Disputers of the Tao: Philosophical Argument in Ancient China 0812690885, 9780812690880

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Disputers of the Philosophical Argument in Ancient China

A. C. Graham

Disputers of the

TAO

Philosophical Argument in Ancient China

A. C.Graham OPEN * COURT La Salle, Illinois 61301

M a p o n p. i i reproduced b y permission f r o m Y u - l a n Fung's A History of Chinese Philosophy, translated by Derk Bodde and published by Princeton University Press.

O P E N C O U R T and the above logo are registered i n the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. © 1989 by O p e n Court Publishing C o m p a n y First printing 1989

A l l rights reserved. N o part of this publication may be reproduced, stored i n a retrieval system, or transmitted, i n any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher, O p e n Court Publishing Company, L a Salle, Illinois 61301. Printed and b o u n d i n the U n i t e d States of America.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Graham, A. C. (Angus Charles) Disputers of the Tao: philosophical argument in ancient China/A. C. Graham. p. cm. Bibliography: p. Includes index. ISBN 0-8126-9087-7. —ISBN 0-8126-9088-5 (pbk.) 1. Tao. 2. Philosophy, Chinese. I. Title. B127.T3G69 1989 181'.11—dc20

89-32227 CIP

CONTENTS

Preface

ix

Abbreviations

xi

Introduction

I.

1

T H E B R E A K D O W N OF T H E W O R L D ORDER D E C R E E D BY H E A V E N 1. A Conservative Reaction: Confucius Ceremony and music Government as ceremony Heaven and the spirits The thread which unifies morality Confucius and 20th-century Western philosophy The centrality of Confucianism in Chinese civilization

9 9 10 13 15 18 22 31

2. A Radical Reaction: Mo-tzu The three tests of argument The criticism of traditional practice by the utilitarian text The unifying principle of morality The centralisation and bureaucratisation of the state Heaven, spirits and Destiny Divisions in the Mohist school

33 36 39 41 45 47 51

3. Retreat to Private Life: The Yangists The Yangist teachings The supposed egoism of Yang Chu

53 56 59

vi

CONTENTS

II.

4. Idealisation of the Small Community: The Utopia of Shen-nung The Golden Age of Shen-nung Hsu Hsing The influence of the Shen-nung ideal

64 66 70 72

5. The Sharpening of Rational Debate: The Sophists Hui Shih Kung-sun Lung The 'White Horse' 'Pointings and Things' Left and Right

75 76 82 85 90 94

6. The Discovery of Subjectivity: Sung Hsing The Kuan-tzu chapter, 'Inward Training'

95 100

F R O M SOCIAL TO METAPHYSICAL CRISIS: H E A V E N PARTS FROM M A N

107

1. From Confucius to Mencius: Morality Grounded in Man's Nature as Generated by Heaven 111 Government 113 The controversy with Kao-tzu over human nature 117 The goodness of human nature 123 Two Confucian essays: the 'Great Learning' and the 'Doctrine of the Mean' 132 2. From Mo-tzu to Later Mohism: Morality Re-grounded in Rational Utility Knowledge and naming Change and necessity The 'a priori' The first discipline: discourse (knowledge of how to connect names and objects) The revised art of discourse in 'Names and Objects' The second discipline: ethics (knowledge of how to act) The third discipline: the sciences (knowledge of objects) The fourth discipline: argumentation (knowledge of names)

137 139 141 143 147 150 156 160 167

3. From Yangism to Chuang-tzu's Taoism: Reconciliation with Heaven by Return to Spontaneity 170 The name 'Taoism' 170 The book Chuang-tzu 172 Stories about Chuang-tzu 174 The assault on reason 176 The Later Mohist defence of reason 183 Spontaneity 186 The illumination of spontaneity 191 Waking and dream 194 Heaven and man 195 Language 199 Reconciliation with death 202 A 'School of Chuang-tzu' development: the 'Great Man' metaphysic 204

III.

H E A V E N A N D M A N G O THEIR O W N WAYS

213

1. Lao-tzu's Taoism: The Art of Ruling by Spontaneity 215 Old Tan and the book Lao-tzu 215 The Way 219 Reversal 223 Doing nothing 232 The mystical and the practical 234 2. Hsun-tzu's Confucianism: Morality as Man's Invention to Control His Nature 235 Heaven 238 Human nature 244 The heart 251 Ceremony and music 255 Theory of naming 261 (1) The purpose of having names 263 (2) The evidence for assimilating and differentiating 264 (3) The pivotal requirements for instituting names 265 3. Legalism: A n Amoral Science of Statecraft Adapting to change Standards and laws The debate over power, morality and law Control of the bureaucracy Legalism and Lao-tzu

267 270 273 278 282 285

4. Two Political Heresies 1. Criticism of hereditary monarchy 2. The question of Chinese anarchism The Chuang-tzu 'Primitivist'

292 292 299 306

CONTENTS

viii

IV.

T H E REUNIFICATION OF THE EMPIRE A N D OF HEAVEN A N DM A N

313

1. The Cosmologists Proto-science and modern science Correlative thinking and correlative cosmos-building Cosmology before the Han Pairs: Yin and Yang Fours and fives: the Five Processes A Kuan-tzu cosmology based on water The Yi

315 315 319 325 330 340 356 358

2. Syncretism and the Victory of Confucianism

370

Appendix 1: A Classification of Chinese Moral Philosophies in Terms of the Quasi-syllogism

383

Appendix 2: The Relation of Chinese Thought to Chinese Language

389

Notes

429

Romanisation Conversion Table: Wade-Giles/Pinyin

441

Abbreviations

445

Bibliography

447

Name Index

469

Subject Index

475

PREFACE This is a general history of Chinese philosophy i n the classical age (500-200 B.C.) w h i c h takes advantage of the progress of textual, grammatical and exegetical studies over the last few decades. Its theme is as much how the sages thought as what they thought, w i t h the focus on debate between rival schools. We n o w k n o w that there is much more rational discourse i n the literature than used to be supposed, especially since scholars ceased to be deterred by textual problems from taking full account of the Later M o h i s t corpus. But just as much attention will be given to the analysis of modes of t h i n k i n g at the opposite extreme from Western rationality, to the aphorisms of Lao-tzu, the correlations of Y i n Yang cosmology and the divinatory system of the Yi. Direct quotation w i l l sometimes exceed exposition, to avoid that dangerous detachment of 'thoughts' from t h i n k i n g and saying w h i c h leaves little behind but labels and slogans, 'universal love' (Mo-tzu), ' H u m a n nature is good' (Mencius), ' H u m a n nature is bad' (Hsun-tzu). The major histories of Chinese philosophy available i n English earlier i n this century came f r o m Chinese stimulated to re-examine their tradition by influences f r o m the West, by Pragmatism ( H u Shih) and Neo-Realism (Fung Yu-lan). In recent years the most original proposals have come from the borders between Western sinology and professional philosophy, for example from the philosopher Herbert Fingarette i n Confucius: The Secular as Sacred, and the sinologist Roger A m e s and philosopher David H a l l i n Thinking Through Confucius. We, like the Chinese, fully engage with the thought only w h e n we relate it to our o w n problems. I shall not scruple to ride a couple of hobby-horses of m y o w n : the impossibility of fully disengaging analytic f r o m correlative t h i n k i n g , and a 'quasi-syllogism' useful for interpreting Chinese thought w h i c h has also altered m y perspective on Western moral p h i l o s o p h y — n o t because I suppose that the understanding of Chinese philosophy depends on swallowing m y o w n , but because it does depend on philosophising for oneself. Taking Chinese thought seriously is not simply a matter of acknowledging the rationality of some of it (and perhaps denying the name 'philosophy' to the rest), nor of discovering something valuable to oneself i n the poetry of

Lao-tzu or the diagrams of the Yi. Its study constantly involves one i n important contemporary issues i n moral p h i l o s o p h y the philosophy and history of science, the deconstruction of established conceptual schemes, the problems of relating thought to linguistic structure, and correlative thinking to logic. References are supplied to existing versions of the texts, but all quoted passages are newly translated. This is necessary to ensure consistent equivalents to the key words. In any case available translations inevitably represent all stages i n the progress of sinology over the last century; the reader searching for a quoted passage i n an older version may sometimes find it hard to recognise. Romanisation follows the Wade-Giles system. I have occasionally supplied tone marks to distinguish words pronounced in different tones w h i c h w o u l d otherwise be confusable (for example the Emperor C h o u overthrown by the Chou). Since the book is designed for the general reader interested i n philosophy, works of scholarship available only i n Chinese or Japanese are mentioned only w h e n depending on evidence unpublished i n Western languages. I apologise if this does less than justice to the importance of Far-Eastern scholarship. For full acknowledgement of aid from others I would have to mention everyone w i t h w h o m I have discussed the issues fruitfully over the 30 years or more that I have worked i n this field. M a n y will find their names i n the body of the work; I select for explicit thanks only some w h o have read and criticised substantial parts of the manuscript, C h r i s t o p h Harbsmeier, Roger A m e s , H e n r y Rosemont, H a l Roth, Robert Henricks. I w i s h to thank also the institutions i n w h i c h I have worked on this book; the Institute of East A s i a n Philosophies, Singapore; the Department of Linguistics, Tsing H u a University, Taiwan; the Department of Religious Studies, B r o w n University; the Department of Philosophy, University of Hawaii; and also the School of Oriental and African Studies, London, where I d i d m y earlier researches into Chinese language and philosophy.

ABBREVIATIONS Texts An Cz HF HN Hs Kz LSCC Lz Me Mo

Analects Chuang-tzu Han Fei-tzu Huai-nan-tzu Hsun-tzu Kuan-tzu Lu-shih ch'un-ch'iu ('Lu Spring and Autumn') Lao-tzu Meng-tzu ('Mencius') Mo-tzu

Editions and Journals BSOAS Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies (London) BSS Basic Sinological Series (Kuo-hsueh chi-pen ts'ung-shu) ed. H]AS HY JAOS JCP PEW SPPY SPTK tr.

edited Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies Harvard-Yenching Institute Sinological Index Series Journal of the American Oriental Society Journal of Chinese Philosophy Philosophy East and West Ssu-pupei-yao 四部備要 Ssu-pu ts'ung-k'an 四部叢刊 translated

Translators D G L RG RK W WB

Duyvendak Graham Legge (Kuan-tzu) Rickett, 'Guanzi' (Kuan-tzu) Rickett, 'Kuan-tzu' Watson Wilhelm-Baynes

INTRODUCTION

C h i n a , like the other civilizations of the O l d World, draws its basic ideas from that time of awakening between 800 and 200 B . C . w h i c h Karl Jaspers has called the A x i a l Period, the age of the Greek and Indian philosophers, the Hebrew prophets and Zarathustra. The creative thinking of that era seems everywhere to have sprung u p a m i d the variety and instability of small competing states; i n C h i n a it begins towards 500 B . C . i n a time of political d i s u n i o n , and may be judged to lose its impetus with the reunification of the empire i n 221 B . C . O u r present knowledge of Chinese history begins w i t h the oracle inscriptions of the Shang, traditionally remembered as the second dynasty, preceded b y the H s i a ; this was overthrown by the C h o u i n the neighbourhood of 1040 B . C . * The C h o u identified their supreme authority Tien ('Heaven'), a sky-god hardly distinguished from the sky itself, w i t h T i , the high god of the Shang; a n d they claimed that the dispossessed Shang had forfeited the T'ien-ming ('mandate of Heaven') by their misrule, a concept w h i c h was to be used to justify later changes of dynasty for the rest of Imperial history. The early C h o u dynasty was remembered as a Golden A g e w h e n the Empire (Tien-hsia 'all below Heaven') was united under the Emperor (Tien-tzu 'Son of Heaven'), and all the descendants of those enfiefed by the founder remained faithful to their lord. This unity was no less than the political u n i t y of the w o r l d , for to the C h o u , and to every succeeding dynasty until the final confrontation w i t h the West, there was nothing outside C h i n a except barbarians bringing or rebelliously refusing tribute. In 770 B . C . , however, barbarian invasion drove the C h o u eastward and the Empire disintegrated. The fiefs emerged as independent states, and the semi-barbarian rulers of C h ' u and Y u e h i n the south soon threw off allegiance to C h o u , if they h a d ever recognised it, by taking the title of wang ('King') formerly reserved for the C h o u Emperor. For a while peace was intermittently preserved by the hegemony of the most powerful lords, D u k e H u a n of C h ' i (685-643 B.C.) and later D u k e 1

* The traditional date of 1122 B.C. for the Chou conquest is now widely abandoned. Recent proposals are 1045 B.C. (Nivison, 'Dates of Western Chou'), 1046 (Pankenier) and 1040 (Nivison, '1040 as the Date').

Wen of C h i n (636-628 B . C . ) . The final struggle, i n w h i c h one lord after another took the title of K i n g , ended w i t h the victory of another semibarbarian border state, C h ' i n i n the north-west, w h i c h i n 256 B . C . annexed what remained of the domain of C h o u itself, and i n 221 B . C . reunified the world under the 'First Emperor' (Shih-huang-ti). Behind the well-documented political surface we can catch sight of deep social and economic changes. In early C h o u all land belonged i n theory to the Son of Heaven, w h o allotted it to hereditary fiefholders required periodically to pay homage at his court, especially favouring his own k i n . These lords, w i t h titles translatable as D u k e , Marquis, Earl, Viscount, Baron, h a d their o w n hereditary ministers and officials, i n lines generally branching from their o w n families. Below was a much larger class of retainers, 'knights' (shih), from w h o m minor offices were filled. A l l were assigned lands, w h i c h the poorer of the knights farmed themselves but the higher ranks organised as manors, w i t h serfs cultivating part of the land for themselves and part for their lord. Goods circulated through tribute and gift rather than trade, cities were noble fortresses, artisans were a hereditary caste of serfs attached to estates or courts. Battle was waged between aristocratic archers i n chariots, with auxiliary infantry from the common people; wars were comparatively short and, for the nobles, restrained by a code of chivalry. Even after the dissolution into competing states the kinship ties of rulers for a long time remained important, at least i n political rhetoric. The weapons and ornaments of the aristocracy were of bronze, the rest of the people remained i n the Neolithic Age. D u r i n g the 300 years w h i c h concern us the already dislocated system of the C h o u was i n course of transformation at every level. Towards the 6th century B . C . C h i n a entered the Iron A g e , later than i n cultures further west and beginning not w i t h wrought but w i t h cast iron, suitable for hoes and ploughshares but not weapons, w h i c h were predominantly of bronze d o w n to the 3rd century B . C . A S the great fiefs emerged as independent states, the conflicts of noble families resulted i n centralisation under the victor who, whether of the old ducal line or a usurper from another family, increasingly chose his ministers for talent rather than birth. A s the great states swallowed the small the knightly class of the defeated became masterless, seeking office i n any state w h i c h w o u l d employ them; at the same time newly conquered lands came to be entrusted to appointed administrators rather than divided out into new fiefs. Trade expanded, money circulated, l a n d itself became saleable, there were rich merchants w h o sometimes w o n h i g h office. The manors broke up into peasant

