression in both cases implies at least two things. First, they signify that cultivation is a gradual process that requires each subsequent stage to be built upon the previous one. The distinctive features of the sequential process in each case, expressed through the respective analogies, reaches from the low to the high. In Plato the ascent is grounded on knowing what was previously unknown, while in the Zhuangzi it is based on forgetting what ought to be forgotten. In other words, the former is knowledge-oriented learning via rational contemplation, whereas the latter is based on ‘sitting in self-forgetfulness’ (zuo wang 坐忘) through intuitive meditation. Consequently, Plato’s method leads to an accumulation of know-how and meta-cognition, but Zhuangzi’s culminates in selferasure and empty-mindedness. Second, both analogies offer methods of cultivation, albeit through different processes. According to Zhuangzi, ‘sitting in self-forgetfulness’ is the most crucial path to identification with Dao, and thus conducive to spiritual triumph over a preoccupation with the physical, and absolute freedom from this-worldly concerns. This condition may be described as one wherein a person has exhausted the principle of all principles, and fulfilled the utmost of human nature (qiong li jin xin 窮理盡性). Being in the supreme state of serenity and emptiness can only be realised and ensured if a person (is prepared to) cast off one’s limb and trunk, give up one’s hearing and sight, and leave one’s physical form, thus depriving himself of his mind-heart (Zhuangzi, chapter 6, ibid.: 111). The beauty ladder calls for a type of purification captured by the hierarchical but conditional movement. It is possible to enjoy a higher class of beauty only when the love of the lower and preceding class of beauty is purified or sublimated. The ascent to the summit to apprehend beauty in itself is encouraged by the analogy. At the same time, however, there is room for a person to pause at some point during the entire process. By contrast, in the mind-heart excursion, much is left to the person who strives to attain Dao. It seems that there is no halfway-point where a person may claim success. That is, if and only if one succeeds in going through all the seven stages is he enabled to attain Dao, and live a good life of complete purification and absolute freedom in the Daoist sense. If by any chance he halts the progressive process prior to the final stage, he is most likely to live an uneasy life because he will expose himself to inevitable disturbances and temptations from the outside world. How may we benefit from learning about the different paths to a good life? Here, we may imagine a dialogue across the two traditions. For example, when a Platonic lover of beauty cannot go any further in exploring the unknown, he may perhaps try to ‘sit in self-forgetfulness’ from the perspective of Daoism. On the other hand, if a pursuer of Dao does not manage to ‘sit in self-forgetfulness’, he may be able to persuade himself to reflect upon what ought to know from the viewpoint of Platonism. This comparison captures how a person, in cultivating himself or herself, may select from either of the two alternative frames proposed. Third, in both the beauty ladder and the mind-heart excursion, a person becomes increasingly detached from involvement in political matters. Plato’s tale hints at an attitude not unrelated to the tradition of Hellenic Quietism, while Zhuangzi’s tale exposes an attitude associated with the heritage of Chinese Daoism. In both cases, the

46 Cultivating a Good Life correct attitudes are aligned with a preference for the contemplative life, as opposed to a political life. Historically, Plato himself demonstrates his quietist tendency by rejecting the invitation to join the Thirty Tyrants for the governance of Athens. Zhuangzi does the same when he is invited to be a prime minister of a state during the Warring States period. He even goes so far as to ridicule the envoy by pointing to a tortoise and saying that he would become this tortoise dragging its tail in the mud than a high official in confinement. Both Plato and Zhuangzi make astute observations about political affairs, but abstain from direct involvement because of their heightened awareness of the constant and unjust struggles in that domain. Quietism is mainly preoccupied with inner knowledge of things. It tends to favour tranquil contemplation, such as a philosophical life, and to withdraw from the political arena. As to Daoism, its detachment from worldly affairs involves a sequence of three distinct stages in human development. The sequence consists of: having no-knowledge (wu zhi無知) as one is born ignorant; having knowledge (you zhi 有知) as one becomes learned through study during the period of maturity; and shedding knowledge (qu zhi 去知) as one strives to forget what ought to be forgotten during the period of spiritual cultivation. The transition from having no-knowledge to having knowledge is demanding and strenuous. Yet, it is even more difficult for a person to be transformed from having knowledge to shedding knowledge, because this process involves ridding oneself of psychological inertia to forget what one has learnt, but also a cognitive resistance to erasing it from memory: mind-heart. Finally, tranquillity is a shared characteristic of both models of a good life. The contemplative life in Plato is attainable through philosophical training and epistemological improvement. It also requires mental tranquillity and serene contemplation. This picture is explicated primarily with reference to logos-based reasoning or rational thinking, which is in turn characterised by philologos as love of word, and discursive clarity in either theoretical argumentation or analytical classification. Similarly, what the mind-heart excursion attempts to furnish is no other than mental tranquillity and serene contemplation. It is almost always described by means of a person’s experience of a new orientation enlivened by their intuitive grasp of Dao. This new orientation features philopraxis as a love of action, as well as mystical obscurity. With respect to the alternatives in question, philologos without philopraxis could be ineffective, and philopraxis without philologos could be misleading. It is for this reason that they can work interactively so as to bring forth and even consolidate their potential impacts on illumination or enlightenment. If what is proposed above is acceptable, the two alternative paths to a good life might be pragmatically utilised to create a synthetic frame of reference, with modifications. This may sound to some like holding a ‘forced marriage’, and to others like cooking a ‘collected soup’. Yet, this frame of reference proposes a variety of methods of cultivation in order to nurture types of wisdom concomitant with particular conceptions of a good life. In brief, they offer alternative pictures of a good life. Furthermore, the investigation of these two models have sharpened our insights on the connection between the methods of cultivation and teleological ideals, as well as the ways in which human knowledge, feelings, attitudes, detachment, orientation, and fulfilment are intimately intertwined.

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Notes 1 All translations of Greek in this chapter, unless otherwise noted, are from texts in Plato’s Symposium. These are noted by Stephanus number only. Where another dialogue is quoted, the name of the dialogue and Stephanus number are given. Except for the long extract at the beginning, all translations of Greek text are by the author. Throughout the passage of the Symposium at issue in this chapter, Plato plays on an ambiguity between the divinity, Eros (here translated ‘Love’ with capital ‘L’), and desire (eros). Ultimately, as is shown in the conclusion of this chapter, Plato is concerned to equate philosophical desire with divinity, so the distinction and the ambiguity are not particularly important. 2 These Latin terms are derived from Marsilio Ficino’s commentary on the Symposium, 6.8 (2012: 168–9). Ficino talks about five kinds of love in this section. I believe three kinds of them are relevant to the Platonic love of beauty in the analogy of the beauty ladder. These include the humanus amore that is essentially active, the ferinus amore that is voluptuous, and the divinus amore that is contemplative. 3 All the English-language renditions of Zhuangzi have been translated by the author, or they have been adapted (by the author) from the translations offered by other scholars. 4 The Great Learning (Da xue), one of the Confucian classics, advocates a sense of mission to do whatever possible for actualising this sociopolitical objective. This sense of mission is condensed into four Chinese notions that stand for four cardinal tasks: personal cultivation (xiu shen 修身), regulating the family (qi jia 齐家), governing the state well (zhi guo 治国), and bringing order to the world (ping tian xia 平天下). Chan 1973: 86. 5 Zhuangzi’s notion of ‘having a clear mind-heart’ seems to share something with the Schopenhauerian idea of ‘the pure subject of knowledge’ in spite of the discrepancy that the former is oriented towards the Dao, whereas the latter towards the Idea. Neither of them could be actualised without serene contemplation in distinct mode each due to the different philosophical backgrounds involved. Cf. Schopenhauer, Third Book, 1909: 231–3. 6 Laozi, Dao De Jing (trans. Wang Keping, Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 2008), ch. 15, 32–3. Comparatively speaking, these two rhetorical questions contain a crucial and instructive message. ‘The muddy’ has rich connotations. On one level it means ‘muddy water’, but metaphorically it signifies a muddy mind-heart, turbid situation, chaotic order, confused environment, decadent morality, and so on. All this is the opposite of ‘the clear’ as its antithetical counterpart. Likewise, ‘the still’ is regarded as denoting ‘the dead’, ‘the static’, ‘the inert’, ‘the inactive’, and so on. All this is antithetical to the qualities of ‘the alive’ or ‘the dynamic’. As regards these two pairs of opposite categories – the muddy and the clear, the still and the alive – a vehicle of transformation is highly desirable. The vehicle itself seems to be made up of such essential but contradictory elements as ‘tranquillity’ and ‘activity’. As has often been observed in practice and experience, it is through concentration and tranquillity that one is able to get out of the mire of muddiness and confusion on the one hand, and eventually become clearminded and remain at ease on the other. This is often true of the natural process during which muddy water becomes clear through tranquillity or freedom from disturbance. However, in terms of psychology and development, the involvement in tranquillity and peace for too long a time can turn into a state of stillness, during which one may grow slack, inert, or indolent. At this stage activity is required as a stimulus. When activated and motivated, one becomes renewed, energetic, and ­creative again. This can be seen

48 Cultivating a Good Life as an exposition of the reason why stillness (static state) taken to its extreme degree will turn into activity (dynamic state) and vice versa in the existence of all beings. The dialectical form of their transformation is actually extended from the general principle that ‘Reversion is the movement of the Dao’. It is said that Martin Heidegger (1889–1976) was deeply impressed by the two rhetoric questions. He had them written on a wall scroll and hung it in his study for contemplation. We guess that the German philosopher may have had a profound reason to do so, because he himself was at the time preoccupied with seeking the possibility of ‘clarity’. Cf. Wang Keping 2011: 193–4. 7 Rosen 1987: ch. 7. See also the simplified Chinese version, Rosen (trans. Yang Junjie), 2011: 239.

Bibliography Chan, W., ed. (1973). A Source Book in Chinese Philosophy. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Cui, D. (1992). Zhuang xue yan jiu [A Study of Zhuangzi’s Thought]. Beijing: Renmin chubanshe. Ficinus, M. (2012). De Amore: Commentarium in Convivium Platonis, trans. L. Zhonghe and .i Yang, Shanghai: East China Normal University Press. Guo, X. and X. Cheng, eds (2013). Zhuangzi zhu shu [The Works of Zhuangzi Annotated and Explained], Beijing: Zhonghua Shuju, republished in 2013. Keping, W., trans. (2011). The Classic of the Dao: A New Investigation. Beijing: Foreign Languages Press. Laozi (2008). Dao De Jing, trans. W. Keping. Beijing: Foreign Languages Press. Pascal (1962). Pensées, Paris: Librairie Générals Française. Plato (1996). Symposium, trans. W. R. M. Lamb. Cambridge, MA and London: Harvard University Press. Plato (1997). ‘Symposium’, trans. A. Nehamas and P. Woodruff, in J. M. Cooper (ed.), Plato: Complete Works, 457–505. Indianapolis: Hackett. Rosen, S. (1987). Plato’s Symposium. New Haven: Yale University Press. Rosen, S. (2011). Plato’s Symposium. Translated into Chinese by Junjie Yang. Shanghai: East China Normal University Press. Schopenhauer, A. (1909). The World as Will and Idea, trans. R. B. Haldane and J. Kemp. London: Kegan Paul. Yang, A. (1993). Zhongguo gudai jingshen xiangxiangxue--Zhuangzi sixiang yu zhongguo yishu [The Phenomenology of Spirit in Ancient China: Zhuangzi’s Thought and Chinese Art], Changchun: Northeast Normal University Press. Zhuangzi (1999). The Zhuangzi, trans. Wang Rongpei. Beijing: Foreign Languages Press.

4

Awareness and Spontaneity: Three Perspectives in the Zhuangzi Lisa Raphals

Several modes of action or attitudes of mind have been proposed as skills or processes at the heart of good lives. Prominent among these, in the early Chinese context of the Zhuangzi, are recommendations for a special type of awareness that is closely linked with both spontaneity and a particular kind of indirection characterised as ‘acting without acting’ (wuwei 無為). This chapter uses three contemporary perspectives to explore the central role in the Zhuangzi of a kind of spontaneous awareness, which informs Zhuangist accounts of harmony and balance, in senses that range from the personal and even medical to the sociopolitical and cosmological. The first perspective is the idea that awareness and inclination are fundamental to choice and agency. This view is widespread in the Zhuangzi, and is also central to contemporary theories of embodied cognition. I present Zhuangist accounts of awareness through the lens of A. C. Graham’s account of inclination informed by awareness as the basis for agency and choices among ends. I then turn to three contemporary neuroscientific accounts of self and agency, which are consistent with the recommendations of the Zhuangzi. The second perspective problematises this account of agency and spontaneity by introducing the problem of boundaries between humans and animals as they affect agency and self-consciousness. Are animals’ reactions purely instinctive, or do (at least some) animals engage in awareness (including self-awareness), choice, and agency? I begin with accounts of human–animal continuity in the Zhuangzi. Other arguments for animal consciousness appear in the ‘Elements of Ethics’ of the 2nd-century (CE) Stoic philosopher Hierocles, which provide a comparative approach within the ancient world. Contemporary accounts of spontaneous decisionmaking by other animals come from evolutionary biology, neurology, and the study of animal group behaviour. The third perspective arises from four ontologies proposed by the anthropologist Philippe Descola, which provide a very different perspective on awareness and human– animal boundaries.

50 Cultivating a Good Life

Awareness, spontaneity, and agency A. C. Graham’s studies of the Zhuangzi have informed a generation of subsequent scholars in three contexts: his philological work on the Zhuangzi; his translation of the Inner Chapters of the Zhuangzi into English; and as a philosopher who attempted to use the Zhuangzi to solve a major problem in moral philosophy first set by David Hume. In Reason and Spontaneity, Graham attempted to address Hume’s famous lacuna between ‘is’ and ‘ought’. He proposed a theory of value that grounds all values in the imperative to ‘be aware’, an approach explicitly derived from the Zhuangzi. This approach introduces a theory of spontaneity informed by awareness.

‘Be aware’: A Zhuangist response to Hume A recurring theme in the Zhuangzi is the importance of awareness. This focus takes many forms. One is the repeated contrast between ‘great’ and ‘small’ perspectives, which in turn is linked to the Zhuangist account of ‘great knowledge’ (da zhi 大知).1 This account begins at the beginning of chapter 1 (Xiaoyao you 逍遙遊), which contrasts the awareness of short-lived creatures such as the morning mushroom and summer cicada with the awareness of creatures with great longevity, such as the da chun 大椿 tree that lives eight thousand years: 小知不及大知；小年不及大年 small knowledge does not reach great knowledge; small years do not reach large years.2

The passage claims that short-lived creatures cannot know what lies beyond their existence in time. Chapter 2 (Qiwu lun 齊物論) continues the comparison between ‘great knowledge’ and ‘small knowledge’: 大知閑閑，小知閒閒； great knowledge is wide and encompassing; small knowledge is narrow and petty.3

Chapter 17 (Qiu shui 秋水) links great knowledge to a series of contrasts: between far and near, large and small, many and few, and past and present. It returns to the theme of limited perspectives of small knowledge: a frog in a well has no experience of the sea; a summer insect never experiences winter ice.4 A second focus on awareness is the Zhuangist account of awareness as a hallmark of the crafts masters whose skills the Zhuangzi repeatedly extols.5 The Zhuangzi repeatedly depicts hyper-aware individuals who excel at the performance of a craft or skill, beginning with the butcher Pao Ding 庖丁of chapter 3, the sole skill master of the Inner Chapters. In the Outer chapters, they continue with Wheelwright Bian (Lun Bian 輪扁) of chapter 13 and six characters from chapter 19: a hunchback who catches cicadas (julou zhangren 痀僂丈人), an expert ferryman (jin ren 津人), an



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expert swimmer (zhangfu you zhi 丈夫游之), the bell stand maker Woodworker Qing (Zi Qing 梓慶), and the skillful draftsman Artisan Chui (Gong Chui 工倕). They also include the skillful draftsman (hua zhe 畫者) of chapter 21 and the skillful swordsmith (chui gou 捶鉤) of chapter 22. Cook Ding’s account of his own skill shows its roots in awareness and spontaneity: 始臣之解牛之時，所見无非〔全〕牛者。三年之後，未嘗見全牛也。 方今之時，臣以神遇而不以目視，官知止而神欲行。依乎天理，批大卻， 導大窾，因其固然。 When I began to carve oxen, I saw nothing but [whole] oxen wherever I looked. Three years later, I never saw an ox as a whole. Now I am in touch through the spirit and do not look with the eye. I know how to stop the senses, and the spirit I desire to run its course. I rely on Heaven’s structuring, cleave along the main seams, take as my guide the main cavities, and rely on what is so of itself [ziran].6

The other craftsmen also, to varying degrees, make explicit their use of heightened awareness. For example, according to Wheelwright Bian, the balance necessary to make the spokes of a wheel fit exactly right is: 得之於手而應於心，口不能言，有數存焉於其間。臣不能以喻臣之子， 臣之子亦不能受之於臣 something you ‘get’ in your hands and feel in your heart-mind; the mouth cannot put it into words; there is a kind to knack to it. I cannot explain it to my son, and he cannot learn it from me.7

When Confucius asks the skillful cicada catcher about his skill, he replies ‘I have dao’ (wo you dao ye 我有道也), and describes his perceptions thus: 吾處身也若厥株拘，吾執臂也若槁木之枝，雖天地之大，萬物之多， 而唯蜩翼之知。吾不反不側，不以萬物易蜩之翼 I empty my body like a rooted tree stump; I hold my arms like the branch of a withered tree; for all heaven and earth’s vastness and the myriad things’ greatness, I am only aware of the wings of the cicada. I don’t wander or waver, and would not change all the myriad things for the wings of a cicada.8

When asked about his skill, Woodworker Qing describes his preparations for making a bellstand by ‘fasting to calm the heart–mind’ (zhai yi jing xin 齊以靜心). He forgets reputation and reward, praise and blame, and skill or clumsiness, and, after seven days, reaches a point where: 輒然忘吾有四枝形體也。當是時也，無公朝，其巧專而外骨消；然後入 山林，觀天性；形軀至矣，然後成見鐻，然後加手焉

52 Cultivating a Good Life I forget that I have a body and four limbs. During this time there is no ‘my lord’s court’; the skill of it concentrates and outside distractions melt away; only then do I go to the mountain forest to observe Heaven’s inherent nature of the wood. The aptitude of the body reaches its peak; and only then do 1 completely see the bellstand; and only then do I put my hand to it.9

A third focus of the issue of awareness is its apparent opposite: the account of ‘forgetting’ (wang 忘) and ‘heart-fasting’ (xin zhai 心齋) as means to increase awareness by emptying the mind.10 For example, in chapter 2 we are advised that the best way to live out our full years is to: 忘年忘義，振於无竟，故寓諸无竟。 forget the years, forget duty, be shaken into motion by the limitless, and so find things their lodging-places in the limitless.11

In an account of the death of Laozi, normal grief and mourning are described as ‘forgetting what we have received from it’ (wang qi suo shou忘其所受).12 The deformed masters of chapter 5 also ‘forget’. For them: 故德有所長而形有所忘，人不忘其所忘而忘其所不忘，此謂誠忘。 For to the extent that power stands out, bodily form becomes something we forget. When people do not forget what they had forgotten but do forget what they had not forgotten, this is what we may call ‘complete forgetting’.13

Zhuangzi 4 describes ‘heart-fasting’ (xin zhai) as the ‘emptiness’ (xu 虛) that occurs when one ‘listens’, not with the ears or mind, but with one’s constituent qi.14 Although they are described differently, a combination of awareness and spontaneity are central to all three. In his work on the Zhuangzi and elsewhere, Graham was consistently occupied by two linked concerns: the importance of skill knowledge and the importance of informed, spontaneous performance. The latter receives sustained attention in the central argument of Reason and Spontaneity (1985), where Graham argued that as agents who choose our ends and purposes, we encounter Hume’s view that no normative imperative about values can be derived logically from declarative statements about facts.15 As Graham puts it: ‘I am not an instinctive being like an animal. I have to choose, and on the [Humean] position we are here considering, all imperatives are ungrounded’.16 Graham argues that rationalists and moralists have been unwilling to acknowledge that much of what they value arises from the areas of human behaviour that share the spontaneity of physical events. On the one hand, physical events are externally caused, while human action is willed. But in the case of what Graham describes as spontaneous actions, a problem arises because he seems to be using the term, not for ‘spontaneous’ uncaused events of the kind described as chance (automaton) or luck (tuchē) by Aristotle, but rather for events that are self-caused by the spontaneous inclinations of



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an ‘aware’ agent. In Graham’s treatment of spontaneous events, the agent is ‘free’ only to the extent that she learns to direct such actions.17 Graham’s point is not that we should become more spontaneous, but rather that we do not really need to be troubled about Hume’s problem of getting from ‘is’ to ‘ought’. The way out, in his view, was to recognise that our ultimate goals are spontaneous, in the sense of being self-caused (rather than uncaused). Once we recognise this, the only necessary first principle becomes ‘Be aware’.18 Graham, following the Zhuangzi, argues that our ends are grounded in inclinations, not in reason, and that inclinations are spontaneous.19 Graham advances a general theory of value that grounds all values in the imperative to ‘Be aware’.20 He rejects both Kantian rationalism and Romantic irrationalism in favour of a notion of self in which awareness integrates reason and spontaneity: Like the animals, I am an organism which spontaneously senses, analogizes to the already experienced, and tends towards or away. Unlike them, I am selfconscious, can detach myself from spontaneous process in order to analyze and criticize perceptions, analogies and reactions, choose ends from my spontaneously emerging goals, choose means to my ends. In becoming self-conscious I require an imperative by which to choose between spontaneous tendencies as they veer with changing awareness, but only one, ‘Be Aware’.21

Part of this view is explicitly derived from the Zhuangzi. Graham identifies the Zhuangzi with what he calls anti-rationalism (as distinct from irrationalism), which recognises the need to be aware, but rejects reason as the basis for awareness or the link between awareness and action. In conclusion, two issues arise from Graham’s account of Hume on ‘is’ and ‘ought’. One concerns Graham’s view that Hume claims that all imperatives are ungrounded, something that Hume does not say directly. By ‘ungrounded’, Graham presumably means that, according to Hume, normative directions cannot be grounded in merely factual premises.22 At issue is whether Graham does indeed provide an alternative to Hume’s is–ought distinction because Hume claims only that normative directions cannot be derived from merely factual premises. The combination of a factual premise and a normative directive does not address Hume’s is–ought problem.23 The issue seems to turn on the status of Graham’s dictum to ‘Be aware!’ If we take the slogan as a normative first principle, it fails to solve the Humean problem because it merely combines factual premises with a normative directive, and fails to meet Hume’s requirement of merely factual premises. This seems to be Graham’s understanding, since he identifies ‘Be aware!’ as ‘an imperative’ [emphasis added] by which to choose between spontaneous tendencies.24 Can Graham’s argument be made to do what he wants it to? One possibility is to take ‘Be aware’ as a factual description of a self-conscious agent. An observer could, and following Graham, would, describe her awareness as the result of a normative directive, but that need not be her standpoint. On this view, the ‘Be aware!’ perspective is grounded in the agent’s self-consciousness.

54 Cultivating a Good Life A second issue concerns Graham’s account of spontaneity. An area where the Zhuangzi and Hume seem to clearly agree is the claim that our ends are grounded in inclinations, and those inclinations are spontaneous. Or as Hume puts it: reason alone can never produce any action or propose any end. Only passion can propose ends, but reason is useful in working out how to obtain them, so ‘reason is and ought only to be a slave of the passions’.25 The propositions that our ends are grounded in inclinations, which in turn are spontaneous, are quite consistent with Hume’s view of reason and the passions. Such a reading might bolster claims for the Zhuangzi’s ‘anti-rationalism’. I would argue against such a reading because rationalism – specifically analysing wholes into their components – is an important first step in several accounts of selfcultivation in the Zhuangzi.26

The biology of choice and agency Graham’s explicitly Zhuangist argument began with the observation that much human behaviour shares the spontaneity of physical events, and spontaneous actions seem to belong more to the realm of the caused than to freedom of the will.27 Recent neuroscience has clarified some of the ways in which spontaneous inclinations may be said to be caused. Most fall under the broad umbrella of what has been called embodied cognition. Three aspects of this research are of particular relevance to Zhuangist awareness and spontaneity: neurological accounts of the self or its absence, Antonio Damasio’s somatic marker hypothesis, and research on self-referential processing. Hume famously argued that the ‘self ’ is a bundle of momentary impressions strung together by the imagination; as such it is a useful, narrative fiction.28 Contemporary neuroscience suggests that a variety of neurological processes – distributed across several regions of the brain – contribute to the subjective experience of the self.29 Spontaneous action is important to this account of the self in several ways. One is that important ‘prenoetic’ aspects of consciousness precede reflective thought; they ‘happen before we know it’ and are unavailable either to immediate experience or to reflective consciousness.30 On the account of Shaun Gallagher and others, consciousness and cognitive processes – including perception, memory, and imagination – are structured prenoetically by virtue of being embodied. In his account of the embodied mind, Gallagher makes a key distinction between two different but closely related systems that he calls ‘body image’ and ‘body schema’: A body image consists of a system of perceptions, attitudes, and beliefs pertaining to one’s own body. In contrast, a body schema is a system of sensorymotor capacities that function without awareness or the necessity of perceptual monitoring. This conceptual distinction between body image and body schema is related respectively to the difference between having a perception of (or belief about) something and having a capacity to move (or an ability to do something).31

Body image can include mental representations, beliefs, and attitudes insofar as they concern one’s own body. Body schema involves motor capacities, abilities, and habits that enable, and constrain, movement and posture. Body schema also applies to objects



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of perception and intention beyond one’s own body. Body schemas operate below the level of self-referential intention, and involve quasi-automatic ‘tacit performances’. Intentional and goal-directed activities also can affect movements controlled by the body schema, which although not a form of consciousness, can support (or undermine) the intentional activities of the body image.32 Thus prenoetic performance helps to structure consciousness. It affects and structures our relations with our environment, including posture and habitual styles of movement The important point for purposes of the present discussion is that prenoetic performance informs spontaneous and skilled performance. Both spontaneous inclination or action and skill knowledge significantly involve what we might call the extended action of body schemas, beyond the workaday monitoring of the body to far more complex activities. Other research gives similar accounts of physically ‘caused’ embodied cognition. According to Antonio Damasio’s somatic marker hypothesis, the brain associates physiological signals (‘somatic markers’) and the emotions that arise from them with past actions and their outcomes. As a result, somatic markers bias our decisions towards some behaviours and away from others.33 There is evidence that such affective reactions are often faster and more basic than cognitive evaluations. There is also evidence that anticipatory emotions may be as important as cognitive evaluations in making risky decisions.34 Several neuroscientists have argued for the existence of a physical ‘self ’, sometimes described as a sensorimotor ‘proto-self ’. It differs from several other neurological ‘selves’ by the stimuli to which it responds and the domain in which it acts.35 According to Georg Northuff, this ‘self ’ resembles what William James (1890) called the physical self, and interacts with other ‘selves’ with distinct domains of activity. These include a ‘minimal self ’ or ‘core or mental self ’ (which resembles James’ ‘mental self ’) and an ‘autobiographical’ or ‘narrative self ’ (with some similarity to James’ ‘spiritual self ’).36 But what links together these distinct ‘selves’ in the brain to form the reality (or illusion) of a self or person? One contemporary answer is that the brain creates the subjective sense of self through ‘self-related processing’.37 Self-related processing operates on pre-reflective stimuli associated with a strong sense of selfhood.38 It operates through a neural system made up of cortical midline structures, which are both anatomical structures and functional elements.39 These structures seem to affect several kinds of selfreferential processing, including language, spatial perception, memory, emotion, facial recognition (of both oneself and others), and perception of agency, including ownership of one’s movements.40 These structures are probably not specific to humans, and may have equivalents across several other species of mammals. In summary, evidence for embodied cognition, across several sciences and disciplines suggests a physical basis of emotion, decision-making, and even reason, with no need for a ‘self ’ who thinks, decides, and so on. This possibility gives Graham’s Zhuangist dictum ‘be aware’ expanded meaning. Are prenoetic processes truly beyond the range of self-reflective activity? Graham seems to be arguing that they are not, because some individuals, like Cook Ding and Wheelwright Bian, can extend self-reflective awareness into prenoetic processes. At the very least,

56 Cultivating a Good Life basing our decisions on maximal awareness includes awareness of somatic states and inclinations.

Animal awareness An important element in Graham’s account of awareness is a clear distinction between ‘aware’ humans and ‘instinctive’ animals. I argue that a Zhuangist account of harmony and awareness may be more a continuum than a contrast between the two. Nor is the Zhuangzi alone in attributing some kind of agency to animals. I now turn to alternative perspectives from three sources: the Zhuangzi, the Greek Stoic Hierocles, and evolutionary biology.

Animal awareness in the Zhuangzi Why does the Zhuangzi seem to attribute awareness to animals (and plants)? The Zhuangzi describes ‘destiny’ (ming 命) in the biological sense of lifespan (sheng ming 生命), for example: 死生，命也，其有夜旦之常，天也。人之有所不得與，皆物之情也。 Death and life are because of decree [ming], that there are regularities of night and day is because of Heaven. People having things in which they cannot participate is because of the configuration of living things.41 物得以生，謂之德；未形者有分，且然无閒，謂之命 When living things acquire by giving birth, this is called power [de]. When what has not yet acquired form has allotments [fen], this is called ming.42

These passages suggest, but do not assert, that ming is predetermined in the quantitative sense of lifespan. Other passages describe lifespan as ‘years allotted by heaven’ (tian nian 天年), for example: 故未終其天年，而中道已 夭於斧斤。 [‘useful’ plants and trees] do not live out their heaven-[allotted] years [tian nian], but in mid-life die prematurely by the axe.43

The Zhuangzi insists that ming and tian nian are not limited to humans, thereby introducing an important continuity between human and animal in the ‘fates’ of living things. This account of ming locates human decisions within a natural continuum of living things, mirroring the Zhuangzi’s attitudes towards human roles in the cosmos. It suggests an appreciation of what in modern terms we would call the shared biological heritage between humans and animals. The Zhuangzi also seems to recommend animals as models because of their freedom from destructive emotions. Animals do not fret over changes in their environment,



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and are not upset by the illusory shifts of human emotions. Grass-eaters are not upset by changes in pasture or water creatures by change in their habitus. They accommodate small changes, provided the great constancies remain. The Zhuangzi recommends their attitude as an alternative to happiness, anger, grief, and pleasure: 草食之獸不疾易藪，水生之蟲不疾易水，行小變而不失其大常也，喜怒哀 樂不入於跄次. Grass-eating animals are not upset by a change of pasture; water creatures are not upset by a change of stream. They go along with minor change, provided they do not lose the great constancies. [Be like this] and happiness, anger, grief, and pleasure can never enter your breast.44

Now these animals do not understand or care about their ming, but they do respond naturally to change. Elsewhere, the Zhuangzi suggests that all living things have a natural lifespan, determined in part by the norms for particular species. Morning mushrooms live for a day; the long-lived trees of southern Chu live for centuries.45 Each has a ming, but it is subject to circumstance, and there is no guarantee that any individual (animal or human) will survive to complete it. But the Zhuangzi does distinguish between the agency of humans and other living things. Animals are caught in traps because of their nature, not because of individual decisions or mistakes. And even animals that live out their allotted ming do control or deliberately create the characteristics that ‘save’ them.46 In this sense, the Zhuangzi maintains an ontological difference between humans and other living things. Our life spans are determined by combinations of accident and individual circumstance and choice, not by class membership. Only humans make deliberate choices that optimise their ming.

Hierocles on animal self-perception A different account of animal consciousness comes from the Stoic philosopher Hierocles’ (2nd century CE) ‘Elements of Ethics’.47 Hierocles argues that what motivates all animals is ‘self-ownership’, a reflexive version of oikeiōsis, ‘appropriation’ or ‘ownership’ of oneself. We see this disposition in animals’ instinct for self-preservation, but self-preservation requires self-awareness, since an animal must perceive itself before it perceives anything else: One must know that an animal immediately, as soon as it is born, perceives itself [aisthanetai heautou].48 Animals perceive their own parts [merōn tōn idiōn aisthanetai]. Thus, winged creatures, on the one hand, are aware of the readiness and aptness of their wings for flying, and, on the other hand, every land animal is aware both that it has its own members and of their use; and we ourselves are aware of our eyes and ears and other parts.49 Every hegemonic faculty [hēgemonikē] begins with itself. In this way a cohesive structure [hexis], which binds together what pertains to it, is first binding of itself.50

58 Cultivating a Good Life This concept of self-perception (heautou aisthanesthai, antilēpsis, or sunaisthēsis) seems to be a Stoic invention.51 Hierocles’ animal self-perception is preconceptual or non-conceptual; it is not grounded in experience or learning.52 Both James Brunschwig and Anthony Long have identified it with proprioception, the ‘muscular sensation’ that allows an animal to monitor and control the state and position of its limbs.53 As Long explains it, the Stoics were interested in the principles that caused animals to function as well-organised wholes, and these principles included animals’ ability to coordinate movement and maintain physical orientation. Long also observed that an important result of the interaction between exteroception and proprioception was self-image (phantasia), which animals use in both self-perception and self-concern.54 Hierocles’ animal ‘self-perception’ has interesting parallels to Zhuangzian accounts of animal felicity, to more extended Stoic account of oikeiōsis (in humans), and to biological evidence about animal brains and bodies.

Empirical evidence for animal awareness and agency Several findings from evolutionary biology also contribute to views of animal awareness. In the 19th century Charles Darwin argued that differences in the mental lives of animals are differences of degree, not of kind.55 Contemporary evidence suggests the existence of a neurological ‘core self ’ across at least mammalian species. Bernhard Baars argues that homologues of human brain structures behind cognition and conscious perception also occur in animals. Evidence from animal anatomy and physiology suggests that some kind of consciousness may be ‘biologically fundamental and phylogenetically ancient’.56 Jaak Panksepp goes further, and opposes ontological or metaphysical positions about consciousness that are based on the assumption that consciousness is grounded in rationality and command of language.57 He prefers a ‘Spinozan-type dual-aspect monism’, based on the view that affective consciousness arises from complex neural networks that control instinctual emotional actions.58 Panksepp and others present substantial experimental evidence for internal affective states in animal minds. One example is the subcortical brain systems behind both human and some animal emotions. Other mammals have similar neurological systems, and their emotions are controlled by similar regions of the brain.59 As explained by Panksepp’s dual-aspect monism, raw emotions do not require higher-level cognitive processing or interpretation; instead, they reflect the neurodynamics of emotional operating systems and their associated brain mechanisms.60 Some cognitive scientists argue that many animal species have core self-related processing abilities. This point is important because self-related processing coordinates not only emotions and motivations, but also homeostasis with external stimuli related to goal-directed activities. Other mammals have the capacity to relate bodily states, intrinsic brain states, and environmental stimuli to life-supporting goal orientations. It has been suggested that self-related processing operates through a central integrative neural system made up of subcortical–cortical midline structures, and that these structures are homologous across mammalian species.61 Finally, what might be called group consciousness emerges in studies of animal group behaviour. They demonstrate situations in which the superior awareness of a few



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individuals can ‘spontaneously’ alter the behaviour of collective groups. Recent research on collective decision-making in animal groups shows that complex relationship between individuals and groups occurs in the collective behaviour of animal groups such as swarming ants, schooling fish, and flocking birds. Alignment among individuals (the tendency to move in the same direction as one’s immediate neighbours) appears to provide a way to transmit information about directional change as a rapid wave extending over a great distance. The turning movement of the group creates a larger ‘sensorium’ than the perceptions of individual group members ever could. Such behaviour makes it possible to rapidly amplify local fluctuations in situations such as reacting to predators, changing weather conditions, or fire or other threats to the group. In ‘wave’ behaviour, when one individual detects a threat and changes direction, the result is a propagating wave of turning, which makes it possible for many individuals or even the whole group to avoid the threat. This behaviour is spontaneous in several senses. It does not depend on the consciousness or specific leadership of any one individual, nor does it require language or any kind of deliberate signalling.62 In these examples, the spontaneous ‘turning’ of animals, based on ‘awareness’ of danger, protects both individual and group. These examples hardly rise to the modes of awareness advocated in the Zhuangzi, but they do form part of a continuum in which animal consciousness seems to go far beyond simple proprioception. The combined effect of evidence for a neurological ‘core self ’, self-related processing in nonhuman animal brains, and collective decision-making by animal groups is to suggest continuity between animals and humans. In a contemporary perspective, such evidence reinforces Zhuangzian accounts of embodied spontaneity.

An anthropological perspective A radically different approach to questions of personal identity and psychological continuity comes from a strand of contemporary anthropology that explores radical differences in cultural ontologies. Philippe Descola argues that, in order to understand relations that human beings establish with nonhuman animals, we cannot use cosmologies and ontologies that are bound to one culturally particular context. In particular, he argues that the modern ‘Western’ cosmology and ontology that opposes nature to culture is both culturally specific and of fairly recent origin.63 Descola draws on his many years of research among the Achuar, an Amerindian group who live on the frontier between Ecuador and Peru.64 The Achuar believe that humans, most plants, and animals all possess souls (wakan), which give them reflexive awareness and intentionality; and enable them to experience emotions and communicate with others. The Achuar classify humans as ‘complete person’ (penke aents) by virtue of human language which makes them agents or ‘persons’. The Achuar understand technical expertise in large part as the ability to create contexts for communication between human spirits and those of the game hunted by Achuar men and the plants tended by Achuar women.65 Descola argues that the Achuar ontology and cosmology is one of many that make no clear boundary between nature and culture. What is interesting for

60 Cultivating a Good Life purposes of the present discussion is that they conceptualise relations between humans and animals very differently than does Western individualism.66 Descola goes on to argue that these different ontologies are reflected in culturally specific schemas of practice that give rise to two modes of structuring relations of ‘selves’ and others – which he terms ‘identification’ and ‘relationship’. Identification is a general schema that establishes similarities and differences between oneself and other entities through analogies and contrasts in appearance, behaviour, and other properties ascribed to self and others. Relationships build on and extend the primary terms set out by identification. Descola identifies two fundamental modes of identification, which he calls ‘interiority’ and ‘physicality’. Interiority is the attribution of mental processes, subjectivity, and intentionality. Physicality refers to the world available to sense experience and the properties of beings related to behaviour or form.67 It is important to emphasise that this distinction differs in important ways from the mind–body dualism that has been a dominant – though not unique – part of the metaphysics of the post-Greek West. Descola argues that some perceived distinction between interiority and physicality is a human universal, but the details of how that distinction is managed are culturally specific. As he puts it, the duality of interiority and physicality, which is present all over the world in various modalities, is thus not simply an ethnocentric projection of an opposition peculiar to the West between, on the one hand, the body and, on the other, the soul or mind. On the contrary, we should regard this opposition, in the guise in which it is forged in Europe, together with the philosophical and theological theories that it has prompted, as a local variant of a more general system of elementary contrast.68

Descola identifies four possible ways to organise ontological space constituted by different distinctions based on interiority and physicality: The recognized formulae for expressing the combination of interiority and physicality are very limited. Faced with some other entity, human or nonhuman, I can assume either that it possesses elements of physicality and interiority identical to my own, that both its interiority and its physicality are distinct from mine, that we have similar interiorities and different physicalities, or, finally, that our interiorities are different and our physicalities are analogous.69

He identifies four basic ontologies based on the four combinations of shared and distinct attributions of interiority and physicality to different kinds of beings. The four ontologies are: animism, totemism, naturalism, and analogism. They are summarised in the table below:

similar physicalities dissimilar physicalities

similar interiorities

dissimilar interiorities

totemism animism

naturalism analogism



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Animism (which he identifies with Amazonia) sees interiority as continuous across all living things. In this ontology, all living things possess both agency and intentionality, though different agents are distinguished by their different bodies and practices available to perception. Although humans, nonhumans, and spirit entities have different physical forms, all have interiority. Totemism (identified with Indigenous Australia) sees both interiority and exteriority as continuous. These shared continuities make possible the identification of human groups (tribes) with nonhuman counterparts (totems) on the assumption that in each case, the paired groups emerge from an ontologically prior monism (the ‘Dreaming’). Naturalism (identified with the modern West) sees exteriority as continuous and interiority as discontinuous, thereby differentiating humans, animals, and so on. Naturalists restrict intentionality and agency to the ‘culture’ of the human realm, and deny it to the realm of ‘nature’. Cultural humans have agency, and this distinguishes them from the determinism of nature, which is mechanical and universal. Finally, analogism (identified with much of Asia, the Andes, and medieval Europe) sees no continuity, of either interiority or exteriority. On this view there is no continuous ontology or cosmology, and the only way to establish identity or order is by artificial analogies between radically dissimilar elements. Examples include such practices as astrology, polytheism, and belief in the transmigration of souls.70

Conclusion Two aspects of this argument are of particular interest for the present discussion. First, Descola’s account of identification is based on distinctions between self and any other, human or nonhuman. Second, of his four ontologies, animism and totemism take interiority as continuous between selves and others, including nonhuman others. They also resolve the original problem of the apparent similarity between ‘caused’ spontaneous human actions. It remains to tie these three perspectives together. Neurological evidence suggests a ‘core self ’ in both humans and some animals that engages in self-related processing in the brain and in collective decision-making by animal groups. These possibilities make Graham’s account of self-caused spontaneity and awareness all the more suggestive, given his sustained preoccupation with the importance and efficacy of informed, (self-caused) spontaneous performance in the Zhuangzi. This spontaneity arises from cultivated dispositions grounded in perception and inclination that make action effortless yet efficacious. These dispositions are also associated with skill: both skill knowledge as a mode of knowing, and specific skills and expertise. Skill mastery – whether in archery, cookery, musical performance, pottery, or even generalship – entails combinations of extensive physical practice and rational ‘principles’, closely attentive to minutely changing microclimates in time. In a Chinese context, both self-caused spontaneity and skilled performance are associated closely or loosely (depending on the text) with wuwei and also with what is spontaneous in the sense of being ‘self-so’ (ziran).71 At the individual level, the

62 Cultivating a Good Life skills associated with good lives involve cultivation of inclination, perception, and awareness. They involve rational activity, surely, but are not derived solely or even primarily from it. These models of good lives are specifically human, and do not engage continuities with others, human or otherwise. But animal behaviour suggests that good lives might not be a purely individual matter. Studies of animal group behaviour indicate salutary effects from the spontaneous behaviour of hyper-aware individuals, who sense subtle changes and guide the behaviour of the group. In conclusion, I want to suggest that a new and less explored set of possible skills behind good lives emerges if we extend notions of informed awareness and spontaneity beyond individualist notions of persons. We may have something to learn from the spontaneous collective decision-making of some animals and the ‘sensoria’ of animal groups. In our considerations of what specific skills and capabilities facilitate ‘good’ – and not-so-good – lives, we need to consider both the skills of autonomous individuals and other capabilities that draw on more fluid notions of interiority and on complex relations between individual and group dynamics.

Notes 1 The scholarship on all these topics is too extensive to review here. On awareness and great knowledge see Chiu 2012, Raphals 1996 and Sturgeon 2015. 2 Zhuangzi 1: 11 (Graham 1981: 44). 3 Zhuangzi 2: 51 (Graham 1981: 504). 4 Zhuangzi 17: 568. 5 On skill, see Bruya 2010, Fraser 2008, Graham 1983, Lai and Chiu forthcoming, and Yearley 1996. 6 Zhuangzi 2: 119, after Graham 1981: 63–4. 7 Zhuangzi 13: 491, cf. Graham 1981: 140. 8 Zhuangzi 19: 640, cf. Graham 1981: 138. 9 Zhuangzi 19: 658–9, after Graham 1981: 135. 10 On forgetting and heart-fasting, see Fraser 2014, Kohn 2015, and Raphals 2018 and forthcoming. 11 Zhuangzi 2: 108, Graham 1981: 60. 12 Zhuangzi 3: 28 cf. Graham 1981: 65. 13 Zhuangzi 5: 216–17, cf. Graham 1981: 80. 14 For example Zhuangzi 4: 147–8, cf. Graham 1981: 68–9. 15 Graham 1985, cf. Graham 1961 and 1983. This response to Graham is indebted to Raphals 2019. 16 Graham 1985: 2. 17 Graham 1985: 7, cf. Arist., Phys. II.5–6. Aristotle discusses the relation between both as otherwise uncaused events, and considers luck to refer only to events that result from the intentions of agents capable of thought (dianoia, Phys. 197a1–6) or who are capable of experiencing good fortune (eutuchesai, Phys. 197b1–2). 18 Graham 1985: 9–10. 19 Graham 1985: 2–3, 7–9. 20 He describes this theory as a ‘quasi-syllogism’ (1985: 7). 21 Graham 1985: 151.

22 23 24 25 26

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See Hume (1960[1888]), 3.1: 469. I am grateful to Rick Benitez for this point. Graham 1985: 151, discussed above. Hume 1960[1888], 2.3.3: 414–15. These include the accounts of the skill of Cook Ding (chapter 3), Wheelwright Bian (chapter 13), the cicada catcher (chapter 19), and the bell stand maker Woodworker Qing (chapter 19). They also include the language play of the ‘Sorting that Evens Things Out’ (chapter 2), and Zhuangzi’s numerous debates with, and assessment of Hui Shi throughout the text. 27 Graham 1985: 7, discussed above. 28 Hume 1960[1888], 1.4.6: 252. 29 Gallagher 2000: 14–21. 30 Gallagher 2005: 2. 31 Gallagher 2005: 24. 32 Gallagher 2005: 26. 33 Damasio 1991: 217–99 and 1994. 34 Loewenstein et al. 2001. 35 For the proto-self, see Damasio 1999 and Panksepp 1998a, 1998b. 36 See Northoff et al. 2006: 440. For ‘minimal’ and ‘narrative’ self, see Gallagher 2000 and Gallagher and Frith 2003. For core or mental self and autobiographical self, see Damasio 1999. 37 Northoff and Bermpohl 2004: 102–7; Northoff et al. 2006; D’Argembeau, Ruby, et al. 2007. 38 Gallagher and Zahavi 2005, Legrand 2003 and 2005. 39 For more on cortical midline structures, see Northuff and Bermpohl 2004 and Northuff et al. 2006: 441–2. 40 Northoff et al. 2006: 446–9. 41 Zhuangzi 6: 241, cf. Graham 1981: 86. 42 Zhuangzi 12: 424, cf. Graham 1981: 156. 43 Zhuangzi 4: 177, cf. Graham 1981: 74. Another ancient tree (20: 667) is too gnarled for the carpenter, and is left on the mountains to live out its allotted lifespan. For further discussion, see Raphals 2017. 44 Zhuangzi 21: 714, cf. Graham 1981: 131. 45 Zhuangzi 1: 39. 46 For example oxen with white foreheads, pigs with upturned noses, and humans with piles cannot be used as sacrificial victims (4: 177), but they do not choose these features. 47 First published in von Arnim 1906, just after his Stoicorum Veterum Fragmenta. This absence may have contributed to his inaccessibility (Long 1996: 251–3). 48 Hierocles I.35–40, text and translation by Bastiannini and Long (1992) in Ramelli 2009: 4–5, cf. Von Arnim 1906 and Long 1991: 107. 49 Hierocles I.50–55, trans. Bastiannini and Long (1992) in Ramelli 2009: 4–5. 50 Hierocles VI.10–15, trans. Bastiannini and Long (1992) in Ramelli 2009: 16–17. 51 Aristotle (De sensu 7 448a26) uses the phrase autou aisthanesthai, but clearly of a human being. For claims that oikeiōsis is a Stoic invention, see Brink 1956 and Long 1996: 250–4. For claims for a peripatetic origin, see von Arnim 1926. Brink (1956) presents a detailed history of the issues and evidence. 52 Long 1996: 256. 53 Brunschwig 1986: 137; Long 1996: 258. This term was used by the neurologist Charles Sherrington (1906) to distinguish between what he called exteroceptive, interoceptive, and proprioceptive perception. These terms referred to the sensation

64 Cultivating a Good Life of external stimuli (such as vision, hearing, etc.), internal sensations, and ‘muscular sensations’ concerned with the mechanics of locomotion. See Sherrington 1906: 116 and 131–5 (reflexes), 308, 316–20 and especially 336–45 and 347–9. 54 Long 1996: 258–60. 55 Darwin 1872: 127. 56 Baars 2005: 7. We can infer human-subjective experiences from behavioural and brain evidence, and similar evidence exists for other mammals and perhaps other non-mammalian animals. But biological evidence suggests that subjectivity may be conserved in species with human-like brains and behaviour. 57 Panksepp 2005: 39. He refers to them as ontological, but they are perhaps better described as metaphysical. 58 Panksepp 1998a, 1998b and 2005, among many others; Panksepp’s research in this field is too extensive to quote in full. For discussion of animal cognition, see Parvizi and Damasio 2005, Seth et al. 2005, and Taylor et al. 2006. 59 These core emotional networks shared by all mammals include (using Panksepp’s capitalisation convention) FEAR, SEEKING, anger-RAGE, sexuality-LUST, nurturance-CARE, separation distress-PANIC, and joyful PLAY (1998a and 2005). 60 Panksepp 2005: 64. 61 Northoff and Bermpohl 2004; Northoff et al. 2006; Northoff and Panksepp 2008. 62 See Couzin 2008. For supporting studies, see Couzin 2007, 715; Couzin and Krause 2003; Conradt and Roper 2005; and Sumpter 2006. It has also been proposed that there are important commonalities between neuronal processes and collective animal behaviour. For turning behaviour, see Couzin et al. 2005: 513–516. 63 Descola 2013: xviii. See also Descola 1996b. 64 1996a. 65 Descola 2013: 5–7. 66 Descola 2013: 8–27. 67 Descola 2013: 116–19. 68 Descola 2013: 121. He notes that consciousness of a distinction between the interiority and the physicality of the self seems far more universal that lexical distinctions corresponding to nature and culture are rare outside European languages, and have no clear cognitive bases. 69 Descola 2013: 121. 70 Descola 2013: 121–5. 71 For wuwei in Zhuangzi see Fox 1996, Kohn 2013 Moeller 2015, and Wu 1981. For detailed discussion of ziran as Daoist self-causation, see Bruya 2010. For other discussions of spontaneity in Zhuangzi, see Billeter 1996 and 2008: 45–70; Callahan 1998, Chen Guying 2012: 23, Graham 1983, and Kupperman 1996.

References Arnim, H. von. (1906). Hierokles. Ethische elementarlehre (Pap. 9780), Berlin: Klassikertexte, Heft iv. Arnim, H. von. (1926). ‘Arius Didymus' Abriss der peripatetischen Ethik’, Sitzungsberichte der Academie Wien 204 (3), Vienna. Baars, B. J. (2005). ‘Subjective Experience Is Probably Not Limited to Humans: The Evidence From Neurobiology and Behavior’, Consciousness and Cognition, 14: 7–21.



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Bastiannini, G. and A. A. Long, eds (1992). ‘Hierocles’ Elementa Moralia’, in Corpus dei papiri filosofici Greci e Latini, Parte I, vol. 1, 268–451, Florence: Leo L. Olschki. Billeter, J.-F. (1996). ‘Non-pouvoir et non-vouloir dans le Zhuangzi : un paradigme’, Asiatische Studien/Etudes asiatiques, 50 (4): 853–80. Billeter, J.-F. (2008). Études sur Tchouang-tseu. Paris: Éditions Allia. Brink, C. O. (1956). ‘Οἰϰείωσις and Οἰϰειότης: Theophrastus and Zeno on Nature in Moral Theory’, Phronesis, 2: 123–45. Brunschwig, J. (1986). ‘The Cradle Argument in Epicureanism and Stoicism’, in M. Schofield and G. Striker (eds), The Norms of Nature: Studies in Hellenistic Ethics, 113–45. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Bruya, B. J. (2010). ‘The Rehabilitation of Spontaneity: A New Approach in Philosophy of Action’, Philosophy East and West 60 (2): 207–50. Callahan, W. A. (1998). ‘Cook Ding’s Life on the Whetstone: Contingency, Action, and Inertia in the Zhuangzi’, in R. T. Ames (ed.), Wandering at Ease in the Zhuangzi, 175–96. Albany, NY: SUNY Press. Chen Guying 陳鼓應 (2012). ‘Daojia de renwen jingshen’ 道家的人文精神 (The Humanist Spirit of Daoism), Beijing: Zhonghua shuju. Chiu, W. W. (2012). ‘The idea of zhi in the Zhuangzi’, Ph.D. Dissertation, University of New South Wales. Conradt, L. and T. J. Roper (2005). ‘Consensus Decision-making in Animals’, Trends in Ecology and Evolution 20: 449–56. Couzin, I. D. (2007). ‘Collective Minds’, Nature 445: 715. Couzin, I. D. (2008). ‘Collective Cognition in Animal Groups’, Trends in Cognitive Sciences 13 (1): 36–43. Couzin, I. D. and J. Krause (2003). ‘Self-organization and Collective Behavior in Vertebrates’, Advances in the Study of Behavior 32: 1–75. Couzin, I. D. et al. (2005), ‘Effective Leadership and Decision-making in Animal Groups on the Move’, Nature 433: 513–16. Damasio, A. (1991), Somatic Markers and the Guidance of Behaviour. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Damasio, A. (1994). Descartes’ Error: Emotion, Reason, and the Human Brain. New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons. Damasio, A. (1999). The Feeling of what Happens: Body and Emotion in the Making of Consciousness. New York: Harcourt Brace. D’Argembeau, A., P. Ruby et al. (2007). ‘Distinct Regions of the Medial Prefrontal Cortex are Associated with Self-referential Processing and Perspective Taking’, Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 19 (6): 935–44. Darwin, C. (1872). The Expression of Emotions in Man and Animals. London: John Murray, rpt. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 3rd edn., 1998. Descola, P. (1996a). The Spears of Twilight: Life and Death in the Amazon Jungle, trans. J. Lloyd. London: New Press. Descola, P. (1996b). ‘Constructing Natures: Symbolic Ecology and Social Practice’, in P. Descola and G. Pálsson (eds), Nature and Society: Anthropological Perspectives, 82–102. London: Routledge. Descola, P. (2013), Beyond Nature and Culture, trans. J. Lloyd. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Fox, A. (1996). ‘Reflex and Reflectivity: Wuwei in the Zhuangzi’, Asian Philosophy, 6 (1): 59–72. Fraser, C. (2008). ‘Psychological Emptiness in the Zhuangzi’, Asian Philosophy 18 (2): 123–47.

66 Cultivating a Good Life Fraser, C. (2014). ‘Heart-fasting, Forgetting, and Using the Heart Like a Mirror : Applied Emptiness in the Zhuangzi’, In J. Liu and D. Berger (eds), Nothingness in Asian Philosophy, 197–212. London: Routledge. Gallagher, H. L. and C. D. Frith (2003). ‘Functional Imaging of “Theory of Mind”’, Trends in Cognitive Science, 7 (2): 77–83. Gallagher, S. (2000). ‘Philosophical Conceptions of the Self: Implications for Cognitive Science’, Trends in Cognitive Science, 4 (1): 14–21. Gallagher, S. (2005). How the Body Shapes the Mind. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Gallagher, S. and A. N. Meltzoff (1996). ‘The Earliest Sense of Self and Others: MerleauPonty and Recent Developmental Studies’, Philosophical Psychology, 9 (2): 211–33. Gallagher, S. and D. Zahavi (2005). ‘Phenomenological Approaches to Self-consciousness’, in The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, ed. E.N . Zalta. online. Graham, A. C. (1961). The Problem of Value. London: Hutchinson. Graham, A. C. (1981). Chuang tzu: The Inner Chapters. London: Unwin. Graham, A. C. (1983). ‘Taoist Spontaneity and the Dichotomy of “is” and “Ought”’, in V. Mair (ed.), Experimental Essays on Chuang-tzu, 3–23. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press. Graham, A. C. (1985). Reason and Spontaneity. London: Curzon. Hume, D. ([1888] 1960). A Treatise of Human Nature, ed. L. A. Selby-Bigge, 3 vols., Oxford: Clarendon. Ivanhoe, P. J. and P. Kjellberg, eds (1996), Essays on Skepticism, Relativism, and Ethics in the Zhuangzi. Albany: SUNY Press. James, W. (1890). The Principles of Psychology. 2 vols. New York: Henry Holt and Company. Kohn, L. (2013). Zhuangzi: Text and Context. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press. Kohn, L. (2015). ‘Forget or Not Forget? The Neurophysiology of Zuowang’, in New Visions of the Zhuangzi, 161–79. St. Petersburg, FL: Three Pines Press. Kupperman, J. (1996). ‘Spontaneity and Education of the Emotions’, in P. J. Ivanhoe and P. Kjellberg (eds), Essays on Skepticism, Relativism, and Ethics in the Zhuangzi, 183–95, Albany, NY: SUNY Press. Lai, K. and W. W. Chiu (eds) (forthcoming), Skill Mastery and Performance in the Zhuangzi. Legrand, D. (2003). ‘How not to Find the Neural Signature of Self-consciousness’, Consciousness and Cognition, 12 (4): 544–6. Legrand, D. (2005). ‘Being a Body’, Trends in Cognitive Science, 9 (9): 413–14. Loewenstein, G., E. Weber, C. Hsee and N. Welch (2001). ‘Risk as Feelings’, Psychological Bulletin, 127 (2): 267–86. Long, A. A. (1991). ‘Representations of the Self in Stoicism’, in S. Everson (ed.), Psychology: Companions to Ancient Thought, 102–20. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Long, A. A. (1996). ‘Hierocles on oikeiōsis and Self-perception’, in Stoic Studies. 250–64. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press. Moeller, H.-G. (2015). ‘Basic Aspects of Daoist Philosophy’, International Communication of Chinese Culture, 2 (2): 99–107. Northoff, G. and F. Bermpohl (2004). ‘Cortical Midline Structures and the Self ’, Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 8: 102–7. Northoff, G. et al. (2006). ‘Self-referential Processing in Our Brain – A Meta-analysis of Imaging Studies on the Self ’, NeuroImage, 31: 440–57. Northoff, G. and J. Panksepp (2008). ‘The Trans-species Concept of Self and the Subcortical-cortical Midline System’, Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 12 (7): 259–64.



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Panksepp, J. (1998a). Affective Neuroscience: The Foundations of Human and Animal Emotions. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Panksepp, J. (1998b). ‘The Periconscious Substrates of Consciousness: Affective States and the Evolutionary Origins of the Self ’, Journal of Consciousness Studies, 5 (5–6): 566–82. Panksepp, J. (2005). ‘Affective Consciousness: Core Emotional Feelings in Animals and Humans’, Consciousness and Cognition, 14: 30–80. Parvizi, J. and A. Damasio (2005). ‘Consciousness and the Brainstem’, Consciousness and Cognition, 14: 135–59. Ramelli, I. (2009). Hierocles the Stoic: Elements of Ethics, Fragments, and Excerpts, trans. D. Konstan. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature. Raphals, L. A. (1996). ‘Skepticism in Zhuangzi and Theaetetus’, in P. J. Ivanhoe and P. Kjellberg eds, Essays on Skepticism, Relativism, and Ethics in the Zhuangzi, 26–49. Albany, NY: SUNY Press. Raphals, L. A. (2018). ‘The Zhuangzi on ming: Perspectives and Implications’, in R. C. Steineck and R. Weber (eds), Concepts of Philosophy in Asia and the Islamic World, vol. 1, 175–204. Leiden: Brill. Raphals, L. A. (2019) “Reason and Spontaneity Reconsidered,”in R. T. Ames and C Defoort (eds.), Having a Word with Angus Graham: On the First Quarter Century of his Immortality, 215–230. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press. Raphals, L. A. (forthcoming). ‘Neuroscientific and Cognitive Perspectives on the Zhuangzi’, in K.-C. Chong (ed.), The Dao Handbook of the Zhuangzi, [in preparation]. Dordrecht: Springer. Seth, A. K. et al. (2005). ‘Criteria for Consciousness in Humans and other Mammals’, Consciousness and Cognition, 14: 119–39. Sherrington, C. (1906). The Integrative Action of the Nervous System. New Haven: Yale University Press. Sturgeon, D. (2015). ‘Zhuangzi, Perspectives, and Greater Knowledge’, Philosophy East and West, 65 (3): 892–917. Sumpter, D. J. T. (2006). ‘The Principles of Collective Animal Behaviour’, Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 361: 5–22. Taylor, S. et al. (2006). Self-awareness in Animals and Humans: Developmental Perspectives, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Wu K.-M. (1981). ‘Trying Without Trying: Toward a Taoist Phenomenology of Truth’, Journal of Chinese Philosophy, 8: 143–67. Yearley, L. (1996). ‘Zhuangzi’s Understanding of Skillfulness and the Ultimate Spiritual State’, in P. J. Ivanhoe and P. Kjellberg (eds), Essays on Skepticism, Relativism, and Ethics in the Zhuangzi, 152–82. Albany, NY: SUNY Press. Zhuangzi 莊子 1961. Zhuangzi jishi 莊子集釋. Ed. Guo Qingfan 郭慶籓. Beijing: Zhonghua shuju.

5

Understanding ‘Dao’s Patterns’: Han Fei Barbara Hendrischke

‘Dao’s patterns’ (daoli 道理) figures as a newly defined concept in Han Fei’s 韓非 (?–233 BCE) essay ‘Explaining the Laozi’ (Jie Lao 解老).1 This essay has been transmitted in Han Fei’s collected writings, the Hanfeizi ‘Master Han Fei’. Whether it originates with the philosopher himself has so far been impossible to decide. However, there are no overwhelming reasons against this being the case.2 For the sake of convenience, Han Fei will in the following be treated as the author. This is not problematic for interpreting the text of ‘Explaining’. Even if Han Fei was not the author, it is evident from the text’s style and contents that it can only stem from someone who was roughly Han Fei’s contemporary and who vaguely shared his education and philosophical interests. The essay is an early example of one original philosopher openly discussing the teachings of another original philosopher who, when looked at from a distance, lived in the same world as did he.3 Both belong to the last centuries of the Warring States period (475–221 BCE). Their texts differ widely in style and philosophical intent. The text of the Laozi was created by an anonymous author or authors and consists of poems while all other ancient Chinese philosophical works are composed as dialogues, essays, or collections of sayings.4 This stylistic difference is in tandem with the Laozi’s view on the people’s use of language and in particular on their concepts and value judgements. They are all seen as misleading. Instead, the audience is addressed by using images, metaphors, and paradoxes, as in the Zhuangzi. This perspective on language allows the Laozi’s authors to briskly deconstruct other positions while they phrase their teachings in a more indirect, tentative, and poetic manner. Proposals are often formulated from a negative perspective and aim to criticise established perceptions and prevailing customs. For the Laozi, philosophising can start only with one’s personal experience. It is proposed that human beings must ground their conduct in the awareness of their existence as mortal beings. This is in stark contrast to other Warring States philosophers who view human beings as embedded in the realms of social expectations and traditions. For them, instructions for human conduct can only be derived from an awareness of historical and cultural preconditions that is to be acquired by studying a set corpus of canonical texts. The Laozi differs. Han Fei shares the Laozi’s critical approach, in two respects. First, he is sceptical regarding the efficiency that can be attained by the common use of language. He ponders problems of communication and sees at times more effect in serving the



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psychological expectations of an audience than in explicating what is reasonable or true. Second, he agrees with the Laozi that an education in classical texts has nothing to do with the maintenance of social order and good government. He also agrees that to do things right cannot be learnt from historical precedent but from a direct analysis of the situation at hand. In both texts there is much opposition against basing communal life on the moral norms that were propagated by Confucian thinkers. In the Laozi they are called superfluous and even detrimental because they detract from the inner nexus of things. For this reason actions are said to be efficient only when they are grounded in the depth of someone’s vitality and in consequence, as the author of the Laozi argues, also in that of the things being acted on. In order to succeed, human beings are therefore expected to rely on their own and everyone else’s ‘spontaneity’, which is a key term for the Zhuangzi as well as for the Laozi. This renders stratagems as well as moral considerations futile. Han Fei partly agrees. He calls the reliance on behavioural norms misleading since a person’s interest in their own well-being provides a much stronger and more reliable motivation for action. A ruler is therefore advised to keep order by a strict regimen of punishments and rewards. It can be argued that in the highly competitive realms of late Warring States discourse Han Fei attempted, by means of ‘Explaining’, to make Laozi his ally. Judging by the core chapters of the Hanfeizi the philosopher’s general interest lies in forms of argumentation and aspects of social and political philosophy. The same holds true for ‘Explaining’, where the Laozi is read from both perspectives. The essay takes its structure from the sequence of the eleven sections of the Laozi that are its subject.5 This sequence may, from all we know, result from Han Fei’s own choice. In each case the author gradually takes his readers or his audience through a section’s arguments in stages. He intertwines his own statements with a sentence or two from the Laozi that is usually with good reason introduced by ‘therefore it is said’, as if the Laozi’s phrase were epitomising what Han Fei has said. In this fashion Han Fei’s own propositions and the Laozi quotations are set up as if to explain and prove each other. This creates the impression that Han Fei’s philosophising takes its direction from the wording of the other text. This impression is no doubt intended. When Han Fei was writing, the Laozi was a prominent and well-admired text.6 As far as we can tell, ‘Explaining’ puts a new style of philosophical writing to the test. The result is a sophisticated text that succeeds on two fronts. On the one hand it provides a thorough interpretation of the Laozi. It explains the difficult text’s wording and some major concepts. On the other hand it proposes and defends ideas that convey Han Fei’s own political and social outlook. The concept of ‘dao’s patterns’ documents both aspects. It exemplifies Han Fei’s analytic approach to the Laozi’s philosophical poetry. It also documents Han Fei’s pragmatic outlook. He applies the concept in answer to the Laozi’s concern with the vulnerability of life. Section 50 of the Laozi draws a picture of the human condition as situated between life and death, both of which are seen to be of equal strength and where, by pursuing our preference for life, we create a region for our death. Overdoing life creates a risk: ‘Therefore the wise man who cherishes vital energy and spirit thinks highly of remaining somewhere in quietude.’7 The concept of self-cultivation that is a central component of much Warring States social philosophy appears in the Laozi in a meaning that is alien to its general usage. Self-cultivation is depicted as the discipline that someone shows when nourishing his or her vitality. The

70 Cultivating a Good Life Laozi’s advice is to ignore demands for moral rectitude and scholarly subtlety. Another Laozi section adds that ‘Men in life are soft and weak, while in death they are stiff and rigid’ and ‘therefore it is said, stiffness and rigidity are companions of death while softness and weakness are companions of life’.8 When drawing these points together, the reader arrives at an argument for the quietist ideas of reversal, restraint, and doing nothing that pervade the Laozi. The question of how to hold onto life (she sheng 攝生) that is raised in section 50 of Laozi thereby finds an answer in the proverbial wisdom that we may retain what we do not cling to. The Laozi illustrates the proximity of death and the vulnerability of life by introducing images of mortal danger. Rhinoceros and tigers are such fierce animals that only the most courageous hunter deals with them.9 However, there are men who can withstand their attacks. Why is this so? Someone can face them on the condition that within him there is ‘no room for death’. Han Fei sets out to explain this phrase. He starts by identifying the mortal dangers that human beings may be faced with: Since the people only know of claws and horn of rhinoceros and tigers and do not know that all the myriad things have claws and horn, they do not avoid the harm that lies in these things.10

This observation is followed by examples from diverse spheres of life. ‘Claws and horn’ can be found in weather conditions, the penal code, the occurrence of violent strife in a local community, or illness caused by the disorder in one’s rhythm of movement and rest. What holds true in all these dangerous situations is the following: When someone likes to use his own judgement irrespective of dao’s patterns, the ‘claws and horn’ of nets and strings harm him.11

Here Han Fei matches the Laozi’s image of claws and horn with the image of nets and strings that are tools to catch birds and in a literal sense point to the dangers a gentleman may face from others who are situated above and below him.12 For Han Fei, the main danger the gentleman as well as the rest of us must fear lies in wrong thinking, or as he puts it, in the use of ‘one’s private judgement’. This view was not unusual.13 In the 2nd century BCE the historian Sima Qian observed that the great general and statesman Xiang Yu suffered defeat in his struggle against the founder of the Han dynasty because ‘he trusted only his private judgement and did not follow ancient precedents’.14 For the historian and many of his contemporaries study of the past was the reliable opposite to using one’s personal judgement. This is certainly not Han Fei’s meaning. What he sets up as the reliable opposite to one’s private or perhaps ‘personal’ judgement is attention to ‘dao’s patterns’. Such attention will in his view enable people to ‘hold on to life’ and thereby achieve their aim. The term does not originate with Han Fei but he supplies it with new meaning that is coined in response to the existential threat that section 50 of Laozi deals with. Both the terms dao and li that are combined in this concept have an impressive history and a range of meanings. In combining them Han Fei restricts this range. Li ‘pattern’ is the narrower of the two terms.15 In the Mohist canon it points to the



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‘arrangement of parts in a structured whole’, as A. C. Graham puts it.16 This definition assigns to li a crucial role in the creation of a statement or a thought which is echoed by Xunzi when he states that knowing relies on the patterns of things: ‘The general condition for knowing lies in the human disposition. The actual possibility to know lies in the patterns of things.’17 However, since for him these patterns represent order and regularity, Xunzi extends the term’s meaning in another direction. To understand patterns has for him not only epistemological but also moral relevance and in consequence he argues that any understanding which fails to enhance the strength of these patterns must be set aside.18 Han Fei follows Xunzi part of the way. He also views li as a principle that gives order to human understanding but for him the term’s positive value comes to the fore when it is shown to induce functionally appropriate thinking and thereby decision-making. Xunzi’s interest in the term’s moral connotation is left aside. For this reason, Han Fei’s position closely resembles what is said in the Zhuangzi’s ‘Autumn Floods’, where Ruo of the North Sea explains: Whoever knows dao is sure of penetrating the patterns, whoever penetrates the patterns is sure to be clear-headed in weighing things, whoever is clear-headed in weighing things will not use other things to his own harm.19

With this reasoning, to penetrate patterns becomes key to personal security, just as Han Fei suggests in his attempt to solve the Laozi’s dilemma of someone faced with mortal danger. For Han Fei the term is therefore of practical importance and he sets out to define more closely how the observation of patterns allows us to know things: All things which have shape are easily sliced out, easily hacked out. How shall we show this? If they have shape they have length or shortness, so largeness or smallness, so squareness or roundness, so hardness or softness, so lightness or heaviness, so whiteness or blackness. It is being long or short and large or small and square or round and hard or soft and light or heavy and white or black which is called ‘pattern’. The pattern being fixed the thing is easily hacked out.20

Graham suggests that for this passage, as in the Mohist canon, things are divisions of a universe: Patterns arrange the whole so that within it things take shape and to our observation appear as things.21 Being patterned, things appear as partaking in specific features as detailed in the above quotation. These features are also situated on a timeline. They include the stages that things occupy in the process of becoming, for instance of ‘surviving or perishing, birth or dying, flourishing or decaying’.22 In ‘Explaining’, the use of the term pattern is coherent. Foreknowledge, for instance, is said to anticipate ‘the occurrence of events and the workings of patterns’.23 It is repeatedly stated that the practical result of understanding patterns lies in appropriate action.24 Han Fei does not link this to any normative value. For him, the concept remains free from moral connotations. While this understanding suits his own as well as the Laozi’s social philosophy, it has remained isolated.25 In the later use of the term, Xunzi’s interest in the moral consequences of understanding the order that is suggested by patterns has prevailed.

72 Cultivating a Good Life The full term patterns of dao is used by Han Fei at times as if patterns were its abbreviation.26 He understands patterns of dao as dao-derived patterns and as another, only more precise, word for patterns. Since according to the Laozi everything derives from dao – its epithet is ‘mother of the world’ (tianxia mu 天下母) – so do the things’ attributes or their patterns.27 We may therefore conclude that by observing patterns we gain some insight not only into things but also into dao itself, which is otherwise hard to access. So in the expression patterns of dao the possessive dao acts as a reminder of the ontological quality of the patterns that we observe. This becomes obvious in the following passage with which Han Fei ‘explains’ section 14 of the Laozi, whose topic is the concept of dao: Dao is that through which the myriad things are as they are and that by which the myriad patterns are defined. A pattern is the texture of a thing as a whole. Dao is the means by which the myriad things become wholes. Therefore I would say: ‘Dao is what patterns them.’ Since things have patterns they cannot encroach on each other. Since things cannot encroach on each other because they have patterns, the patterning of them is the cutting up of things. Each of the myriad things has a different pattern, and [although] each of the myriad things has a different pattern dao completely defines the patterns of the myriad things. Dao, therefore, cannot but transform. Since it cannot but transform its commitment is not constant.28

From this passage Chad Hansen draws the conclusion that for Han Fei each thing has a ‘guiding tendency’ – his term for li ‘pattern’ – that governs its distinguishable attributes and its course of development and completion. Dao can, therefore, be understood as the compendium of patterns that guides via a pattern for each thing. This entails dao being divisible.29 This is a reasonable interpretation of Han Fei’s words that address the need to understand patterns while also addressing the difficulty of laying hold of dao. This difficulty is thematised throughout Han Fei’s comments on sections 14 and 1 of Laozi. He ends by quoting section 1 of Laozi: ‘The dao that can be dao-ed is not the constant dao’. The dao that is present in the things’ patterns naturally cannot be constant. Since both section 14 and section 1 deal with the inaccessible nature of dao, Han Fei explains them in a curtailed manner by quoting only isolated sentences.30 The theory that, because of its ontological dominance, dao cannot be made part of a human enterprise is of no interest to him and he cuts off aspects of dao that are hard to combine with a rational approach to human action. Instead, he advocates with energy that the observation of dao as present in the things’ patterns leads to practical success. This he puts in the following words: The reason why most people encounter defeat in what they wish to achieve is that they do not understand dao’s patterns and are not willing to ask men who know and listen to men who are capable.31

This is said as a critique of people’s disregard for Laozi’s thesis on the interdependence of disaster and good fortune. Dao’s patterns are thereby set up as a superior guide for decisions regarding one’s personal life as well as political and commercial issues.



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A ruler who ignores dao’s patterns will reduce his population, and a merchant who does so will ruin his wealth.32 Although for Han Fei, as for his contemporaries, to understand something was in principle not different from acting in accordance with what one had understood, he seems to touch on the problem of implementing insights when he introduces the formula ‘to submit to patterns’. Since he often shows a keen interest in matters of psychological relevance, we may assume that for the concept of daoli he took the additional step of exploring the mindset that enables people to make appropriate use of the patterns that they have observed. In explaining section 59 of the Laozi, Han Fei connects the adherence to dao’s patterns with the quietist conduct that the Laozi, as well as ‘Explaining’, call conducive to one’s vitality and personal security: The wise man puts his spirit to use in quietude. When there is quietude little is dispersed. When little is dispersed we speak of sparing. The art we call sparing [in the use of one’s sense organs and mind] is derived from dao’s patterns. Indeed, someone able to [use his sense organs and mind] sparingly is a person who follows dao and submits to patterns. The common people . . . do not follow and submit to dao’s patterns.33

This seems to say that the wise man, by means of understanding the situation he happens to be in, submits to it. He does not overextend his faculties in an effort to oppose or avoid it. He can do so because, by grasping dao’s patterns, he becomes aware of his situation. Attitudes and conduct that are propagated throughout the Laozi and also throughout ‘Explaining’ are usually formulated in the negative as avoidance and reduction, as if nourishing life meant to live with as little intensity as possible. In contrast, the advice to ‘follow dao’s patterns’ is a positive formula that points in a forward direction. In both respects this suits Han Fei’s philosophical intention. At this point we are prepared to return to the initial passage of Han Fei’s comments on section 50 where he advocates the attention to dao’s patterns as a recipe against threats to one’s life. Having observed that tigers, rhinoceros, and soldiers find no place to hurt a sage, the Laozi raises the question ‘Why is this so?’, and provides the answer that the sage is without any region of death. Han Fei’s explanation for this answer is the following: That someone who does not undertake preparations [which neighbours may see as aggressive] will certainly not incur any harm lies in dao’s patterns of heaven and earth. He embodies dao of heaven and earth.34

Here Han Fei intensifies his advice by rhetorically enhancing the patterns human beings are expected to rely on. He adds the epithet of heaven and earth and calls dao’s patterns something that one should embody (ti 體). Expressions used earlier are ‘to rely on’ (yuan 緣), ‘to know’ (zhi 知), and ‘to follow and submit to’ (zongfu 緃服). These attitudes and ways of action are in Xunzi’s terminology summarised by ‘to embody’: ‘To know how to investigate and then to implement dao is to embody it.’35 Han Fei follows suit in the use of ‘to embody’. Such an ‘investigation’ can only in an

74 Cultivating a Good Life inferential manner start from the attributes of things, as listed above. It does not rely on historical precedence and makes no use of the system of correspondences that became fashionable only after Han Fei’s life time. By advocating the investigation of patterns, Han Fei provides an answer that fits the riddles posed in section 50 but conflicts with what is said in section 73 of the Laozi which also deals with threats to life and proposes that people will be safe as long as they play by the rules that heaven has set. What these rules are remains unclear: Heaven hates what it hates. Who knows the reason why? Therefore even the sage treats some things as difficult.36

It is at this point that Han Fei steps in to argue for the need to infer ‘heaven’s reason’ from the observation of what is in sight as documented in dao’s patterns and thereby unravel difficulties. ‘Explaining’ deals with principles of human conduct and has little to say on how someone who understands dao’s patterns navigates through daily life. However, we learn that such a person takes great care not to antagonise others and for this reason adheres to the restraint, modesty, and self-control that are advised throughout the Laozi. He will, therefore, investigate affairs and measure things up before proposing plans, just as a craftsman makes use of compasses and the carpenter’s square.37 He will never be the first to voice an opinion and never attempt to propagate his insights among people who lack interest.38 When in government he remains quiescent and thereby potent. Even the courage of a compassionate mother who manages to protect her child against diverse dangers is said to stem from her awareness of the patterns of dao.39 We may assume that someone who is seen to adhere to dao’s patterns shows respect for dao, while simultaneously paying close attention to the situation she or he happens to be faced with. In other chapters of the Hanfeizi there is little regard for the lifestyle that is propagated in the Laozi and the Zhuangzi. However, while people are not expected to think of dao they are advised to rely on an independent investigation of facts. They are shown to succeed once they understand the psychological and social features of their situation. This holds true for the ruler who is said to prosper as long as he realises and counteracts the desire of his subordinates and family to cause his downfall, for the official who furthers his career by knowing the sovereign’s weaknesses or for the wife who can protect her status because she knows of its transience.40 Such conduct may conflict with the world view that prevails in the Laozi but agrees with adhering to the patterns of dao as far as these patterns are the key to rational analysis.

Notes 1 Thanks are due to the editors of this volume and an anonymous reviewer for their advice and support and also to Sue Wiles for helping to make this chapter readable. 2 For a recent discussion of some of the issues that are involved in this question, see Goldin 2013: 13–18. Cf. also Hansen 1992: 371, Lundahl 1992: 218–41 (for whom Han Fei is not the author of ‘Explaining’) and Vandermeersch 1964: 241–70.



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3 Such an instance is rare. However, the Laozi, being short and often ambiguous, has from early on induced others to venture a commentary that expresses much of their own thought. The Xiang’er 想爾 (2nd century CE), as well as the commentaries by Heshang gong 河上公 (2nd century CE?) and Wang Bi 王弼 (226–49), can serve as examples (Chan 2016; Robinet 1977). 4 I here follow A. C. Graham whose observation seems to have met with little opposition: ‘Chinese literature is often said to have no long poems, but this judgement depends on conventions of classification. Lao-tzu is not classed as a shih 詩，for which ‘poem’ is the standard English equivalent, but for a Westerner it is without doubt a long philosophical poem or poem cycle’ (Graham 1989: 218). 5 Quotations often represent the full Laozi section. What Han Fei quotes makes it likely that he saw individual sections of the text in roughly the same shape in which they have been transmitted. 6 This is documented by the frequent presence of Laozi manuscripts among tomb objects from the late 4th to the 2nd centuries BCE. At present, the earliest findings are from a tomb situated in Guodian in Hubei near the capital of ancient Chu. The interment date is around 300 BCE (Cook 2012: 5). The authority enjoyed by Laozi materials is also confirmed by ‘Illustrating the Laozi’ (Yu Lao 喩老), another chapter of the Hanfeizi, and by ‘Dao’s response’ (Dao ying 道應) of the Huainanzi from the 2nd century BCE. Both quote lines from the Laozi in proof of general maxims that are drawn from historical anecdotes. The origin of the Laozi remains unclear. On linguistic grounds Baxter (1998) has arrived at a date of around 400 BCE. Author or authors remain unknown (Shaughnessy 2005). 7 See Chen 1974: 371: 是以聖人愛精神而貴處靜. Translations here and in the following are my own unless a translator is referred to. 8 See Laozi 76: 人之生也柔弱，其死也堅強 and 故堅強者死之徒，柔弱者生之徒 (Zhu 1980: 189f.); also compare Ryden’s translation (2008: 157) and Henricks’s (1998) discussion of the wording of Laozi 50. 9 As observed in the Zhuangzi, Guo 1989: 17.596; Watson 1970: 185. 10 See Chen 1974: 371: 民獨知兕虎之有爪角也，而莫知萬物之盡有爪角也， 不免於萬物之害. 11 See Chen 1974: 371: 好用其私智而棄道理，則網羅之爪角害之. In a simplifying mode Takeuchi (1960: 260) translates棄道理 as ‘to oppose the order of nature (自然の理)’. 12 The Shuoyuan that Liu Xiang 劉向 (79–8 BCE) assembled from earlier materials has the following remark on a gentleman’s conduct: ‘I have heard that conduct must resemble that of birds. Looking upwards one is in fear of birds of prey and looking downwards in fear of nets and strings’ 臣聞之，行者比於鳥，上畏鷹鸇，下畏網羅 (Zhao 1985: 10.300). The speaker is Cheng Hui 成回. He addresses his teacher, Zi Lu 子路, who is a prominent disciple of Confucius. 13 The chapter ‘Private Storehouse’ (Jinzang 禁藏) of the Guanzi (Li 2004: 53.1023), that may have originated at roughly the same time as ‘Explaining’ (Rickett 1993), argues that once officials do so, they disregard laws and put the order of the state at risk. The Hanfeizi chapter ‘Pretensions and Heresies’ (Shiye飾邪; Chen 1974: 19.310) also criticises the use of ‘private judgement’ (si zhi 私智) in ministers. It must be remembered that in the Hanfeizi and elsewhere the term si 私 ‘private’ often stands for the opposite of gong 公 ‘in the public interest’. From a political perspective Han Fei condemns all private interest. There is, however, no hint of seeing any public interest in basing one’s judgement on dao’s patterns.

76 Cultivating a Good Life 14 See Shi ji 7.339: 奮其私智而不師古, as translated by Yang 1975: 237. Xiang Yu did not follow advice but chose to reign the empire from the South where he was at home rather than from the strategically more advantageous region that he had just conquered. 15 The received text of the Laozi and the manuscript versions found in tombs do not contain the character. For its etymology Schuessler (2007: 349) arrives at the conclusion that ‘the basic meaning is “cut in a regular way, divide into equal sections”’. The broad spectrum of translation terms, reaching from Hansen’s ‘guiding tendency’ (1992), which we will get back to, to Ziporyn’s (2013) ‘coherence’, results from li’s dominating presence in Song dynasty thought. Tang (2005: 1–17) sees the pre-Qin use of the term as divided into an interest in the analysis of either physical objects or social relations and in consequence of something either in a fixed state or in some process. 16 See Graham 1978: 191. The whole in question can be the ordered cosmos or rational discourse. In evaluating the relevance of a statement, li is decisive: ‘In the sorting out of admissible and inadmissible denials, if his grounds are that in principle the claim deserves rejection, however much is denied his denial is the right choice.’ 論誹之可不可 以理之可非 雖多誹其誹是也 (for text and translation, see Graham 1978: 452). 17 See Wang 1988: 21.406: 凡以知，人之性也. 可以知，物之理也; cf. Hutton 2014: 233, who renders li as ‘underlying pattern’, following Knoblock (1988–94: vol. 3, p. 110). 18 See Wang 1988: 8.124: 凡知說，有益於理者爲之， 無益於理者舍之; cf. Hutton 2014: 56, who here renders li as ‘good order’. 19 See Guo 1989: 17.588, as translated by Graham 1986: 149: 北海若曰： 「知道者必達於理，達於理者必明於權，明於權者不以物害己.」 20 See Chen 1974: 20.377 as translated by Graham 1989: 286, slightly modified: 凡物之有形者易裁也，易割也. 何以論之？有形則有短長，有短長則有小大， 有小大則有方圓，有方圓則有堅脆，有堅脆則有輕重，有輕重則有白黑. 短長、大小、方圓、堅脆、輕重、白黑之謂理，理定而物易割也. 21 Graham 1989: 286 here follows Hansen 1983: 30. The opposite would be to see the universe as consisting of an aggregate of things. 22 See Chen 1974: 20.369, as translated by Graham 1989: 287: 故定理有存亡，有死生， 有盛衰. Harbsmeier (1998: 239) views the pairs of concepts in the list quoted above as a deliberate line-up ‘to indicate a range of dimensions or parameters along which physical objects may be said to have attributes’. He concludes that li is one term by which the concept of ‘attribute’ was expressed in Chinese texts. 23 See Chen 1974: 20.338: 先物行先理動之謂前識. 24 See, for instance, Chen 1974: 20.341, as translated by Graham 1989: 287: ‘If thinking is thorough you grasp the patterns in affairs. . . If you grasp the patterns in affairs you are certain to achieve results.’ 思慮熟則得事理 . . . 得事理則必成功. As Graham (1989: 287) has observed: ‘Han Fei reminds us frequently throughout the essay [“Explaining”] that the purpose of grasping the patterns (of death and life, rise and decline) is strictly practical.’ The same holds true for the understanding of ‘patterns of dao’ as discussed below. 25 There are isolated parallels. In the following passage from the Lü Shi Chunqiu ‘patterns’ can be seen as providing understanding. They can, however, also be viewed as conveying order, in the sense of Xunzi: Therefore, a distinction that does not fit the patterns [of things] is false and understanding that does not fit the patterns [of things] is misleading. The former kings have executed people who were misleading and false. Patterns are the ancestor to right and wrong. (Chen 1984: 18.1177f.; see also Harbsmeier 1998: 239)



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Several passages in the so-called Huang Lao materials that were excavated in Mawangdui clearly take up Han Fei’s understanding of the concept (Yates 1997: 94–7 and 82–5; see also Sarkissian 2001: 31) and so to some extent does the Huainanzi. It argues, for example, that dao’s patterns are of more military consequence (兵以道理 制勝) than the commander’s personal character (Liu 1968: 15.14b–15a; Major 2010: 602; see also Meyer in Major 2010: 879). However, in the main, Han dynasty sources side with Xunzi and see patterns as representing norms and the observation of patterns as enhancing morality. 26 Regarding the term daoli, Han Fei departs even more decidedly from Xunzi than in his use of li. For Xunzi both dao and li are, when used individually, general notions of good order and when combined represent a norm that resembles rightness (yi 義): ‘[The superior man] is courageous in doing the right.’ 其行道理也勇 (Wang 1988: 2.35 as translated by Dubs 1928: 53), or Shuoyuan: ‘[Worthy and sage men] have respect for benevolence and rightness and follow dao’s patterns.’ 謹仁義，順道理 (Zhao 1985: 20.598). 27 See Laozi section 25. 28 道者，萬物之所然也，萬理之所稽也.理者，成物之文也；道者，萬物之所以成也. 故曰：道，理之者也.物有理，不可以相薄，物有理不可以相薄，故理之為物之制. 萬物各異理，萬物各異理而道盡稽萬物之理，故不得不化；不得不化，故無常操 (Chen 1974: 20.365; the translation relies in part on Graham 1989: 286f.). The phrase ‘dao is what patterns them’ is here introduced by the formula gu yue 故曰, usually translated as ‘therefore it is said’, which in ‘Explaining’ is the standard introduction for quotations from the Laozi. The phrase is not derived from the Laozi if we follow the received text or the manuscript versions. The supposed quotation certainly reads as if it were a conclusion from the two preceding sentences. For this reason, gu yue is here understood as being the same formula which is used elsewhere in the Hanfeizi to signify that the author draws a conclusion in his own words. Examples abound, although in Liao’s disciplined translation the formula is almost always something like ‘hence the saying’ while Chen sees no need for quotations marks; see, for instance, Chen 1974: 46.951; Liao 1959 vol. 2: 243 or Chen 1974: 17.290; Liao 1959 vol. 1: 148. 29 See Hansen 1992: 373f. 30 We cannot tell if or in which form these sections were existent when ‘Explaining’ was written. Neither is contained in the Guodian manuscripts. 31 See Chen 1974: 20.345, explaining section 58 of the Laozi: 今眾人之所以欲成功而反為敗者，生於不知道理而不肯問知而聽能. 32 See Chen 1974: 20.343. 33 See Chen 1974: 20.350: 聖人之用神也靜，靜則少費，少費之謂嗇. 嗇之謂術也， 生於道理. 夫能嗇也，是從於道而服於理者也. 眾人…不服從道理. 34 See Chen 1974: 20.372: 不設備而必無害，天地之道理也. 體天地之道. 35 See Wang 1988: 21.397: 知道察，知道行，體道者也. Compare, however, Hutton’s (2014: 229) translation: ‘One who knows the Way and observes things by it, who knows the Way and puts it into practice, is one who embodies the Way.’ 36 See Lau 2001:106: 天之所惡, 孰知其故？是以聖人猶難之, in Lau’s translation. The Mawangdui manuscripts do not contain the last sentence, as briefly discussed by Wagner (2003: 493). Zhu (1980:184) deletes the sentence. 37 See Chen 1974: 20.377. 38 See Chen 1974: 20.345. 39 See Chen 1974: 20.376. 40 See for instance chapters 17 and 9; for a wife’s reasoning, see Chen 1974: 17.289–90.

78 Cultivating a Good Life

References Baxter, W. H. (1998). ‘Situating the Language of the Lao-tzu’, in L. Kohn and M. LaFargue (eds), Lao-tsu and the Tao-te-ching, 231–53. Albany: State University of New York Press. Chan, A. (2016). ‘Laozi’, in E. N. Zalta (ed.), The Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy (fall 2016 edition) URL = http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2016/entrie s/laozi/ (Accessed 20 January 2017). Chen Qiyou 陳奇猷 (1974). Collected Interpretations of the Hanfeizi (Hanfeizi Jishi 韩非子集释). Shanghai: Renmin chubanshe (上海: 人民出版社). Chen Qiyou 陳奇猷 (1984). Collation and Interpretation of the Lü Shi Chunqiu (Lü Shi Chunqiu Jiaoshi 《吕氏春秋校釋》). Shanghai: Xuelin chubanshe (上海: 學林出版社). Cook, S. (2012). The Bamboo Texts of Guodian. A Study and Complete Translation. Ithaca: East Asia Program Cornell University. Dubs, H. H. (1928). The Works of Hsüntze. London: Probsthain. Goldin, P. R. (2013). ‘Introduction: Han Fei and the Han Feizi’, in P. R. Goldin (ed.), Dao Companion to the Philosophy of Han Fei, 1–21. Dordrecht: Springer. Graham, A. C. (1978). Later Mohist Logic, Ethics and Science. Hong Kong and London: Chinese University Press and School of Oriental and African Studies. Graham, A. C. (1986). Chuang-tzu. The Inner Chapters. London: Allen & Unwin. Graham, A. C. (1989). Disputers of the Tao. La Salle, IL: Open Court. Guo Qingfan 郭慶藩(1989). Collected Interpretations of the Zhuangzi (Zhuangzi Jishi 《莊子集釋》). Beijing: Zhonghua shuju (北京: 中華書局). Hansen, C. (1983). Language and Logic in Ancient China. Ann Arbour: University of Michigan Press. Hansen, C. (1992). A Daoist Theory of Chinese Thought: A Philosophical Interpretation. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Harbsmeier, C. (1998). Language and Logic in Traditional China. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Henricks, R. G. (1990). Lao-tzu, Te-tao ching. London: The Bodley Head. Henricks, R. G. (1998). ‘Chapter 50 in the Laozi: Is it “Three out of Ten” or “Thirteen?”’, Monumenta Serica, 47: 303–13. Hutton, E. L. (2014). Xunzi. The Complete Text. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Knoblock, J. (1988–94). Xunzi. A Translation and Study of the Complete Works. Stanford: Stanford University Press. Lau, D. C. (2001). Tao Te Ching. Hong Kong: Chinese University Press. Li Xiangfeng 黎翔鳳 (2004). Collation and Annotation of the Guanzi (Guanzi Jiaozhu 《管子校注》). Beijing: Zhonghua shuju (北京: 中華書局). Liao, W. K. (1959). The Complete Works of Han Fei Tzu. London: Probsthain. Liu Wendian 劉文典 (1968). Collected Explanations of the Huainanzi (Huainan Honglie Jijie 《淮南红烈集解》). Taipei: Shangwu yinshuguan (臺北: 商務印書館). Lundahl, B. (1992). Han Fei Zi. The Man and the Work. Stockholm East Asian Monographs No. 4. Stockholm: Stockholm University. Major, J., S. Queen, A. Meyer and H. Roth (2010). The Huainanzi. A Guide to the Theory and Practice of Government in Early Han China. New York: Columbia University Press. Queen, S. (2013). ‘“Han Feizi and the Old Master: A Comparative Analysis and Translation of Han Feizi Chapter 20, ‘Jie Lao,’ and Chapter 21, ‘Yu Lao,’’’ in P. R. Goldin (ed.), Dao Companion to the Philosophy of Han Fei, 197–256. Dordrecht: Springer.



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Rickett, W. A. (1993). ‘Kuan tzu’, in M. Loewe (ed.), Early Chinese Texts: A Bibliographical Guide. Berkeley: Society for the Study of Early China. Robinet, I. (1977). Les commentaires du Tao to king jusqu’au VIIe siècle. Paris: Collège du France. Institut des Hautes Études Chinoises. Ryden, E. (2008). Laozi. Daodejing. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Sarkissian, H. (2001). ‘Laozi: Re-visiting Two Early Commentaries in the Hanfeizi’. M.A. thesis. University of Toronto. Schuessler, A. (2007). ABC Etymological Dictionary of Old Chinese. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press. Shaughnessy, E. L. (2005). ‘The Guodian Manuscripts and Their Place in TwentiethCentury Historiography on the Laozi’, Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies, 65 (2): 417–57. Sima Qian 司馬遷 (1982). Historical Records (Shiji 《史記》). Beijing: Zhonghua shudian (北京: 中華書店). Takeuchi Teruo 竹内照夫 (1960). Kanpishi (Hanfeizi《韓非子》). Tokyo: Meiji shoten. Tang Junyi 唐君毅 (2005). A Discussion of the Origins of Chinese Philosophy. Introduction (Zhongguo Zhexue Yuanlun. Daolun Pian《中国哲学原论。导论篇》). Beijing: Zhongguo kexue chubanshe (北京: 中国社会科学出版社). Vandermeersch, L. (1964). La Formation du Légisme. Paris: École Française d’Extrēme Orient. Wagner, R. (2003). A Chinese Reading of the Daodejing. Albany: State University of New York Press. Wang Xianqian 王先謙 (1988). Collected Explanations of Xunzi (Xunzi Jijie 《荀子集解》). Beijing: Zhonghua shuju (北京: 中華書局). Watson, B. (1970). The Complete Works of Chuang Tzu. New York: Columbia University Press. Yang, H.-Y. and G. Yang (1975). Records of the Historian. Hong Kong: Commercial Press. Yates, R. D. S. (1997). Five Lost Classics: Tao, Huanglao and Yin-Yang in Han China. New York: Ballantine Books. Zhao Shanyi 趙善詒 (1985). Commentaries to the Shuoyuan (Shuoyuan Shuzheng《說宛疏證》). Shanghai: Xinhua shudian (上海: 新華書店). Zhu Qianzhi 朱謙之 (1980). Collation and Interpretation of the Laozi (Laozi Jiaoshi 《老子校釋》). Beijing: Zhonghua zhuju (北京: 中華書局). Ziporyn, B. (2013). Beyond Oneness and Difference. Li 理 and Coherence in Chinese Buddhist Thought and Its Antecedents. Albany: State University of New York Press.

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Part Two

Doubt, Predicament, Conflict: Cognitive, Affective, and Epistemic Difficulties The pursuit of wisdom seems invariably to create dissonance and tensions. In the ancient Greek and Chinese traditions, doubt is a critical element of a cultivated life. Cross-tradition comparisons highlight the different concerns and methods of scepticism, including notions such as suspicion, different levels of awareness, and transformative experiences. Doubt also unsettles, often because it challenges the status quo, requiring individuals to establish themselves on a new footing. The establishment of new values and ideals may require “forgetting” aspects of conventional life, including those tutored, predictable emotional responses to situations. Yasuhira Yahei Kanayama engages in a comparative analysis of Greek skepsis and Chinese doubt. Kanayama points out that the Chinese term for doubt, Huaiyi, unlike the Greek term skepsis, lacks the element of previous consideration or inquiry in its core meaning. Virtue, Dao, in the Chinese context was a way of life rather than a way of inquiry. So, whereas in the Greek context doubt and inquiry were paths to virtue and happiness, in the Chinese philosophical tradition it is better not to doubt. It is noted that there was in the Greek tradition a certain freedom to wonder and doubt beyond the parameters set by a certain way of life or a particular tradition. The sceptic aporia was actually regarded as a healthy type of doubt which could lead to a state of ataraxia (tranquillity). This was notably absent from the Confucian tradition, as tradition in the Chinese context was linked to one’s identity and its essential validity therefore could not be seriously questioned. Kanayama also engages in the interesting comparison of the Socratic Kingly Art and the Confucian concept of wangdao (the kingly way). It is argued that the Greek term technē (art) was neither a moral nor a cosmological principle. Thus, Socrates tried to acquire the Kingly Art via philosophical inquiry. Confucius in contrast saw the old wisdom of the sage kings as a moral principal and also the law of the universe. Both philosophers were trying to promote human cultivation as simultaneously teachers and politically active/motivated intellectuals. Yet, whereas Confucius was eager to dispense teachings and wisdom directly to his pupils, Socrates was wary of this, acknowledging his own aporia and instead inviting his interlocutors to become involved in critical inquiry. There follows a fascinating exposition of the later sceptic way of living which arises from these earlier Socratic arguments on self-

82 Cultivating a Good Life cultivation and the chapter concludes with insights into how modern cognitive therapy and meditations have many aspects in common with ancient scepticism. Per Lind discusses the concept of aporia and the critical issue of wisdom and cognitive conflict in the outlines of scepticism. In the 2nd century CE, in an introductory work on the outlines of Pyrrhonism, Sextus Empiricus presents a method of philosophical self-development consisting of the deliberate and perpetual construction of and exposure to what is today known as cognitive conflict. Lind explores what may be said in defence of this perplexing technique in the explicit context of wisdom cultivation. It is argued that the Pyrrhonean method is a valid wisdom cultivation technique, when a developmental account of perplexity (anchored in everyday experience as well as present-day sciences related to personal development) and the awareness-centred, content-neutral conception of wisdom are provided. Hyun Jin Kim and Karen Hsu discuss the extent to which the understanding of the good life and the processes involved in achieving that state of existence in the Histories of Herodotus differs from and also at times concurs with the understanding of the good life in the Lunyu (attributed to Confucius). In Book 1 of his Histories, the Greek historian Herodotus through his mouthpiece, the ‘sophist’ Solon, ‘philosophies’ on the good life and on who deserves to be called ‘fortunate’. In the fictional dialogue between the wise Solon and the fabulously wealthy, but ultimately unlucky Lydian king Croesus, Herodotus expounds the view that the possession of great material wealth and power at any given time in life does not equate happiness, rather the question of whether one’s life is happy or not can only be accurately assessed by observing how a person ends his or her life. This teleological view of life also informs the manner in which one cultivates the good life in Herodotus: by avoiding hubris that would anger the divine and escaping the misfortunes of life. It is observed that both the Histories and the Lunyu denounce the pursuit of excessive self-aggrandisement and champion a more modest cultivation of one’s livelihood. However, sharp differences emerge in their assessment of human misfortune, which possibly reflects the differences in cultural and sociopolitical milieu of the respective authors. Jesse Ciccotti’s chapter focuses our attention on the topic of emotions. It provides a highly nuanced comparative analysis of the Stoic and Ruist (Confucian) views of emotions and how they relate to the central theme of self-cultivation. Two seminal texts are chosen to highlight these views: The Meditations of the Stoic Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius and the Mengzi by the Chinese Warring States period philosopher Mencius. The whole of the Meditations, Ciccotti explains, can be classified as an exercise in therapeutic self-cultivation designed to correct wrong thinking and heal the soul from the damages inflicted on it by perverse passions. Essential to this therapeutic healing process is the adoption of certain beneficial habits such as fixing one’s attention on something to overcome the impulses of passion, encouraging oneself to focus on a specific aim or end goal, a purpose, and finally self-talk designed to constantly and repetitively remind oneself of the correct path and proper Stoic doctrine. Mencius in contrast does not condemn outright desires for sensory satisfaction (through food, sex, or good music). Rather his focus is on persuading the agent of the affective experience to concentrate his or her attention on proper moral goals while experiencing those emotions. Mencius believes that the human heart–mind has a natural preference for

Doubt, Predicament, Conflict: Cognitive, Affective, and Epistemic Difficulties 83 rightness. This preference however needs to be carefully cultivated in order to become one’s dominant mode of behaviour. Interestingly both philosophers believe that one and the same faculty produces both thought and emotions in human beings. This sharply contrasts with the tendency in Anglo-European philosophical traditions to divide the locus of the two. It is also observed that both philosophers share an optimistic outlook for the success of self-cultivation, provided one focuses his or her attention on the correct moral priorities. Lauren Pfister’s chapter provides an interesting comparison of the counter-cultural expressions of wisdom and new forms of whole-person cultivation in the Inner Chapters of the Zhuangzi (focusing in particular on the two so-called ‘instruction pluralogues’ and also the six ‘instruction dialogues’) and the Four Christian New Testament Gospels. Pfister notes that there are obvious differences such as the dominance of the biographical narrative related to the birth, growth, teachings, ministries, and sacrifices of Rabbi Yeshuah in the gospels, which has no parallel in the Inner Chapters of the Zhuangzi. The worldviews these two sets of texts portray are also radically different in character. However, it is also noted that there are striking likenesses in literary forms, paradoxical claims, and rhetorical strategies that move the disciples (and the reader) towards a transformative experience prompted by an encounter with ‘the Holy Spirit’. One striking point of convergence is Jesus’ insistence on the need to be generous to the poor and to reach out to ‘the poor, the crippled, the lame, [and] the blind’. Pfister argues that this parallels quite remarkably the claims in the Inner Chapters of the Zhuangzi regarding the ‘usefulness of uselessness’. Numerous similar examples from both Daoist and Christian canonical sources allow for the subsequent analysis in the chapter of counter-cultural forms of wisdom that require a rejection of mundane wisdom and a new style of whole-person cultivation.

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6

Skepsis and Doubt: Ancient Greece and the East1 Yasuhira Yahei Kanayama

This chapter examines conceptions of doubt, and different attitudes to doubt between ancient Greece and the East, by considering some texts associated with key figures in Greek, Chinese, and Japanese thought. The approach here is thematic, surveying different types of doubt in the traditions, at times comparing them to enhance the distinctive features of each as well as to bring out their subtle differences. Various facets of doubt are revealed in this inquiry across the sections of this chapter. They include the nature of doubt, its association with tranquillity, its relation to philosophical activity, its role in government, its meaning for a better way of life, and its function in therapy and meditation.

Positivity of Greek skepsis and negativity of Japanese 疑 This section presents, in brief, a comparison of different notions of doubt in the Greek Socratic tradition and in the Eastern Confucian tradition, drawing special attention to the questions of whether doubt is accompanied by inquisitive exploration, and whether doubt is viewed negatively or positively. Let me begin this chapter with a personal note about what I felt after translating all the works of the Greek sceptic, Sextus Empiricus, with Mariko Kanayama as the co-translator.2 To translate into Japanese the Greek word skepsis or skeptikē agōgē, which is equivalent to English ‘scepticism’, we adopted 懷疑主義 (kaigi shugi), and there was nothing mistaken about that. In Chinese, too, 懷疑論 (huaiyi lun) is employed, and when Japan tried avidly to absorb new ideas of the Western world after having opened itself after the long period of national seclusion (1639–1854), the term Japanese academics in the Meiji Era (1869–1912) adopted for ‘sceptical philosophy’ in a dictionary of philosophy, 哲學字彙 (Tetsugaku jii), published by Tokyo University in 1881, was 懷疑理學 (kaigi rigaku) (66). However, the character 疑 (gi in Japanese, yi in Chinese) made, and still continues to make me doubt (疑) whether the employment of 懷疑 (kaigi in Japanese, huaiyi in Chinese) in our translation was the best choice.

86 Cultivating a Good Life The Greek verb skeptesthai, from which skepsis is derived, means ‘look about carefully, consider’. Therefore, the original meaning of skepsis is ‘consideration, inquiry,’ and skeptikos means as an adjective ‘reflective, inquiring,’ and as a noun ‘reflective person, inquirer’. Thus we could have adopted for example 考察主義 (kōsatsu shugi) as the translation of skepsis and skeptikē agōgē, incorporating the two-character word 考察 meaning ‘consideration’, ‘inquiry’, or ‘investigation’. In fact Sextus Empiricus explains skeptikē agōgē (scepticism, sceptic school) as follows (PH 1.7): Skeptikē agōgē is called zētētikē (investigative) from its activity in investigating and inquiring (skeptesthai); ephektikē (suspensive) from the state of mind that arises after the investigation in the person who is inquiring (skeptomenos); aporētikē (inclined to doubt), either, as some say, from being in doubt (aporein) about everything and investigating, or else from being perplexed (amēchanein) as to whether to assent or deny; and ‘Pyrrhonian’ from the fact that Pyrrho appears to us to have applied himself to skepsis (inquiry, scepticism) more vigorously and conspicuously than anyone before him. (Cf. also DL 9.70; Aulus Gellius 11.5)

But if we had adopted 考察主義 for our translation, we would have been put into deeper doubt (疑) because it would have resulted in the complete severing of the concept from its traditional connection with aporia (doubt) and epochē (suspension of judgement). This was why, although in principle we employed 懷疑 in translating skepsis and skeptikos, we used also the expression, 懷疑 (考察), when the nuance of consideration comes to the fore. Consideration (skepsis, 考察) was certainly a good thing for Greek philosophers under Socrates’ influence. It was the essence of philosophia: pursuit (philo-) of wisdom (sophia). This emphasis on consideration enabled them to welcome even perplexity or doubt as something that made them proceed on further inquiry, and the Greek Sceptics regarded suspension of judgement, resulting from skepsis, as the main factor leading to happiness. In contrast to this, 疑 had nothing positive for many of the intellectuals under the strong Confucian influence in Japan of the Meiji Era.3 Sensei 先生 (Teacher), the main character of one of the greatest modern Japanese novels, Kokoro こゝろ (Heart, 1914), by NATSUME Sōseki 夏目漱石 (1867–1916), on some occasion fails to maintain an appearance and reveals his mind to his young admirer, who is the narrator of the story (1.31): As the necessary result of what happened in the past, I have come to doubt (疑) people. So, to tell the truth, I doubt (疑) you, too. But I don’t want to doubt (疑) you. You seem too straightforward to doubt (疑). I want to trust (信用 shinyō in Japanese) people, even one person, before I die.

Sensei, as a sincere young intellectual seeking the Way (道), was robbed of his inheritance by his uncle, and came to doubt the trustworthiness of human beings in general; but at first he still could trust love, falling in love with Shizu 静, the daughter of the widow owner of his lodging house; however, his kindness to his high-minded but neurotic friend, called ‘K’ in the novel, changes everything; he invites K to lodge at



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the widow’s house with him, and K, who also falls in love with Shizu, confides his own passion for Shizu to him, thus robbing Sensei of his chance of confiding in K; from fear of losing Shizu, he asks the widow’s permission to marry Shizu and is allowed, but he keeps missing the chance of telling K about their engagement; and when K has learnt about it from Shizu’s mother, he commits suicide; after that Sensei marries Shizu, who does not know why K committed suicide, but he cannot lead a happy married life. In a reclusive life with Shizu, he despises himself and doubts (疑) even the genuineness of love. He becomes a kind of misanthrope, but still he wants to trust (信) people. He hates his natural inclination to entertain caiyi 猜疑 (saigi in Japanese: suspicion against the intentions of others), but cannot open himself up to others. As Sensei’s 疑 indicates, generally speaking, the Chinese character 疑 is basically negative in its meaning: almost all of the Chinese compounds, currently in use in Japanese, containing this character represent gloomy aspects of human nature (嫌疑, 容疑, 狐疑, 猜疑, 疑心, 半信半疑), except 懷疑, the meaning of which is in principle neutral, just because it is a philosophical term. However, even this word has a negative nuance, when Sōseki’s close friend, FUTABATEI Shimei 二葉亭四迷 (1864–1909), says cynically in his essay, Watashi wa kaigiha da 私は懷疑派だ (‘I  am a sceptic’, 1908), as follows: I am, well, a ‘懷疑派 (sceptiste)’. First of all, logic is ludicrous. The law of thought serves only to adjust ideas that occur to human mind, and how much does it have to do with real human life? Psychologically, human beings are not mere thought. Mental energy can appear as feeling, wisdom, will. It is thus of no use to adjust thought alone. … When you think about ‘consciousness’ in psychology, the amount of ‘under-conscious work’ is unfathomable. … Therefore, the thought that comes to the surface of consciousness is never sufficient to determine types of human beings as a whole. How should I act, then? I don’t know. I only grope my way.

All that Shimei, who doubts even the efficacy of logic as a sceptic, can do in this situation is to grope his way, as his pen name, Shimei (四迷), meaning ‘go astray in the four directions,’ symbolically suggests.4 The left-hand radical of 疑 (yi) is derived from the figure of a person standing stock-still, looking back with a cane made to stand on the ground, without being able to decide whether to proceed or to return (e.g. Shirakawa 1987: 148). So it represents the state of being at a loss on one’s way (道). In the Chinese tradition the Way (道) was the way of life to be followed in accordance with the law of the universe. According to Takeuchi (1978: 41), 道, which is now written as the combination of 辵 and首, was inscribed in the Zhou period on bronze utensils as 首 (head) in the centre of 行. 行 was, on the other hand, inscribed in the Yin period on tortoise shells as the sign representing a crossroad. This indicates that 行 originally meant ‘way,’ and came to mean ‘go,’ because the way is a place where people go. Erya says, 一達謂之道路 … 四達謂之衢, with 道 meaning ‘one straight way’ and qu 衢 meaning ‘the place from where four ways start’. Thus, the basic meaning of 道 was the main way, and because the way is the place people should stick to without any deviation,

88 Cultivating a Good Life it came to mean ‘moral principle people must follow and practice as human beings’. Confucius thus says, ‘My way (道) has a single thread running through it’ (Analects 4.15). However since this principle is set not for convenience’ sake, but according to human nature, namely, according to the manifestation of virtue innate to human beings, 道 came to be interpreted as an aspect of the law of the universe, as Laozi says that 道 originated all.5

Then, it is natural for Japanese intellectuals under the influence of Confucianism to show negative attitude to 疑. However, it is not that the Eastern tradition rejected any kind of 疑, accepting every kind of xin 信. 信 means trust as well as trustworthiness. The Analects emphasises the importance of 信 as trustworthiness in many places.6 But it is the existence of people and things untrustworthy that makes trustworthiness all the more important (Analects 2.22; 8.16). It is thus necessary prudently to distinguish between what is worthy of 信 (trust) and what is not. Of course, what one should trust with full conviction is 道 (Way) (19.2). On the other hand, one should not put trust in untrustworthy people or one’s false judgement (5.6, 10; 7.1; 14.31; 17.8), because it prevents one from realising the Way. Confucius thus acknowledges the value of 疑 (doubt), as well. Doubt enables one to be freed from hypocrisy (12.20), to start asking questions (16.10), and to maintain the attitude of queyi 闕疑, which consists in carefully setting aside what is doubtful and asserting only what can be trusted, so as to reduce mistakes to the minimum (2.18).7 This attitude of 闕疑 was shared by Socrates, as well, especially in his warning against misanthropy and misology (Pl., Phd. 88c, 89d–91c). The number of really bad people or good people is small, and most of the human beings are neither absolutely bad nor absolutely good; so one should not place great trust naively on someone; otherwise one will fall into misanthropy by having one’s trust betrayed by the very person one believed in. In the same way, concerning logos (argument, discourse), even though there are some people who engage in contradiction only to get the better of others in argument, there are also discourses and arguments to be trusted. And in order not to fall into misology, one is required to have an art, which helps one to distinguish between trustworthy and untrustworthy arguments.

Scepticism and tranquillity As we have seen in the previous section, doubt can be viewed negatively and can be unsettling. The discussion in this section focuses on the positive aspect of doubt Socrates and the Greek Sceptics found through their philosophical activities. Socrates’ attitude of seeking for an art (technē, Pl., Phd. 89d6, e6, 8, 90b7) that helps him to distinguish between trustworthy and untrustworthy arguments is similar to, but different from, Confucius’ attitude of 闕疑. In the Protagoras Socrates advises Hippocrates to take care when he buys provisions upon which the soul is nourished: if what we have bought is food for the body, we can take it back home from the store in other containers and consult an expert as to whether to eat it or not. But if it is food for the soul, it is impossible to carry it back home in a separate container. So, it is necessary to consider



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(skeptesthai, 314b4) it before consuming it, lest we should damage our soul (313c–314b). Sensei and K were followers of the Confucian tradition, whose teachings were intertwined with their identity. Therefore, to change their views of themselves and of the world meant changing their identity. Thus, being unable to discard their preconceived ideas and lose their identity, both of them committed suicide as the final resort. In contrast, Socrates or Greek inquirers, who try to examine the food for the soul before adopting it as their way of living, are able freely to wonder and doubt. It is certainly healthier than hasty consumption. The word representing the doubt of the Greek Sceptics is aporia as a noun, and aporein as a verb. They are different from the words Socrates employed when criticising misanthropy and misology: apistia as a noun (distrust, Phd. 88c4, d3) and apistein as a verb (91c9). Although aporia (doubt, perplexity) is an unpleasant thing for Socrates’ interlocutors who have their ignorance revealed by him, it is something to be gladly accepted in the context of inquiry, for it can encourage us to embark on the pursuit of wisdom. Apistia, on the other hand, is unhealthy, for it comes from a too easy trust in something, and can easily cause disturbance (anataraxai, 88c4) and fear (phobeisthai, 91c9), and lead to misanthropy and misology. The aporia the Greek Sceptics entertained was the healthy type of doubt, and they valued it as the main source for ataraxia (tranquillity), whose literal translation is ‘freedom (a-) from disturbance (tarachē)’.8 Sextus explains how suspension of judgement, which occurs to Sceptics through entertaining doubt in inquiry, leads to tranquillity (PH 1.12, 26): The causal principle of Scepticism we say is the hope of attaining tranquillity (ataraktein). … When the Sceptic set out to ‘seek for wisdom’ (philosophein, philosophise) with the aim of deciding among appearances and of apprehending which are true and which are false, so as to attain tranquillity (ataraktein), he found himself involved in equipollent disagreement, and being unable to decide this, he suspended judgement. And when he suspended judgement, there followed fortuitously tranquillity (ataraxia) in respect of matters of judgement.

However, we may wonder whether it is really possible for people to attain tranquillity through doubt and suspension of judgement. But Sextus replies as follows (PH 1.27–29): For the person who believes that something is by nature good or bad is for ever being disturbed (tarassesthai). … On the other hand, the man who makes no determination as to what is by nature good or bad neither avoids nor pursues anything intensely, and as a result he is tranquil. In fact something like what is told of Apelles happened to the Sceptic. Once, they say, when this painter was painting a horse and wanted to create the effect of the horse’s foam by painting, he was so unsuccessful that he gave up and threw at the picture the sponge on which he had been wiping off the colours from his brush, and in striking the picture, the sponge produced the effect of a horse’s foam. So, too, the Sceptics were hoping to achieve tranquillity by deciding the anomalies in what appears and is thought of, and being unable to do this they suspended judgement; but when they suspended judgement, the tranquillity followed as if fortuitously, just as a shadow follows a body.

90 Cultivating a Good Life But this explanation by Sextus may make us more suspicious about the possibility of achieving tranquillity, for it would be certainly impossible for Apelles to continue producing masterpieces merely by throwing his sponge. Just as Sōseki was a follower of the Confucian tradition, the Greek Sceptics, not only Sceptics in the Academy but even Pyrrhonian Sceptics, were the followers of Socrates. So let us return to the Socratic origin of Greek Scepticism, and see from where this connection between doubt (aporia) and tranquillity (ataraxia) could come.

Protreptikos logos in Plato’s Euthydemus: Doubt and philosophy The Greek Sceptics explain how their philosophy enables them to achieve tranquillity, according to the pattern of the argument called ‘protreptikos logos’ (exhortatory argument to philosophy). This is the argument designed to promote the cultivation of mind. The discussion in this section examines its Socratic version and makes its salient features clear. The Sceptics set out to ‘seek for wisdom’ (philosophein, philosophise) to attain tranquillity (ataraktein). This is exactly the way the protreptikos logos proceeds. Plato’s Euthydemus most substantially describes Socrates’ protreptikos logos. In the Euthydemus Socrates explains to Crito the exchanges he had on the previous day with two sophist brothers, Euthydemus and Dionysodorus, and a beautiful youth, Cleinias, and his lover, Ctesippus: there the sophist brothers claim to teach virtue in a most excellent and speedy manner by means of their newly acquired wisdom, the eristic (Euthd.271d– 272b, 273c–e). So, Socrates asks them to educate Cleinias, whose cultivation of mind Socrates is eager to achieve, by exhibiting their wisdom and exhorting him to philosophy and to the care of virtue (274a–275a). But what they actually do is merely to make fun of him, through eristic arguments (275c–277c). Thus, Socrates shows his own version of exhortatory wisdom (protreptikē sophia) (278c–282d):

1. All human beings wish to ‘do/fare well’ (eu prattein). (278e) 2. Various good things like wealth, health, beauty, good birth, powers, honours,

temperance, justice, and courage are not enough to achieve this goal. One needs to have good fortune (eutuchia), and what brings about good fortune is wisdom (sophia). And if one has wisdom, one does not actually need good fortune in addition. (279a–280b) 3. What makes good things beneficial is the right use, and what brings about the right use is knowledge (epistēmē). Thus, knowledge is the key, not only for good fortune but also for ‘doing/faring well’ (eupragia). (280b–281b) 4. If one lacks prudence (phronēsis), wisdom (sophia), or intellect (nous), one will be rather harmed by things that are usually regarded as good. (281b–e) 5. Therefore, because we are all eager to be happy (eudaimones), we must prepare ourselves by all means to become as wise as possible, and thus we must engage in philosophy (pursuit (philo-) of wisdom (sophia)). (282a–d)



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But exactly what kind of knowledge should we seek for as the knowledge achievable through philosophy? Without its specification it seems impossible to approach it. Is it some special sort of knowledge, or is it necessary to acquire every sort of knowledge (282e2–4)? To find the answer for it, Socrates has it agreed by Cleinias that philosophy is the acquisition of knowledge, and concludes, according to what has been settled in the previous argument [(3)], that the kind of knowledge to be acquired is such that enables one to use in a right way whatever good things it produces (288d–289b). But what is such knowledge? Here, Cleinias suddenly begins to give a series of wise answers, making Crito suspect that the real interlocutor is someone else, probably Socrates himself (290b–e; cf. Burnyeat 2002: 63 n.46). For in examining various candidates of the knowledge in question, he says that the art of generalship is nothing but a kind of man hunting (thēreutikē), and argues that just as huntsmen and fishermen hand over their prey to the cooks, and as geometers, astronomers, and calculators, all of whom are hunters in search of truths, hand over their discoveries to the dialecticians (dialektikoi), so do the generals hand over what they have captured to someone else, in this case to the statesman. So, it is likely to be the art of politics (politikē) that is the knowledge in question. Socrates calls this art Kingly Art (basilikē technē) (291c4–5), and says that it sits at the helm of the state, and guides and rules all things, so as to make all things useful and provide happiness (291d1–3). However, what does this Kingly Art actually produce by making a right use of what it has received? Its product must be beneficial and good. But what is generally taken to be its proper product, even the wealth of the citizens, their freedom, and the social accord of the city, is neither good nor bad according to the previous agreement that nothing but knowledge can be good. Kingly Art must thus provide the citizens with some sort of knowledge. But the kinds of knowledge other than Kingly Art do not know how to use their products, and are unable thus to produce good things; thus, it follows that what Kingly Art teaches the citizens is nothing but Kingly Art, which knows how to make a right use of various things. But in what respect are the citizens made good and beneficial by Kingly Art? Although they may, by being taught by it, become able to teach it to others, so as for the latter in turn to be able to teach it again to others, it remains totally unclear in what respect they become good. And thus Crito cannot help saying to Socrates, ‘You seem to have come to a great impasse (aporia)’ (291d–293a). The literal meaning of aporia is ‘without (a-) passage (poros)’ and is similar in its meaning to 疑, but Socrates does not seem to have been annoyed at all by falling into the aporia (Euthd. 292e6, 293a1). He tells Crito jocularly that when he was thrown into aporia, he exclaimed at the top of his voice, calling upon the sophist brothers to rescue them as though they were the Dioscuri (Castor and Pollux) (293a). The Dioscuri are the protectors of travellers by land and sea, and with their divine help Socrates would be certainly happy to continue his journey of inquiry, for he was sure that engaging in philosophy and making his fellow Athenians notice their ignorance by leading them into aporia was Apollo’s command to him (Ap. 23a–c, 29d–30a, 30e–31a). The Greek word for ‘travelling, journeying (by land or by water)’ is hodos, and its basic meaning is ‘way, road’. Being in doubt on the hodos of inquiry was not a problem for Socrates at all.

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Chinese 道 and Greek hodos Why was it not a problem for Socrates? The discussion in this section examines the Greek concept of hodos in more detail, to see more exactly what good effect Socrates and Plato thought the doubt could have for inquirers, pointing out at the same time its difference from the Chinese and Japanese concept of 道. When the Chinese 道 and the Greek equivalent hodos were metaphorically applied to something to do with human actions, the former was the moral principle to be followed, whereas the latter was the way of inquiry, especially for Socrates. It is not that there is no use of hodos, representing some moral principle. As long as our life, physical as well as mental, is conceived as a journey, hodos can be naturally employed to represent some way of living. For example, when Aristippus, in a conversation with Socrates, said he would rather walk some middle way (hodos), refusing the way of ruling the city as well as that of being ruled as a slave (X., Mem. 2.1.11), the hodos he tried to choose was what he considered to be the surest way to achieve freedom and happiness. However, humans are fallible. Aristippus may be mistaken in his choice, and his hodos may rather lead to misery. This was exactly the question Socrates made Aristippus consider by taking him to a junction from which two ways are seen to go in opposite directions, the smooth way of Vice and the difficult way of Virtue (2.1.12–19). Whatever hodos Socrates’ interlocutors may choose as leading to happiness, they are made to examine it together with him, proceeding the way of inquiry before embarking on the actual way of living. The concept in Plato’s philosophy that corresponds in its contents most exactly to the Chinese 道 will be the Good (agathon) rather than the hodos, for it is what everyone seeks to possess, without being satisfied with its mere appearance (Euthd. 271d–272b, 273c–e; R. 505a–e), the guiding principle according to which the rulers should govern the state (R. 505e–506b), and the cause of all the things in the universe (Phd. 98e–99c; R. 508b–509b). Confucius said, ‘If I should hear (聞) the Way (道) in the morning, it would be all right to die in the evening’ (Analects4.8). Socrates in the Phaedo is supposed to have had the same feeling when he hoped to find in Anaxagoras’ book the explanation of how the Good works as the cause of all the things in the universe (Phd. 97c–98b). But the direction Socrates and Confucius took after that was different. When Socrates was disappointed by Anaxagoras’ explanation, he gave up learning from others, and began to contrive his own way with a view to seeking the cause (Phd. 99c–d). In contrast to this, Confucius emphasised the importance of hearing (wen 聞) (Analects 4.8), even though it is not mere hearing, but ‘hearing one so as to understand two (or hopefully, ten)’ (5.9). He took himself to be a transmitter of the wisdom of sage kings in the past, thus saying ‘I transmit but not create. I have faith in antiquity and love it’ (7.1). So, he gladly replied to questions, when asked by his disciples, as the Analects abundantly shows. Socrates, on the other hand, who was keenly conscious of human fallibility, declined to transmit his ideas to those who want to learn from him, disavowing knowledge (Smp. 175d–e; Phdr. 229c–230a), and tried to make others engage in inquiry conducted together with him (Men. 70a–71d).



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Confucius and Socrates: Cultivation in each setting The discussion in this section compares the styles of intellectual exchange, the target of persuasion, and the political settings between the Greek and Chinese traditions, and considers the difference between Socrates and Confucius in this larger framework. As Aristotle points out, human beings are animals that form a state (polis) to live together (zōion politikon, Pol. 1253a2–3; EN 1097b11).We, humans, cannot survive, without helping each other, aided by the art of politics (politikē). Our welfare is realised to a great degree in political settings, for example, as the wealth of the citizens, their freedom, and the social accord of the state, to which Socrates referred in the Euthydemus (292b). His rather negative remark there on these three items as things neither good nor bad on the ground that they can bring harm if unwisely employed may make us suppose that Socrates and Plato neglected their importance. But the unwise use of a thing does not mean that the thing itself is worthless. Pericles made the Athenians idle and cowardly by making them wealthy through instituting public wages (Grg. 515e). However, what made the wealth harmful in this case was the wrong way in which Pericles tried to achieve this goal. In ancient China, too, Confucius and other intellectuals tried to achieve the welfare of all under heaven (tianxia 天下). What they did for that purpose was to persuade rulers to execute Heaven’s Mandate (tianming 天命), by following the Kingly Way (wangdao 王道). However, it is not easy to persuade them. A madman of Chu, Jie Yu, advised Confucius to abstain from politics, saying that it was dangerous to engage in politics in the state where virtue had declined (Analects 18.5). Confucius himself said that one should evade a state embroiled in conflict and devote oneself to faithfulness and learning (8.13); he also replied, when asked why he would not engage in government, that to be a friend to one’s brothers is to engage in government, and said, ‘Why must I take the trouble of engaging in government?’ (2.21). This attitude of Confucius’ is very similar to that of Socrates, who abstained from publicly engaging in politics, because it would have perished him long ago (Pl., Ap. 31d), but was confident that he was the only person engaging in politics (politikē technē) in the truest sense, believing that exhorting people to care for the soul through philosophy is the true politics (Grg. 521d). But as was shown above, their actual ways were different, Confucius being a transmitter, and Socrates being a fellow-inquirer or examiner. Generally speaking, although there are of course exceptions, the Greek intellectuals exhibited agonistic traits in the atmosphere of competition for prestige, even in teacher–pupil relations, while the Chinese intellectuals were rather irenic, placing great importance on the respect paid by pupils to teachers.9 As Lloyd points out, this had something to do with the difference of the targets they tried to persuade, the target of the Chinese being the rulers and their ministers, and that of the Greeks being a general public, their rivals, colleagues and potential pupils. The Chinese intellectuals were never in doubt that the ideal government was the rule by the wise and benevolent monarch, and they frequently invoked the past wisdom, going back to the sage kings, in their persuasion. They relied, comparatively more than their Greek counterparts, on precedents and examples, real or imaginative, hoping that this manoeuvre would make the ruler draw a general moral on his own without being offended.

94 Cultivating a Good Life The Greeks, on the other hand, engaged in public debate with their rivals in such democratic institutions as the law-courts and public assemblies, developing various techniques of persuasion, ranging from demonstrative arguments to merely likely ones. This made it urgent then, first, to examine each argument critically, and second, to establish the proper way to distinguish between sound and unsound arguments. And further, the quest for the most persuasive argument, which is incontrovertible in everyone’s eye, led them to develop the axiomatic-deductive demonstration system, consisting of a network of true propositions supporting one another on the basis of self-evident truths.

Socrates’ Kingly Art as the target of his philosophical hunting This type of knowledge with axiomatic-deductive system became the model of art (technē) for the Greeks. Socrates’ Kingly Art in the Euthydemus is supposed to have this kind of hierarchical structure. In the protreptikos logos Socrates refers to a variety of art (technē, 279e–280a, c, 289a, 289c–290c, 291b–292a, c). To leave aside the eristic, which neither Socrates nor Plato would regard as a genuine technē, they are (1) arts of making, such as the arts of flute-making, lyre-making, money-making, shoe-making, agriculture, medicine (health-making), and speech-making; (2) arts of hunting, such as the arts of hunting with dogs, fishing, quail-hunting, geometry, astronomy, calculation, and generalship; (3) arts of using what is produced or acquired, such as the arts of flute-playing, citharaplaying, carpentry,10 cooking, and dialectic; (4) the special art in which making and using is combined, which is the art of politics, Kingly Art; (5) some other arts whose affiliation concerning making, hunting, or using is not clear (e.g. the art of enchanting, the art of letters (grammar), and the art of steering ships). Although they are a motley assembly, there is a feature common to them: if something is a technē, it must know the nature (phusis) of each thing it deals with, and be able to give an account (logos), or a cause or explanation (aitia), of what it deals with (cf. Grg. 465a, 501a–b; Phdr. 262b, 270b). Now, the best paradigm of technē in Greece with the ability to give an account was geometry, to be completed as Euclidean geometry with its axiomatic-deductive system, and Kingly Art is supposed to have had a similar hierarchical construction, ultimately grounded on the clearest and strongest principles. The method Plato introduced to achieve this kind of knowledge was the method of hypothesis which he borrowed from geometry (Men. 86e–87b; Phd. 100a–b, 101d–e, 107b; R. 510b–511d, 533b–c). Socrates, who was thrown into aporia (impasse) in the quest for Kingly Art, compared his situation to the situation of children who chase crested larks in vain, and also to the situation of people who find themselves standing at the starting point in a labyrinth, when they think they have finally arrived at the end (291b–c). What do these comparisons suggest concerning Kingly Art? Let us see first the labyrinth comparison. It is important to note here that even the most complicated labyrinth has some route leading to the goal, and that even if one returns to the starting point, there can be some progress towards it, as long as one takes a different route each time. It is a silly thing



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to stick to a single route. By exploring the field, checking every possible route, one certainly acquires a map-like view which shows the network of the labyrinth, by the time when one finally reaches the desired destination. And it is expert hunters that are most resourceful for finding ways, fully equipped with a most detailed cognitive map of the area. Why do children fail in their lark-hunting? It is because larks do not return directly to the nest, but land some distance away from it. But Greek fowlers were resourceful; they used an owl as a decoy to catch crested larks. They set it in the centre of vertical rods arranged in a circle and smeared with birdlime. In the daytime, when the owl is dim-sighted, small birds gather around it and flutter, which the Greeks called ‘admire’ (thaumazein); while they admire the owl and flutter, they are caught with birdlime (Dionysius, On birds 3.17; Arist., HA 609a8–16; Aelianus, De natura animalium 1.28). In the Euthydemus Socrates and Cleinias were running after concrete manifestations of Kingly Art, with its beneficial products. These manifestations correspond to crested larks. However, they could not find any good thing that would be rightly claimed to be the product of Kingly Art, except Kingly Art itself, for anything but Kingly Art, even the wealth of the citizens and so on could be harmful unless wisely employed. Children cannot catch a crested lark, because they try to catch it on the very place where the bird has landed, regarding it as the place of the nest. But the place fixed and determined in the actual hunting of crested larks is only the place of the owl, Athena’s sacred bird, ‘admired’ by other birds, and the owl of course stands for wisdom. The wealth of the citizens will be realised in a state in various ways and in various places, according to various circumstances, in some cases as something beneficial and in other cases as something harmful. However, this does not mean that there is no case in which Kingly Art produces the wealth in such a way that it will cause no harm. But some may argue that I am reading too much in the reference to lark-hunting. However, Socrates refers also to quail-hunting (Euthd. 290d4), in which fowlers catch quails in the same way, using a bird as a decoy, in this case a quail itself, for quails are lured to the decoy due to their lecherous nature (Arist., HA 558b30–559a2, 613b6–8, 614a26–28; X., Mem. 2.1.4). The contrast of the philosophical and the amorous nature of these two kinds of birds is intended by Plato.

Philosopher as the hunter The art of hunting to which the lark- and quail-hunting belongs is instructive in considering what Plato regards as Socrates’ inquiry in the quest for Kingly Art. Greek hunting is the focus of this section. Just as it is not children but hunters who can catch larks, so it is philosophical hunters who can hope to catch Kingly Art. The driving force working in the quest for wisdom, including Kingly Art, is love (erōs), represented by the philo- part of philosophia. Socrates says that Erōs (Love) is a mighty hunter, always weaving some devices, and throughout life engaging in pursuit of wisdom (philosophy) (Smp. 203d). In ancient Greece the art of hunting was a well-established art, as we can see in Xenophon’s Cynegeticus, and also in the fact that Plato refers in the Euthydemus to

96 Cultivating a Good Life the three kinds of hunters (land-hunters with dogs, fishermen, and quail-hunters (fowlers), Euthd. 290b10, d4; cf. also Sph. 220a–b). Plato groups even geometers, astronomers, and calculators as hunters, who try to catch truths (Euthd. 290b10–c2). What is noteworthy about hunting is that it is rare that hunters can see their games. Even if they had a glimpse of a hare, the animal is too speedy to overtake. So they rely on dogs, and use such devices as traps, birdlime, nets, and other kinds of enclosure, three-pronged spears, and fishing rods (Sph. 220a–221c). The time when Plato began to show interest in hunting in the context of inquiry (cf. Ly. 218c5, Grg. 489b8, 490a5) overlaps the time when he began to think of learning as recollection and to employ the method of hypothesis in inquiry (Men. 80d–81e, 86d–87a). Both these new ideas are presented to make go forward Meno, whose name suggests a person who stays (menōn) without proceeding in inquiry. Recollection is presented to deal with Meno’s eristic argument to the effect that it is impossible to inquire after the thing one does not know, because one does not know what to pursue, and also because even if one should meet with it, one will not be able to know that this is the thing that one did not know (80d–e). What Plato means by ‘recollection’ is such a difficult question that we cannot enter into it here. But there is one thing Socrates declares as undeniably certain concerning recollection, which is that one must investigate the things one does not know, without believing that it is not possible to discover what we do not know or that we need not investigate it (86b7–c2). This would be exactly the kind of reply a mighty hunter would give, saying, ‘One must try to catch even the game which is not in sight now, never believing that it is impossible or unnecessary to try to catch it’. What Greek hunters relied on in hunting were tracks (ichnē), that is, footprints and scent tracks (X., Cyn. 1.17; 5.1–21). Wherever the quarry is hiding, there is a way that leads them to its hiding place, consisting of many paths and tracks, visible and invisible. Explaining in reply to Meno’s challenge why it is possible to recollect what one does not know, Socrates said, ‘since all nature is akin, … nothing prevents a man, after having recollected one thing … from discovering all other things, if one is brave and does not become weary of investigating’ (81c9– d4). And the method of hypothesis introduced for the first time in the Meno is such a method as to enable one to explore the kin relationships of ways existing in nature. The Greek word meaning ‘quest for ways’ is methodos, consisting of meta- (in quest) and hodos (way). It is noteworthy that the dialogue where Plato employed the word methodos for the first time is the Phaedo (79e, 97b), the next dialogue in which recollection and the method of hypothesis appear. The English word ‘method’ coming from the Greek word ‘methodos’ may suggest that ‘methodos’ means ‘way’ or ‘method’, but the expression ‘kata touton ton tropon (by that method) tēs metodou (of the methodos)’ (Phd. 97b5–6) clearly shows that methodos is not ‘method’ but rather the quest for ways (investigation, inquiry). Socrates says in the Republic (531c9–d3) as follows: If the methodos of all the subjects [arithmetic, plane and solid geometry, astronomy, harmonics] … arrives at their association (koinōnia) and kinship (sungeneia) with one another, and comes to calculate comprehensively how they are related with one another in their family relationship (oikeia), then the investigation of them does make some contribution to what we want.



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The mathematical studies, like arithmetic, plane and solid geometry, and so on, were classified as arts of hunting in the Euthydemus (290c). They hand over their discoveries to the dialecticians. In the same way, their methodos (pursuit of ways) is said in the Republic (531d) to be the prelude to the greatest thing to learn, the Good (cf. 505a), which was the very subject of Kingly Art (Euthd. 292b). However, it is impossible for human beings to obtain the divine knowledge of the Good. What Socrates could do to explain the Good was merely to show its offspring (the Sun), to give some idea about what direction one should head for in the quest for it (R.  506e–507a). The highest degree of wisdom achievable for human beings remains to be what Socrates called ‘human wisdom,’ consisting in the awareness of one’s own ignorance and in the pursuit of wisdom (Ap. 20d8). But this ‘human wisdom’ is the most important thing for human beings in that it enables them to approach the knowledge of the Good. Socrates considered it to be his mission given by Apollo to teach the Athenians this ‘human wisdom’. Although it is not the Kingly Art Socrates sought, it is still the human Kingly Art. If it were the (divine) Kingly Art, it would be able always to maintain the welfare of people, but because it is not so, what Socrates could choose was the other alternative (Euthd., 292d), namely, to teach this human Kingly Art to others so as for the latter to teach it further to others, through examining his fellow citizens and telling them to care for the soul, and what his pupil, Plato, chose to do was the same thing in another way, to leave his dialogues as Socrates’ footsteps so as for his readers to be able to follow them (Phdr. 276c–d), and also to establish his Academy as the institution for Socratic hunter education.

Skepsis, as consideration and sceptic way of living Later in Hellenistic times, Plato’s Academy turned to scepticism under Arcesilaus (c.316/15–241/40 BCE), and Aenesidemus in the 1st century BCE, who studied in the Academy, started Pyrrhonian Scepticism, and aligned himself to the semi-legendary Pyrrho of Elis (c.365/60–275/70 BCE). This Pyrrhonian Scepticism recommended suspension of judgement as the surest way to achieve tranquillity. In ancient Greece happiness was represented by two sets of words: (1) eudaimonia (noun), eudaimōn (adjective), and (2) eupragia (noun), eu prattein (verb). The former represents the inner state of mind that can be regarded as ‘blessed by good (eu) deity (daimōn)’, while the latter represents successful actions, ‘doing (prattein) well (eu)’, especially political success when Athens was flourishing with democracy. However, as the political power of Greek city states declined with the rise of imperial power from Macedonia, the interest of people shifted from eupragia to eudaimonia. This trend was conspicuous among Hellenistic philosophers, in whose remaining works the words related with eupragia are scarcely found,11 only the words related with eudaimonia still being employed. Ataraxia (tranquillity) was a eudaimonia type word. Pyrrho was one of the philosophers who first set the goal of philosophical activity openly in tranquillity. By claiming that it is achievable, and to be achieved, through abstaining from judgement (Eus., PE 14.18.4–5; DL. 9.68; SE, M. 11.141), he opened

98 Cultivating a Good Life a new horizon, against the position presupposed by the protreptikos logos that the achievement of happiness requires wisdom and proper judgement. However, does the suspension of judgement really enable us to attain tranquillity and to live a life worthy of rational human beings? Shimei was sceptical; as a self-styled sceptic he claimed to be groping his way, putting in doubt even logic and the law of thought, and denying their relevance to real life. But this is actually a far cry from what the Greek Sceptics regarded as genuine scepticism. All that ancient Sceptics could have accepted from Shimei’s remark about scepticism was his reference to the existence of unfathomable amount of ‘under-conscious work’. Since Plato,12 most Greek philosophers shared the following view concerning the stages of cognition:

1. Movement from the outer world is transmitted as bodily affection (pathēma, pathos) at the under-conscious level.

2. The movement arises to consciousness by arriving at the soul, and is perceived and, as it were, stamped in it as an impression.

3. The impression is preserved as memory. 4. Judgement arises from perception and memory as the result of the mind’s assent to the impression.