holdings, subject to tax and forced labour by the state, from which emerged commoner landlords drawing rent and hiring wage labour. Wars were now fought between mass armies of conscripted peasants, with success i n war as a further channel of social mobility. By the end of the period there were four recognised classes: knights, peasants, craftsmen, merchants, ranked i n that order by their presumed value to the state. The great change after reunification by the C h ' i n dynasty and its successor the H a n (206 B . C . - A . D . 220) is that, i n spite of a brief and partial return at the beginning of the H a n to the C h o u policy of distributing fiefs, C h i n a becomes from now onwards a centralised empire administered by a n appointed bureaucracy of literati, not by a hereditary aristocracy educated i n the chariot and the bow. Shih, still the name of the office-holding class, has come to be more conveniently translatable as 'scholars' or 'literati' than as 'knights'. D u r i n g the last centuries of disunion, with the bureaucratisation of the competing states, the at least partially literate knightly class h a d become increasingly open to the talents and freer to serve whichever ruler offered the best terms. The thinkers of the A x i a l A g e are all i n or on the edge of this now fluid class, not excluding those w h o show signs of being on the way i n from the crafts (the Mohists) or w h o , refusing office to plough their o w n fields, are becoming indistinguishable f r o m peasants (the Shen-nung communities). Although one could get rich by trade, it remains the common assumption that the road to wealth a n d power is through high office; consequently nearly all of them are preoccupied with such questions as w h e n it is morally right to accept office i n these degenerate times (the Confucians), who deserves appointment (the Mohists), whether it is better to avoid employment for the benefits of private life (Chuang-tzu). Their whole thinking is a response to the breakdown of the moral and political order which had claimed the authority of Heaven; and the crucial question for all of them is not the Western philosopher's 'What is the truth?' but 'Where is the Way?', the way to order the state and conduct personal life. From the viewpoint of the rulers w h o listen at least to the more practical of them, they are men w i t h new answers to the problem of how to r u n a state i n these changing times; and this problem is indeed central to all of them, whether they have practical answers (the Legalists), or ponder the moral basis of social order and its relation to the ruling power of Heaven (Confucians, Mohists), or as defenders of private life think the proper business of the state is to leave everyone alone (Chuang-tzu). N o one questions that government is by nature authoritarian; if an alternative is seen to rule by legitimate force it is the abolition or minimalisation of

government, leaving people to organise their affairs by custom. There are theoretical anarchists i n ancient C h i n a , but no democrats. A m o n g the A x i a l A g e civilizations, as Benjamin Schwartz observes, C h i n a alone has the sense of looking back from present disruption towards an empire and culture w h i c h flourished i n the immediate past. In the others, belief i n lost G o l d e n Ages, "to the extent that it exists at all, is marginal and often different i n k i n d " . None of the divergent Chinese schools accepts the states into w h i c h the world has divided as the natural units of political organisation. Except for Yangists and Taoists w h o refuse the responsibilities of office, all have at the back of their thinking, however theoretical, the purpose of attracting rulers to a project for recovering the lost and longed-for political a n d social cohesion. B y about 300 B . C . there was a nearly general recognition that times h a d changed, that there could be no return to the institutions of C h o u , that the practice of offering one's programme as the regime of sage kings even earlier than the C h o u was no more than a convention; hopes n o w centred on so reforming one state that it could conquer or w i n the peaceful allegiance of the rest. W i t h the final victory of C h ' i n i n 221 B . C . there was a brief renunciation of the past unparalleled until the Cultural Revolution i n the 1960s; the conqueror burned the classics and the annals of the states and proclaimed himself 'First Emperor'. However, this radicalism was inadequate to the lasting needs of a civilization i n w h i c h a unique capacity for political and cultural integration has been inseparable from the sense of continuing tradition. Without p u r s u i n g inquiry into the causes, we may mention the one w h i c h has always been obvious to Western observers, an exceptionally tight yet widely extended family structure w h i c h subordinates youth to age, w h i c h centres social duty on filial piety and relations w i t h the other world on the cult of ancestors. A s early as the Shang, as we k n o w f r o m the oracle bone inscriptions, ancestor worship had been a crucial obligation for the ruling family at least. 2

The fixing of attention on the origins of tradition, w h i c h makes China unique i n the A x i a l A g e , has a perhaps unexpected parallel later i n history, Western Europe u p to about A . D . 1700. O u r o w n tradition refused for a thousand years to believe that the R o m a n Empire had gone forever, then saw its o w n accelerating development as a 'renaissance' of the Classical Age, its break w i t h the Mediaeval church as a return to primitive Christianity, its emerging science as the recovery of ancient Egyptian and Jewish w i s d o m ciphered i n the Hermetic corpus and the Kabbalah. (Newton himself supposed that he was rediscovering truths w h i c h w o u l d be k n o w n to Moses, Pythagoras and Moschus the Phoenician). It is 3

INTRODUCTION

5

arguable that even now, i n spite of the decline of Bible-reading and classical education, most of us are on a direct line to Greece and Israel i n the A x i a l A g e w h i c h bypasses most other thought before Descartes and Galileo; the layman introducing himself to Mediaeval or Renaissance thinking has strayed into an alien climate of the m i n d demanding the same intellectual and imaginative effort as the philosophy of another civilization. A l t h o u g h there is undeniably a 'Western tradition'—the route traced backwards through the diverging and converging currents w h i c h lead from the Axial A g e to ourselves—I am inclined to think that the idea of a 'Western civilization', pushed back beyond A . D . 1600 to incorporate at each fork the culture more directly ancestral to ours, is no more than a retrospective fiction b y w h i c h we claim for ourselves most of the genius we have heard of since H o m e r . The parallel w i t h the West, limited as it is, may suggest w h y Chinese thinkers, while appealing to the authority of the ancient sage kings, display such variety and originality: there is no greater stimulus to discovery than the belief that the truth was once k n o w n and so can be k n o w n again. There is the difference of course that the West never d i d overcome its centrifugal forces. It wanted to do so, and, at the beginning of close acquaintance w i t h C h i n a i n the 17th and 18th centuries, was inclined to look u p to it w i t h awe and envy; but it can be seen i n retrospect that it was our unconquerable diversity and instability w h i c h i n the 18th century roused us to the Faustian daring of committing ourselves fully to the forces d r i v i n g towards an u n k n o w n future. One generalisation w h i c h seems to hold everywhere i n the Axial A g e is that the basic thoughts, on w h i c h the O l d - W o r l d civilizations have subsisted ever since, originated i n small competing states, and that creativity weakened w i t h their absorption into great empires (Alexander's, the First Emperor's, the M a u r y a n i n India, the Achaemenid i n Iran). Here again C h i n a is peculiar i n that, although as elsewhere empire in due course disintegrates, there is always a return to unity. D o w n to the present century it presented the unique spectacle of an empire surviving from the age of Egypt and Babylon, and preserving a pre-alphabetic script like theirs as an instrument of continuity and unity, legible through the millenia for speakers of mutually unintelligible dialects. A b o u t the time when the First Emperor was looking for the elixir of life C h i n a discovered the secret of the immortal empire, the unkillable social organism. If ideas have any effect at all on social forces, Chinese philosophy of the A x i a l A g e must be judged a tremendous practical success. (The disadvantages of that success w h e n C h i n a finally collided w i t h a less stable and more dynamic civilization are another matter.) The outcome was the syncretism 4

first tried out i n the Lu Spring and Autumn (c. 240 B.C.), w i t h Confucianism emerging as the dominant ingredient f r o m about 100 B . C . One cannot explore it without being impressed by its success i n integrating diverse tendencies so that they become socially cohesive. Let us try to write d o w n in a condensed prescription the Chinese secret of the immortal empire embracing nearly a quarter of the h u m a n race, defeating the destiny by w h i c h all things come and go. 1. (From Confucianism). A n ethic rooted, below the level of critical reflection, in the most enduring social bonds, kinship and custom, w h i c h models the community on the family, relates ruler/subject to father/son and past/present to ancestor/descendant. 2. (From Legalism). A rational statecraft w i t h the techniques to organise an empire of unprecedented size and largely homogenise custom throughout it. 3. (From Yin-Yang). A proto-science w h i c h places man i n a cosmos modelled on community. 4. (From Taoism, reinforced from the Later H a n by Buddhism). Personal philosophies relating individual directly to cosmos, allowing room w i t h i n the social order for the unassimilable w h o might disrupt community. 5. (From M o - t z u through the argumentation of the competing schools). A rationality confined to the useful, w h i c h leaves fundamental questions outside its range. Both i n C h i n a and the West the Axial A g e has a range of interests w h i c h narrows as the culture crystallises, a contraction w h i c h is both cause and effect of the loss of texts, sometimes forever, sometimes to be rediscovered w i t h fertile consequences a thousand years later, revealing the heliocentric theory of Aristarchus or Hero of Alexandria's steam engine. Here the most striking difference between the traditions at the two ends of the civilized world is i n the destiny of logic. For the West, logic has been central and the thread of transmission has never snapped; there was always, even w h e n there was very little else, the part of Aristotle's Organon translated, just before it was too late, from Greek into Latin by Boethius. In China the proto-logic of the Sophists and Later Mohists was still a Live influence on the first major philosophical revival, the Neo-Taoism of the 3rd and 4th centuries A . D . , but its documents had already dwindled to the mutilated remains available today, and without the textual scholarship to work out their problems. In the 7th century the book Mo-tzu itself disappeared, except for a fragment w h i c h d i d not include the dialectical chapters; the full text was not recovered until the 16th century. The

Chinese cultural organism, w h i c h assimilated Confucian morality, Legalist administrative techniques, Y i n - Y a n g cosmology, Taoist and i n due course Buddhist mysticism, simply ejected the Sophists and Mohists, as well as the Buddhist logic imported from India w h i c h briefly flourished i n the 7th century. In spite of sporadic revivals of interest, C h i n a d i d not digest them until it encountered Western rationalism. They had not however quite lost their nutritional value; the renewed study of the M o h i s t and Buddhist logic inside its o w n tradition has helped C h i n a to absorb the foreign substance being forced d o w n its throat at gunpoint by the West. It is a commonplace that even i n the A x i a l A g e rational demonstration had a much smaller place i n Chinese than i n Greek thought; indeed there is none at all i n the famous books from w h i c h the general reader gets his idea of Chinese 'philosophy', the Analects of Confucius, Lao-tzu, the Yi. Work i n recent decades on the analysis of Chinese concepts, identification of technical terms, uncovering of the presuppositions behind apparent gaps i n argument, textual criticism of the corrupt and mutilated writings on dialectics, not to mention the grammar of the language itself, has revealed that most of the ancient Chinese thinkers are very much more rational than they used to look. There was indeed, besides the Sophists primarily interested i n logical puzzles, a school w h i c h fully shared the Greek ideal of bringing all knowledge w i t h i n the scope of reason, the Later Mohists. What may strike us as remarkable is that the immediate reaction to the birth of a Chinese rationalism was the explicit anti-rationalism of Chuang-tzu, w h i c h left a m u c h more lasting mark on Chinese civilization. We might s u m u p the Chinese attitude to reason i n these terms: reason is for questions of means; for your ends i n life listen to aphorism, example, parable, and poetry. The Sophists d i d practice argument for its o w n sake, if only i n the spirit of f u n , w h i c h is perhaps near the origin of a pure delight i n disinterested reason i n Greece too; but the lasting effect i n China was to convince everyone except the Mohists that problem-solving without useful purpose is a pointless frivolity. The Mohists themselves were moralists judging all issues by the principle of utility, and what they took from the Sophists was the tools for building a logically sophisticated utilitarianism. The other example of a developed system, at the level however not of philosophy but of social science, is the Legalist theory of the state; a n d this too sprang directly from practical considerations, from the problems of statecraft. Since means are dependent on ends, it is inevitable that on the Chinese scale of value the wise dicta of Confucius and Lao-tzu are primary, the practical rationality of M o - t z u and H a n Fei is secondary, the

games w i t h logical puzzles of H u i Shih and K u n g - s u n L u n g are at best tertiary. A s it happens, the Western tradition seems by now to be abandoning its long quest to find rational grounds for its ends. M a n y would now agree that on the one h a n d our disinterested truths never do free themselves from their roots i n concepts shaped by questions of means, on the other that philosophers w h o have anything to say to us about ends are those like Kierkegaard and Nietzsche w h o think i n the style of Chuang-tzu rather than Kant. M i g h t one say that Chinese civilization, the strength of w h i c h was always in its sense of balance, has seen reason i n its right proportions from the very beginning? That would not be incompatible w i t h recognising that our unlimited, perhaps unreasonable, commitment to reason, has achieved on the plane of means results unattainable by any other path, including the whole of modern science and technology. In this history of early Chinese thought we shall centre attention on how the thinkers think, over the whole spectrum from Later Mohist rationalism to Chuang-tzu's anti-rationalism.

T H E B R E A K D O W N OF T H E WORLD ORDER DECREED BY H E A V E N

1. A CONSERVATIVE REACTION: CONFUCIUS A m o n g the states into w h i c h the C h o u Empire dissolved there was a small d u k e d o m i n the Shantung peninsula, L u , w h i c h had originated as the fief of the D u k e of C h o u , younger brother of K i n g W u the founder of the dynasty. It can be seen f r o m the Tso Commentary (Tso chuan, 4th century B.C.), a history from 722 to 466 B . C . attached to the Annals of L u , that this state prided itself o n preserving the culture of C h o u . Thus i n 542 B . C . a visitor from the state of W u asked to hear the music of C h o u , and witnessed w i t h critical comments the Songs performed by skilled singers, and the W u , Shao, and other ancient dances. In 540 B . C . an emissary from the great state of C h i n "examined the books at the office of the G r a n d Historiographer, saw the symbols of the Yi a n d the annals of L u , and said 'The ceremony of C h o u is all i n L u . O n l y now do I understand the potency of the D u k e of C h o u a n d w h y C h o u reigned.' " Early Chinese history is a record of rulers, ministers and generals, and has little to say of philosophers unless they hold office. A t first sight we seem unusually well-informed about K ' u n g C h ' i u of L u , commonly k n o w n as Confucius (a Latinisation by the first missionaries of K ' u n g futzu 'Master K'ung'), w h o is even provided by tradition w i t h exact dates (551—479 B.C.). Unfortunately, as the earliest w h o i n later centuries came to be seen as the greatest, he was inevitably the centre of progressively accumulating legend; we shall not attempt to extract a nucleus of historical truth.* The oldest source for his teaching is the Lun-yu (Assorted Sayings'), commonly k n o w n as the Analects, a selection of sayings and brief anecdotes of the Master and of some of his disciples. Other collections 1

* For a biographical sketch of Confucius based strictly on the three earliest sources(Analects,Mencius, Tso), see Lau, Analects (Penguin version 161-94).

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probably circulated i n different branches of his school, for of quotations from the Master by the two most important of the early Confucians, Mencius and H s u n - t z u , most of the former's and all of the latter's are missing f r o m the Analects. The Analects itself shows signs of accretion; i n particular the last five chapters (chs. 16-20) differ considerably from the rest. However, given a book homogeneous i n thought, marked by a strong and i n d i v i d u a l m i n d , and w i t h inadequate criteria at our disposal for distinguishing the voice of the original teacher (very much as w i t h the Gospel sayings of Jesus), it is convenient to accept it as the record of the earliest stage of Confucianism without asking how much of it is i n the actual words of the founder. The Confucius of the Analects is a teacher, surrounded by a circle of disciples, w h o vainly aspires to the h i g h office w h i c h w o u l d enable h i m to reform government; he sets a precedent w h i c h w i l l be followed by philosophers for the next three centuries by travelling w i t h his disciples from state to state seeking a ruler w h o w i l l listen to h i m . H e wins audiences f r o m D u k e L i n g of Wei (534-493 B . C . ) , D u k e C h i n g of C h ' i (547490 B . C . ) , and i n his o w n state of L u Dukes Ting (509-495 B . C . ) and A i (494468 B.C.). It may be a mistake to think of h i m as finding his message first and attracting disciples afterwards. H i s thought and his sense of mission are of a k i n d w h i c h might develop naturally f r o m the experience of an ordinary teacher of the Songs, Documents, ceremony, and music of C h o u , distinguished at first only i n that his disciples learn f r o m h i m , as from an inspiring schoolmaster, much more than is on the curriculum. The Tso Commentary records that i n 518 B . C . M e n g H s i - t z u of L u , humiliated by his own ignorance of ritual, sent his two sons to Confucius, purely to study ceremony.