To leave aside stage (3), where the soul may be passive in some phases and active in others, stages (1) and (2) are basically passive, insofar as the soul is passively affected by the movement which comes from the outer world to arrive at it and be stamped in it. Thus, the founder of Stoicism, Zeno, defined ‘impression’ (phantasia) as the marking stamped (tupōsis) in the soul (SE, PH 2.70, M. 7.228–41; DL 7.50), and compared it to an open palm with the fingers spread out. This state was called also phainomenon (appearance). There is a crucial difference between this passivity and the mind’s active commitment which brings about assent (sunkatathesis) and judgement (doxa) in stage (4). This distinction opened the way for ancient Sceptics to make their scepticism a philosophically and morally effective way of living. According to Sextus, ‘the Sceptic assents to the affections (pathē) that are forced on them according to impression (phantasia), … but he does not dogmatise in the sense in which some say that dogma is assent to some non-evident thing inquired after according to the sciences’ (PH 1.13). The Sceptics suspend judgement concerning non-evident things, but accept what they receive passively and inevitably as affections, impressions, or appearances, and try to live according to them in the humanly best way possible. That is to say:

I. By nature’s guidance they are naturally capable of perceiving and thinking; II. By the necessitation of affections – hunger and thirst – they are conducted to food and drink;

III. By the handing down of customs and laws, they regard piety as good and impiety as bad in the conduct of our life;

IV. By teaching of the arts they can be active in the arts which they accept. But they explain all this [(I) to (IV)] non-judgementally (adoxastōs) (PH 1.23–24).13



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Besides, because they are philosophers, they can engage in philosophical activities, following the logic and the law of thought taught by the art of philosophy (according to (IV)). And as long as what guides them is not judgement but appearance, there is nothing incompatible with their scepticism. However, against this it may be argued that they are merely giving the name of ‘appearance’ to what is usually called ‘judgement’. But there is something in the Sceptic claim that they are merely following appearances. According to a story, when Pyrrho, the founder of Greek Scepticism, was scared by a dog rushing at him, he fled (DL 9.66; Eus., PE 14.18.26), and in reply to the reproach for it, he answered that it is difficult entirely to strip oneself of humanity but that one should contend as much as possible against the things, first with deeds, and if not possible, with logos (word, argument, reason). The reproach is that he showed disturbance despite his claim to achieve apatheia (non-affection) or ataraxia (tranquillity, literally ‘non-disturbance’) (Charge 1). But people may also reproach him as having judged that a dangerous dog was rushing at him, despite his claim to live by suspending judgement (Charge 2). Pyrrho’s reply implies answers to both charges. To see his answer to Charge 2, it will be helpful to see recent studies of neuroscience and psychology. According to Antonio Damasio’s somatic marker hypothesis, our decision-making is governed by bodily reactions rather than by reason (Damasio 1994: 171ff). When we see a menacing dog, its visual signal first goes to the thalamus, and then most of the message goes to the visual cortex, where it is analysed and assessed so that we perceive it as a dog with such and such characters. But more quickly a small portion of the original signal goes straight from the thalamus to the amygdala, and triggers bodily reactions and emotional responses, throwing us immediately into the fight-or-flight mode (cf. Goleman 1995, 2006: 19). We act before making any assessment or judgement. But this automatic and unconscious response is not limited to the circuit involving the amygdala. It is observable not only in (I) nature’s guidance and (II) the necessitation of affections, but also in (III) the handing down of customs and laws, and (IV) the teaching of the arts. Unconsciously and automatically, we stop when seeing the red light (working of (III)), and say ‘4’ when seeing ‘2+2=’ (working of (IV)) (cf. System 1 of Kahneman 2011). We thus act by following appearances most of the time, more frequently than we imagine. As to Charge 1, in a sense the Sceptics accept it, for they admit that they are disturbed by things which are forced upon them. But at the same time they distinguish the plight of ordinary people and theirs; ordinary people are afflicted not only by the affections themselves, but also, and no less, by believing that these circumstances are evil by nature; in contrast to them the Sceptics come off more moderately even in these cases because they shed the additional judgement that each of these things is evil in its nature (PH 1.29–30). The actual goal of the Sceptics was ‘moderate affection’ (metriopatheia) rather than tranquillity (freedom from disturbance). Most animals, including humans, are born to be sensitive to dangers for the sake of survival. But although other animals stop being disturbed once the danger has passed, we, human beings, who are capable of thinking about the future, are prone to continue ruminating about the event and other possible dangers. We try to detect the cause of the present misery in order to evade similar future predicaments. However,

100 Cultivating a Good Life what we often do on such an occasion is to ‘use reasoning not to find the truth but to invent arguments to support our deep and intuitive beliefs’ (Haidt 2006: 37), which are most of the time negative. Our additional judgement that the event is bad makes us fear its future occurrence as if it were always present. This attitude keeps our body in the constant fight-or-flight mode and constructs a loop of negative judgements and emotions. This kind of disturbance (tarachē) was the very problem that the Sceptics tried to cope with through their scepticism. According to Posidonius, Pyrrho could remain calm when his ship was in danger of sinking in a storm; he pointed to a piglet that went on eating, and told his frightened fellow passengers that the wise man should keep himself in tranquillity and non-affection just like the piglet, by means of logos and philosophy (DL 9.68; Plutarch, Quomodo quis 82F). As we saw in the story of Pyrrho scared by a dog, his position was that even though it may be impossible to strip ourselves of humanity, we are fully able to contend with it by means of reason (logos), which also belongs to our humanity. However, is this rational part of humanity really strong enough to contend with the other part of humanity?

Sceptics’ cognitive therapy and meditation Starting from Damasio, neuroscientists today are rather sceptical about the power of human reason. Haidt compares our rational self to a rider on the elephant, and our body with its own emotions to the elephant; when the elephant really wants to have his own way, our rational self is no match for him, however hard we try to direct things (Haidt 2006: 4). However, Haidt still admits that there are three good methods to change our affective style: (1) cognitive therapy, (2) meditation, and (3) Prozac (Haidt 2006: 35–44). And (1) and (2) have much in common with ancient Scepticism.

1. Cognitive therapy: Our reason has some innate capacity to confront appearances

with doubt; cognitive therapy thus trains clients to catch their thoughts in words and name the distortions so as to be able to find more accurate ways of thinking (Haidt 2006: 38). This lesson is involved in the Sceptics’ strategy of setting against one idea an idea opposite to it (antithesis) so as to suspend judgement through their equipollence (isostheneia), for if we sincerely try to set two ideas against each other, we never fail to articulate them explicitly in words, and what we have captured in words is already almost under our control. It thus certainly helps to lead to tranquillity (or at least to moderate affection) (SE, PH 1.8). 2. Meditation or mindfulness, on the other hand, trains us (i) to accept everything as it is, and also (ii) to build our awareness of how we feel and think. In the practice of meditation our awareness wanders even though we try to attend to the movements of the breath in and out; but we are told (i) not to make a critical judgement of our wandering, and also of our very act of making a critical judgement of our wandering. What is important is (ii) to become aware of our wandering and of the fact that we are making a critical judgement of ourselves, and (i) to accept what appears in mind simply as an appearance, not as a fact, and gently to bring our awareness back to our breath (cf. for example Kabat-Zinn 1990, 2005: 126).



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Affections first arise in the body, and if they reach the soul, we notice them; if they do not reach it, they remain unnoticed by us (Pl., Phlb. 33d). But whether they reach the soul or not depends not only on their strength but also on the soul’s attentive capacity. If we have cultivated our awareness, we can be aware of the bodily turmoil at an early stage, when it is still very small, so as to be able to regulate and keep it at the level of moderate affection, while if we are dull in awareness, our bodily turmoil is, when noticed, already too great to be regulated, and causes uncontrollable mental disturbance. Thus what brings about tranquillity is not the mere sponge hurling (cf. SE, PH 1.28) but the cultivation resulting from the daily practice of suspending judgement. Sextus employs two words to represent his scepticism: (1) skepsis14 and (2) skeptikē agōgē.15 Agōgē is a word that can be translated as ‘way of life’. On being found once talking to himself, and being asked the reason, Pyrrho answered that he was training to be good (DL 9.64). By following the way of living consisting in attending to appearances and setting opposite ideas against each other, Sceptics engaged in the daily practice, which is equivalent to the practice of mindfulness meditation and cognitive therapy.

Conclusion This chapter dealt with two sets of pairs, the contrasted pair of 信 (trust, belief) and 疑 (doubt, aporia), and the corresponding pair of the Good and 道 (Way). The ultimate goal for both Socrates and Confucius was happiness or welfare of 天下 (All under Heaven). As a route to approach it, Socrates, for whom to learn (manthanein) was to inquire (zētein), emphasised skepsis (consideration), while Confucius, for whom to learn (學) was to hear (聞), emphasised 信. Socrates gladly accepted to get lost and be thrown into aporia (impasse) as an occasion to broaden perspectives, while Confucius tried to go straight along the Way (道), avoiding doubt (疑). However, in order to trust what is to be trusted, it is necessary to set aside what is to be doubted (cf. 闕疑). Thus, even those who emphasise 信 cannot help acknowledging some value in 疑. And even those who try to remain in the state of aporia in order to continue inquiring may turn out to be convinced of some truth as the result of exploring and broadening perspectives. In fact Socrates became convinced to the highest degree humanly possible that one must never do injustice (Cr. 49b7; cf. also Ap. 28b6–c1) and that this was a core factor for happiness, as the result of his neverending skepsis. The discovery of the Greek Sceptics that tranquillity can be obtained by suspending judgement was also the result of their never-ending skepsis, but this time not as a judgement, but as an appearance, or as a passive experience that occurs to them as if fortuitously (SE, PH 1.13, 19–20, 26, 29). However, even if the two key figures from the Chinese and Greek traditions, Confucius and Socrates, both presented themselves as the masters of 闕疑, their ways to approach this height were different. Confucius, whose first principle was 道, tried to follow this 道 through 信, while Socrates, whose first principle was the Good, tried to approach the Good through the way (hodos) of inquiry (skepsis).

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Notes 1 This article is based on the latter half of the paper, ‘Everlasting inquiry in Ancient Greek philosophy: Socrates, Plato and the Sceptics’, read at the Conference, ‘In pursuit of wisdom: Ancient Chinese and Greek perspectives on cultivation’. Sections of the first half have been published as ‘The Birth of Philosophy as 哲學 (Tetsugaku) in Japan’ in vol. 1 (2017) of Tetsugaku (International Journal of the Philosophical Association of Japan): http://philosophy-japan.org/tetugaku/volume-1-2017-philosophyand-the-university/. I am deeply grateful to the editors of this volume for invaluable comments on earlier drafts of this chapter and all through the process of its revision, and also to the anonymous reviewer for comments that have helped me to clarify my argument and to decrease misunderstanding. 2 They are published by Kyoto University Press: SE, PH (1998), M. 1–6 (2004), M. 7–8 (2006), M. 9–11 (2010). The abbreviations, including the works of Sextus Empiricus, employed in this chapter are as follows: Arist. = Aristotle: EN = Nicomachean Ethics; HA = Historia Animalium; Metaph. = Metaphysics; Pol. = Politics. Eus. = Eusebius: PE = Praeparatio evangelica. Pl. = Plato: Ap. = Apology; Cri. = Crito; Criti. = Critias; Ep. = Epistulae; Euthd. = Euthydemus; Grg. = Gorgias; Lg. = Laws; Ly. = Lysis; Men. = Meno; Phd. = Phaedo; Phdr.= Phaedrus; Phlb. = Philebus; Plt. = Politicus; Prt. = Protagoras; R. = Republic; Sph. = Sophist; Smp. = Symposium; Tht. = Theaetetus; Ti. = Timaeus. DL = Diogenes Laertius. SE = Sextus Empiricus: M. = Adversus mathematicos; PH = Pyrrhoniae hypotyposes. Xenophon = X.: Cyn. = Cynegeticus; Mem. = Memorabilia. 3 But I should mention also that there was an important exception, FUKUZAWA Yukichi 福澤諭吉 (1834–1901). In his Gakumon no Susume, 學問のすゝめ (An Encouragement of Learning, 1871–1876), Section 15, Jibutsu wo utagatte (疑って) shusha wo danzuru koto (put things in doubt so as to make right decisions)), he explicitly referred to the possibility of finding truth and human progress in the realm of doubt (疑), as well as to the danger of conceit and falsity in the realm of belief (信). On the basis of his learning of both Chinese classics and Western new ideas, he severely criticized the hypocrisy of people in authority, who claimed to be the followers of Confucianism. 4 Shimei’s position is similar to Hume’s judgement that radical Sceptics cannot help making judgements in their real life, however hard they try to stick to their principle. This kind of criticism was made in ancient Greece, too, and ancient Sceptics prepared their answer, as Burnyeat (1980) points out. 5 On this ground Takeuchi argues that Confucianism arose prior to Daoism. 6 Analects 1.4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 13; 5.26; 7.25; 8.4, 16; 9.25; 12.7, 10; 13.4, 20; 15.18; 17.6; 19.10; 20.1B. 7 In this sense the attitude of Fukuzawa in his Gakumon no Susume can be said to be that of 闕疑. I am thankful to my colleague, YOSHIDA Jun 吉田純, for his kind instruction about the concept of 闕疑. 8 The verb anataraxai (Phd. 88c4) consists of ana- and tarassein, the verb from which the noun, tarachē, is derived. 9 The following explanation of the difference between ancient China and Greece is based on the comparative studies by Lloyd, for example in Lloyd (1996) chapters 2, 4, 10; (2004): 34–5, 45–8, 61, 120–1, 133–4; (2014): 12–21, 26–7, 39–41, 111. 10 Although carpentry is described as the art of using tools and wood (280c, 281a), it is certainly the art of producing houses and artefacts. In fact even the arts that make



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something must know how to use tools and materials, and the arts that use something must have some product they themselves make. 11 In Stoicism only in SVF III.511 (eupragia), 515 (eu prattein), and for Epicurus eu prattein was a letter greeting he preferred (DL 10.14). 12 Tht. 179c, 187a, 189e–190a, 206d; Sph. 263d–264a; Phlb. 33d–34b, 38b–39c; cf. also Phd. 96b. 13 Cf. also PH 1.231; 2.102, 246, 254; 3.2, 151, 235. 14 SE, PH 1.5, 185, 209, 213, 215, 220, 236, 241; 2.14, 45; M 10.20; 11.140, 148, 149. 15 SE, PH 1.4, 6, 7, 11, 21, 22, 25, 210, 212, 235, 241; M 7.29; 11.257.

References Burnyeat, M. F. (1980). ‘Can the Sceptic Live his Scepticism?’ in M. Schofield, M. F. Burnyeat and J. Barnes (eds), Doubt and Dogmatism, 20–53. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Burnyeat, M. F. (2002). ‘Plato on How not to Speak of what is not: Euthydemus 283a-288a’, in M. Canto-Sperber and P. Pellegrin (eds), Le Style de la Penseé, 40–66. Paris: Les Belles Lettres. Damasio, A. R. (1994). Descartes’ Error: Emotion, Reason, and the Human Brain. New York: G.P. Putnam. Goleman, D. ([1995] 2006). Emotional Intelligence. New York: Bantam Dell. Haidt, J. (2006). The Happiness Hypothesis. London: William Heinemann. Kabat-Zinn, J. ([1990], 2005). Full Catastrophe Living. New York: Bantam Dell. Kahneman, D. (2011). Thinking, Fast and Slow. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Lloyd, G. E. R. (1996). Adversaries and Authorities. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Lloyd, G. E. R. (2004). Ancient Worlds, Modern Reflections. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Lloyd, G. E .R. (2014). The Ideals of Inquiry. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Shirakawa, S. (1987). Jikun (白川静『字訓』). 東京 (Tokyo): 平凡社 (Heibonsha). Takeuchi, Y. (1978). Rōshi to Sōshi (老子と荘子), in vol. 6 of The Works of TAKEUCHI Yoshio 『 ( 武内義雄全集』), 7–149. 東京 (Tokyo): 角川書店 (Kadokawa Shoten). Tetsugaku jii (1881),『哲学字彙』東京大學三學部印行 http://kindai.ndl.go.jp/ info:ndljp/pid/752942.

7

Wisdom and Cognitive Conflict: Benign Perplexity in the Outlines of Scepticism Per Lind

‘How fine it would be, Agathon’, [Socrates] said, ‘if wisdom were a sort of thing that could flow out of the one of us who is fuller into him who is emptier’ Plato, Symposium 175d

Introduction In his seminal 2002 volume What Is Ancient Philosophy? Pierre Hadot (102) states that the Hellenistic schools were ‘defined by a specific existential choice … proper to each school’. When he immediately adds that this choice ‘was … the choice of a certain type of wisdom’, it may be hard not to wonder at the peculiar case of Pyrrhonean Scepticism.1 Sporting what is arguably both the most clear-cut and the most hands-on technique of wisdom cultivation in Hellenistic Ethics, this school leaves very little in the way of hermeneutic wiggle room. Its programmatic instruction – situated under the univocal rubric ‘What Scepticism Is’ (ti esti skepsis) at the opening pages of the fundamental source text Outlines of Scepticism – is to do one thing, and one thing only (Sextus Empiricus 2000: 4–5): Scepticism is an ability to set out oppositions among things which appear and are thought of in any way at all, an ability by which, because of the equipollence in the opposed objects and accounts, we come first to suspension of judgement and afterwards to tranquillity. … Suspension of judgement is a standstill of the intellect, owing to which we neither reject nor posit anything. Tranquillity is freedom from disturbance or calmness of soul.

In this central passage, the presumptive sage is basically told to deliberately trip her own mind up by systematically establishing instances of what is today known as cognitive conflict.2,3 Following Hadot, the question poses itself: What is the ‘wisdom’ in doing that? Why should someone seeking to gain a better life through philosophy



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want to pursue perplexity and undecidability – what Sextus Empiricus calls ‘a standstill of the intellect’ (stasis dianoias)? This is the main question addressed by this chapter. The inquiry starts off from a key observation: The viability of the Pyrrhonean wisdom cultivation technique necessarily hinges on what conception of wisdom is read into it. It is argued that given a content-neutral, awareness-centred conception of wisdom, the Pyrrhonean variety of wisdom cultivation is not only rationally defensible, but psychologically feasible. In order to provide the skeletal layout of such a wisdom conception, congruent with the peculiarities of the Pyrrhonean method, a positive, developmental account of cognitive conflict and perplexity is ventured, based on everyday experience with support from cognitive psychology and the philosophy of education. The overall point is made that perplexity is quite likely the strongest in-house impetus for structural revision and development known to the human cognitive architecture, and accordingly, that the transformative effort of Pyrrhonism may do well to harness its dynamics, even to the point of exclusivity. More importantly, the account also serves to set up the main argument, which proceeds in two steps. In the first step, the robust unlearning modality inherent to perplexity is explored. It is argued that it has two different functions, a specific and a general one. The specific function is to signal a distinct, functional mismatch between cognitive map and territory. That is to say, it serves to pinpoint and call attention to various instances of cognitive failure, thus enabling one to learn from one’s mistakes in the straightforward sense of learning specific lessons about specific issues. The general function of perplexity derives from one of the main defining traits of the specific one; namely, the direct experience of cognitive map and territory as separate entities. It consists, quite simply, in the repeated occurrence and progressive psychological integration of this experience. Contrasting the specific function, the general one thus enables a kind of meta-learning from mistakes: In providing an avenue of gradually becoming less likely to confuse cognitive map and territory, it allows for assuming cognitive ownership of oneself over time. In the second and final step of the argument, the specific function of perplexity is associated with a content-centred wisdom conception (through its conduciveness towards cognitive expertise), while the general function is linked to an awarenesscentred one (through its reliance on the content-neutral mechanics of cognitive self-regulation). Textual evidence is then presented to the effect that Pyrrhonism is designed with an eye to farming perplexity for the latter, general function, along with some ideas and suggestions on the viability of such a project.

Wisdom and its cultivation Wisdom is not alien to human life. In a loose, everyday sense, there is certainly a human ability or potential to grow wiser with experience. To some extent, most of us doubtless undergo this kind of development – and this well outside of any intentional attempt at wisdom cultivation as such.4 Yet inescapably, the moment discriminating thought is brought to bear on this observation a number of questions arise: What is this ‘wisdom’ that seemingly increases over time? What is its character and content? For that matter,

106 Cultivating a Good Life what kind of character and content can it have? What drives the process forward? What holds it back? What components must be present for its operation? What can be left out? Why does the process in some instances almost resemble one of natural development, while in others it may be hard to see at all? It seems any step beyond the level of folk conception easily ends up serving to underscore Robert Sternberg’s (1990: ix) apt remark, that ‘wisdom is about as elusive as psychological constructs get’. Fortunately, seeing that our central concern is the relation between the Pyrrhonean cultivation method and wisdom in a rather unqualified sense; no strict definition of the latter is really called for.5 All we need is merely the implicit meaning of the term – the ‘loose, everyday sense’ – to function as enough of a zetetic corrective in itself to secure the general relevance of the investigation.6 That said, with the investigation itself drawing upon the views and findings of empirically oriented research disciplines like learning theory and cognitive psychology, a provisional contextual framing approximating the general outlook of these disciplines is practically unavoidable. For the purposes of this chapter, wisdom is thus on the one hand left undefined in a strict sense, but on the other it is approached as a main development potential of human cognition. More specifically, it is approached as a kind of cognitive growth which critically involves the self-enfolded feedback cycle of accumulation, processing, and regulation of subjective experience. Note that this framing comfortably accommodates for the key everyday intuition that wisdom can, and often does, grow without deliberate cultivation. Note, moreover, that it raises very few constraints as to the qualified nature of wisdom as such; adopting it has virtually no bearing on any pet notions of wisdom one might harbour. It leaves the question wide open whether wisdom should be considered, for instance, a thing of understanding, knowledge, ability, awareness, maturity, motivation, or any combination of them. Along similar lines, the fact that the notion of wisdom this chapter explores in connection to Pyrrhonean Scepticism is exclusively content-neutral and awarenesscentred should not be taken as reflecting any leanings on the part of the author to dismiss other common intuitions on the matter. On the contrary, I find Hadot’s (2002: 102) speaking of several ‘type[s] of wisdom’ adequate and clarifying. I do contend, however, that the philosophical reception of Pyrrhonism, unlike that of its Hellenistic siblings Stoicism and Epicureanism, has been disadvantaged by the preconceived centrality of more analytically robust intuitions of wisdom – such as understanding, knowledge, or ability – to any philosophical project intent on its cultivation.

Ethics and the exercise of reason As the relationship between Pyrrhonism and its philosophical competition in antiquity provides both historical context and heuristic contrast to the Pyrrhonean approach, we shall presently dwell on it a bit further.7 The gist of the matter is that while the Hellenistic schools were all, as transformative philosophies, in the business of modifying beliefs and judgements connected to various grounds for everyday behaviour, Stoicism and Epicureanism were, unlike Pyrrhonism, heavily invested in the general relevance and



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properness of doing standardly truth-oriented, ontologising philosophy to this end.8 Indeed, ‘the usual orientation of Greek philosophy’ observes Richard Bett (2000: 178, emphasis mine), is to try to achieve a desirable attitude to life by means of successful theoretical enquiry, in which one comes to understand certain of the ways in which things present themselves to us as true to their real natures, and certain others as false …

Without a correct understanding of the realities of human existence, these schools seem to ask themselves, how are you supposed to negotiate successfully the changing fortunes of life and the dictates of societal convention so as to gain the happiness and wisdom of a sage? This question, and others like it, tugs at the ideological core of every transformative effort. Indeed, without some kind of rational reality account to inform it, it seems any systematic approach towards life would be arbitrary. At any rate, Epicureanism and Stoicism certainly took philosophical theory very seriously. The sheer comprehensiveness of their teachings is legendary. ‘Try to imagine’, writes renowned classics scholar Anthony Long (1993: 156), a single affiliation incorporating your political party, your religion, your form of therapy, your cosmology, your psychology, your fundamental values – an affiliation which unified all that’s involved in being, say, a Christian, Jungian, Marxist, utilitarian believer in the big bang. Then, I think, you have a loose analogy to one of the leading Hellenistic schools in their most challenging phase …

The central and manifest cerebrality of this approach ultimately rests on the original insistence of Socrates, the founder of Western ethical philosophy, on the unaided exercise of reason as an instrument of individual transformative empowerment.9 In the public memory of Socrates, this claimed radicality and scope of reason was famously married to a distinctly heroic assortment of personal skills and qualities – a combination which set a challenging personal example for posterity and ‘gave currency to the notion of a “wise man’’’ (Long 1993: 141). The resulting portrait of philosophical self-governance (enkrateia) was a spectacular statement of what was to become the foundational promise of Hellenistic Ethics: that achieving that particular amalgam of virtue and wisdom the Greeks knew as happiness (eudaimonia) is ‘up to us’, and not a question of external circumstances.10 As may be gleaned from its near-saintly status in Western ethical philosophy, the transformative promise of Socratic enkrateia involves a serious and obvious difficulty. Is there not, as Hadot (1995: 268) writes, ‘an abyss between philosophical theory and philosophy as a living action’? Can a person really think himself wise? There seems to be no necessary connection between what one thinks and what one does. On the contrary, reason appears to battle for behavioural supremacy with various human needs, passions, habits, and personality traits, as well as, on another level, influences of social, cultural, and material circumstance. In the face of adversity, the resources and achievements of conceptual mastery may well prove to be merely conceptual.

108 Cultivating a Good Life To be enkrates, a master of oneself, one must somehow bridge Hadot’s abyss between theory and living action. In other words, one’s life must be brought into and kept in total agreement with one’s understanding of the ethical realities of human existence. Depending on the perceived ethical realities, this may call for a considerable degree of moral effort. By way of illustration, the standard set by Socrates in the Apology requires little comment (28b): You do not speak well, Sir, if you think a man in whom there is even a little merit ought to consider danger of life or death, and not rather regard this only, when he does things, whether the things he does are right or wrong and the acts of a good or a bad man.

Seeing that the process of anchoring philosophical insights deep enough to bring about lasting personal transformation demanded more than just a sea of coherent and well-argued theory – and recognising, in all probability, that most people are not philosophical heroes of Socratic stature – the major Hellenistic schools (i.e. Stoicism and Epicureanism) turned to various considerations and techniques of a psychological, rhetorical, or mnemonic nature. Nussbaum (1994: 35) explains this adaptive feature of Hellenistic Ethics (‘medical philosophy’): Calm dialectic does not probe deep enough to elicit hidden fears, frustrations, angers, attachments. If confusions are rooted deeply enough, it will not find them. Thus medical philosophy, while committed to logical reasoning, and to marks of good reasoning such as clarity, consistency, rigor, and breadth of scope, will often need to search for techniques complicated and indirect, more psychologically engaging, than those of conventional deductive or dialectical argument. It must find ways to delve into the pupil’s inner world, using gripping examples, techniques of narrative, appeals to memory and imagination – all in the service of bringing the pupil’s whole life into the investigative process.

To modern ears, the resulting combination may seem a strange mix of objective and subjective value sets and procedures – a bit, perhaps, like an independent, consumeroriented product testing facility adopting the communicative techniques and strategies of the advertisement industry. Given the ethical imperative of personal transformation, though, along with the perceived centrality of doing philosophical theory to this end, the instrumentality of such a pairing is quite straightforward. Wisdom cultivation then needs transformation as well as information, motivation as well as insight, ability as well as knowledge, and action as well as words.11 As far as these schools were concerned, then, wisdom was not in itself an exclusively cerebral, top–down affair. Yet, it was in a significant sense cultivated from the top and down.12 That is to say, being a dual process of 1) making and maintaining schoolspecific sense of human existence and 2) effectuating the psychological digestion and general ethical employment of this sense, the intended personal transformation was, if you will, ontologically loaded. Hence, it is to some degree only to be expected that the standard philosophical virtues (as referred for example by Nussbaum above) were



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operationally implicated and highly regarded every step of the way. More importantly, however, this same actuality – that the path of self-transformation with the major Hellenistic schools was always illuminated beforehand by a given rational order – in fact betrays a deeper commitment to the exercise of reason; or more precisely, to the cognitive modality of conceptual mastery. In these systems, the latter was regarded as transformatively innocent; indeed something necessary and uncontestably positive for bringing about personal change. This unspoken yet axiomatic view was supported by their respective psychologies, which both held the human soul (psychē) to be wholly rational. As both systems also subscribed to physicalist ontologies, this yielded a shared view of transformative philosophy as a rationally driven, yet ultimately physical restructuring of the soul (Gill 2006) – a view which cannot help but call for of an orderly conceptual template. In view of the above reasons, the brand of wisdom cultivation advocated by the major Hellenistic schools remains, for all its psychological adaptivity, a fundamentally cerebral one, centred on the making, upholding, and psychological integration of school-specific sense.13

The procedural imitation of nature Resuming our main discussion, one thing should be clear enough: Whatever it is that the cognitive conflict-driven transformative engine of Pyrrhonism cultivates, it must differ from the sense-making, theory-charged kind of wisdom endorsed by its philosophical competition. As we have seen, the latter takes a recognisably philosophical approach, holding time-honoured concerns, ideals, and modalities such as ontology, theoretical clarity, and conceptual mastery as natural allies of wisdom cultivation. The perplexityinducing Pyrrhonean machinery, on the other hand, is not recognisably philosophical in the same way.14 While it employs rational arguments in a superficially standard way, its insistence on doing so as a means to create cognitive conflict effectively treats ontology, theoretical clarity, and conceptual mastery as enemies, not allies, of wisdom cultivation. Clearly, if the Pyrrhonean programme was designed to cultivate the same general type of wisdom as Epicureanism and Stoicism – where wisdom is, roughly, to align oneself with nature and the Good as seen through the lens of school-specific dogma – it would be blatantly self-defeating. But then, if wisdom as knowledge and ability (as per the above understanding of Stoicism and Epicureanism) is out of the question, exactly what does Pyrrhonism in fact cultivate? Surely not wisdom as ignorance and disability? Strange as it may seem, an answer along such lines would actually not be far off the mark. In order to see how this can be so, we need to take a fresh look at the idea of imitating nature in the context of wisdom cultivation. As already observed, a key intuition about wisdom development is that it in many cases happens spontaneously, without any intentional effort directed at wisdom itself. At first sight, the notion of deliberately aiming or training for wisdom – which forms the overarching raison d’ētre of the Hellenistic schools – may seem quite at odds with this intuition. An interesting trait of the metaphor of wisdom cultivation, however, is that it admits of both the motif of natural or spontaneous growth and the notion of intentional effort. Being a botanical metaphor, it suggests that just as cultivation in a botanical sense can be said to consist of identifying, re-creating, and, if

110 Cultivating a Good Life possible, augmenting the relevant conditions of the natural habitat of a given plant, so does wisdom cultivation consist in the same with regard to the relevant conditions of spontaneous wisdom growth in what may be provisionally referred to as the everyday cognitive wild.15 In both instances, it is suggested, the essence of cultivation is the imitation of nature. Accordingly, engaging in philosophical wisdom cultivation would seem to presuppose that one has arrived at a sufficiently workable, comprehensive, and internally consistent account of spontaneous wisdom growth to form a systematic programme of its active cultivation. In implicitly adopting this perspective on imitating nature, Pyrrhonism stakes out a different path of philosophical self-transformation than its competition.16 As we have seen, the Stoic and Epicurean schools aimed to imitate nature in a largely ontological sense, where this ambition was significantly informed by school-specific dogma on the precise nature of said nature, and figured as the ultimate goal of wisdom cultivation rather than its operational principle.17 With Pyrrhonism, things are the other way around. If any ambition of alignment with nature as the ultimate goal of cultivation can be said to exist inside the Pyrrhonean transformative programme, it would do so in a context where dogma is regarded as a part of the problem, not the solution.18 In line with the cultivation metaphor itself, and in stark contrast to the Stoic and Epicurean schools, the main and primary Pyrrhonean imitation of nature is procedural rather than ontological. Accordingly, the key question is not what nature is, but what it does. More precisely, what does it do when people grow wiser? I aim to demonstrate in the next two sections how the singular Pyrrhonean focus on establishing cognitive conflict may be profitably interpreted as an attempt to recreate systematically a significant condition of cognitive growth as it happens of its own accord, outside the context of deliberate wisdom cultivation – namely, the raised awareness that is triggered by the experience of cognitive failure. My basic claim, if you will, is that Pyrrhonism, unlike its philosophical siblings of the Hellenistic era, does not undertake to reap personal transformation from the possibly stagnant closure of being right about human existence, but from the unsettling dynamics of being wrong.

The school of perplexity In this section, the rudiments of a content-neutral, awareness-centred conception of wisdom are sketched, in the form of an analysis of the everyday phenomenon of cognitive derailment and the special kind of cognitive growth that it sets us up for. A brief exploration of habitual cognition will serve as our point of departure (forming, as it does, the ‘rail’ part of cognitive derailment). As the account unfolds, it will be helpful to keep in mind that the terms ‘subjective’, ‘objective’, and ‘ontology’ are employed here in connection to functional shifts of human cognition, and not to issues of epistemology. The world of everyday experience is a world of seemingly inherent intelligibility. Appearances notwithstanding, most of us are aware that this intelligibility of the



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world is principally a product of human cognition running its habitual course.19 That is to say we are intellectually aware, but do not habitually experience, that the basic sense that the world is making is in fact of our making. For instance, we know that ‘tree’ is a decidedly human concept, yet we still experience trees as trees. That is to say, we typically experience them as somehow being what we merely call them, ceaselessly offering their apparent, self contained identity – and thus their intelligibility as trees – to us instead of the other way around. In this way, as far as the intellect is concerned, what is essentially cognitive map operates and appears as the territory itself. The process may be described as an ongoing projective externalising of intelligibility, conceptually structuring and so enabling the everyday experience of reality. The present section explores how the modality of perplexity offers a unique opportunity to directly experience and interact with the mechanics of this otherwise quite elusive externalising of intelligibility. It is suggested that it does so by way of two main functions, a specific one and a general one. As mentioned in the introduction, the specific function of perplexity is to pinpoint and call attention to various instances of functional mismatch between cognitive map and territory, while the general function is to teach us the separateness of cognitive map and territory which makes the specific function at all possible. These two functions will now be dealt with in turn, with the former given a more extensive treatment over several subsections, reflecting the fact that the latter is derivative of it.

The specific function of perplexity Picture yourself having dinner with some friends at your favourite restaurant. Between the main course and dessert you excuse yourself and head to the restroom. Unbeknownst to you, that particular area of the restaurant has recently been renovated, so as you turn what used to be the last corner you unexpectedly find yourself staring down an empty hallway. Perplexed, you step back and start looking around for directions. There are several points I would like to raise in connection to the above scenario. One of them, unsurprisingly, is that it illustrates the specific function of perplexity – which is to wake us up to the fact that the functional marriage between cognitive map and territory is coming undone in and because of direct experience, and to focus our conscious attention on the issue at hand. This general principle, I believe, holds on several levels of cognitive processing. It is in many cases much harder to fully open oneself to different outlooks, habits, competences, and procedures in any significant area of life unless one has gotten well and truly stuck using the current ones. And when one does get stuck, what happens on the cognitive level, generally speaking, if not that a previous state of cognitive operation is seen to falter due to some kind of cognitive incongruity? An incongruity, for example, between the expected outcome of a certain cognitive competence and the actual one, between disparate, yet functionally overlapping competences, or between cognitive reality claims of a more straightforwardly propositional (‘factual’) form. Perplexity then follows as the experiential dimension of the cognitive system cognising itself failing. A thrust of raised awareness is triggered in which our conscious attention is brought to bear

112 Cultivating a Good Life on the problem at hand, typically through a process involving the identifying and owning up to of the cognitive structures or competences inherent to its arising. Another point I would like to raise is that the scenario implies a subtle but significant shift of function as regards the cognition locating the restroom.20 Before the moment of perplexity, the location of the restroom was simply the location of the restroom; in other words, this particular cognition shouldered the operational capacity of reality in your inner world. (This is said in reference to the fact that you were by no means hypothesising or having reservations about the true whereabouts of your intended destination as you left the table.) Some moments later this reality was contradicted by direct sensorimotor experience, and perplexity ensued. More precisely, for a brief moment a state of cognitive conflict obtained between the operational reality claim of a hitherto fully valid cognition and that of a new one.21 As the conflicting reality claims in question were not perceived to be of equal assertive strength, however, the conflict between them was quickly resolved, more or less completely without the aid of conscious attention.22 With the resolution of the conflict, the cognition originally mapping the location of the restroom completed a three-step shift from the cognitive status of reality, over the impossibility of thwarted reality, to the status of an experientially invalidated and decommissioned cognition.23 A related point concerns the fact that this kind of shift forms a forced but ephemeral acknowledgement of the subjective roots of objectivity.24 As observed above, the sensemaking, hermeneutically accessible reality given in everyday habitual cognition is the function of an ongoing projective externalisation of intelligibility. Hence, when our cognitive reality maps function, they come across not as the contingent, evolving structures of interpretation that they are, but as the fixed, stand-alone properties of what they map. Now, this is of course perfectly fine – they need to do this in order to do their job properly. Nevertheless, a necessary outcome of this is that in navigating reality we are thrown back and forth between two functionally disparate modes of cognitive operation. Most of the time, reality comes across as simply being what it is, that is to say, hermeneutically ready-made, dependably resistant to the notions and whims of human subjectivity. This state holds until reality proves incoherent enough to us about something important enough. Then reality, as far as the implicated issue is concerned, becomes suddenly and acutely our problem – a problem forcing us to acknowledge our contributing role as cognitive subjects. Not unlike a proverbial clog in the machinery, the presence of cognitive conflict simply stops the cogwheels of externalised intelligibility from turning, and the implicated area of reality cognition can, in consequence, literally no longer make any sense of the corresponding area of cognitive reality. In the cognitive equivalent of a service stop, our cognitive map, bereaved of its projective status as territory, becomes locally cognised as cognitive map. (The unthinkable alternative would be to allow for reality itself to be inherently chaotic – a notion which confounds the very principles of reality cognition.) As soon as the problem is solved, the projective externalisation of intelligibility is resumed, on account of which the previously incoherent part of cognitive reality snaps back into its objective, independent stance. That is to say, cognitive map reappears as territory. As we saw in the restaurant scenario, the known location of the restroom (which was from the standpoint of cognitive function indisputably real and



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objective) became recognised as an instance of your own subjectivity, just as another indisputably real and objective reality, that is an empty hallway, took its place.25 In terms of cognition, the purportedly unnegotiable – that is reality – was just negotiated; still it has somehow, by operational imperative, become yet again unnegotiable.

Volition and cognitive decoupling This observation, in turn, adheres to a fourth, more general point: As the experiential awareness of conflicting reality cognitions, perplexity itself is far too cognitively primitive to be any kind of action.26 In fact, the unpleasant and pre-volitional drive-like properties of ‘cognitive dissonance’ noted by social psychologist Leon Festinger (1957: 18) suggest perplexity to be as primitive to the human organism as hunger, thirst, or physical pain.27 This would render it less comparable to the instinctive withdrawal reflex when burning oneself, for instance, than to the actual burning itself. A significant implication of this cognitive primitiveness is that perplexity is powerless to resolve cognitive conflicts on its own. Fortunately, it has an active corollary of sorts, as seen perhaps most graphically in the standard philosophical manoeuvre of taking a mental step back and approaching questions about reality in the abstract. A pertinent technical term for this aspect shift may be found in cognitive psychology, where ‘cognitive decoupling’ refers to the markedly human ability to (Evans and Stanovich 2013: 236) ‘prevent our representations of the real world from becoming confused with representations of imaginary situations’, thus enabling hypothetical reasoning and mental reality simulation.28 In this context, cognitive decoupling could be described as a voluntary transition of mental focus from cognitive map as territory to cognitive map as cognitive map. It would thus amount to a deliberate bracketing of and detachment from our projective externalising of intelligibility, as opposed to being driven to the same by the perplexing experience of the latter tripping over its own feet in cognitive conflict. Essentially, it is what would happen if one of your dinner companions in the restaurant scenario told you about the new location of the restroom beforehand, as you left the table. That way, you would have learnt about it without having to suffer any perplexity, being able to distance yourself (through cognitive decoupling) from any commitment to the previous location in its live capacity of cognitive reality before any conflict could obtain. The cognitive map would then have been adjusted entirely in a safe ‘reality simulation’ mode; that is, as map rather than territory. Though your dinner companion’s helpful advice would no doubt get the job done as far as information goes, in some respects it makes for a less optimal learning situation than the former scenario. This holds especially in terms of personal transformativity, on the grounds that it does not offer any clear unlearning modality vis-à-vis obsolete cognitions and thus commands less revisionary bite on your cognitive ecology. How much less would depend on a number of factors, including your level of mental focus and the manner in which the information was conveyed. (Note the resurfacing relevance of personal exertion and communicative strategy when personal transformation is left to mere thinking, as observed with the major Hellenistic schools in the previous section.) Details aside, chances are greater with this scenario that residual habit may send you off in the wrong direction for a few steps the next time you visit the restaurant.29

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The benefits of an ontological burn Now, what makes cognitive decoupling an ‘active corollary’ to perplexity is how the two operate in tandem to identify and resolve cognitive conflicts. In the above I have suggested that the cognitive mechanics of perplexity, in terms of their primitiveness, may be compared to those of burning oneself. In doing so, I intimated the extended analogy that we recoil instinctively from perplexity much as in the latter case. This we do, after a fashion: As already indicated, in order for reality not to be rendered inherently chaotic, and for us to navigate existence with incrementally growing competence, our cognitive apparatus appears hard-wired to wake up and acknowledge any and every cognitive conflict as its own offspring, provided that the conflict reaches a certain level of significance. In various conceptual guises, this general idea has been represented in cognitive science ever since its inception.30 My suggestion, inside the bounds of the extended burning analogy, is that this reflexive, pre-volitional recoil from perplexity is a recoil into the bracketed ‘reality simulation’ mode of cognitive decoupling.31 The inherent discomfort of perplexity would then be rendered secondary to the recoil, just like any awareness of pain is secondary to the reflexive physical withdrawal from the implicated heat source in the case of burning oneself. In further extension of the burning analogy, the lingering, unsettling effects of perplexity may well serve to motivate us to consciously and deliberately maintain our cognitive decoupling once initiated, much like the pain from a burn may motivate us to maintain our physical withdrawal from the implicated heat source. In sum, my suggestion is that while cognitive decoupling certainly can be initiated at will, this modality of cognition is also actualised involuntarily by perplexity, and serves to help settling whatever issues of cognitive conflict the latter may signal. Apart from commanding more revisionary bite, the perplexity-induced kind of cognitive decoupling has a further advantage over the one entered wilfully: It enjoys the direction and purpose occasioned by a specific cognitive failure. As I have aimed to demonstrate, the occurrence of cognitive conflict alerts us to inadequacies of our working cognitive ecology which may otherwise be very hard to spot, as these form part of the very structures, strategies, and competences that render reality accessible to our intellect. Without a specific and significant cognitive conflict to alert and engage our deliberate attention, a situation which calls for cognitive growth on our part may keep doing so indefinitely, without our ever growing any wiser. This is well illustrated by the following episode, recalled by Harvard educational psychologist William Perry (1988: 148–9) in a work on cognitive development: A top student from a good school came to Harvard at a young age, possibly a year too young. Since he had won a regional prize in history, he enrolled in a section of Expository Writing that focused on writing about history. He consulted me in a state of some agitation, having failed three attempts to write a satisfactory response to the assignment: ‘Consider the theory of monarchy implied in Queen Elisabeth’s Address to Members of the House of Commons in 1601.’ ‘Look’, he said, ‘I can tell what she said … all her main points. I’ve done it three times, longer each time. But he says he doesn’t want that. What is this ‘theory of monarchy implied’ stuff anyway? He says to read between the lines. So I try to read between the lines – and huh – there’s nothing there’.



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The student is aware that he is failing his assignment, but has little idea how. The situation offers some element of cognitive conflict, such as that between the originally expected and the actual outcome of his assignment responses, but it is clearly inadequate to pin the problem down. He knows what monarchy is, but the concept of a theory of monarchy confounds him. He looks, but finds nothing between the lines in the Queen’s address, for there is nothing to wake him up to the pertinent preconception he himself brings to the table. Cognitive decoupling in itself, unguided by perplexity, does him little good. Interestingly, Perry continues by making the following, somewhat stray comment: The intellectual problem is not too obscure. The student cannot see a theory of monarchy because he has never been confronted with two. Until he sees at least two, a monarch is a monarch and who needs a theory?

Indeed, what is the use of cognitive ownership when reality is right in front of you, plain and uncontested, for all to see? Had the student seen a second monarchy, Perry seems to suggest, this would have unlocked the cognitive ownership necessary for progress. He would have been able, as Perry puts it, to ‘see a theory of monarchy’ instead of monarchy, pure and simple. A monarch would then no longer have been just a monarch – a hermeneutically self-contained object of the world – but something critically involving the contributory structures and processes of human cognition. There would, in short, have been cognitive growth.

Echoes from the philosophy of education Interestingly, the general model of conflict-driven cognitive development sketched in the present section is by and large corroborated by contemporary research in the discipline increasingly referred to as the philosophy of education, where a specific type of learning processes are addressed as ‘conceptual change’ processes.32 This term refers to a kind of learning that (Vosnadiou 2014: 171), ‘requires fundamental changes in the content and organization of existing knowledge.’ For many years, conceptual change research was guided by the so-called ‘classical approach’, according to which (Vosnadiou 2008: xiv, emphasis mine) ‘the student is like a scientist, the process of (science) learning is a rational process of theory replacement, conceptual change is like a gestalt shift that happens over a short period of time, and cognitive conflict is the major instructional strategy’. Though presently, the findings of conceptual change research have increasingly come to question the validity of the classical approach on virtually all of these accounts (Vosnadiou 2008: xiv), the basic facticity of the revisionary function of cognitive conflict in human cognition has not come under any fire per se. On the contrary, it is taken for granted as a valid avenue of cognitive growth. However, any instance of its actual operation has been shown to be influenced by a multitude of individual, social, and cultural factors – a fact which questions the efficacy of cognitive conflict as a blanket instructional strategy, especially in a classroom setting.33 It must be said, however, that these later findings are to some extent presaged already by Festinger’s

116 Cultivating a Good Life pioneering 1957 volume on ‘cognitive dissonance’. Symptomatically, the focus of this work is not on cognitive growth, but on ways of maintaining internal consistency – including strategies amounting to sweeping dissonance under the cognitive rug. Another point of some relevance in this context is how the horizon of conceptual change research has come to widen since the days of the classical approach. From its humble beginnings in science instruction, conceptual change research is now seen to tie into questions of human knowledge restructuring in general (Vosnadiou 2008: xv): It is acknowledged that conceptual change research is not restricted to physics but makes a larger claim about learning that transcends many domains (physics, mathematics, biology, psychology, history, political science, medicine, gender studies, cultural studies), and can apply not only to education, but also to the problems investigated by developmental psychology, evolutionary psychology, and cognitive science.

On a final note, while the significance of this parallel requires considerable qualification (most of which cannot be undertaken here), it remains remarkable, in my view, that present-day educational research has exhibited, and indeed still exhibits, a methodological interest in cognitive conflict, given that it shares its overarching concern for human development with Pyrrhonism.

The general function of perplexity What I call the general function of perplexity is in some ways a more subtle affair than the specific one. I believe most of us would spontaneously agree that there is such a thing as learning from mistakes in life, and that this kind of learning is connected to having our preconceptions, expectations, or interests frustrated in various ways. In view of this commonly accepted fact, the specific function of perplexity should come across as a fairly approachable notion. The general function of perplexity is a bit less intuitively robust. If the former can be said to be about acquiring knowledge, insights, or competences not congruent with and hence to the short-term detriment of the cognitive ecology under employment, the latter concerns a certain less direct effect of this kind of competence acquisition over time. In some ways, its conceptual elusiveness is reminiscent of how education is sometimes said to be ‘that which remains when one has forgotten all one has learnt in school’. It concerns a kind of acquired proficiency in the overall management of cognitive content, a learning about learning, rather than the actual subject matter. Elsewhere in this chapter, I have used the expression ‘metalearning from mistakes’ to provide some makeshift handles on this learning modality – a formulation pregnant with a question as good as any to open the present discussion: Can our learning from mistakes teach us anything about our learning from mistakes? My suggestion is that it can. In fact, my suggestion is that we may actually not be able to stop it from doing so even if we deliberately turn our attention away. Given a sufficient number of instances, some of which demanding our attention in ways contrary to any original intent of ours, our learning from mistakes is likely not only to promote personal expertise but also to start us off towards cognitive ownership and



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epistemic humility. The processes by which we learn about the world appear set-up so as to recursively teach themselves about themselves – and us about ourselves. In the case of perplexity, the mechanics of the matter is quite straightforward. In virtue of the ongoing background process referred to earlier as ‘the everyday functional marriage between cognitive map and territory’, or more frequently ‘the projective externalisation of intelligibility’, it is very hard or even impossible for human cognition to get between itself and the world. As long as things are running smoothly, it is experientially blind to its own contributory role with respect to the immediate and seemingly ready-made, stand-alone intelligibility of everyday reality. (Again, this is all for good reason. If our tried and tested ways of interpreting and organising our experience of existence did not re-enter the flow of actual experience in automatised form, below the radar of conscious awareness, what good would they do us? They would then not, as now, be able to ease the workload of conscious cognition, which in turn would render us grossly incapable of human life as we presently know it.) What the core experience of perplexity through cognitive conflict signifies, is that these projective operations have been halted mid-step. In virtue of the conflict, the spell of procedural and representational invisibility has suffered an issue-specific break, which will last until the conflict is resolved. The break does not, however, make the otherwise clandestine activity of automated reality cognition become transparent to the intellect. Rather, the break is such that the reality that this activity was mapping (in effect, intelligibilising) is experienced as suddenly escaping the intellect – not unlike what happens when a spotlight unexpectedly goes out, leaving whatever it illuminated in darkness.34 For the general function of perplexity, the critical outcome of this operational failure of cognition is the manifest experiential distinction between that which just stopped and that which did not: cognitive map and territory, respectively. At the focal point of the conflict, the usual instrumental conflation of the two simply no longer functions. As past deliberations in this chapter have hinted at, there are several conceptually distinguishable, yet functionally inseparable, layers to this cognitive modality. There is a reactive layer, wherein perplexity can be viewed as an ‘ontological burn’, provoking a ‘recoil’ into cognitive decoupling. There is a categorical one, consisting in the undeniable fact that cognitive conflict always happens within the confines of a cognitive system. In necessary consequence, the conflict itself is a cognitive phenomenon, which, strictly speaking, leaves reality unimplicated, ever escaping, as it were, the grasp of cognition. There is also a layer you could call grammatical, coming across as a hard-wired, unnegotiable insistence on the internal coherence of that which is to be counted as the true placeholder of externalised intelligibility; in a word, reality. If you look at it, each of these three layers refines and restates cognitive map and territory as separate orders. Cognitive decoupling is not only a response to, but a cognitive representation of the separateness of cognitive map and reality. The second and third layers approach the separateness of the two from opposite directions, each isolating the character of one of the orders in clear contrast to the other. The upshot as far as the general function of perplexity is concerned is worth restating: The ‘functional marriage’ between cognitive map and territory passes through a developmental episode of tension; a domestic quarrel, if you will, wherein awareness is brought to bear on the true character of each

118 Cultivating a Good Life part as they contrast each other. Automated reality cognition is cognised by higherorder cognition as that which was just brought to a mid-step halt by a perplexing cognitive conflict, and reality is identified as that which, in evident consequence, is no longer rendered accessible to the intellect. Now, it is an undeniable fact of life that many people progressively assume some measure of cognitive self-ownership across their lifespan. At the very least, it is certainly common enough not to be treated as a fluke phenomenon. While this is not the place to undertake any full or definitive treatment of this kind of development, I believe it safe to say that regardless of any role played by such factors as general cognitive ability, there can surely be no better experiential basis for it than the one provided by the general function of perplexity. Indeed, what kind of experience should make people become cognisant of themselves as epistemically provincial and fallible if not the cumulative experience of being corrected by reality? What other modality of cognition allows for cognition to cognise itself failing? It seems to me self-evident that what is here referred to as the general function of perplexity should serve to foster a growing sensitivity to the respective natures of cognitive map and territory. This sensitivity, in turn, should bring some relational maturity to their functional marriage and make a person less likely, over time, to mistake the former for the latter.

The storm of aporia The second section of this chapter sought to introduce the Pyrrhonean brand of wisdom cultivation by unpacking the basic point that wisdom cultivation necessarily takes on different forms depending on how wisdom is conceived of. This final section will briefly revisit this discussion, in order to demonstrate how the different sets of interrelated themes and challenges belonging to content-oriented and awarenessoriented wisdom cultivation relate to the two functions of perplexity. In virtue of its conduciveness towards cognitive expertise, the specific function of perplexity is associated with the former, while the general function, due to its exclusive reliance on the revisionary mechanics of the specific one, is linked to the latter. Next, it is argued, on the basis of available textual evidence, that Pyrrhonism seeks to harness the general function of perplexity as a wisdom cultivation method. Along the way, some auxiliary comments are made as to the viability of this approach.

Content-centred wisdom and the specific function of perplexity As the example of the major Hellenistic schools in the second section illustrated, should wisdom be identified with a particular body of cognitive expertise, informed by a correspondingly particular set of views, the associated cultivation techniques will quite obviously be designed to reproduce the same expertise and these same views to the detriment of others. A point left unspoken in that context was that any contentoriented project of philosophical self-transformation will be essentially accumulative in character, in the simple sense that it intends the material extension of a given cognitive ecology. To be sure, the process of incorporating new material may require subtractive (revisionary) elements, after the manner in and extent to which resident



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views, strategies, and capabilities offer resistance to it. The subtraction is, however, not essential to the process. On the contrary, it is precisely because something is added that things may have to be subtracted. In fact, this fundamental character of cognitive accumulation and incorporation can be seen to inform the entire cultivation project. Looking back at all the themes and ideals adhering to content-oriented wisdom cultivation touched upon in the second section – sense-making, conceptual mastery, coherence, comprehensiveness, practise, repetition, effort, motivation, and so on – it is clear that they are tied into challenges related to the psychological palatability and digestion of foreign cognitive content. This convergence of purpose betrays a related point as well. Speaking generally, it must be acknowledged that a content-centred idea of wisdom, where wisdom is understood as a cognitive conglomerate of existential know-how accumulated over time, has a certain intuitive robustness to it. Yet to strictly and exclusively identify wisdom with cognitive content has peculiar repercussions for the prospect of active wisdom cultivation, as it banishes any role of personal rootedness from the wisdom equation. This invites the notion implied by Agathon in Plato’s Symposium, that wisdom is – technically speaking – some kind of distributable, context neutral substance.35 If the identification, moreover, is with a particular set of views and competences to the detriment of others, one ends up with a view of wisdom cultivation as something akin to a cognitive grafting act. Wisdom cultivation would then have no choice but to engage in the kind of integrative re-personalisation issues displayed by Stoicism and Epicureanism. There seems, in short, to be a genuine sense in which wisdom-ascontent needs to be appropriated as one’s own before it really becomes wisdom; and this appropriation does not happen as a natural outgrowth of the content as such, but needs to be effectuated by a system of auxiliary cultivation techniques built for the purpose. There are two main ways in which the specific function of perplexity displays an affinity to content-centred wisdom cultivation as incorporated by the major Hellenistic schools. The first is via the shared centrality of accumulated cognitive expertise. Simply put, the cultivation style of the Stoicism and Epicureanism seeks to distribute a distinct configuration of existential expertise, while the specific function of perplexity, given time, produces one. The second avenue of affinity between the two highlights the contextual asymmetry of the first. As already noted, content-centred wisdom cultivation, by its very nature, cannot avoid facing off with the issue of personal rootedness on some level. The image of this rootedness is readily and singularly provided by the specific function of perplexity. In consequence, the former ends up mimicking the latter: To match one’s unreflected motivations, responses, and courses of action to school-specific teachings, one needs to entertain a kind of inner dialogue where, roughly put, one part of the supposedly all-rational soul addresses another, by entering into cognitive decoupling over specific mismatches between the two.

Awareness-centred wisdom and the general function of perplexity An awareness-centred project of philosophical self-transformation will have nothing to do with any corrective extension of cognitive ecologies. Nor will it concern itself with the nature or extent of any specific body of cognitive expertise that may be already resident in a given cognitive ecology. The object is rather to have the cognitive system

120 Cultivating a Good Life wake up to full operational ownership of itself and whatever content it happens to employ, thereby enabling it to better respect the profound categorical divide between itself and the world. In consequence, its cultivation method will be awareness-raising in character, displaying, like Pyrrhonism, a strong operational affinity with the processes by which human cognition folds back on itself. It is a well-known fact that awareness, in the guise of self-knowledge, has been considered a viable candidate for wisdom ever since the dawn of Western philosophy. True to form, the wisdom of knowing one’s own nature, especially one’s limitations, and the corresponding foolishness of not doing so, appears to retain its intuitive strength until this day. Sternberg’s list of foolish fallacies (2003: 160), for instance, solely concern varieties of ignorance regarding the self: egocentrism, omniscience, omnipotence, and invulnerability. The palpable counter-intuitiveness, however, of the idea of a wise person being utterly bereft of any kind of actual, accumulated competence in life suggests wisdom-as-awareness to be as fundamentally lacking and one-sided as wisdom-as-content, standing on its own.36 The concert between awareness-centred wisdom cultivation and the general function of perplexity should be fairly obvious. What I have referred to as ‘metalearning from mistakes’, or the repeated experience and progressive psychological integration of cognitive map and territory as separate entities – in essence, the general function of perplexity – is clearly a process in which cognition folds back on itself and becomes its own object. The specific function, as stated, triggers cognitive decoupling and hence a kind of ownership of the representational structures and processes which render reality accessible to the intellect. It does so in order to facilitate the revisionary deliberations necessary for solving cognitive conflicts and thus promote progressive cognitive expertise on specific issues. Once the cognitive map is brought into alignment with the territory, however, this ownership typically falls to the wayside as a pale memory, having fulfilled its immediate purpose. (As noted in connection to the case of the Harvard student, cognitive ownership is of little apparent use when reality speaks loudly and clearly. A monarch, obviously, is a monarch, and who needs a theory?) Through the repeated experience of the transient cognitive ownership triggered by perplexity, and of the experiential distinction between cognitive map and territory which makes this ownership possible, the general function of perplexity has human cognition facing an ongoing, low-grade confrontation with the nature of its own functionality – a lesson in reflexive subjectivity, if you will, taught by objectivity itself.37

Objections to the Pyrrhonean approach The systematic recommendation of Pyrrhonism, again, is to (Sextus Empiricus 2000: 4) ‘set out oppositions among things which appear and are thought of in any way at all.’ While this passage clearly expresses a deliberate methodological harnessing of cognitive conflict, there are several issues that need to be addressed in order to argue the main point of this section, which is that this harnessing is profitably understood as a harnessing of the general function of perplexity for the transformative purposes of wisdom cultivation. One such issue concerns what an uninitiated observer will probably regard as the most immediately problematic traits of the method: Its manifest indiscriminateness, intensity, and ontological negativity. Why this virtual storm of



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aporia? Significantly, these controversial traits may all be explained in reference to the general function of perplexity. First, concerning indiscriminateness: As the general function of perplexity is in fact meta-specific, intending only the general properties of the specific one, discrimination has no obvious place here. The functionally entangled reactive, categorical, and grammatical layers of the perplexity-induced separation of cognitive map and territory share, among other things, a complete disregard of cognitive specifics. The subject matter of any given cognitive conflict simply does not enter into the equation. Second, concerning intensity: In its originary context of spontaneous and natural wisdom growth – ‘the everyday cognitive wild’ – the general function of perplexity is typically a low-grade, background process. As noted by Festinger (1957: 18), human beings are averse to the phenomenon of conflicting cognitions. In consequence, we typically turn our back on it at the earliest opportunity. In prescribing cognitive conflicts marked by ‘equipollence’ (Sextus Empiricus 2000: 4) Pyrrhonism seeks to drastically increase both the frequency and the amplitude of such exposure, in the evident hope of accelerating the process. Third, concerning ontological negativity: There are two distinct senses in which one can speak of ontological negativity in connection to the Pyrrhonean method. On the one hand, there is the ontological negativity inherent to the phenomenon of perplexity itself, consisting of being robbed of intellectual access to the subject matter of one’s perplexity. On the other hand, there is also the kind of ontological negativity implicated in opposing various instances of common-sense ontology by engaging them in cognitive conflict. By necessity, one must then employ material that is ‘negative’ to what one seeks to oppose. Now, as observed with the general function of perplexity, without cognition standing against cognition in conflict, cognition does not arise before cognition purely as cognition. It follows that if Pyrrhonism, on the present interpretation, wishes for this to happen, it would be irrational indeed for it to avoid ontological negativity in any of these two senses, as they are both tied in with cognitive conflict. Another issue concerns the very fabrication of perplexity undertaken by the Pyrrhonean cultivation method. It is one thing for perplexity to break the step of automated cognition in the everyday cognitive wild, calling our conscious attention to bear on emerging anomalies and the like. It is quite another, it may seem, to deliberately set up cognitive conflicts for oneself in the essentially abstract, philosophical way prompted by Pyrrhonism – that is to say, in the ‘reality simulation’ mode of cognitive decoupling. Elsewhere in this chapter, cognitive decoupling has been described as a shield of detachment against live perplexity, both in a pre-emptive capacity and as the go-to modality for post-perplexity damage control. How could it possibly be regarded, even implicitly, as a cognitive incubator of perplexity, seeing that it basically serves as a functional counterpoint of habitual, automated cognition? In order to sketch a constructive approach to this objection, it must be realized that the shield of detachment offered by cognitive decoupling is not a detachment from perplexity per se but from its ‘liveness’; i.e. the cognitive reality-‘coupling’ of certain pertinent cognitions. It is a focused upholding of the separateness of cognitive map and territory in order to reframe the underlying conflict as an artefact of the cognising rather than the cognised. Thus, it does not in itself resolve or even

122 Cultivating a Good Life address the perplexing conflict as such. Until the conflict is resolved, the potential for recurring perplexity remains. This is important because of the likely nature of cognitive decoupling as a human action; it may well be more comparable to lifting a weight up than to flicking some kind of mental switch. If common experience is any indication, the human capacity for cognitive decoupling parallels other general human capacities such as, for instance, that of running: While quite universal, it still varies in character and capacity between individuals and leaves plenty of room for improvement by regular practise.38 This would be consistent with the observable actuality that it takes a lot of energy, and quite a bit of practise, to maintain cognitive decoupling fully and consistently, especially if the investigation touches upon issues of great personal or existential import. What begins as a thought experiment may cross paths with deep, unyielding concerns. Hence, at the outer limit of mental skill, focus or endurance, or in the presence of various kinds of attachment (or better yet, any combination of them) decoupled cognitions may slip into a coupled state. Another main factor, I suspect, in counteracting cognitively decoupled thought resides in the inherent representational thrust of conceptual thought. This may take a bit of clarifying. The human cognitive architecture typically appropriates reality as something external to and independent of itself – and itself as the irrevocable ‘inside’ of appropriation; the seat, if you will, of intentionality. This fundamental order of radical difference entails not only that the cognitive appropriation of reality will instate within itself a polarising gap between cogniser and cognised, but that this gap is routinely bridged by this same appropriation. The upshot is that the content aspect of conceptual thought is inseparable from its projective, world-intending aspect: You cannot have the meaning part of representation without the objectivising, outward momentum part. In consequence, if thinking is representationally meaningful, it is also directionally opposed to the reframing act of cognitive decoupling. This in turn renders cognitively decoupled conceptual thought an inherently tensional undertaking. It intends the world, so to speak, yet is held back from active reality representation.

Concluding remarks on the Sceptic way and its end So far I have argued that following the Pyrrhonean programme of cognitive conflict amounts to an artificial acceleration of the specific function of perplexity. It remains to offer, in conclusion of this chapter, a tentative sketch of how this reading relates to the self-described end of Pyrrhonism; that is to say, tranquillity (ataraxia). Aside from the key passage quoted at the opening of this chapter, the Pyrrhonean source text Outlines of Scepticism contains a relatively small number of clues as to how the Pyrrhonean transformative effort should be understood. These need to be taken in conjunction in order for the full picture to emerge. The first one we will look at is the following passage (Sextus Empiricus 2000: 5–6): The causal principle of scepticism we say is the hope of becoming tranquil. Men of talent, troubled by the anomaly in things and puzzled as to which of them they should rather assent to, came to investigate what in things is true and what false, thinking that by deciding these issues they would become tranquil.



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The chief constitutive principle of scepticism is the claim that to every account an equal account is opposed; for it is from this, we think, that we come to hold no beliefs.

According to this passage, Pyrrhonism originated in the standard philosophical predicament of being puzzled about reality, and trying to sort things out. But the last two lines indicate that there was a change of heart at some point. Despite the nature of the originating cause, for some reason the programme itself came out as not at all focused on obtaining the desired answers, but on maintaining artificially the general experience of puzzlement. The point of this strategy is indicated at the end. It is to, somehow, ‘come to hold no beliefs.’39 Note that this coming to hold no beliefs cannot be a matter of simply walking away from the reality question and letting it be – for this could obviously be done without the help of a systematic method such as the one on offer in the very same sentence. Rather, all things considered, Sextus Empiricus seems to imply by this talk of coming ‘to hold no beliefs’ that there is a way of coming to terms with the reality question without settling it. A second passage graciously fills in some of the blanks for us (Sextus Empiricus 2000: 10–11): A story told of the painter Apelles applies to the Sceptics. They say that he was painting a horse and wanted to represent in his picture the lather on the horse’s mouth; but he was so unsuccessful that he gave up, took the sponge on which he had been wiping off the colours from his brush, and flung it at the picture. And when it hit the picture, it produced a representation of the horse’s lather. Now the sceptics were hoping to acquire tranquillity by deciding the anomalies in what appears and is thought of, and being unable to do this they suspended judgement. But when they suspended judgement, tranquillity followed as it were fortuitously, as a shadow follows a body.

Remember, we already know from the first passage that the struggle at hand for the original proto-sceptic is to pass judgement, not on what appears, but on the reality of what appears (‘what in things is true and what is false’). That is to say, the problem concerns what to believe as real (‘assent to’). We also saw the method of cognitive conflict being vaguely suggested as a means of putting this problem to rest. The passage containing the Apelles parable is consistent with this reading. In this second passage, Sextus Empiricus is telling us about the chance discovery of an unforeseen way forward: that of being overcome by difficulty. It relates how the proto-sceptic failed to settle the reality question (‘deciding the anomalies in what appears and is thought of ’), but still attained the desired tranquillity thanks to an unexpected lateral breakthrough.40 Like the painter flinging his sponge at the painting, the proto-sceptic is said to have ‘suspended judgement’ on the issue at hand, and like the painter, thereby inadvertently produced the result he was after from the beginning.41, This passage, when read together with the first one, tells us a bit more about the connection between the proto-sceptic’s reality problem and the Pyrrhonean cultivation technique. Albeit a bit between the lines, it is communicated that the latter is, in short, an attempt to recreate the unsettling conditions of the original sceptic’s predicament, in the hope of inviting a similarly lateral breakthrough of tranquillity. The key realization to make is that on both accounts the proto-sceptic appears to have taken the philosophical

124 Cultivating a Good Life reality problem to a point where it unexpectedly transformed in his hands. The tranquillity originally associated with the achievement of intellectual mastery through a successful theoretical inquiry suddenly obtained in an entirely unforeseen way. What kind of transformation is this? How can the hoped-for tranquillity obtain in an unexpected manner, yet also in a strong enough connection to what the proto-sceptic is doing to inspire and form the ultimate end of a systematic method? Frustratingly, Sextus Empiricus never addresses this issue directly. Granted, however, that tranquillity (ataraxia) is understood in the light of both the above and other brief passages of the source text describing the method and its expected result – ‘[to] come to hold no beliefs’ about how things are ‘really’, ‘externally’, ‘actually’, ‘by nature’, and ‘beyond the apparent’ (Sextus Empiricus 2000,: 5–11) – one might venture an informed guess. Interestingly, Pyrrhonean tranquillity would then seem to be attributable to a profound sensibility to the difference between cognitive map and territory. It is a sensibility, in other words, that elsewhere in this chapter is linked to the general function of perplexity, and hence, a sensibility that is arguably developed further by artificially accelerating that function – which is precisely what I claim that the Pyrrhonean programme does. My guess, then, is that the general function of perplexity itself holds a distinct, procedural end point where, presumably, the experiential pattern of acknowledging the separation of cognitive map and territory reaches such a level of clarity and centrality as to trigger a cascading, system-wide realisation, congruent with the Apelles parable.42 I consider the chance discovery of such an end point, provided that it exists, a likely candidate for the self-described genesis of Pyrrhonism. It is my contention that such a reading of Pyrrhonism has several strong points. In conclusion of this chapter, I will now turn to briefly listing some of them. A climactic turning point at the far procedural end of the general function of perplexity would explain the strange tension between lawfulness and unpredictability signaled by the Pyrrhonean source text. There are simply too many factors involved to establish if or when any given practitioner will reap the massive metacognitive kickback the method intends for him or her. Understanding the general function of perplexity in this way also comfortably explains how a quest for the truth may inadvertently trigger a lateral, transformative insight about truth, ensuing precisely the kind of deflation of everyday dualist metaphysics – or ‘shed[ding] of additional opinon’ – depicted by Sextus Empiricus in his chapter on the sceptic end (Sextus Empiricus 2000, 10-11): For those who hold the opinion that things are good or bad by nature are perpetually troubled. When they lack what they believe to be good, they take themselves to be persecuted by natural evils and they pursue what (so they think) is good. And when they have acquired these things, they experience more troubles; for they are elated beyond reason and measure, and in fear of change they do anything so as not to lose what they believe to be good. But those who make no determination about what is good and bad by nature neither avoid nor pursue anything with intensity; and hence they are tranquil.

Moreover, having a deflation of everyday dualist metaphysics along such lines as the end goal of Pyrrhonism would offer a neat solution to the so-called apraxia problem (the idea that the sceptic should be rendered wholly inactive as a result of his or her



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philosophy). The apraxia problem only obtains in a strictly dualist framework, where the beliefs abandoned by the sceptic are taken as objective reality rather than ‘additional opinion’. Finally, such a reading of Pyrrhonism would render it tantalasingly coherent with the Eastern heritage ascribed to Pyrrhonism in Diogenes Laertius (9.11), the plausibility of which has recently received renewed scholarly attention (Kuzminski 2008, Beckwith 2015).