Ceremony and music Let us start w i t h Confucius as he sees himself, the preserver and restorer of a declining culture, w h o w o u l d not presume to invent anything. "In transmitting but not originating, trusting i n and loving the ancient, I w o u l d venture to compare myself to our old P'eng." (Analects 7/1) In studying the Documents and Songs of early C h o u , and the ceremonies and music, Confucius recognises the importance of thinking, but is inclined to put the stress rather o n learning. "To learn without t h i n k i n g is stultifying, to think without learning is dangerous." (2/15)

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"I used to go without food all day, without sleep all night, to think. N o use, better to learn." (15/31) " M y disciples, w h y does none of you learn the Songs? The Songs may be used to stir imagination, to become observant, to get people together, to complain, at home i n serving your father a n d abroad i n serving your lord; a n d you w i l l remember m a n y names of birds, animals, plants and trees." (17/9) This may seem a n u n p r o m i s i n g beginning to a philosophical tradi­ tion, but let us continue. The institutions w h i c h for Confucius are central to C h o u culture are its ceremony and its music. The w o r d li 禮 'ceremony' embraces all rites, custom, manners, conventions, from the sacrifices to ancestors d o w n to the detail of social etiquette. Li i n social intercourse corresponds to a considerable extent w i t h Western conceptions of good manners; the Confucian gentleman moves w i t h a n effortless grace w i t h i n the framework of fixed convention, i n f o r m i n g every action w i t h consid­ eration a n d respect for the other person. Yueh 樂 ('music'), w h i c h embraces dance, is primarily the music and dance of sacred rites; correspondingly, ceremony is continuous w i t h music i n being conducted w i t h style like an artistic performance. What above all distinguishes li from Western conceptions of good manners is that for Confucius it has everywhere the efficacy of sacred rite, an efficacy i n transforming h u m a n relations w h i c h is independent of the powers to w h i c h explicitly religious rituals are addressed. The enormous importance w h i c h Confucius ascribes to ceremony by no means implies that he identifies the ritual w i t h the moral. H e has a different w o r d , 義 (related to another yi 宜 'fitting'), for the right, w h i c h is conceived as the conduct fitting to one's role or status, for example as father or son, ruler or minister. "It is the right w h i c h the gentleman deems the substance, it is through ceremony that he performs it, through h u m i l i t y that he expresses it, through being trustworthy that he perfects it, the gentleman!" (15/18) "If those above love ceremony, none of the people w i l l presume to be irreverent; if they love the right, none w i l l presume to disobey; if they love trustworthiness, none w i l l presume to be insincere." (13/4) The effect of ceremonial forms i n the social hierarchy is, as this last passage implies, that instead of actions merely being fitted to each other as right (the people obeying the ruler) attitudes become harmonious (the people revering the ruler). "The disciple Y u - t z u said 'In the employment of ceremony it is harmony w h i c h is most to be valued. In the Way of the former kings it is

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this w h i c h is most beautiful, follow it i n small things and great. Where things are not o n course, if you harmonise b y the knowledge of harmony without regulating it b y ceremony, they still cannot be p u t on course." (1/12) M u s i c no doubt also inspires this harmony, although Confucius never theorises about its overwhelming effect o n himself. "The Master while i n C h ' i heard the Shao, and for three months d i d not notice the taste of meat. H e said 'I d i d not conceive that making music had reached such heights.'" (7/14) Chapter 10 of the Analects records detailed observations of the Master's o w n ceremonial performance. " W h e n summoned b y his lord to serve as usher, his expression was serious, his step brisk. W h e n w i t h clasped hands he bowed to his colleagues o n left and right, his robes moved evenly i n front and behind. His h u r r y i n g advance was a glide. W h e n the guest w i t h d r e w he would invariably announce 'The guest no longer looks back.'" (10/2) A l t h o u g h there are later ritualist texts w h i c h prescribe such details, Confucius himself never lays d o w n rules about them. It may be presumed that his disciples noted points i n the performance of the supreme artist i n ceremony of w h i c h he w o u l d perhaps not himself be conscious, as refinements of a personal style from w h i c h one could learn without necessarily imitating h i m . There are items i n the series i n w h i c h his good manners plainly have nothing to do w i t h prescribed forms. "The stable caught fire. O n returning from court the Master said 'Is anyone hurt?'. H e d i d not ask about the horses." (10/11) The past to w h i c h Confucius looks back is not the beginning of things; there is n o cosmogonic m y t h i n p r e - H a n literature, merely a blank of prehistory before the first Emperors, w h o for Confucius are the pre-dynastic sages Yao a n d S h u n . A l t h o u g h interested i n the institutions of all the Three Dynasties w h i c h followed he draws primarily on the last, the C h o u , the one of w h i c h the tradition is not yet extinct. Indeed he sees history d o w n to the C h o u not as regress but as progress. " C h o u h a d the two earlier dynasties as examples to it. H o w glorious is its culture! I follow C h o u . " (3/14) In spite of this fidelity to C h o u he sees the rebuilding of contemporary culture as a process of selecting and evaluating past and present models. "The Master called the Shao music both perfectly beautiful and perfectly good. H e called the W u music perfectly beautiful but not perfectly good." (3/25) " L i n Fang asked about the basic i n ceremony. The Master said 'An

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13

excellent question! In ceremony prefer the thrifty to the extravagant, i n mourning put grief before meticulousness.'" (3/4) Elsewhere we see h i m a p p l y i n g the former of these critical principles to a traditional observance. "To wear a hempen cap is the ceremony, but the black silk cap of today is thriftier, so I follow the majority. To prostrate oneself before ascending the steps is the ceremony, but today people prostrate themselves at the top, w h i c h is lax; even at the cost of diverging from the majority I do it before ascending." (9/3)

Government as ceremony A pair of concepts first prominent i n the Analects is Tao 道 'the Way' and te 德 'Potency'. In this text Tao is used only of the proper course of human conduct and of the organisation of government, w h i c h is the Way of 'antiquity', of 'the former kings', of 'the gentleman', of 'the good man' and of 'Wen and W u ' the founders of C h o u , or else of what someone teaches as the Way ('my Way', and 'our master's Way'). Confucius does not use it, as Confucians as well as Taoists soon came to do, of the course of the natural world outside m a n . Te, w h i c h has often been translated as 'virtue' (to be understood as i n 'The virtue of cyanide is to poison' rather than i n 'Virtue is its o w n reward'), had been traditionally used of the power, whether benign or baleful, to move others without exerting physical force. Confucius uses it i n this sense of the charisma of C h o u w h i c h w o n it universal allegiance, but moralises and widens the concept, so that it becomes the capacity to act according to and bring others to the Way. The two concepts are interdependent, as later i n Lao-tzu (also entitled Tao te ching 'Classic of the Way and of Potency'); a person's te is his potentiality to act according to the Tao. " O n e not persistent i n maintaining Potency, not sincere i n his trust in the Way, how can you tell whether he is there or he isn't? " (19/2) "Be intent on the Way, be grounded i n Potency, rely on nobility, take recreation i n the arts." (7/6) A n extremely remarkable feature of Confucius' thought is his conviction that all government can be reduced to ceremony. In a state w h i c h has the Way the ruler w i n s the reverent submission of all by ceremony alone without the need of force, through the Potency w h i c h emanates f r o m his person. In an age w h e n government was detaching itself more and more f r o m the ritual functions of kings this indeed looks like a reversion to an obsolete past of primitive magic (although we shall

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later be re-examining this point i n the light of Fingarette's observations); as Schwartz notices, the early C h o u Documents already give great weight to penal law. " A r e you capable of ruling the state by ceremony and deference? Then what difficulties w i l l y o u have? If you are incapable of ruling the state by ceremony and deference, what have y o u to do w i t h ceremony? " (4/13) "If you guide them b y government, hold them even by punishment, the people w i l l elude y o u a n d have no shame. If y o u guide them by Potency, hold them even b y ceremony, the people w i l l both have shame and draw near you." (2/3) Confucius accepts law as belonging to the apparatus of government, but measures success i n ruling by h o w little it is necessary to apply it. "In hearing litigation I a m no different f r o m others, but the point is surely to b r i n g it about that there is no litigation!" (12/13) "Chi-k'ang-tzu asked Confucius about government: 'What if we were to execute those without the Way to get nearer to those w h o have it?' 'When y o u engage i n government,' Confucius answered, 'what need have you for executions? If you desire to be good the people w i l l be good. The gentleman's Potency is the w i n d , the small man's Potency is the grass. The grass i n the w i n d f r o m above is sure to b e n d . ' " (12/19) A l t h o u g h Confucius protests at excessive taxation and recognises the need to enrich the people before expecting them to respond to teaching, he sees the radical cure of social ills, not indeed i n simply returning to C h o u institutions, but i n arranging the ideal court ceremonial by a critical selection f r o m the rituals of the Three Dynasties, Hsia, Y i n or Shang, and Chou. "Yen Y u a n asked about ruling a state. The Master said 'Put into effect the calendar of H s i a , ride the carriage of Y i n , wear the cap of C h o u . For music, the Shao and W u . Banish the airs of C h e n g and keep glib people at a distance. The airs of C h e n g are wanton, glib people are dangerous.'" (15/11) Ideally the ruler should not have to do anything at all, simply trust to the Potency w h i c h radiates from h i m . Confucius once even uses the term wu wei 無為 'doing nothing' later to become characteristic of Taoism. "One w h o p u t i n order b y doing nothing, w o u l d not that be Shun? What is there that he did? Just assumed a respectful posture and faced south." (15/5) "One w h o engages i n government by Potency may be compared to the North Star; it occupies its place and all the stars pay homage to it." (2/1) 2

3

4

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15

This can hardly be intended as practical politics, but there is no question of his confidence i n Potency as a universal civilizing influence. "The Master wished to live among the barbarian N i n e Tribes. Someone said 'They're uncouth, what about that?' H e said 'If a gentleman lived among them what uncouthness w o u l d there b e ? ' " (9/14) This is not quite the faith i n the universal influence of the good m a n w h i c h Mencius was later to support b y his doctrine of the goodness of human nature. It is rather a faith i n the power of trained manners, customs, and rituals to harmonise attitudes and open the inferior to the influence of the superior. H i s single reference to h u m a n nature emphasises not man's goodness but his malleability. "The Master said 'By nature we are near to each other, by habituation we diverge.' The Master said ' O n l y the highest w i s d o m and lowest folly do not shift.'" (17/2)

Heaven and the spirits W h e n i n the 17th and 18th centuries Confucius first attracted attention in the West m a n y saw h i m as a rationalist sceptical of the existence of supernatural beings. To Westerners preoccupied w i t h the emerging conflict between reason and religion this seemed the obvious interpretation. It took some time to appreciate that, except for the Mohists, no one i n ancient C h i n a m u c h cared whether consciousness survives death or whether Heaven is a personal G o d or impersonal principle, issues of overwhelming importance to Jesuits and philosophes. The attitude of Confucius is that we should not be diverted from h u m a n affairs by matters which do not concern us. There is no reason to question that he recognises the sacrifices to Heaven, mountain a n d river gods, and ghosts of ancestors, as the greatest of ceremonies, harmonising not only man w i t h man but m a n w i t h cosmos. But for h i m the value of ceremony is i n the harmony itself a n d does not depend o n anything outside. He is not interested i n how the sacrifices relate us to cosmos; our business is w i t h man, and to speculate about the realm of the numinous is idle curiosity. It is not so m u c h that he is a sceptic as that he does not care whether you are a sceptic or not. "The Master d i d not talk about marvels, feats of strength, irregularities, gods." (7/21) " C h i - l u asked about serving the ghosts and gods. The Master said, 'Until you can serve men how can you serve the ghosts?'

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'Permit me to ask about death.' 'Until you k n o w about life how can you k n o w about death?'" (11/12) "Fan C h ' i h asked about w i s d o m . The Master said 'To work at doing right for the people, a n d to be reverent to the ghosts and gods but keep them at a distance, may be called w i s d o m . " (6/22) "He sacrificed as though they were present, sacrificed to gods as though the gods were present. The Master said 'Unless I involve myself i n the sacrifice it is as though I d i d not sacrifice.'" (3/12) A story i n a H a n anthology of largely pre-Han material, unlikely to be genuine but very typically Confucian, has the Master judging the propriety of questions about the spirits entirely by the consequences for human behaviour. " T z u - k u n g asked Confucius whether the dead have knowledge or not. Confucius said: 'If I preferred to say that they do have knowledge, I am afraid that filial sons and obedient grandsons w o u l d hinder life to send off the dead. If I preferred to say that they do not, I am afraid that unfilial offspring w o u l d abandon the dead without burial. If you wish to k n o w whether the dead have knowledge or not, delaying until death to know it for yourself you still won't be too late.' " 5

The shift of attention to the h u m a n realm, a n d refusal to speculate outside its range, became general throughout the age of the philosophers. The question whether "the dead have knowledge" is raised occasionally, but i n terms of whether ghosts can harm the living, not of personal survival; the only k i n d of immortality welcomed, w h e n the prospect of it was conceived i n the 3rd century B . C . , is the prolongation of life by elixirs, not survival as a ghost. Some, including the Confucian Hsun-tzu, take it for granted that consciousness ends at death. Otherwise, except by the Mohists, w h o do argue at length that the dead are conscious, the issue is left open a n d treated as a theme for w i t rather than serious argument. Thus i n a story w h i c h turns u p i n the 3 r d century B.C. a king of C h ' u is about to sacrifice two prisoners of war i n order to smear his battle drums w i t h their blood; they escape this fate b y arguing "If the dead lack knowledge, it w i l l be pointless to use us to smear the drums; if they do have knowledge, w h e n you are about to go into battle we shall stop the drums s o u n d i n g . " In 265 B . C . , according to another story, Q u e e n H s u a n of C h ' i n on her deathbed commanded that her lover be buried alive w i t h her, but was similarly dissuaded. 6

" ' D o you think that the dead have knowledge?' 'They do not,' said the Q u e e n .