Notes 1 For the sake of practicality, the designations ‘Pyrrhonism’ and ‘Pyrrhonean Scepticism’ here refer to the philosophy described by 2nd-century CE physician Sextus Empiricus in the first book of his Pyrrhonei hypotyposes (Outlines of Pyrrhonism [or Scepticism]). Moreover, I follow Sextus Empiricus in considering this philosophy to have been pioneered by Pyrrho of Elis in the late 4th century BCE, which makes it a rough contemporary of Stoicism and Epicureanism (Sextus Empiricus 2000: 4). I should add, perhaps, that Hadot himself views Pyrrhonism as a method of developing indifference towards life (Hadot 2002: 112). While I do not consider him to be wrong about this, I feel that there is much to be said regarding the nature of this indifference and its production. The present chapter may be regarded, in its own small way, as a tentative step towards rectifying this matter. 2 I employ the same basic conception of cognition as Festinger (1957: 3), where a cognition is defined as ‘any knowledge, opinion, or belief about the environment, about oneself, or about one’s behaviour’. Note that, as with the Pyrrhonean method, no difference is made here between the domain of sensory experience and that of thought (‘oppositions among things which appear and are thought of in any way at all’). As for the term ‘cognitive conflict’, it is well established in the philosophy of education and refers, much like Festinger’s famous ‘cognitive dissonance’, to a state of incoherence or mismatch between cognitions. Unlike the latter, however, its research context is oriented towards cognitive development. 3 As I consider this understanding of Sextus Empiricus’ basic instruction more or less unavoidable, it will not be argued in this chapter. 4 This is not to say, of course, that wisdom development happens independently of the person as an active agent, with all that this implies. 5 See, however, Sternberg (2005) for a brief review of some definitions put forward. 6 The term ‘zetetic corrective’ refers to the guiding function of implicit meaning with regard to the explicatory ambition of philosophical investigation: In trying to establish what a certain thing is, we clearly have some intuitive notion of what we are investigating, or we would risk investigating the wrong thing. If implicit meaning was incapable of this function, then Meno’s paradox (Plato, Meno 80d), or something much like it, would in fact have refuted philosophical praxis two and a half millennia ago. Evidently, it did not – and does not. In the present case the implicit meaning of wisdom is guiding (is the ‘zetetic corrective’ of) an investigation not into the explicit or ‘qualified’ nature of wisdom per se, but into the possible wisdom – again, ‘in a loose, everyday sense’ – of the Pyrrhonean cultivation technique. The content-neutral, awareness-centred conception of wisdom that this chapter explores to this end is precisely that, a means to an end. To the extent that this conception should prove intuitively invalid, the main argument of the chapter fails. 7 The following brief treatment of Stoicism and Epicureanism should not be understood as relevant to the question of the internal relationship between the integral parts of

126 Cultivating a Good Life philosophy according to Hellenistic Ethics (Physics, Logic, and Ethics) as touched upon, for instance, by Annas (1995) and Cooper (1995) regarding the case of Stoicism. The point here is a more general one, concerning a certain axiomatic view on the transformative role of reason maintained by these schools. 8 See for example Nussbaum (1994: 24): ‘All the theories we shall study (again, Skepticism excepted) insist that the ethical theories must cohere with our best theories in other areas of inquiry – inquiries about nature, for example, about psychology, about the relationship between substance and matter.’ 9 On the centrality of Socrates to Hellenistic Ethics, see Long 1988, 1993, 1999 and Gill 2006, 74–126. 10 On Socratic enkrateia and its importance to Hellenistic Ethics, see Long (1993).The centrality of the first to the latter is such that Long’s characterisation of the Socratic ethical legacy (1999: 639) doubles more or less flawlessly as a description of enkrateia and its implications: ‘Rational control over emotions and external circumstances, criticism of conventional ethics, inner freedom, independence of judgement, tranquillity, the guidance of prudence or wisdom’ – these are the elements of Socrates’ ethical legacy which left their mark on the Cyrenaics as well as on the Cynics, on the Epicureans as well as on the Stoics.’ 11 Please note that I am not saying that Epicureanism and Stoicism explicitly endorsed any or all of these conceptual pairings as sufficient components of wisdom, nor that they rejected others. I am merely saying that their modus operandi as art-of-living philosophies betrays a general allegiance to them in that capacity. It is clear, moreover, that the separateness of philosophical theory and philosophical therapy in Stoicism and Epicureanism should not be overstated. In various ways, the Stoic and Epicurean cosmologies fed into and were part of the transformative efforts of their schools. It is not a coincidence, for instance, that the rational and deterministic universe of Stoicism encourages the (typically Stoic) acceptance of one’s individual fate. Nevertheless, as explained by Nussbaum in the above quote, this does not rule out the presence of auxiliary, ‘more psychologically engaging’ techniques of personal transformation. See also note 13 for some very brief comments on the differences between the Stoic and Epicurean schools on wisdom cultivation. 12 Here, I follow Hadot’s use of ‘wisdom’ in connection with the Hellenistic schools, as in the quote opening this chapter. 13 This is not to say, of course, that there was no significant difference between the Stoic and Epicurean approaches to wisdom cultivation. As they conceived of nature and the Good differently, they consequently came to emphasise different elements of human existence as important to human flourishing. Stoicism, holding virtue as the only real Good, and generally being less critical of the Socratic style of ethical philosophy, unsurprisingly came out as a more heroic, mind-over-matter undertaking than Epicureanism, which stressed the centrality of pleasure as the Good. The general tone of the latter is well indicated by the fact that the famous ‘fourfold remedy’ is offered precisely as a remedy. Still, in both cases the cultivation of wisdom strongly involved adopting and putting to ethical practise a certain view of the world and human existence. For some additional, albeit very general comments on the character of Stoic and Epicurean wisdom cultivation, please see the final section of this chapter. 14 Of course, if you read Sextus Empiricus against himself, that is to say as a wayward ontologist rather than a deliberate manufacturer of cognitive conflict, then his arguments will indeed take on a greater resemblance to philosophy. Historically, this has been the common reading, turning Pyrrhonism into Philosophical Skepticism – a more or less self-refuting epistemological position (on most interpretations),



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that somehow still manages to command the vigilant argumentative attention of generation upon generation of epistemologists. I borrow this expression from the title of Edwin Hutchins’ 1995 work Cognition in the Wild. That Pyrrhonism in fact can be said to take this view will be argued in the final section. This is not to say that their cultivation practises were identical. Please see note 13. That Pyrrhonism regards its method as an antidote to what they called dogmatizing, that is holding beliefs about reality in an external sense, beyond the screen of appearances, is clear from books vi–xii of the Outlines of Scepticism (Sextus Empiricus 2000: 5–11). Please note that by ‘principally’ I do not mean to say ‘entirely’ or ‘reductively’. On my use of ‘cognition’, please see note 2. If there were not both operating as reality at this point there would not have been any conflict, and hence, neither any perplexity. The personal and situational gravity of the conflicting elements, both in absolute terms and in relation to each other, of course influence the resolvability and cognitive resource allocation of a given cognitive conflict, too. Another factor of influence, in all probability, is the general stress level of the cognitive system harbouring the conflict. As the cognitive conflict did not concern the actual (new) location of the restroom, the latter need not be determined for this shift to happen. (The conflict, again, is between the apparent reality of the new hallway and the location of the restroom as indicated by hitherto perfectly functional structures of cognition. These are both cognitive realities as the conflict obtains). Please mark that I am not saying that there are no other roots of objectivity. Just to be clear: For something to ‘became recognised as an instance of your own subjectivity’ in this sense, it does not mean that this something is recognised as pure fantasy. Rather, what is recognised is the subjective roots of everyday cognitive objectivity. Differently put, the fact that the world in an important sense is my world does not bereave you of any cognitive ownership on your part. On a related note, at the moment of conflict, it is of course not only the previous location of the restroom that becomes owned up to, but also the empty hallway. It is their cancelling each other out as reality claims that breeds perplexity in the first place. In the next step, the former becomes owned up to as a faulty cognition, but that is another matter. Cognitive ownership at this stage is ownership of the conflict as such, which of course necessarily includes its component parts. ‘Reality’ is here anything that answers to human intentionality from a projectively externalised position of hermeneutical independence, in other words any intelligible experience whose very intelligibility can be internalised precisely as a projective externalisation of the kind discussed at the start of the present section. For instance, anyone who has ever studied mathematics at any level knows from experience that abstract entities such as numbers and other mathematical symbols can perfectly well stage a perplexing cognitive conflict. They are thus ‘reality’ in the sense employed here. Festinger’s theory of ‘cognitive dissonance’ does not differentiate between cognitions cognised as reality and cognitions cognised as cognitions. While cognitive conflict (what Festinger calls ‘cognitive dissonance’) can emerge in both of these functional states, perplexity only obtains in the case of live cognitions. There has to be an instance of ongoing projective externalisation of intelligibility – that is to say, an instance of cognitive reality – thwarted by another for it to happen. As perplexity is clearly more psychologically discomforting than the mere awareness of incoherence, the drive-like properties Festinger observed in connection to cognitive dissonance holds at least as well for perplexity, and quite possibly more so.

128 Cultivating a Good Life 28 Considering how early in individual development the basic capacity for cognitive decoupling appears in humans in the form of reality-oriented play (Leslie 1987), one might perhaps be tempted to hypothesise that some animals, particularly mammals displaying signs of play, may also to some extent share in this capacity. Even on the most generous of interpretations, however, not even the great apes engage in realityoriented play in anything approaching the sophistication of human children. 29 This is not to say that residual habit could never resurface after a scenario involving cognitive conflict; especially when the conflict in question, as in the original restaurant scenario, concerns a marginal issue and requires little conscious attention to solve. The point is simply that all things being equal, cognitive conflict possesses a greater transformative potential than detached, rational deliberation. (Another way of putting the matter is that the difference resembles the one between revolution and evolution. The former comes at a greater cost to the cognitive structures under employment, whereas the latter tends to be limited by the same.) 30 ‘It is a beloved idea in cognitive science’, writes cognitive psychologist David Smith (2005: 266–7), himself quoting several sources, ‘that cognitive indeterminacy and difficulty inherently elicit higher level and even conscious modes of cognition and decision making in the organism.’ He then goes on to speak of the general functional dynamics of what I call the specific function of perplexity as ‘a structural, almost logical, reason why mind needs to be so composed that it responds to difficulty and uncertainty in this way.’ 31 This talk of a reflexive recoil into ‘the bracketed, ‘reality simulation’ mode of cognitive decoupling’ should not be understood as necessarily indicating detachment in any lofty, armchair sort of way. Though the centrality of perplexity to the practise of philosophy has been pointed out at an early stage in Western philosophy (Plato, Theaetetus 155c-d, Aristotle Metaphysics 1.982b) – on very good grounds, in my view – perplexity obviously does not turn us into ‘instant philosophers’ in any graphic or qualified sense of the word. Rather, the recoil from perplexity into cognitive decoupling is meant to signify a waking up from automated, habitual cognition to an awareness of the perplexing issue as an artefact of one’s own cognition. What is ‘decoupled’ from reality is thus not so much the cognitive subject as a person, but the implicated cognitions themselves. This point can be restated via the example of reality-oriented play in small children: One need not be ‘detached from reality’ in any conventionally philosophical way in order to pretend that a banana is a telephone. 32 Some of the other names which seem to be used more or less interchangeably to refer to this discipline are learning theory, pedagogy, and educational philosophy. 33 These factors include (Limon 2001: 374): prior knowledge, motivation, interests, epistemological beliefs (about learning and teaching and about the subject matter to be learnt), values, and attitudes towards learning, learning strategies, and cognitive engagement in the learning tasks, reasoning abilities, role of peers, and teacher– learner relationships. 34 The metaphor is a bit shaky, though, on the grounds that with cognitive conflict, there are two spotlights ‘shining’ on the same spot, and it is precisely for this reason that they both go out, leaving reality in intellectual obscurity. 35 ‘Here, Socrates, come sit by me, so that by contact with you I may have some benefit from that piece of wisdom that occurred to you there in the porch.’ (Plato, Symposium 175c-d) Socrates’ answer is quoted at the opening of this chapter. 36 For a more balanced view of wisdom, combining the contend-centred and the awareness-centred approaches seems an obvious option. Why should we have to choose between, say, the Socrates of Diogenes Laertius (II.5:23), who won a military



37

38

39

40

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decoration of valour at the Battle of Potidaea, and the Socrates of the Laches dialogue, a self-confessed ignorant who failed to determine the nature of courage (199e)? Can we not have both well-grounded competence and self-awareness? After all, the two functions of perplexity, the specific and the general one, are aspects of one and the same self-regulatory modality of human cognition. Though I believe such a perplexity-centred synthesis to be very much in alignment with conventional, intuitive notions of wisdom, developing a theory in this direction clearly falls outside the scope of the present chapter. Please note that in virtue of the revisionary elements implicated by the ‘re-personalisation’ issue concomitant to content-centred wisdom cultivation, the difference between the two ways of wisdom cultivation is strictly speaking not that the awareness-centred one raises awareness while the content-centred one does not, but that the former does it exclusively and through the general function of perplexity, while the latter does it as a side effect of handling specific issues and mostly through cognitive decoupling rather than live perplexity. The latter at least should be obvious to anyone in academic philosophy looking back at their own intellectual development. In my view, cognitive decoupling is possibly the most central ‘silent curriculum’ skill one must identify and learn to hone as a budding academic philosopher. Due to seemingly conflicting passages in the source material, the precise meaning of ‘belief ’ in the Pyrrhonean system has been debated. See Burnyeat & Frede (1997) for a collection of key articles on this issue. The present interpretation sorts among the radical ones that hold belief in the Pyrrhonean sense to concern whatever goes beyond appearances, and hence, that the Pyrrhonean system for this reason can house no beliefs at all. See also the end of the present subsection, where this issue is briefly touched upon. Note the phraseological parallel that holds between ‘anomalies in what appears and is thought of ’ in the Apelles section and the statement quoted at the opening of this chapter on the subject of ‘What Scepticism Is’: ‘Scepticism is an ability to set out oppositions among things which appear and are thought of ’. The translation I use (Sextus Empiricus 2000) says that the result came ‘fortuitously’. Something like ‘inadvertently’ or ‘unintendedly’ may be a better rendering of the Greek adverb tuchikōs in the present context, given the shadow analogy (‘as a shadow follows a body’) at the end. Clearly, one does not base a systematic method on what one perceives to be a coincidence. Yet Pyrrhonism presents itself as founded upon the hope of achieving tranquillity precisely by way of what came before this tranquillity in the story of the proto-sceptic. If anything, the shadow analogy supports a strong connection between the two, though one in total disregard of human intention. Strangely, there seems to be an analogical mismatch inside the Apelles parable between Apelles and the proto-sceptic, made all the more poignant for occurring at the very point of peripety: The former got clearly agitated, flinging a sponge at the painting in frustration, whereas the latter merely ‘suspended judgement’. On the topic of this mismatch, there may be an interesting observation to make regarding our reading of the key Greek term epochē (‘suspension of judgement’), which comes from epechw, literally to ‘hold upon’, and so, given the context, to ‘hold back’, ‘suspend’, or ‘keep in check’. It is easy to lose sight of the fact that epochē figures here as a technical term of philosophy, given a precise definition by the author (Sextus Empiricus 2000: 5): ‘Suspension of judgement [epochē] is a standstill of the intellect [stasis dianoias], owing to which we neither reject nor posit anything.’ Now, the noun stasis (‘standstill’) comes from the verb istēmi (‘make to stand’, ‘erect’, ‘set’, ‘place’), among the derived

130 Cultivating a Good Life meanings of which we find, on the one hand, ‘set on foot’ and ‘stir up’ (as in inciting a revolt), and on the other ‘bring to a standstill’ (as in staying or checking something). This inherent potential for contrariety is echoed in stasis as well. If the translation of stasis in the technical definition of the epochē were to reflect the former rather than the latter meaning, then we would, via the altered definition, end up with a version of the Apelles parable where there is a fundamentally reactive state of agitation not only on the side of the artist, but on the side of the proto-sceptic as well. According to Price (2011: 94), who discusses the use of stasis in antiquity, this term is in ancient sources often used together with the noun tarachē (‘disturbance’, ‘tumult’, ‘disorder’) as a military-political term denoting civil war, rebellion, and internal strife. For what it may be worth, in the quoted passage from Sextus Empiricus, a negative construction from tarachē, namely ataraxia (‘tranquillity’), can be found in the very next sentence. It is noteworthy that rendering stasis as ‘internal conflict’, ‘civil war’, or ‘uproar’ in the technical definition of epochē would not be inconsistent with the context, since what this definition is meant to explain is presented as a result of the systematic practice of establishing cognitive conflicts. Clearly, what follows from cognitive conflict is perplexity – an ‘internal conflict’, ‘civil war’, or ‘uproar’(stasis) of the intellect. To be fair, perplexity may equally well be described as a functional ‘standstill’ or ‘checking’ (stasis) of the intellect; it is, however, a checking brought about precisely by the internal conflict of the same. This stirring or activating dimension of istēmi (as stasis) also serves to underscore the nonlinear, quantum leap-nature of the attainment of tranquillity (ataraxia), as described in the Apelles parable. Admittedly, as a reactive state rather than an act, this ‘internal conflict’ account of the epochē is not transparently congruent with the active sense of the epochē employed in the Apelles parable (epeschon), but then again, neither is the ‘standstill’ one. Besides, Sextus Empiricus is known to inexplicably oscillate between an active and a passive formulation of the epochē (Thorsrud 2009: 128).

References Annas, J. (1995). ‘Reply to Cooper’, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 55 (3): 599–610. Aristotle, Metaphysics. http://data.perseus.org/citations/urn:cts:greekLit :tlg0086.tlg025.perseus-eng1:1.980a Bett, R. (2000). Pyrrho, His Antecedents, and His Legacy. Oxford: Oxford University Press Burnyeat, M. and M. Frede (1997). The Original Skeptics. Indianapolis, IN: Hackett Publishing Company. Beckwith, C. (2015). Greek Buddha: Pyrrho’s Encounter with Early Buddhism in Central Asia. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Cooper, J. (1995). ‘Eudaimonism and the Appeal to Nature in the Morality of Happiness: Comments on Julia Annas, The Morality of Happiness’, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 55 (3): 587–98. Diogenes Laertius. Lives of Eminent Philosophers. http://data.perseus.org/citations/urn: cts:greekLit:tlg0004.tlg001.perseus-eng1:2.5 Evans, J. and K. Stanovich (2013). ‘Dual-Process Theories of Higher Cognition: Advancing the Debate’, Perspectives on Psychological Science, 8 (3): 223–41. Festinger, L. (1957). A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.



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Gill, C. (2006). The Structured Self in Hellenistic and Roman Thought. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Hadot, P. ([1995] 2004). What Is Ancient Philosophy? trans. M. Chase. Cambridge, MA: The Belknap Press. Hutchins, E. (1995). Cognition in the Wild. Cambridge, MA: Massachusetts Institute of Technology Press. Kuzminski, A. (2008). Pyrrhonism: How the Ancient Greeks Reinvented Buddhism. Lanham: Lexington Books. Leslie, A. (1987). ‘Pretense and Representation: The Origins of “Theory of Mind”’, Psychological Review, 94 (4): 412–26. Limon, M. (2001). ‘On the Cognitive Conflict as an Instructional Strategy for Conceptual Change: A Critical Appraisal’, Learning and Instruction, 11 (4–5): 357–80. Long, A. (1993). ‘Hellenistic Ethics and Philosophical Power’, in P. Green (ed.), Hellenistic History and Culture, 138–57. Berkeley: University of California Press. Long, A. (1988). ‘Socrates in Hellenistic Philosophy’, Classical Quarterly, 38 (1): 150–71. Long, A. (1999). ‘The Socratic Legacy’, in K. Algra et al. (eds), The Cambridge History of Hellenistic Philosophy, 617–41. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Nussbaum, M. ([1994] 2009). The Therapy of Desire. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Perry, W. (1988). ‘Different Worlds in the Same Classroom’, in P. Ramsden (ed.), Improving Learning: New Perspectives, 145–61. New York: Nichols Publishing Company. Plato, Apology. http://data.perseus.org/citations/urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0059.tlg002.perseuseng1:17a Plato, Laches. http://data.perseus.org/citations/urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0059.tlg019.perseuseng1:178a Plato, Meno. http://data.perseus.org/citations/urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0059.tlg024.perseuseng1:70a Plato, Symposium. http://data.perseus.org/citations/urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0059.tlg011. perseus-eng1:172a Plato, Theaetetus. http://data.perseus.org/citations/urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0059.tlg006. perseus-eng1:142a Price, J. (2011). ‘Josephus’ Reading of Thucydides: A Test Case in the Bellum Iudaicum’, in V. Pothou and G. Rechenauer (eds), Thucydides, a Violent Teacher? History and its Representations, 79–98. Goettingen: V&R Unipress. Smith, D. (2005). ‘Studies of Uncertainty Monitoring and Metacognition in Animals and Humans’, in H. Terrace and J. Metcalfe (eds), The Missing Link in Cognition: Origins of Self-Reflective Consciousness, 242–71. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Sternberg, R. ([1990] 1995). Wisdom. Its Nature, Origins and Development. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Sternberg, R. (2005). ‘Older but not Wiser? The Relationship between Age and Wisdom’, Ageing International, 30 (5): 5–26. Sternberg, R. (2003). Wisdom, Intelligence, and Creativity Synthesized. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Sextus Empiricus (2000). Outlines of Scepticism, eds J. Annas and J. Barnes. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Thorsrud, H. (2009). Ancient Scepticism. Stocksfield: Acumen. Vosnadiou, S. (2014). ‘Conceptual Change’, in D. C. Phillips (ed.), Encyclopedia of Educational Theory and Philosophy, 170–2. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage publications.

8

Understanding Fortune and Misfortune in a Good Life: ‘Solon’ and ‘Confucius’ Hyun Jin Kim and Karen Kai-Nung Hsu

What exactly is the ‘good life’? In a fascinating narrative in Book 1 of his Histories the Greek historian Herodotus presents his views about the subject via the voice of the ancient Athenian sage Solon (1.30–32).1 Naturally the views of ‘Solon’ in this so-called Croesus and Solon episode are more probably those of Herodotus himself rather than those of the legendary wise man Solon.2 However, it must also be recognised that the views attributed to Solon, whom Herodotus presents as the most eminent of the Greek sophists of the time (1.29), are very likely to be a representation of how Herodotus’ Greek audience would have expected a wise man such as Solon to view the subject matter under consideration, that is ‘what is the good life?’. Via his sage ‘Solon’ Herodotus approaches the issue by explaining who is the most fortunate man (olbiōtatos) to have lived and why that man was the most fortunate. Solon’s counterpart, the Lydian tyrant, Croesus expresses the view that the possession of great power and material prosperity equates happiness and the good life. While not entirely rejecting the value of great material prosperity Solon in contrast to Croesus’ ‘naïve’ understanding of human happiness, puts the emphasis on the age-old, somewhat conventional Greek view on the instability of human fortune and by extension human happiness.3 The gods according to this view were envious (phthonos)4 and therefore no human being could become too prosperous without incurring the vengeance (nemesis) of the gods, as Croesus himself later discovers at the end of the logos. Great men in Herodotus’ Histories after their initial success and material prosperity almost always inevitably encounter misfortune (e.g. Croesus, Cyrus, Cambyses, Polycrates, Cleomenes, Darius, Xerxes,5 etc., just to name some of the most prominent historical characters in the Histories). What is particularly noteworthy in the ‘Croesus’ and ‘Solon’ dialogue is the very prominent juxtaposition between the wealthy/powerful, but ultimately unfortunate tyrant/king and the less wealthy and influential, but fortunate private individual. Solon explains to Croesus that he cannot label Croesus the most fortunate man alive because he needs to see the end of all things, how things turn out for the king in the end.6 Because of the mutability of fortune a man can just as easily be deprived of his great wealth and material well-being as temporarily appearing to prosper greatly. The Athenian Tellus

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and the Argives Cleobis and Biton are fortunate because, although they did not possess great wealth or great power like the great tyrant Croesus, they still managed to hold on to enough wealth to live comfortably, were spared most of the misfortunes and tribulations of life, and, most importantly, earned lasting fame via a glorious death: Tellus while bringing victory to his native city through the display of his martial arete (virtue) and the two Argives while performing an outstanding feat of physical prowess also demonstrated their filial piety to their mother (again virtuous conduct). Much has been made of the fact that those who are chosen as examples of good fortune in this episode happen to be Greeks, whereas the man who experiences disaster due to his hubris is a non-Greek ‘barbarian’. Do Greeks have good fortune and enjoy the good life because they are Greek? Is this evidence of the presence of an East–West dichotomy in Herodotus’ historical thinking?7 If Greeks are fortunate, is that due to them being ethnically Greek which predisposes them to correctly cultivate the good life or is it due to Greeks cultivating ‘wisdom’ (as in the case of the ‘sophist’ Solon, in sharp contrast to the ‘barbarian’ Croesus) which allows them to avoid terrible disasters? The notion that the Greeks are naturally predisposed to being cleverer and wiser than their barbarian counterparts seemingly receives confirmation later on in Book 1 where Herodotus seems to say: ‘from old times the Hellenic stock (to Hellēnikon: literally the Greek thing) has always been distinguished from foreign by its greater cleverness and its freedom from silly foolishness’ (1.60.3, trans. Godley, based on the OCT reading). Yet this seemingly arrogant assertion of Hellenic superiority is not what it seems, especially if we accept the variant manuscript reading of this passage which states that it was the barbarians who have been distinguished from the Greeks by their greater cleverness and so on.8 The episode which frames this statement seems to confirm the latter variant reading, as it demonstrates the gullibility/stupidity of the Athenians who are ‘said to be the subtlest of the Greeks’ (1.60.3), but are shown ‘even then’ at the time of Peisistratus’ seizure of tyranny to have been woefully lacking in intelligence. Although Herodotus is quick to express his scepticism about the veracity of this account, the context, even if we were to accept the validity of the OCT reading, clearly suggests that this is no straightforward assertion of Greek cleverness in contrast to the supposed lack of wisdom of the barbarians. If Herodotus was celebrating the wisdom of the Greeks here, then he has surely chosen a perplexing context to demonstrate that wisdom. As to why this is even a point of interest, until the first decade of this century the representation of Greeks and non-Greeks (or barbarians) in the Histories was more often than not interpreted (quite erroneously it now seems) by Classical scholarship (though not by all Classicists) through the prism of the Greek–Barbarian antithesis. The struggle between ‘Barbarian’ ‘Asia’ and ‘Greek’ ‘Europe’ was thus seen as the central theme of Herodotus’ narrative. However, this preoccupation with polarity and ‘othering’ at the expense of other interpretative models and the application of clearly anachronistic modern categories and standards of differentiation to a complicated and very fluid ancient context has now been severely criticised. The dominant trend in more recent scholarship has been to emphasise the fact that Herodotus and other Classical authors such as Aeschylus and Xenophon generally do not define Greek–non-Greek relations in terms of simplistic, strictly racial, ethnic, or even regional dichotomies.9

134 Cultivating a Good Life While it is surely reasonable to not discard entirely the significance of oppositional identity creation among Greeks, the recognition of the pluralism inherent in many of our extant Classical Greek literature, especially Herodotus, is of critical importance when reinterpreting controversial passages such as the one discussed above.10 Herodotus actually qualifies the above statement of Hellenic and especially Athenian superiority by commenting in Book 5 that the Milesian leader Aristagoras found it easier to fool the masses (30,000 in all) of the Athenian democracy than a single person, Cleomenes the enigmatic, half-mad king of the Spartans: ‘he could not deceive Cleomenes of Lacedaemon, one single man, but thirty thousand Athenians he could’ (5.97.2, Godley). Furthermore, when consideration is given to the fact that in paragraphs immediately preceding the above statement in Book 1 the very Greekness of the Athenians is brought into question and the Athenians are presented by Herodotus as Pelasgians (i.e. barbaroi) who have changed their language (1.57.3), the idea that Herodotus believes Greeks to be wiser than non-Greeks loses any convincing argument in its favour. That Herodotus does not attribute superior wisdom to the Greeks at the expense of non-Greeks is further demonstrated by the historian’s Egyptian logos. Egypt is actually held up as an example of barbarian superiority vis-à-vis the Greeks. Throughout the Egyptian logos Herodotus consistently argues for the greater antiquity of Egyptian civilisation and asserts that much of Greek religion is actually derived from Egypt (2.4, 2.43, etc.).11 As well as acknowledging the numerous Greek debts to Egypt, Herodotus also points out the various areas in which the Egyptians have surpassed the Greeks in knowledge. By way of example he states that the Egyptian monthly system is cleverer than the Greek one (2.4.1). Later on in the logos he contrasts the unreliable Greek account of the Trojan War with the supposedly more precise eye-witness accounts and reliable records of the same event preserved by the priests of Egypt (2.112–120). He even calls the Greek version of events silly (mataion) (2.118.1). Such comments as these of course earned Herodotus the epithet philobarbaros/barbarian-lover, which the indignant Plutarch later used to deride Herodotus.12 It seems evident, therefore, that in Herodotus Greeks are generally not presented as possessing superior wisdom to non-Greeks. If that is the case, then why are the fortunate men in Solon’s examples ethnic Greeks? The key to understanding this seems to lie primarily with the question of sociopolitical status (emphasised above), not race or one’s ethnicity. One should note that, when Croesus voices his dissatisfaction with Solon’s choices of the most fortunate individuals, he does not say – how could you have chosen a Greek and not a Lydian? Croesus is angry because Solon has chosen commoners ahead of himself, a tyrant. In other words, the Greeks in Solon’s examples are chosen first and foremost because they are non-royal, private citizens, not primarily because they are Greeks (Tellus the most fortunate man is indeed made an Athenian, possibly in order for Solon to indulge his own patriotic pride or perhaps to satisfy Herodotus’ Athenian audience, but that is neither the key point of concern in the dialogue itself nor a vital factor in its implications). Many in the past have argued that the struggle between tyranny and freedom (usually understood to mean ‘barbarian’ tyranny and ‘Greek’ freedom) is the clearest,

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unifying theme of the Histories.13 It was argued, for instance, that tyranny is ‘one of the firmest markers of Persia and Persian ways.’14 It was thought that more often than not tyranny is associated with specifically Near Eastern, monarchic regimes. Therefore, the understanding was that if the contrast is between a tyrant and a private individual, then it more often than not implied also a certain ethnic/racial divide. Moles famously argued that freedom in Herodotus is ‘conceptualized as Greek and good, slavery/ tyranny as barbarian and bad.’15 A similar opinion was shared by Konstan who argued that Herodotus has an ‘abiding disposition to classify and contrast societies in terms of reason versus passion, or love of freedom versus innate servility.’16 Munson, another great scholar, spoke of Herodotus’ extraordinary commitment to freedom and democratic equality and his celebration of the ‘superiority’ of a culture that chose to adopt constitutional forms of government.17 The picture is, however, slightly more complicated than this neat dichotomy of barbarian tyranny versus Greek freedom. The most obvious complicating factor of course is the fact that most of the fifty tyrants18 mentioned in Herodotus are actually Greeks.19 Does the despotic and cruel behaviour of barbarian tyrants then explain why they encounter disasters? Not quite, since Croesus for starters is hardly your typical tyrant. Both he and the wise Cyrus, whom Croesus later advises, are the most humane and virtuous of all the tyrants we encounter in the narrative of Herodotus. They are certainly not of the same breed as some of the later kings we encounter in Herodotus: the insane Cambyses and hubristic Xerxes. Yet, they still encounter misfortune. Furthermore, in Herodotus the barbaroi are not alone in displaying what could be called despotic tendencies.20 This becomes apparent when one examines Herodotus’ treatment of the Greek Peisistratids of Athens and the Cypselids of Corinth. These Greek tyrants possess all the wrong attributes that one would associate with a barbarian despot such as wanton cruelty (Periander’s killing of his wife (3.50)); extravagance (the sacrificing of 100 cattle by Cleisthenes of Sicyon to entertain his daughter’s suitors (6.129)); sexual deviance (necrophilia by Periander who also carries out the bizarre act of stripping naked the women of Corinth to placate the ghost of his deceased wife (5. 92F.1)); and fear of excellence of eminent citizens (the advice given by the cunning Thrasybulus to his fellow tyrant Periander to eliminate all those who may prove capable of challenging his grip on power (5.92E.2)).21 Thus, in Herodotus being a tyrant has something to do with being more prone to encountering misfortunes in life, but the ethnicity of the individual does not seem to have any significant bearing on whether he or she is likely to be more fortunate or unfortunate in life. Could that imply then that establishing free constitutions like the Athenian democracy (of which Tellus, the most fortunate man to have ever lived, was a citizen) helps in cultivating the good life free from misfortune? Or, since during the time of the putative Tellus the democracy did not exist yet, avoiding the concentration of great wealth and power in the hands of particular individuals and spreading both assets more evenly among the citizenry, is that the means by which to cultivate the good life? Again, Herodotus’ views here seem to be more nuanced than simplistic. Monarchy or tyranny is to the surprise of many, represented by Herodotus as an institution that has been deliberately chosen by the inhabitants of Asia, which can at times prove very very effective for example in the case of Persians who earned their

136 Cultivating a Good Life ‘freedom’ and rule over Asia through the genius of one men, Cyrus, as Darius points out in the famous constitutions debate (3.82).22 In Book 2 Herodotus reports also that up to the time of Rhampsinitus ‘they said that Egypt – was altogether well-governed and prospered greatly’ (2.124.1, Godley), that is under the rule of kings/tyrants. Herodotus actually acknowledges the deeds and achievements of certain tyrants: the capable rule of Peisistratus (1.59.6); the virtue (perhaps feigned) of Deioces the king of the Medes (1.96.2); the prosperity and honest government brought to Egypt by King Amasis (2.177); and the splendour of Samos under its tyrant Polycrates (3.60) whose terrible death is lamented by Herodotus as thoroughly undeserved (3.125). Greek or rather Athenian democracy does bring some clear advantages according to Herodotus. The democratic constitution is reported to have made the Athenians by far the best (5.78) among the Greeks by instilling in each citizen a desire to excel, whereas under tyranny ‘they fought below their best because they were working for a master’ (5.78, trans. Waterfield)23. However, being a citizen of this great democracy does not make one necessarily immune from misfortune or more virtuous. The Athenian democracy in Herodotus quickly starts to display the same tyrannical tendencies as the despotic Persian king whom they repulsed during the Persian Wars.24 Athens’ hegemony over the so-called Delian league, which the Thucydidean Pericles would later label a tyranny (Thucydides 2.63), turns the democratic city into a tyrant polis. Excessive avarice and greed25 for land, which are characteristics often associated with tyranny, can also be found in the democracy. Themistocles the great democratic victor of the Battle of Salamis is portrayed rather unflatteringly by Herodotus due to his unrelenting avarice (8.5, 8.111–2)26 and the Athenians themselves are presented in a similar light in the Pelasgian excursus in Book 6 where their greed for land is clearly demonstrated in their reception of the Pelasgian envoys to whom they demand the transfer of the island of Lemnos ‘covered with all manner of good things’ (6.139.3). It is also surely no accident that the Histories closes with the juxtaposition of Athenian cruelty and the advice of Cyrus the Great to the Persians on how to maintain imperial rule (9.122). Herodotus vividly narrates how Xanthippus, the father of Pericles, the famed leader of the democracy who was also an advocate of aggressive imperialism towards Athens’ allies, nailed the Persian governor Artayctes to a plank and then brutally murdered Artayctes’ sons before his eyes (9.120).27 The unlucky Artayctes was the descendent of the Persian noble Artembares whose misguided advice, Herodotus notes, if adopted, would have deprived the Persians of their empire had it not been swiftly rejected by Cyrus, the sage-king. Artayctes in effect, thus, represents the negative developments of Persian imperialism: excessive expansionism28 and abandonment of simplicity for luxury and magnificence. Herodotus suggests that Athens is in danger of committing the same hubristic errors as the Persians.29 The image of the lion (which carries a negative, sinister connotation in the Histories, as Herodotus uses the same imagery when referring to Cypselus, the ruthless tyrant of Corinth (5.92)30) with which Pericles is identified (6.131) and the close association of his Alcmaeonid ancestor Cleisthenes (as Herodotus notes, the founder of the Athenian democracy (6.131.1)) with another Cleisthenes (whom he is named after), his maternal grandfather and as it happens a famous tyrant, clearly suggests the existence of affinities between Periclean democracy and tyranny.31 Herodotus in fact

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suggests that Cleisthenes abolished the old tribal divisions of Attica in imitation of similar reforms undertaken by his tyrant ancestor in Sicyon (5.67). The end result of Athenian hubris was of course disaster in the Peloponnesian War, which Herodotus seems to have partially witnessed, although he did not live to see its final denouement. Herodotus, however, had knowledge of similar debacles from earlier episodes in Greek history. The freedom, but also the disorder, lack of unity, and inclination towards internal disputes and mutual jealousies among the democratic, free Greeks throughout the Histories hamper their efforts to ward off ‘enslavement’ at the hands of the Persians. The Samians (3.142–3) and the Ionians fail miserably in their quest for freedom.32 It seems clear then that there is no stereotype of good versus evil in Herodotus’ depiction of either monarchs/tyrants33 or for that matter democracies, which automatically leads one to misfortune or alternatively the other to greater success. This observation, however, must be qualified by the instances in Herodotus where he seems to either exaggerate or highlight the disasters suffered by famous kings, tyrants, and the most celebrated tyrannical families such as the Cypselids, the Achaemenids, and the Mermnads.34 This brings us back to Herodotus’ teleological, ‘Solonian’ view of history and human endeavours (1.30 ff.), that is the idea that greatness and good fortune incur the envy (phthonos) of the divine and that any hubris which is prone to manifest itself in even the very best of men when they attain monarchic power, as Otanes points out in the constitutions debate (3.80), is checked by nemesis. In the end Herodotus’ view of the good life and how to cultivate it seems to be more traditional than political. Constitutions, like ethnicity, are not the ultimate determiners or facilitators of the good life for the historian. Is practical wisdom, then the key? Can rulers and private individuals avoid the misfortunes of fate by either cultivating wisdom themselves or listening to wise men (e.g. Solon) giving them good advice. Would the life of Croesus have turned out differently had he listened to Solon’s wise advice? Perhaps, but in all likelihood no. Croesus, after he is spared by Cyrus, his conqueror, himself becomes a wise advisor like Solon. He was unable to escape his nemesis, but would he be able to ward off disaster for his new patron Cyrus? The end result, as Herodotus tells it, is lamentable. Grethlein summarises it brilliantly: ‘As the disaster comes despite Croesus’ advice, it shows that there is no regularity that would allow man to overcome the contingency of chance. Even Croesus who has learned from his own suffering cannot prevent the downfall of Cyrus. To put it bluntly, the only consistency is life’s inconsistency’.35 The human condition is such that even human wisdom has severe limitations and does not guarantee the making of correct choices in every instance. One cannot therefore escape one’s fate, no matter how wise he or she might be. This is brought to the fore most clearly in the story of the downfall of Polycrates, the Greek tyrant of Samos. Polycrates is advised by his friend the wise Egyptian king Amasis to abandon his dearest possession (3.40.2) in order to deflect the envy of the gods. Polycrates has become too successful and this, as Amasis notes, is dangerous. Polycrates actually listens to the wise advice and yet his most precious possession, the ring, is returned to him by fate and he ultimately fails to escape the terrible calamity that awaits him in the end.36 So what is the answer? One cannot escape misfortune by any means. The only choice is to minimise one’s losses by not becoming a too obvious target of divine envy (the

138 Cultivating a Good Life reason why the humble Tellus, not the affluent Croesus, is the most fortunate man). Don’t be too successful, don’t be too greedy, be satisfied with what you have, don’t strive to be a great man with great power and wealth, be a simple citizen with enough for your own livelihood and hope that many of life’s misfortunes will just happen to pass you by without damaging you too much. That is the somewhat depressing conclusion. It is the view one finds earlier in the Iliad and the Odyssey in Homer and Herodotus continues to espouse this archaic Greek view of human happiness. Interestingly this ‘Solonian’ Greek view of fortune and misfortune allows for an intriguing comparison with a similar, but essentially different approach to the good life found in the teachings of another sage, Confucius in early China. ‘Confucius’ (to the extent he is represented in the Lunyu)37 emphasises the development of moral character, which he identifies as the key to a ‘good’, virtuous life. Virtues are cultivated and attained through learning and practice. In the Analects/Lunyu, purportedly compiled by the followers of Confucius, it is claimed that those who follow the ethically correct way (Dao 道) will attain a good life. The benefits from this good life can be rather prosaic (such as enjoying the company of good friends) or profound (such as being able to die content).38 Dao is the progression of self-cultivation by developing characteristics that are considered morally good39 and the Lunyu’s teachings seem at first glance to encourage everyone to actively strive to attain these virtuous characteristics regardless of one’s position in society. ‘Confucius’ after all states that when pursuing virtue, the person ‘[should] not be afraid to overtake [the] teacher.’40 Furthermore, ‘Confucius’ seems to encourage his disciples to practice selfcultivation regardless of their economic circumstances. He praises his most beloved student, Yan Hui’s 顏回 determination in self-cultivation, although Yan Hui’s poverty forces him to survive on only ‘a handful of rice to eat, a gourd of water for drink, a hovel for [his] shelter.’41 Confucius further commends his other student, Zilu’s 子路 ability to feel no embarrassment in being dressed in his ‘tattered gown’ and feel no envy for those wearing fine clothes.42 It would seem from the reading of these passages that for the Chinese sage the ‘good’ in the good life was equated not so much with material well-being, but with the state of living and practising a moral and virtuous life and thereby encouraging others in society to emulate virtuous actions. ‘Confucius’ reminds his students that Boyi 伯夷 and Shuqi 叔齊 (who starved to death to avoid the dishonour of serving what they viewed as an unjust government) are remembered and celebrated by the people for their undeterred moral rectitude, while upon the death of the wealthy Duke Jing of Qi 齊景公, people found no memory of his to praise.43 However, a degree of tension does exist in the Lunyu between the above idealistic view that one should follow the way through moral self-cultivation regardless of personal circumstances and the reality of coping with one’s material needs. As Li accurately observes there is a close connection between material well-being and the cultivation of virtues in ‘Confucian thinking.’44 Confucius is said to have stated: 「富而可求也，… 吾亦為之。如不可求，從吾所好。」45 If the search for riches is sure to be successful … I will do so. As the search may not be successful, I will follow that which I love.46

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On the one hand, the Analects teaches everyone to follow the way through selfcultivation with the goal of attaining high moral standards regardless of one’s situation in life, but on the other hand the sage himself seems to agree that if he could pursue wealth or material well-being, he would do so, and only follow what he desires if the pursuit of wealth is deemed unsuccessful. Furthermore, at one point in the Analects Confucius notes that even though Yan Hui came close to perfection in his pursuit of the way, he often suffered penury as a consequence, while his other student, Zigong 子貢, who was evidently not content with that way of life, went into business and attained greater affluence.47 The Analects suggests that a good society is one that is affluent and where all the people are in possession of the necessities of life such as food, clothing, and shelter.48 Wealth-accumulation, therefore, is not necessarily a bad thing for Confucius. It should in fact be encouraged, while poverty is indeed a bad thing, which should be avoided.49When Ran Qiu 冉有 asked Confucius what to do with so many people, ‘Confucius’ is noted as saying ‘enrich them’ (富之) and when they become rich, ‘educate them’ (教之).50 According to this passage, people’s personal happiness and well-being need to be achieved before they can be educated to lead an ethical life.51 Mencius further supports this claim by stating that when people are affluent with ‘plentiful grains’ they will then become morally good.52 This seeming tension between moral cultivation at all costs and the reality of pursuing material well-being in early ‘Confucian’ (or rather classical Ru) thought could potentially be explained by what could be termed the distinction of people. The Analects frequently mentions three types of people: the sage (shengren 聖人), the gentleman (junzi 君子),53 and the common people (xiaoren 小人). The shengren is the ultimate semi-divine being that encompasses all ‘goodness’. According to ‘Confucius’, this state of being was only realised by several sage kings and high nobles such as Yao 堯, Shun 舜, and the Duke of Zhou 周公, who displayed high morality and governed selflessly.54 Political advisors and scholars in the Chinese classical tradition are frequently seen recounting the supposed words and actions of these sage kings/rulers when providing counsel to contemporary rulers.55 The second type, junzi, originally referred to the son of a ruler/king (someone who belonged to the high aristocracy) and was only later used as a term denoting an individual with high moral character or someone engaged in the process of self-cultivation. The importance of junzi in the Confucian tradition, however, cannot be over-emphasized, since the junzi is ultimately seen as the ideal leader to serve in public office. Finally, the xiaoren symbolises the average people in society who display many flawed human behaviours. Therefore, when ‘Confucius’ states that a decent level of material well-being is required before one can engage in self-cultivation, he is possibly referring to these xiaoren, who are short-sighted in their life goals and require material wealth to be satisfied in life.56 ‘Confucius’ is reluctant to acknowledge the existence of any shengren in his contemporary society. He, however, seems to stress nonetheless that moral goodness exemplified by sagehood can be attained through persistent cultivation.57 For ‘Confucius’, those who actively cultivate the self to attain sagehood are called junzi58 and while most people never will become junzi, the main emphasis actually falls on the process via which a junzi learns/acquires the virtues necessary for governing the lesser people, or xiaoren, with ‘proper’ ethical standards of living. Underlying this exaltation

140 Cultivating a Good Life of the junzi is the belief that an individual has to improve oneself before the society as a whole can be improved. Therefore, for the happiness and well-being of society as whole to be realised, the government must be entrusted to those who have cultivated what ‘Confucius’ deemed ‘superior’ qualities.59 A junzi thus for the most part denotes the attributes of an ideal political leader who should serve in public office.60 The ‘good’ life in Confucian thought therefore cannot be divorced from intense political involvement and the wielding of a certain amount of political authority. This is somewhat in contrast to Herodotus’ reluctance to associate the good life with political power, though both ‘Solon’ and ‘Confucius’ seem to value highly the fortunate/virtuous man’s contribution to wider society (as a means of attaining fame and recognition in the Greek context and as a moral obligation to society in the Confucian context). The life of a Confucian junzi would have been much more cumbersome than the life of say a Tellus or the lives of the Cleobis-Biton brothers. The junzi is obliged to follow certain patterns of moral behaviour in speech and action such as do more and speak less;61 be righteous and modest (a concept quite alien to the ancient Greeks obviously);62 and perfect his mind and character so that his attitude has no party bias and is only concerned for justice.63 As mentioned previously, the highest ideal in Confucianism is the virtuous life regardless of one’s personal circumstances. Therefore, even when an individual meets adverse circumstances in life such as poverty or sickness, is emotionally affected by grief at the death of a loved one, is frustrated by the lack of appreciation by others, and laments the moral defilement of the times, one would still be able to display the manners of a junzi – one that is sympathetic and calm.64 In other words, the realisation of the ‘good’ life is when a junzi is able to transcend external influences and redirect one’s energy to a more positive pursuit. One of the most obvious examples of this is Confucius himself. He endures the loss of his students and sons,65 and struggles with the lack of understanding from others during his pursuit of a seemingly unsuccessful political career.66 Sometimes, even his students are puzzled by their teacher’s cruel fate, that his efforts and worthiness are unappreciated by society.67 However, the life of Confucius is seen as demonstrating just how well a junzi persevered to make society better despite his circumstances.68 Furthermore, it is argued that a junzi should also be attentive and responsive to the political fate of his community. Confucius praises the two ministers of the state of Wei 衛, Shi Yu 史魚 and Qu Boyu 蘧伯玉, for conducting themselves in a righteous manner regardless of adverse circumstances.69 When a junzi is fortunate to serve under a good government, he will ‘display his talents,’ but under a bad government, the junzi will knowingly ‘fold [his talents] up in his heart,’70 even at the cost of his life, as ‘Confucius’ continues to state: 志士「仁人，無求生以害仁，有殺身以成仁。」 A righteous man … does not seek life at the expense of his humanity; there are instances where he will give his life in order to fulfill his humanity.71

Thus, an ideal Confucian junzi will always be ‘frugal, humble, benevolent, and calm’72 and fulfills his political duty regardless of personal circumstances. The actual reality of course was that the Confucian junzi was almost always someone from the highest echelons of society, who need not have worried too much about his

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daily sustenance, could afford to educate himself, and actively engage in politics, while the xiaoren were for the most part the common people, the average men and women in society who had no such luxury.73 In short, a junzi was the elite aristocrat (endowed with virtue), rather than the common man whom ‘Solon’ in the Greek context identifies with the good life. In the Analects, the junzi is frequently compared in a favourable manner to the lowly xiaoren. A junzi is supposedly sympathetic and calm, a xiaoren (the commoner) is partisan and emotional.74 The junzi differs from the xiaoren in that the former chooses to follow dao continuously, whereas the latter chooses to follow the dao occasionally (because the former can afford to do so, while the latter cannot).75 The junzi must ideally function as the leader over the xiaoren whereby the former is the ‘wind’ and the latter is the ‘grass’ that bends whenever the wind blows.76 It is to be only expected then that the actions of the junzi – the elite government official – would be the exact opposite to those of the xiaoren – the commoner. In early Confucian thought therefore the likes of a Tellus are not necessarily qualified to be a junzi without some serious modifications to their character (maybe even social class, if Tellus was one of the poor kakoi of Athens) and approach to life in general (in particular the willingness to constantly engage in politics and hold public office). Of course during Solon’s time, unlike during the days of Herodotus when any citizen of the Athenian democracy could hold public office via the casting of lots, public office in the 6th century BC before the establishment of the democracy was held almost exclusively by the affluent agathoi and the eupatridae, the aristocracy. If Tellus was relatively affluent and he actually was a real person and not a literary creation, he may for all intent and purposes have been an aristocrat himself, although one could also conceivably make the argument that Herodotus is anachronistically likening the ancient Athenian Tellus with the contemporary Athenian citizen of the democracy. To ‘Confucius’ a prerequisite of the ‘good’ life is the practice and achievement of a cluster of qualities that are traditionally understood as the cardinal Confucian virtues – ren 仁 (benevolence, humaneness or goodness), xiao 孝 (filial piety), yi 義(justice or duty), li 禮 (etiquette, rituals, or proper conduct), zhi 智 (wisdom), xin 信(trustworthiness), and yong 勇(courage).77 These virtues are outlined in the Analects via the discussions of a person’s actions or inactions and the conclusions made by the teacher as to whether the individual has or lacks virtues. A junzi makes the learning and cultivation of the above-mentioned virtues his ultimate goal, and thereby achieves the ‘good’ life. One of the central ethical tenets of Confucius’ political philosophy that becomes the leading characteristic of the junzi is ren, which corresponds to the supreme and all-embracing virtue.78 Apart from the shengren, Confucius does not agree that people of his time and indeed himself, have fully succeeded in achieving it. However, it is assumed that practice makes perfect and ren is depicted as being attainable by those who make the persistent effort to practice it wholeheartedly, that is by the junzi.79 Ren is the theoretical and practical moral self-cultivation and is associated with attributes such as wisdom and courage.80 However, again there is a distinction made between the ren of a junzi and that of a xiaoren. That is because the ren of a junzi, who is very often a government official or someone who holds matching influence, has a far greater impact on society than that of a xiaoren. A junzi is responsible for guiding (dao 導) and rectifying (zheng 正 or zhi 治) the people and thus transforming society for the better.81

142 Cultivating a Good Life Accompanying this core virtue of ren are the virtues of yi and xiao, also critical for the ‘good’ life. Yi is closely linked with li, the conceptual guide to human life in the aspects of ceremonies dedicated to ancestors and deities, social and political institution, and the general etiquette of daily life.82 The difference lies in that li can be overridden by other considerations such as the basic need of getting food, while yi is the fundamental principle for establishing rules and institutions – it pertains to actions that are always right and a junzi would not breach the yi under any circumstances.83 As previously mentioned, Confucius commends those who sacrificed their wealth, status, and even lives to defend the justice they seek.84 The proper actions of a junzi is his filial devotion or xiao to one’s ancestors and parents, which in many respects is a similar concept to the Roman aristocratic pietas and incidentally reminds us of the filial piety which brought fame to Cleobis and Biton in the Croesus-Solon episode. ‘Confucius’ of the Lunyu believes that filial piety is the basis for ren and a socially and politically engaged junzi. Mencius later further developed this concept by suggesting that a junzi’s demonstration of filial piety was the precursor of his loyalty to the state.85 For instance, Mencius uses the sageking Shun as an exemplum to illustrate how filial piety also had a positive effect on one’s patriotism.86 The Confucian Classic of Filial Piety (Xiao Jing 孝經) sums this up neatly: 子曰:「君子之事親孝，故忠可移於君 … 居家理，故治可移於官。是以行成於內, 而名立於後世矣。」 The Master said, it is only because [junzi] serve their parents with family reverence that this same feeling can be extended to their lord as loyalty (zhong 忠). … And it is only because they maintain a proper home life that this same sense of organization can be extended as proper order to the offices of government.87

What becomes apparent in all this is the extent to which ‘Confucius’ largely disregards and easily dismisses the question of the basic necessities of life when he approaches the issue of the good life. This may be because the virtuous man that he had in mind, the junzi whose life would be a model of the ‘good’ life, was someone who would be destined for high public office, even rulership. In other words, a well-to-do aristocrat or noble whose wealth and level of affluence made his principal concerns high politics, not the daily struggle for sustenance that concerned the xiaoren (commoner). The spectre of the mutability of fortune and possible fall from grace that may accompany a life in public office, which so concerned ‘Solon’ or rather Herodotus in Greece, does not seem to have disturbed ‘Confucius’ too much, since in his estimation a junzi equipped with the virtues mentioned above could hardly be expected to fail. Even if he did fall victim to some cruel twist of fate like Croesus in Herodotus his life would set a virtuous example to others to imitate rather than dissuade men from aspiring to high office, since even the demise of a virtuous man can be viewed as literally an act of selfsacrifice for the well-being of society and therefore ‘good’ and glorious. The different perspectives that govern the attitudes of ‘Solon’ (Herodotus) and ‘Confucius’ may in some way be conditioned by the political and social milieu in which the two sages were operating. An increasingly democratic Athens needed to assign value to the life of the private citizen, whereas the essentially oligarchic world of Confucius’ China during the Chunqiu period was more concerned with effective

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governance of the masses aimed at increasing the wealth and power of the state and its elite. Fortune or misfortune during a life and what was a ‘good’ life were thus defined differently in the two societies with both texts (the Histories and the Analects) reflecting the socio-economic and political realities of their target audiences.

Notes 1 For an extended discussion of the encounter between Solon and Croesus, see Miller 1963; Schneeweiss 1975; Stahl 1975; Sage 1985; Chiasson 1986; Harrison 2000: 31–63; Grethlein 2010: 188–9. 2 Shapiro 1996:349. 3 Shapiro 1996: 350, 355. See also Pelling 2006: 143, 146, 148. 4 Shapiro 1996: 352. 5 See Harrison 2000: 43–63 for a detailed comparison of these great men in Herodotus. 6 Shapiro (1996), 357. For an excellent analysis of teleology in Herodotus, see Grethlein 2013: 185–223. 7 Grethlein 2013: 199. 8 Laurot 1981: 42–3, argues that the passage can be read differently to imply not Greek superiority, but a barbarian one. This is of course the variant reading, which is accepted as the more likely reading in the Teubner edition of this passage. 9 See Gruen 2011, and also Vlassopoulos 2013:7. 10 For pluralism in Classical Literature, see Apfel 2011. 11 For further discussion on Herodotus’ understanding of Egyptian religion and his theory of cultural diffusion, see Harrison 2000: 182 ff. and 209 ff. 12 See Plutarch’s, On the Malice of Herodotus. 13 Moles 2002: 50. Waters 1971: 94, in contrast, almost alone among his contemporaries, argues that freedom versus tyranny is not the dominant theme or key motivating factor in Herodotus and that it is unnecessary to exaggerate the historian’s hostility to tyranny. See also p.3. 14 Pelling 2002: 126. 15 Moles 2002: 50. 16 Konstan 1987: 60. See also Raaflaub 1987: 242 for an argument similar to Munson’s and Konstan’s. 17 Munson 2005: 4. 18 Waters 1971: 9. 19 Moles 2002: 50. 20 See Lateiner 1989: 172 ff. for a list of the characteristics of the autocrat in Herodotus. 21 For a discussion on this anecdote and its use both in Herodotus and Athenian democratic rhetoric, see Forsdyke 1999: 361–72. 22 Pelling 2002: 154. See also Hart 1982: 65, who points out correctly that Herodotus has no doctrinaire attitude towards tyranny. 23 Herodotus obviously does value what could be called internal freedom within a state, as can be deduced from the passage above. However, references to internal freedom are rare in the Histories and overwhelmingly the freedom that Herodotus discusses is external, the freedom of a state or city from an encroaching outside power. What is ironic in this praise of Athenian freedom is the fact that their new bellicosity and bravery is exemplified not in the context of wars against the barbarian, but as here in the context of conflict with fellow Greeks. See also the predictions of Hippias (5.93).

144 Cultivating a Good Life 24 See Fowler 2003: 305–18. Fowler adopts the view that Herodotus’ view of Athens was shaped by his experiences in the 440s–30s BC when Athenian imperialism was in full swing. For Herodotus’ attitude towards Pericles and Athens, see also Strasburger 1982 and Forsdyke 2006: 228 ff. 25 For a detailed treatment of Athenian imperialism and the role of greed in Herodotus’ narrative, see Balot 2001: 114–35. 26 See Fornara 1971: 66 ff. 27 For further discussion, see Moles 1996: 272 ff. 28 Raaflaub 1987: 244, argues that it is the ultimate greed/pleonexia of wanting to conquer exotic (unreachable) or poverty-stricken (uncivilised) peoples that leads tyrants to disaster. The expansionist policies of democracies in the Histories are not successful either. In the immediate aftermath of Marathon, the democratic hero Miltiades leads a campaign against Paros, which ends in miserable failure (6.132 ff.). 29 For extensive discussion of the closing sections of the Histories, see Dewald 1997: 62–82 and Boedeker 1988: 30–48. 30 Harvey 1966, thinks otherwise, but the context in which the story appears and the account of the Alcmaeonid links to tyrants, seem to validate this analysis. 31 Thomas 1989. Thomas’ chapter on the oral traditions circulating in Athens concerning the Alcmaeonids is particularly revealing. See also Moles 2002: 41. 32 See Waters 1985, for a discussion on Herodotus’ depiction of the Ionian revolt. For Samos see Pelling 2002: 152ff. 33 Bratt 1987: 36. 34 Bratt 1987: 160. 35 Grethlein 2010: 192. 36 For discussion, see Grethlein 2010: 195. 37 The question of whether the Lunyu and other later Confucian literature accurately conveys the original thoughts of Confucius is beyond the parameters of this chapter. It must be pointed out however that the words attributed to Confucius are probably to some extent as generic and context specific as the views expressed by ‘Solon’ in Herodotus. Both are simply the arch-typical sage to whom is attributed ‘ancient wisdom’. 38 Analects 1.1: 3; 4.8: 10. Unless otherwise stated, cited translations are adapted from Leys, S. 2014. The Analects: Confucius. New York. 39 Analects 7.6: 18. 40 Analects, 15.36: 48. 41 Analects, 6.11: 16. 42 Analects 9.27: 26. 43 Analects 16.12: 51. 44 Li 2014. 45 All Chinese texts for The Analects come from Academia Sinica 中央研究院, 漢籍電子文獻, 古漢語語料庫http://hanji.sinica.edu.tw/. 46 Analects 7.11, Legge (trans.) 1972: 198. 47 Analects11.19: 31; Olberding 2013: 422. 48 Li 2014. 49 Li 2014: 173. 50 Analects, 13.9: 37–38. 51 Li 2014. 52 Mencius, 7A23: 149. 53 Other translations of junzi include exemplary person, true gentleman (J. Legge), proper man (E. Pound), and superior man (A. Waley).

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54 Chan 1969: 15. See also Wei 1984 for a list of virtues demonstrated by the six legendary emperors and prime minister. 55 For discussion, see Lu 2015. 56 See Chow 2011, and Li 2010. Li 2014: 72, defines ‘material well-being’ as having more than the basic level of adequate food, clothing, shelter, and medical care. 57 Analects 7.26: 20. All Confucian thinkers, including Mencius and the later Zhu Xi and Wang Yangming share the belief that the ethical ideal can be attained by all through self-cultivation. 58 Lu 2015: 51; Shun 2014: 4–5. 59 Luo 2012: 18; Kramers 2008: 749–50; DiCicco 2003: 8–9. 60 Luo 2012: 16. 61 Analects 1.14: 4; 2.13: 6; 4.24: 12. 62 Analects 15.18–9: 47; 17.23: 54. 63 Analects 4.10: 11; 15.23: 47. 64 Shun 2014: 11; Analects 15.1–2:45. 65 Analects 6.10:16; 11.8, 11.9, 11.10, 11.17: 30–1. 66 Analects 14.38:44; 18.6:56. 67 Analects 15.2:45. 68 Olberding 2013: 424. 69 Analects 15.7: 46; Olberding 2013: 421. 70 Analects 15.7: 46. 71 Analects 15.9:46. 72 Li 2010: 19. 73 See Lu 2015; Chow 2011; Li 2010. 74 Analects 2.14:6; 4.11, 4.16:11; 6.13:16; 7.37:21; 12.16:35; 13.20,13.23, 13.25, 13.26: 39–40; 14.6:41; 14.23:43; 15.2:45; 15.21, 15.34: 47–8; 18.8:50. 75 Lu 2015: 54. 76 Analects 12.19:35; 13.4:37. 77 Tan 2005: 409. 78 Dawson 2000: xxi. 79 Lu 2015: 54–5; Luo 2012: 15; Dawson 1993: xxi. 80 Rainey 2010: 34; Analects 14.4:40; 14.28: 43. 81 Luo 2012: 19. 82 Shun 1997: 56–7. 83 Huang 2010; Mencius 6B1: 132; 6A10:127. 84 For example Analects 15.7: 46; 15.9:46; 15.8:47. Mencius 6A10: 127 later supports this view that between life and justice, he will take justice over life. 85 Nylan 1996: 2–4; Rosemont and Ames 2009: 1. 86 See Mencius 5A: 97–8. 87 Xiao Jing chapter 14, Rosemont and Ames 2009: 113.

References Apfel, L. J. (2011). The Advent of Pluralism: Diversity and Conflict in the Age of Sophocles. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Balot, R. K. (2001). Greed and Injustice in Classical Athens. Princeton: Prince University Press.

146 Cultivating a Good Life Boedeker, D. (1988). ‘Protesilaos and the End of Herodotus’ Histories’, Classical Antiquity, 7 (1): 30–48. Bratt, K. D. (1987). Herodotus’ Oriental Monarchs and their Counsellors. Princeton: Princeton University. Chan, W. (1963). A Source Book in Chinese Philosophy. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Chiasson, C. C. (1986). ‘The Herodotean Solon’, Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies, 27 (3): 249–62. Chow, K. 周国正 (2011). ‘The Definition of junzi and xiaoren by Confucius: A Discussion of a Sentence in the “Analects” (Kongzi duijunziandxiaorende jieding: Cong “lunyu” “wei youxiaorenerrenzhe ye” de jiedushuo qi 孔子对君子与小人的界定 – 从 《论语》'未有小人而仁者也'的解读说起)’, Journal of Peking University, 48 (2): 115–20. Confucius (1972). Confucian Analects, The Great Learning, and The Doctrine of the Mean, trans J. Legge. New York: Dover Publications. Confucius (2014). The Analects of Confucius, trans. S Leys, ed. M. Nylan. New York: W. W. Norton & Company. Dawson, R. (2000). ‘Introduction’, in Confucius: The Analects, vii–xxxii. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Dewald, C. (1997). ‘Wanton Kings, Pickled Heroes, and Gnomic Founding Fathers: Strategies of Meaning at the end of Herodotus’ Histories’, in D. H. Roberts, F. M. Dunn and D. Fowler (eds), Classical Closure, 62–82. Princeton: Princeton University Press. DiCicco, J. E. (2003). ‘The Development of Leaders in Ancient China, Rome, and Persia’, Public Administration Quarterly, 27 (1/2): 6–40. Fornara, C. W. (1971). Herodotus: An Interpretative Essay. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Forsdyke, S. (1999). ‘From Aristocratic to Democratic Ideology and Back Again: The Thrasybulus Anecdote in Herodotus and Aristotle’, Classical Philology, 94 (4): 361–72. Forsdyke, S. (2006). ‘Herodotus, Political History and Political Thought’, in C. Dewald and J. Marincola (eds), The Cambridge Companion to Herodotus. 224–41. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Fowler, R. (2003). ‘Herodotus and Athens’, in P. Derow and R. Parker (eds), Herodotus and his World: Essays from a Conference in Memory of George Forrest, 305–18. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Grethlein, J. (2010). The Greeks and their Past: Poetry, Oratory and History in the Fifth Century BCE. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Grethlein, J. (2013). Experience and Teleology in Ancient Historiography: ‘Futures Past’ from Herodotus to Augustine. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Gruen, E. S. (2011). Rethinking the Other in Antiquity. Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press. Hart, J. (1982). Herodotus and Greek History. London: Croom Helm. Harrison, T. (2000). Divinity and History: The Religion of Herodotus. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Harvey, F. D. (1966). ‘The Political Sympathies of Herodotus’, Historia, 15 (2): 254–5. Huang, Yushun黄玉顺 (2010). ‘Confucius’ Theory of Justice (孔子正义论)’, Academic Journal Graduate School Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (中国社会科学院研究生院学报), 2: 136–44. Konstan, D. (1987). ‘Persians, Greeks and Empire’, in D. Boedeker (ed.), Herodotus and the Invention of History, 59–73 Arethusa 20 (1/2).

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Kramers, R. P. (2008). ‘The Development of the Confucian Schools’, in D. Twitchett and J. K. Fairbank (eds), The Cambridge History of China Volume 1: The Ch’in and Han Empires, 221BC – AD 220, 747–65. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Lateiner, D. (1989). The Historical Method of Herodotus. Toronto and London: University of Toronto Press. Laurot, B. (1981). ‘Idéauxgrecs et barbarie chez Hérodote’, Ktema, 6: 39–48. Leys, S. (2014). The Analects of Confucius. New York: W. W. Norton and Company. Li, C. (2014). ‘Material Well-being and Character Cultivation’, in Chenyang Li and Peimin Ni (eds), Moral Cultivation and Confucian Character: Engaging Joel J. Kupperman, 171–88. New York: SUNY Press. Li, H.-Z. (2010). ‘A Way of “Junzi”: Centred on the Thought about the Junzi (君 子之道―《论语》中的“君子”思想阐发)’, Journal of Chaohu College (巢湖學院學報), 12 (4): 16–19. Lu, C.-H. (2015). ‘The Chinese Way of Goodness’, in S. Hsu and Y.- Y. Wu (eds), Education As Cultivation in Chinese Culture, 45–61. Singapore: Springer. Luo, S. (2012). ‘Confucius’ Virtue Politics: ren as Leadership Virtue’, Asian Philosophy, 2 (1): 15–25. Mencius (2009). Mencius., trans. I. Bloom and P. J. Ivanhoe (ed.). New York: Columbia University Press. Miller, M. (1963). ‘The Herodotean Croesus’, Klio, 41 (1): 89–92. Moles, J. (1996). ‘Herodotus Warns the Athenians’, Papers of the Leeds International Latin Seminar, 9: 259–84. Moles, J. (2002). ‘Herodotus and Athens’, in E. J. Bakker, I. J.F. de Jong and H. van Wees (eds), Brill’s Companion to Herodotus, 33–52. Leiden: Brill. Munson, R. V. (2005). Black Doves speak: Herodotus and the Languages of Barbarians. Cambridge, MA and London: Harvard University Press. Olberding, A. (2013). ‘Confucius’ Complaints and the Analects’ Account of the Good Life’, Dao: A Journal of Comparative Philosophy, 12 (4): 417–40. Pelling, C. (2002). ‘Speech and Action: Herodotus’ Debate on the Constitutions’, Proc. Cambridge Philological Society, 48: 123–58. Pelling, C. (2006). ‘Educating Croesus: Talking and Learning in Herodotus’ Lydian Logos’, Classical Antiquity, 25 (1): 141–77. Raaflaub, K. A. (1987). ‘Herodotus, Political Thought, and the Meaning of History’, in D. Boedeker (ed.), Herodotus and the Invention of History, Arethusa, 20 (1/2): 221–48. Rainey, L. D. (2010). Confucius and Confucianism: The Essentials. Oxford: Wiley- Blackwell. Rosemont, H. Jr. and R. T. Ames (2009). The Chinese Classic of Family Reverence: A Philosophical Translation of the Xiaojing. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press. Available online at: http://www.jstor.org.ezp.lib.unimelb.edu.au/stable/ j.ctt6wqpd9.6 (Accessed 10 June 2016). Sage, P. W. (1985). Solon, Croesus and the Theme of the Ideal Life. Baltimore: University Microfilms International. Schneeweiss, G. (1975). ‘Kroisus und Solon’, in ed. A. Patzer, Apophoreta (Festschrift U. Hölscher), 161–87. Bonn: Habelt. Shapiro, S. O. (1996). ‘Herodotus and Solon’, Classical Antiquity, 15 (2): 348–64. Shun, K. (2014). ‘On Reflective Equanimity – a Confucian Perspective’, in C. Li and P. Ni (eds), Moral Cultivation and Confucian Character: Engaging Joel J. Kupperman 1–25. New York: SUNY Press.

148 Cultivating a Good Life Stahl, H. P. (1975). ‘Learning Through Suffering? Croesus’ Conversation in the History of Herodotus’, Yale Classical Studies, 24: 1–36. Strasburger, H. (1982). ‘Herodot und das PerikleischeAthen’, in W. Schmitthenner and R. Zoepfel (eds), StudienzurAltenGeschichte II 592–626. Hildesheim: G. Olms. Tan, S. (2005). ‘Imagining Confucius: Paradigmatic Characters and Virtue Ethics’, Journal of Chinese Philosophy, 32 (3): 409–26. Thomas, R. (1989). Oral Tradition and Written Record in Classical Athens. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Vlassopoulos, K. (2013). Greeks and Barbarians. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Waters, K. H. (1971). Herodotus on Tyrants and Despots: a Study on Objectivity. Wiesbaden: Steiner. Waters, K. H. (1985). Herodotus the Historian: His Problems, Methods and Originality. London: Croom Helm. Wei, Z. 韋政通 (1984). Ru Jia Yu Xian Dai Zhongguo (儒家與現代中國). Taipei: Dong da tushu gong si (東大圖書公司)

9

Emotion and Self-Cultivation: Marcus Aurelius and Mengzi Jesse Ciccotti

Some general studies have been made comparing Greek and Chinese theories of emotion, and several recent studies have compared Stoic and Ruist (Confucian) philosophy. There has yet to be a comparison of Stoic and Ruist views of emotion and its relationship to self-cultivation, despite the centrality of this issue for both philosophical schools. In this chapter I shall compare the views of emotion and their relationship to self-cultivation in the Meditations by Marcus Aurelius (121–180 AD) and the Mengzi by Mengzi (372–289 BC).

Marcus Aurelius Marcus Aurelius is consistent with the broader Stoic tradition in his basic orientation towards the affective life of humans.1 According to the general Stoic theory, affective experience comes in two types which I will distinguish by calling the first ‘passions’ (pathē), and the second ‘emotions’ (eupatheiai, literally, good passions).2

Marcus on passions A number of metaphors employed by Marcus reveal the negative perspective he shares with the Stoic tradition towards passions. In the Med. 2.16 passions are a disease that requires a cure.3 Passionate responses to external impressions turn a person into ‘an abscess and a sort of morbid outgrowth on the universe.’4 Again, in 4.29 this is likened to cutting oneself off from universal nature similar to amputating a limb, or politically speaking, becoming a fugitive. And in 10.25, 11.9, and 11.20 yielding to passions is akin to acting like a runaway slave or a deserter, and again, cutting oneself off from nature (11.20). In 10.25 and 11.20 three key passions are repeated as a cluster: distress (lupas), fear (phobous), and anger (orgas). Anger is not mentioned by early Stoics as one of the four primary categories of passions,5 but was emphasised by later Roman Stoics such as Cicero, Seneca, and Epictetus, so it is not surprising to see Marcus adopt it here. Why were passions so negatively viewed by

150 Cultivating a Good Life Marcus and other Stoics? An answer to this question is found in the Stoic pursuit of the good life. The Stoic end or goal of life as formulated by Cleanthes (331–232 BC), the second head of the Stoa, is ‘living in agreement with nature’ (homologoumenōs tē phusei zēn).6 Marcus recognises this idea in 3.4, and gives another rendering of it in 1.9 and 12.1 as ‘living according to nature’ (kata phusin zēn).7 The Stoics held to a physical monist view of the universe in which reason (logos) is the prime matter composing all discrete parts of a hierarchical universe, differentiated by the ‘tenor’ (hexis) of ‘spirit’ (pneuma) they are endowed with. Humans, occupying the highest position (shared with the gods) within this hierarchy, are endowed with the highest ‘tenor’ of spirit which is also called reason, such that they can choose to act in accordance with or against universal nature (the gods always act according to nature and therefore do not share this ‘freedom’ with humans). Biologically, this concentration of pneuma is in the heart, and Marcus uses three different terms to refer to this rational faculty which guides human action: ruling faculty (hēgemonikon), mind (nous; often dianoia as a faculty), and guardian-spirit (diamōn).8 By allowing one’s rational faculty to guide one’s actions, a person could, theoretically, direct all actions to follow the lead of the greater whole of which one is a part. The whole (universal nature) is also guided by a rational and ruling faculty, just as a human body is guided by its own rational faculty (a microcosm of the macrocosm). Following the rational guidance of one’s own ruling faculty is, therefore, living in agreement with nature (7.11). Passions are impulse-initiated judgements made by the rational faculty which are improper or irrational, meaning they are judgements that are not in alignment with universal nature. Marcus plays with several metaphors to describe how this occurs. In 2.10, anger is a turning of one’s back on reason (logon) due to some distress (lupēs) or unnoticed contraction of the ruling faculty,9 and desire (epithumian) is the result of the overpowering influence of pleasure (hēdonēs). Similarly, in 3.4 and 3.6 great power is attributed to the passions and the enticements of the senses to overthrow or seize control and carry us away. The only protection we have is found in the ruling faculty (hēgemonikon), which is described in 8.48 as a mighty citadel, impregnable against the assaults of the passions, so long as we retreat into it. Finally, if we were still in any doubt as to the nature and moral quality of passions, in 11.18 Marcus identifies them as the opposite of virtues, distress, and anger being weaknesses, wounds, and a surrender to an implied enemy.

Marcus on emotions So far we have covered only half of the territory of human affective experience. Marcus admired his teacher Sextus not only for seeming to be ‘completely free of passion’ (apathestaton) but also ‘full of affection (philostorgotaton) for his fellow human beings’ (1.9). Contrary to the prevailing misunderstanding that a Stoic sage is void of affective experience (stemming from the pursuit of being ‘without passion,’ apatheia), a good Stoic should have a vibrant affective life. Marcus does not refer to any of the three primary emotions of joy (chara), caution (eulabeia), or wish/desire (boulēsis) more commonly referred to in other Stoic texts. That does not mean he lacks vocabulary to

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express positive affective experience (eupatheiai) articulated in his own idiosyncratic and thoroughly creative way. A number of key terms appear throughout the Meditations indicating Marcus’s high regard for emotion. In the Med. 6.30 Marcus lists four of the six most commonly recurring emotions: affectionate love (philon), satisfaction (arkoumenos), graciousness or kindliness (eumenē), and simplicity (haploun). Two more commonly mentioned emotions are freedom (eleutheros) and gratefulness (hilaos).10 Satisfaction and simplicity are relatively easy to explain within Marcus’s broader philosophical outlook, both referring to a person’s rational engagement in the providential ordering of the rational universe. Satisfaction and gratefulness both indicate a willing acceptance of the destiny or fate that the sovereign deity has handed to a person (e.g. 2.3, 8.32, 8.45). Satisfaction also relates to one’s own actions, as long as they accord with nature (e.g. 3.12). Simplicity refers to a way of life in accordance with nature and unhindered by irrational or incorrect judgements (e.g. 4.37). Freedom is experienced when a person is unhindered by passions and is an emotion that arises as the result of properly exercising the power of the ruling faculty (e.g. 6.16, 8.48). One of the more richly employed terms expressing emotion in the Meditations is kindliness, which indicates a proper response to circumstances brought about by nature (e.g. 4.25, 8.43, 8.47), or a proper response to other human agents falling short of the goal of living in agreement with nature (e.g. 7.3, 8.51). Finally, the crowning emotion is affectionate love. Affectionate love seems to be the predominant emotion for Marcus, taking as its object universal nature and whatever nature brings about (3.16, 4.23, 4.36, 7.57, 10.21, 12.1), one’s own nature (5.1, 7.13), other human agents and their actions (2.13, 6.39, 7.22, 7.31, 9.27, 11.1, 11.9), and grows from philosophy and the benefits that come through practicing it (4.31, 5.9). If this is the affective landscape of humans according to Marcus, what suggestions or proposals does he make for getting a person from experiencing passions to experiencing emotions? How do we cultivate affective experience that leads to the good life? How can we be healed of the disease of passions and nurture emotions in our lives?

Marcus on cultivating emotions In Med. 3.9 Marcus says, ‘Venerate your faculty of judgment (hupolēptikēn). For it depends entirely on this that there should never arise in your ruling centre (hēgemonikōi) any judgment that fails to accord with nature or with the constitution of a rational being.’ This is quite simple to assert, but much more difficult to achieve – and Marcus is not ignorant of this. In fact, the entire text of the Meditations can be considered an exercise in therapeutic self-cultivation (Hadot 1998: 35–53). The form we see throughout the whole of the Meditations is called ‘notes’ (hypomnēmata) or memory aides.11 The basic form of the exercise is to record foundational principles or doctrines (dogmata) which a person could refer to again and again, reinforcing their truths in a person’s memory. In this way they would become the default mode of viewing the world. This mode of rationalised mind-renewal – correcting wrong thinking12 through meditative writing – is intended to heal the soul. This is exactly what we find in the Meditations, a series of doctrines of varying lengths repeated at

152 Cultivating a Good Life irregular intervals, intended to help Marcus control his inner discourse. But the text of the Meditations is not the final word on self-cultivation activities that nurture a healthy soul. Within the context of the broader exercise of note-writing, a number of other practices are delineated that an observant reader will discover. One of the most important habits that will help a person overcome the power of passions is keeping a fixed attention. Several practices assist in establishing this habit. One is to mentally set something before one’s eyes (7.58, 10.27, 10.33). Another practice is the repeated encouragement to oneself to keep fixed attention on an ‘aim,’ an ‘end,’ (skopos, telos) or a ‘purpose’ (eikēi) (e.g. 2.16, 5.14–5.16).13 One way to accomplish this is through a form of ‘self-talk’ that recurs very often throughout the Meditations (e.g. 5.28).14 In the Med. 8.29 he says, ‘Wipe out vain impressions (phantasias) by continually telling yourself, “It now rests with me to make sure that no wickedness, or appetite, or disquiet should exist within this soul of mine”’. Other passages exhibit an internal conversation that goes on in his thoughts, debating a matter: And likewise, if you are distressed because you are failing to accomplish some particular action which strikes you as sound, why do you not persist in the action rather than yield to the distress? ‘But something too strong for me is blocking my way’. Then you should not be distressed, because the responsibility for your failure to act does not rest with you. – ‘But my life is not worth living if this act is left undone’. – Then depart from life with generous feelings in your heart. (8.47)

The Med. 8.29 quoted above also illustrates another mode of mind-renewal, that of exhortative exclamation reminiscent of Buddhist psychological shock techniques.15 One of Marcus’s favourites is ‘Wipe out vain impressions (phantasias)!’ that we saw in 8.29 (see also: 5.2, 7.17, 7.29, 9.7). Another helpful practice is to remember and continually repeat to oneself correct doctrines (e.g. 2.9, 10.6, 12.26). As I mentioned earlier, the whole of the Meditations is an exercise in this practice. These doctrines are like a doctor’s ‘knives and instruments’ that should be always ‘at hand to deal with urgent cases’ (3.13), for it is in these principles that life is found (7.2). In all of these self-cultivation practices a single theme emerges of a focus on the ruling faculty and its ability to make proper judgements (e.g. 2.12, 8.47, 8.49, 9.13, 9.15). Critical to making proper judgements is actualising another of Marcus’s repeated exhortations, preservation of the purity or autonomy of his ruling faculty (e.g. 3.6, 4.22, 5.26, 9.7). The power of this faculty is so immense it can turn even hindrances to developing virtue into benefit or advantage (e.g. 4.1, 5.20, 6.50, 7.2, 8.35, 10.33), so long as a person exercises it with ‘reservation’ (4.1). The action of the ruling faculty, when exercised, is to analyse things to see them as they really are. Marcus often refers to this as seeing a thing ‘stripped down to its essence,’ enabling a person to see the world ‘as a whole and in its parts’ (3.11; cf. 6.13, 12.2, 12.8).16 Keenly aware of his own weaknesses and propensity to give in to passions (e.g. 11.18), Marcus offers a final encouragement to anyone who has not fully lived up to the Stoic ideal. The Med. 8.34 is an excellent, if not a little grotesque, picture of what is possible if someone pursues self-cultivation. The limb that cuts itself off from universal nature through indulging the passions can be reattached! And an even greater gift

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of God is the ‘power not to be broken away from the whole in the first place.’ While this looks positive, in a more benign metaphor of grafting a branch into a tree in 11.8 Marcus raises a rather puzzling point. He says, ‘if this process of separation is often repeated, it becomes difficult for the part that withdraws to reunite with the others and recover its place.’ He goes on to indicate that a branch which has never been cut from the tree is ‘not at all the same as that which has been grafted onto it again after being cut off, whatever the gardeners may tell you,’ so he encourages himself not to cut himself off in the first place. Marcus does not offer a lot of hope to people who find themselves repeatedly failing to uphold the impossibly high ideals of the Stoics, and we might be left wondering how we ourselves might survive. Yet, in spite of this negative comment, the majority of Marcus’s injunctions to himself do not share this deeply pessimistic outlook. Rather, we are led to believe that our efforts at self-cultivation will one day pay off, and we will enjoy the peace of mind and quietness of heart that the Stoics call a ‘smooth flow of life,’ as Marcus says in 5.2, ‘How easy it is to repel and wipe away every disturbing or inappropriate thought, and recover at once a perfect calm.’

Mengzi Mengzi on emotion The Mengzi contains a rich variety of terms expressing affective experience. Some of the most commonly recurring terms are joy (le 樂), desire (yu 欲), pleasure (yue 悅), love (ai 愛), like (hao 好), and dislike (wu 惡). The same full range of emotions is experienced by the common person and the sage alike, and Mengzi does not differentiate emotions as good and bad. Instead of evaluating emotions themselves,17 he evaluates the agent, emphasising that the difference between the common person and the sage (or the morally cultivated person) is the object of the agent’s affections, not the emotion they experience. One clear instance of this is 1A:7. King Xuan of Qi reportedly sees an ox being led to a sacrificial slaughter. His compassion is aroused by the terrified expression of the animal and asks it to be traded for a sheep, which he has not seen. Mengzi points out that the not-unsympathetic feeling (buren 不忍) that King Xuan experienced is the very same feeling that ought to be leading him to care for his people (bao min 保民). The problem is that he is not taking his people as an object for his affective sensitivities. Although he was caught off guard by the sight of the pitiable ox which led to a spontaneous compassionate response, the general focus of his heart-mind (xin 心) is on fulfilling his own desires for other things – such as glory that comes through war, sensory satisfaction (through food, sex, or good music), and being served – preventing his natural ability to act compassionately towards his people. That Mengzi is not opposed to these other desires is clear from other discussions Mengzi has with King Xuan in 1B:1–5. Mengzi never criticises King Xuan for having desires which King Xuan uses as excuses for not ruling for the good of his people; Mengzi merely points out that King Xuan is not allowing the people to satisfy the same desires. What seems clear is that Mengzi’s purpose is to redirect the gaze of the agent through affective experience towards proper goals. What, then, are emotions according to Mengzi?

154 Cultivating a Good Life I will take 2A:2 as a starting point, which will give us a means for understanding the general field of emotion from Mengzi’s point of view, as well as the linkage between emotion and self-cultivation. There is an essential, complex, and reciprocal relationship between three aspects of a person related to emotion in Mengzi’s nascent philosophical anthropology described at length in 2A:2, namely the heart-mind, the will (zhi 志), and vital energy (qi 氣). The heart-mind is the seat of human intellect and emotion. The will is the heart-mind moving in a particular direction.18 Vital energy is the lifesustaining material composing all things, sometimes associated with breath or air,19 filling the human body and particularly concentrated in the physical heart. Because Mengzi rarely refers to vital energy, and because it is not explained in 2A:2, a brief note on widespread notions of vital energy in the pre-Qin period will help draw a link between vital energy and emotions. The Zuo Zhuan 左傳, a text generally accepted to precede Mengzi’s time, explains that movements of vital energy in a person give rise to emotions.20 The two most basic emotions are like and dislike; from these two basic emotions come other emotions, such as anger from disliking and pleasure from liking. Earlier in the Zuo Zhuan (Legge 2010: 573, 581) it is explained that excesses or deficiencies of vital energy results in physical disease. This does not imply that emotions are themselves diseases, but it at least indicates that uncontrolled vital energy is something to be avoided. Control of vital energy comes through regulation (jie 節), and this example in the Zuo Zhuan refers to the music of the ancients as a means to regulate all other matters.21 If we accept that this conception of vital energy and its relationship to emotions continued to hold currency in Mengzi’s day, then we can reasonably conclude that emotions are the responses of vital energy in a person to internal and external stimuli. A movement of the heart-mind can move vital energy and produce an emotion. In addition to this, things considered to be outside the boundaries of a person can also move a person’s vital energy, also producing emotion.

Mengzi on cultivation With the above in mind we return to 2A:2, where Mengzi says that the will is the commander (shuai 帥) over vital energy. If the will is focused, ‘bottled up,’22 or concentrated (yi 壹), it has the power to command vital energy. At the same time, vital energy, if focused (yi), can also move or control the will. As our inner vital energy interacts with and responds to external stimuli it can move the heart-mind, but our vital energy does not itself have a natural moral direction. To support this claim Mengzi cites the example of running causing involuntary breathing (qi) and the (physical) heart to pound.23 That means external stimuli will inevitably influence the vital energy in its own preferred direction, such as food generating a desire called hunger, or a woman’s beauty generating a desire for sex – that is, something external causing an internal movement. If a person relies only on their vital energy for direction they will lack a guiding principle and will appear animal-like, pursuing each desire as it arises.24 However, if a person focuses their will they can control their vital energy, and in this way they will maintain a more stable disposition, able to exercise some degree of control over their behaviour and emotions. This explains why Mengzi, citing

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the examples of Meng Ben, Beigong You, and Meng Shishe in 2A:2 using their will to control their vital energy in order to generate courage, says there was something admirable in their effort – their vital energy was not allowed to run wild and they were confident in their choice (regardless of whether it was moral or not). However, their efforts are inferior to Zengzi’s, Gaozi’s, and Mengzi’s efforts because they lacked a clear moral direction, and because they should ‘not [use the will to] abuse their vital energy’ (wubao qi qi 無暴其氣). The former three persons may have been able to control their vital energy by force, but Mengzi says there is a better way followed by Zengzi, Gaozi, and himself, which is to be led by things that have a moral direction. This is where Mengzi parts ways with Gaozi. They are in agreement that vital energy – the well-spring of emotion – lacks a moral direction, so it cannot be trusted to guide a person’s life. Two other elements in 2A:2 have a moral direction, which Mengzi and Gaozi both rely on. Gaozi’s preference is for ‘doctrines’ (yan 言),25 and Mengzi’s preference is for the heart-mind. Gaozi, as quoted by Mengzi, says ‘If you do not get it [rightness] from doctrines, do not look for it in your heart-mind. And if you do not get it in your heart-mind, do not look for it in your vital energy.’ We have already determined that vital energy does not have a moral direction, so Mengzi approves of the second part of the maxim – you will not find reliable direction for moral feeling and action in your vital energy. Gaozi indicates by the first part of the maxim that morality or rightness is to be found in doctrines which presumably do not originate from within oneself, from a person’s heart-mind. This accords with his statement in 6A:4 that rightness is external. If rightness comes from doctrines that indicate right behaviour (such as treating an elder as an elder), then these doctrines must be forced on one’s heart-mind so that it inclines in a moral direction (6A:1–2). This is Gaozi’s form of self-cultivation.26 This also explains why Gaozi says ‘do not bother looking for moral direction in your heart-mind if you cannot find it in doctrines.’ He does not believe it can be found there – it must be put there through correct doctrines (Nivison 1996: 125–6). Mengzi is critical of this violent approach to cultivation, calling it ‘mutilation’ (Lau’s translation of qiangzei 戕賊; 6A:1). He believes that rightness is internal, that an inclination towards what is moral is present in a person’s heart-mind before doctrines even enter the picture. This is because the heart-mind has its own natural preference (direction) for rightness (yi 義, 6A:7). In spontaneous moments, such as the example of King Xuan’s emotional response to seeing the ox or the impulse experienced by someone seeing a child about to fall into a well (2A:6), this natural preference is subtly revealed. But these sporadic revealing moments are insufficient to bring the nascent sprouts to full bloom. That is why we are not told that the person actually goes to rescue the child. And it is also why Mengzi points out that King Xuan’s heart-mind is sufficient to enable him to become the leader of the feudal states (a True King), despite the fact that he has not been doing what is right. If the heart-mind has this internal natural preference or inclination towards morality, how does Mengzi propose cultivating it so that it becomes an unstoppable force like a fire consuming wood or a spring bursting forth (2A:6)? First, Mengzi is aware that the human heart-mind and vital energy do not start out with robust strength. Starting in a condition of weakness, they are highly susceptible to external influence. Such is the state of the young boy trying to learn the language of

156 Cultivating a Good Life Qi in 3B:6. With everyone around him shouting in the language of Chu, how would he learn to speak Qi? It is similar for plants left in the cold for ten days and the warm sun for one day. We should not be surprised that they wither (6A:9). After enough damage is done, a man’s heart-mind will resemble the barrenness of Ox Mountain (6A:8), the fragile sprouts completely eradicated. Mengzi is indicating that a person needs to take notice of his or her environment and avoid (or prevent, where there is responsibility, as with a ruler) situations which would be harmful to the healthy growth of the heartmind and vital energy. Other environmental concerns include sufficient economic support in the case of the common people, and good moral education (1A:7, 3A:3), without which a person will be overwhelmed by basic bodily concerns – the siren call of vital energy influenced by external things – and neglect moral effort. Second, if the vital energy is not nourished and strengthened through consistent practice of rightness (2A:2), a person will not have the courage to face opposition to their choice for right action.27 This is why Mengzi encourages the nourishment of a certain kind of vital energy often translated as ‘flood-like qi’ (haoran zhi qi 浩然之氣). This particular kind of vital energy is nourished by acts of rightness, and starves when we do not act according to the standard set by our heart-mind. If a person is consistent in practicing the rightness whispered at by their heart-mind, their vital energy will grow to immense proportions and provide needed strength to continue to pursue the right course, even when the heart-mind wants to give out. Third, Mengzi encourages King Xuan to push outward or extend (tui 推) his kindness (en 恩) to his people.28 The king has demonstrated that his heart-mind has a ‘taste’ for kindness (6A:7; see also, Chan 2002: 59–60) and that this is sufficient to act morally. What needs to be developed is not his emotional sensitivities to the needs of his people, because these occur naturally; what the king needs to do is act on the emotions generated by his heart-mind, which he has already experienced. Quite similarly, in 2A:6 Mengzi develops his famous theory of the four sprouts of the heart-mind. These are emotional expressions of moral sensitivities every human possesses by virtue of being human, similar to the eye’s ability to see or the ear’s ability to hear (6A:15). While there is no space to argue for it here, I suggest that chong 充 in the final two sentences of 2A:6 is better rendered ‘carry out,’ rather than the more common rendering of ‘develop.’29 This fits with Mengzi’s claim in 1A:7 that the king needs to extend the not-unsympathetic feeling (buren 不忍) he already has. These emotional whispers of the heart-mind do not need developing,30 they need to be acted on or carried out. Finally, in 6A:15 Mengzi explains that each person is endowed with greater and lesser ‘parts’ (ti 體), which are correlated with greater and lesser ‘organs’ (guan 官). The stimulation of sense organs appeals directly to a person’s vital energy, bypassing a person’s faculty of thinking (si 思). But the heart-mind, a second kind of organ, is able to think. By exercising this faculty, the heart-mind is able to acquire its object (cf. 6A:6 and 7A:3), which we have already identified as morality. Rather than focusing on one’s emotional responses, which would be a focus on the expressions of vital energy, Mengzi directs our attention to keeping priorities straight and focusing one’s attention on what is most important (6A:10, 6A:12), the subtle movements of the heart-mind. As Mengzi’s example of two people learning to play weiqi 圍棋 in 6A:9 attests, unless one is intently focused on the correct object (zhuan xin zhi zhi 專心致志), it can only be

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counted as sporadic attempts similar to leaving plants in the sun for one day – failure is certain.

Comparison Numerous points of comparison may already be apparent to the reader. Here I will highlight several of the most significant points and indicate where further research has the potential to open up deeper convergences and diversities between Marcus and Mengzi on emotion and self-cultivation, and beyond. First, Mengzi does not attach moral significance to any particular emotion(s) or divide emotions into categories of good and bad, as we find in Marcus specifically and the Stoics generally. This is the most significant difference between Marcus’s and Mengzi’s views of emotion, and it is difficult to conceive of a work-around that might enable us to come to some sort of synthetic solution that both Marcus and Mengzi could accept. One example is the issue of anger. Marcus is adamant that anger never leads to a positive outcome and should be avoided or eradicated in all situations. Mengzi clearly considers anger that takes an appropriate object to be a very positive emotional response to a negative situation (1B:3). This brings up a second difference that cannot be covered comprehensively here and requires a deeper exploration. Marcus’s philosophy of emotion is deeply embedded in his cosmology, ontology, and physics, in short, a monism, that is not shared with Mengzi.31 This underlying philosophical position makes the resulting conclusion regarding the emotions all but inevitable. Is it possible for Marcus to give up his underlying substantive claims about humans and the universe and still achieve his goal of a life lived according to nature? Would a deeper exploration into Mengzi’s views of the Dao, Heaven, vital energy, and the human psycho-physical composition reveal a deeper confluence with Marcus’s ideas, and might lead to a reinterpretation of the source and experience of emotions from what I have offered here? A third significant difference is evident in Marcus’s and Mengzi’s approaches to cultivation. Mengzi regards rightness as internal to a person’s heart-mind, in contrast to Gaozi’s claim that it is found in doctrines (yan) that are external. Mengzi’s criticism of Gaozi’s claim, that Gaozi’s method requires an abuse of his vital energy by forcing himself to do what is right, might appear to apply equally well to Marcus’s methods for self-cultivation. Marcus certainly favours repeating doctrines! However, this assessment is complicated by the second difference pointed out earlier. Doctrines (dogmata) for Marcus are exact emanations of universal reason, resonating with the logos of his own ruling faculty, so that repeating these doctrines to himself promotes an internal–external correspondence, bringing his internal logos into conformity with the ‘external,’ universal logos. While Mengzi acknowledges a form of internal–external correspondence (7A:1), whether or not doctrines (yan) somehow correspond to Heaven (tian) or a heavenly principle in Mengzi’s philosophy would require deeper investigation. Such a connection might be more readily apparent in a comparison with Zhu Xi’s Principle-centred Learning (lixue 理學).

158 Cultivating a Good Life Without minimising the significance of these differences, some of the similarities in their positions may be instructive for contemporary considerations of the human endeavour of self-cultivation. First, Marcus and Mengzi both hold to a view that is highly confident in the locus of human action. For Marcus this is the ruling faculty (hēgemonikon), for Mengzi the heart-mind (xin).32 Contemporary Anglo-European traditions typically separate the faculty that generates emotions from the faculty that generates intellect, and reason is often considered to be at odds with emotion, each battling for supremacy (historically this may be traced back to Plato’s psychology in the Phaedrus 246a–254e). Marcus and Mengzi both reject this dichotomy, insisting that one and the same faculty produces thought and emotion. What is most important for both views is that this control-centre for humans is powerful enough to overcome negative external influences. Marcus is supremely confident, so that he claims even obstacles or hindrances can be turned into assistance in self-cultivation, converting unacceptable passions into sanctifying emotions. Mengzi is a little more hesitant to ascribe benefit to external obstacles, but he still maintains that the heart-mind can overcome obstacles in its path. Central for both views, too, is the importance of maintaining a focus or fixed attention on the correct object. Marcus continually reasserts the importance of maintaining a correct aim, and Mengzi repeatedly urges us to consider and not lose sight of proper objects suggested by the heart-mind. This seems to be the root of cultivation for Marcus and Mengzi. Marcus may give many more practical suggestions for how to maintain a correct aim, whereas Mengzi is more concerned with broadstroke schemes for convincing others that the power to change can be found within themselves. But for both it comes back to proper attention paid to the higher priority of a moral orientation that resides in us, and is not added from or found outside of our inner self.

Notes 1 Troels Engberg-Pedersen (1998) has written on Marcus’s view of emotion, attempting to “forget about his relationship with [Marcus’s] philosophical predecessors,” allowing him to speak for himself. While this is in some ways helpful in highlighting Marcus’s unique contributions, Engberg-Pedersen cannot help but refer to the Stoic tradition regarding emotion at times, and an unintended result of this approach is that he fails to fully acknowledge the debt Marcus owes to his philosophical forebears and the genuine connections that exist. 2 Some scholars prefer “emotions” and “good emotions” to reflect the similarity between the Greek terms, but I find “passion” works well in English to bring out the excessive nature of pathē, as described in many early Stoic fragments. See LS I 65 (this notation refers to Long 1987, volume I, text section 65. Some texts will include a letter, further specifying the passage). 3 See also Cicero’s Tusculan Disputations 4.23–27, where he calls passion a “disease of the mind” (aegrotationes animi). 4 All quotations are from Hard 2011, and references follow book and chapter format.

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5 That does not mean it would not fit under one of the four main categories, the other two being appetite (epithumia) and pleasure (hēdonē). Pleasure is mentioned often in the Meditations, quite commonly alongside pain (ponos), but in those contexts it seems to refer not to a passion but to a sense impression. For the most in-depth analysis Marcus offers of pleasure and pain, see 9.1. 6 See LS I 63B, see LS I 63C, and note to line 6 of the Greek text in LS II, 390 (this notation refers to Long 1987, volume II, page 390) for a conflicting view of the phrase’s origin presented by Diogenes Laertius 7.87–89. 7 We might also count 4.39 as an acknowledgement of this axiom, but the phrasing is slightly different: kata phusin biounti. 8 These are three terms to describe the same thing. Unlike other views that take the inner-most guiding faculty of a human to be divided (as in Plato’s description of the soul in Book IV of the Republic), the Stoics regarded it as a unitary whole. 9 For more on contraction, see Galen’s comments in LS I 65D. It is worth noting that Galen was Marcus’s medical doctor for a time. 10 Another possible additional term is ethelō, meaning wish or will, but Marcus’s use of it is ambiguous. At times it is positive, and at times negative, so I have not included it for analysis here. 11 Marcus himself depreciatingly calls them hypomnēmatia, “little notes”. See Ceporina 2012: 45. 12 The idea that if we know the good we will do it originates with Socrates, and is a keystone of Stoic ethics. See Gorgias 509e and the Republic 413a. Marcus indicates his familiarity with these passages in 7.63. 13 The final term is usually used negatively, as in 12.20: “Firstly, never act at random (eikē)…” or in 8.17: “For nothing should be done without a purpose (eikē).” 14 In my own reading I counted 40 passages that deliberately employ this practice. 15 For example, Mazu Daoyi’s (馬祖道一 709–788 AD) unpredictable behaviours meant to shock students into enlightenment. 16 Several scholars have called this “the view from above.” See Rutherford 1989: 155–61; Engberg-Pedersen 1998: 311–21; and Hadot 1995: 175–7. 17 One passage in which Mengzi appears to evaluate emotions is 7B:35. Mengzi sets up a contrast between desires and the contents of the heart-mind. As I will show below, this amounts to not allowing one’s vital energy to have control, but to focus one’s energy on the heart-mind. Then desires will follow their proper course. 18 That does not make it a faculty of the heart-mind. See Shun 1997: 66–7. 19 See 6A:7 and 7A:36. These are the only two passages besides 2A:2 that mention qi, and in both contexts qi is better rendered “air” rather than “vital energy.” A. C. Graham has commented that the primary sense of qi in its older sense “is like such words in other cultures as Greek pneuma ‘wind, air, breath’.” Graham 1989: 101. A much more extensive investigation is required before this can be substantiated. 20 See Legge 2010: 704, 708; I am indebted to Chan 2002 for this and the following reference. 21 It should be mentioned that these passages in the Zuo Zhuan refer to six qi, not one. Chan 2002: 51 points out that this can be reconciled through a reference in Zhuangzi implying that there was an original energy from which the six are derived. 22 Chan 2002: 48. He derives this translation from a Shuowen jiezi 說文解字 explanation. 23 We should not forget that the physical heart is closely tied to the heart-mind. 24 Ironically, most animals exercise more self-control than many humans. 25 For this translation, see Nivison 1996: 127–8.

160 Cultivating a Good Life 26 Interestingly, Gaozi’s understanding of self-cultivation differs little from Xunzi’s. 27 For examples of courage to act rightly in the face of intense pressure, see 3B:1, 5B:7, and 6A:10. The courage of the crown prince, Shi Zi of Teng, in 3A:2 is worthy of special mention. When his father died, all his advisers challenged his desire to follow the proper rites, even citing ancient sources for their positions. After consulting Mengzi, the prince decided to follow what he knew was right, and the people who came to mourn expressed great delight at his proper conduct. 28 For a helpful, full-length comparison of Mengzi’s tui and Stoic oikeiōsis, see King 2015. 29 See Chan 1963: 65 and Lau 2003: 73 for ‘develop.’ Ivanhoe/Van Norden 2005: 129–30, Van Norden 2008: 45–7 render it ‘fill out.’ Bloom 2009: 35 comes closest to ‘carry out’ by rendering chong as ‘bring to fulfilment.’ My suggestion for this rendering is further strengthened when chong is used similarly in other contexts. See 3B:10, 5B:4, and 7B:31. 30 Here I am in agreement with Im 1999: 3. 31 King 2015: 358–61 has also touched on this in his conclusion, but no one has yet attempted the comparison. 32 Surprisingly (or perhaps not), they both locate this faculty biologically in the heart. A comparison between traditional forms of medicine and human biology, GraecoRoman and Chinese, might yield surprising results, and could even highlight differences in the historical development of medicine in these two geographic locations. It might also encourage the recovery of lost medical wisdom in the Graeco-Roman tradition that traditional Chinese medicine has managed to retain.

References Bloom, I. (2009). Mencius, ed. P. J. Ivanhoe. New York: Columbia University Press. Ceporina, M. (2012). ‘The Meditations’, in M. van Ackeren (ed.), A Companion to Marcus Aurelius, 45–61. Oxford: Blackwell. Chan, A. K. L. (2002). ‘A Matter of Taste: Qi (Vital Energy) and the Tending of the Heart (Xin) in Mencius 2A2’, in A. K. L. Chan (ed.), Mencius: Contexts and Interpretations, 42–71. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press. Chan, W. (1963). A Sourcebook in Chinese Philosophy. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Engberg-Pedersen, T. (1998). ‘Marcus Aurelius on Emotions’, in J. Sihvola and T. EngbergPedersen (eds), The Emotions in Hellenistic Philosophy, 305–37. Dordrecht: Springer. Graham, A. C. (1989). Disputers of the Tao: Philosophical Arguments in Ancient China. La Salle: Open Court Press. Hadot, P. ([1987] 1995). Philosophy as a Way of Life: Spiritual Exercises from Socrates to Foucault, trans. M. Chase. Oxford: Blackwell. Hadot, P. ([1992] 1998). The Inner Citadel, trans. M. Chase. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Hard, R. (2011). Marcus Aurelius: Meditations with Selected Correspondence. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Im, M. (1999). ‘Emotional Control and Virtue in the “Mencius”’, Philosophy East and West, 49 (1): 1–27. Ivanhoe, P. J. and W. B. Van Norden (2005). Readings in Classical Chinese Philosophy. 2nd ed. Indianapolis: Hackett.

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King, R. A. H. (2015). ‘Mencius and the Stoics – tui and oikeiōsis’, in R. A. H. King (ed.), The Good Life and Conceptions of Life in Early Graeco-Roman Antiquity, 341–62. Berlin: de Gruyter. Lau, D. C. (2003). Mencius, A Bilingual Edition. Revised ed. Hong Kong: Chinese University Press. Legge, J. ([1872] 2010). The Chinese Classics: Volume 5 – The Ch’un Ts’ew with the Tso Chuen. Shanghai: East China Normal University Press. Long, A. A. and D. N. Sedley (1987). The Hellenistic Philosophers, Vol. I and II. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Nivison, D. (1996). The Ways of Confucianism: Investigations in Chinese Philosophy, ed. B. Van Norden. Chicago: Open Court Press. Rutherford, R. B. (1989). The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius: A Study. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Shun, K. (1997). Mencius and Early Chinese Thought. Stanford: Stanford University Press. van Norden, B. (2008). Mengzi, with Selections from Traditional Commentaries. Indianapolis: Hackett.

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Dislodging Mundane Wisdom: The Inner Chapters of the Zhuangzi and the New Testament Gospels Lauren F. Pfister

Categories and themes of ‘instruction interactions’ What will be done in the following paragraphs is an initial attempt to re-categorise some of the major kinds of interactions found in both the Inner Chapters of the Zhuangzi [庄子] and the Four Gospels, especially as they point us towards choices that lead to counter-cultural expressions of wisdom and new forms of whole-person cultivation. Afterwards, I will explore more systematically the nature of that transformative wisdom found in each text, and elaborate in more detail the linkage between choosing that alternative form of wisdom and its attendant expression in specific kinds of wholeperson cultivation. In this manner I hope to underscore the significance of all that has been accomplished by this comparative study, especially the innovative results that it has presented.

Categories of ‘instruction interactive texts’ Defoort’s important paper dealing with ‘instruction dialogues’ (Defoort 2012) faces a significant categorisation problem: the example she chose from chapter 7 of the Inner Chapters [Ying Di Wang 養帝王] involves three persons in what we might refer to as a plura-logue, and not just two persons in a dialogue. It is not simply an interaction between a ‘master’ and a ‘disciple,’ but something more dynamic and complicated, and yet all still written down for the sake of ‘instruction’. What is actually present in that interaction (and is adequately described by Defoort in her paper) is a special kind of ‘plura-logue,’ one where two alternative forms of wisdom and their attendant practices of cultivation are presented and assessed, leading to an experiential affirmation of a Zhuangzian account of sagely wisdom. In fact, within the Inner Chapters there are only two such plura-logues. Following Defoort’s precedent, I will refer to these as ‘instruction plura-logues’. The first occurs in chapter 5 [De Chong Fu 德充符] where an aspiring amputee named ‘Shushan the

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Toeless’ initially approaches the Ruist teacher, Zhongni [仲尼 or ‘Elder Brother Ni’]1 to become his disciple, yet only to be rejected because he is physically deformed, even though he is obviously virtuous. Subsequently he approaches ‘Master Longyears’ [Lao Dan 老聃],2 where he finds acceptance and ‘sees’ the inadequacies of Ruist discipleship. The second plura-logue is the one helpfully described by Defoort, where the disciple is Master Lie [列子], whose original teacher, Master Hu [壺子], is being criticised by an apparently spiritually powerful and anonymous wizard [shenwu 神巫].3 In order to indicate the error of these criticisms, Master Hu reveals four stages of his own Daoist-inspired cultivation, leading to initial puzzlement, but finally confirming his authenticity and profundity, resulting in an otherwise unexplained but frightened departure of the wizard. Besides these two instruction plura-logues where there were explicit worldviews being put into contention, there are also six other ‘instruction dialogues’ that are, in fact, master–disciple dialogues, all occurring in the Inner Chapters and not mentioned by Defoort.4 That is to say, out of thirty-seven interactions found within the Inner Chapters of the Zhuangzi, eight of them serve as ‘instruction interactions,’ provoking the reader to consider an alternative form of Daoist wisdom and its concomitant expressions of whole-person cultivation. Though the themes discussed within these master–disciple instruction dialogues differ, they all serve the purpose of revealing to the disciple (and the reader) the attainments of Daoist adepts. Intriguingly, three of these instruction dialogues are constructed as fictional conversations between ‘Elder Brother Ni’ and his favourite disciple Yan Hui [顏回],5 and so there is immense irony in having this famous pair of Ruist scholars involved in conversations that lead the disciple and the reader to Daoist learning and experiences of the results of Dao-centred cultivation. Notable, in two of these dialogues, it is Elder Brother Ni who advocates the Daoist position. In the earliest ‘instruction dialogue’ between these two putatively Ruist figures found in chapter 4, Renjian shi [人间世] or ‘The Human World’], Elder Brother Ni teaches his disciple how to respond to a rather unruly princely scion whom the former is to teach. The supposed Ruist Master ends up advocating a Daoist ideal of becoming a ‘mirror of others,’ that is, simply responding in like manner to whatever the nasty royal child does, and so never offending him. This is attained, however, by the Daoist cultivation technique of ‘heart–mind’s fasting’ [xinzhai 心齌], a process by which one’s rational and emotional states become immune to being moved by the ephemeral twists and turns of human affairs. Precisely this form of cultivation is the goal of all Dao-centred meditative practices, and becomes the answer for issues of governance, teaching, facing death, and questions of ethical concern. In the last of these instruction dialogues carried on by these two famous Ruist personalities, Yan Hui achieves Daoist liberation through ‘meditative forgetfulness’ [zuowang 坐忘, literally, ‘forgetting while sitting’ or ‘sitting forgetfully’], so that his teacher, Elder Brother Ni (alias Master Kong 孔子) is startled into the realisation that his disciple has surpassed him. So, in a final literary twist that is intended to shake the reader’s presuppositions, Elder Brother Ni ends up requesting to become his former disciple’s student! Here we have all the makings of a denigrating rhetorical strategy to nudge readers into a Dao-centred wisdom that will prompt them to explore the same kind of cultivation practices experienced by Yan Hui and other Daoist adepts.

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Thematic concerns in all interactions within the Inner Chapters Obviously, a comprehensive categorisation of interactive themes and their rhetorical strategies would demonstrate just how creative and deconstructive the instruction interactions and other literary interactions within the Inner Chapters are. Here we can offer only an initial summary of the major themes found in the instruction interactions. Subsequently, I will apply that list of themes comparatively to identify how similar kinds of interactions within the Four Gospels function in their own historical and cultural context. One of the main themes addressed in the instruction interactions (included also in eleven out of the thirty-seven interactions) found within the Inner Chapters of the Zhuangzi deals with Daoist ways of governance. These interactions are regularly opposed to Ruist advocacy of ‘humane governance’ [renzheng 仁政], believing that in the end these prove to be cruel and insensitive to many who live under this style of government. Instead, a Dao(ist)-inspired sagely ruler becomes a ‘Perfect Human’ or ‘Consummate Person’ [zhiren 至人] by meditative wandering that allows one to adjust to any political situation with total equanimity. Another major theme is the understanding and cultivated approach to one’s own and one’s friends’ deaths. In three interactions6 the main clue for the acceptance of death is that one’s destiny is not to be denied, but to be accepted, since ‘life’ is actually belonging to all forms of ‘transformation’ [hua 化]. The human physical form is only one kind of life, and Daoist understandings of the continuance of life in other forms suggests that ‘life’ is conserved even though it does not abide in one particular physical form across time. This is not necessarily advocating some form of reincarnation, but it is accepting a conservation of Dao-centred life that is privileged in all interactions with sentient and non-sentient beings. Still another prominent theme deals with the proper way to teach those who are seekers, including rulers, rulers-in-waiting, and those seeking long life through Daoist meditative techniques and practical forms of cultivation. Two stories in this realm are worth mentioning. The first is the dialogue between a skilful cook and his ruler (chapter 3, the famous story of Bao Ding [庖丁] carving an ox), and the second found in chapter 6, portrayed as a half-hearted seeker named Nanbo Zikui (given the name ‘Sir Sunflower of Southunc’ (Mair 1998: 56)) who seeks to be taught by a female Daoist adept named Nu Yu (lit. ‘Female who walks alone’).7 In the former instruction dialogue, the cook explains how he wields his butcher knife so that it never needs to be sharpened, and so reveals the paradoxical Dao-centred way that is never harshly forceful, but able to do all that is required by a butcher preparing meat for the kitchen. What is remarkable about the second instruction dialogue is that, as in a number of other dialogues within the Inner Chapters, when the seeker first asks, he is soundly rejected by the adept, normally because he is seen as ‘wasting the Master’s time’. Nevertheless, if the seeker persists in asking, he will obtain some advice or explanation. Here a kind of ‘negative psychology’ is obviously at work within the dialogue, and yet its goal is not to ‘succeed’, but to portray a transformative choice affirming Dao(ist)centred wisdom and unexpected forms of whole-person cultivation practices. Because the seeker continues to ask, Nu Yu finally explains that she experienced a series of three stages of meditative cultivation, achieved after three, seven, and nine days of practice,

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respectively. The final state of existence is described as ‘putting life beyond one’. There is described here an attitude possessed by Daoist adepts that even the basic concerns related to survival and impending death cannot change. What adds colour and sarcastic value to that story is that, as a result of the seeker’s further questioning, Nu Yu provides the ‘geneology of her teachers,’ starting from one named ‘Son of Assistant Ink,’ and then through others including ‘Bright Vision’ and ‘Murky Mystery,’ and beginning with the Great Master, ‘Would-be Beginning’ (Mair 1998: 57). Clearly, the names of the Daoist teachers reflect the states of consciousness and existence that are the goals of their Dao-centred living. Those interactions that contain principled critiques against humane governance, logical forcefulness, and virtuous exertion in their Ruist and rationalistic modes are meant to lead one to a special insight. In what might be seen as an instruction soliloquy, but is actually an instruction dialogue framed in a dream,8 that insight is ultimately given by this unusual means to a carpenter. Having passed a ‘useless tree’ on a working trip in another state, the carpenter dreams that the tree speaks to him, pointing out that it is precisely because of the tree’s uselessness that it can live a long life and so fulfil its Dao-intended longevity.9 This is surely the ‘usefulness of uselessness’ [buyong zhi yong 不用之用], a form of paradoxical wisdom about life promoted within this canonical Daoist text.

Thematic concerns in instruction interactions in the Four Gospels Where the biographical narrative related to the birth, growth, teachings, ministries, and sacrifices of Rabbi Yeshuah dominate the gospels in a way unparalleled in the Inner Chapters of the Zhuangzi, and the worldview it portrays as a consequence is radically different in character, what we are interested in noting here are the likenesses in literary forms, paradoxical claims, and rhetorical strategies that move the disciples (and the reader) towards a transformative experience prompted by an encounter with ‘the Holy Spirit’. First of all, and most prominently, the Gospels contain more or less fifty parables, some being just a few sentences in length, and others fully worked out as captivating stories for listeners (and readers).10 Embedded in many of these are pithy literary sayings, surprising twists in the story line, and conclusions that point to the nature of the ‘Kingdom of God’ or the life that is informed and moulded by the ‘Word of God’.11 Notably, the majority of these parables are expressed within the framework of instruction plura-logues, so that oftentimes the intended purpose of the parables are made explicit only within the larger context of the interactive discussions before and after the parable/parables are presented. From another angle it is important to note that the intentions bound up in the use of these parables are not merely educative, but also strategic. ‘The knowledge of the secrets of the kingdom of heaven has been given to you [all], but not to them [others outside the circle of disciples]’ (Mt. 13:11). The outcome, then, leads to a paradoxical experience: ‘Though seeing, they do not see; though hearing, they do not hear or understand’ (Mt. 13:14-15). This is stated as a fulfilment of an ancient Hebrew prophecy from Isa. 6:9-10.12 For religious conventionalists these are certainly shocking

166 Cultivating a Good Life claims! Much like the initial seeker running after a Daoist sage, a main point of these parables and instructive responses is to shake one out of complacency, and move one towards a transformative interest in taking part in the Kingdom of God. Consequently, one is either provoked towards such a commitment, or put off by the radicality of the claims associated with this form of self-reflective spiritual cultivation. As we have seen within certain Daoist instruction plura-logues, there are also many interaction plura-logues within the Four Gospels that pit the conventional wisdom of certain Jewish religious leaders against the wit and allusive insights of Rabbi Yeshuah. Jewish traditions of ritual cleanliness are portrayed as not offering authentic spiritual cleansing (Mk 7:1-23); conventional understanding of the ‘Sabbath rest’ does not allow for ‘work’ that would sometimes prevent truly humane acts and miracles of healing from taking place (Lk. 13:10-17); confounding claims made by Rabbi Yeshuah about being the ‘Son’ of the ‘Heavenly Father,’ and so ‘making himself equal to God’ (Jn. 8:4859 and 10:30-33) – a matter involving blasphemy and worthy of capital punishment – is countered by a chreia, an authoritative reference to a passage in Psalm 82 where a reference to those serving as judges refers to them as ‘gods’ (Jn. 10:34ff), and so silences his critics. There is a dislodging rhetoric at work here, where Jewish theological and religious authorities are trumped by the strategic questions raised by this strange rabbi from northern Israel. Where one cannot find an emphasis within Rabbi Yeshuah’s teachings that directly parallels and elaborates on the critiques of conventional ways of governance, Rabbi Yeshuah characterised his way of life in contrast to the authoritarian styles of rulership in his own day,13 and though he himself had authority as the ‘teacher’ and ‘lord’ of his disciples, he exemplified a form of ‘servant leadership’ that was startling for even his closest followers.14 Though he referred to political situations where ‘a kingdom divided against itself ’ would bring political and cultural disaster,15 this was not a matter that he elaborated within his teachings. Even though all this is the case, Rabbi Yeshuah did not avoid arguments and conflicts with local Jewish leaders, charging some of the ‘teachers of the law and Pharisees’ with emphasising ritual practices while ‘neglecting’ what is far more important before God (and humans), that being ‘justice, mercy, and faithfulness’.16 Here even the political implications of ‘suffering for righteousness sake’ were made all the more explicit and terrifying, especially when he characterised discipleship as ‘carrying one’s cross,’17 for the cross was unquestionably a political tool of judgement and treason and a cruel oppressive punishment used by the prevailing Roman colonial authorities. Notably, Rabbi Yeshuah set out the platform of his own way of life by citing an ancient prophecy from the book of Isaiah, indicating his preferential concern for presenting the good news of the Kingdom of God to the poor, providing freedom to prisoners and oppressed persons, and seeking an economic adjustment of all institutions according to standards known as ‘the year of Yahweh’.18 The direct political implications of such an alternative way of governance is undeniable. Here it should be highlighted that Rabbi Yeshuah’s notable emphases related to ‘the poor’ and ‘the oppressed’ were major themes within Jewish scriptures and religious life, but were not practiced in ways that would resolve the problems of those marginalised persons. As a consequence, he urged those who followed him or would want to become disciples to ‘be generous to the poor,’19 and to reach out to ‘the poor, the crippled,

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the lame, [and] the blind’ (Luke 14:13 and 21) in ways that parallel remarkably the claims in the Inner Chapters of the Zhuangzi regarding the ‘usefulness of uselessness’. In contrast to other styles of teacher–student or master–disciple relationships, Rabbi Yeshuah called the ‘weary and burdened’ to share his way of life, because he would not ‘lord it over them,’ but receive them in gentleness and compassion (Mt. 11:28-30). So, in ways also transgressing mundane wisdom that associated the accumulation of wealth with divine blessing, Rabbi Yeshuah urged a young wealthy person (and possibly also therefore one with political clout) to sell his possessions, give it to the poor, and follow him. So demanding was this requirement that some of his closest disciples wondered whether they themselves could ‘pass through the eye of a needle,’20 as required of such a wealthy person.21 Notably in response, Rabbi Yeshuah confirmed that it was ‘hard for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of God,’22 but assured his disciples that because they has left their own normal ways of life, and suffered because of persecution at times, they would also be promised ‘eternal life’.23 Here there is not only a political repercussion related to discipleship, but also a key distinction between ‘mundane life’ (generally referred to by the Greek term bios) and a meaningful life associated also with eternal communion with God (generally referred to by the Greek term zoē), notably paralleling the difference between personal life and the Dao-centred life promoted in the Zhuangzi. This overall situation, therefore, could be expressed in what became another of the famous paradoxes recorded in the Gospels and repeated more than once: ‘Many who are first will be last, and many who are last will be first’ (Mt. 19:30 and Mk. 10: 31, see also Mt. 20: 16 and Lk. 13:30). Here again, ‘the first’ within this context often would refer to those in power and authority, serving as rulers. As has been already seen above, there are many references to ‘the kingdom of God’ within the instruction interactions in the Four Gospels that refers to a spiritual reality that ‘comes to life’ through repenting of one’s sins before God, as well as with the casting out of demons (Matthew 12:28), and so offers a new ‘ruling’ that is predicated on this transformative experience of ‘being put right’ with the Deity. Here the continual reference to a return to the Way in Zhuangzian-like tropes, pursued by getting rid of hindering states of active engagement, and taking up an ‘emptying’ of oneself, is echoed in the rhēmata or poignant sayings of Rabbi Yeshuah. ‘Whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me and for the gospel will save it.’24 There is here the same kind of either/or-ness that is found in the instruction dialogues and plura-logues of the Inner Chapters of the Zhuangzi: one cannot go halfway towards cultivating a Dao-centred life. One either accepts the transformative view of life that this new wisdom revealed through the ‘Word of God’ and realised in the Kingdom of God presents, or one is caught up in a form of intellectual and spiritual misguidedness that endangers one precisely because they are ‘being found useful’ in the more mundane forms of intellectual and spiritual life. Here then, and quite naturally, questions about concerns generated by one’s living conditions and the fear of death arises. Paradoxically, once again, Rabbi Yeshuah ‘blesses’ those who are ‘persecuted because of righteousness’, because ‘theirs is the kingdom of heaven’ (Mt. 5:10-12), that is to say, they have attained the goal of cultivation in holiness that the new wisdom reveals, and so belong to the kingdom of heaven where the living God receives, reaffirms, renews, and regenerates such persons.25

168 Cultivating a Good Life Prompted once again by parallels found within the sections of the Zhuangzi that have been previously addressed, there is a question of whether or not Rabbi Yeshuah is found in the midst of the instruction dialogues and plura-logues of the Four Gospels to reject or deflect the desires of persons who expressed a willingness to follow him and his teachings. Here there are found a number of similarities, including first of all those who initially express willingness to follow him, but then leave disappointed because they are not willing to submit to the conditions of discipleship that they are required of them,26 and second, a former demoniac who is healed through exorcism, and then is told not to follow Rabbi Yeshuah, but instead to return to his homeland to proclaim what miraculously had occurred to him (Lk. 8:38-39). An even more poignant set of instruction dialogues occurs where three different persons are apparently ‘put off ’ by Rabbi Yeshuah because they will not immediately and unreservedly follow him.27 All of those rejections involve setting aside what may be seen as conditions involving mundane wisdom in choosing to become a disciple. The first involves a matter of personal comfort and a safe place in which to dwell, but Rabbi Yeshuah responds by underscoring that even though other living things have places of residence, ‘the Son of Man has no place to lay his head’.28 To one who preferred to say some final words to his family members before taking off, Rabbi Yeshuah requires immediate decisiveness and allows for no delay (Lk. 9:61-62). To another who requests to have the opportunity to care for his father until his death, Rabbi Yeshuah rejects what would be seen in mundane wisdom as a principled act of filial submission, responding with a call to follow him and ‘let the dead bury the dead’.29 In another instruction plura-logue that includes an embedded parable, those who make excuses for following and are rejected include a person who has just married, another who has just purchased a plot of land, and a third who has obtained a new team of oxen to work his land.30 All of these justifications suggest some sort of practical wisdom that was generally understood, but become vacuous or even hypocritical in the context of fulfilling obligations made to allow the Kingdom of God and divine righteousness to have a preeminent status within one’s earthly life (Matthew 6:33). Two other pericopes that reflect a biblical parallel for arguing ironically for ‘the usefulness of the useless’ can also be located in certain instruction interactions under conditions that reflect the rejection of mundane wisdom in preference for an alternative vision of the Kingdom of God and its implications in the midst of the ‘practical world’. The first occurs in a context where many persons are gathered along with Rabbi Yeshuah in a home of two sisters, Martha and Mary. Concerned about showing appropriate hospitality to so many guests, Martha complains to Rabbi Yeshuah about the fact that her sister, Mary, is not helping in those ritual acts involving the reception of guests in their home. Nevertheless, Rabbi Yeshuah responds by indicating that Mary, having sat down along with others to hear his teachings, ‘has chosen what is better’ (Luke 10:42). In other words, what would be considered normal obligations in terms of proper etiquette for hospitality is less important than the ‘uselessness’ discovered in attending to ‘the Word of God’. In a far more conflictual and intense interaction between the Roman colonial ruler, Pilate, and the bleeding Rabbi Yeshuah who has endured physical punishment by Roman soldiers, yet one that still could be considered an instruction dialogue because of the nature of the questions being asked by Pilate, the Jewish itinerant evangelist confirms that he is also a ‘king,’ but then qualifies this claim by clarifying that ‘my kingdom is not of this world’ (John 18:36). While this

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claim would seem utterly ‘useless’ in the face of the authority who would determine Rabbi Yeshuah’s execution, that judgement is put aside by the Jewish teacher by adding that the very authority Pilate has is not his own, but given by the God whose kingdom is represented by Rabbi Yeshuah himself. All these examples from both Daoist and Christian canonical sources provide the textual materials that now can be further analysed for their general accounts of the counter-cultural forms of wisdom that require both a rejection of mundane wisdom and a new style of whole-person cultivation.

Characterising transformative wisdom and the nature of whole-person cultivation The alternative forms of wisdom that are promoted in these two very different canonical sources from ancient Chinese and ancient Greek texts can now be succinctly characterised. Within the Inner Chapters of Zhuangzi there is a Dao-centred and sometimes blatantly anarchistic wisdom that is contrasted to a rationalised mundane form of Ruist wisdom and virtue-centred elitism. This opposition was not only made explicit in the sarcastic instruction interactions within the Inner Chapters, where well-known Ruist figures are made into Daoist advocates, but was also recognised by later Song Ruists as a challenge to their own preferred rationalistic accounts of cultured wisdom and virtuous cultivation.31 The parallel account of a counter-cultural wisdom advocated by Rabbi Yeshuah in the Four Gospels is a radically God-centred and sometimes obviously paradoxical wisdom that is set in opposition to the traditional and ritually centred practical wisdom of some major Jewish teachings of his day. The Daoist vision argues that ‘life’ is not limited to one’s own humanly earth-bound existence, but is linked to a greater vision of ‘life’ that promotes longevity and embracing of basic vital forces that can release one from human concerns even about death, and propel one into supra-rational experiences that only consummate/perfect persons are able to embody. The Christian vision promoted by Rabbi Yeshuah offers a qualitatively different kind of life (zoē) in relationship with the living God that comes through preeminent submission to the Kingdom of God, and releases one through forgiveness of sins into a heavenly oriented lifestyle in the presence of God and in relationship with others in the earthly plane. Both canonical texts are explicit in linking miraculous and preternatural experiences with the powers of these counter-cultural expressions of wisdom. They require a decisive choice for this alternative, arguing against the assumed positive value of the forms of mundane wisdom that they oppose. Ultimately, this decision becomes a transformative choice that leads willing seekers into new styles of whole-person cultivation. Undeniably, the roles of master–student and teacher–disciple relationships in initiating the patterns of whole-person cultivation by means of imitating the methods promoted by the master or teacher are initially paramount. It is by means of these relationships that the new wisdom is identified and confirmed, and new ways of cultivation become living options for the potential student or disciple. That there are distinct forms of wholeperson cultivation associated with these two Daoist and Christian scriptures must be confirmed, and so will be described in more detail below. Nevertheless, though in both traditions these relationships serve as the fulcrum point, moving a seeker into becoming an adherent of that specific tradition, there is also a dialectical transformative movement

170 Cultivating a Good Life that leads the adherent to become directly engaged with the Dao or the Kingdom of God. Only by this means can the new lifestyle built upon a newly oriented form of whole-person cultivation become nurtured and sustained. What has been seen within the Inner Chapters of the Zhuangzi are forms of whole-person cultivation that emphasise the cultivation of the ‘whole’ of life, so that the personal dimension becomes less significant. A Dao-centred living presence may be reclusive because it must involve an ‘emptying of the heart–mind,’ but it can also be ‘in the mundane world but not of it’. More significantly, this internally meditative transformation of the whole person releases them from bodily limitations as well as from a unique corporeal identity, allowing that sentient presence to thrive on transcending normal life by means of Dao[ist]-informed revelling in the fullness of living transformations, their vital interconnectivity, and their transcendent realisation in unabashedly preternatural expressions of human-embodied extraordinariness.32 From the many instruction interactions found in the Four Gospels Rabbi Yeshuah advocates a God-centred life in worship and relational intimacy that is also expressed in unselfish responsiveness to people living around one. This God-centredness nurtures a communally enriched whole-person cultivation, responsive both to heavenly rhēmata and the pre-eminence of heavenly values especially (but not necessarily exclusively) embodied within human relationships, framed by either the spiritual duties of discipleship or the sensitive responsiveness of God-centred neighbourliness. Here the ‘denying of self ’ is not a selfless forgetfulness, but is embodied in unselfish acts of virtuous care that includes compassion, love, justice, and seeking a flourishing interrelational peace. Rabbi Yeshuah promotes a practice of whole-person cultivation expressed in various modes of thankful worship, intercessory concern, meditative focus, and engaged compassion; the heavenly and earthly are intertwined in mutual honour and agapeic responsiveness.33 Its daily embodiment on earth anticipates a promised transformed completion of all these relationships in an eternal peace where God and all sentient beings relate together in dynamic love and mutually fulfilling joy.34 The contrast of such a heavenly scene with its expressions in the midst of the conflicts and cruelties of some earthly contexts where God-centredness is not only unappreciated, but even despised, is neither hidden nor left unaddressed. Eternal life is not only a gift but also a justifying fulfilment of those who suffer for righteousness in earthly realms. It relies on a ‘mature wisdom,’ a heavenly oriented responsive to divine rhēmata, that the Apostle Paul later argues is ‘not the wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age’ (1 Cor. 2:6). Dislodging mundane wisdom, a flourishing life that is God-centred is also wisely loving, virtuously unselfish in community, and righteously sacrificial in times where larger social and political conflicts are unavoidable.

Notes 1 The fact that Master Kǒng [or Kongzi 孔子] is addressed by this informal means fills the interaction plura-logue with an atmosphere that is humorously transgressive against Ruist veneration of their master-teacher. See clever renderings of these sarcastic modes in Mair 1998 and Ziporyn 2009.

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2 Here I am borrowing Mair’s clever rendering for ‘The Old Master’ or Laozi. Found in chs. 3 [Yangsheng Zhu 養生主] and 7[Ying Di Wang 應帝王] of the Zhuangzi. 3 All these figures appear only once in the Inner Chapters, with only the first having his name linked to a known written text within Daoist traditions. 4 Others not to be mentioned in detail here are found in ch. 2 Qiwu Lun [齊物論], a dialogue between (in Mair’s renderings) ‘Sir Motley Southurb’ and ‘Sir Wanderer of Countenance Complete’ and in ch. 3 Yangsheng Zhu, in a plura-logue on the meaning of death. 5 One occurring in ch. 4 Renjian shi, and the other two in ch. 6, Dazong Shi. 6 As found in chs. 3 and 6, where two appear in the latter chapter. 7 This female Daoist figure is unique within this portion of the Zhuangzi, not only in her gender (since most Daoist adepts are almost always male), but also in the level of attainment in a Dao-centred life that she portrays to the seeker. 8 From the angle of the epistemological sources for understanding ‘life’ within the Zhuangzi, there is no privilege given to normal waking consciousness. A dream-state is just as much of a ‘human experience’ as is a self-conscious rational state of awareness. 9 Found in ch. 4, Renjian shi. 10 A broad definition of the technical term ‘parable’ leads to identifying as many as fifty relevant passages as parables. 11 As with the Chinese term dao [道], the Greek term logos can refer to spoken, thought, and written words, sayings, or concepts. Though it is a regular trope in Protestant worship to refer to ‘The Word of God’ (ho logos tou theou) as a term of reference for the Bible, in fact, that phrase may refer to the spoken message or the creative power of the Deity at the beginning of created times-and-spaces. (For a general discussion of this trope in Greek, see Smillie 2004.) For example, in the text of Heb 4:12, we have the statement where this phrase occurs from the New International Version: ‘For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.’ Here we have a medical metaphor of the ‘double-edged sword’ that indicates the rhetorical impact of divine expressions within the life of a person (as addressed in Smillie 2004: 347–50). Nevertheless, there is another Greek term that explicitly is employed to indicate ‘speech,’ this being the term rhēma. Generally stated, it is employed in ancient Greek literature to refer to ‘speech,’ a ‘saying’ or a ‘statement’ (as elaborated in Silva 2014, article on ‘ ҅ρημα G4839 (rhēma),’:207). However, this same term can also be stretched to refer to an event that one remembers or a “thing” that has happened. Its general use in the Gospels is dealing with the ‘expressions’ or ‘sayings’ of people who are being cited in various passages. In some cases it can be more specifically taken to refer to ‘a choice word’ or ‘an immediate Spirit-inspired ‘word’ peculiarly adapted to a crisis or struggle’ (quoting here from Smillie 2004: 346). As it ends up, about half of all the appearances of rhēma occur in the Gospels of Luke and John. As might be expected, then, many of those occurrences refer to the ‘words’ of Rabbi Yeshuah as well as to the ‘Word of God’ that inspired him (as underscored in Silva 2014: 209–10). 12 Quoting and glossing the Septuagint Greek version of Isa. 6: 9-10. 13 Particularly in contrast to ‘the rulers of the Gentiles’. See Mt. 20: 25 and Mk 10: 42. 14 Illustrated especially in the context of washing their dirty feet, as seen in Jn. 13: 2-17. 15 Consult Mt. 12: 25-28. Here he uses this saying as a commonplace proverbial insight into governance.

172 Cultivating a Good Life 16 Citing phrases from Mt. 23: 23-24. To these charges Rabbi Yeshuah added that these Jewish leaders embodied ‘greed and self-indulgence,’ and were hypocritical and wicked. For these and other criticisms, consult Mt. 23: 25-35. 17 ‘Suffering for righteousness’ sake’ was the last of the beatitudes (Mt. 5: 10-12), but was underscored in other sayings of Rabbi Yeshuah in the midst of instruction interactions as well. ‘Taking up the cross’ and following him was a condition for discipleship. See Mt. 10: 38 and 16: 24; Mk 8: 34, and Lk. 9:23 (here adding ‘taking up the cross daily’). 18 Quoted from the Greek version of Isa. 61: 1-2 in Lk. 4: 18-19. The ‘year of Yahweh [LORD]’ was a technical phrase referring to the return to previously established economic standards upheld in the Pentateuch. 19 As found, for example, in Lk. 11: 41, and 22: 23. 20 Referring to a Jewish proverbial saying that it is ‘easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God’ (Mt. 19: 24). 21 Here and below, citing passages found in all the Synoptic Gospels in Mt. 19: 16-24, Mk 10: 17-30, and Lk. 18: 18-30. 22 Citing Mt. 19: 23, Mk 10: 23, Lk. 18: 24. 23 Found in Mt. 19: 29-30, Mk 10: 29-30, and Lk. 18: 29-30. 24 Mk 8:35, but see also Mt. 16: 25 and Lk 9: 24. 25 Mt. 5: 10. This transformative interpretation is elaborated in Pfister 2000 and Fei Leren [Lauren F. Pfister] 2009. 26 As in the case of the so-called rich young ruler (King James version) or rich young man (New International Version), as seen in Mt. 19:16ff, Mk 10:17ff and Lk. 18:18ff. 27 See these instruction dialogues in Mt. 8: 18-22 and Lk. 9: 57-62. 28 ‘Foxes have holds and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head’ (quoted from Mt. 8: 20 and Lk. 9: 58). 29 Here the implication is that those who stay to await the death of others instead of taking up the call to ‘proclaim the kingdom of God’ are themselves already spiritually dead, because they have not understood the pre-eminence of the life (zoē) that is bound up in the rule of God within their own lives. 30 See Lk. 14: 15-24, an instruction plura-logue including a parable where excuses were made by persons who had originally accepted an invitation to attend a wedding banquet. 31 Here I am referring to the 13th chapter of the Jinsilu 近思録, authored by Zhu Xi 朱熹 and Lü Zuqian 呂祖謙, where both Daoist and Buddhist claims regarding wisdom and cultivation practices are soundly rejected as ‘heterodox groups’ (yiduan 異端). 32 Intriguing to me is the paradoxical question that arises particularly in the Zhuangzian context: would a consummate person [zhiren 至人], numinous person [shenren 神人], or complete person [zhenren 真人] retain enough human capacity and interest to write some portion of the Zhuangzi? Or does the dialectical move into Dao-centred living through forgetting, emptying, and sloughing off terrestrial attachments make the task of such creative writing/revealing testimony otiose? 33 This could be summed up in the ‘new commandment” Rabbi Yeshuah gave to his disciples near the end of his life, ‘As I have loved you [all as disciples], so you must love one another’ (Jn. 13: 34). Would a Zhuangzi-ian perspective see this as an all-tooearthly entanglement rather than a dialectical mutuality that transcends mundane self-centeredness? 34 Expressed by reference to the ‘oneness’ between God and aligned humans transformed by agapeic mutuality in Jn. 17: 20-23.

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References Defoort, C. (2012). ‘Instruction Dialogues in the Zhuangzi: An “Anthropological” Reading’, Dao: A Journal of Comparative Philosophy, 11 (1): 459–78. Fei, L. [Lauren F. Pfister] 费乐仁 (2009). ‘Rethinking Whole Person Cultivation: Renewing Understandings of Ruist-Christian Dialogue through Models of Transformation’ (‘Quanren Xiushen de Zaisi: Yi Zhuanghua Moshi Chongxin Lijie Ru Ye Duihua’ 全仁修身的再思: 以转化模式重新理解儒耶对话), in L. Guolong 卢国龙 (ed.) Ruist Studies (Rujiao Yanjiu 儒教研究) 1: 354–70. The Holy Bible, New International Version (1973). Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House. Mair, V. H. (1998). Wandering on the Way: Early Taoist Tales and Parables of Chuang Tzu. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press. Pfister, L. F. (2000). “Re-examining Whole Person Cultivation: Reconsidering the Significance of Master Kong’s ‘Knowing the Heavenly Decree’ and Yeshuah’s ‘Beatitudes’,” Ching Feng 1:1 (New Series): 69–96. Silva, M. (ed.) (2014). New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology and Exegesis. Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House. Smillie, G. R. (2004). ‘“‘Ό ΛΟΓΟΣ ΤΟΥ ΘΕΟΥ” [the Word of God] in Hebrews 4: 12-13’, Novum Testamentum, 46 (4): 338–59. Ziporyn, B. (trans. and comm.) (2009). Zhuangzi: The Essential Writings with Selections from Traditional Commentaries. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company.

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Part Three

Here, Now, Ever-after: How to Practise and Achieve a Good Life What kinds of practices are necessary in the pursuit of happiness, or in living a good life? The chapters in this section affirm the centrality of action and practice in a good life, how different capacities may be developed, and how better conditions may be sought in the afterlife, given that some of life’s struggles cannot be overcome in this earthly life. A common theme is the development, in particular, of perception, whether it is related to a person’s grasp of salient, morally weighty factors in particular circumstances, in hearing, or in being attuned to others around us, or to the task at hand. Our perceptive skills are multifaceted and they need to be cultivated. The aim of practice is to sharpen skills within typical and atypical settings so that, in using them, we begin to understand their reach. To put it differently, skills need to be adaptive in order to yield optimal outcomes aligned with a person’s beliefs or a society’s ideals. Sophie Grace Chappell draws our attention to Aristotle’s remark that the point of ethics is to become virtuous (and to how many discussions of Aristotelian ethics miss this point). In ‘Knowing How to Act: Aristotle’, she establishes that Aristotelian ethics is concerned not so much with logoi as it is with praxeis. For Aristotle, we learn to be moral by working with examples, articulated not in moral theory but by ostension. Through practice, that is, in doing, we develop a ‘feel’. We begin to understand which factors are salient in a situation, and which standards or principles should be deployed. The discussion also covers much ground in anticipating objections to a judgementcentred view, one that is not ultimately guided by an overarching ‘master rule’ prescribed by any one moral theory. By directing our gaze at (an agent’s) perception, understanding, and other moral capacities, Chappell’s reflections on Aristotle place cultivation right at the centre of ethics. The idea that we need to practise at being moral similarly underscores Karyn Lai’s characterisation of Confucian philosophy in ‘Learning to Be Reliable: Confucius’ Analects’. Lai makes a case for reliability (xin) to be included as a central focal point of a paradigmatic Confucian life. On this view, ethical life is not merely a matter of a person’s moral commitments and behaviours but also of actions that consistently manifest those commitments over time. Lai highlights the various components of Confucian cultivation essential for building reliability, including familiarisation, reflection, and practice. This reading of the Analects brings together its ethical and epistemological frameworks, drawing on a tailoring metaphor in the text, where each piece—every action taken by a person – is custom-made, so to speak. A Confucian paradigmatic person is one who, in undertaking tasks, reliably realises his moral commitments in different scenarios and contexts.

176 Cultivating a Good Life Listening is an important part of self-cultivation too, as borne out in the writings of Master Wen in Wenzi, a Daoist text. Andrej Fech suggests that early Chinese writings prioritise both hearing and sight as equally important senses in the acquisition of knowledge. In fact, some Chinese texts, including the Wenzi, attribute a more fundamental role to hearing. In the Wenzi, the capacities of sight and hearing are, intriguingly, aligned with perception of different phenomena and are accessible only to those with particular capacities. While the wise person can see ‘what takes shape’, the sage hears ‘what has not been born’. Fech fills out this account of the auditory senses in early Chinese texts that involve not only hearing with the ears but also with the mind–heart. Auditory perception involves cognitive capacities and affect, as well as (having) the right attitudinal composure. Therefore, cultivation is essential not only to develop listening skills but also to inculcate attitudes such as attentiveness, humility, and open-mindedness. Liu Xie was a 5th-century thinker who synthesised Confucian and Daoist ideals to reflect on the place of writing in a cultivated life. In ‘Cultivation and the Arts of Writing: Liu Xie’, Will Buckingham rejects a popular view of writing as a process driven by anguish, using Liu Xie’s discussions in the Wenxindiaolong to highlight the potential elegance and spontaneity of writing, drawing on the Confucian idea of wen – patterns – and Daoist dao. Dao, the totality of all things, the relations between them, and their processes and interactions, may be artfully expressed in writing, if the writer skilfully makes them manifest in his work. Such skills must be nurtured in such a way that the process, involving the mind–heart, is spontaneous rather than forced. What is more, because writing, conceived in this way, is the writer’s attunement and engagement with the world; it nourishes his or her vital energies (yang qi). Mu-Chou Poo demonstrates that what the ordinary people of Han China (206 BCE–220 CE) could not attain or achieve in this life, they sought to provide for the dead in the netherworld. ‘Death and Happiness: Han China’ studies mortuary practices and funerary objects to reveal the conceptions of happiness and aspirations of the people. In doing so, it introduces layers of complexity to our understanding of ancient Chinese thought and life. Poo uses examples to demonstrate how ordinary people expressed their concerns about material well-being in their attempts to provide for the dead – in ‘giving’ money, servants, and vehicles, among other things. While China’s textual legacy gives us the impression that the ancient Chinese were preoccupied with cultivation, this chapter is a fitting reminder that the texts of this time captured primarily official views. In contrast, focus on mortuary practices complicate and enrich our understanding of Han China, that its common folk had more modest expectations as they were primarily concerned about material well-being.