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'If Your Majesty's divine intelligence plainly knows that the dead lack knowledge, w h y uselessly b u r y the m a n you loved i n life beside an unknowing corpse? But if the dead do have knowledge, his late Majesty's wrath has been mounting for a long t i m e . ' " O n l y the Mohists take the issue wholly seriously. Besides arguing i n detail that ghosts and gods exist and are conscious they point out as contradicting himself a Confucian w h o maintains both that "Ghosts and gods do not exist" and that "The gentleman must learn the sacrificial ceremonies." Whether Heaven is a personal or impersonal power is another issue on which no one argues except the Mohists, w h o accuse the Confucians of holding that "Heaven is unseeing and the ghosts are not daimonic" , that is, they lack the daimonic insight w h i c h uncovers secret wrongdoing. It is in any case a question of degree, for even such as H s u n - t z u , for w h o m Heaven is highly impersonal, have no other paradigm than a human ruler and fall into personifying imagery. In the case of Confucius, his reticence allows us to see only that he tends to personify w h e n pondering w i t h awe and humility whether Heaven is on the side of his mission. It is a question he asks himself especially w h e n i n danger on his travels. "Heaven generated the Potency i n me, what can H u a n T ' u i do to me?" (7/23) " W h e n imprisoned i n K ' u a n g the Master said 'Since K i n g Wen died has not the culture come to reside i n me? If Heaven is about to abandon this culture, those w h o die afterwards w i l l not get to share i n it; if Heaven has not yet abandoned this culture, what can the men of K ' u a n g do to me?'" (9/5) "The Master said 'There's no one, is there, w h o recognises me.' T z u k u n g said ' W h y is it that no one recognises you?' The Master said 'I neither resent Heaven nor blame man; i n learning about the lower I have fathomed the higher. The one w h o recognises me, wouldn't it be Heaven?'" (14/35) Of the death of his favourite disciple, i n w h o m he put his greatest hopes, we read " W h e n Yen Y u a n died the Master said 'Alas, Heaven has abandoned me, Heaven has abandoned me." (11/9) Confucius may be seen to fluctuate between a faith that Heaven w i l l protect his mission and despair that Heaven has abandoned h i m . He struggles to understand 'destiny' (ming, literally 'decree', what Heaven has decreed). The reconciliation w h i c h he calls " k n o w i n g destiny" and claims to have attained at the age of 50 is a calm recognition that personal fortune and the rise a n d fall of good government are ultimately 7

8

9

10

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beyond man's control, a n d that to be at peace it is enough to have done one's best. W h e n a disciple is endangered b y a certain K u n g - p o Liao Confucius says "The Way being about to prevail is destiny, the Way being about to fall to ruin is destiny. What can K u n g - p o Liao do about destiny? " (14/36) "Ssu-ma N i u was worried that 'All other m e n have brothers, I have none.' Tzu-hsia said 'I have heard that death a n d life are destined, and riches and honours depend o n Heaven. If the gentleman is reverent and without failings, a n d deals w i t h others respectfully and with ceremony, everyone w i t h i n the four seas w i l l be a brother to h i m . What misfortune is it to the gentleman to have no brothers?'" (12/5) It appears f r o m the Tso Commentary that court historiographers, diviners, physicians a n d musicmasters already h a d a cosmology i n w h i c h the course of the heavenly bodies was called the 'Way of Heaven'. To co­ ordinate the Way of h u m a n custom a n d its seasonal festivals w i t h the cycles of Heaven i n a universal Way seems i n retrospect a n obvious step, and it was later to be made. But there is only one reference to the Way of Heaven i n the Analects: "What the Master has to say about h u m a n nature a n d the Way of Heaven we cannot get to hear." (5/13) There is however one passage w h i c h implies a fundamental unity of Heaven and m a n . It suggests that w i t h the perfect ritualisation of life we w o u l d understand our place i n community and cosmos without the need of words, a thought w h i c h seems to anticipate Taoism. "The Master said 'Ι should like to do without speech'. T z u - k u n g said 'If you do not speak what message w i l l your disciples have from you? '. 'Does Heaven speak? ', he said. 'The four seasons proceed b y it, the hundred things are generated b y it. Does Heaven speak?" (17/19) But the Way is mentioned explicitly only as the proper course of h u m a n conduct a n d government. Indeed he thinks of it as itself widened by the broadening of h u m a n culture. " M a n is able to enlarge the Way, it is not that the Way enlarges man." (15/29)

The thread which unifies morality Until very recently most Western readers of Confucius tried to detach his moral thinking f r o m its b e d d i n g i n ceremony, w h i c h they discarded if not as dross then at any rate as significant only w i t h i n Chinese society. The

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major Confucian virtue jen 仁, commonly translated 'benevolence', an unselfish concern for the welfare of others, can indeed f r o m Mencius onwards be understood i n detachment f r o m ceremony. But the translation 'benevolence' is not appropriate to the Analects itself, where Confucius is forming a new concept b y adapting an o l d w o r d to his o w n insights. Jen had been the stative verb corresponding to the n o u n jen 人 w h i c h the aristocratic clans of C h o u used to distinguish themselves from the common people. Thus i n two of the Songs a lady admires a m a n riding out to hunt as "handsome and martial", "handsome and strong", "handsome and jen (noble, lordly)". By the time of Confucius the n o u n jen was widening to the ordinary w o r d for a h u m a n being. But throughout the history of Imperial C h i n a there was some hesitation i n applying the n o u n to include barbarians, although it was always understood (as already by Confucius) that they are civilizable by the adoption of Chinese customs; genetically they are jen, but u n t i l civilized they tend to be classed rather w i t h the beasts and birds. The noble, civilized, fully h u m a n , pride themselves on their manners a n d conventions, but above all on the virtues w h i c h give these meaning a n d w h i c h distinguish themselves f r o m the boors and savages w h o do not k n o w how to behave. The stative verb jen, as it was inherited by Confucius, covers like English 'noble' the whole range of superior qualities distinctive of the m a n of breeding. Granted that it is coming to mean ' h u m a n , humane' rather than 'noble', it may be convenient to stay w i t h 'noble' as the ad hoc equivalent i n the present chapter; being nearer to the older meaning, it suggests the sort of concept w h i c h Confucius is n a r r o w i n g i n the direction of benevolence. In any case he finds h u m a n qualities at their full flower only i n the chun-tzu 君子 ('lord's son'), a w o r d w i t h very m u c h the same social and moral range as English 'gentleman'. Its opposite is hsiao-jen 小人 'small man', 'vulgar m a n ' . Confucius more than once joins the stative verb w i t h the n o u n , for example "A noble w h o is ignoble ( = a h u m a n w h o is inhuman), what has he to do w i t h ceremony? A noble w h o is ignoble, what has he to do w i t h music?" (3/3) A t the source of the varied qualities w h i c h distinguish the noble is a disinterested concern for the other person. " C h u n g - k u n g asked about being noble ( = human). The Master said 'Behave abroad as though welcoming a n important guest, employ the people as though conducting an important sacrifice. What you do not

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yourself desire do not d o to others. N o one i n the state will resent you, no one i n the family w i l l resent you." (12/2) Here, i n the middle of the usual ceremonial references, we come on the grand generalisation, "What you do not yourself desire do not do to others", the negative form of the G o l d e n Rule at the heart of ethics, w h i c h in the West too sprang f r o m a m i n d not m u c h inclined to analysis, that of Jesus. Confucius, w h o generally gives the impression of synthesising a view of life from the contemplation of rites, texts, pieces of music, persons in legend or history rather than of abstracting ideas, does have a universal pattern r u n n i n g through his teaching. "The Master said T z u - k u n g , do y o u think of me as someone w h o has learned a lot and retained it? ' 'Yes,' he answered, 'Is that wrong? ' 'Wrong, I have one thread r u n n i n g through i t . ' " (15/3) " T z u - k u n g asked 'Is there a single w o r d w h i c h one could act o n all one's life?' The Master said 'Wouldn't it be likening-to-oneself (shu)? What you do not yourself desire do not do to others.'" (15/24) Shu is one of the phonetic cognates of ju 如 'be like' w h i c h are basic to analogical t h i n k i n g i n Chinese, and is written w i t h the same graph distinguished b y the 'heart' radical w h i c h tends to mark verbs of thinking and feeling ('thinking of [self a n d other] as alike'). The art of definition developed only gradually throughout the classical period, but towards the end of it we find it neatly defined i n the syncretistic Shih-tzu. "Likening-to-oneself is u s i n g one's o w n person to measure. What you do not yourself desire do not do to others, what you dislike i n others reject in yourself, what you desire i n others seek i n yourself, this is likening-tooneself"" A l s o illuminating are Hsun-tzu's three rhymed slogans for shu. "For the gentleman there are three sorts of likening-to-oneself. Being unable to serve your lord Yet expecting obedience f r o m a servant is failure to liken-to-oneself. Being unable to give parents their due Yet expecting sons to be filial is failure to liken-to-oneself. Being unable to be respectful to an elder brother Yet expecting a younger to take orders from you is failure to liken-to-oneself. If a knight is clear about these three sorts of likening-to-oneself it w i l l be possible for h i m to correct his p e r s o n . " 12

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A l t h o u g h only the negative side of the G o l d e n Rule is included i n the formulation the positive is also affirmed. "The Master said: 'Tseng-tzu, I have one thread r u n n i n g through m y Way.' Tseng-tzu assented. W h e n the Master went out the disciples asked 'What d i d he mean? '. 'The Master's Way', said Tseng-tzu, 'is nothing but doing-one's-bestfor-others (chung) and likening-to-oneself (shu).'" (4/15) Chung 忠 is used especially of devoted loyalty to a ruler, but also of wholeheartedness o n behalf of inferiors. It is a phonetic cognate of chung 中 'centre', the graph as w i t h shu being distinguished b y the 'heart' radical. The fullest collection of early Confucian definitions, by Chia Y i i n the 2nd century B . C . , has "Concern for and benefiting issuing right from the centre of you is called chung." While shu is not a virtue but a form of analogical thinking, chung is one of the Confucian virtues, displayed o n behalf of others i n general and of one's prince i n particular. For the disciple Tseng-tzu at least, the one thread cannot be quite reduced to a single concept; there has to be both the wholeheartedness on behalf of others a n d the act of putting oneself i n their places by w h i c h one learns what to do for them. It is this single thread w h i c h unifies courage, reverence, and the other dispositions w h i c h are distinctively noble or h u m a n . "Fan C h ' i h asked about being noble. The Master said ' O n e is concerned for others.' H e asked about being wise. The Master said ' O n e knows others'. (12/22) Jen as such does not i m p l y knowledge; indeed, i n observing that all virtues go astray without learning, Confucius gives as one illustration "To love nobility more than learning deludes one into foolishness." (17/8) Jen is not-sufficient for sagehood, w h i c h requires knowledge and ability as well. " T z u - k u n g said 'What of someone w h o by his bounty to all the people is capable of helping everyone? M a y he be called noble? ' 'Is that to do w i t h being noble? ', said the Master. ' W i t h sagehood surely. Even Yao and S h u n w o u l d have trouble w i t h that. A s for the noble, himself desiring to stand u p he stands others up, himself desiring to get through he gets others through. The ability to find the analogy i n the nearest may be called the secret of nobility.'" (6/30) Here the attitude to others w h i c h springs from likening them to oneself is presented not i n negative but i n positive terms. 13

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A striking feature of Confucius' treatment of jen is that he does not see it as a matter of degree. Either you have it or you don't; and even i n most of the best of us it is only intermittent. H e says of his o w n disciples: "In the case of Yen Y u a n , his heart for three months at a time does not go off course from being noble. A s for the rest of them, they attain it only for a day or a month." (6/7) One should perhaps see jen as the orientation w h i c h makes right action effortless, following attainment of just the right balance between self and others, a precarious balance w h i c h hardly anyone is able to sustain. The perfectly and permanently disinterested person being a very rare creature, Confucius is cautious i n recognising even the greatest men as jen, and disclaims it of himself. It seems however that since it is a matter of attuning the desires o n behalf of self and others, w h e n you do have jen it comes effortlessly a n d instantaneously: 14

"Is nobility so far away? A s soon as I desire to be noble, nobility arrives." (7/30) To identify the one thread u n i f y i n g the ceremonial raises the possibility of treating it as a principle w h o l l y detached from ceremony, w h i c h becomes mere social convention. This was what M o - t z u was soon to do, subjecting all conventions to the principle of concern for everyone and the test of practical utility. But such a detachment f r o m tradition and custom always remained foreign to Confucianism. For Confucius the instant i n w h i c h you conquer self to see self and others i n perfect proportion is an instant i n w h i c h accord w i t h conventions becomes effortless and the exercise of style w i t h i n fixed forms is an uninterrupted flow. The achievement of jen results immediately from 'return to cere­ mony' (fu li 復禮), w h i c h may be understood as the recovery of the meaning of ceremony b y w h i c h it ceases to be mere formality. "Yen Y u a n asked about the noble. The Master said 'By conquest of self returning to ceremony one becomes noble. If by conquest of self you return to ceremony for a single day, the whole w o r l d w i l l acknowledge you as noble. Becoming noble derives f r o m oneself, not from others!' 'I w o u l d ask you to itemise it'. 'What isn't according to ceremony don't look at, don't listen to, don't say, don't d o . ' " (12/1)

Confucius and 20th-century Western philosophy A l t h o u g h Confucius was important to 18th-century philosophes as the example of an enlightened moralist independent of revealed religion, his

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thought was until very recently seen as irrelevant to serious philosophy. It was assumed that a sage expressing himself i n brief and scattered dicta has nothing to teach a true philosopher, whose interest i n C h i n a , if any, will be i n the rational argument w h i c h begins w i t h M o - t z u . However, i n the present century Western philosophy has turned back on itself to question its o w n conceptual schemes, a n d searches ancient or alien thinkers, on the lookout for revealing alternatives. The help one can get from pre-Socratics or Chinese i n unlearning one's o w n conceptual habits has little to do w i t h their degree of logical sophistication. That Confucius can be relevant to contemporary philosophising was first appreciated by the professional philosopher Herbert Fingarette, whose Confucius: the Secular as Sacred (1972) revitalised all our t h i n k i n g about the sage. Fingarette, w h o originally dismissed Confucius as a "prosaic and parochial m o r a l i z e r " , came to see h i m as a guide to a moral philosophy w h i c h recognises the performative function of language and its interde­ pendence w i t h social convention. He starts from J. L . Austin's concept of the "performative utterance", w h i c h undermined the assumption that language either describes what objectively is or evokes emotion or action. Such formulas as 'I promise to . . . ' or 'I c h o o s e . . . ', the judge's 'Guilty' or the 'I do' of the marriage ceremony, do not describe an action, nor do they evoke it; the utterance of the words is itself the act. Performative speech or gesture assumes a context of accepted convention, whether unformulated (as w h e n one reads the significance of a minute variation i n a handshake or a smile) or overtly developed as the ritual w i t h i n w h i c h 'Guilty!' or 'I do!' acquires the force of an irrevocable deed. The web of convention w i t h i n w h i c h we live is i n the first place inherited from tradition, but refines itself or deteriorates w i t h the creative fluidity or sterile rigidity of performance. A s more and more i n language w h i c h h a d seemed descrip­ tive turns out to be performative (Fingarette leaves open the question whether "ultimately all utterances are i n some essential way performa­ tive" ), it becomes less and less plausible to dismiss Confucius' call for the 'correction of names' as a survival of the magical t h i n k i n g w h i c h precedes the discovery of objective truth. There seems after all to be nothing w r o n g w i t h primitive word-magic except its tendency to intrude into the natural order from the social order where it actually works. In Chinese ming 名 'name' is cognate w i t h ming 命 'command, decree', and it is often the latter w h i c h is used for the act of naming. For Confucius, n a m i n g is primarily the act w h i c h , i n calling somebody 'ruler' or 'subject', 'father' or 'son', ordains his social function. W h e n asked by a disciple about government (cheng 政 'enforcement of the correct', distin15

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guished from cheng 正 'correct' by the 'beating' radical associated w i t h force), Confucius, w h o prefers an unforced order, surprises h i m b y saying that the first thing he w o u l d correct is names. " T z u - l u said 'If the L o r d of Wei entrusts the government ( = enforce­ ment of the correct) to y o u , what w i l l y o u do first?' 'Correct names, surely!', the Master said. ' H o w far y o u can stray f r o m the point! What w o u l d that correct? ' ' T z u - l u , y o u are a boor. O n matters of w h i c h he is ignorant a gentleman expresses no opinion. If names are incorrect, saying is out of accord. If saying is out of accord tasks are not fulfilled. If tasks are not fulfilled ceremony a n d music remain inert. If ceremony and music remain inert punishment is misapplied. If punishment is misapplied the people have nowhere to put hand or foot. Therefore what the gentleman names is sure to be sayable, a n d what he says is sure to be performable. It is simply that the gentleman is never haphazard i n what he says." (13/3)* O n one occasion Confucius is disgusted that the name of a ritual vessel is being used loosely; even these little things have their repercus­ sions on the social order. "The ku is un-ku. What sort of a ku is that?" (6/25) The crucial thing however is the n a m i n g of social roles. "Duke C h i n g of C h ' i asked Confucius about government. Confucius * Waley (Analects p. 21f) and Creel (Shen pp. 117-19) treat the 'correction of names' saying as the one item in the Analects which cannot be older than Mencius and Hsun-tzu. It is undeniably one of the Analects passages most literary in appearance, with the only example in the book of the sorites form later so common (If A then B, if B then C . . . . ) ; it does not impress as likely to be a saying of Confucius jotted down in his own words. However reports of spoken discourse may vary widely in the extent to which they are reworked in literary language; and in any case what matters is whether we can assume, as with the rest of the Analects, that the saying belongs to the earlier phase of Confucianism, before Mencius. The first Confucian to mention the 'Correction of Names' is Hsun-tzu, who has a whole chapter on it with the phrase as title. He does not mention Confucius, but this accords with his general practice; there are only half-a-dozen direct quotations from Confucius in his essay chapters (Hsun-tzu chs. 1-24), none of them from the Analects. A decision depends on where one wishes to fit the passage in the history of Chinese thought. Waley and Creel read it as assuming the logical interest in names and objects which began with the Sophists. I am more impressed by Fung Yu-lan's placing of it, as reflecting a concern for the ritually correct name likely to be much older than logical inquiries into language. Nor am 1 persuaded that the reference to punishment implies a later Confucianism coming to terms with Legalism. The Analects accept punishment as a practical necessity, and to declare that it will be misapplied if ceremony and music are inert seems to me fully consistent with its thought.

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replied: 'The ruler rules, the minister ministers, fathers are fatherly, sons sonly.' 'Excellent!' said the D u k e . 'Indeed, if the ruler does not rule and the minister does not minister, if fathers are unfatherly and sons unsonly, even if there is grain w o u l d I get to eat i t ? ' " (12/11) Re-reading the 'Correction of Names' passage i n the light of this one, we see that the succession of tasks w h i c h transfers grain from the fields to the dining table depends o n each person doing what rightly used names instruct h i m to do; and only w h e n the process is r u n n i n g smoothly w i l l ceremony and music come to life to harmonise relations, and enforcement of order by punishments be morally informed. Returning to Fingarette, Confucius is relevant to the present as a precursor w h o can teach us to think ourselves inside the unnoticed context of ritualised behaviour w i t h w h i c h performative speech and gesture are i n interaction, w h i c h analytic philosophy has rediscovered but tries to objectivise i n value-free terms, as "the intelligent practice of learned conventions and language." Thus the element of the magical and the sacred i n the Analects, w h i c h has seemed to be the detritus of primitive assumptions i n a m i n d freeing itself from the supernatural, on the contrary reflects a profound insight into the workings of social convention. The ritual act, influencing through interrelations w h i c h the agents do not analyse, does have an efficacy different i n k i n d from the act calculated as means to an end. The m a n of Potency w h o has, not an abstract k n o w l edge of conventions, but an effortless skill and grace i n operating w i t h them, although 'doing nothing', does enhance the order around h i m . In the this-worldly orientation of Confucius there is a recognition that the sacred, understood as a power for good independent of the wills of individuals, does not issue f r o m an external realm of spirits but is inherent i n the spontaneity of ritualised relations between persons. Fingarette thinks that Confucius can help us to escape other dichotomies w i t h w h i c h analytic philosophy is unsatisfied, such as mind/body and inner/outer. Of these the former never emerged i n pre-Han philosophy; the word hsin 'heart' is sometimes translated ' m i n d ' , reasonably enough i n later philosophy influenced by Indian B u d d h i s m , but i n the classical period it refers only to the heart as the organ w i t h w h i c h one thinks, approves and disapproves. (Thinking is not i n traditional C h i n a located i n the brain.) The dichotomisation of inner (nei P^) ) and outer (wai ?\- ) does emerge i n the 4th century B . C . ; thus Mencius, i n a manner quite familiar i n the West, classes all moral virtues as not outer but inner. 17

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Readers w h o take this dichotomy for granted assume that Confucius, w h o is plainly m u c h more than a stickler for the formalities, must have located his jen 'nobility, h u m a n i t y ' i n the inner rather than the outer man. But according to Fingarette "jen and its associated 'virtues', and li too, are not connected i n the original text w i t h the language of ' w i l l ' , 'emotion', and 'inner states'. The move f r o m jen as referring us to a person on to jen as 'therefore' referring us to his inner mental or psychic condition or processes finds no parallel i n the Analects." Jen is conceived rather as "a directed force operating i n actions i n public space and time, and having a person as initial point-source and a person as the terminal point on w h i c h the force i m p i n g e s . " Fingarette reads this as a warning to us today not to psychologise moral philosophy. Confucius is not a victim of the postCartesian superstition of m i n d as 'ghost i n the machine'; he does not conceive the difference between ritual as dignified and reverent performance and as empty formality i n terms of the presence or absence of dignity and formality i n the performer's m i n d . This claim has excited m u c h criticism, but mainly from sinologists w h o have not come to question the dichotomy and suppose that if Fingarette does not recognise jen as inward he must be treating it as o u t w a r d . But his approach to the mind/body problem, although of the kind sometimes called 'logical behaviourism', does not deny that C o n fucius and ourselves can have secret thoughts. The position is that silent verbal thinking and speaking aloud are a single process, i n w h i c h the uttered does not draw its meaning or value f r o m the unuttered. The disciple Yen Y u a n , whose "heart for three months at a time does not go off course from jen"), is evidently t h i n k i n g nobly i n his heart even when not doing anything. Confucius does more than once refer to examining oneself ' w i t h i n ' (nei). " W h e n you see your better, think about becoming his equal; w h e n you see a worse, examine yourself w i t h i n . " (4/17) "I have yet to see anyone w h o is capable of seeing his o w n errors and accusing himself w i t h i n . " (5/27) "If examining w i t h i n he finds nothing unwholesome, what else has he worry about or to fear?" (12/4) These i m p l y private self-examination, perhaps of unspoken thoughts as well as of past actions. But the reference is to looking back at one's o w n actions, i n implicit contrast w i t h looking out at other people's. The contrast is not between m i n d and body as inner and outer compartments of oneself. Confucius can help us escape being "blinded by a mind-matter 19

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dualism, or b y the behaviourist acceptance of the dualist way of dividing the world, along w i t h the denial of the reality of the 'mental' half." A further advantage of studying Confucius, according to Fingarette, is that he gives us the opportunity to rethink moral philosophy without certain concepts w h i c h have seemed crucial to the West, such as choice and responsibility. "Confucius does not elaborate the language of choice and responsibility as these are intimately intertwined with the idea of the ontologicaUy ultimate power of the individual to select from genuine alternatives to create his o w n spiritual destiny, and w i t h the related ideas of spiritual guilt, and repentance or retribution for such g u i l t . " The claim that the concept of moral choice is foreign to Confucius has offended many readers. Confucius is of course very m u c h concerned w i t h choice i n the most general sense of the w o r d , as settling after due consideration on a particular course of action. "If you don't say 'What shall I do about it, what shall I do about it?' there's nothing I can do about y o u . " (15/16) But choice i n this general sense does not necessarily imply even the posing of alternatives. It might be the contemplation of one's situation, and the examples of sages i n similar situations, until inclination spontaneously settles i n a certain direction. A s for the narrower sense w h i c h Fingarette finds specifically Western, Schwartz objects w i t h some justice that he seems to be t h i n k i n g of "choosing between 'value systems' or creating one's o w n values", although the Judaeo-Christian tradition at least conceives free choice as "freedom to choose between the known good and the k n o w n e v i l " , w h i c h is " i n no way different from Confucius's choice between following the way and straying from i t . " However, it does seem to be the case that Confucius is not i n the habit of posing alternatives at all. For h i m , you follow the Way if clear-sighted enough to see it and strong enough to persist i n it, otherwise you simply fall away from it out of blindness or weakness. It is only later, w i t h the rise of schools with competing principles, that we meet w i t h such metaphors as the crossr o a d s (conspicuously absent i n the Analects, i n spite of many references to the Way, w a l k i n g , paths, tracks), or the weighing of alternatives as though on a balance. In particular, Confucius does not think i n terms of choices between ends. H e is very m u c h concerned with 'desires' (yii $ L ) and especially with 'intent' (chih , a cognate of chih ^ 'go to' written w i t h the 'heart' radical), w i t h whether one is intent on learning, on nobility, o n the Way, but has no separate w o r d for the goal of desire or intent. In place of choice 23

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between ends he has likes and dislikes spontaneously altering as learning progresses: y o u leave behind ignorant preferences as the Way becomes clearer and see them retrospectively as deviations from the Way. C o n fucius once speaks of a m a n w h o by listening to bad advice from someone has " h a d his intent confused (huo ^ ) by h i m . " Fingarette notes that when Confucius uses this w o r d huo the thought is not "of a m i n d i n doubt as to w h i c h course to choose but of a person being inconsistent i n his desires or acts." Confucius twice answered requests to explain the word. 27

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"You desire life for one you love and death for one y o u hate. To desire that someone lives yet also that he dies is confusion." (12/10) "Forgetting i n a moment of rage not only your o w n safety but your parents', isn't that confusion?" (12/21) The overriding imperative is to learn and arrive at knowledge; once you know, orientation towards action may be left to take care of itself as confused inclinations sort themselves out. To apply the metaphor of weighing w h i c h Confucius does not use, the agent is not the weigher but the arm of the balance itself. "The wise are not confused, the noble do not worry, the brave do not fear." (9/29) "From 151 was intent on learning, f r o m 30 h a d found m y feet, from 40 was not confused, f r o m 50 knew the decree of Heaven, from 60 h a d an attuned ear, from 70 followed what the heart desires without transgressing rule." (2/4) Fingarette notices one case i n the Analects w h i c h a Westerner would discuss i n terms of choice between conflicting duties to family and state. "The Governor of She told Confucius: 'Here we have an Upright K u n g , w h o testified against his o w n father for stealing a sheep.' Confucius said: 'Where I come f r o m upright men are different from this. The father covers u p for the son, the son covers u p for the father, and therein is the uprightness.'" (13/18) Confucius does not argue, simply offers his o w n preference for consideration. A r g u m e n t w o u l d be pointless, since the issue is w h i c h course you find yourself preferring i n the light of your whole knowledge of the world and of yourself. That the crux of the matter is w h i c h way you spontaneously tend i n full knowledge may be seen i n a discussion of the Confucian doctrine that parents must be mourned for three years, later a target of M o h i s t criticism. The disciple Tsai Wo h a d objected that one year is long enough. Confucius answers: " 'Would you be comfortable eating rice a n d wearing brocade?' 1 would.'

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'If you w o u l d , then do it. W h e n the gentleman is i n mourning, he does not relish eating tasty food, does not enjoy listening to music, is not comfortable living at home, w h i c h is w h y he w i l l not do that. If as it seems you w o u l d be comfortable, then do it.' "After Tsai Wo went out the Master said ' H o w ignoble is Tsai Wo! A child has lived three years before it leaves its parents' bosom. M o u r n i n g for three years is the m o u r n i n g current throughout the world. D i d Tsai Wo have three years of love f r o m his parents?'" (17/21) The issue is a matter of taste, but tastes change w i t h knowledge and experience. The proper duration of mourning is h o w long you want to mourn if you fully appreciate how m u c h your parents have done for you; the Way is what you w o u l d want to d o if you had the wisdom of the sage. Confucius himself, according to his little autobiographical sketch, set out in pursuit of knowledge at 15, by 40 found that all confusions of inclination had sorted themselves out, and b y 70 desired for others what they desired for themselves and so wanted to do precisely what he ought to do. A point of interest here, not discussed by Fingarette, is that Confucius has evaded another Western dichotomy, fact/value, i n a way w h i c h seems common to the Chinese tradition i n general; we shall be returning to it i n discussing later thinkers. Confucius a n d his successors seem to assume that the value of conduct derives f r o m the value of w i s d o m . O n e might be disposed to reject this as a n obvious fallacy. If w i s d o m is confined to knowledge of fact, value cannot be derived f r o m it; if w i s d o m includes knowledge of value the derivation is circular. But the Chinese assumption is that action starts from spontaneous motives and that before asking 'What shall I do?' I am already being drawn i n one direction or another. We may test the consequences by laying d o w n a quasi-syllogistic formula to be applied by particular agents i n particular situations. 29

In awareness of everything relevant to the issue I find myself moved towards X ; overlooking something relevant I find myself moved towards Y. In which direction shall I let myself be moved? Be aware of everything relevant to the issue. Therefore let yourself be moved towards X . e v e r y t h i n g relevant to the issue' w o u l d be every fact, sensation, emotion, w h i c h moves me spontaneously i n one direction or another. T am aware of everything relevant' w o u l d be judged as one judges A H men are mortal' i n the classical syllogism, for example b y Popper's principle that a strictly universal statement is unverifiable but demands assent if one persistently

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fails to refute it. To be aware of everything relevant I w o u l d have to try out imaginatively all spatial and temporal viewpoints from w h i c h I might find myself moved. Similarly, the shu 'likening to oneself w h i c h is the basis of morals for Confucius is a trying-out of h o w I find myself moved from other personal viewpoints. Whether for purposes of the argument personal viewpoints correspond strictly w i t h spatial and temporal might be questioned, but I have argued i n detail elsewhere that they d o . We conclude this section w i t h David H a l l the philosopher and Roger Ames the sinologist, w h o i n Thinking Through Confucius (1987) have proposed Confucius as a model for the post-modernist w h o has left behind the West's long dependence on the transcendent. Western thought has hitherto been dominated by pairs such as G o d / w o r l d , mind/body, reality/appearance, good/evil, i n w h i c h A is transcendent i n the sense that "the meaning or import of B cannot be fully analysed and explained without recourse to A , but the reverse is not true." Chinese thought on the other hand tends rather to conceptual polarities w i t h A and B each "requiring the other for adequate articulation". This feature of Chinese thought has long been noticed i n the Yin-Yang correlations, but we have continued to take it for granted that Heaven and the Way must share the transcendence of our o w n principles. However, while i n the West a scientific law of nature, just as m u c h as a divine command or a Platonic form, loses its authority if not declared transcendent, unchanged by changes i n the phenomena to w h i c h it applies, Confucius knows no obstacle to recognising that principles "have their source i n the h u m a n , social contacts w h i c h they serve". We have overlooked that Confucius sees Heaven as interacting w i t h m a n , w h o i n responding reacts on Heaven, affects his destiny, reconstitutes the Way. Here we may recall that remarkable dictum of his, " M a n is able to enlarge the Way, it is not that the Way enlarges m a n . " This capacity to order life without appeal to the transcendent, whether as pre-existing and universally applicable moral principle, legal enactment or law of nature, is possible because he has a different conception of cosmic and social order. H a l l and A m e s distinguish 'logical' or 'rational' order imposed by transcendent principles or laws from 'aesthetic' order, of harmonious interrelations i n w h i c h Heaven and the Way are themselves involved. Confucius prefers the aesthetic order sustained by ritual, music, a n d performative naming to the order sustained by laws and punishments, w h i c h is 'rational', and w i l l i n due course be explicitly rationalised by the Legalists. One is impressed by the range of issues to w h i c h Confucius is coming to be seen as relevant. N o t that he can take all the credit for it; the relevance 30

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i n most cases is of Chinese thought i n general, the basic assumptions of which are first visible i n Confucius.