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Knowing How to Act: Aristotle Sophie Grace Chappell

Aristotle as ethical anti-theorist Our present business [pragmateia] is not aimed, as our others are, at theory [theōria; the word’s range of meanings also includes ‘contemplation’, ‘spectating’, even ‘sightseeing’]. We are not inquiring in order to learn the essence of virtue, but to become virtuous. Otherwise this business is useless. (Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics (NE) 1103b26-29; I use my own translations throughout) It is not easy to miss the striking radicalism of what Aristotle says here, but most of us manage it somehow. In practice today, most philosophical ethicists’ work – including most Aristotelian philosophical ethicists’ work – is aimed at producing theoretical truth about morals, and indeed a moral theory, in the sense of a deductive system of justification and explanation for ethics – ‘a philosophical structure which, together with some degree of empirical fact, will yield a decision procedure for moral reasoning’ (Williams 1981: ix). Nor are Aristotelian philosophical ethicists typically shy of attributing a moral theory in that sense to Aristotle himself. Nowadays it is routine to describe Aristotle as an adherent, perhaps even the inventor, of a moral theory called virtue ethics – and not altogether unheard-of to hear him called a deontologist or a consequentialist or a perfectionist, either. This in spite of Aristotle’s own fairly clear denial, in the words I quote as epigraph, that he aimed at any kind of theory in ethics, not to mention his further remark at the end of the quotation that such a body of theory would be useless anyway. Apparently the point of ethics for Aristotle is so much practical rather than theoretical that he would have regarded our term ‘practical ethics’ as absurdly tautologous. Aristotle’s primary interest is not in a theory of virtue at all; it is in the pursuit and the cultivation of virtue. Perhaps his verdict on a lot of modern philosophical ethics would have preechoed Marx: the moral philosophers have only observed the world of the practical, the point is to change it. So why do we ignore the radical rejection of moral theory that Aristotle apparently enounces in these words? One possibility is that we look at the rest of the Ethics,

178 Cultivating a Good Life and decide on the basis of what he says elsewhere that Aristotle doesn’t really mean it. The most adequate interpretation of any text makes sense of it by resolving any conflicting texts in line with the majority of the textual evidence. But the majority of the textual evidence (someone might reason) suggests that the Nicomachean Ethics does, overall, offer a moral theory; so we should infer that Aristotle can’t be serious in the uncharacteristic remarks that he makes here. A different line is to take seriously what Aristotle says, but reject it. Philosophical ethics, it might be said, is about theory-building not personal edification, about systematic understanding not the development of one’s character, and if Aristotle does not see that, he is just wrong; he has mixed up philosophical ethics with some other form of ethics, perhaps with the kinds that some moderns, such as Blackburn and Hare, dismiss as ‘moralising’ or ‘preaching’. Or again, with a little more nuance (and plausibility), someone might say that Aristotle presents us with a false dichotomy. Theorising in ethics can have practical as well as theoretical upshots. So developing a moral theory and becoming a better person are not completely separate alternatives. Doing one can help us do the other, and if Aristotle does not see that, he is – once more – just wrong. Behind these responses, I suspect, there may lurk a kind of incomprehension of what Aristotle or any other ethicist could be up to, if not moral theory. Perhaps what really motivates us to downplay or ignore Aristotle’s doctrine that the object of ethics is practical not theoretical is just our inability to see what that doctrine could possibly mean. My first aim here is to explain what it might mean; to make better sense of Aristotle’s concern, not with the theorisation, but with the actual cultivation of virtue. That in turn may help us to begin to see something that will be central to my argument: how ethics in general can be something quite different from moral theory-building, without relapsing either into obscurantist conservatism, or unhelpful silence.

Practising virtue and knowing what to do The idea was canvassed above that Aristotle makes an uncharacteristic remark when he says that we do ethics not ‘in order to learn the essence of virtue, but to become virtuous’. But the remark is not uncharacteristic. Nor is it isolated: It is well said that the just man comes to be from just actions, and the self-controlled man from self-controlled actions. For no one has any prospect at all of becoming a good person except by such actions. But most people do not do these things; instead, they ‘take refuge in the arguments’, thinking that that is doing philosophy, and they will become admirable people that way. In this they act like sick men who listen attentively to their doctors’ instructions, but do nothing to follow those instructions. (NE 1105b9-17)

Only the practice of virtue will make us virtuous; talking about virtue, or listening to talk about virtue, is no substitute. Just as the point of medicine is to make people well, and that point is not achieved by talking about prescriptions, but by following them, so likewise the point of ethics is to make people good, and that point is not achieved by

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talking about the virtues, but by practising them. ‘Truth in practical matters is judged from deeds, and from life’ (NE 1179a18-19). 1105b13’s phrase ‘take refuge in the arguments’ (eis tous logous katapheugontas) seems to be an allusion to Plato, Phaedo 99e5. The allusion is a dig at Socrates, whose most famous doctrine, as everybody knows, was that we should begin in ethics by seeking definitions, logoi, which express the essence of the virtues (NE 1144b28-30); only then will we be able to proceed on the basis of knowledge in ethics, a knowledge which (according to the Protagoras) will be a systematic understanding of how to weigh the pleasant and the painful against each other in order to provide a hedonistic calculus as a basis for action. However, Socrates often professed himself unable to find such definitions, and no one he talked to could do it to his full satisfaction either. Hence, the explicitly moral–theoretical structure proposed for Socratic ethics in the Protagoras is not completed. Is not; and the moral that both Plato and Aristotle drew from the failure of Socrates’ project in the Protagoras is that such a moral theory cannot be completed. But, we might say in very swift and rough summary, they thought this for different reasons. What Plato thought was that a moral theory based upon explicitly known definitions cannot be completed by us, because we do not possess the godlike knowledge – the vision of the Form of the Good – that we would need to complete it; but someone might attain that godlike knowledge, and then that person would be able to complete such a moral theory. In the meantime, the best knowledge we can have of what to do is tacit and inarticulate, more a matter of having the right character (and/or, as in the Meno, true beliefs) than of having the relevant ethical knowledge. Aristotle goes further than Plato. He thinks not only that a moral theory based upon explicitly known definitions, such as Socrates apparently envisaged, cannot as it happens be completed by us, but that such a theory necessarily cannot be completed by anyone. It is not just that we do not possess a godlike knowledge of ethical definitions; it is that there is no such knowledge for anyone to possess. Hence, for Aristotle, the knowledge involved in having the right character is not just the best kind of ethical knowledge that we can have; it is the best kind of ethical knowledge, period. The ideal in ethics is not a matter of (propositional) knowledge at all; practical truth is not a matter of logoi, general definitions, but of praxeis, particular actions. What affirmation and denial are in understanding, pursuit and avoidance are in appetition. … This is understanding and practical truth. (NE 1139a21-27)

As we might also be tempted to say, ethical knowledge is knowledge-how, not knowledge-that. What the good person knows, in knowing what to do, is more like what the cyclist knows in knowing how to stay on his bike, or what the languagespeaker knows in knowing how to speak his language grammatically, than what the historian knows in knowing when the Battle of Marathon took place. Once we see just how radically anti-Socratic and anti-theoretical Aristotle’s conception of practical truth is, a number of other things come into focus. For instance, it becomes easier to see more of the real point of NE VI’s famous catalogue of the five kinds of intellectual virtue, with its starring role for phronēsis, ‘good

180 Cultivating a Good Life sense’ or ‘practical wisdom’. In the face of Platonist conceptions, Aristotle needs to explain how a virtue of the intellect can be genuinely of the intellect, and genuinely a virtue, without being knowledge of the explicit propositional kind that Platonic (or at any rate Socratic) knowledge typically is. His famous solution is to insist on the particularity of the objects of phronēsis: ‘phronēsis is of the ultimately specific thing, for the thing to be done is something ultimately specific … and of this there is no epistēmē, but rather aisthēsis’ (NE 1142a24 ff.); ‘where particulars are concerned, the judgement lies in the perception’ (NE 1126b3-4). Perhaps, with our eye on the bicycle-riding analogy, we might even translate aisthēsis here as ‘feel’ rather than ‘perception’ or ‘sensibility’: knowing how to ride a bike without falling off is a matter not of mastering a theory but of feel, and so, on Aristotle’s view, is knowing how to do the right thing. I pause here to note an objection to this bike-riding analogy. ‘With riding a bike it’s clear what counts as success or failure – you fall off or you stay on. It’s not clear at all with virtue what counts as success or failure. And that tends to make judgements of virtue subjective.’ The best answer is that virtue does involve criteria of success or failure – criteria which point us in the direction of an overall conception of eudaimonia. The conception of success or failure involved is, of course, a difficult one to make fully explicit, and there are certainly hard cases for it. To say why, for instance, heroic resistance to an invader, even when defeat is certain, can count as virtue, we would need to be able to explain why such resistance might also be called successful – a question which I address elsewhere, in Chappell (2014 chapters 6–7). Appreciating Aristotle’s anti-theoretical conception of practical truth also helps us to understand a claim that he consistently holds to, but which can seem strange to our eyes, about the conclusion of what has unfortunately come to be called ‘the practical syllogism’. (‘Practical reasoning’ would be a better phrase; ‘reasoning towards action’ would be better still. As Kenny (1979: 111–13) points out, the Greek, syllogismoi tōn praktōn, is hardly ever used by Aristotle, and certainly not intended by him as a technical term.) Aristotle’s odd-seeming claim is that the conclusion of such reasoning is not a proposition stating what action should be done, nor even an intention to perform that action; it is the action itself (see NE 1147a25-31, dMA 701a20-33). The conclusion is the action, not a sentence stating that the action is to be done, nor yet an intention. Practical reasoning that issues only in these kinds of results has gone wrong, for Aristotle, because the whole point of practical reasoning is to lead to action. This claim has puzzled modern commentators, who have been inclined to ask how Aristotle thinks such a view can possibly be reconciled with the logic of syllogisms laid out in his Analytics. But the sharp contrast with formal syllogistic is intentional on Aristotle’s part. What he wants us to see is how radically different practical reasoning is from such syllogistic, precisely because it issues in actions not propositions: in practical not theoretical truth. To understand the claim best we should not only note how different it makes practical reasoning from classic syllogistic reasoning; we should note also how closely what Aristotle says here connects with the remarks just quoted about the non-propositional nature of practical truth. The insight that knowing what to do is a matter of practical know-how, not of theoretical knowledge-that, also helps make sense of a third thing. This is Aristotle’s

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frequent repetition of what may well seem to us maddeningly unhelpful remarks about rightness in action: The one who stands his ground against or runs away from those things, and for the sake of those things, that he should, and in the way and at the time that he should, and who likewise, in respect of confidence, acts as he should – that man is the courageous one. (NE 1115b17-19) The temperate man desires what he should, as he should, when he should, which is also what reason requires. (NE 1119b16) Bad taste and vulgarity do not fall into excess in the amount of what is spent beyond what should be, but rather because they involve ostentation on things that are not as they should be, in a way that is not as it should be. (NE 1122a31-33) And so the liberal man will give for the sake of what is noble. And he will give rightly, for he will give what he should, to whom he should, and when he should, and will do as he should in all the other respects relating to right giving. (NE 1120a24-26) For indeed the liberal man will spend what he should, in the way that he should. (NE 1122b11-12) Thus the man who gets angry about the things and with the people he should, and in the way he should, and when he should, and for as long as he should, is praised.  … Those who do not get angry about the things that they should are thought to be ineffectual, as are those who do not get angry in the way they should, or when they should, or with the people they should. (NE 1125b31-32, 1126a4-6)

What, we might ask, can possibly be the point of such remarks? How is it supposed to be helpful as practical guidance, to be told merely that, to reveal these various virtues, you should act ‘as you should’, hōs dei? The best answer, I think, is that it’s not supposed to be helpful, except in the sense of eliminating the distracting thought that guidance of that sort is so much as available. Aristotle is not lamely repeating a tiresomely cryptic formula here, under the mistaken impression that he is giving us advice of a sort that we could actually implement. The point is precisely the opposite. What he is trying to show us is that if we want to know exactly what to do in words and definitions, instead of using words and definitions to get a rough idea of what to do and then relying on aisthēsis to complete the picture, then as a rule hōs dei, ‘as it should be’, is all there is to say. Right action (and similarly right reason, orthos logos) cannot be precisely captured in a definition – or at any rate, it can’t be precisely captured in a useful definition: the only precise formula on offer is the unhelpful hōs dei. (Just as if we were trying to describe skilful bike-riding, we might at a certain point fall back on remarks like ‘He rides his bike just so.’ This is helpful only insofar as it ostends something particular.) The whole point of repeating this phrase is that, where practical truth is concerned, to look for a usable verbal formula or definition that will characterise it completely and exactly

182 Cultivating a Good Life is to look in altogether the wrong direction. Instead, we should look for examples of good performance. But no doubt this is difficult, especially in matters which are particular. For it is not easy to define how and with whom and why and for how long a man should be angry. … Nor is it easy to fix exactly by reason how far and how much a man should be blamed, either. For indeed nothing else that is perceived is easily defined. Such things are among particular matters, and the judgement on them lies in perception. (NE 1109b14-23)

If you want to see exactly what good bicycle-riding is, you need to look not at a verbal definition of good bike-riding, but at actual examples of it. The only place to find complete determinacy about what counts as good bike-riding is, unsurprisingly when you think about it, in the principal actualisation of the skill of bicycle-riding, that is, in examples of good bike-riding. Just likewise, if you want to see exactly what virtue is, no definition of virtue or prescription for virtue can tell you that; what you need to do is look at the principal actualisation of virtue, which is of course some actual example of a good person. Practical truth lies in action, not in words. Where else could it lie?

Practical truth and metaethical realism For a modern reader, a question that will naturally arise at this point is about realism and non-realism in ethics. My claim that, for Aristotle, ‘practical truth lies in action, not in words’, and my denial that (fully particularised) practical truth is wholly propositional, may look close to an admission that talk about truth in ethics is at best metaphorical, and that ethical claims are not really truth-apt at all. If Aristotle has the conception of practical truth that I have suggested so far, doesn’t that make him a non-realist in ethics? Not necessarily, because the claim that practical truth lies in action not in words can come with a variety of explanations why words, or more exactly precise definitions, are not possible in ethics. For sure it might be because the whole discourse of ethics is not ultimately truth-apt. But nothing I have said here forces us into that familiar modern irrealism. The view which I am developing – and suggesting can fruitfully be ascribed to Aristotle – is only that fully particularised practical truth is not propositional. That does not exclude the possibility that less than fully particularised practical truth might be propositional, or representable by propositions; this view can accord with intuition by allowing that generalisations like ‘Rape is wrong’ can be both fully propositional and fully truth-apt (and indeed true). But why aren’t fully particularised practical truths propositional? The answer might be, as Sarah Broadie suggests (1991: 221, 223), that Aristotle’s basic conception of truth is not a propositional or semantic one anyway: He has chosen the term ‘true’ [in the phrase ‘practical truth’] precisely to make the point that practice like theory is an exercise of reason, its success a success of reason … the genus of which theoretic truth is one species and practical another [is not semantic truth but understanding].

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Or again, the reason why fully particularised practical truths are not propositional may be – and this is my own suggestion – because of the perceptual phenomenology of ethics. In perception generally, what we experience outstrips the expressive resources of our language: there simply aren’t the words to say exactly what it is like to taste marzipan, rustle taffeta between your fingers, or see the aurora borealis. It’s not just a more convenient way to convey the content of these experiences to others, to say ‘Taste, touch, look for yourself ’; it’s the only way. And this not because there is anything unreal about the taste of marzipan, the rustle of taffeta, or the spectacle of the Northern Lights, but simply because they are matters of perception. We should not demand the same sort of explanation in every inquiry alike. In some inquiries it is enough to do a good job of showing simply what is true [without also showing why], as for example with inquiries into first principles – for the fact that something is true is primary, and a principle. Some first principles are studied by induction, some by aisthēsis, some by a kind of habituation, and others in other ways; so in each case we must try to approach the first principles in the way which suits their nature. (NE 1098a34-b5)

Perhaps the content of ethical experience will be just as real as the content of perceptual experience, yet just as impossible to articulate except by ostension, if what is right in ethics too is – as Aristotle repeatedly claims – a matter of aisthēsis: as I, with my eye on the bike-riding example, have suggested we translate it, a matter of feel.

Knowing how to argue about ethics A different worry about the position that I am ascribing to Aristotle is that it looks obscurantist. Saying that ‘what is right in ethics is a matter of feel’ apparently means abandoning all hope of securing the great advantage of systematic moral theory: explicitness, resolubility. If the right thing to do is determined by something measurable – as it would be if we could achieve the Protagoras’ science of measurement for ethics – then wherever we disagree about ethics, we will be able to settle our disagreement simply by doing the relevant measuring. If anything like that science is impossible, then we are forced to rely instead on something nebulous that Aristotle calls aisthēsis, and that I have called ‘feel’. But (it may be objected) that hardly seems like a promising basis for a form of reasoning about ethics. It also seems to bring us back by another route to the last section’s worry about subjectivism; it is a short step from saying that ethical judgement is all about feel to saying that there is no more to ethical judgement than subjective taste or preference, and then, by familiarly cynical processes, enshrining the preferences of whoever happens to be in power as if they were reasons. However, we should distinguish two possible positions about aisthēsis. One is the extreme view that all that happens in ethical judgement is that we feel that something is right or wrong, and so judge that that is right or wrong. This really is a hopelessly obscurantist position which makes ethical discussion, argument, and reasoning

184 Cultivating a Good Life impossible. Fortunately, there is no reason to attribute it to Aristotle. His position is a much less extreme view which gives ethical judgement much more structure. This more moderate view allows that ethical decision can involve all sorts of factors, criteria, standards, and even forms of measurement. The point is not that such factors cannot be deployed in ethical decision. It is simply that how they are deployed in ethical decision, and indeed whether they are deployed in ethical decision, and how much they count for if they are, are all matters that ultimately only judgement – the judgement of the agathos – can settle. For otherwise (though Aristotle does not spell this out) we face a familiar regress. Where we have a rule that we want to apply, deciding how to apply it will either be something that we do by applying a meta-rule, or else something that we do by an exercise of judgement. If we do it by applying a meta-rule, the same choice will apply about the meta-rule: do we apply that by applying a meta-meta-rule, or by an exercise of judgement? The point is not, pace the most literal reading of Wittgenstein (Philosophical Investigations I, 217, 219, 232), that there can never be ‘a rule for the application of a rule’. As any student of legal systems knows, sometimes there can. For example, the First Amendment to the US Constitution is a rule defining the application of the rule that Congress has the right to make laws: ‘Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.’ (Another example is H. L. A. Hart’s ‘rules of recognition’, which tell judges what rules they must count as the legal rules: Hart 1961. Bob Lockie reminds me of a different case: the Canadian road signs which simply read ‘Obey road signs!’) There can be no plausible objection to the existence of some rules for the application of other rules. But in fact that is not Wittgenstein’s point anyway. His point is not what it literally seems, that there can never be a rule for the application of a rule; it is rather that there can’t always be a rule for the application of a rule. At some point or other every application of every rule will depend on a judgement that ‘This rule applies here, and this is the way to apply it’. In line with this, we should see Aristotle’s view of ethical decision-making as a twopart view. One part of it consists in explicitly formulable, propositionally expressible rules, criteria, or standards of other kinds (not necessarily rules – is an example a rule? – but I will say ‘rules’ for brevity). For the most part these rules are assessable as correct or incorrect, and so as generating ethical truths or falsehoods, in a perfectly straightforward sense. These rules are general in nature, and for that very reason do not always apply, or on their own completely determine any particular case (no more than the tips and hints that we might give to someone learning to ride a bike will always apply, or on their own completely determine what good bike-riding is). The other part consists in judgements about how, where, when, and indeed whether to apply these articulate rules, what to do about clashes between them and exceptions to them, and so forth; and in action issuing from such judgements. Except where they are themselves rules (meta-rules, rules for the application of rules), these judgements are particular in nature, and for that very reason do not on their own completely determine any general rule (no more than good bike-riding completely determines what advice is good advice for someone learning to ride). It is to this second part of ethical decision-making that

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Aristotle’s notion of practical truth applies: it is here specifically that the criterion of truth lies not in general principles, but in the particular action. This view is not just about ethical rules: no picture of ethical decision-making that did not admit that it always takes judgement to apply ethical rules could be an honest or ideologically innocent one. But it is not just about judgement, either: no picture of ethical decision-making that gave judgement no principles or criteria to work on could be an informative one. Aisthēsis, perception or sensibility, has, literally, a decisive place in moral judgement – it is the key to the process of deciding what to do. But aisthēsis is not the only ingredient of decision-making. All sorts of criteria, standards, and even forms of measurement can and do get deployed in Aristotelian deliberation. The point is only that they are all parts of deliberation; they are not the whole of deliberation, and they cannot substitute for the role played by judgement, any more than judgement can substitute for their role. On this picture, it is perfectly clear why Aristotle dwells so much on the imprecision and approximateness of the various general standards that he thinks we can use, and which he devotes much of the Nicomachean Ethics to describing. For instance, Aristotle does not disagree with the Socrates of the Protagoras that pleasure is ethically significant, and a marker or symptom (to say no more than that) of rightness in action: NE 1153b25-6. We can make something of the idea of pleasure as a criterion of the good. But a criterion, not the criterion: there is no truth which is always applicable by everybody to the effect that the right thing to do is pursue pleasure. (The person for whom it is closest to being a universal truth that the right thing to do is pursue pleasure is, of course, the good man: NE 1173b23, 1176a16. For Aristotle as for some Confucians, the moral paradigm or standard (kanon) is the person of virtue.) And so nothing as universal or determinate as Socrates’ science of measuring pleasures is available. Nor, given his generally teleological outlook, would Aristotle reject the idea that some choices in ethics are best made by comparing the consequences of the alternatives; but some choices, not all. (A teleological outlook in ethics says that what is good is determined by the (natural) goals of life. This is not the same thing as a consequentialist outlook, which says that the right action is always the one with the best overall consequences. Consequentialism can be presented as one way of spelling out a theory of rightness for teleological ethics, but there are plenty of other possibilities; for example Aquinas is obviously a teleological ethicist, but obviously not a consequentialist.) Again, Aristotle would not disagree with those who say, like Linda Zagzebski today, that rightness and goodness in action can be known by linking them to examples (Zagzebski 2017): after all, Aristotle is himself the originator of the philosophical method of doing ethics by reflecting on examples of good character, the exposition of which dominates his discussions of the virtues in NE III-V and VIII-IX. Here too, however, there is always the question of what exactly we should learn from the examples we review: and that again is something that only judgement can determine. And likewise with another form of argument that Aristotle probably originates, the function argument. Even if it were true that thinking about the human function was supposed by Aristotle to give us any specific guidance at all in making decisions,

186 Cultivating a Good Life still that guidance could not be simply read off any zoologically correct account of the human function. It would have to be mediated by good judgement. And in any case, it doesn’t give specific guidance (McDowell 1998: 35–6): ‘To many commentators [the ergon argument] suggests that Aristotle envisages an external validation for his ethic, starting from the facts about human nature. [But] in fact there are only two substantive points on which Aristotle suggests that facts about human nature constrain the truth about the good human life, in a way that might be supposed to be independent of inculcated propensities to value this and despise that. First, a good human life must be an active life of that which has logos' (NE 1098a3-4). … Second, human beings are naturally social (NE 1097b11, 1169b18-19). … Obviously these two points fall a long way short of purporting to afford a validation of Aristotle’s ethic in full. But it is the whole substance of his ethic, not just these two somewhat structural features of it, that he wants to represent as objectively correct’ (see also Chappell 2005).

The general pattern whereby Aristotle both endorses a criterion of the good and also insists on its fallibility and incompleteness and subjection to the verdicts of judgement is visible above all in what we might call his ‘pet’ doctrine, the doctrine of the mean. This is pretty plainly the doctrine on the basis of which Aristotle would be most inclined to build a moral theory in the sense of a system of morality, if he went in for systematic moral theory at all (as I am arguing he does not). There is certainly something a bit schematic – maybe a bit too schematic – about the way he tries to apply the doctrine of the mean to different virtues: as is widely agreed, the schematism is most problematic of all in Book V’s notorious discussion of justice as a mean. Aristotle certainly thinks that we can look to questions like ‘What are the extremes regarding this disposition or spectrum of dispositions, and what lies between them?’ for some degree of guidance whereby to steer our course through life (NE 1109a3435). However, the mean we seek is relative to us, pros hēmas, not absolute, haplōs; and Aristotle explicitly tells us that this entails that the mean we seek is not one that can be found by arithmetical measurement, or anything like it (NE 1106b35-36). In Aristotle’s discussion, the moment of transition from rules (and other similar criteria) to judgement is pretty clearly marked. That transition follows straight on from Aristotle’s discussion of the mean: With all the dispositions that have been discussed, there is a target which the man who has reason aims towards, tightening or loosening his bow-string; there is a kind of standard for the means that we say lie in between excess and defect, and which are fixed in line with right reason. However, to say this may be true, but it is not at all clear. For in every endeavour such that there is a science about it, this holds true – that one should neither try too hard nor be too easy-going, but [aim at] ‘the middle state and according to right reason’. But someone who has hold only of this will know no more than he did before; just as he would not know what treatments to bring to bear on the body, if someone told him only ‘such as medical science orders, and according to

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what someone would say who had medical science’. And so with the dispositions of the soul as well, we must not only say what is true, but also define what right reason is, and what is its defining mark. (NE 1138b21-34)

But, of course, what then follows in Book VI of the Ethics is precisely not a verbal definition of the kind of ‘right reason’ that fixes the correct application of the doctrine of the mean. On the contrary, what follows is an argument that there can be no such verbal definition: instead, what we need is an account of practical truth. J. O. Urmson draws the right moral: It must be wrong to hold that Aristotle thought that we should decide how to act on particular occasions by working in from the extremes. … If one were to ask Aristotle how to decide how to act on particular occasions, his initial answer would be that one must do so by bringing to bear the intellectual excellence of (practical) wisdom. If we then ask in what wisdom consists, we shall get a long answer about … planning ability, experience, ability to appreciate a situation, and executive ability. … There is no simple decision procedure for the wise man to use. How could there be when there are so many variables? If one is generous, one has a settled disposition to do whatever is found to be the generous thing; but what the generous thing to do is depends on a full appreciation of all the factors in the situation by an experienced man who has acquired sound general principles. (Urmson in Rorty 1988: 162–3)

Even ‘Aristotle’s pet doctrine’ as I have called it, the doctrine of the mean, is not intended to give us a determinate decision procedure. Like every other ethical principle or factor that Aristotle discusses – and he discusses a wide variety of principles and factors – the doctrine of the mean is a rule of thumb only. It shows us roughly where the right action is likely to be found; to locate the right action exactly is, as we’ve seen, a matter for the good person’s judgement. Or as Urmson puts it, having ‘sound general principles’ is only part of the recipe for right action; the other part, at least equally crucial, is the experienced person’s ‘full appreciation of all the factors in the situation’.

‘Judgement’ and ‘master rules’ in ethics The last section took on the accusation of obscurantism; now we need to take on a different objection, that I am pushing at an open door. If I was right to say that judgement is indispensable in ethical decision-making, then every plausible picture of ethical decision-making will include a role for judgement – including those pictures given in systematic moral theory. So the view that I am developing out of a reading of Aristotle will not have the anti-moral–theoretical bite that I claim it has. The appeal to judgement, in fact, will be entirely uncontroversial. As it is put by two recent defenders of a ‘generalist’ moral–theoretical approach to ethics: [Our] characterizations of principles are consistent with the idea that applying those principles requires imagination, judgment, or insight. A much more

188 Cultivating a Good Life ambitious conception of moral principles holds that an adequate set of moral principles must function as a kind of algorithm. Such principles would provide a purely mechanical decision-procedure. It is not clear that any of the major historical defenders of generalist accounts have understood principles in this way. … If particularists are sceptical of algorithmic decision-procedures, then we share their scepticism. (Ridge and McKeever 2006: 11)

Can an adherent of systematic moral theory simply accept that there is a place for judgement in ethical decision-making – and thereby defuse the anti-theoretical argument that I am trying to develop? Yes and no: there is an ambiguity in the phrase ‘a place for judgement’ that we need to resolve. Suppose the systematician’s preferred moral theory is U. Then the systematician can certainly accept this claim: (A) There is a place for judgement about how U applies. As Ridge and McKeever note, no sane adherent of moral theory, however systematic, should deny (A). But now contrast (A) with (B): (B) There is a place for judgement about whether U applies. Can a systematician who accepts moral theory U, accept (B) as well as (A)? I don’t see how. The whole point of any systematic moral theory is that it always applies. (Always applies, not should always be applied by the agent in the situation. The agent in the situation might not face the question how he should apply U, because it might be a corollary of U that that question should not be visible from his deliberative perspective. Whether or not the agent in the situation faces this question, in any situation there will nonetheless be the question how U applies there. So this is the question on which my formulation focuses.) Systematic moral theories are supposed to explain rightness everywhere. So if you accept some systematic moral theory, U for instance, there can be no question about whether U applies in some case. To accept U yet think that this question is open is not to make room for judgement; it is just to be confused. To make this clearer, let’s give a content to U. Suppose that, as its name may suggest, U says this: (U) The right thing to do is what maximises utility. Then the adherent of U (the utilitarian) can accept (A), because the utilitarian can accept that it might be a matter of judgement exactly what counts, in any situation, as maximising utility. But the utilitarian can’t accept (B) without ceasing to be a utilitarian. For to accept (B) is to accept that there are situations where (U) applies, and situations where (U) doesn’t apply, and that it takes judgement to tell which is which. And the whole point of being a utilitarian is that you think that (U) always applies, somehow or other. This brings out one of the key features of what I am opposing under the name of ‘systematic moral theory’, and the contrast with the more pluralistic positions that

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I think make more sense. Alongside (U) we can put up other rules for decision, such as: (K) The right thing to do is whatever is universalisable; (C) The right thing to do is whatever accords with public rules that no party to them could reasonably reject; (V) The right thing to do is act as the virtuous person would; (GR) The right thing to do (to others) is whatever you would like others to do (to you) if your positions were reversed; and even Aristotle’s own (M) The right thing to do is whatever lies in the mean relative to us; – and about all these and many other possible rules for decision-making, we can ask whether (A) and (B) are true about them. The idea of systematic moral theory is that we can divide all these possible rules for decision-making into three categories. For most rules, neither (A) nor (B) is true, because they are not rules that apply at all; that is, they are bad rules. For many rules, both (A) and (B) are true, because these rules serve as rules of thumb only: they may be applicable in one case, but they needn’t be applicable in another – they are, if you like, local or intermittently binding rules. For at least one rule, however (says the systematician), only (A) is true. This is the one master rule that defines the theory, (U) or (K) or (C) or whatever it is, and explains the local roles of all the other rules – why they are sometimes helpful and sometimes not, where they should be applied and where not, and why. The master rule is not local, but universal; not intermittently binding, but continuously binding. It is always applicable somehow; so there can be a question about how it is applicable (A), but there can’t be a question about whether (B). So there is a substantive question in dispute between the moral systematicians and my anti-theoretical position. (A substantive question: in fact there is more than one, but one will do to start with.) The question is just this: Does ethics need a master rule, and if so, why? Complication: more exactly, the substantive question here is not ‘Does ethics need a master-rule?’, but ‘Does ethics need a substantive master-rule?’ Compare bike-riding again. There can be a trivial master rule for bike-riding, namely ‘Ride your bike well’, or ‘as circumstances demand’, or ‘as an expert bike-rider would ride it’, or similar. But there cannot be a substantive master rule for bike-riding, such as ‘Ride your bike by keeping the front wheel on the white line at the side of the road at all times’. Similarly, I shall argue, there can be a trivial master rule for ethics, such as ‘Do the right thing’, ‘Do what good judgement would tell you to do’, or even ‘Do what would be done by the person who always acts rightly’. But for one thing, none of these trivial master-rules is uniquely correct, as moral theorists suppose their one master rule to be uniquely

190 Cultivating a Good Life correct; none of them is the only fundamental rule for ethics, which generates and explains all the other rules. And for another: to echo an Aristotelian complaint that I quoted earlier, these are trivial rules – they give us no new information about how to act. A unique master rule that does give us new information is what moral theorists aspire to find. But I see no reason to think that there can be a master rule for ethics which is substantive in this way. It would be surprising if there was no truth at all in the kind of master-rules that moral theorists form partisan sects around; but it would be at least equally surprising if any one of those master-rules constituted the whole truth. Systematic moral theory characteristically takes it for granted that there is some one master rule, and goes on to seek it. But this whole enterprise is flawed from the very beginning, by the utter groundlessness of the assumption that such a unique master rule either can be found, or needs to be found. My alternative proposal – one which I think is supported by the best evidence there can be, the data of experience – is that ethics does not need, and does not have, a master rule. For most rules, neither (A) nor (B) is true – these are just bad rules, with no good application. For many rules, both (A) and (B) are true: these are local or intermittently binding rules. But there is no master rule, no substantive rule such that only (A) is true of it – such that there can be a question about how it applies, but not about whether. And Aristotle too, I believe, is committed to saying this, on the basis of the doctrine of practical truth that I have expounded above. The consequence of this denial of all substantive master-rules is a larger role for judgement than any systematician can allow, and a different one. For we will have to be able to decide somehow, not only how to apply rules when we do, but also when to apply them: which rule should be applied where. (I do not mean that we will have to be able to make such decisions in real time, as part of our conscious deliberative procedure; I do mean that we will have to be able to make them offline, as part of our reflective assessments of our own conscious deliberative procedures.) If we cannot do this by reference to a master rule because there is no master rule, then we will have to do it by exercising judgement. This picture has two great advantages over any systematic moral theory. First, it is realistic: it matches what is actually done both by good deliberators and by good reflectors on deliberation, which is not to adhere uniformly and universally to a single master rule for determining what is good and right, but instead to reach for whatever aids and techniques for determining that they think will help in the case they are actually concerned with. (Rather like the different levers in the train-driver’s cabin that Wittgenstein discusses (Philosophical Investigations I,12); the temptation, and the error, is to think they must all work in the same way.) Second, it is generously inclusive: it does not dispute the theorists’ claims that some moral phenomena are well explained by (U), others by (K), others again by (C), and so on. What my picture does not do is move from these explanatory successes for the various rules (U), (K), (C), and so on to the systematician’s implausible claim that the pattern of explanation that succeeds in some cases must at all costs be extended to cover all cases. And a good thing too. If anything is the key mistake in normative ethics, this move is: the inference from, say, ‘Utilitarianism gives a good explanation of the right in many public and political contexts’ to ‘So we are rationally compelled to make

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utilitarianism the theory of right for every context whatever’. It would be remarkable enough if just one talented and rigorous moral theorist were to commit this obvious non sequitur. The striking thing about contemporary moral theorists, even the rigorous and talented ones, is that probably a numerical majority of them commit it. One usefully up-front example is Philip Pettit: The desirability of having a single criterion of ultimate evaluation argues [sic] that if we have to live with consequentialism in political theory, then we ought also to try to live with it in moral theory. Consequentialism is capable of providing the final criteria of assessment for all individual actions, as well as all social arrangements, whereas non-consequentialism can provide candidates for that role only in respect of individual actions. But suppose it is desirable in itself, as many think, to have a unified, unvarying account of the ultimate yardsticks of moral assessment. That will argue that everyone ought to endorse consequentialism across the whole territory, avoiding the arbitrariness of preserving non-consequentialism in restricted pockets. (Pettit 2012: 67)

We must have a ‘single criterion of ultimate evaluation’. Why? Because ‘many think’ this? ‘Many think’ that the cosmos was created in 144 hours about 5000 years ago; that does not seem to me a sufficient reason to adopt Young-Earth Creationism. Or because it would be ‘arbitrary’ to have more than one criterion? Even that paradigm of non-arbitrariness and systematic rigour, Newton’s mechanics, has more than one ultimate principle: Newton’s system rests on three laws of motion. There is nothing more irrational than misplaced rationality. The premiss of Pettit’s argument is that normative political theory is inescapably consequentialist. Insofar as this premiss has enough determinate meaning to be assessed at all, it seems pretty plainly false. (Certainly Pettit does not establish it. What he himself calls his best argument for it turns on the claim that assessments of alternative possible political institutions are bound to be consequentialist assessments. The step from this to ‘Political theory is inescapably consequentialist’ is another non sequitur, and the claim itself is another falsehood.) But even if it were true, it is hard to see how ‘Political theory is inescapably consequentialist’ could imply ‘Moral theory is inescapably consequentialist’. That simply doesn’t follow at all. It is difficult to imagine what could make such a leap look attractive, if it were not for the false and misleading theoretical imperatives imposed on us by the will o’ the wisp hunt for a single allembracing moral or normative system. Once we shake ourselves free of the urge to join in that hunt, new uses for our philosophical energy begin to suggest themselves. If the truth in ethics is not that there is a single master rule that on its own shapes the whole of moral space, but rather that there are a number of different rules (and other standards) serving different deliberative purposes at different times, then it looks like the ethicist’s attention may usefully be turned to some questions about this variety of rules and other standards. What are they? How many of them are there (if there is a countable number)? How do they interact? When we speak of judgement choosing which of them to deploy where, what, more exactly and concretely, does that actually come to? Above all, what are these different ethical criteria actually like?

192 Cultivating a Good Life I suspect there is a richness and interest in these questions that should be more than sufficient to answer one of the doubts I mentioned at the beginning, about what ethics could possibly be if it was not theory-building. For these questions set an agenda that will give ethicists plenty to do – even if what it gives them to do has little or no connection with the construction of systematised theories about virtue, and focuses their minds instead on questions about the pursuit and cultivation of virtue itself.1

Note 1 This chapter has been in the pipeline for a while now. Among the readers whom I have to thank for their patience, encouragement, and learning, I particularly remember Karyn Lai, Rick Benitez, and Hyun Jin Kim, the organisers of the lovely conference ‘In pursuit of wisdom: ancient Chinese and Greek perspectives on cultivation’, at UNSW, Sydney, in January 2016; in the audience at that conference I particularly remember Richard King and Will Buckingham. Earlier versions of the chapter were helpfully criticised by Sarah Broadie, and by an audience at the Glasgow Senior Seminar in 2015. With the usual disclaimers, thanks to them all, and apologies to other whose help I have forgotten.

References Broadie, S. (1991), Ethics With Aristotle. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Chappell, T. (2005). ‘“The Good Man is the Measure of all Things”: Objectivity without World-centredness in Aristotle’s Moral Epistemology’, in Christopher Gill (ed.), Moral Objectivity in the Ancient World, 233–55. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Chappell, S. G. (2014). Knowing What To Do, Oxford: Oxford University Press Hart, H. L. A. (1961). The Concept of Law. Oxford: Clarendon. Kenny, A. (1979). Aristotle’s Theory of the Will. London: Duckworth. McDowell, J. (1998), Mind, Value, and Reality. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Pettit, P. (2012). ‘The Inescapability of Consequentialism’, in U. Heuer and G. Lang (eds), Luck, Value, and Commitment: Themes from the Ethics of Bernard Williams, 41–70. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Ridge, M. and Sean McKeever (2006), Principled Ethics. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Rorty, A. (1988), Essays on Aristotle’s Ethics. Riverside: University of California Press. Williams, B. (1981), Moral Luck. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Wittgenstein, L. (1951), Philosophical Investigations. Oxford: Blackwell’s. Zagzebski, L. (2017), Exemplarist Moral Theory. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

12

Learning to Be Reliable: Confucius’ Analects Karyn Lynne Lai

Reciting the Odes can arouse your sensibilities, strengthen your powers of observation, enhance your ability to get on with others, and sharpen your critical skills. Close at hand it enables you to serve your father, and away at court it enables you to serve your lord. It instils in you a broad vocabulary for distinguishing birds, animals and plants. (Analects of Confucius 17.9; adapted from the translation by Ames and Rosemont 1998: 206)

Introduction In the Analects, Confucius remarks on the inconceivability of a life lacking in xin 信 (2.22). Here, I propose a translation of xin as reliability. In doing so, I locate the meaning of the term in the context of a cultivated life. What are the elements of such a life? Existing discussions in Confucian philosophy highlight its value orientation, focusing on the terms ren 仁 (benevolence), yi 義 (rightness), and li 禮 (propriety) in ethical terms. Xin is often interpreted, also with ethical overtones, as ‘trustworthiness’. My proposal builds on this work by bringing together the ethical and epistemological aspects of xin. Hence, ‘reliability’ is not meant to replace all other translations of xin. Rather, I suggest that xin in the Analects has a cluster of meanings (which I explore in the chapter) and that, thinking about it in terms of reliability helps to enrich our understanding of it. By translating xin as ‘reliability’, I bring out two of its main features. First, I focus on the longer-term consistency in a person’s actions and behaviours in different circumstances across time. Second, by saying that reliability is epistemic in nature, we turn our orientation toward knowing how best to act or respond in different circumstances (e.g. to proceed 行; xing; 15.6). In the first section, I provide an overview of xin and its place in the Analects, including a brief sketch of some influential ways in which the term has been interpreted in scholarship. The second section, ‘Acting reliably’, situates xin within the context of the demands of official life in the time of Confucius and his early followers by focusing on conversations that relate to lapses in reliability. This helps to explain why reliability is an apt translation for the xin and establishes its place in the Analects. Finally, in the

194 Cultivating a Good Life last section ‘Learning to be reliable’, I draw together some elements of cultivation in the Analects, providing a fuller understanding of reliability and how it might be cultivated.

Xin: its place in the Analects Xin has a central role in the Analects: The Master said, ‘I am not sure that anyone who [is trustworthy] (xin; 信) is viable as a person. If a large carriage does not have the pin for its yoke, or a small carriage does not have the pin for its crossbar, how can you drive them anywhere?’ (2.22; adapted from the translation by Ames and Rosemont 1998: 81)1

The character appears in 32 of the Analects’ 499 paragraphs. Confucius himself is said to be xin (5.28), and xin was one of his four teachings (the others being the written script, how to handle matters, and loyalty (文, 行, 忠, 信) in 7.25; see also 17.6). Xin has an important role in human relationships: in some conversations, it is coupled with loyalty (忠 zhong; see 1.8, 9.25, 12.10). As the vast majority of human interactions involve verbal exchanges, xin is deeply connected with one’s words: in 15.6, a person needs to ensure that his words are sincere and trustworthy (see also 1.13, 5.10). Xin is particularly prominent in two relational domains. The first is friendship, highlighting the mutual reliance and trust between friends. Close examination of these passages reveals interesting aspects of the conception of friendship in the Analects (1.4, 1.7, 1.8, 4.28, 9.25), though it is beyond the scope of this discussion to do that. The second domain is in government, specifically, in the relationship between those in power and the common people. In Analects 12.7, to gain the people’s trust (xin) in the government, to ensure the supply of food, and to provide of arms for war, are listed as the top three priorities of government, and ranked in order of importance. The people’s trust must be nurtured; it is a responsive relationship that stems from the trustworthiness of those in power (1.5, 13.4). Only then will the people come to rely on them (任; 17.6, 20.1; see also 19.10). Across these passages, we see a number of meanings of xin, clustering around the ideas of trust, trustworthiness, reliance, and reliability. The notion of relationality underlies this cluster of meanings: trustworthiness begets trust; others come to rely on those who are reliable. Therefore, in the literature, there is an influential analysis of xin in terms of the alignment between a person’s deeds and his words. This interpretation highlights the graph (信), comprised by two radicals: 亻 (or 人), meaning ‘human’ or ‘person’, and 言, meaning ‘word’ or ‘what is spoken’. The composite character is often interpreted to mean ‘a man standing by his word’, noted by Ezra Pound who articulated the views of his teacher Ernest Fenollosa (Pound 1951: 22; see Ames and Rosemont 1998: 53). Pound describes xin in terms of ‘fidelity’, referring to a person who holds to his promises.2 Following Fenollosa and Pound, scholars including especially Dimcheuk Lau – whose translation of the Analects has been influential – have identified the ethical dimension of xin as its major feature, where the focal point is the concordance between a person’s words and his actions.3



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Other translators of the Analects offer different perspectives on xin and I mention a few here that will help broaden our understanding of it in current debates. Brooks and Brooks present an interpretation of the Analects shaped by their understanding of the conversations that might have arisen among the early Confucian followers (Brooks and Brooks 1998). For example, they suggest that the coupling of xin with zhong in 15.6 should be interpreted in light of the concerns of official life and its relationships. Here, they argue, loyalty and fidelity are important components of xin.4 One effect of the Brooks’ interpretive methodology is that it breathes life into some of the terms in the Analects. In this light, xin has an important function in the lives of the early Confucians: ‘2.22 [the linchpin passage] approaches a definition of what is ethically human, but in active rather than descriptive terms: fidelity is something you do, not something you are’ (ibid.: 113). Ames and Rosemont’s translation of xin also focus on its relational aspect and its continuing relevance: xin captures a fiduciary relationship marked by reciprocity. The dual components of such a relation are commitment, on the part of one person, and trust, on the part of the other. For them xin is translated as ‘[to] make good on [one’s] word’ (Ames and Rosemont 1998: 81): every reader of the Analects confronts visually ‘person’ standing by ‘words’ or ‘speech’. Xin is often translated as ‘trustworthy’. However, being simply well intended in what one says and does is not good enough; one must have the resources to follow through and make good on what one proposes to do. Interestingly, as with most classical Chinese terms, in understanding xin we must appreciate the priority of situation over agency. That is, xin in describing the situation of persons making good on their word goes in both directions, meaning both the commitment of the benefactor and the confidence of the beneficiary. Xin, then, is the consummation of fiduciary relationships. (ibid.: 53)

Ames and Rosemont’s analysis also foregrounds the moment of interchange captured by xin, where situationality, rather than agency, frames the interaction. Their account is grounded in their view of relational personhood in Chinese philosophy; in subsequent work, they express personhood in terms of roles (Ames 2011; Rosemont and Ames 2016). Finally, Slingerland’s account of xin emphasises agency.5 He draws on the discourse of virtue ethics, suggesting that xin (especially in 13.20) is a ‘minor virtue’, one that ‘can easily be taken too far’ (2003: 242); indeed, that it might even become ‘a vice through excess’ (ibid.: 148). Slingerland also provides some clues concerning how trustworthiness might need to be aligned with rightness (yi 義) in his commentary on 1.13. Here is Slingerland’s translation of 1.13: Master You said, ‘Trustworthiness comes close to rightness, in that your word can be counted upon. Reverence comes close to ritual propriety, in that it allows you to keep shame and public disgrace at a distance. Simply following these virtues, never letting them out of your sight – one cannot deny that this is worthy of respect.’ (ibid.: 5–6)

196 Cultivating a Good Life In his commentary, Slingerland refers to the views of Huang Kan (黃侃 1886–1935), who relates the tale of a person who doggedly kept his word to meet with another in heavy storms and drowned; it would have been better if he had not kept his word (2003: 6). Across his various comments on the xin passages in the Analects, Slingerland brings into view the practical import of xin: as much as trustworthiness (conceived as virtue) is important, it must be moderated in practice. Two prominent features of xin are shared across the analyses we have seen so far. First is its ethical component, expressed in terms of fidelity, that is, the alignment between a person’s actions and his words. Ames and Rosemont are right to propose that, at its very core, xin is a relational concept – for it is a person’s fidelity that begets another’s trust. This element of xin captures the ‘internal’ ethical consistency of a person’s commitments and actions, which might be a reason why Slingerland expresses it in terms of a person’s character (2003: 15). The second feature relates to xin, enacted. Brooks and Brooks emphasise that xin pertains to doing, while Ames and Rosemont stress the dynamic nature of xin, operating at the centre of fiduciary relationships. Importantly, for Ames and Rosemont, xin is expressed in an active phrase, ‘making good on one’s word’ (1998: 53; 74; 81). For Slingerland, the practical element in xin rests primarily in how this ‘minor virtue’ is brought in line with more weighty considerations in practice. At this point, we should briefly consider the place and function of xin. What are we expecting, when we seek reliability in a person? In what kinds of tasks is this person reliable? In the context of the Analects, a Confucian scholar-official (Ru, 儒) would be expected reliably to handle a wide range of matters associated with his position at court. These would have included maintaining his own commitment to humanity (4.4; 4.23), proposing institutions that would enable human flourishing (2.3; 12.7), advising the ruler, perhaps even to remonstrate with him (2.19; 19.10), allocating tasks to the common people (19.10), acting and speaking with tact and decorum (16.6), and, not least, having successful personal relationships (1.1; 1.11; 4.18). In light of the range of matters the Ru would have had to handle, it becomes clear that xin pertains not merely to a person’s successes in handling tasks, measured only by their outcomes. This alerts us to the naivete of the question above, that focused on tasks. Rather, xin sits at the nexus of a person’s commitments and his actions, realised, consistently, over time. Reliability draws our attention to two dimensions of the commitment–action nexus. First, how do the person’s actions bear out his commitments? (Or, how do his actions match his words?) Secondly, is the nexus relevantly and reasonably manifest in action, over time? These are elements of xin qua reliability that will be explored in the following sections. To summarise the discussion in this section, relationality and situationality are irreducible elements of xin. From a first-person perspective, being trustworthy is not simply about situational consistency between a person’s words and actions. It is also about a person’s moral identity over time, manifest in both his words (commitment) and deeds: making promises he has kept, or withdrawing from agreements when weightier moral factors bear on the situation at hand, or reviewing his undertakings, and so on. The longitudinal aspect of xin, manifest in a person’s actions through time, is best captured by the term ‘reliability’. When we reflect on the two relationships in which xin figures most prominently – friendship and trust in government – it is not



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simply that we trust (or should be able to trust) friends and those in power in the relevant moral senses, but also that we can reliably count on them in pertinent ways. In the next section, I provide more support for the notion of reliability in the Analects by investigating some conversations relating to action.

Acting reliably The conversations we examine in this section do not necessarily mention xin. However, they present scenarios where correct or appropriate actions are taken, or not. The key passage here is 5.22, where Confucius expresses frustration at his young followers’ failure to act aptly in particular situations. The discussion here picks out particular passages in the Analects that highlight the importance of taking appropriate action. I suggest that a person’s ability to act appropriately in different situations, over time, is his reliability, manifest in practice. I begin this discussion by drawing attention to the connection between xin and practical action before moving on to examine Confucius’ frustration in 5.22. Analects 15.6 identifies xin as one of four rudiments in the life of an effective official: Zizhang asked about getting by in the world (xing 行). The Master replied, ‘In your speech, be dutiful and trustworthy, and in your conduct be sincere and respectful. In this way, you will always get by in the world, even if you find yourself in some barbarian state. If your words are not dutiful and trustworthy, and your conduct is not sincere and respectful, how can you possibly get along, even in your own region? When standing still, visualize these principles standing by your side; when riding in your carriage, see them resting before you on the crossbar. Only then will you get by in the world.’ Zizhang then wrote these words on the end of his sash. (trans. Slingerland 2003: 176)

In the broadest sense, the term xing refers to movement or process. In this passage, Zizhang comes to Confucius with a question about how he is to proceed in carrying out official duties. Slingerland fittingly interprets Zizhang’s question as a concern about ‘getting by in the world’, hence reflecting Zizhang’s preoccupations with official life. Though not explicit, this conversation reveals the importance of preparation for official life: the advice is for Zizhang to be mindful of the principles he has learnt; accordingly, he writes these words on his sash to remind himself of them. The problem is not simply one of recalling what one has learnt, however. In 5.22, Confucius is annoyed at his young followers, who are unable to do what is situationally appropriate: The Master was in the state of Chen, and said, ‘Homeward! Homeward! My young friends at home are rash and ambitious, while perhaps careless in the details. With the lofty elegance of the literatus, they put on a full display of culture, but they don’t know how to cut and tailor it.’ (trans. Ames and Rosemont 1998: 101)

198 Cultivating a Good Life These young men seem to have absorbed prevailing customs and appropriate decorum but are unable to adapt them to the situation. This passage expresses one of the perils of learning: in one sense, a person can be a good learner as they demonstrate full competence in performing what they have been taught; in another sense, the unreflective, context-insensitive application of learnt behaviours is hardly a sign of successful learning. The Mencius, another early Confucian text, makes a connection between this passage and several others that focus on the ‘village worthy’ (xiang yuan 鄉原) (Mencius 7B.37; which refers to the conversations in Analects 13.21 and 17.13). What is so problematic about such a person? ‘If you want to condemn the village worthy’, said Mencius, ‘you have nothing on him; if you want to criticize him, there is nothing to criticize. He chimes in with the practices of the day and blends in with the common world. Where he lives he seems to be conscientious and to live up to his word, and in what he does, he seems to have integrity.’ (Mencius 7B.37; cited in Ames and Rosemont 1998: note 86, p. 239)6

In the Analects, the passage on the village worthy (17.13) is immediately followed by a negative comment on those who unthinkingly repeat what they hear: The Master said, ‘To hear something on the road, and then repeat it everywhere you go, is to throw Virtue away.’ (17.14; trans. Slingerland 2003: 206)

Slingerland notes that number of commentators draw the lesson that blind repetition falls significantly short of understanding and realisation (expressed in the term zhi (知 or 智), often translated ‘knowledge’ or ‘wisdom’). Analects 17.14 is explained in light of Analects 2.11, which gives central place to the apposite application of one’s learning to the situation at hand. In 2.11, Confucius is meant to have remarked, ‘Revising the old in order to realise the new; this is a teacher indeed’ (trans. Lai). Slingerland explains his translation of 17.14 with reference to 2.11, drawing on Huang Kan’s (皇侃; 488–545) commentary: as Huang Kan explains, ‘Mere rotelearning is not sufficient to make one a teacher of others. In order to teach others, one must first be able to “both keep past teachings alive and understand the present” [2.11], and one must examine what one has learned in detail and practice it for a long time. Only then is one ready to repeat and transmit teachings to others. If, instead, one hears something on the road, and then turns around and repeats it to someone else, a great deal of nonsense and foolishness will inevitably be the result’ (ibid. 206). Huang Kan and earlier commentators7 point out that each situation is unique – new – in that it has distinctive circumstantial features that bear on the decision to be made. Let us return to 5.22, where Confucius uses the metaphor from tailoring (cai 裁), to express his followers’ lack of ability to adapt their learning to the situation at hand. What does tailoring involve? Each piece of tailored clothing is made to fit a particular person. Specific considerations are brought to bear, including the physical measurements of the wearer, the style of clothing and the print, colour and weave of the cloth. Interestingly, the English phrase ‘to tailor’ has similar connotations of taking



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action that is fitting under particular circumstances.8 Indeed, the term ‘tailor’ can be, and is, used metaphorically exactly to make the point about fit. We might hear, for instance, the following comment in a business context: ‘We’ll need to tailor the proposal to the situation at hand.’ Likewise, Confucius was using the term metaphorically. Each tailored piece is, in effect, a ‘new’ piece. It is, to use a phrase in today’s consumer context, ‘custom made’. Each tailored piece, cut and sewn well, testifies to the tailor’s reliability, and her expertise. Here, we take it that ‘reliability’ in the relevant sense implies that the tailor is not merely competent but, in fact, does an impressive job, time and time again; for we would not call the tailor ‘reliable’ if her work left much to be desired.9,10 If reliability is a concern in the Analects, as I have suggested here, does the text have any advice to offer in relation to its cultivation? How does a person learn to be reliable in what he or she undertakes? How might learning processes incorporate both familiarisation with prevailing norms and practices, and development of insight and initiative to adapt one’s knowledge to the situation at hand? I believe that the Analects provides some clues on how reliability may be cultivated. In the final section, I construct a picture of cultivation from selected conversations in the Analects.

Learning to be reliable In this section, I outline a number of processes associated with cultivation: familiarisation, reflection, and practice. I use these terms not to pick out clearly defined, independent stages of learning, nor do I suggest that they correspond to specific terms in the Analects. However, these categories are conceptually helpful in setting out the terrain in the Analects, highlighting its various components of cultivation. I discuss each in turn.

Familiarisation Not a few conversations in the Analects stress the importance of picking up cues from the surrounding environment. For example, Confucius is described as a keen observer (guan 觀; to observe) of human behaviour (e.g. 2.10), and he recommends that we learn from others who are exemplary, but also from those whose behaviours leave much to be desired (7.22).11 Confucius’ advice is to learn from a wide range of sources – to learn broadly (boxue 博學) – as he himself does (6.27; 9.2; 12.15; 19.6). Moreover, a person should learn not only from social interactions but from reading books (dushu 讀書; 11.25) such as the Book of Odes (Shijing 詩經) and the Book of Documents (Shujing 書經) (1.15; 3.8; 7.18; 8.8; 13.5; 16.13). The Odes is also a resource for learning about the natural world (17.9). The Analects also proposes a variety of methods for familiarising oneself with the world and with its prevailing norms and practices. These include listening (wen 聞; e.g. 1.10; 2.18; 4.8; 5.9; 7.3; 7.28, etc.), asking questions (wen 問; 3.15; 5.15; 10.14; 16.10; 19.6), having discussions – indeed, many of the conversations feature Confucius having conversations with his followers (yan 言; e.g. 1.15; 3.8; 7.18), and practising ritual propriety (li 禮; 6.27; 12.15). Finally, we should not forget to mention the process

200 Cultivating a Good Life of familiarisation with names (zhengming 正名), a process by which a person learns correct names (such as father, wife, and official) and applies them to conduct. In 13.3, zhengming is a priority of government: the correct use of names underlies all aspects of sociopolitical life as it is a system of standardisation.12 This quick survey of the sources and methods of familiarisation provides a deeper understanding of a set of related themes on learning in the Analects, including why it is important to have like-minded friends (1.8), how following ritual propriety may help anchor a person in the received norms and practices of the time, the place of tradition, as well as the need for the early followers to orientate their lives in the tumultuous times of the Warring States (Zhanguo 戰國; 475–221 BCE). This overview also reminds us of the seeming fixation on the past in some of the conversations, including those in which Confucius seems to be yearning for the Zhou and its customs (3.14; 7.5; 17.5), at one point claiming not to be a creator (of new ways) as he was only a transmitter (of tradition) (7.1). Yet, other passages challenge this picture, portraying Confucius as an adept interpreter of the past, authoritatively modifying customary practices (e.g. 9.3). What could the Confucians have learnt from the past? And what can we learn from the Analects? Above all, how can learning from the past help us become more reliable? Recall the discussion in the previous section that centres on acting in the moment; we also saw how quite a few of the conversations expressed concern about the failure to adapt one’s learning to the situation at hand. In light of this, it seems reasonable to suggest that, in the Analects, learning consists in familiarising oneself with what has gone before, so as to build a repository of information on what has worked in the past and what not, as well as the range of possibilities for action. This store of information will help to inform the decision being made in the present: the new. Discretion is emphasised in 7.28, where Confucius explicitly states how information from the past is adapted: There are some who, without knowledge, forge new ways, but I do not do that. I listen widey, select what works well, and follow it. I look widely and remember what I see. This is a second tier of knowledge. (trans. Lai)

In 16.9, Confucius claims that those who are born with knowledge (sheng er zhi zhi zhe 生而知之者) are of the highest tier, while the second – to which he belongs – consists of those who study in order to acquire knowledge (xue er zhi zhi zhe 學而知之者). In 7.20, Confucius notes that he himself was not born possessing knowledge but that he earnestly seeks it. Together, these three conversations suggest the centrality of acquiring knowledge (even though some might be born with particular insights). Analects 7.28 also cautions against undertaking matters without knowledge.13 In the Analects, the term to study or learn (xue 學) has a range of meanings associated with a person’s familiarisation with prevailing norms and practices. This kind of learning is necessary, but not sufficient, for cultivation.

Reflection So far, we have seen that the learner builds up a repository of knowledge through the processes of familiarisation. To be able to reproduce actions or behaviours is hardly



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adequate; discretion is needed to use and adapt the information to the present situation. In 2.15, xue is contrasted to, but also coupled with, reflection (si 思): Confucius said, ‘Learning without due reflection leads to perplexity; reflection without learning leads to perilous circumstances’ (trans. Ames and Rosemont 1998: 79). Reflection must be brought to bear on what a person has learnt. For a person simply to have a large and unwieldy volume of information is hardly desirable. Analects 15:31 suggests that learning is a less demanding process than reflection: The Master said, ‘Once, lost in my thoughts [si], I went a whole day without eating and a whole night without sleeping. I got nothing out of it, and would have been better off devoting the time to learning [xue].’ (trans. Ames and Rosemont 1998: 190)

From these two conversations, it seems that reflection is an activity that involves stepping back from existing beliefs and practices to properly assess them. Perhaps that is why it is reckless to engage in reflection without full understanding.14 As we might expect, there are not many clues concerning the cognitive and psychological aspects of reflection. However, I discuss three examples below which exemplify the hallmarks of reflective reasoning that constitute an exemplary life and the adaptation of old to new, even though they do not explicitly make the connection between si and its outcomes in reasoning. In the first conversation, in Analects 9.3, Confucius diverges from traditional prescriptions to follow current practices on one issue: he wears a silk cap rather than a linen one as the former is more economical. On another issue, however, he rejects the then popular practice for a more traditional approach: he bows before ascending the steps to a hall with an altar. Two aspects of this conversation are interesting. First, Confucius stands independently from both inherited tradition and prevailing standards. In each case, he provides reasons why he chooses to maintain tradition or follow contemporary practice. Secondly, it is intriguing that the author of this passage deemed it important to compose this anecdote, which speaks to Confucius’ independence from norms as well as his ability to reason on a case-by-case basis, adapting what he knew to the case at hand. In my second selected scenario, Confucius expresses dissatisfaction relating to the term ‘gu’ (觚), a ritual vessel: A gu ritual drinking vessel that is not a gu ritual drinking vessel – a gu indeed! A gu indeed! (6.25; trans. Ames and Rosemont 1998: 109)

What was Confucius criticising? Brooks and Brooks suggest that this utterance subtly refers to ren, no longer carrying any significant moral weight in Confucius’ time (1998: 36). Another interpretation of this comment draws on the debate on zhengming. On this view, Confucius was posing a challenge to the incorrectness of the name that was used. The term ‘gu’ had originally referred to a cornered drinking vessel but the vessel had changed even though its name was still in use. Legge, an early translator of the Analects, suggests this and states that ‘The name without the reality is folly’ (1991: note 23, p. 75).15,16 Whatever the original intentions of the utterance, we see here another instance of Confucius standing at the crossroads of tradition and current practice. Confucius

202 Cultivating a Good Life reflects on the use of ‘gu’ as a label, commenting on its lack of fit with his observations of the world. In contrast to a learner, who is just grasping the scope of names and applying them unreflectively, Confucius (unhappily) notes the shifts in its meaning, standing back and criticising its incorrect use. In a third example, Confucius gives different answers to two followers who ask the same question. An observer, Gongxi Hua, asks why he has given opposing prescriptions to different people: Zilu inquired, ‘On learning something, should one act upon it?’ The Master said, ‘While your father and elder brothers are still alive, how could you, on learning something act upon it?’ Then Ranyou asked the same question. The Master replied, ‘On learning something, act upon it.’ Gongxi Hua said, ‘When Zilu asked the question, you observed that his father and elder brothers are still alive, but when Ranyou asked the same question, you told him to act on what he learns. I am confused – could you explain this to me?’ The Master replied, ‘Ranyou is diffident, and so I urged him on. But Zilu has the energy of two, and so I sought to rein him in.’ (11.22; trans. Ames and Rosemont 1998: 146–7)

A few observations may be made of this conversation. First, it demonstrates the need for tailoring responses to different people; it could be taken as an example of how Confucius knew people (zhiren 知人), an important skill for a ruler or higher official to have, in order to allocate fitting responsibilities to officials with particular capabilities (1.16; 12.22; 20.3). Secondly, the focus here is not on the prescriptive remarks Confucius makes to Zilu and Ranyou. Rather, it is on why Confucius gives the different responses. Thirdly, and perhaps most interestingly, Confucius is portrayed as a person attuned to the needs of different people – perhaps as a teacher par excellence, who responds reliably in a wide range of scenarios.

Practice What can a person do to develop capacities like those exemplified in these three (and other) conversations in the Analects? We have so far seen the importance of acting in the moment that requires a person to apply their learning to the situation at hand.17 In the Analects, the attentiveness to practicalities looms large; all of Book Ten expresses Confucius’ focus on the details of the circumstances – as, for instance, he would not sit on his mat unless it was straight (10.9). And, indeed, if a reader expects only to extract conceptual lessons from the Analects, Confucius will come across as overly fussy and pedantic. It is not only in Book Ten, but across its chapters, that the conversations are situationally focused. A person develops awareness of situationally relevant details through practice, by handling tasks in a range of situations, finding out what works and what does not. Through practice, a person puts to test her assumptions, estimates, and imagined possibilities. Recall the term xing (行) which, in its broadest sense, refers to movement or action. Xing may also refer to what is permissible (1.12), what the norms prescribe



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(15.11; 15.24; 16.11; 17.6), appropriate conduct (2.18; 5.10), the possibility of putting something into practice (2.13; 5.20; 15.18), whether something can be attained or an action realised (11.3; 13.3; 14.36; 18.7), and the conditions that limit what may be achieved (5.7; 5.14). In the Analects, xing may best be described as the possibility of alternative actions in any one situation, in light of relevant constraints and enablers.18 It is only through taking action that a person can cultivate sensibilities19 for the range of possibilities associated with particular types of actions. In each action, a person’s repository of knowledge is articulated. Working out possibilities and reflecting on them in light of one’s commitments is, I suggest, at the heart of cultivation. In time, and with due diligence to learning and reflection, a person builds a repertoire of successful and effective actions.20 Accordingly, when a person builds her repertoire, she will also enhance her reliability. She not only has access to a repository of knowledge – which is also available for all those who apply themselves to learning – she has developed her own repertoire. For those who know her, their understanding of what she is capable of and what she is likely to achieve is formed through time and, if convinced, they will rely on her in relevant ways. What might a reliable person be like? In the Analects, we see some glimmers of Confucius of whom, we may say, is reliable: he knows when he should no longer trust what people say (5.10), he knows to provide different answers to different people (11.22), and he knows, for example, not to force a person without moral compunction to comply with existing behavioural ritual norms (17.21). Together, these anecdotes and others help us build a picture of Confucius’ reliability. Indeed, it is quite plausible that it was the intention of the authors of some of the passages and the compilers of the text, among other things, to convey this picture of Confucius as a person who, among other notable characteristics, may be described as xin. The text presents a picture of Confucius as a person who is reliable in action, in his behaviour and the advice he gives. In conclusion, I summarise my key arguments and consider their implications for Confucian agency and cultivation. Xin qua reliability has important moral, temporal and relational aspects. From a relational point of view, we come to believe a person is reliable – and may come to rely on them for particular things – only after she has, through time, acted reliably. From an agent’s point of view, each situation is ‘new’ in the sense that it will present different salient factors which will bear on his intended actions and their outcomes. Neither agency nor situationality takes precedence in this account. The agent applies his capabilities and skills in response to the opportunities and constraints that arise with each situation. This view of agency has a dynamic dimension, lending itself to a narrative account of personhood. Each action is significant as, together with others and taken over time, it cumulatively adds to a picture of agency. Isolated lapses or failures may not necessarily alter the perception of a person’s ability, just as a celebrated musician’s slip up at one concert may not necessarily affect her reputation as a skilled performer. Nevertheless, if a pattern of mishaps develops over time, our picture of her reliability will change. In this chapter, I have placed xin at the centre of Confucian life – following 2.22 that sees it as the linchpin of personhood. The interpretation offered here draws our attention to action – and cultivation – that sits at the crossroads of ethics and epistemology. Acquaintance with a repository of information about moral norms and practices is

204 Cultivating a Good Life inert until it is enacted, expressing the agent’s moral commitment and epistemological capabilities, together with her skills, qualities, and dispositions. The focus on reliability highlights the nature of Confucian agency whereby taking situationally appropriate action is constitutive of a person’s repertoire of successes (measured in task-relevant ways) in particular areas; and, conversely, where practice and experience helps attune a person to morally weighty considerations that arise in different contexts. This account of xin yields a rich and dynamic picture of cultivation, agency, and relational selfhood in Confucian philosophy.