The centrality of Confucianism in Chinese civilization Confucianism is the earliest of the competing tendencies i n the thought of ancient C h i n a , a n d also the one w h i c h about 100 B . C . emerges as final and permanent victor. To see this fact i n perspective it is necessary to consider whether it may be misleading to think of Confucius as founder of a philosophical school i n direct competition w i t h others. A t the end of the age of the philosophers Ssu-ma T'an (died 110 B . C . ) classified them as the 'Six Schools', Y i n - Y a n g , Ju (Confucian), M o h i s t , Legalist, 'School of Names' (Sophist) and Taoist. A l t h o u g h most of these were no more than tendencies distinguished retrospectively, the Ju and the Mohists were undoubtedly true schools maintained through generations of teacher and disciple. There is however an important difference between the two; the Mohists are the upholders of ten specific doctrines, while the Ju are professional teachers, not primarily of ideas, but of the subjects classified by the time of the H a n as the Six Arts, ceremony, music, archery, charioteering, writing and mathematics. Their literary curriculum, w h i c h by the H a n had g r o w n into the Six Classics, consists of the basic texts of the C h o u civilization preserved i n L u , the Documents (proclamations of C h o u and pre-Chou rulers), the Songs (anthology of early C h o u verses), and the Spring and Autumn (chronicle of L u d o w n to the time of Confucius), to w h i c h came to be added the Yi (Chou manual of divination w i t h H a n appendices), the Record of Ceremony (largely H a n codifications of and discourses on traditional rituals w h i c h as long as they remained alive were probably unwritten), and the soon lost Record of Music. It is likely that the term Ju, a w o r d meaning 'soft' first applied perhaps by men w h o rule and fight to the softies w h o merely teach, was already used of professional teachers before Confucius, w h o once tells a disciple "Be a gentleman Ju, not a vulgar Ju". It is not clear how far the pre-Han Confucians were conceived as a school of thought to be ranked beside the Mohists and the rest. Thus the earliest history of the philosophers, i n the 'Below i n the Empire' chapter at the end of Chuang-tzu, probably from early i n the 2nd century B . C . , starts from M o - t z u and puts the Ju right outside, as teachers with an acknowledged social function preserving part of the ancient tradition of the Way; ' A s for what resides i n the Songs and Documents, i n ceremony and music, there are m a n y among the gentry of Tsou and L u , 34

35

32

THE BREAKDOWN OF THE WORLD ORDER DECREED BY HEAVEN

the teachers w i t h memorandum tablets i n their sashes, w h o are able to clarify i t . " H a r d l y any information survives about a teaching profession before Confucius, but we have noticed how natural it is to see his thought as springing from the preoccupations of such a profession. The rise of Confucianism might then be seen as pervasion of the class of teachers, who discover through Confucius the 'one thread' uniting the diverse disciplines w h i c h they teach. This pervasion may have been quite gradual. When i n early texts one meets w i t h the moral terminology one associates w i t h Confucianism, it is by no means to be taken for granted that it implies an allegiance to Confucius; such terms are likely to have been common to the whole class of teachers of manners and morals. Thus there is a collection of moralising discourses ascribed to Yen Y i n g , chief minister of Duke C h i n g of C h ' i (547-489 B . C . ) , the Spring and Autumn ofYen-tzu, which appears i n the bibliography of the Han History as Confucian, but has long puzzled scholars as to where to place it. The discourses are often followed by praises of Yen Ying's perspicacity ascribed to Confucius (or i n a few cases to Mo-tzu); but w h e n Yen Y i n g speaks of Confucius it is to make severe criticisms, w h i c h were taken over by the Mohists i n their antiConfucian p o l e m i c s . C h ' i was the great state i n the Shantung peninsula, and we can understand that its teachers might well resent the authority of the sage from the tiny neighbouring state of L u , and elevate their o w n Yentzu at his expense. But this resistance h a d broken d o w n by the C h ' i n and early H a n , w h e n the historian Ssu-ma C h ' i e n speaks of C h ' i and L u as the centres of C o n f u c i a n i s m . 36

37

38

39

The peculiar lasting power w h i c h enabled the Confucians to overcome their apparently stronger rivals may be traced then to their monopoly of traditional education. The difficulty i n dispensing w i t h them may be seen even i n the one great persecution they suffered, by the First Emperor. After reuniting the world i n 221 B . C . he decided to set u p inscribed stones proclaiming his glory. These could not of course publicise the ruthlessly amoral doctrines of the Legalists w h i c h had brought h i m to power; he "set up the stone, consulted w i t h the ju from L u , and inscribed it w i t h praises of the Potency i n C h ' i n . " In 219 B . C . he demanded the help of 70 Ju from C h ' i and L u i n preparing for the Imperial sacrifice to Heaven on M o u n t T'ai, but after hearing them squabble over the details of ritual dismissed them. In 213 B . C . he burned all records of the past except of his o w n state of C h ' i n , forbade private ownership of "the Songs, the Documents, and the words of the h u n d r e d schools," and ordained severe punishments for all w h o "appeal to the past to condemn the present." In 212 B . C . according to 40

41

A RADICAL REACTION: MO-TZU

33

Ssu-ma Ch'ien's history, he buried alive some 460 scholars on suspicion of sedition.* However, he never dispensed w i t h a team of 70 erudites exempted from the b a n o n possession of the classics, apparently Confucian, certainly including the notorious Confucian turncoat Shu-sun T u n g , w h o continued serving different masters d o w n to the H a n . It may be suspected that if you wanted your son to have a more than practical education you always h a d to send h i m to the Ju, however much you might grumble that they were stuffing the lad's head w i t h a lot of nonsense. The strength of the Confucians was that as preservers of the C h o u tradition they were the guardians of Chinese civilization as such. It was never quite possible to treat them as just another of the competing schools unless, like the First Emperor beginning history w i t h himself, or M a o Tsetung during the Cultural Revolution, you could contemplate razing it to the foundations to make a w h o l l y new start. O n e may add that since Confucianism roots all its general ideas i n the minute study of existing custom, arts and historical precedent, it alone held the promise of the full integration of the individual into his culture, community, and cosmos w h i c h must be part of the secret of China's social immortality.

2. A RADICAL REACTION: M O - T Z U Rational debate i n C h i n a starts w i t h the first rival of Confucius, M o T i (Mo-tzu), a n d develops i n sophistication w i t h the clash of competing schools. The book Mo-tzu, the corpus of the M o h i s t school, provides remarkably little information about its founder, not even the name of his native state. The dialogues of M o - t z u a n d disciples or opponents, curiously impersonal compared w i t h those of Confucius, throw us an occasional biographical scrap; i n one K i n g H u i of C h ' u (488-432 B . C . ) refuses to grant a n interview to a m a n of such low status, and there are others w h i c h at any rate place h i m i n the late 5th century B . C . But whether i n Mo-tzu or elsewhere the only stories told of h i m present h i m i n the role, not of teacher challenging Confucius, but of master craftsman competing w i t h a certain K u n g - s h u Pan. I n the most famous, w h i c h fills a whole chapter of Mo-tzu, he hears i n L u that K u n g - s h u Pan has invented a scaling ladder w h i c h the great state of C h ' u w i l l use to conquer the little state of Sung. H e hurries to C h ' u , demonstrates that he can counter all 1

2

* Ssu-ma Ch'ien (c. 90 B.C.) Shih chi (ch. 6) 257f, tr. Chavannes, v.2, 1761. But it is likely that the persecution of the scholars was exaggerated in Confucian legend (Bodde in Twitchett and Fairbank 95f).

34

THE BREAKDOWN OF THE WORLD ORDER DECREED BY HEAVEN

K u n g - s h u Pan's nine possibilities of attack, and w h e n threatened w i t h death replies that it w i l l be useless to k i l l h i m because 300 of his followers are already operating his engines of defence on the walls of Sung. Passing through S u n g on his return journey he is refused shelter from the rain by the warden of one of the city gates. Later legend, for w h i c h these two are the master craftsmen of their age, presents M o - t z u as inventor of a marvellous k i t e w h i c h however the M o h i s t version of the tale credits to K u n g - s h u Pan. " K u n g - s h u Pan shaved bamboo to make a kite. W h e n the kite was finished he flew it, and it d i d not come d o w n for three days. K u n g - s h u Pan thought himself supremely skilful. M o - t z u said to h i m 'The kite you made is not worth the linchpin of a wheel made by me. A piece of w o o d 3 inches long, w h i c h it takes only a moment to cut out, w i l l support a load of 50 piculs. Therefore if one's achievement is beneficial to m a n , call it 'skilful'; if it is not call it 'maladroit'." (Mo 49392-94 tr. M e i 256) It w o u l d seem then that M o - t z u was a m a n of low status, an artisan, judging by the last story a carpenter, a n d that this has something to do w i t h his most distinctive innovation, that he judges institutions not by the tradition of C h o u but b y their practical utility, b y whether like the linchpin of a wheel they are beneficial to the people. The last quarter of the book is devoted entirely to the defence of cities, a n d is full of highly technical information about military engineering. Even the Later M o h i s t Canons, a manual of disputation, repeatedly takes its examples f r o m money, prices, carpentering, rich merchants, a n d has a section defending the determination of prices by supply a n d d e m a n d . In passing from the Analects to Motzu one has the impression of descending to a lower stratum of society, without access to the h i g h culture of C h o u . The notoriously graceless style of early M o h i s t w r i t i n g , ponderous, humourless, repetitive, suggests the solemn self-educated m a n w h o writes only for practical purposes and has no opportunity to polish his style as an adviser to princes. A l t h o u g h the moral terminology of M o h i s m has m u c h i n common w i t h Confucianism one pair of Confucian terms is notable for its absence, the 'gentleman' and his opposite the 'vulgar m a n ' . 3

4

That the M o h i s t school flourished side by side w i t h the Confucian right d o w n to the beginning of the H a n a n d then vanished once and for all may have something to do w i t h the fact that i n little states centred on cities the lower strata exerted a political force w h i c h they lost w i t h the reunification of the Empire. Thus we read i n the Tso Commentary that i n 519 B.C. Prince Ch'ao of C h o u "started a rebellion w i t h the support of those among the former officials a n d the H u n d r e d Crafts w h o h a d lost their

35

A RADICAL REACTION: MO-TZU

jobs, together w i t h the descendants of Kings L i n g a n d C h i n g / ' In 477 B . C . i n Wei "the D u k e made the artisans work too long. The D u k e wished to expel Shih P ' u , but before he could do so trouble broke out, a n d on the Hsin-ssu day S h i h P ' u attacked the D u k e w i t h the support of the artisans." The evidence does not however entitle us to treat M o h i s m as the ideology of artisans as a self-conscious class. A s far as our information goes, the great agency of political change i n ancient C h i n a was not class war but the centralisation a n d bureaucratisation of states. The Mohists seem to be among the m e n from below for w h o m offices are n o w open. Such attention as they get f r o m rulers is w o n by craftsmen w h o have made themselves indispensable as military engineers, but not presumably (as Schwartz notices) b y the court artisans w h o make the luxury goods w h i c h they so vigorously denounce. It seems clear that by this period you were already of the knightly class if y o u h a d the education a n d skills to attract a ruler to employ y o u . The essay 'Elevation of Worth' i n the first of its three versions both assumes that office-holders are knights and advocates promotion to the highest offices even f r o m the peasantry and the crafts, as also does the C o n f u c i a n Hsun-tzu's ' K i n g l y S y s t e m ' . We may see the M o h i s t s as arrivistes o n the verge of or i n the knightly class, introducing fresh approaches foreign to the o l d hereditary knighthood to w h i c h most Confucians belonged. Throughout the 4th a n d 3rd centuries B . C . we meet the Mohists as a highly organised c o m m u n i t y under a G r a n d Master, w h i c h by the end of the period h a d split into three sects w h i c h denounced each other as 'heretical Mohists'. It appears f r o m the dialogue chapters of Mo-tzu that members w h o took office i n a state were expected to contribute to the funds of the organisation, a n d that if they betrayed M o h i s t principles the Grand Master could order their retirement, also that the school taught ten specific doctrines, w h i c h are those expounded i n the ten essays w h i c h are the core of the book Mo-tzu. Each essay is preserved i n three versions, w h i c h probably come f r o m the three sects into w h i c h the school divided. The three versions, although they often r u n parallel from sentence to sentence, are never identical i n phrasing, w h i c h suggests that they were written d o w n f r o m a c o m m o n oral tradition w h i c h may or may not go back to the discourses of M o - t z u himself. O f the total of 30 core chapters seven are lost and three of the shortest are not ascribed to M o - t z u . There is a great deal of textual a n d stylistic evidence that the three unattributed chapters are replacements for chapters already lost w h e n Mo-tzu assumed its present form, and that their insertion i n the w r o n g series has pushed the arrangement of the three versions askew. W h e n corrected, the series 5

6

7

8

9

10

11

36

THE BREAKDOWN OF THE WORLD ORDER DECREED BY HEAVEN

show different tendencies w h i c h may be labelled 'Purist', ' C o m p r o mising', and 'Reactionary'; we begin to understand what the Mohist sects must have been fighting over. Not ascribed to Mo-tzu Purist Compromising Elevation of Worth ch. 8 9 Conforming Upwards 11 12 Concern for Everyone 14 15 16 Rejection of Aggression 17 18 19 Thrift in Utilisation 20 21 (22) Thrift in Funerals (23) (24) 25 Heaven's Intent 26 27 Elucidating Ghosts (29) (30) 31 ? Rejection of Music 32 Rejection of Destiny 35-37 (dislocated by transpositions)*

Reactionary 10 13

28 7

Of the unattributed chapters, chapter 17 can be identified from parallels w i t h the 'Heaven's Intent' triad as a fragment of the missing conclusion of the Purist chapter 26. Until we come to consider the divisions between the sects we shall follow the Purist versions w h e n they are available.

The three tests of argument A s may be seen f r o m their names, the ten doctrines cover a varied assortment of political a n d cultural issues on w h i c h M o h i s m rejects the C h o u tradition represented b y Confucius; that some of them do touch on what we should call philosophical issues is quite incidental. Since their doctrines are new the M o h i s t s have to give reasons for them, w h i c h they lay out i n consecutive essays; this is the beginning of systematic debate i n C h i n a . It is i n Mo-tzu that we first meet the w o r d pien | ^ 'argue out alternatives', cognate w i t h pien ^ - ' d i s t i n g u i s h ' , w h i c h was to become the established term for rational discourse. It is the distinguishing of the right alternative, the one w h i c h 'is this' (shih ^_) from the w r o n g alternative, the one w h i c h 'is not' (fei ^ ). We find also i n Mo-tzu a recognition that the soundness of a thought has nothing to do w i t h w h o thinks it. * The 'Rejection of Destiny' chapters are ch. 35 Purist, ch. 36 Reactionary, ch. 37 Compromising. But ch. 35 applies the tests as presented in ch. 36 and vice versa, which may be explained by the transposition of 35/10-18 with 36/5-13; also 35/18-33 is full of special features of the Compromising chapters, so should belong to ch. 37 (G. Divisions in Early Mohism 12-16).