Notes 1 In opening this discussion, and for the sake of simplicity, I use ‘trustworthiness’ as a translation for xin; I will introduce the subtleties of the term in the course of the chapter. In modifying Ames and Rosemont Jr.’s translation, I have replaced ‘does not make good on their word’ with ‘is trustworthy’. 2 Pound says this about the character: ‘Fidelity to the given word. The man here standing by his word’ (1951: 22). 3 D. C. Lau writes: ‘To be [xin] is to be reliable in word. An important part of this has, of course, to do with promise-keeping. But when Confucius talks of being [xin] in word (I.7; XIII.20; XV.6), he means more than that. To be [xin] in word applies to all one’s words. It concerns, besides promises, resolutions concerning future conduct, or even plain statements of fact. Not to carry out a resolution is to fail to be [xin]; to have made a statement not borne out by facts – whether they be present or future facts – is equally to fail to be xin. … Confucius often opposes the terms [yan] (word) and [xing] (deed). For one’s deed to fail to match one’s word is to fail to be [xin]’ (1979: 25). Lau explains xin and a handful of other terms in the Analects in terms of ‘the moral qualities of the gentleman’ (1979: 31). 4 Refer to the commentary on this conversation (Brooks and Brooks 1998: 132). See also their commentaries on 2.21 and 2.22, whereby zhong in 2.21 concerns ‘vertical loyalty’ while xin in 2.22 pertains to the ‘lateral “fidelity”’ (1998: 113). This is not the only way Brooks and Brooks understand xin. Their analysis of the term differs across the different conversations in the Analects, depending on which conversations are attributed to which speakers or groups. 5 Slingerland notes that, in the linchpin passage, xin may refer to trustworthiness as a facet of an individual’s character or of the nature of social relations (2003: 15). This stands in clear contrast to the Brooks’ view that xin pertains more to action (what one does) rather than character or virtue (who one is). 6 Refer also to Slingerland’s commentary on 17.13, where he notes of the village worthy, that ‘by serving as counterfeit models of virtue for the common people, the village worthy is in effect a false prophet, not only blocking the development of true virtue in himself but also leading others astray’ (2003: 206). 7 In fact, Huang Kan’s commentary draws from the ideas of He Yan (何晏; c. 195–249). He Yan’s commentary states, ‘Teachers must revise the old to realise the new, engage in close study and extended revision (practice). Then only can they successfully transmit their words. If you (simply) hear things along the way, and transmit that, you will be spreading falsehoods’ (trans. Lai). 《欽定四庫全書》本。本書10卷，拆分成5冊。



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影印古籍 欽定四庫全書·經部八·四書類 論語集解義疏; 論語集解義疏卷九~卷十 (pp. 26–27/112). 8 There is another interesting metaphor in the Analects, quan (權), meaning to ‘weigh’ and used in the Analects to refer to ‘weighing up’, sometimes in exigent circumstances (9.3; 18.8). Refer to Antonio Cua’s helpful discussion of quan and jing in relation to Mencius’ philosophy (2005: 351, note 14). 9 We might jokingly say that the tailor with poor skills was ‘reliably inaccurate in measuring hem lengths’, but the joke in fact rides on overturning the meaning of the term ‘reliable’. 10 Back to the young followers of Confucius: we would expect a variety of reasons for their failure to tailor their actions to particular situations as needed. In 9.29, Confucius recognizes that confusion at the point of action is a significant problem: ‘The Master said, “The wise (zhi 知) are not in a quandary [huo 惑]; the authoritative (ren 仁) are not anxious; the courageous are not timid.”’ (9:29; trans. Ames and Rosemont 1998: 132). The term for confusion, 惑, is comprised by two characters, 或 (huo), meaning (to have) alternatives, and 心 (xin), which means the human mind–heart. The composite character signifies a mind–heart which does not know which alternative to pick. One example of confusion is provided in 12.21, where a person in a fit of rage loses sight of his priorities (forgetting himself and even his parents). In 12.10, a contrast is set up between rectitude and being in a quandary: ‘Zizhang enquired about accumulating rectitude and distinguishing (and clarifying) confusion. Confucius replied, “Prioritise loyalty and reliability (xin), and follow the right; this is to accumulate rectitude. To simultaneously love and hate someone, and thus to simultaneously want this person to live and to die, is to be in a quandary…”’ (trans. Lai; adapted from the trans. Ames and Rosemont 1998: 156). 11 It is noteworthy that guan, observation, also has a fundamental place in the Yijing’s (Book of Changes 易經) Appendices; it is how one begins to understand the world and it enables a person to orientate himself in the world: ‘When in ancient times Lord Bao Xi ruled the world as sovereign, he looked upward and observed [guan] the images in heaven and looked onward and observed [guan] the models that the earth provided. He observed the patterns on birds and beasts and what things were suitable for the land. Nearby, adopting them from his own person, and afar, adopting them from other things, he thereupon made the eight trigrams in order to become thoroughly conversant with the virtues inherent in the numinous and the bright and to classify the myriad things in terms of their true, innate natures’ (Xici zhuan 2.2; trans. Lynn 1994:77; annotations by Lai). 12 Holloway links the idea of zhengming with 17.9, proposing that 17.9 – the conversation on reading the Odes quoted above – may help fill out the broadest understanding of zhengming, as a way of ‘clarifying and ordering our world’ (2013: 95). 13 There are different interpretations of this passage. Ames and Rosemont Jr. link this comment with 7.1, where Confucius claims that he is a transmitter and not an innovator. Their translation focuses on those with who create without knowledge (the first tier of knowledge), with Confucius claiming only the second for himself. Their translation of the first sentence reads: ‘There are probably those who can initiate new paths while still not understanding them, but I am not one of them’ (1998: 117).There is another possible translation of this statement that is somewhat more ambivalent about those who create without knowledge (the view taken here in my translation). According to this view, Confucius distances himself from this first type of person. However, his own approach belongs to a second tier; the first tier is the person who is

206 Cultivating a Good Life born with knowledge, referred to in 16.9 and 7.20, and not those who act or initiate without knowledge. 14 Other examples where Confucius’ interlocutors seem to speak or act precipitously include 11.22 and 13.3. 15 Legge argues that the term gu referred to a cornered vessel, captured in jiao (角), one of the components of gu. According to Legge, jiao referred to a ‘horn’ – a sharp corner – and in Confucius’ time, the form of this ritual vessel was changed while its name was kept. Legge believes that this statement hinted at the inept government of the day (1991: note 23, p. 75). 16 Refer to the helpful discussion of the relation between zhengming and ethics, and whether this passage fits within the ambit of zhengming, in Loy (2014). 17 In earlier work, I suggest that the primary epistemological notion in the Analects is best described as ‘knowing to act in the moment’ (Lai 2012). 18 Another term in the Analects captures the sense of practice, with emphasis on performance (xi 習: 1.1; 1.4; 17.2). In 1.1, Confucius says that it is a joy to be able to learn through practice, at appropriate moments (學而時習之). A few translators interpret this phrase as a conjoint of two elements, the second taking place only after the first, with the intention to capture the stages of learning: first to learn, then to practice (e.g. ‘To learn something and then to put it into practice at the right time’ (trans. Leys 1997: 3), and ‘Having studied, to then repeatedly apply what you have learned’ (trans. Ames and Rosemont 1998: 71)).I suggest a different reading, however, connecting learning and practice: ‘Learning, just like practising in a timely way’. I have translated ‘er’ (而) to mean ‘alike’ (ru 如) (Pulleyblank 1995: 148; Schuessler 2007: 224), which understands timely practice as a way to learn. My translation also interprets shi (時) as timeliness rather than frequency (shishi 時時); compare Leys’ and Ames and Rosemont’s translations above. 19 The Analects does not provide sufficient detail to allow us to construct an account of what this entails. However, scholars have drawn on other contemporaneous texts including the Mengzi and the Xunzi to offer a more substantial picture of moral cultivation. See, for example, Shun (1997); Chan (2002); Chong (2007); Yu and Ivanhoe (2010); and Kline and Tiwald (2014). 20 I have not mentioned a person’s moral commitment to others in her undertaking to be trustworthy and reliable. Suffice to say here that the discussion here takes it as implicit that xin incorporates this moral undertaking. This chapter does not intend to exclude xin’s moral dimension but rather seeks to flesh out ways of cultivating xin.

References Ames, R. (2011). Confucian Role Ethics: A Vocabulary. Hong Kong: Chinese University Press. Ames, R. and H. Rosemont Jr. (1998). The Analects of Confucius: A Philosophical Translation. New York, NY: Ballantine Publishing Group. Brooks, E. B. and A. T. Brooks (1998). The Original Analects: Sayings of Confucius and His Successors. New York: Columbia University Press. Chan, A., ed. (2002), Mencius: Contexts and Interpretations. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press.



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Chong, K.-C. (2007). Early Confucian Ethics: Concepts and Arguments. Chicago, IL: Open Court Publishing. Cua, A. (2005). ‘Xin (Mind/Heart) and Moral Failure: Notes on an Aspect of Mencius’ Moral Psychology’, in A. Cua (ed.), Human Nature, Ritual, and History: Studies in Xunzi and Chinese Philosophy, 348–70 (Studies in Philosophy and the History of Philosophy). Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press (first published in 1999). Holloway, K. (2013). The Quest for Ecstatic Morality in Early China. New York: Oxford University Press. Kline, T. C. (III) and J. Tiwald, eds (2014). Ritual and Religion in the Xunzi, SUNY series in Chinese Philosophy and Culture. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press. Lai, K. (2012). ‘Knowing to Act in the Moment: Examples from Confucius’ Analects’, Asian Philosophy, 22 (4): 347–64. Lau, D. C., trans. (1979). Confucius: The Analects (Lun yu). Translated with an introduction by D. C. Lau. Harmondsworth, UK: Penguin Books. Legge, J., trans. (1991). Chinese Classics: With a Translation, Critical and Exegetical Notes, Prolegomena, and Copious Indexes. Taipei: SMC Publishing Inc.; reprinted from the last edition by Oxford University Press; vol. 1: Confucian Analects, The Great Learning, The Doctrine of the Mean (3rd edn), with a Biographical Note by L. T. Ride. Leys, S., (a.k.a. Pierre Ryckmans) trans. (1997). The Analects of Confucius: translation and notes by Simon Leys. New York: W. W. Norton. Loy, H.-C. (2014). ‘Language and Ethics in the Analects,’ in A. Olberding (ed.), Dao Companion to the Analects, 137–58. Netherlands: Springer Publishing. Lynn, R. J., trans. (1994). The Classic of Changes: A New Translation of the I Ching as Interpreted by Wang Bi. New York: Columbia University Press. Pound, E., trans. (1951). Confucius: The Great Digest, The Unwobbling Pivot, The Analects. New York: New Directions. Pulleyblank, E. G. (1995). Outline of Classical Chinese Grammar. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press. Rosemont, H. Jr. and R. Ames (2016), Confucian Role Ethics: A Moral Vision for the 21st Century?, Göttingen; Taipei: V&R Unipress; National Taiwan University Press. Schuessler, A. (2007). ABC Etymological Dictionary of Old Chinese. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press. Shun, K.-L. (1997). Mencius and Early Chinese Thought. Stanford: Stanford University Press. Slingerland, E., trans. (2003). Confucius Analects: With Selections from Traditional Commentaries. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing. Yu, K.-P., J. Tao and P. J. Ivanhoe, eds (2010). Taking Confucian Ethics Seriously: Contemporary Theories and Applications. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press.

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Auditory Perception and Cultivation: The Wenzi 文子1 Andrej Fech

Introduction This chapter explores the relationship between cultivation and hearing as presented in the Daoist text Wenzi 文子 or Master Wen. Although it was not mentioned in the extant pre-Qin literature, during the Eastern Han dynasty (25–220 CE), the text was viewed as one of the most important representatives of Daoism and its alleged author, Master Wen, was regarded as the closest disciple of Laozi 老子.2 Although some scholars claim that the Wenzi was actually written by Master Wen in the early 5th century BCE, linguistic and philosophical analysis of the text show that it was probably composed during the first decades of the Han dynasty.3 Besides the received Wenzi, an excavated version of the text is available nowadays, discovered in 1973 and consisting out of about 277 bamboo slips dated in the 1st century BCE.4 Unlike the transmitted version, in which the main protagonist is Laozi, the excavated fragments feature a dialogue between ‘Master Wen’ and a character called ‘King Ping’ (Pingwang 平王).5 This ‘King Ping’ is mostly identified as the founder of the Eastern Zhou dynasty, King Ping of Zhou 周平王 (r. 771–720 BCE).6 Thus, it would appear that, originally, Master Wen did not figure as a disciple of Laozi, but as the political advisor of a mighty Zhou monarch. As will be shown below, this feature might also have contributed to the great significance of ‘hearing’ in the cultivation process as proposed in the Wenzi. The position of the texts that show similarities to the Wenzi in regard to the role of auditory perception in cultivation, such as the excavated manuscript Wuxing 五行 or Five Forms of Conduct and the Zhuangzi 莊子, will be dealt with here as well.7 This chapter aims to answer the following questions: how did the text define human excellence in terms of auditory perception? How did it establish a link between the process of self-cultivation and auditory perception? What steps did this process involve and how did it differ from other views on the topic?



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Sensual perception and the exemplary person In this section, I focus on the Wenzi’s discussion of sagacity (sheng 聖) and wisdom (zhi 智), the two terms designating exemplary human qualities. To this end, I chose a passage from the fifth chapter of the transmitted text that has several parallels to the excavated manuscript and can, thus, be regarded as authentic to a certain degree. The two notions belong among the most conventional terms for human excellence deployed in early China. However, the Wenzi gives them unusually complex definitions:

1. Master Wen inquired about sagacity and wisdom. 2. Laozi said: ‘To know it by hearing is sagacity, to know it by seeing is wisdom.’

Sages always hear the causes of misfortune and fortune and know which Way to choose; the wise always see how misfortune and fortune take shape and know which acts to choose. 3. Sages know the auspicious and inauspicious signs of the Way of Heaven, thus they know what causes misfortune and fortune to arise. The wise foresee their taking shape, thus they know the gateways of misfortune and fortune. 4. Hearing what has not yet come into being is sagacity; seeing ahead what will take shape is wisdom. Those without hearing or seeing are ignorant and confused.8 (Wenzi 5/25/24-6) (All translations of the Wenzi in this chapter are done by the author. Compare translation to Cleary 1992: 67 and Van Els 2006a: 230–1.) In the excavated manuscript, the beginning of the dialogue looks as follows:9 0896 … wisdom.’ King Ping asked: ‘What is called sagacity and wisdom?’ Master Wen answered: ‘To know it by hearing is sagacity …10

The association between wisdom and visual perception11 and, particularly, sagacity and auditory perception found in the above passage was widespread in China. Sharing the same semantic element ‘ear’ (er 耳) and having similar pronunciations, the characters ‘sagacity’ (sheng 聖) and ‘sound’ (sheng 聲) were often used interchangeably in early Chinese manuscripts.12 Sharp hearing ‘was perhaps the most important means by which […] sagacity was made apparent to the world’ (DeWoskin 1982: 34). It is thus small wonder that the connection between a particularly keen sense of hearing and sagacity can (explicitly or otherwise) be attested in a number of early Chinese texts.13 The Wenzi’s first definition of the two terms (line 1) as ‘knowing it by hearing’ (wen er zhi zhi 聞而知之) and ‘knowing it by seeing’ (jian er zhi zhi 見而知之) is also far from unique, appearing in several early texts in contexts as different as historical narratives,14 cosmology,15 and medicine16. But the earliest text to contain them was

210 Cultivating a Good Life probably the Wuxing 五行, associated with Confucius’ grandson, Zisi 子思 (483–402 BCE).17 Here is a related passage from the text: To have heard the way of the noble man is to be discerning [of ear]; to know it when one hears it is to be sagacious. The sage [is one who] knows the Way of Heaven. […] To have seen [the way of] the worthy man is to be perspicacious [of sight]; to know it when one sees it is to be knowing.18 (Cook 2012: 504)

The Wuxing identifies the object of audial and visual perception respectively as the ‘way of the noble man’ (junzi dao 君子道) and ‘the worthy man’ (xian ren 賢人). What constitutes sagacity and wisdom is awareness (zhi 知) of what is being perceived in either case. This points to the crucial role played by the heart (xin 心) in the attainment of sagacity and wisdom. In fact, reaching the same acuity of sensory perception without realising what is being perceived constitutes a case of ‘not sagacity’ (bu sheng 不聖) and ‘not wisdom’ (bu zhi 不智).19 Moreover, the Wuxing identifies the heart as the agent commanding all the senses,20 suggesting that the extraordinary sensual acuity of the sages and wise ones may also result from the right application of the heart. In the Wenzi (line 2), sagacity is also the cognitive ability (zhi 知) – indicating the importance of the heart – to choose the appropriate way (dao 道) based on what has been perceived audibly. Wisdom, on the other hand, connotes the same cognitive ability – based on visual clues – in regard to one’s action (xing 行). In both cases, the objects of audial and visual perceptions are ‘fortune’ (fu 福) and ‘misfortune’ (huo 禍). Understanding the unfolding pattern of fortune and misfortune figures prominently in discussions on the nature of sagacity and wisdom from the late Warring States and Han periods. Some texts show close similarities to the Wenzi, while underscoring the latter’s eclectic character.21 The sage possesses an earlier grasp of the development of affairs than the wise, being able to perceive the very causes (suo sheng 所生) of fortune and misfortune and not just their observable manifestations (cheng xing 成形). How this auditory perception exactly works is open to interpretation: from the ability to penetrate the Way itself to simply listening to instructions about its patterns. Obeisance towards its patterns is decisive in determining whether the outcome of an action will be fortune or misfortune. The mention of the act of distinguishing (ze 擇) further underscores the vital role of the heart (Geaney 2002: 86). Accordingly, both sagacity and wisdom come about from the coordinated activities of the senses and the heart. The Wenzi’s last definition of sagacity as the hearing of ‘what has not yet been born’ (wei sheng zhe 未生者) and of wisdom as the seeing of ‘what takes shape’ (cheng xing zhe 成形者) is quite unique. Accordingly, sagacity and wisdom are distinguished from each other not only through their association with different senses, but also through their connection to the different developmental stages of phenomena in the world. A sage is someone who is able to grasp the phenomena even before they appear, whereas a wise man is able to recognise them only when they take on visible forms.22 That fits the general picture of the world as promulgated by the Wenzi, according to which all phenomena start out as subtle and minute entities and then, due to the nourishing influence of the Way (dao 道), acquire ever more prominent manifestations.23 Thus, the cognitive reach of sagacity clearly surpasses that of wisdom.



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This hierarchy of senses differs from many other texts featuring the cosmological notion of the Way. There we either find a sage person capable of both exceptional audial and visual acuity, by being able to perceive both the shapeless and soundless.24 Or, as it is the case with the Laozi, Wenzi’s main inspiration, we discover the predominance of visual metaphors when describing the early cognition of phenomena, such as ‘observing their minute secrets’ (guan qi miao 觀其妙), ‘seeing the small’ (jian xiao 見小), and so on. This appreciation of auditory perception might indeed go back to the Wuxing, contending that only the sage (with his acute hearing) possesses the highest form of knowledge, that of the ‘Way of Heaven’ (tian dao 天道).25 However, there are also some significant differences between the two works. Firstly, in the Wuxing, favouring sound and hearing appears to be based on the association of the ‘highest level of [moral] attainment’ with music (Holloway 2009: 65), whereas the Wenzi does not contain any clear references to music. Secondly, in the Wuxing, sagacity is intrinsically connected to the virtues of ‘wisdom’, ‘benevolence’ (ren 仁), ‘righteousness’ (yi 義), and ‘propriety’ (li 禮).26 This means that, in the end, sagacity, and its specific sensory acuity and cognitive ability, can develop only as the result of successful cultivation of the four other virtues.27 In the Wenzi, quite uncharacteristic of a Daoist work, the same virtues of ‘benevolence’, ‘righteousness’, and ‘propriety’ are identified as a necessary precondition for the growth and flourishing of all things. Moreover, the Wenzi calls them the ‘four warp threads’ (si jing 四經) and connects them to the notions of the Way and wen 文, whose original meaning was a weaving pattern with warps serving as its basis. However, their connection to the cultivation of sagacity is rather uncertain.28 As we will see in the following section, the self-cultivation process as understood in the Wenzi will provide further evidence for the significance of auditory perception in this work.

Auditory perception and self-cultivation In this section, I focus on the Wenzi’s discussion of the different types of listening and their connection to cultivation. The position of the Wenzi is compared to that of the other early Chinese texts. The received Wenzi introduces several types of listening in the context of self-cultivation right in the beginning of the fifth chapter, in a passage with several parallels to the excavated text29: Your learning will not penetrate the essence if you do not listen to the Way deeply. … The highest learning involves listening with the spirit, middling learning involves listening with the heart, lower learning involves listening with the ears. When listening with the ears, you will learn (only) with the skin. When listening with the heart, you will learn with flesh and muscles. When listening with the spirit, you will learn with bones and marrow. Thus, if you do listen to something not deeply, then you will not know it clearly; if you do not know it clearly, then you will be unable to grasp its essence; if you are unable to grasp its essence, then you

212 Cultivating a Good Life will not put it into practice with success. The general principles for listening are to empty the heart so that it is clear and calm, to diminish the qi and not let it flourish, to have no thoughts and no rumination.30 (Compare translation to Cleary 1992: 62)

Auditory perception – ‘listening’ (ting 聽) – functions here as the basis for the cultivation of virtue (in the transmitted text: the learning). Among the three different types of listening – using the ears (er 耳), the heart (xin 心) and the spirit (shen 神) – only the former denotes the process of auditory perception in the generic sense.31 The others are used metaphorically to indicate different depths (shen 深) with which (acoustical) content is perceived. From the above, it can be inferred that the factor distinguishing between different kinds of listening is the degree of emptiness (xu 虛) of one’s heart. A look at the Chinese philosophical literature of the period reveals that emptiness of the heart was given different interpretations. Some sources address it mainly in the context of the ability to receive (by means of auditory perception) and internalise new information.32 In such case, an empty heart signifies receptiveness to new content. Accordingly, to have such a receptive heart does not necessarily lead to knowing the Way. To obtain such knowledge, an ‘empty-hearted’ person has yet to be accordingly advised. In other cases, however, the emptiness of the heart does rather connote the complete unity with the Way, leading to the loss of the self. This seems to be the position of the passage from the Inner Chapters of the Zhuangzi introducing the famous notion ‘fasting of the heart’ (xin zhai 心齋), quoted below due to its closeness to the Wenzi: Confucius said, ‘Make your will one! Don’t listen with your ears, listen with your heart. No, don’t listen with your heart, but listen with your qi. Listening stops with the ears, the heart stops with recognition, but qi is empty and waits for all things. The Way gathers in emptiness alone. Emptiness is the fasting of the heart.’33 (Watson 2013: 25)

Although the Zhuangzi identifies qi as the organ of the highest listening, while the Wenzi speaks of the spirit, both positions are by and large congruent with each other as the spirit was perceived as ‘refined qi’ (Puett 2002: 109) in early China. The question is, however, whether the Wenzi regards emptiness of the heart as the sole prerequisite for experiencing the Way, as it appears to be the case in the Zhuangzi. I contend that there is no direct evidence for such a strong position in the Wenzi. Rather, the text seems to hold that alongside the emptiness of the heart, the right object of perception (ideally, the Way, or an instruction about it), and the right amount of scrutiny towards the latter are also constitutive of the best outcome of learning. Interpreted in this way, emptiness of the heart means rather an attentive (and humble) attitude of the listener (certainly, of varying degrees). Thus, listening with the spirit would describe a situation in which the utterly attentive listener is able to achieve an intuitive understanding of the Way, provided that what he is listening to is the Way (or an instruction about it). This would possibly facilitate the insight into what has not yet come into existence, characteristic of sagacity. For, the notion of spirit, initially referring to external divinities, eventually came to be redefined as ‘the ultimate phase of internal power’ (Graziani 2009: 497) and, as such, it was indeed often ‘associated with metaphysical knowledge, especially knowledge of the



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future’ (Roth 1991: 641). Listening with the heart would then stand for the intellectual/ rational understanding of audibly perceived content on the basis of a careful and openminded perception. As for listening with the ears, it would be tantamount to the act of mere physical perception without the cognitive grasp of the related content whatsoever. Emptying of the heart seems to not have been involved in this kind of perception.

Auditory perception and the content of the Wenzi We have seen that, in the Wenzi, the cosmological interpretation of the Way was the most prominent. However, in the bamboo fragments, the term also connotes the teaching of the ancient sages34 and it seems clear that Master Wen sees his own doctrine as continuing the heritage of the sages of the past.35 In fact, while the Wenzi purports to be a historical record of a conversation between a ruler and his counsellor, what it really shows is how the Way of the ancient sages was transmitted to King Ping by means of ‘audible’ instruction by Master Wen. To signify this transmission, the text uses yet another auditory metaphor: the ‘hearing of the Way’ (wen dao 聞道). From its usage in early Chinese texts, it is evident that, while in some cases this metaphor appears to signify the full understanding of the Way, leading to a kind of mystical unity with it,36 it oftentimes signals an instruction on the principles of the Way,37 as the verb wen ‘involves asking questions, thinking, evaluating, and in short, the proves of learning and knowing through dialogue and critical engagement’ (Chan 2014: 110). Below are some examples of the second type of ‘listening of the Way’ in the excavated Wenzi: 0967 [X].” King Ping said: ‘Excellent! Although fond of the Way, I have never heard the Way.’38 2477 … I have already heard the Way! May I ask [X]39

Although initially possessing some fascination for it, King Ping claims to have never ‘heard the Way’, that is never received an illuminating instruction on its principles. It is only through the guidance of Master Wen that the monarch came to attain the degree of clarity about the Way which can amount to ‘hearing the Way’. Applying this discussion to the three types of listening mentioned above, King Ping’s eventual grasp of the Way could be seen as the result of his being able to listen to Master Wen’s teaching with the ‘heart’ or, even, with the ‘spirit’.

Conclusion In view of the exceptionally high number of Wenzi’s parallels to other early Chinese texts, I have already argued elsewhere that, in the first place, its author has to be credited with completing the task of ‘selecting, adjusting and putting together different “building blocks” to generate the conceptual unity of [a philosophical] text’ (2016: 240). The observations made in the present paper validate this view. When presenting his understanding of the function of auditory perception, the author

214 Cultivating a Good Life of the Wenzi drew on texts as different as the Wuxing, stressing the importance of cultivation of self through music, whose completion is labelled as the ‘timbre of jade’ (yu yin 玉音), and the Zhuangzi, exalting the ‘panpipes of Heaven’ (tian lai 天籟) that can be perceived and appreciated only by someone who has lost his self (Cook 2003: 76–7).40 Due to the fragmentary character of the excavated text we cannot definitively rule on the coherence of the resulting synthesis. However, some of its features are still discernible. While, at first glance, the system seems elitist when identifying exceptional sensory acuity as the key feature of the sages (and the wise),41 an in-depth analysis shows that the main factor for attaining sagacity and wisdom has to be recognised as the ‘heart’. Because it is the ‘heart’ that regulates both the depth of sense perception and the degree of recognition of the perceived content (the ‘spirit’, in addition to the connotations given above, was also understood as a special, ‘non-dual’ quality of the ‘heart’ (Roth 1999: 106–7)). One of the notable characteristics of the Wenzi is that the object of hearing is formulated in an ambiguous way so that it can relate to both the cosmic Way and oral instructions about the Way, including its political significance (first formulated by ancient sages and transmitted by Master Wen). Perhaps this ambiguity was intentional and was designed to show the reader that cosmology and politics are interrelated, and/or that the teaching of Master Wen was the expression of the cosmic Way. The reason the author of the Wenzi chose to regard hearing not as an example of second-hand knowledge, as was sometimes done in early China,42 but as the means of grasping the subtlest truths might go back to any of the works quoted here. Another possible scenario might be found in the commonly held ideas of those times according to which the sage could perceive the cosmic melodies, attunement to which made him able to predict the future (Brindley 2012: 128). However, the author might have also been aware of the fact that ‘hearing’ involves the element of ‘obeying’ (as can be seen in the modern term ting cong 聽從). It is no coincidence that the ‘mandate of Heaven’ (tian ming 天命) was often said to be received audibly (Katz 2013: 172–3). In this sense, the stress on auditory perception of the Way emphases its normativity and great significance for all spheres of human life.

Notes 1 Some parts of this article have been published in my doctoral dissertation (Fech 2012). 2 Wang Chong 王充 (27–97) compared the relation between Laozi and Master Wen to that of Confucius and his favourite disciple Yan Hui 顏回 (521–481 BCE) (Huang 1990: 783): 以孔子為君，顏淵為臣，尚不能譴告，況以老子為君，文子為臣乎！老子、 文子，似天地者也。‘Although Confucius was like a prince, and Yan Yuan like a minister, he could not make up his mind to reprimand Yan Yuan, how much less would Laozi have been able to do so, if we consider him as a prince and Master Wen as his minister? Laozi and Master Wen were like Heaven and Earth.’ Translation adapted from Forke 1907: 100. 3 For an overview of theories on Wenzi’s date of composition, see Fech 2012: 135–43.



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4 For more details on this discovery, see Hebei Sheng wenwu yanjiusuo 1981: 11–12. 5 For the study of the relation between the excavated and the transmitted versions of the Wenzi, see Van Els 2006b: 168–92. 6 For an overview of recent arguments for this view, see Fech 2015: 226–29. 7 For previous studies on this topic, see Van Els 2006b: 80–86, 98–103 and Zhang 2007: 126–50. What distinguishes this chapter from these detailed studies is its focus on the pre-eminence of auditory metaphors. 8 文子問聖智。老子曰：聞而知之，聖也，見而知之，智也。聖人嘗 聞禍福所生而知擇其道，智者嘗見禍福成形而知擇其行。聖人知 天道吉凶，故知禍福所生，智者先見成形，故知禍福之門。聞未生，聖也。 先見成形，智也。無聞見者，愚迷。 9 The excavated version of the Wenzi is quoted according to its publication in the journal Wenwu (Hebei Sheng wenwu yanjiusuo 1995: 27–34). While in that publication the text is reproduced in simplified characters, I will be using traditional characters in this chapter. 10 0896 知。平王曰何謂聖知。文子曰聞而知之，聖也 11 For some examples, see Xing 2000: 249. 12 See Chen 2000: 420. 13 The most detailed account is contained in the Fengsu tongyi 風俗通義 (Wang 1981: 618): 聖者聲也，通也。言其聞聲知情，通於天地，條暢萬物也。‘Sagacity connotes sound and (complete) penetration. This means that when the sage hears a sound, he knows the truth of the matter. (His knowledge enables him to) penetrate (the affairs of) Heaven and Earth, and (thus he is able to) establish order and bring about the flourishing of the multitude of beings and affairs’ (Translation adapted from Chan 2014: 109). 14 The Mengzi 孟子 (14.38/78/22-26) seems to have applied these definitions to different historical figures. It is well-known that Mencius regarded the historical figures described as possessing the ability of ‘knowing it by hearing’ – king Tang 湯, king Wen 文 and, above all, Confucius – as sages. 15 For wisdom, see Taixuan jing 太玄經 (Sima 1998: 186): 故玄者，用之至也。 見而知之者，智也。視而愛之者，仁也。‘Therefore, the mystery of which we speak is the ultimate in the utility. To see and to know it is wisdom. To regard it with love is humanness’ (Nylan 1994: 344). 16 For sagacity, see Nan jing 難經 (Wang 1992: 186): 經言望而知之謂之神， 聞而知之謂之聖。[…] 聞而知之者，聞其五音，以別其病。‘The scripture states: Anybody who looks and knows it is to be called a spirit; anybody who listens and knows it is to be called a sage. […] Those who “listen and know it” are those who listen to the five notes [in a person’s voice] in order to distinguish his illness’ (Unschuld 1986: 539). 17 For a concise introduction to the Wuxing and its place in early Confucian tradition, see Cook 2012: 265–78. 18 Guodian Wuxing, 150, strips 26–27: 聞君子道，聰也。聞而知之，聖也。 聖人知天道也。[…] 見賢人，明也。見而知之，智也。 19 Guodian Wuxing, 150, strips 23–24: 聞君子道而不知其君子道也，謂之不聖。 見賢人而不知其有德也，謂之不智。‘To have heard the way of the noble man and yet not know it is the way of the noble man is called “not sagacious.” To have seen the worthy man and yet not know that he possesses virtue is called “not knowing”’ (Cook 2012: 503).

216 Cultivating a Good Life 20 Guodian Wuxing, 151, strip 45: 耳目鼻口手足六者，心之所役也。心曰唯， 莫敢不唯；[心曰]諾，莫敢不諾。‘The ears, the eyes, the nose, the mouth, the hands, and the feet – these six are the servants of the heart-mind. When the heartmind says “obey,” none dares not obey; [when it says] “go along,” none dares not go along; [when it says] “advance,” none dares not advance […].’ (Cook 2012: 517). 21 For sagacity, see Guanzi 管子 (Li 2004: 576): 昔者聖王本厚民生， 審知禍福之所生。‘In ancient times, the sage kings treated the livelihood of the people as fundamental and carefully studied the causes of disaster and prosperity’ (Rickett 1985: 416). For wisdom, see Chunqiu fanlu 春秋繁露 (Su 1992: 259): 智者見禍福遠，其知利害蚤。‘A wise man sees misfortune and fortune (coming) from far, he knows what is advantageous and what is detrimental early on.’ For more discussion on the definition of wisdom, see Svarverud 1998: 330–4. 22 It is noteworthy that the excavated text does not contain the character ‘first’ (xian 先), which defines the cognitive abilities of the wise persons in textus receptus. 23 See Van Els 2006a: 226–28; Fech 2012: 164–75. 24 See, for instance, the Mawangdui manuscript Dao yuan 道原 (87, column 171, shang): 故唯𦔻（聖）人能察无刑（形），能聽无【聲】。‘Therefore it is only the Sage who is able to examine the formless, who is able to hear the [sound]less’ (Yates 1997: 174). 25 Both texts share the same, quite characteristic, terminology to stress the importance of recognising events in their earliest manifestations. For instance, the character ji 幾 connoting ‘minute sings’ (Holloway 2009: 139) can be found in both texts. For the Wuxing, see strip 48; for the Wenzi, see strips 0772 and 1171. 26 Jingmen shi bowuguan 1998: 149, strips 4–5: 德之行五，和謂之德， 四行和謂之善。善，人道也。德，天道也。‘The conducts of virtue number five, and all five in concert (/harmony) we refer to as “virtuosity”; four conducts in concert (/harmony) we refer to as “goodness.” Goodness is the Way of mankind; virtuosity is the Way of Heaven’ (Cook 2012: 488). 27 However, sensual acuity also serves as the precondition for the development of other virtues. In this sense, the argument of the Wuxing is circular (Meyer 2012: 128). 28 The content of some bamboo fragments might still hint at such a connection: 0909 囗經者，聖知之道也。[王]也不可不 ‘[X] warp threads are the way of sagacity and wisdom. The king cannot but …’. 29 The three bamboo slips in question are: 2482 [修德非一]聽，故以耳聽[者， 學在]皮膚。以心聽 ‘The cultivation of virtue does not involve only one form of listening. Therefore, when listening with the ears, learning will be in the skin. When listening with the heart …’; 2727 學在肌月（肉）。以囗聽者 ‘… learning will be in the flesh and muscles. When listening with …’; 2828 [不深者，知不遠而不能盡其功，不能]‘… not deep, your knowledge will not reach far and you will not be able to complete your accomplishments. Not being able to …’. 30 Wenzi 5/24/11-14: 學問不精，聽道不深。故上學以神聽，中學以心聽， 下學以耳聽。以耳聽者，學在皮膚，以心聽者，學在肌肉，以神聽者，學 在骨髓。故聽之不深，即知之不明，知之不明，即不能盡其精，不能盡 其精，即行之不成。凡聽之理，虛心清靜，損氣無盛，無思無慮。 31 However, the heart is often said ‘to see, listen and speak’ in early Chinese texts and as such it ‘cannot seem radically divorced from the senses’ (Geaney 2002: 99–100). 32 Xunzi 21/103/25-104/2: 人何以知道？曰：心。心何以知？曰：虛壹而靜。 心未嘗不臧也，然而有所謂虛 。[…] 人生而有知，知而有志；志也者， 臧也；然而有所謂虛；不以所已臧害所將受謂之虛。‘What do men use to know



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the Way? I say that it is the mind. How does the mind know? I say by its emptiness, unity, and stillness. The mind never stops storing; nonetheless it possesses what is called emptiness. […] Men from birth have awareness. Having awareness, there is memory. Memories are what is stored, yet the mind has the property called emptiness. Not allowing what has previously been stored to interfere with what is being received in the mind is called emptiness’ (Knoblock 1994: 104). Yinqueshan 2010: 186: 然而聽有五患：其二在內，其三在外。曰：內之二患何也？曰：中心不虛， 耳目不閒，唯（雖）聞善言，不褚於心，內二患也。‘However, the listening has five calamities, two of which are inner, and three are outer.’ ‘What are the two inner calamities?’ ‘When the inner mind is not empty and ears and eyes are not idle, then good speeches are not saved in heart, even though they are heard. These are the two inner calamities.’ 33 Zhuangzi 4/10/1-3: 仲尼曰：「若一志，无聽之以耳而聽之以心，无聽之以心而聽之以氣。 聽止於耳，心止於符。氣也者，虛而待物者也。唯道集虛。虛者，心齋也。」 34 0909[辭曰。道者先聖人之傳]也。天王不[齎不囗] ‘A saying states: “The way has been transmitted from the former sages.” If the Heavenly King does not offer it, not [X]’. 35 Master Wen claims to have received (at least some of) his knowledge of the Way from the tradition (initiated by the sages of the past): 0741 聞之傳曰道者[博] ‘[I] heard it in the tradition: The Way is vast …’. 36 Zhuangzi 6/17/9-10: 南伯子葵問乎女偊曰：「子之年長矣，而色若孺子， 何也？」曰：「吾聞道矣。」‘Nanpo Zikui said to the Woman Crookback, “You are old in years, and yet your complexion is that of a child. Why is this?” “I have heard the Way!”’ (Watson 2013: 46). 37 Laozi 41A/14/17-8: 下士聞道，大笑之。不笑不足以為道。‘When the worst student hears about the way he laughs out loud. If he did not laugh it would be unworthy of being the way’ (Lau 2001: 61). 38 0967 囗者。平王曰。[善。好乎道，吾未嘗聞道也] 39 2477 已聞道矣。請囗 40 Zhuangzi 2/3/23-24: 子游曰：「地籟則眾竅是已，人籟則比竹是已。 敢問天籟。」子綦曰：「夫吹萬不同，而使其自已也，咸其自取，怒者 其誰邪！」‘Ziyou said, “By the piping of earth, then, you mean simply [the sound of] these hollows, and by the piping of man, [the sound of] flutes and whistles. But may I ask about the piping of Heaven?” Ziqi said, “Blowing on the ten thousand things in a different way, so that each can be itself – all take what they want for themselves, but who does the sounding?”’ (Watson 2013: 8–9). 41 Pythagoras, who was alone able to perceive the cosmic ‘music of the spheres’, would be the Western equivalent of such an exceptional sage. See Höffe 2005: 25. 42 The famous Chinese proverb ‘to see something once is better than to hear about it a hundred times’ (bai wen bu ru yi jian 百聞不如一見) is attested already in the Hanshu 漢書 (69.2975).

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Cultivation and the Arts of Writing: Liu Xie Will Buckingham

Introduction There is a long-standing view in the West that writing is somehow necessarily tied up with suffering. This view explains the popular and wholly spurious quotation that circulates on the Internet and that is attributed to Ernest Hemingway. This snippet of dubious provenance goes as follows, ‘There is nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed.’ It is likely that Hemingway never said any such thing. For a start, Hemingway liked to write standing up and longhand, sometimes in the nude, his soft loafers nestling upon the pelt of a lesser kudu he had shot himself (and having gone to all the trouble of shooting a lesser kudu, it would seem a waste to bleed all over it). However what interests me about this quote is not the question of attribution, but instead the question of why it should be so very popular at all. I have worked as a writer for almost two decades, and I have taught writing in various contexts for almost as long. And as a writer and teacher of writing, it seems to me that this quote – shared and re-shared countless times – says something about how many in the West culturally view the act of writing. This strange tale of typewriters and blood reinforces the essentially romantic myth of the writer as a heroic and tragic figure, whose art is born and can only be born out of suffering. As a philosopher and as a writer, I find something problematic about this idea that writing is, out of necessity, entangled with suffering. Not only is it poorly supported by the evidence, but also over the years I have come to see that it serves neither writers nor students of writing well. So, in this chapter I want to set out a different approach to thinking through the relationship between writing and life. To do this, I will draw upon the work of Liu Xie (5th–6th centuries CE), author of the Wenxin diaolong, or the Literary Mind and the Carving of Dragons. Liu’s book pays close attention to the relationship between the practice of writing, and the question of how one might best cultivate the good life. The vision of writerly practice Liu sets out in his book provides us with a much more positive and sustainable idea of what it might mean to write. Liu draws together Confucian and Daoist themes in a wide-ranging, subtle, and sustained meditation on the human practice of writing. Liu’s text is deeply rooted in a study of

222 Cultivating a Good Life the earlier Chinese philosophical traditions, but it also offers substantial new insights into the practice of writing. For Liu, writing, if undertaken properly, can be a form of cultivation that leads to the nourishing of one’s vital energy, and can contribute to a life well-lived. My own approach to Liu Xie is not primarily as a scholar immersed in sinological matters, nor exactly as a philosopher concerned with questions of comparison between different traditions. Instead, I approach him, first and foremost, from my own standpoint as a writer and teacher of writing, concerned not only for the ways in which words or literature may matter, but also for the ways in which lives and how we live them may matter. So in this chapter, I will begin by setting out the background to Liu Xie and his Wenxin diaolong, and in particular to the forty-second chapter of Liu’s book called yangqi (養氣), or ‘nourishing vitality’, where he explores in greatest detail this notion of writing as a form of cultivation. Then I will briefly say something about the curious Western notion that, as Wai-Yee Li writes in her essay on Liu, ‘literature is against life, or that the unfulfilled life provides the impetus for literature’ (Li 2001: 208). Here I will attempt to undermine two common claims that are made about the relationship between writing and the unfulfilled life: the first is that suffering or unfulfilment is, in some way, essential to the creation of literature; and the second is that writing itself entails a kind of suffering, that we cannot write without somehow diminishing or using up our life. Having done this, I will look more closely at Liu’s notion of yangqi, or nourishing vitality, as a form of cultivation. This notion of nourishing vitality is one that is both subtle and complex, drawing upon Confucian and Daoist traditions. But alongside its theoretical sophistication, it is also an extraordinarily pragmatic idea, and Liu provides practical advice on how we can deploy our vital energies so that we might best serve the art of writing. It turns out that Liu’s contention is not only that the proper nourishing of one’s vitality can serve the end of cultivating one’s practice of writing, but he also suggests the reverse: that writing is itself a form of cultivation that can help nourish and guard our vital energy. If this is the case, then, we have a virtuous circle that severs the apparently necessary connection between writing and suffering. Within this virtuous circle, not only does living well serve writing well but also writing well serves living well. I will end this chapter by returning to some very basic practical questions about the ideal relationship between writing and living, and about what this may mean for those who seek to write, and what it may mean for those who seek to lead others in deepening their understanding of the art of writing.

Liu Xie and his Wenxin diaolong Liu Xie’s Wenxin diaolong was written around the turn of the 6th century of the common era, whilst he was living in the Dinglin Buddhist temple, working as an apprentice to the eminent monk Seng You 僧祐 (445–518). It is not certain how young Liu was when he first entered the monastery, whether he was, as Antje Richter puts it, ‘still an impressionable boy or already a marriageable young man’ (Richter 2012).

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Indeed, Liu’s dates are not entirely clear, although scholars usually place his birth between 465 and 471 CE. It is generally agreed that he was in the monastery by at least 489 CE, if not significantly earlier (Knechtges and Chang 2010: 573). According to traditional biographies, Liu was orphaned at an early age. If this is true, it may be that the opportunity to enter the monastery and work with Seng You served as a means for developing his capacity for, and delight in, learning, whilst also securing something of a livelihood and future. In the Wenxin diaolong, Liu writes of how, his youth behind him, he dreamed of Confucius. ‘When I was over thirty’, he writes, ‘one night I dreamed I was carrying red lacquer ritual vessels. And I followed Confucius and headed towards the South.’1 The dream was a turning point. ‘Dawn came and I woke, and I was joyful and greatly pleased! The sages are hard to see, and yet he came to the dream of an inferior person like me! Since the birth of humanity, there has not yet been anyone who resembles Confucius.’2 Not all scholars are convinced by the veracity of Liu’s dream. Richter, for example, insists that the dream symbolism is ‘suspiciously simple’, being both ‘blandly generic’ and ‘peculiarly empty’ (p. 88). And it may be, of course, that this is no more than a literary device, a piece of self-mythologising to demonstrate Liu’s authority in writing his book. But we have all perhaps had dreams that are both blandly generic, and that have also had an air of significance, so I do not see this alone should rule out the dream’s veracity. In the end, it does not matter at all whether Liu actually dreamed of Confucius; what matters is the role the dream plays in Liu’s text. In the Chinese tradition, dreams of virtuous figures of the past can serve to establish a form of spiritual kinship, as Confucius has said in Analects 7.5 to have in his earlier years dreamed of the Duke of Zhou (Slingerland 2003: 65). In Liu’s potted autobiography, this dream is staged as the point at which he went from being a scholar and compiler of the works of others, to establishing himself as a writer in his own right, somebody who could contribute to the tradition in which he was schooled. There is something striking about the way Liu aimed to contribute to this tradition. In his attempt to make his name as a writer, he could have sat down to write a commentary on the classics of Confucianism, which is how many writers of his time struck out for fame. But he chose a different path, taking the art of writing as his subject matter. His own account of why he chose this as his focus is intriguing. To propagate and praise the teachings of the Sage [Confucius], it might have been better to comment on the Classics. But great Confucians such as Ma Rong 馬融 (79–166 CE) and Zheng Xuan 鄭玄 (127–200 CE) have already seen into the essence. So even if I analysed the Classics deeply, it would not be enough to establish myself as a scholar. But literary writing is in truth the very root and branch of the Classics. … Therefore, I took up the brush and ink, and I started to discuss writing.3

Instead of electing to become yet another commentator on the Classics in a crowded marketplace, Liu decided to stake a claim to be doing something more fundamental, exploring the ‘root and branch’ of the Classics by writing about writing itself.

224 Cultivating a Good Life After completing the Wenxin diaolong, although again we cannot be sure precisely when, Liu left his mentor Seng You and the Dinglin temple in order to seek his fortune in the outside world. According to the Book of the Liang Dynasty or Liangshu (梁書), he used a ruse to seek patronage for his work. Knowing it was hard to get the eye of the rich and powerful, he dressed as a peddler of cheap texts, and apprehended the renowned scholar Shen Yue 沈約 (441–513) on the highway, pressing his copy of the Wenxin diaolong upon him. According to the story, Shen took the text and instantly recognised Liu’s genius. Why Shen would be willing to buy penny dreadfuls from passing hawkers is anybody’s guess; but it is to his credit that he did, if he did. Liu’s petitioning of Shen is consistent with his abiding concern throughout the Wenxin diaolong with the idea of literary fame. To attain any level of renown, it was essential to have powerful patrons; and in the world of early 6th century Chinese literati, few were as powerful as Shen Yue. But there was another reason Shen was a shrewd choice for a mentor. Whilst, as Victor Mair writes, ‘Shen Yue was definitely a lay Buddhist, and a very learned one at that’ (Mair 2001: 76), he was also a scholar who managed to bridge the gap between the more exclusively Buddhist world in which Liu found himself, and the broader cultural world of early 6th-century China. Shen’s knowledge straddled Confucianism, Buddhism, and Daoism. He was an accomplished poet, a prolific writer of prose, and a sharp political operator who was equally at home in the monasteries of Buddhism and Daoism, in the library, and in the court. As a mentor and champion, he must have seemed ideal. But if Liu thought that the patronage of Shen Yue might lead to enduring fame for his Wenxin diaolong, he was to be disappointed. Shen’s connections helped Liu to secure for himself a position in the court of the Crown Prince Xiao Tong 蕭統 (Owen 1992: 183), where he took up the post of Chamberlain for the Surrogate Secretary in the Eastern Palace or Donggong Tongshi Sheren (東宮通事舍人) (Xiao and Knechtges 1982). The court of Xiao Tong was a place of enormous literary sophistication; and Xiao himself had a substantial interest in literature, overseeing the compilation of the Wen xuan (文選), a collection of earlier Chinese literature complied according to genre. But despite Xiao Tong’s own passion for literature, Liu’s Wenxin diaolong did not generate much interest among his contemporaries. Like a modern-day scholar desperately looking for citations to drive up his research rankings, Liu must have been bitterly disappointed by the very few references to his work in the writings of his contemporaries. Stephen Owen notes that in the literary world of his day, Liu was ‘at best, a minor figure’ (Owen 1992, 184). And there is very little evidence that his book was widely read or of significant influence until much later in Chinese history. Instead, it seems that Liu continued to be recognised not as a creator of original works himself, but primarily for his scholarship, his knowledge of Buddhism, and his skills as an editor. In the year 518, after the death of his old mentor Seng You, the emperor ordered Liu to leave the court and return to Dinglin temple to collaborate on the continuation of Seng You’s work. Soon after entering Dinglin temple for a second time, Liu took the monastic robe, with the ordained name Hui Di 慧地. He died after only two years, in the year 520, having lived a life of some distinction, but having failed to attain to the fame that he once craved.

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Cultural patternings This gives a sense of the richness of the cultural background that helped fashion Liu’s work – a rich brew of literature and philosophy, of Daoist, Confucian, and Buddhist sources. One might think from Liu’s biography that Buddhism would loom the largest of these. But Liu’s text has no specific Buddhist references, whilst at the same time it makes repeated direct appeals to the Confucian and Daoist traditions. Certainly, the concepts that I am most interested in here – concepts that are at the heart of Liu’s book, such as 文 wen or ‘pattern’ and 氣 qi or ‘vitality’ – find their most potent resonances in the indigenous traditions. So whilst Victor Mair has persuasively argued that once one digs beneath the surface, and looks particularly at the text’s epistemology and methodology, Liu’s work is ‘Buddhist to the core’ (Mair 2001), my focus here will be on the traditions of Confucianism and Daoism. Perhaps the most important concept in Liu’s work is wen 文, or pattern. In contemporary Chinese, wen is found in compounds such as wenhua (文化) or culture, and wenxue (文学) or literature. In Liu’s work it can refer narrowly to writing or literature. But to restrict it to this narrow sense alone – and to claim that Liu’s concern is literary criticism – is to overlook the ambition and scope of the text. In fact the notion of wen allows Liu to engage in a much broader-ranging philosophy and metaphysics of the world as pattern. His concern with writing takes its force from this broader philosophical and metaphysical picture. This is evident from the opening line of the text, which reads, ‘Pattern (wen) is a very great power indeed – is it not born together with heaven and earth?’4 What Liu presents us with, in fact, is a rich metaphysics of wen that arises out of a philosophical tradition stemming, ultimately, from the commentaries to the Yijing (易經) or Book of Changes. David Hall and Roger Ames summarise this tradition up to the era just before Liu Xie, in their book Thinking from the Han, Just as the firmament displays elegance as a celestial pattern (tianwen 天文), so the human world as the ‘heart-mind of heaven and earth’ expresses its accomplished patterns as culture (wenhua 文化). Wen is ‘pattern’ where aesthetic value and meaning are co-present. Wen is writing, both in the sense of literature (wenxue 文學) and the written word (wenzi 文字). It is elegance (wenti 文體) and style (wenfeng 文風); it is education in the humanities (wenjiao 文教); it is civilisation (wenming 文明). Wen are the wrinkles on an older person’s face that reflect character and experience.’ (Hall and Ames 1998: 33)

Longxi Zhang refers to the opening pages of Liu’s text, where he directly addresses wen, as a ‘grandiose and mystifying little preamble’ (Zhang 1996), as if to suggest that this broader picture of wen is simply literary excess, or the unfortunate sign of a writer getting carried away with himself. But when reading Wenxin diaolong not just as a book about literature, but as a book with broader philosophical ambitions, Liu’s determination to give wen this broad scope, rather than an extravagant metaphysical flourish, can be seen as central to his argument. It matters for Liu that wen should not just be writing, literature, or literary culture, precisely because the act of writing is an

226 Cultivating a Good Life act of engaging not only with patternings that are inherent to literary works, but also with the patternings that are inherent to lives and to the world. Once Liu has opened his text with this rhetorical question about the scope of wen (‘–is it not born together with heaven and earth?’), he goes on to give some examples of those things that may be considered as wen: the contrast of dark and yellow colours, the differentiation of the round and the square, the sun and the moon, and the mountains and the rivers. All these, Liu says, can be considered to be ‘the wen of dao’ (道之文 WXDL 1/5) or the wen, the patterning, of the fundamental course of things. This relationship between wen and dao is central to Liu’s thinking. If dao is the underlying principle, the fundamental course of things, wen is the manifestation of this dao. Wen is its concretisation or embodiment of dao as it appears in the forms of the myriad things. As Zong-qi Cai points out (Cai 2000, 9), this connection between wen as embodiment and dao as underlying principle can be traced back to the Great Commentary or Da Zhuan 大傳 of the Yijing. In Richard John Lynn’s translation: ‘Since the Dao consists of change and action, we refer to it in terms of the “moving lines” [yao]. Since the moving lines consist of different classes, we refer to them as “things”. Since things mix in together, we refer to these as “patterns”’ (Lynn 1994: 92–3).5 In this scheme, as dao is active and changing, this changing activity of dao gives rise to the moving lines of the hexagrams of the Yijing. These moving lines provide the underlying principle of differentiation into things. And things, in turn, come together and mix in patterns. There is a progressive move towards lower levels of abstraction, and greater levels of concretisation, where wen is the natural outflow of dao, expressed in the coming together of the myriad things. This linkage between dao and wen is central to Liu’s text. Thus he writes that ‘Mind is born, and then language is established; language is established and then pattern (wen) is made manifest. This is the dao of nature.’6 Dao here is the underlying principle that links mind, language, and the making-manifest of pattern. Liu goes on to write that, ‘The dao is followed by the sages so that they can hand down wen, the sages follow wen to make manifest dao.’7 Wen is the external manifestation, as pattern, of the dao. The implication of this is that for Liu, wen is something that has exactly the same breadth of scope as dao. This is why it is a mistake to read Liu’s text as a work that is merely concerned with literature. If we take seriously the way that wen and dao are given the same scope, we can see that its philosophical and metaphysical ambitions are far broader. Wen encompasses the patterning of literature, but also the patterning of the world and the patterning of individual lives, just as dao is the principle that underpins all of these different kinds of patterning. Thus, what Liu is interested in is this: how one may deploy the patterning of literature in response to, and in relation to, the patterning of life itself, as a part of a patterned world, and in accord with this underlying dao.

Squandering energy, dissipating vitality We have seen how, in her essay ‘Between “Literary Mind” and “Carving Dragons”: Order and Excess in Wenxin diaolong’, Wai-Yee Li writes of the deep roots of the idea that literature is ‘against life’. Li argues that Liu Xie directly challenges the notion that

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‘poetic perfection is achieved at the expense of worldly advancement in both physical and psychological well-being’ (Li 2001: 208). For Liu, notions such as these are not only destructive towards the lives of those who write, but they also risk diminishing the literary works these writers produce. In the Western context, this notion that writing is somehow against life is one that is made up of two intertwined claims. The first is that suffering is a somehow essential to the impetus for the creation of art. The second is the claim that art, in this case specifically writing, is itself a particularly exquisite and terrible kind of suffering. In the first case, we have the idea of the writer who undergoes some great trauma, and this trauma becomes an impetus to writing. Of course, given that writers are human beings, given that human beings suffer, and given that suffering is one of the most central of human concerns, it is not surprising that writers should be concerned with suffering. Nor is it surprising that they might be spurred to write as a result of various sufferings. But what I want to call into question here is the idea that there may be necessary connection between this kind of trauma or suffering and acts of creation. What I want to suggest, along with A. L. Kennedy writing in the Guardian newspaper in 2012, is that ‘suffering is largely of no bloody use to anyone, and definitely not a prerequisite for creation’ (Kennedy 2012). Suffering is neither a necessary, nor a sufficient condition for art. The second claim, that writing is necessarily itself a kind of suffering – as demonstrated in the fake Hemingway quote – is perhaps even more dubious. Writers are fond of the notion that the mysterious ailment known as Writer’s Block is one of the greatest sufferings known to mankind. This mythology has entered the popular imagination, hence David Sipress’s New Yorker cartoon of a man on a rack, saying to his torturer, ‘Don’t talk to me about suffering – in my spare time, I’m a writer’ (Sipress 2008). But whilst this may be pleasingly self-aggrandising for certain kinds of writers, it is a notion we could do without. In Liu’s day as well, this idea of the debilitating effect of writing was not uncommon. Thus Cao Pi 曹丕 (187–226), Liu tells us, feared that composition was injurious to life, and Lu Yun 陸雲 (262–303) ‘sighed that the use of one’s thought [in literary endeavour] led to the sapping of the spirit’.8 And Liu concedes that ‘this is not entirely empty talk’.9 Some writers do indeed experience this kind of agony over their work. Liu references the case of a scholar who is said to have pricked his thigh with an awl to stay awake in his labours. But what Liu goes on to suggest is intriguing: he proposes that this suffering for one’s art is a simple misjudgement. It is a failure to deploy one’s talents, and capacities, and above all one’s vitality or qi (氣) in the proper fashion. And for Liu, it is precisely this failure to correctly deploy one’s vitality – rather than the act of writing itself – that has such dire consequences. In his chapter on the flaws of writers, Liu himself lists the many examples from Chinese history of writers whose lives have been less than exemplary, or for whom the pursuit of literature served to diminish or even curtail these lives Let’s take a quick look at the flaws of literary types: Xiangru stole a wife and took bribes; Yang Xiong was addicted to drink and profligate; as for Jing Tong, he could not get his act in gear, whilst Du Du was insatiable in entreating others; Ban Gu fawned upon Dou to gain prestige; Ma Rong sided with Liang Ji and was

228 Cultivating a Good Life unrestrained with money; Wen Ju’s arrogance speeded his own death; Zheng Ping was so crazed and foolish that he was executed; Zhong Xuan was frivolous and spiky, hot-headed and competitive; Kong Zhang’s hastiness made him sloppy; Ding Yi’s rapacity made him a beggar; Lu Zui stuffed his face and was completely brazen; Pan Yue craftily entreated Emperor Hui of Jin; Lu Ji sided with the aristocrats Jia and Guo; Fu Xuan was obstinate and narrow-minded, and reviled the state institutions; Sun Chu was ruthless and wilful and sued the government. These things are all examples of the flaws of writers.10

Things may go wrong for writers for many reasons, of course. And some of these may be beyond the writer’s own capacity to forestall or to overcome. But in his chapter on nourishing vitality, Liu insists that the central problem (at least from among those that are within the writer’s power to address) is the writer’s misdeployment of their own vitality. Ears, eyes, nose mouth are the servants of life; thought and speech are the functions of the spirit. When the will is moderated harmoniously, you merge with the order of things, and the feelings are free-flowing; but if you grind away excessively, the spirit weakens and vitality (qi) fades: this is the nature of our temperament.11

‘Grind away excessively’ (zanli guofen 鑽礪過分) is a construction that brings to mind the hard grinding of gemstones. This grinding away is counterproductive because it lays waste to the very vitality from which good writing springs. And the reason writers may be inclined to opt for the hard grind, and thus squander their qi or their vitality, is nothing other than overbearing ambition. Liu writes as follows: Now, one’s capacities and parts are limited, but the mind can be used without limit; like a duck standing on tiptoe, trying to be like a crane, one can squeeze out words and force thoughts; but in this way the internal vital spirits (qi) are squandered, like waves disappearing in a whirlpool; and the mind is harmed, just like the trees on Ox Mountain.12

The reference to Ox Mountain (Niu Shan 牛山), is of course to Mencius, where Ox Mountain appears in a parable of sorts about how external conditions may lay waste to the ‘sprouts’ or ‘shoots’ of virtue. It is of the nature of Ox Mountain to be forested, Mencius tells us: but external forces come to cut down the trees, and then oxen are grazed upon it, so that seeds that have taken root no longer have a chance to flourish. Remove the oxen, however, leave the mountain be (because, as Edward Slingerland (2014) has pointed out, there is a Confucian variety of ‘non-doing’ or wu-wei as well), and the mountain will, in time, return to its natural state. Similarly, ambition leads to the squandering and dissipation of one’s vitality, and it is the dissipation of this vitality that directly harms life, leading to regrettable tendencies such as rapacity, stuffing one’s face, and obstinacy. Liu is clear that this terrible squandering of energy is not essential to the art of writing, but instead born out of a profoundly mistaken approach to writing. Instead of this squandering and this waste, for Liu, if we are writing optimally, writing can be a

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form of active cultivation, such that we can both write well and also live well, and the two can support each other. But to understand this a bit more deeply, it is necessary to look more closely into this notion of nourishing vitality.

Nourishing vitality For Liu, vitality or qi is absolutely central to the practice of writing. In the ‘Wind and Bones’ (fenggu 風骨) chapter of the Wenxin diaolong, Liu quotes Cao Pi 曹丕 saying that ‘in wen take qi as paramount; the substance of qi is clear or muddied, and it cannot be attained by effort’.13 Qi or vitality is the most important thing; but it cannot be forced. Thus, the question for the writer is how to cultivate or nourish vitality, but without forcefulness. Throughout his text, Liu sets himself up as the enemy of excessive grinding labour. The verse at the end of the yangqi chapter reads as follows: Such disorder! Ten thousand phenomena. How wearying! One thousand thoughts. We should treasure our obscure spirit, provide nourishment (yang) to our unadorned vitality (qi) Water is stilled to become a mirror. Fire is calmed, and then it brightens. Without disturbing literary (wen) contemplation, allow the bright essence to flourish.14

In his chapter on nourishing vitality, Liu gives a potted history of Chinese literature and language from the time of the Three Sovereigns down Liu’s own day. He does so to demonstrate there is a crisis in the way writers have failed to nourish their vitality, a crisis that has negatively affected the development of literary works. Liu maintains that the ancients managed to maintain their stores of abundance, but later generations have been without ease.15 This lack of ease has, in the end, diminished their literary endeavours. Thus, the idea of nourishing vitality is a way of attempting to address what Liu sees as a decline in literary quality through a mistaken approach to the act of writing. To understand the origins and significance of this notion of yangqi or nourishing vitality, it is necessary to put it in the context of the traditions in which Liu is working. Liu was not the first writer to talk of nourishing qi – here he acknowledges the influence of the Han dynasty writer Wang Chong王充 (27–100 CE) – but his treatment of it is much more extensive than that of any of his predecessors. There are two canonical sources on which Liu draws when setting out his notion of yangqi. The first is that of the Daoist text, the Zhuangzi 莊子, a work that had a powerful influence upon the entirety of Liu’s work. One of the most important chapters of the Zhuangzi, the chapter called Yangsheng Zhu (養生主) or ‘The Primacy of the Nourishing of Life’, is specifically preoccupied with this question of cultivation (yang 養). The second source is Mencius’s notion of haoran zhi qi (浩然之氣) or ‘overflowing vitality’, a famously enigmatic concept. I will consider each of these in turn. In the Yangsheng Zhu chapter, there is the famous story of the Cook Ding who cuts up an ox with such skill that his cleaver has never needed to be sharpened in nineteen years. In the story, Lord Wenhui watches the cook dance around and carve up the

230 Cultivating a Good Life ox, and then he commends the cook on his skill. In reply, the cook describes how he has attained this degree of skilfulness. He talks about the long process of gaining intuitive skill-knowledge of the carcass of the ox, the webs of ligaments and tendons, the joints, and the bones. He talks about having the knowledge of where cuts can be made easily and fluidly, and where it is necessary to slow down, gather together his concentration, and work with care. And he talks about the satisfaction (manzhi 滿志) that comes from seeing the job well done. But what is truly striking is Lord Wenhui’s response to all of this. As he stands there in the abattoir, in the place of death, he says, ‘How wonderful! I have heard the words of cook Ding, and I have thereby attained to the nourishing of life.’16 Here a few comments are in order. The first is that this is explicitly about the nourishing or the cultivation of life (yangsheng 養生). The second that this cultivation is related to the deployment of a skill to its utmost level, such that the skill becomes effortless. This notion of the effortlessness that comes with skill at the highest level is very different from the notion of effortful striving that characterises notions of suffering for one’s art. Thirdly, the skill in question, butchery, is deliberately shocking, as if the Zhuangzi is challenging us with the idea that even butchery may be something that can be elevated to the level of an art. And finally, the deployment of this skill, however seemingly unelevated, is something that may allow the one who practises it to cultivate (yang 養) their vitality, so that at the end of this intensive labour they might be able to stand back, fully alert, satisfied, unspent, and brimming over with life. Liu himself alludes to the passage from the Zhuangzi where he writes, ‘By often taking it easy, one’s talents are sharpened; but when one has a surplus of energy, then one should take courage in writing; this will make the blade as if new, with no blockages in the spaces between flesh and skin.’17 That is to say, talent is sharpened through the guarding of one’s vitality, just as it is blunted through excessive ambition. When one guards oneself like this, it is possible to use the blade of one’s talents ‘as if new’ (ru xin 如新). This is not about storing up energy so that it may be expended in the labour of art. Writing is itself not ‘excessive grinding’ that requires stores of energy to then subsequently be expended. Instead of a model based upon notions of storing up and expending, this is one in which the writer can put their vitality to use without expenditure, just as Cook Ding expends no energy, and nourishes his life, as he sweeps his blade to and fro. In the same passage, Liu refers to the ‘breathing in and out’ (tuna 吐納) of the literary arts (wenyi 文藝), a reference to Daoist practices of longevity. As Wai-Yee Li writes, these Daoist concepts concern the ‘mental balance and inward ordering’ necessary for literary composition. In this ‘breathing in and out’, life and literature are merged in a fashion that is ‘both play and moral self-cultivation’ (Li 2001, 207) through the regulation – the alternating tightening and slackening – of one’s qi. The term Liu uses is jiexuan 節宣, which has its origins in the Zuo Zhuan 左傳, or Mr. Zuo’s Annals, where it refers specifically to the use of qi in a fashion that is neither constricted nor sloppy, such that the noble (junzi 君子) can attend to the business of state without exhaustion.18 The other source on which Liu draws in setting out this notion of nourishing vitality is Mencius’s haoran zhi qi or ‘flood-like qi’. In the Mencius, it appears in the context of

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a conversation between Mencius and his follower Gongsun Chou. Mencius talks about flood-like qi, and in response Chou asks him what he means. Mencius replies that this qi is ‘supremely great and supremely strong. If you cultivate it with uprightness and do not harm it, then it will fill the space between heaven and earth’.19 This overflowing qi, for Mencius, is that which harmonises (pei 配), righteousness (yi 義), and the way (dao 道). Thus qi seamlessly brings together ethical and underlying metaphysical dimensions. In a detailed essay on the concept, Lee Rainey (1998) unpacks this idea by talking of how haoran zhi qi is a matter of according one’s own qi with the vitality or qi of the world as a whole. But there are also ethical implications here. Robin Wang writes that Mencius’s haoran zhi qi is that which ‘produces a union between moral refinement and physical cultivation’ (Wang 2010); it is a kind of flow in which one’s physical and moral being is accorded with dao, harmonised with the tendencies, propensities, paths, and flows of the world at large. If one can make use of this qi to unite both the natural course of things or dao and righteousness or yi, the claim is that it becomes easy to succeed in one’s endeavours. If we can now bring together the perspectives from both Mencius and the Zhuangzi, we can see that the notion of yangqi in Liu’s work is one that is concerned with the following: firstly, in the pursuit of wen, the harmonising one’s own vitality with the broader vitality of the world and with the underlying dao (‘the sages follow wen to make manifest dao’); secondly, an active cultivation of this vitality (‘provide nourishment to our unadorned vitality’); thirdly an effortlessness, or minimisation of effort, such that one is able to cultivate activity without strain (‘grinding away excessively’), acting in a fashion that is optimal, but does so without any risk of exhaustion (‘the spirit weakens and vitality fades’). There is an intimate connection, then, between qi or vitality, wen or pattern, and the underlying dao. Wen, we have already seen, is coextensive with dao as the manifestation in pattern of the underlying principle. But this manifestation is made possible thanks to qi, or vitality (‘in wen take qi as paramount’). This means when Liu talks of qi, he is concerned with vitality on several levels: on the level of the work, of the writer, and of the world at large. So as Jing Hong 洪静 (2014) correctly notes, there are three kinds of qi at play in Liu’s work: the qi of nature (自然之氣 ziran zhi qi, literally the qi of the ‘such-as-it-is’), physiological qi (生理之氣 shengli zhi qi, literally the qi by virtue of which a specific living order emerges, here referring to the qi of the writer’s whole person as a dynamic process), and the qi of the work (作品之氣 zuopin zhi qi). Because the nourishing of vitality cuts between work, writer, and world, in nourishing qi one is simultaneously doing a number of things. One is bringing into being a work that is expressive of a refinement of qi, a work that itself pulses with vitality. One is bringing about a particular condition of bodily ease, along with a suppleness of feeling and a sharpness and brightness of mind. And one is harmonising one’s being with the broader qi of the world. These three aspects, rooted in the same underlying dao, all feed each other. For Liu, writing is never a matter of simply writing. It is also a matter of life itself, and the guarding of the very vitality of this life. He writes as follows: Thus it is proper to unhurriedly follow the emotions, with great suppleness and harmoniousness. If you squander and weaken your spirit and vigour, forcing the

232 Cultivating a Good Life harmonious qi, your grappling with texts will only diminish your years, and your dabbling with the brush will only cut down your nature.20

This unhurried, harmonious suppleness is echoed also in Liu’s chapter on shensi 神思 (‘spiritual thought’, or imagination) where he writes, ‘Therefore, one should take charge of one’s heart-mind (xin) and cultivate technique, but there is no use in arduous overthinking; and the one who has excellent qualities and has a mastery of their deeds needs not strain at feeling.’21 Arduousness, overthinking, strain: all of these deplete qi. We write best, and live best, when our writing is free of arduousness, when we can regulate the tightening and slackening of our qi without strain, and when our literary endeavours are in harmony with our own physiological and psychological being, and the broader processes and principles of the world.

A virtuous circle: The arts of living and the arts of writing So far, we have seen that for Liu the act of writing, when properly approached, should not lead to ruin, despair or disaster. But because the vitality that one nourishes when one yangs one’s qi is something that is rooted in the underlying dao, and is therefore something that straddles the wider world, the writer and the work, there is the intriguing suggestion that not only may living well aid writing well, but also, conversely, writing well – that is, writing in a way that nourishes this vitality – may serve the end of living well. When it comes to how writing itself can act as a form of cultivation, Liu is cautious in the claims that he makes. Here we can return to the passage where Liu writes of the ‘breathing in and out’, or tuna 吐納, of writing – the tightening and slackening of our qi as we write. This direct reference to Daoist practices of meditative breathing is not accidental, for Liu goes on at the end of this passage to claim, ‘Although this is not the ten thousand arts of [Daoist] breath control (taixi 胎息), it too is a way of guarding qi.’22 Here the link between traditional Daoist practices of cultivation and the act of writing is made wholly explicit. And whilst Liu grants that writing may not be equivalent or equal to such practices, he insists that should still be considered as a form of cultivation. But how are we, practically, to use writing as a form of cultivation? Here, Liu’s advice is more direct and homely. ‘When ideas come’, he writes, ‘then put the mind at ease in order to take up the brush; but when things become confused, then put aside the brush and reel in the mind. Free wandering (xiaoyao 逍遙) is a cure for exhaustion; talk and laughter are medicine for weariness.’23 There is, of course, a clear nod to the Zhuangzi in his reference to xiaoyao, or free wandering. For Liu, we write best when the mind is lucid, untroubled, and free of the disturbance of ambition, or the misery of excessive grinding. Once we have given up on the ambition that squanders our energy, then we can attend to the guarding and following the flow of our qi when it is in full flood, and to the easeful refusal to force it when it is not. Proceeding in this way, not only does the work emerge without strain, anxiety or fretfulness, but we also effectively nourish our lives as a whole. In this way,

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although writing may not be equal to Daoist meditative and breathing practices, it works according to the same principles and is rooted in the same underlying dao. This underlying dao is what enables the causality to work in two directions: on the one hand, cultivating one’s qi is a means of cultivating success in writing; but on the other hand, writing itself can be a means of cultivating qi. Not only is a nourished life good for writing, but writing is good for the nourishment of life. Here it is worth distinguishing Liu’s approach from the therapeutic approach to writing that is more familiar in the West. There is a long tradition going back at least to the Stoics of seeing writing as a form of therapy. But too easily identifying Liu’s nourishing of vitality with therapy would be a mistake. The crucial difference lies in the background against which Liu’s view of writing takes place. Therapy suggests an ailment from which one is to be cured, an inadequacy in the world that writing can help us navigate. But the view suggested by Liu’s work is not so much curative as it is optimising. If the idea of therapy maintains a thread of connection between the act of writing and the idea of suffering – in the sense that writing is a means of compensating for the sufferings of life – the idea of yangqi is one that sidesteps this concern with suffering altogether: whether as a spur to writing, as a necessary result of writing, or as a problem to be solved by writing. It suggests that if we could only live in the appropriate fashion, and write in the appropriate fashion, the arts of living and of writing might be harmonised, and we might thereby find that the world, rather than being something inadequate or something to be overcome, is itself the thing that can continually sustain our vitality. What Liu holds out for is this: a virtuous circle, cycling constantly between the vitality of the world, the vitality of the work, and the vitality of the writer. It is a bracing, optimistic, exhilarating view. It suggests that if we yang the qi of our lives as a whole, then we can practice literature more optimally. It suggests that difficulties in the creation of literary works may be solved not by grinding away at problems internal to the work, but by thinking about broader questions of how one nourishes one’s vitality. It suggests that the practice of writing may be a way of nourishing and enriching our lives more broadly. And for those of us who care about living well as well as about writing well, it means that we don’t have to choose between the two.

Writing in the service of life The Wenxin diaolong’s vision of writing as a form of cultivation provides a powerful and necessary antidote to all that posturing about writerly misery, about typewriters, and about blood. It challenges us to ask what it might be to see writing as an activity in the service of life. And it provides us with a vision of the vocation and practice of writing that may be of considerable benefit to those of us who seek to follow in the footsteps of Liu Xie, and to make sense of the world and of our lives through the act of writing. But because what concerns me most is the relationship between writing and life, here I will dispense with theory, and end with a story. I started on the early draft for this chapter whilst I was living in Chengdu. It was winter, my apartment was cold, and I was struggling to make sense of the subtleties and complexities of Liu’s work. Grinding away excessively in my chilly apartment, I felt my energy becoming increasingly

234 Cultivating a Good Life depleted. I was grumpy and miserable. Then, one morning, I woke up and shuffled to my desk, and felt myself hovering on the brink of despair. As I sat there – tired, frustrated, bored – it suddenly struck me that perhaps I should not just read Liu’s work as a scholar might, but I should also take his advice as a writer might. So I packed a small bag, left my apartment, headed to the bus station, and, on a whim, caught a bus to the ancient town of Langzhong in north-eastern Sichuan. In Langzhong, I checked into a small hotel. I spent the next few days strolling around the city. I took boats over the river. I climbed to hilltop temples. I chatted with strangers in the old bazaars. I made friends with the staff in a local coffee shop. I gave up on worrying about the draft I was trying to write, and surrendered myself instead to the pleasures of talk, laughter, and free wandering. But when I returned to my hotel at night, something miraculous happened. I found myself sitting down at my desk, fully satisfied, cracking open a bottle of beer, taking up my copy of Liu Xie’s Wenxin diaolong, and starting to write. And in this way, seemingly without any great effort, by the time I had come to the end of my short break in Langzhong, the draft was complete.

Notes 1 齒在踰立，則嘗夜夢執丹漆之禮器，隨仲尼而南行。(WXDL 50/2). All translations of Liu Xie’s Wenxin diaolong are by the author. 2 旦而寤，乃怡然而喜，大哉！聖人之難見哉，乃小子之垂夢歟！自生人以來， 未有如夫子者也。（WXDL 50/2） 3 敷贊聖旨， 莫若注經， 而馬鄭諸儒， 弘之已精， 就有深解，未足立家。 唯文章之用， 實經典枝條… 于是搦筆和墨， 乃始論文。 (WXDL 50/2) 4 文之為德也大矣，與天地并生者何哉？(WXDL 1/1) 5 道有變動，故曰爻。爻有等，故曰物。物相雜，故曰文。(XCZ B.10) 6 心生而言立， 言立而文明，自然之道也。(WXDL 1/1) 7 道沿聖以垂文，聖因文而明道。 (WXDL 1/5) 8 曹公懼為文之傷命，陸雲嘆用思之困神。(WXDL 42/4) 9 非虛談也 (WXDL 42/4) 10 略觀文士之疵:相如竊妻而受金，揚雄嗜酒而少算，敬通之不修廉隅，杜篤之請 求無 厭 ，班固諂竇以作威，馬融黨梁而黷貨，文舉傲誕以速誅，正平狂憨以致 戮，仲宣 輕銳以躁競，孔璋傯恫以粗疏，丁儀貪婪以乞貨，路粹餔啜而無恥， 潘岳詭禱于愍懷， 陸機傾仄于賈郭，傅玄剛隘而詈台，孫楚狠愎而訟府。 諸有此類，并文士之瑕累。(WXDL 49/2) 11 夫耳目鼻口，生之役也；心慮言辭，神之用也。率志委和，則理融而情暢； 鑽礪過分，則神疲而氣衰：此性情之數也。 (WXDL 42/1) 12 若夫器分有限，智用無涯；或慚鳧企鶴，瀝辭鐫思。于是精氣內銷， 有似尾閭之波；神志外傷，同乎牛山之木。 (WXDL 42/3) 13 文以氣為主，氣之清濁有體，不可力強而至。(WXDL 28/3) 14 紛哉萬象，勞矣千想。玄神宜寶，素氣資養。水停以鑒，火靜而朗。 無擾文慮，郁此精爽。(WXDL 42/7) 15 古人所以餘裕，后進所以莫遑也。(WXDL 42/2) 16 善哉！吾聞庖丁之言，得養生焉 (Zhuangzi 3:5) 17 常弄閑于才鋒，賈餘于文勇，使刃發如新，腠 理無滯 。(WXDL 42/6)

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18 ‘I have heard that for the noble man there are four periods to the day: in the early morning he hears administrative business, during the daylight hours he consults, in the evening he crafts his commands, and at night he rests his body. In this way he releases his life force in regulated fashion (節宣其氣), not allowing any blockage or stagnation to weaken his constitution, lest his heart be muddied and all the standards of order be thrown into confusion’ (Durrant et al. 2016: 1327). 僑聞之，君子有四時，朝以聽政，晝以訪問，夕以脩令，夜以安身，於 是乎節宣其氣，勿使有所壅閉湫底，以露其體，茲心不爽，而昏亂百度 19 其為氣也，至大至剛，以直養而無害，則塞于天地之閒。(Mengzi 2A2: 13–14) 20 故宜從容率情，優柔適會。若銷鑠精膽，蹙迫和氣，秉牘以驅齡， 洒翰以伐性。(WXDL 42/5) 21 是以秉心養術，無務苦慮，含章司契，不必勞情也。(WXDL 26/3) 22 雖非胎息之萬術，斯亦衛氣之一方也。(WXDL 42/6) 23 意得則舒懷以命筆，理伏則 投筆以卷懷，逍遙以針勞，談笑以藥倦 。 (WXDL 42/6)

References Cai, Z. (2000). ‘Wen and the Construction of a Critical System in the Wenxin Diaolong’, Chinese Literature: Essays, Articles, Reviews 22, 1–29. Durrant, S., W.-Y. Li and D. Schaberg (2016). Zuo Tradition / Zuozhuan: Commentary on the ‘Spring and Autumn Annals’. Washington: University of Washington Press. Hall, D. L. and R. T. Ames (1998). Thinking from the Han: Self, Truth, and Transcendence in Chinese and Western Culture. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press. Hong, Jing 洪静 (2014). ‘A New Exploration of Liu Xie’s yangqi’, 刘勰’养气说’新探. Theory Journal《理论学刊》 12 (1): 121–6. Kennedy, A. L. (2012). ‘Why I Hate the Myth of the Suffering Artist’, The Guardian, Available at https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2012/apr/02/myth-ofthe-suffering-artist (Accessed 01 January 2017). Knechtges, D. R. and T. Chang (2010). Ancient and Early Medieval Chinese Literature (vol 1): A Reference Guide. Leiden: Brill. Li, W.-Y. (2001). ‘Between “Literary Mind” and “Carving Dragons”: Order and Excess in Wenxin diaolong’, in Z.-Q. Cai (ed.), A Chinese Literary Mind: Culture, Creativity and Rhetoric in Wenxin Diaolong, 193–225. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. Lynn, R. J. (1994). The Classic of Changes: A New Translation of the I Ching as Interpreted by Wang Bi. New York: Columbia University Press. Mair, V. (2001). ‘Buddhism in the Literary Mind and Ornate Rhetoric’, in Z.-Q. Cai (ed.), A Chinese Literary Mind: Culture, Creativity, and Rhetoric in Wenxin Diaolong, 63–82. Stanford: Stanford University Press. Owen, S. (1992). Readings in Chinese Literary Thought. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Rainey, L. (1998). ‘Mencius and His Vast, Overflowing Qi (Haoran Zhi Qi)’, Monumenta Serica, 46: 91–104. Richter, A. (2012). ‘Empty Dreams and Other Omissions: Liu Xie’s Wenxin Diaolong Preface’, Asia Major, 25: 83–110. Sipress, D. (2008). ‘Don’t talk to me about Suffering…’ [cartoon]. The New Yorker. 20 October 2008.

236 Cultivating a Good Life Slingerland, E. (2003). Confucius Analects, with Selections from Traditional Commentaries. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company. Slingerland, E. G. (2014). Trying not to Try: The Art and Science of Spontaneity. New York: Crown Publishers. Wang, R. (2010). ‘The Virtuous Body At Work: The Ethical Life as Qi 氣 in Motion’, Dao, 9: 339–51. Xiao, T. and D. R. Knechtges (1982). Wen xuan, or, Selections of Refined Literature. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Zhang, L. (1996). ‘What is Wen and Why is it Made So Terribly Strange?’ College Literature, 23: 15–35.

15

Death and Happiness: Han China Mu-Chou Poo1

Is there such a thing as supreme happiness in the world or isn’t there? Is there some way to keep yourself alive or isn’t there? What to do, what to rely on, what to avoid, what to stick by, what to follow, what to leave alone, what to find happiness in, what to hate? Zhuangzi, Zhile, trans. Watson 1964: 111 It is often assumed that personal cultivation, whether mental or physical, can lead to a better state of existence. This may be regarded as the path to wisdom and happiness. However, happiness is a vague concept. It may be defined as a state of contentment, as a kind of existence that has no wants. Yet, what that contentment rests in may vary across time and space and among different cultures. Because happiness is often elusive, and life is short, people often resort to constructing an existence beyond this life on earth, based on their earthly experience, their aspirations and apprehensions, as well as their hopes for a rewarding life. Here I propose neither to look at the problem from a philosophical point of view, nor to consider how personal cultivation could lead to happiness, but by looking at mortuary practices, in ancient China, as a reflection of the people’s apprehensions and aspirations. The concept of the netherworld, the belief system, and the social norms that are constitutive of the idea of happiness form an intricate web of beliefs and practices that will provide us with insights into a particular cultural system. This chapter proposes a novel way to understand happiness in light of the human encounter with death: it suggests that how people imagined the afterlife and made mortuary preparations for it reflects what they had in mind of an ideal existence, or happiness. If, as many may have assumed, this ideal life was defined and confined by the conventional wisdom of the day, it should be a demonstration of the collective values of society as a whole. Here, I also suggest a second important insight arising from the study of mortuary practices, which can offer fascinating views of the life of the common folk, which may not always be in accord with the elite ideologies in that society.

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Views of happiness in early Chinese texts Before venturing into the mortuary customs of early Chinese society and the idea of happiness implied by such customs, it is necessary to give a brief account of the views of happiness expressed in the texts – shaped very much by the elite intellectuals – as a basis of discussion. According to the Confucian ideal, the most important task for a conscientious gentleman (junzi 君子) is to find a way to make the world a better place for the multitudes. Confucius emphasises personal cultivation as a precondition for a junzi to realise the ideals of benevolence (ren 仁), rightness (yi 義), propriety (li 禮), sagacity (zhi 智), and trustworthiness (xin 信). Mengzi (孟子c. 372–289 BCE), one of the most important proponent of Confucian ideals, also talks about cultivation of the right vial energies (qi 氣).2 Yet, his intellectual effort was mostly geared towards teaching the rulers, such as King Hui of Liang, ways to establish a benevolent government that could help the people to live a life free of want. Whether this could be considered a happy life, or whether Confucius or Mengzi knew what the common people really wanted for a happy life could, of course, be subjects of further discussion. Nonetheless, the concern with the cultivation of moral personhood in the lives of Ru (儒) officials was the hallmark of Confucian teaching. Whether the cultivation of this moral personhood is also connected with the happiness of those who practice self-cultivation, as the Stoics might have insisted, however, did not seem to have been a central focus of discussion.3 Presumably, the intended audience of teaching in such texts belonged to the elite, whose material needs was not a problem. It seems that, in the Confucian texts, moral rectitude and passion to serve in the government were the most important qualities of an educated person, so important that they might have eclipsed other human needs. In their discussions of good government, there is often the assumption that feeding the people well is a good enough achievement, and that people will judge the ruler by whether he can supply a ‘good life’, that is, material well-being, to the people. This is expressed most famously by Mengzi’s explanation of his ideal plan: For the people not to have any regrets over anything left undone, whether in the support of their parents when alive or in the mourning of them when dead is the first step along the Kingly way. If the mulberry is planted in every homestead of five mu of land, then those who are fifty can wear silk, if chickens, pigs and dogs do not miss their breeding season, then those who are seventy can eat meat; if each lot of a hundred mu is not deprived of labour during the busy season, then families with several mouths to feed will not go hungry. Exercise due care over the education provided by village schools, and reinforce this by teaching them the duties proper to sons and younger brothers, and those whose heads have turned hoary will not be carrying loads on the roads. When those who are seventh wear silk and eat meat and the masses are neither cold nor hungry, it is impossible for their princes not to be a true King. 養生喪死無憾，王道之始也。五畝之宅，樹之以桑，五十者可以衣帛矣； 雞豚狗彘之畜，無失其時，七十者可以食肉矣；百畝之田，勿奪其時， 數口之家可以無飢矣；謹庠序之教，申之以孝悌之義，頒白者不負戴於道 路矣。七十者衣帛食肉，黎民不飢不寒，然而不王者，未之有也。(Mengzi zhushu, juan 1: 12.1–2; Lau (tr.) 2003: 7–9)

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However, there seems to be a ‘double standard’ here. While the elites considered material comfort a secondary concern in their lives – because they possessed a ‘higher’ moral rectitude – they believed that ‘people’ (min民) would be content and happy once provided with material needs. This can be represented by the often-quoted passages from the Analects: The Master said, ‘Admirable indeed was the virtue of Hui! With a single bamboo dish of rice, a single gourd dish of drink, and living in his mean narrow lane, while others could not have endured the distress, he did not allow his joy to be affected by it. Admirable indeed was the virtue of Hui!’ 子曰。賢哉。回也。一簞食。一瓢飲。在陋巷。人不堪其憂。回也不改其樂。 賢哉回也。(Lunyu 6.9, trans. Legge 1960: 188) The Master said, ‘With coarse rice to eat, with water to drink, and my bended arm for a pillow; I have still joy in the midst of these things. Riches and honours acquired by unrighteousness, are to me as a floating cloud.’ 子曰。飯疏食。飲水。曲肱而枕之。樂亦在其中矣。不義而富且貴。於我如浮雲。 (Lunyu 7.15, trans. Legge 1960: 200)

These words imply that life with coarse rice and plain water was not a comfortable one for average people, yet the Confucian intellectual could take pleasure in it because they had a higher vision of life that could allow them to ignore unpleasant material conditions.4 By contrast, another passage from the Analects spells out the different needs of the common people: Zi Gong asked about government. The Master said, ‘The requisites of government are that there be sufficiency of food, sufficiency of military equipment, and the confidence of the people in their ruler.’ Zi Gong said, ‘If it cannot be helped, and one of these must be dispensed with, which of the three should be foregone first?’ ‘The military equipment’, said the Master. Zi Gong again asked, ‘If it cannot be helped, and one of the remaining two must be dispensed with, which of them should be foregone?’ The Master answered, ‘Part with the food. From of old, death has been the lot of all men; but if the people have no faith in their rulers, there is no standing for the state.’ 子貢問政。子曰：足食。足兵。民信之矣。子貢曰：「必不得已而去， 於斯三者何先？曰：去兵。子貢曰：必不得已而去，於斯二者何先？曰： 去食。自古皆有死，民無信不立。 (Lunyu 12.7, trans. Legge 1960: 254)

This passage basically says that for a government to stand, the trust of the people is most important. But the trust of the people is not easily established if material needs are not supplied, as Mengzi elaborated. If we put Mengzi’s words quoted above, side by side with these words of Confucius, it seems that the Confucian thinkers are satisfied with providing a comfortable material life to the people, while they themselves consider self-cultivation as their duty. Such self-cultivation, realised through the practice of observing benevolence, propriety, and compassion, has been a familiar

240 Cultivating a Good Life topic of Chinese intellectual history. Yet, unlike many other cultures, Confucian ethics does not leave much room to the will of gods to intervene with human affairs, as the importance of serving people takes precedence over the service of gods and spirits. The Analects recorded a conversation between Confucius and a disciple named Jilu: Jilu asked about how to serve the ghosts and spirits. The Master said: ‘One could not yet serve humans; how could one serve the ghosts?’ Ji Lu said, ‘May I ask about death?’ The Master replied, ‘Not knowing [the meaning of] life, how could one know anything about death?’ 季路問事鬼神。子曰：未能事人，安能事鬼？季路曰：敢問死？子曰： 未知生，焉知死？(Lunyu 11.12, trans. Legge 1960: 240–1)

This passage is often quoted as the epitome of the humanistic concern of Confucius, as he cares about this-worldly affairs while refraining from discussing the unknown world of the dead or the spirits. Apparently only human affairs are relevant in the enterprise of building an ideal and presumably happy world. Jilu’s question about death, however, was answered by Zhuangzi (369–286 BCE) more than a hundred years later, as we shall see below, regarding Zhuangzi’s discussion of the subject of happiness. He opens his essay on ‘Supreme Happiness’ with the compelling questions: Is there such a thing as supreme happiness in the world or isn’t there? Is there some way to keep yourself alive or isn’t there? What to do, what to rely on, what to avoid, what to stick by, what to follow, what to leave alone, what to find happiness in, what to hate? (Zhuangzi, Zhile, trans. Watson 1964: 111) 天下有至樂無有哉？有可以活身者無有哉？今奚為奚據？奚避奚處？ 奚就奚去？奚樂奚惡？(Guo 1961: 608)

The tone of the questions reflects a chaotic time when people seem to have lost a firm grasp of the meaning of life, or the way to happiness. He then proposes a reply according to the commonly accepted idea of ‘desirable life’ and ‘undesirable life’ to establish a point of contention: This is what the world honours: wealth, eminence, long life, a good name. This is what the world finds happiness in: a life ease, rich food, fine clothes, beautiful sights, sweet sounds. This is what it looks down on: poverty, meanness, early death, a bad name. This is what it finds bitter: a life that knows no rest, a mouth that gets no rich food, no fine clothes for the body, no beautiful sights for the eye, no sweet sounds for the ear. People who can’t get these things fret a great deal and are afraid – this is a stupid way to treat the body. Zhuangzi, Zhile, trans. Watson 1964: 111) 夫天下之所尊者，富貴壽善也；所樂者，身安、厚味、美服、好色、音聲也； 所下者，貧賤夭惡也；所苦者，身不得安逸，口不得厚味，形不得美服， 目不得好色，耳不得音聲；若不得者，則大憂以懼。其為形也亦愚哉！(Guo 1961: 609)

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These two pictures of life – desirable and undesirable – may have wider universal appeal beyond early China, both then and now. However, as an unconventional and imaginative thinker, Zhuangzi quickly turns around – much in the spirit of Epicurus or Lucretius – and subverts these conventional views of happiness that the Confucians would be perfectly happy with. Zhuangzi employed a series of allegories to demonstrate his point: When Zhuangzi went to [Chu], he saw an old skull, all dry and parched. He poked it with this carriage whip and then asked, ‘Sir, were you greedy for life and forgetful of justice, and so came to this? Was your state overthrown and did you bow beneath the axe and so came to this? Did you do some evil deed or shameful wrong doings that brought disgrace upon your parents and family, and so came to this? Was it through the pangs of cold and hunger that you came to this? Or was it because of your age that brought you to this?’ When he had finished speaking, he dragged the skull over and, using it for a pillow, lay down to sleep. In the middle of the night, the skull came to him in a dream and said, ‘You chatter like a rhetorician and all your words betray the entanglements of a living man. The dead know nothing of these! Would you like to hear an explication of death?’ ‘Indeed’, said Zhuangzi. The skull said, ‘In death there are no rulers above, no subjects below, and no chores of the four seasons. With nothing to do, our springs and autumns are as endless as heaven and earth. Even the happiness of a king facing south on his throne could not surpass this!’ Zhuangzi couldn’t believe this and said, ‘If I got the Arbiter of Fate to give you a body again, make you some bones and flesh, return you to your parents and family and your old home and friends, would you want that?’ The skull frowned severely, wrinkling up its brow. ‘How could I throw away the happiness of a king on throne and take on the toils of the human world again?’ (Zhuangzi, Zhile, trans. Watson 1964: 114–15) 莊子之楚，見空髑髏，髐然有形，撽以馬捶，因而問之曰：「夫子貪生失理， 而為此乎？將子有亡國之事，斧鉞之誅，而為此乎？將子有不善之行， 愧遺父母妻子之醜，而為此乎？將子有凍餒之患，而為此乎？將子之春秋 故及此乎？」於是語卒，援髑髏枕而臥。夜半，髑髏見夢曰：「子之談者 似辯士。視子所言，皆生人之累也，死則無此矣。子欲聞死之說乎？」 莊子曰：「然。」髑髏曰：「死，無君於上，無臣於下，亦無四時之事， 從然以天地為春秋，雖南面王樂，不能過也。」莊子不信，曰：「吾使司 命復生子形，為子骨肉肌膚，反子父母妻子、閭里、知識，子欲之乎？」 髑 髏 深 矉 蹙 頞 曰 ： 「 吾 安 能 棄 南 面 王 樂 而 復 為 人 間 之 勞 乎 ？ 」 (Guo 1961: 617–19)

Zhuangzi’s questions regarding how the skull came to its fate are intended to present a general view (not his own but that of the status quo) of a good death or happy fate, since the skull is obviously not buried properly or ceremoniously, probably due to one of the reasons stated by Zhuangzi. The questions are of course posed

242 Cultivating a Good Life only to allow the skull, in fact Zhuangzi himself, to present his view of death and happiness. That is, only in death can one find eternal peace, which may be regarded as the state of ultimate happiness. It is also a state free of all worldly concerns. This may be a dramatic and rhetorical presentation of his ideas, yet it is in tune with Zhuangzi’s interest in advocating an unencumbered spirit that abhors the prevailing social conventions dominated by ‘Confucian’ ideals. It also stands in drastic contrast with the ethos of Homer, when the ghost of Achilles says to Odysseus: ‘Say not a word’, he answered, ‘in death’s favor; I would rather be a paid servant in a poor man’s house and be above ground than king of kings among the dead’ (Odyssey 11, trans. Samuel Butler). Zhuangzi’s writing might not have had significant impact on the then contemporary public. But his stories about the skull and other characters did capture a glimpse of the chaotic social scene of the late Warring States period (476– 221 BCE). What he attacked or ridiculed were, among other things, the prevailing social conventions of the time. Regarding funerals, for example, mortuary practices in Warring States and the Qin–Han periods (221 BCE–220 CE) reflected a general belief that the dead should be supplied with abundant funerary objects to be used in the netherworld (Poo 1990). The rationale motivating such mortuary practice was inevitably the assumption that dissatisfaction in life could be compensated for in death, and that if a person did not live a happy life on earth, he or she could have the chance to have an ideal life after death by having a proper burial. Mortuary practices reveal some clues as to how people in a society thought about happiness in life: to supply or not to supply the dead with particular types of objects, and how much to supply, are based on assumptions about the conditions or necessities for a happy life.

Representations of the netherworld Mortuary practices of the Han dynasty has been a subject of intense study for the past forty years, if we take the publication of the Mawangdui Tomb no. 1 in 1973 as a milestone (Changsha Mawangdui yihao Hanmu 1973). Here I shall make general observations on the development of the image of the netherworld to set the background for the following discussions on the relationship between the idea of the netherworld and the search for happiness in life. Study of the evolution of the ancient Chinese tomb styles from vertical-earthen-pit-wooden-casket-tomb to horizontal-brick-chamber-tomb5 and the changing combination of funerary assemblage from ritual bronze vessels to surrogate models of objects for daily use indicates that there was an increasingly clear material expression of a concept of the netherworld that was formulated by imitating the world of the living. This imitation was shown first by the construction of a home-like tomb for the deceased to live in, and then by providing the deceased with the necessities of daily life in the form of surrogate models (Poo 2011; Pirazzoli-T’Serstevens 2009: 949–1026). Moreover, the change in burial styles and funerary assemblage corresponded to, first, the disintegration of the Shang-Zhou political and ritual structure and the decline of the old nobilities associated with

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the vassal system and blood relations and, secondly, the rise of a new social class in association with the development of bureaucracy and meritocracy (Poo 1993; Huang 2003; Lai 2015). Despite this general trend of ‘death imitating life’, there was no generally agreed discourse on the nature and location of the ‘netherworld’ even into the Western Han period. The netherworld could have been simply the tomb itself, as reflected in a resurrection story found in a late 3rd-century Qin tomb, in which the person mentioned that the tomb was his dwelling in death (Li 1990; Harper 1994). There are also more general terms, such as the Yellow Spring (Huangquan 黃泉),6 the Dark City (Youdu 幽都),7 or simply the ‘underground’ (dixia 地下) that are employed to refer to the netherworld. Both ‘Yellow Spring’ and ‘Dark City’ are used synonymously to refer to the netherworld in later literature, although they were no more than metaphors.8 By the Han dynasty, the term ‘underground’ began to be used regularly in texts in funerary settings, such as in inventory lists of funerary objects or imaginary official documents to the officials of the netherworld. For example, an official in the netherworld was addressed as the ‘Lord of the Underground’ (dixiazhu 地下主), while another was addressed as the ‘Assistant Magistrate of the Underground’ (dixiacheng 地下丞). The ‘two-thousand-bushel of the Underground’ (dixia erqiandan 地下二千石) was also a common term found in funerary texts (Poo 1998: 168–9). With other supporting evidence, it has been argued that, with the appearance of these underground officials, the netherworld was imagined as a place ruled by an underground government, not unlike the bureaucracy on earth. One can argue with reason that such imagination could only have come into being after the earthly bureaucracy had already been fully established and had controlled the life of the people in a considerably efficient fashion.9 On the other hand, this understanding of the idea of the netherworld is only part of the story. One well-known example that shows the rich imagination of a world beyond this life is the funerary silk painting/banner found in the Mawangdui Tomb no. 1 of Lady Dai, dated to 168 BCE. Ever since its discovery, the silk painting of Mawangdui Tomb no. 1 has been the subject of debate and speculation. Although some of the elements found in the painting, such as the toad and hare in the moon, the sun bird, the fusang tree, and the eight red dots among the tree leaves, could be identified with known textual traditions, a few elements still defy interpretation (Loewe 1979, 50–3. See Bodde 1961: 369–408; Birrell 1993: 138–44; 195). On the whole, it is relatively certain that, with the image of the deceased tomb owner in the centre, the silk painting depicts the world in which the deceased would be residing. This assumption, furthermore, is supported by another almost identical silk banner found in Mawangdui Tomb no. 3, which belonged to the son of Lady Dai. In this painting, the son himself, shown as a man standing with his long sword, occupies the centre of the picture. Whatever the place might be, it certainly evokes a sense of mystery, with the accompanying figures and the appearance of the sun and the moon together in the sky. Might this place be somewhere in the sky? The painted four layers of coffins of Lady Dai, in this connection, also deserve to be considered, for each of them has a design that suggests a certain conception of the netherworld.

244 Cultivating a Good Life In a nutshell, the four layers of coffins could be metaphorical representations of the several regions that the deceased would go through during the journey to her destination: first comes pitch black, as death occurs; then gradually there appear clouds, in which spirits, monsters, and animals of all sorts reside; passing through this cloudy region the deceased enters into a realm of blissfulness and happiness; and finally reaches her home of eternal sunshine.10 All told, the images on the Mawangdui silk painting and the coffins could be seen as an effort to represent an imaginary landscape of the world of the dead that integrated different ideas – whether religious, mythological, or legendary – current in early Han. Such a composite view of the netherworld is certainly much more complex than the ‘underground’ represented in the funerary texts. Moreover, the overall mood of the silk paintings seems to be that of serenity and contentment, with the deceased accompanied by his or her servants or family members. Another silk painting with similar scenes found in Shandong, several hundred miles from the Mawangdui tombs, but close in time, depicted not only the tomb owner, but also many scenes of daily life, thus confirming that the painting’s purpose was to depict a place where the deceased could spend his or her days happily under the eternal appearance of the sun and moon (Linyi Jinqueshan Hanmu fajuezu 1977: 11, inside cover). In their choice of mythological themes, the similarities between these two silk banners, and the decorative paintings in the late Western Han brick tomb of Pu Qianqiu in Loyang (Sun 1977) makes it likely that the Mawangdui silk paintings’ conception of the netherworld was far-reaching and long lasting. In fact, one could make a case that the Mawangdui paintings might have represented a decorative tradition that is the precursor of the painted brick tombs that were beginning to be prevalent in the Eastern Han. It should be emphasised, however, that this imagination of the netherworld is most likely the result of a collective wisdom, distilled from legendary stories passed down through generations, something that should not be quickly dismissed as ‘imagination’ without deeper meaning. This realisation warrants an investigation into the value system underlying these practices.

Attitudes towards the netherworld After examining various ideas about the netherworld, it is time to investigate attitudes towards the netherworld to discover whether it was a desirable place, and why. We have seen Zhuangzi’s depiction of an eternal happy land of the dead, and it is interesting to note that when Zhuangzi describes the world of the dead, it is directly related to the idea of searching for happiness. Zhuangzi’s idea, of course, might have only been an idiosyncratic view regarding the nature of the world and the meaning of a happy life. By musing on the absolute freedom and quietness of the world after death, the ideal happy life that Zhuangzi portrays is one quite opposite to the mundane life of the commoners where the effort to make a living was a constant pressure, the end of which could only be brought about by death. This idea, though sounding a little cynical, or elitist, nonetheless carried some persuasion, as it was not without the support of realistic observations about the human condition. Life is but constant toil; death the real repose.

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In contrast to Zhuangzi’s optimistic depiction of death and the netherworld, a grim and foreboding picture emerged, perhaps in the Chu area south of the Central Plain, where Zhuangzi lived. This is the picture painted by the famous poet Qu Yuan (c. 355–278 BCE) in the Songs of the South, or Chuci. The Chu area has long been regarded as rich in a variety of primitive beliefs in ghosts and spirits. The netherworld depicted by Qu Yuan in one of his poems seems to be a horrifying place with threatening monsters and demons: O soul, Go not down to the City of Darkness, where the Lord Earth lies, ninecoiled, with dreadful horns on his forehead, and a great humped back and bloody thumbs, pursuing men, swift-footed: Three eyes he has in his tiger’s head, and his body is like a bull’s. (Hawkes 1959: 105) 魂兮歸來，君無下此幽都些。土伯九約，其角觺觺些。敦脄血拇， 逐人駓駓些。參目虎首，其身若牛些。(Zhu 1979: 136)

Zhuangzi’s portrayal of a paradise-like netherworld might have been his own invention. The hell-like netherworld in the Chuci, on the other hand, may have reflected some local beliefs in the Chu area where these ritual songs originated. Nevertheless, it could be said that each was built on certain assumptions about what is desirable in life, and what is not. Both, moreover, pointed out similar wishes based on different views of the netherworld, which confirms our idea that, by looking at how people depict the netherworld, we may detect their conception of a happy life.

Mortuary practices and the search for happiness Here, we do not have the space to unfold the various aspects of mortuary practice of the Han people. What we can do, however, is to elaborate on the significance of these practices in relation to how they may reveal people’s search for happiness. As has been pointed out, the Han intellectuals in general held the view that it is unnecessary to provide excessive funerary objects for the dead, either on the ground of modesty, or on the ground that there was nothing left of a person after death, thus there was no need for funerary objects (Poo 1990; 1993; 2008, chapter 8). Yet the fact that this was a persistent issue for them, from Yang Wangsun (楊王孫 fl. late 2nd century BCE) in the Western Han to Wang Fu (王符 83–170 CE) in the Eastern Han (see Poo 1990), indicates that the vast majority of people in the society continue to supply their tombs with luxury items as far as they could, and funerals became occasions for people to display power, fortune, and social prestige. As the author of Discourse on Salt and Iron (Yantielun) argued, during the era of prosperity in the mid-Western Han, lavish funerals had already become the arena of social competition: Nowadays sons do not love and respect [their parents], yet when the parents die they vie with each other by providing extravagant funerals. Though they have no remorse in their heart, yet those who bury their parents with lavish funerary objects, will be praised as filial sons, and make a good name to the world and

246 Cultivating a Good Life glorified by the society. Therefore common people all follow their example, even at the cost of selling their houses and properties. 今生不能致其愛敬，死以奢侈相高，雖無哀戚之心，而厚葬重幣者， 則稱以為孝，顯名立於世，光榮著於俗，故黎民相慕効，至於發屋賣業。11

However, it seems a little rash if we completely dismiss the factor of belief in people’s life. Besides the very real scenario of social competition, one possible interpretation of these practices is that many people genuinely believed the dead had a need for funerary objects in order to have a better life in the netherworld. In searching for an explanation for the use of the funerary objects, such an assumption seems to be straightforward. The happy life in the netherworld, in this context, would be very much material oriented: abundant objects of all sorts supply a good and comfortable life there. The situation has been summed up vividly by Wang Chong (王充 20–98 CE): Thus, ordinary people, on the one side, have these very doubtful arguments (about whether ghosts exist or not), and on the other … note that the dead in their tombs arise and have intercourse with sick people whose end is near. They then believe in this, and imagine that the dead are like the living. They commiserate with them, [thinking] that in their graves they are lonely, that their souls are solitary and without companions, that their tombs and mounds are closed and devoid of grain and other things. Therefore, they make dummies to serve the corpses in their coffins, and fill the latter with eatables, to gratify the spirits. This custom has become so inveterate, and has gone to such lengths, that very often people will ruin their families and use up all their property for the coffins of the dead. They even kill people as sacrificial victims, to satisfy the wish of the living. (trans. by Forke 1962: vol. II, p. 369) 是以世俗內持狐疑之議，外聞杜伯之類，又見病且終者，墓中死人來與 相見，故遂信是，謂死如生。閔死獨葬，魂孤無副，丘墓閉藏，穀物乏匱， 故作偶人以侍尸柩，多藏食物以歆精魂。積浸流至，或破家盡業， 以充死棺；殺人以殉葬，以快生意。(Liu 1990: 461)

Wang Chong’s criticism of prevailing social custom serves as reliable, though unintended, evidence for understanding the social reality of his time. Thus it is for the benefit of the dead that funerary equipment is supplied, for people could not bear to see their kinsfolk spending their time in the netherworld with insufficient sustenance. This kind of care for the dead, and the eager desire for a happy afterlife, moreover, can be seen in a special category of funerary objects, the inscribed bronze mirrors. The simpler inscriptions of the Western Han period often contain shorter sentences: ‘The family has lasting fortune and high prestige’; or ‘Happiness lasting forever’; or ‘Great happiness, having what one wishes, for ever and ever, and having extended years and lifetime.’ Thus happiness also includes gaining fortune and social prestige, and longevity (see, in general, Lin 1999).

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As the mirrors could theoretically be used by the deceased during their life time, we cannot exclude the possibility that, apart from their practicality, they were meant to serve as auspicious objects in ordinary life. Yet the fact that they were found in tombs indicates that the happy life aspired in the inscriptions could equally serve as aspirations for the future of the deceased in the netherworld. Thus, one inscription says: The refined tin and copper is bright and clear, to use it to make mirror is suitable for decoration, it could prolong life and expel the inauspicious things. May you be like the sun light, lasting with the heaven for ever and ever with endless happiness. 凍冶铅華清而明，以之為鏡宜文章，延年益壽辟不祥，與天無極如日光， 千秋萬歲樂未央。(Lin 1999)

Here longevity, more than wealth and power, was appreciated. This is also echoed in another type of mirror inscription that aspire to life with the immortals: The shang-fang (official workshop) made this mirror and truly it is very fine. Upon it are immortal beings oblivious of old age. When they thirst they drink from the springs of jade; when they hunger they feed on jujubes. They roam at large throughout the world, wandering between the four oceans. They rove at will on the well-known hills plucking the Herb of Life. Long life be yours, like that of metal and stone, that you may serve as the protection of the country, and having long lasting happiness that is fit for marquis and kings. 尚方作鏡真大好,上有仙人不知老，渴飲玉泉飢食棗，浮游天下敖四海， 俳徊名山采芝草，壽如金石為國保，長樂未央宜候王。(Loewe 1979: 200–1)

The reference to the immortals here may not be as contradictory to the idea of the netherworld as it seems: recall the Mawangdui silk paintings wherein figures of ‘heavenly officials’ or auspicious signs such as the toad in the moon and the raven in the sun are part of the picture supposedly representing the afterlife. It also suggests that, to people’s mind, the difference between the netherworld and the world of the immortals was sometimes not so clear, as evidenced in the figures of winged immortals among the clouds in the painting on the coffin of Lady Dai. In this connection, it is worth mentioning that the main function of the wall decorations often found in the brick tombs of the Eastern Han period was to provide a ‘program’ of life – much as a set of funerary objects – that could be enjoyed by the deceased in a visualised form.12 Much in accordance with what we have gleaned from the mirror inscriptions, the tomb paintings and reliefs show scenes of daily life, mostly happy banquets, entertainments, carriage parades, official engagements, or auspicious signs such as the appearances of phoenix and immortals; even the Queen Mother of the West is mentioned in the mirror inscriptions.13 The kind of happy life revealed by mortuary practices, therefore, consists of a comfortable living space, abundant food and drink, luxurious garments and objects of daily use as well as servants and transportation vehicles. Moreover, for certain classes

248 Cultivating a Good Life of people, the omnipresent bureaucratic pressure in the form of taxes and corvée service could also be taken care of through various magical and exorcistic methods. For these people, a truly carefree life was constructed when all these measures are in place in the tomb. The deceased could indeed count him- or herself leading a life happily ever after. It is particularly revealing to learn that, whereas the rich tombs (such as the Mawangdui tombs) could avail themselves of abundant equipment of all sorts, exorcistic texts and magical spells are mostly found in some modest tombs, indicating that the tomb owners, lacking the resource for rich funerary paraphernalia, had to resort to other methods to fulfil their need. As mentioned already, by the Han dynasty, the netherworld was conceived of as a place ruled by a bureaucracy just like the one on earth. Since a commoner had no hope of escaping the control of this bureaucracy even after death, the best strategy was to find a way to deal with it. This is when the exorcistic spells and actions were thought to be helpful. The texts found in the less luxurious tombs, including tomb quelling texts, exorcist texts against evil ghosts, or magical spells and talismans that could help pay the taxes, provided assistance for the deceased to lead a safe and worry-free life in the netherworld (Poo 2011). Their wish to eradicate the burden that they suffered on earth, as opposed to the rich who did not have such concerns, therefore, is a clear indication of their effort to establish a happy life in the realm of the netherworld bureaucracy. Finally, as a social institution, the significance of mortuary practice can be understood on two levels. The first is related to the deceased, as the funerary objects and the tomb itself are evidence of measures taken to ensure the welfare and happiness of the deceased in the netherworld. The second, however, does not concern the dead, but the living. This is witnessed by the employment of various exorcist texts that ensure that the deceased will stay in the tomb, not returning to haunt the living. There are also spells intended to help the living descendants have a prosperous, wealthy, and healthy life. The practice of fengshui or geomancy that began in the Eastern Han period is another example: by burying the deceased parents in an auspicious location, the prosperity of the descendants would be guaranteed (Poo 1998: 144–5). Thus the search for happiness through mortuary practice is not only for the happiness of the dead, but also for the living. If the function of religious belief is to provide people with hope, to eradicate fear, and to obtain happiness in the end, then all these needs would inevitably manifest themselves in the way people imagined life after death. Conceptions of the netherworld, and their corresponding mortuary practices, in whatever form, could reflect the collective imagination of a society to fulfil these needs. The Han material gives us an opportunity to look at how, amidst the interplay between belief and imagination, people managed to pursue happiness in the confines of social reality.

Notes 1 This chapter is part of a project supported by a GRF grant from UGC, HKSAR, no. 448613. 2 For example, Mencius 3, trans. Lau 2003: 60–1: ‘I have an insight into words. I am good at cultivating my flood-like ch’i (qi).’ ‘吾知言, 吾善養吾浩然之氣.’

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3 For a recent discussion, see Ivanhoe 2013. Ivanhoe argues that the Confucian idea of happiness is a kind of harmonious and satisfactory life among family, friends, and community on the one hand and ritual, culture, and tradition on the other. I agree with this view, but at the same time I feel that Ivanhoe’s idea of ‘happiness’ or ‘joy’ is based on his interpretation of the Confucian texts. Though ‘le 樂’ (i.e. joy or happiness) is mentioned in the Analects, a collection of short anecdotes about the sayings and doings of Confucius and his disciples, it is never directly discussed. 4 See the discussion of Confucian ‘moral maturity’ in Olberding (2013). 5 The vertical-earth-pit-wooden-casket tomb is the kind of tomb used since before the Shang dynasty down to the Han period. It is basically a square pit dug into the ground, with wooden caskets and coffins placed at the bottom of the pit. The caskets could be divided into several different chambers for the purpose of placing funerary objects. The horizontal-brick-chamber tomb is a burial style that developed during the late Warring States period and gained increasing popularity during the Han dynasty. It almost completely replaced the vertical-earth-pit-wooden-casket tomb. This kind of tomb was constructed with small bricks that resemble the chamber of the living, with a front door through which people could enter into the tomb. 6 This term first appeared in Zuozhuan 2: 20. See discussion in Poo (1998: 65–6). 7 The term ‘Dark City’, coined by the poet Qu Yuan as the netherworld, was a term referring mostly to the northern region. Examples include the following: Shangshu Zhushu 2: 10. ‘申命和宅朔方曰幽都平在朔易.’ Shiji: 3063, quotes the Daren fu 大人賦 of Sima Xiangru 司馬相如: ‘Taking the road around Buzhou mountain, and feast at the northern region 絕道不周,會食幽都.’ Hanshu: 3528, quotes the Ganquan fu 甘泉賦 of Yang Xiong 揚雄: ‘(The height of the gate) casts shadows to the western sea and the northern region, as the elixir gushes forth and forms the stream 陰西海與幽都兮,涌醴汨以生川.’ 8 For example, Jinshu: 1837: ‘The aggrieving ghost crying in the Dark City, the complaining soul anguished in the Yellow Spring 寃魂哭於幽都，訴靈恨於黃泉’ (trans. Poo). 9 See a study of the early Han legal texts found at Zhangjiashan by Barbieri-Low and Yates (2015); Poo (2018: chapter 3). 10 Cf. Wu (1992: 133–34). My understanding is inspired by Wu Hung’s brilliant argument, though a little different from his take. See also recent discussions in Wu (2010: 127–31); Tseng (2011: 166ff.); Wang (2011). For a discussion of the cloud design on the coffin of Lady Dai, see Bao Huashi (Martin Powers) (2005). 11 Huan (1972): juan 6, p. 6. See Poo (1990). This situation is echoed in the early Classical period in Athens, when laws were passed to forbid the people of Athens to gather large crowd of relatives and friends to join the funerary parade, for fear that the parade became an excuse to display the power and fortune of the deceased’s family. See Lefkowitz and Fant (1977: 18–19). 12 We are reminded of similar functions of the ancient Egyptian tomb paintings. 13 For an overview, see Finsterbusch (1966–2004).

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Pirazzoli-T’Serstevens, M. (2009). ‘Death and the Dead: Practices and Images in the Qin and Han’, in J. Lagerwey and M. Kalinowski (eds), Early Chinese Religion part I: Shang through Han (1250 BC-220AD), 949–1026. Leiden: Brill. Poo, M. (1990). ‘Ideas Concerning Death and Burial in pre-Han and Han China’, Asia Major (3rd series) 3 (2): 25–62; Poo, M. (Pu Muzhou) 蒲慕州 (1993). Muzang yu shengsi: Zhongguo gudai zongjiao zhi xingsi 葬墓與生死：中國古代宗教之省思. Taipei: Lianjing 1993; 2nd ed. Beijing: Zhonghua Shuju 2008. Poo, M. (1998). In Search of Personal Welfare: A View of Ancient Chinese Religion. Albany, NY: SUNY Press. Poo, M. (2011). ‘Preparation for the Afterlife in Ancient China’, in P. J. Ivanhoe and A. Olberding (eds), Mortality in Traditional Chinese Thought, 13–36. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, Poo, M. (2018). Daily Life in Ancient China. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Shangshu Zhushu 尚書注疏 (1976). In Shisanjing zhushu 十三經注疏. By Ruan Yuan 阮元. Taipei: Yiwen chubanshe. Shiji 史記. (1973). Beijing: Zhonghua shuju. Sun, Zuoyun 孫作雲 (1977). ‘Loyang Xi Han Bu Qianqiu mu bihua kaoshi 洛陽西漢卜千秋墓壁畫考釋’, Wenwu 文物 6: 17–22. Tseng, L. L. Y. (2011). Picturing Haven in Early China. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Center. Wang, E. Y. (2011). ‘Paintings in Mawangdui Tomb 1 and the Virtual Ritual of Revival in Second-Century BCE China’, in A. Olberding and P. J. Ivanhoe (eds), Mortality in Traditional Chinese Thought, 37–48. Albany: State University of New York Press. Watson, B. (1964). Chuang Tzu, Basic Writings. New York: Columbia University Press. Wu, H. (1992). ‘Art in a Ritual Context: Rethinking Mawangdui’, Early China 17: 111–44. Wu, H. (2010). The Art of the Yellow Springs. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press. Zhu Xi 朱熹 (1979) Chuci jizhu 楚辭集注. Beijing: Zhonghua shuju. Zuozhuan Zhushu 左傳注疏 (1976). In Shisanjing zhushu 十三經注疏. By Ruan Yuan 阮元. Taipei: Yiwen chubanshe.

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List of Contributors Rick Benitez is Professor of Ancient Greek Philosophy at the University of Sydney. He specialises in Plato, especially Plato’s aesthetics, poetics, and myths. He is keenly interested in comparisons between early Greek and Chinese philosophies. Will Buckingham was previously Reader (Associate Professor) in Writing and Creativity at De Montfort University and Visiting Associate Professor at Sichuan University. He is currently working as a freelance writer. He has research interests in comparative philosophy with an emphasis on Continental and East Asian traditions, and in comparative and cross-cultural approaches to creativity. Sophie Grace Chappell is Professor of Philosophy at the Open University. Her research interests include ethics, Plato and Aristotle, and feminist philosophy. Jesse Ciccotti is a PhD candidate at Hong Kong Baptist University. He specializes in Chinese Philosophy, Mediterranean Philosophy, and Comparative Philosophy, and has research interests in 19th- and 20th-Century Chinese Christian and Protestant Missionary writings. Lee M. J. Coulson is an Honorary Associate of the Classics and Ancient History department at the University of Sydney. His PhD dissertation was entitled, The Εὐηθέστεροι Myth: the Wisdom of Noble Simplicity. His current research focuses on Plato’s methods, ethics, and political anthropology. Andrej Fech is Assistant Professor in the Department of Chinese Language and Literature at Hong Kong Baptist University. His research interests are early Chinese thought and history, excavated manuscripts, and comparative philosophy. Barbara Hendrischke is associated with the China Studies Centre of the University of Sydney. Her interest lies in ancient and early medieval Chinese intellectual history. She has published on Daoist philosophical and religious texts. Karen Kai-Nung Hsu is a secondary teacher of the New Arrivals Program. She has previously completed her Master of Teaching (Secondary) at the University of Melbourne. She has also been awarded a Postgraduate Diploma in Arts specialising in Ancient World Studies and has written a thesis titled ‘A Comparative Study of the Ideal Han and Roman Gentleman: Virtues, Education and Officialdom’. Yasuhira Yahei Kanayama is Professor at Nagoya University. His main research interest lies in Plato’s epistemology and methodology and also in Ancient Scepticism.

254

List of Contributors

Hyun Jin Kim is Senior Lecturer in Classics at the University of Melbourne, Australia. He took his DPhil from the University of Oxford, UK, and is the author of multiple books on Greece-Rome and China comparative studies, the Huns and Inner Asia, and the historical implications of China’s contemporary rise. Karyn Lai is Associate Professor of Philosophy in the School of Humanities and Languages at the University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia. Her research interests include Confucian and Daoist philosophies, epistemology and ethics in ancient (pre-Qin) Chinese Philosophy, and comparative (Chinese and Western analytic) philosophy. Per Lind is a doctoral student at Lund University. His primary research interest is in transformative philosophy, with particular emphasis on the ancient notion of philosophy as the pursuit of wisdom. His doctoral thesis focuses on Pyrrhonism as a deliberate system of philosophical self-transformation. Lauren F. Pfister is Adjunct Professor in the Religion and Philosophy Department at Hong Kong Baptist University; a founding fellow of the Hong Kong Academy of the Humanities; former Director of the Centre for Sino-Christian Studies; former Associate Editor, Journal of Chinese Philosophy; and retired from full-time teaching since September 2017. His specialties are Qing Dynasty and 20th-Century Chinese philosophy, China’s missionary-scholars, Ruist-Christian dialogue, cross-cultural and Chinese hermeneutics. He is currently founder and rector of Hephzibah Mountain Aster Academy located in Colorado, USA. Mu-Chou Poo is Professor of History at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. His research focuses on religion and society of ancient Egypt and early China. Lisa Raphals (瑞麗) is Professor of Chinese, Classics and Comparative Literature at the University of California Riverside, and chairs the Program in Classical Studies and Program in Comparative Ancient Civilizations. She studies the cultures of early China and Classical Greece, with interests in comparative philosophy and history of science. Wang Keping is a fellow of Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and Professor at Beijing International Studies University. His research interests are in aesthetics and ancient philosophy. His recent publications include the Rediscovery of Sino-Hellenic Ideas; Moral Poetics in Plato’s Laws; Reading the Dao: A Thematic Inquiry; and Plato’s Poetics in the Republic.

Index Achuar  59–61 action, acting  193, 194, 196, 197–9, 200–4 adept  163–4, 171 adherent  169–70 agapeic  170, 172 agathoi (good persons, indicative of high social status)  141 agathon (good)  92, 97, 101 agency  49–50, 54–7, 61, 195, 203–4 agency, erotic  34–6 agency, philiatic  34–6 aisthēsis (perception)  179–81 alternative  163, 166, 168–9 Amasis  136–7 Analects (Lunyu)  138–9, 141–3, 193–204, 239–40, 249, 223 analogism  60–1 Anaximander  8 animal  53, 56–9 animal awareness  49, 56–9 animism  60–1 anxiety  232 apatheia (without passion)  99–100, 150 aporia, aporein, aporētikē (impasse, perplexity, doubt)  86, 89–91, 94, 101 appropriation, appropriate  119, 122 Aquinas, St Thomas  185 aretē (virtue, excellence)  133 argumentation, forms of  69 arkeō (vide: satisfaction)  151 boulēsis (wish, desire)  150 chara (joy)  150 eleutheria (freedom)  151 eulabeia (caution)  150 eumenia (graciousness, kindliness)  151 haploun (simple)  151 hilaos (graceful)  151 philon (affectionate love)  151 Aristagoras  134

Aristippus  92 Aristotle  93, 177–92 Artayctes  136 ataraxia (tranquillity)  85, 89–90, 97–101, 102 n.8, 104, 122–4, 126, 129–30 Athenian  132, 134–7, 141 attention, fixed on an aim, end or purpose  152, 156, 158 attribute  72, 74, 76 awareness  105, 106, 110–11, 113–14, 117–20, 125, 128–9 basilikē technē (kingly art)  91, 94–5, 97 beauty, beautiful  32–6, 42–6 beauty, of knowledge  33, 35–6, 43 Beigong You  155 bios (mundane life, physical life)  167 blasphemy  166 blessing  167 body, bodies  32–6, 39–41, 42 body image  54–5 schema  54–5 Boyi  138 Buddhism  224–5 buren (unsympathetic feeling)  153, 156 Cambyses  132, 135 Cao Pi  227, 229 change, conceptual  115–16 character  196, 204 n.5 Chengdu  233 child about to fall into a well, in the Mengzi  155 Chinese, ancient  169 chong (carry out)  156, 160 chreia (lit. necessity, duty; technical meaning: an authoritative citation)  166 Cicero  149 cleansing  166

256 Index Cleanthes  150 Cleisthenes  135–7 Cleobis and Biton  133, 140, 142 Cleomenes  132, 134 cognition  106, 110–15, 117–18, 120–22, 125, 127, 128–9 cognitive conflict  104–5, 109–10, 112–18, 120–3, 125–8 decoupling  113–15, 117, 119–22, 128, 129 development  32, 42, 45 growth  106, 110, 114–15 map  105, 111–13, 117–18, 120–1, 124 therapy  100–101 colonial  166 commitment  166 communal  170 community, political  35 compassion  167, 170 complacency  166 Confucianism  27, 221–4, 228 Confucius  7–18, 51, 88, 92–3, 101, 138–42, 193–204, 223 consciousness  171 group  58–9 contemplation  36, 41, 43, 45, 46, 47 context, cultural  164 conventional, conventionalist  165–6 Cook Ding (Pao Ding)  50–1, 55, 229–30 corporeal identity  170 counter-cultural  162 Cratylus  25, 29 creative  164 critique  165–6 Croesus  132–5, 137–8, 142 cross  166, 172 cultivate, cultivation  20, 23, 26–8, 29, 42–6, 104–6, 108–10, 117, 119–21, 123, 125–6, 127, 129, 163, 167, 169, 194, 199–204 methods  33, 44–6 practices  163–4, 172 spiritual  33, 36, 37, 41–6, 166 cultural ontologies  59–61 cultured  169 Cypselus  136 Cyrus  132, 136–7

dao (way, path)  27, 29, 36–46, 70–4, 86–8, 92–3, 101, 102 n.5, 138, 141, 167, 170–1, 209–10, 211–12, 213–14, 226, 231, 232–3 dao-centred  163–5, 167, 169 Daoism  221–2, 225–6, 229–33 Daoist  163–4, 166, 169, 171–2 daoli (dao’s patterns)  68, 73, 77 Darwin, Charles  58 Da zhuan  226 Da Zong Shi (chapter in the Zhuangzi)  36 death  38–41, 164–5, 167–9, 172 death, proximity of  70 decision  169 decisive  168–9 Deioces  136 deity  167 democracy  134–6, 141 demon  167 demoniac  168 denying, of self  170 destiny  38 dialectical  169, 172 dialogue, master-disciple  162 diamon (guardian-spirit)  150 Dinglin, Buddhist temple  222, 224 disciple  163, 165–9 discipleship  163, 166–8, 170, 172 discord  9, 13, 16 dislodging  166, 170 disposition, erotic  32–3 divine  167–8, 170 doctrines, dogmata  151, 152, 155, 157 dream  165, 171, 223 Duke of Zhou  139, 223 educative  165 Egypt  134, 136 elitism  169 embodied cognition  55 emotions  58–9, 231 emotions (in the Mengzi)  153, 154, 156 ai (love)  153 hao (like)  153 le (joy)  153 wu (dislike)  153 yue (pleasure)  153

Index  257 emptiness, of the mind-heart  212 emptying  167, 170 engagement  39 enkrateia (self-mastery)  107, 126 entanglement  39 Epictetus  149 episteme (scientific knowledge)  180 epistemological, epistemology  193, 203–4, 206 n.17 epochē (suspension of judgement)  86, 89, 97–9, 101 equanimity  164 equipollence  104, 121 eternal  167 ethical theory (moral theory)  177, 186–92 ethics Hellenistic  104, 107, 108, 126 relational  195–6, 203–4 eudaimonia, eudaimōn, eupragia, eu prattein (happiness, flourishing)  90, 91, 97, 101, 103 n.11, 107, 180 euētheia (noble simplicity)  20–7, 29 euethesteroi (nobly simple people)  23–4, 27, 29 eupatheiai (positive affective experiences)  149, 151 externalisation  112, 117, 127 extraordinariness  170 eye of a needle  167, 172 feelings, natural  33, 42, 46 female  164, 171 fenggu (wind and bones)  229–30 flow  231 follow  166–8 foreknowledge  71 forgetfulness  163, 170 forgetting  52 forgiveness  169 fortune  132–5, 138, 140, 143 Four Gospels  162, 164–5, 167–70 freedom  133–7, 166 friendship  194, 196 fulfilment  165, 168, 170 Gaozi  155, 157, 160 gentleness  167 God  166–7, 169–70, 172

Good, the Form of the  179 good life  42–6, 150, 151 good news  166 gospels  167 governance  163–6, 171 government  194, 196, 200 grafting  119, 153 Greek, ancient  169 Greek-Barbarian antithesis  133 guan (observation)  193, 199, 202, 205 n.11 gymnastic training  35 habitual  110–12, 121, 128 haoran zhi qi (flood-like qi, overflowing vitality)  156, 229–32 happiness  7, 11, 14, 15, 17 Hare, Richard  178 harmony  7–18 harness  105, 118, 120 healing  166, 168 hēgēmonikon (ruling faculty, rational faculty)  150, 151, 152, 157, 158 Hemingway, Ernest  221, 227 Herodotus  132–8, 140–2 hexagrams  226 Hierocles  57–8 Histories  132–7, 143 hodos (way)  91–2, 96, 101 holiness  167 Holy Spirit  165 Homer  138, 242 Hong Jing  231 hospitality  168 hua (transformation)  164, 170 huaiyi (doubt)  85–7 humane  164–6 Hume, David  50–4 hunting  91, 94–7 hupolēptikēn (faculty of judgment)  151 hypocritical  168, 172 hypomnēmata (notes, memoranda)  151 hypothesis, Plato’s method of  94, 96 ignorance  34 imitation, of nature  110 immortal  247 Inner Chapters, of the Zhuangzi  162–5, 167, 169–71

258 Index insight  165–6 instruction dialogue  162–5, 167–8, 172 interaction  162–4, 169–70 plura-logue  162–3, 165–8, 170, 172 soliloquy  165 intelligibility  110–13, 117, 127 interaction  163–5, 168, 172 intercessory  170 interconnectivity  170 interiority  60–1 intimacy  170 intuition, intuitive  39, 41–6 involvement, in politics  32, 45, 46 irony  163, 168 is-ought distinction  50 James, William  55 Jewish  166, 168–9, 172 joy  170 judgment  151 junzi (paradigmatic person)  1, 10, 11, 17, 139–42, 238 justice  35, 166, 170 kakoi (bad people, indicative of lower social status)  141 kallos (beauty)  34, 35, 42 king  168 kingdom of God  165–70, 172 of heaven  165, 167 King Xuan  153, 155, 156 knowledge conventional  33, 35, 35, 38, 42–6 knowledge how  179–81 knowledge that  179–81 ladder (beauty), Plato  32–6, 42–5 Langzhong  234 Laozi  27, 41, 43 Laozi  52, 208, 209, 211 law  33, 35, 166 Laws  23–4, 28 leader  166 learning  193–204 principle-centred  157 li (pattern)  70–2, 76–7, 79 li (ritual, behavioural propriety, proper conduct)  11, 14, 17, 141–2, 193

Liangshu  224 life  32–46, 164–70 contemplative  36, 46 eternal  167, 170 smooth flow of  153 lifespan  56 listening with ears (er)  211–12, 213 with heart (xin)  211–12, 213 with spirit (shen)  211–12, 213 Liu Xie  221–34 living  165 according to nature  150, 157 in agreement with nature  150, 151 logos (reason)  150, 157, 158 longevity  37, 39, 165, 169 love  170, 172 power and courage of  33 Lunyu. See Analects Lu Yun  227 Lydian  132, 134 Ma Rong  223, 227 Marx, Karl  177 Master Hu  163 Master Lie  163 Master Longyears (Lao Dan, Laozi)  163, 171 mathematics  97 Mawangdui  242–4, 247–8 meditation, meditative  85, 100–101, 163–4, 170 meditative forgetfulness  163 Mencius  139, 142, 228–31, 235, 238–9 Meng Ben  155 Meng Shishe  155 Mengzi. See Mencius method  169 methodos (pursuit, inquiry, method)  96–7 metriopatheia (moderate affection)  99–101 mindfulness  100–101 mind-heart excursion  36–47 ming (fate)  56–7 miracle  166 miraculous  168–9 misanthropy  87–9 misfortune  132–3, 135–8, 143

Index  259 misguidedness  167 moral norms  69 mortuary practice  237, 242, 245, 247–8 mundane  167, 169, 170, 172 music  7–10, 13–18 mutual  170, 172 naturalism  60–1 nature  8, 12, 14, 16 neighbourliness  170 nemesis (just recompense, righteous indignation)  132, 137 netherworld  237, 242–8 neuroscience  54–6, 61 Nicomachean Ethics  177–92 noble simplicity  20, 24, 27–8, 29 normative value  71 nous (mind)  150, 158 obey  214 Odyssey  242 ontology  59–61 ontology, ontological  107–10, 117, 121, 126 oppressed  166 orthos (correct)  34 overthinking  232 Ox Mountain  156, 228 parable  165–6, 168, 171 paradox, paradoxical  164–5, 167, 169, 172 pathē (passion)  149, 150, 151, 152, 158, 159 epithumia (desire)  150 hēdonē (pleasure)  150, 159 lupē (distress)  149, 150, 152 orgē (anger)  149, 150, 157 phobos (fear)  149 pattern  225–6, 231 peace  170 perception auditory  209–13 visual  209–11 Periander  135 Pericles  136 pericope  168 perplexity  105, 109–14, 116–22, 124, 127–30 persecution  167

Phaedo  22 Phaedrus  43, 158 Pharisees  166 philia (friendship)  34 philosophia, philosophein (philosophy)  86, 89–90, 95 philosophy  35, 36, 39, 42, 43 philosophy of education  105, 115, 125 phronēsis (practical wisdom)  177–92 phronimos (sage, wise person)  1 phthonos (envy)  132, 137 physical  164, 168 physicality  60–1 Pilate  168–9 pilgrimage  32 Plato  7–18, 32–6, 42–6, 90, 92–8, 158, 159, 179 Plato’s Academy  90, 97 Plutarch  134 pneuma (spirit)  150, 159 poetry  9–10, 15 Polarity  133 political  166–7, 170 politikē (politics)  91, 93–4 Polycrates  132, 136–7 poor  166–7 practice  166, 170, 193–204 preeminent  168–70 preternatural  169–70 prisoner  166 procedural  110, 117, 124 Proclus  27 progressive  105, 118, 120 projective  111–13, 117, 122, 127 propositional  111 proto-sceptic  123–4, 129, 130 protreptikos logos (exhortatory argument to philosophy)  90, 94, 98 psychological shock techniques, Buddhist  152 psychology, negative  164 punishment  166, 168 Pyrrhonian Scepticism  86, 90, 97, 104–6, 109–10, 116, 118, 120–7, 129 Pyrrho of Elis  86, 97, 99–101 Pythagoreans  8 qi (vital energy, vitality)  154, 155, 156, 159, 222, 225–33 qiangzei (mutilation)  155

260 Index Qiwu lun (chapter of Zhuangzi)  50 Qu Boyu  140–2 Quietism  45, 46 Rabbi Yeshuah (Jesus)  165–72 radicality  166, 169 Ran Qiu  139 rationalistic  165, 169 reclusive  170 Recollection, Plato’s theory of  96 rectification  14–15 reflection  196, 199, 200–2 reincarnation  164 reject, rejection  164, 168–9 relationships  194–7 reliability  193–204 religious  165–6 ren (benevolence, humaneness)  141–2, 193, 201, 205 n.10 repent, repenting  167 representational  117, 120, 122 Republic  21–3, 29 reservation  152 responsive, responsiveness  170, 194 revisionary  113–15, 118, 120, 129 Rhampsinitus  136 rhēmata (Gk. spoken words)  167, 170–1 rhetoric  166 rhetorical strategy  163, 165 rich  167 right  108, 110, 115 righteousness  35, 167–8, 170, 172 ritual  166, 168–9 Roman  166, 168 Ruist (Confucian)  163–5, 168–70 ruler  164, 167, 170–1 ruling  166–7 sacrificial  170 sage  150, 153, 164, 166 Daoist  36–8 sarcastic  165, 169–70 scepticism  85–6, 88–9, 97–101, 104, 106, 122–3, 125, 127, 129 Sceptics  85–90, 97–101, 102 n.4 secret  165 seeker  164, 166, 169, 171 self  49, 51–5 self-cultivation  69, 151, 152, 153, 154, 155, 157, 158

selfless  170 self-reflective  166 self-related processing  55 Seneca  149 Seng You  222–4 servant leadership  166 Sextus Empiricus  85–6, 89–90, 98, 101 shen (spirit)  211, 212, 213 sheng (sagacity)  209–10, 211, 212, 214 shengren (sage)  139, 141 sheng ren zhi dao (dao of a sage)  37 shensi (spiritual thought)  232 Shen Yue  224 Shi Yu  140 shou (enlightening)  37, 38 Shun  139, 142 Shuqi  138 sin  167, 169 situation, situationality  195–204, 205 n.10 skepsis (scepticism, doubt, consideration, inquiry)  85–6, 101 skill  49–52, 55, 61–2 Socrates  86, 88–97, 101, 179, 185 soliloquy  165 Solon  132–4, 137, 140–2 somatic markers  54–5 Sophists  132–3 soul  33, 35, 43 spontaneity  11–12, 17, 38, 40, 41, 50–3, 59, 69 Stoicism  233 Stoics  57–8 strategic  165–6 style  169 suffering  166–7, 170, 172, 221–2, 227, 230, 233 supra-rational  169 suspension of judgement  104, 129–30 Symposium  32, 33, 36, 42, 47 talent  227, 230 tarachē (disturbance)  89, 99–101, 102 n.8 teach  164 teacher  163, 166, 169–70 teacher-student  162–3, 167, 169 teaching  163, 168, 169 Tellus  132–3, 135, 138, 140–1 telos (end, goal)  36, 42, 44

Index  261 Theaetetus  24 Themistocles  136 therapy  233 Thrasymachus  21–2 Thucydides  20–2, 27, 29, 136 tian dao (way of Heaven)  210–11 tianxia (all under heaven)  93, 101 ting (listening)  212 totemism  60–1 tradition  169 tranquillity  32, 37, 39, 41, 44, 46, 47 transcending, transcendent  170 transformation, transformative  105–10, 113, 118–20, 122, 124, 126, 128, 162, 164–7, 169, 172 of self  109–10, 118–19 transformed  170, 172 trust  194–7, 203 truth  36, 42 practical  179–81 theoretical  179–81 tui (extend)  156 tyranny  133–6 universal nature  149, 150, 151, 152 unselfishness  170 US Constitution  184 usefulness of uselessness  165, 167–8 uselessness  56, 165, 168 Utilitarianism  188 value  165, 169–70 vice  195 virtue  8, 10, 12, 16, 18, 181, 195–6, 204 n.5 virtuosity  17 virtuoso  17 virtuous  163, 169, 170 vital force  169 vulnerability, of life  69–70 wandering  164 Wang Chong  229 wangdao (kingly way)  93 way  164, 166–7 wealth  167 weiqi (strategy game called ‘Go’)  156 wen (hearing)  92, 101, 213 wen (pattern)  225–9, 231 Wenxin diaolong  221–34

Wen xuan  224 Wenzi  208–14 Wheelwright Bian (Lun bian)  51, 55 whole person  164, 170 whole person cultivation  162–4, 169–70 Williams, Bernard  177 willingness  169 wisdom  1, 2, 162, 169, 172 anarchistic  169 conventional  166 Dao-centred  163–4 Daoist  163 human  97 mature  170 moral  35 mundane  167–70 new  167, 169 political  35 practical  168–9 sagely  162 transformative  162, 167 wit  166 Wittgenstein, Ludwig  184, 190 Word of God  165, 167–8, 171 words  194–7, 204 nn.3, 7 worldview  163 worship  170 writer’s block  227 wrong  108, 110, 113, 125 wuwei (acting without acting, nonaction)  49, 61, 228 Wuxing  208, 210–11, 214 Xanthippus  136 Xerxes  135 xiao (filial piety)  141–2 Xiao Jing  142 xiaoren (small person; used in derogatory sense)  139, 141 Xiao Tong (蕭統)  224 xiaoyao (free wandering)  232 xin (heart-mind)  153, 154, 155, 156, 157, 158, 159, 210 xin (reliability)  193–204 xin (trust, trustworthiness)  141, 86–8, 101, 102 n.3, 193–7, 204 nn.1, 5, 205 n.20 xin zhai (heart fasting)  51–2, 62, 163 Xunzi  13, 16, 18

262 Index yangqi (nourishing vitality)  222, 229, 231, 233 yangsheng (nourishing life)  229–30 Yan Hui  138–9, 163 Yao  139 yi (doubt)  85, 88, 91, 101, 102 n.3 yi (rightness, justice, duty)  141–2, 155, 156, 157, 193, 195 Yijing  225–6 yin-yang  8 yong (courage)  141 you xin (mind-heart excursion)  36–46 Zengzi  155 Zhang, Longxi  225 Zheng Xuan  223 zhen ren (true person)  38 zhen zhi (true knowledge)  38

zhi (knowledge, wisdom)  141, 209–10 zhi (will)  154, 155 zhiren (perfect human, consummate person)  164, 169, 172 zhi zhi (ultimate knowledge)  38 Zhongni (Elder Brother Ni)  163 Zhuangzi  41–7, 229–32, 237, 240–2, 244–5 Zhuangzi  49–54, 56–7, 61–2, 162, 164–5, 167–72, 208, 212, 214 Zhu Xi  157 Zigong  139 Zilu  138 zoē (meaningful life, eternal life)  169, 172 zong (origin)  38 zuowang (sitting forgetfully, meditative forgetfulness)  163 Zuo Zhuan  154, 159, 230