A RADICAL REACTION: MO-TZU

37

"Master M o - t z u i n argument (pien) w i t h Ch'eng-tzu cited Confucius. 'You are no J u / said C h ' e n g - t z u , ' w h y do you cite Confucius?' M o - t z u said T h i s is something exact for w h i c h there is no substitute.'" (48/58f, tr. M e i 238) Except w h e n casting an argument i n dialogue form the Mohists do not name the author of a thesis; they discuss it on its o w n merits. This is not at all i n the style of the Confucians, w h o expect a thinker to exemplify as well as talk about the Way. The Confucius so v i v i d l y presented i n the Analects teaches above all by being the m a n he is; M o - t z u o n the other h a n d , like most Western philosophers, is a nonentity, whose name even for his o w n school is no more than a label for his thoughts. The last of the ten essays, 'Rejection of Destiny', lays d o w n three tests by w h i c h a doctrine is to be judged. The Purist version calls them 'gnomons', after the astronomer's post of standard height for measuring the length a n d direction of the sun's shadow throughout the day. After lamenting the h a r m done by fatalists to orderly government, it proceeds: " H o w then are we to judge plainly whether the thesis of these people is the right alternative? Master M o - t z u pronounces: to assert one must establish norms. To assert without norms is comparable w i t h establishing the directions of sunrise a n d sunset f r o m on top of a rotating potter's wheel: w h i c h alternative is to be judged right or w r o n g , beneficial or harmful, cannot become plainly k n o w n . Therefore to assert one must have the Three G n o m o n s . What do we mean by the Three Gnomons? Master M o - t z u pronounces: there is f i n d i n g the assertion's root, the evidence for it, and the use of it. In what does one find the root of it? One finds it far back i n the practice of the sage kings of o l d . In what does one find the evidence for it? O n e finds it d o w n below b y scrutinising what is real for the ears and eyes of the H u n d r e d C l a n s . O n what does one use it? O n e applies it i n punishment a n d administration, a n d observes whether it coincides w i t h the benefit of the H u n d r e d Clans and people of the state. This is what is meant b y assertion having the Three Gnomons." (35/6-10, tr. W U7f) The Three Gnomons correspond to categories into w h i c h much Western t h i n k i n g falls, as i n unsophisticated argument for the existence of G o d — G o d exists because the Bible says so, because many have encountered h i m i n personal experience, and because without belief i n h i m ordered society w o u l d collapse. A t this level it is not yet thinkable that even the wisest m e n of the past may not have k n o w n , or that the belief beneficial to society might not be the one confirmed by experience. The doctrines of the ten essays are i n fact established by the Three Gnomons, although for most of them only the first a n d third are applied. The second,

38

THE BREAKDOWN OF THE WORLD ORDER DECREED BY HEAVEN

the test of common observation, is used only for questions of existence, and so for only two of the doctrines, the existence of ghosts and other spirits and the non-existence of Destiny. A l t h o u g h there is some doubt as to how widely the term H u n d r e d Clans (pai hsing Hf-££ ) extends at this period, i n Mo-tzu it already covers the whole people. A s for the existence of ghosts of the dead and the gods of mountains and rivers, those w h o deny their existence are easily refuted by appeal to the many indubitable records of people w h o have seen and heard them. The stories, no doubt transcribed verbatim from livelier writers, make a welcome interlude i n the heavy-handed M o h i s t expositions. "If you want something w h i c h the multitude all saw or heard about, such a case as the Earl of Tu is a past example. K i n g H s i i a n of C h o u killed his minister the Earl of Tu w h o was guiltless. The Earl of Tu said ' M y lord kills me though guiltless. If y o u think the dead have no knowledge, so much for that; if the dead do have knowledge, w i t h i n three years be sure that I shall make m y lord k n o w it'. Three years later K i n g H s i i a n gathered the lords of the states to hunt i n F u . H u n d r e d s of hunting chariots, thousands of attendants, filled the moors. A t noon the Earl of Tu i n an unpainted chariot d r a w n by a white horse, i n a red coat and cap, w i t h a red bow i n his h a n d , w i t h red arrows under his a r m , chased K i n g H s i i a n and shot at h i m u p i n the chariot. H i t right i n the heart and sagging at the spine he collapsed inside the chariot, sprawled over his bowcase and died. A t this time there was none of the attendants of C h o u who d i d not see it, no one farther away w h o d i d not hear of it, and it is o n record i n the annals of C h o u . " (31714-19, tr. W 95f) But we f i n d no such confirmation of the existence of Destiny. " W h e n it comes to h o w we k n o w whether Destiny exists or not, we know it by what is fact for the ears and eyes of the multitude. If someone has heard it, has seen it, one says that it exists; if no one has heard it, has seen it, one says that it does not. But w h y not try investigating it by what is fact to the H u n d r e d Clans? From of old u p to now, since the people first originated, has there ever been anyone w h o saw the thing Destiny, heard the voice of Destiny? There never has been." (36/5-7 tr. M e i 189) O n the eight issues for w h i c h questions of existence do not arise the Mohist arguments divide between the first a n d third tests, between proofs that the doctrines descend f r o m , are 'rooted' i n , the practice of the wisest kings of o l d , and that the results are beneficial to all. A s critics of the C h o u tradition the M o h i s t s take their sage kings indifferently f r o m the founders of all the Three Dynasties (Hsia, Shang, Chou) and the pre-dynastic Yao and Shun. The appeal (but only i n the Purist versions) is to the authority

39

A RADICAL REACTION: MO-TZU

not of antiquity but of w i s d o m , not to 'the former kings' but to 'the sage kings of o l d ' . Three Purist essays i n fact start b y saying that the government of the "kings, dukes and great men of o l d " led to poverty, underpopulation and disorder until the principles of 'Elevation of Worth', 'Rejection of Aggression' and 'Rejection of Destiny' came to be recogn i s e d . * The assumption, unquestioned throughout the core chapters, is that the problems of government are unchanging, and therefore that solutions if correct w i l l already have been k n o w n to the wisest men of the past. Elsewhere i n Mo-tzu however innovation is explicitly upheld. "They (the Ju) say too: "The gentleman follows and does not originate.' We answer: i n ancient times Y i originated the bow, C h u armour, H s i C h u n g the carriage, C h ' i a o C h ' u i the boat. Does it follow that the armourers and wheelwrights of today are all gentlemen, and the four originators all vulgar men? Moreover whatever they now follow someone must have originated, so everything they follow is the Way of the vulgar man." (39/19f, tr. W128) 12

The criticism of traditional practice by the utilitarian test The first a n d third tests, agreement w i t h the practice of the sage kings and practical results, interact i n M o h i s t thought. You distinguish the sage kings f r o m the tyrants b y whether their policies proved beneficial or harmful i n practice; you adopt a new course for its practical effects and then search history for confirmation that the sage kings d i d the same; and you put your o w n thoughts i n the mouths of those y o u identify as sages, k n o w i n g that since the thought is right the sage w o u l d have shared it. This implies that the t h i r d , the utilitarian test, outweighs any ancient authority w h i c h can be cited on the other side. For the Mohists, it provides a principle b y w h i c h to judge all traditional morality. Thus Confucian filial piety imposed a n extraordinarily long and severe period of mourning, for a father three years (in practice 25 months). It is seen by Confucians as a duty w h i c h the filial son w i l l perform without counting the cost; to raise utilitarian objections simply shows you are not a gentleman. The M o h i s t T h r i f t i n Funerals' concedes that supporters and critics of extravagant funerals and prolonged m o u r n i n g "Both say 'We are the ones who are 13

*Commentators and translators (including both Watson and Mei, W 18, 117: Mei 30,101, 182) have found this so surprising that they emend ku "^JT 'ancient times' to chin authority.

'now' without textual

40

THE BREAKDOWN OF THE WORLD ORDER DECREED BY HEAVEN

handing d o w n from our ancestors the Way of Yao, S h u n , Y u , T'ang, Wen and W u " , proposes to "observe what happens if y o u try them out i n turn i n governing the m y r i a d people of the state", and proceeds to show that mourning practices w h i c h interrupt work a n d injure health contribute to impoverishing the people a n d weakening the defences of the state. The utilitarian principle is presented as nothing less than the final criterion of whether action is moral or immoral. "If elaborate funerals a n d prolonged m o u r n i n g can really enrich the poor, increase population, secure the endangered and order the disordered, they are benevolence, the right, the service of a filial son" (25/12-15 tr. W 66). If however they do not, "they are not benevolence, not the right, not the service of a filial son." The utilitarian principle is seen as 'transcendent' as defined by H a l l and A m e s , detached from all custom, w h i c h loses its authority w h e n seen to vary f r o m one society to another. "The upholders today of elaborate funerals a n d prolonged mourning pronounce: 'If really these are not the Way of the sage kings, how to explain w h y the gentlemen of the central states perform them without fail, cling to them instead of d o i n g away w i t h them?' Master M o - t z u says: this is what one calls getting used to the familiar and taking the customary for the right. Formerly east of Y i i e h there was the country of Shai-shu; at the birth of the first son they dismembered and ate h i m , calling it an obligation to his younger brothers. W h e n a grandfather d i e d they carried away the grandmother and abandoned her, saying 'It is impermissible to live w i t h the wife of a ghost'. This was recognised policy above and recognised custom below, performed without fail, clung to instead of done away w i t h ; but is it really the Way of the benevolent and the right?" (25/74-78, tr. W 75) This piece of social anthropology continues w i t h two more tribes w h i c h think it filial for the son to expose his father's body to rot and then bury the bones, or to b u r n the body on a pyre and say his father is ascending w i t h the smoke. Valuation by utility is taken to the extreme of refusal to recognise anything as valuable i n itself; this is a utilitarianism w h i c h never raises the question 'Useful for what?'. This attracts attention especially i n criticisms of the Confucian elevation of music. The Mohists have little to say about the other great civilizing influence, ceremony, except to reproach C o n f u cians for " m u l t i p l y i n g a n d elaborating ceremonies and m u s i c " but 'Rejection of M u s i c ' is one of their ten doctrines. The essay under this title is a prolonged assault o n the great state orchestras, as a reckless waste of resources w h i c h should be used for the benefit of the people. The word 14

15

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41

yiieh Ifc 'music' is written w i t h the same graph as lo 'joy' and i n spite of the divergence of pronunciation was originally the same word; Confucians had the habit of saying ' M u s i c is j o y ' . The M o h i s t essay acknowledges that music is enjoyable, but dismisses this as an irrelevance; what matters is that it fails the first a n d third tests, "does not coincide w i t h the practice of the sage kings long ago", nor w i t h "the benefit of the myriads of the people below." The assumption that there can be no good reason (ku $k.) for an activity except its usefulness shows u p startlingly i n one of the M o - t z u dialogues, i n w h i c h a Confucian appeals to the k i n s h i p of the two words written w i t h the same graph. " M o - t z u asked a Ju 'For what reason does one make music?' ' M u s i c is deemed a joy.' 'You have not answered me. Suppose I ask "For what reason does one make houses?" a n d y o u say "To shelter i n them f r o m cold i n winter and heat i n summer; a n d it is i n the house that one keeps m e n and women separate," then y o u have told me the reason for m a k i n g houses. N o w I ask "For what reason does one make music?", and y o u said " M u s i c is deemed a joy (= entertainment is deemed an entertaining)"; this is as though I said "For what reason does one make houses?" a n d y o u said " A house is deemed a h o u s e " . ' " (48/46-49, tr. M e i 237) The attack o n the extravagance of courts is generalised i n 'Thrift i n Expenditure', w h i c h demands a life reduced to the bare necessities even for rulers. Here, as i n "Thrift i n Funerals' and 'Rejection of M u s i c ' , one seems to recognise the outlook of m e n w h o have risen from below by thrifty habits, and see i n the h i g h culture of the courts only waste and extravagance. O n e can understand w h y for the Confucian Mencius the very w o r d li ^'J 'benefit' has been so soiled by M o h i s t and later by Yangist calculations of benefit a n d h a r m that one can hardly translate h i m coherently without switching the English equivalent to 'profit'. 16

17

The unifying principle of morality The M o h i s t calculations of benefit a n d h a r m are on behalf of a l l , guided b y the principle of ' C o n c e r n for Everyone' (chien ai ^ ). The most popular English equivalent is 'universal love', w h i c h is convenient but rather misleading; it is both too vague (chien implies 'for each' rather than 'for a l l ' ) a n d too w a r m (the M o h i s t ai is a n unemotional w i l l to benefit people a n d dislike of h a r m i n g them). The Mohists were dour people whose ears were open to the demands of justice rather than to the appeal of love. W h e n K i n g H u i of C h ' i n (324-311 B.C.) refused to execute 18

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for murder the son of the G r a n d Master F u Tun, he replied, "By the law of the Mohists whoever kills a m a n suffers death, whoever wounds a man suffers mutilation. This is h o w one deters killing a n d w o u n d i n g . " H e executed his son himself. The case for 'Concern for Everyone' is a good example of the heavy, repetitious development of the very earliest organised arguments i n Chinese literature. It proceeds b y a series of questions. (1) "What is beneficial to the w o r l d , what is harmful?", answered by listing six harms: "states attacking each other, families dispossessing each other, people robbing each other, ruler or minister not gracious or loyal, father or son not compassionate or filial, discord between elder a n d younger brother." (2) "Then o n examination f r o m what do these harms spring?", answered by "They spring from lack of mutual concern." States attack each other because "today the lord of a state knows concern for his o w n state but not for another's state," a n d correspondingly for the rest of the first three harms. Then it proceeds through the full list of six, r u n n i n g from "Therefore if lords of states lack mutual concern they are sure to go to war" to "If elder and younger brother lack mutual concern there w i l l be discord between them," a n d concludes "In all cases the reason w h y the world's calamities, dispossessions, resentments a n d hates arise is lack of mutual concern. This is w h y the benevolent reject it." (3) " H a v i n g rejected it, w i t h what do we replace it?" answered b y "Replace it by the standard of concern of each for everyone and mutual benefit." (4) " H o w then do we act o n the standard?" The answer is that on all levels (state, family, person) each is to have as m u c h concern for another as for himself. "Regard another's state as you regard your o w n , another's family as you regard your o w n , another's person as you regard your o w n . So if the lords of states are concerned for each other they w i l l not go to war . . . " (15/11-15, tr. M e i 82) It continues of course w i t h the rest of the eight harms, and concludes: "In all cases, that the world's calamities, dispossessions, resentments and hates can be prevented from arising springs f r o m mutual concern." Mo-tzu's 'Concern for Everyone' evidently derives from the 'one thread' of Confucius. But Confucius conceived it as a guideline through the variegated web of ritual obligations, while M o - t z u abstracts it as a transcendent principle b y w h i c h the obligations themselves are to be l o d g e d . 'Concern for Everyone' is a concern for each person irrespective of 19

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relations of k i n s h i p w i t h oneself. It is this relentless driving of a principle to its logical conclusion w h i c h gives M o h i s m its appearance of being foreign, not merely to C o n f u c i a n t h i n k i n g , but to the whole of Chinese civilization as i n these few centuries it assumes its lasting shape. N o one else finds it tolerable to insist that y o u should be as concerned for the other man's family as for your o w n . The doctrine i n any case involved a complication, not clarified until the refinement of the ethical system by the Later Mohists; although concern for others should be equal, irrespective of kinship, it is to the benefit of all that each should include among his duties the care of his o w n k i n . ' C o n c e r n for Everyone' is a principle of moral but not social equality. This issue comes u p i n an exchange between the Confucian M e n c i u s a n d the M o h i s t Y i - t z u . Mencius, as evidence that impulses to good belong to h u m a n nature, h a d taken the case of a child about to fall into a well; anyone whether k i n or not w i l l be shocked and r u n to h e l p . Y i - t z u takes this to i m p l y that concern for a child is independent of kinship although each child is i n the care of its o w n family; moreover the same w i l l apply to the ruler's concern for the people, w h i c h i n the words of one of the C h o u Documents is "as though protecting a baby." " Y i - t z u said: 'According to the Way of the Ju, the men of old were "as though protecting a baby". What does this saying mean? A s for us, we think that there are no degrees of concern, but the application starts from the nearer.'" H s u - t z u told M e n c i u s about it. "Does Yi-tzu truly t h i n k , " said Mencius, "that a m a n sees his elder brother's son as near to h i m i n the same way as a neighbour's baby is near to him? H e is taking advantage of a special instance: w h e n the baby is crawling towards the well it is not its own fault. Moreover w h e n Heaven generates a thing it causes it to be from a single root, but Yi-tzu's case has two roots." Yi-tzu's two 'roots' are the principles w h i c h Mencius sees as incompatible, equal concern for all and special care of one's o w n k i n . The most direct application of 'Concern for Everyone' is i n the doctrine of 'Rejection of Aggression'. It w i l l be remembered that "states attacking each other" was the first of the six harms w h i c h are eliminated by mutual concern. The case against aggressive war is built u p by a meticulous weighing of benefit a n d h a r m , i n the first place to the aggressor, i n the second place to all. War interferes w i t h sowing and harvesting, kills countless numbers i n battle or famine, wastes quantities of weapons and horses, leaves the ghosts of ancestors w i t h no one to sacrifice to them. W h y then go to war? K i n g s say, "We covet the glory of conquest and the benefit we get from i t . " The M o h i s t , for w h o m glory has no practical use, 20

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replies: "If you consider the motive for conquest, it can be put to no use; if you consider his gains, they are less than his losses." The capture of a small city may cost tens of thousands of m e n , a serious matter i n an age w h e n generally underpopulated states competed to attract migrants to their undeveloped lands. " O f lands there is a surplus, of the king's subjects a shortage. N o w if y o u expend the lives of the king's subjects, and aggravate misery both above and below, to fight over an empty city, this is to throw away something y o u are short of for something you have more than enough of." But what of the great states, C h ' u and Y i i e h i n the south, C h i n and C h ' i i n the north, w h i c h have most certainly gained by swallowing the smaller? The objection to that is that the benefit to a few is at the expense of harm to the many. " E v e n if i n four or five cases states have gained benefit from it one still calls it failure to practice the Way." It is as though a physician h a d a medicine w h i c h cured four or five men i n 10,000: "one w o u l d still call it failure to practice medicine." Examples follow of states ruined by war, "former ones of w h i c h we have heard w i t h our ears and recent ones we have seen w i t h our o w n eyes." In an age w h e n authorship and date are so often i n doubt one is grateful to notice that all the instances lie between 473 and 431 B . C . , coming d o w n to the time of M o - t z u himself. The Purist series is remarkable, i n this essay and elsewhere, i n never mentioning defensive war, or the wars by w h i c h the sage kings overthrew the tyrants w h o m they replaced. O n e is tempted to suspect that M o - t z u himself was a pure pacifist, a n d that he supposed that the sage kings came peacefully to power w h e n the people went over to them f r o m the tyrants. However, if that is so the M o h i s t school must have changed course very early i n its history. The Mohists of the next century still oppose aggression, but not only advocate but specialise i n defensive war. The story of M o - t z u coming to the relief of S u n g is, as we noticed at the beginning of this chapter, the only substantial fact or legend told about h i m . One of the M o h i s t G r a n d Masters, M e n g Sheng, contracted w i t h the L o r d of Yang-ch'eng i n C h ' u to defend his city. In 381 B . C . the L o r d of Yang-ch'eng was condemned to death, presenting the G r a n d Master w i t h the choice of betraying h i m or sacrificing all the Mohists i n C h ' u i n a hopeless fight. W h e n reproached for being ready to "let M o h i s m die out from the w o r l d " he replied "I am not only the L o r d of Yang-ch'eng's teacher but his f r i e n d , not only his friend but his vassal. If I do not die for h i m , certainly no one w i l l ever again look for a reverend teacher, worthy friend or loyal vassal among the M o h i s t s . It is by d y i n g for h i m that I shall do the d u t y of a M o h i s t a n d pass on our tradition." After sending two

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emissaries to convey the succession to a M o h i s t of S u n g he fought to the death w i t h his 83 disciples. The two emissaries, against the orders of the new G r a n d Master, returned f r o m S u n g to die w i t h t h e m . 24

The centralisation and bureaucratisation of the state The political ideal of M o h i s m appears i n the doctrines of 'Elevation of Worth' a n d ' C o n f o r m i n g U p w a r d ' . While the Confucians at first resisted the tendency of the times towards centralised a n d bureaucratised states with increasing social mobility, the Mohists welcomed it. Mencius still favours hereditary offices, w i t h promotion f r o m below as an exceptional measure; it is not u n t i l the 3rd century that we find a Confucian, H s u n tzu, u s i n g without reservations the M o h i s t slogan 'Elevate worth and employ ability'. The egalitarian implications of 'Concern for Everyone' d i d not lead the M o h i s t i n the direction of democracy; like the rest of the philosophers he assumes that government, if one has to have it at all, must be from above. If we think of M o h i s m as springing f r o m a class to some extent comparable w i t h the merchant class of Renaissance Europe (and there is indeed a strong flavour of 'the Protestant ethic and the spirit of capitalism' about the whole movement), the comparison is w i t h the stage i n the 15th a n d 16th centuries w h e n the m i d d l e classes of Spain, France and England welcomed absolute monarchy as defending them against local magnates a n d affording new opportunities to rise i n the w o r l d . The Mohist, like the Confucian, seeks audience w i t h princes and hopes to be appointed to h i g h office. H i s egalitarianism is expressed, i n the Purist version, i n the demand for a pure meritocracy exemplified by the sage kings. " E v e n among peasants, or among craftsmen and traders, if someone had ability they appointed h i m , a n d gave h i m a h i g h title, ample salary, full responsibility for the w o r k a n d full power to command." (8/17f tr. W 20) "Therefore no one i n office was irreversibly noble, no one among the people was irrevocably base; if someone h a d ability they appointed h i m , if not, degraded h i m . " (8/20 tr. W 20f) In ' C o n f o r m i n g U p w a r d ' the purpose of government is seen as "the u n i f y i n g of morality (yi ) throughout the w o r l d " . Yi is the w o r d cognate with yi 'fitting' w h i c h we have elsewhere translated 'the right'. It is the fitting thing to do i n relation to parents, rulers, and also to self; thus it is yi to fight to the death w h e n i n s u l t e d . The primitive war of all against all before the origin of the state is seen b y the M o h i s t not (as for example by 25

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the Confucian H s u n - t z u ) i n terms of conflicting desires but of conflicting moralities. Individuals compete, but whether for themselves or for family or lord seems not to enter the argument. "In ancient times w h e n the people originated, i n the period before there was punishment and administration, the saying went: 'Everyone i n the world has a different morality'. Hence for one m a n there was one morality, for two m e n two, for ten m e n ten; w i t h the multiplication of men what they called morality multiplied too. Consequently a m a n judged his o w n morality to be morality and other men's not, so they all judged each other immoral. Hence w i t h i n the family father a n d son, elder brother and younger, fell into resentment a n d hatred, became alienated and incapable of co-operating harmoniously. The H u n d r e d Clans throughout the world all by water, fire and poison deprived a n d injured each other, even having excess of strength were incapable of w o r k i n g for each other, left excess resources to rot a n d refused to share them w i t h each other, concealed the proper Way and refused to teach it to each other. Throughout the world they were as disordered as the beasts and birds. "It was clear that the reason w h y everywhere under Heaven there was disorder derived f r o m having no head of government. Therefore they chose the worthiest a n d most acceptable m a n under Heaven and established h i m as Son of Heaven." (11/1-6, tr. W 34f) This reminds one of Western theories of the primal Social Contract; there is however no contractual exchange of liberty for the benefits of government, and no emphasis on the people as a whole choosing the ruler. The Emperor, f i n d i n g the w o r l d too big to govern, proceeds to appoint Councillors. Emperor a n d Councillors then appoint the lords of the 10,000 fiefs or states, w h o i n t u r n appoint heads at lower levels. A s s u m i n g then that everyone 'conforms u p w a r d ' instead of 'allying w i t h others below', and the Emperor himself practices the concern for and benefiting of all w h i c h is conforming to his only superior, Heaven itself, morality w i l l be both unified and perfected throughout the world. But what if the superiors to w h o m one conforms are themselves immoral? The hierarchy consists, i n the Purist version, of Emperor, lords of states, district heads, a n d village heads, by-passing all kinship groups. The Emperor by rewards and punishments enforces on all the injunction, "If there are errors above, criticise them; if there are good men below, recommend them." To start at the bottom, the village head announces to the H u n d r e d Clans: "If y o u hear of something good or b a d , be sure to report it to the district head. What the district head judges right or w r o n g , be sure you all judge

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right or w r o n g . If you discard your bad tenets and practices and learn the district head's good tenets and practices, how w o u l d the district be disorderly? Consider w h y the district is orderly; it is the district head w h o is able to u n i f y the morality of the district, that is w h y it is orderly." (11/13— 16, tr. W 3 6 ) Similarly the H u n d r e d Clans of a district are required to report on its administration to the lord of the state, and of a state to the Emperor himself. A n aciministrator demands conformity not to himself but to the level above h i m . There remains the problem of what to do if the rottenness is at the very top. The C h o u themselves, by justifying their overthrow of the Shang o n the grounds that Heaven abandons the tyrant, had established a precedent to w h i c h new dynasties continued to appeal throughout Imperial history. The Purist version concludes: "If the H u n d r e d Clans everywhere under Heaven conform u p w a r d to the Son of Heaven but not to Heaven, calamity w i l l still not be escaped. N o w if w h i r l w i n d s and rainstorms come over and over again, this is how Heaven punishes the H u n d r e d Clans for not conforming u p w a r d to Heaven." (11/22-24, tr. W37). The implication, although not spelled out, must be that the people should shift their allegiance to a claimant to the throne w h o does display concern for everyone. The people of the village conform not to the village but to the district head, and so o n upwards stage b y stage; the people of the Empire should therefore conform not to the Emperor but to Heaven.

Heaven, spirits and Destiny That the Mohists came from a lower social stratum than other schools is again suggested by their uniqueness i n maintaining, side by side w i t h incisive criticism of traditional values, a belief i n rewarding and punishing divinities w h i c h belongs rather to folk religion. The tendency throughout the classical age is to ignore the spirits of the dead and of the mountains and rivers after paying them their customary respects, and to regard Heaven as an impersonal power responsible for everything outside human control, i n c l u d i n g the undeserved misfortune to w h i c h you resign yourself as your destiny. This trend of the times is intolerable to the otherwise forward-looking Mohists. "The Ju think that Heaven is unseeing and the ghosts are not daimonic. Heaven and the ghosts are displeased; this is enough to bring ruin to the w o r l d . " (48/50f tr. M e i 237)

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" K u n g - m e n g - t z u said: ' G o d s and ghosts do not exist/ and also said 'The gentleman must learn the sacrificial ceremonies.' 'To maintain that ghosts do not exist yet learn the sacrificial ceremonies,' said Master M o tzu, 'is like learning the ceremonies for guests though there are no guests, making a fishnet though there are no f i s h . ' " (48/40-42 tr. M e i 236) It is not however that i n matters of religion the Mohist reveals an unexpected vein of conservatism. Confucians could pay Heaven and the spirits their respects, without much caring whether Heaven is a personal being and the spirits exist, because theirs is an aristocratic code backed by shame rather than guilt. The conduct w h i c h the noble owes to his selfrespect, whether i n C h i n a or i n Europe, does not have to be backed by promises or threats f r o m above, may even defy them (Catholic nobilities i n Europe observed their codes of duelling and courtly love at the risk of their souls). But the Mohist's ethic, precisely because it is new, requires another sanction than self-respect and the respect of peers; he is driven i n the same direction as the great Middle-Eastern religions, with their universal moralities ordained by a personal G o d w h o w i l l judge the mighty as they deserve. The function of Heaven and the spirits i n the Mohist scheme is to enforce the true morality by reward and punishment, and correct or compensate for the world's injustices. But there is little evidence of a spiritual dimension deeper than a guilty fear of ghosts. The Mohists are i n a sense less religious than some they w o u l d denounce as sceptics. The awe and resignation w i t h w h i c h thinkers as far apart as Confucius and Chuang-tzu accept the decree of Heaven has much more of the sense of the holy than anything i n Mo-tzu. The essay 'Heaven's Intent' fully personifies Heaven, crediting it with seeing everything below, w i t h desire and dislike, intent and thought. It starts by accusing gentlemen throughout the w o r l d of the inconsistency of fearing blame from the head of family or state, f r o m w h o m one could flee to another family or state, yet ignoring Heaven, w h o sees and rules everywhere. The argument once again proceeds by questions. (1) "What then does Heaven desire and dislike? Heaven desires us to do the right and dislikes us doing w r o n g . " So if we behave morally we do what Heaven desires; and "if we do what Heaven desires, Heaven will likewise do what we desire." (2) "What then do we desire and dislike? We desire fortune and prosperity, dislike misfortune and r u i n . " (3) " H o w then do we k n o w that Heaven desires us to do the right and dislikes us doing wrong? W h e n there is rightdoing i n the world we live, without it we die; w i t h it we are rich, without it poor; w i t h it we are

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orderly, without it disorderly." It follows that "Those w h o accord w i t h Heaven's thought are concerned for each one of each other, reciprocate by benefiting each other and are sure to be rewarded; those w h o go counter to Heaven's thought hate each other separately, reciprocate by plundering each other, and are sure to be punished." (4) " W h o then has been rewarded for according with Heaven's thought?" Answer, the sage founders of the Three Dynasties. " W h o was punished for going counter to Heaven's thought?" Answer, the tyrants Chieh and C h o u , Y u and L i . "Master M o - t z u pronounces: by way of illustration, we have Heaven's Intent as the wheelwright has the compasses and the carpenter the L-square. Wheelwrights a n d carpenters take u p compasses and L-square to measure the r o u n d and the square throughout the w o r l d , and say 'What coincides is this, what does not coincide is n o t . ' " (26/41f tr. M e i 140) A l t h o u g h they believe i n the survival of consciousness after death the Mohists do not speak of being compensated for injustice i n this world by reward i n the next. The dead are themselves one of the agencies w h i c h reward and p u n i s h o n earth. It may occur to one to ask w h y the Mohist takes it as a simple fact that good and bad do get requited i n this world, a fact so obvious that after the crucial third question i n 'Heaven's Intent' it is used as the proof that what Heaven desires is that men should do the right. The answer is perhaps that he is drinking primarily of the collective effect of moral behaviour leading to a healthy, wealthy, and orderly society. Since he thinks i n terms of the community a n d its ruler rather than of individuals, the justice of the universal order w o u l d not require an absolute justice for each person. "Master M o - t z u fell i l l . T i e h P i came forward and inquired 'You claim, sir, that the gods and ghosts are clear-seeing and able to bring blessings or disaster; the good they reward, the bad they punish. N o w y o u , sir, being a sage, w h y have y o u fallen ill? Would it be that something i n your doctrine is bad or that the gods and ghosts do not clearly know?' 'Even if I do fall i l l , ' said Master M o - t z u , ' w h y conclude that the gods and ghosts are not clear-seeing? There are many directions from w h i c h illness can come to a m a n . It can happen from heat a n d cold, it can happen from overwork. It is as though of a h u n d r e d doors one has shut a single one; w h y be surprised if thieves find a way i n ? ' " (48/76-79, tr. M e i 240) In the immediately preceding dialogue however a disciple w h o objects that i n spite of following the Master he is as poor as ever is told that he cannot be as righteous as he supposes. Even o n the individual level, the

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Mohists certainly think it morally more stimulating to ascribe misfortune to one's o w n w r o n g d o i n g than to lament one's fate. To the extent that the Mohists acknowledge imperfection i n Heaven's justice to individuals, they differ f r o m Confucians only i n degree. O n the widest scale, i n the rise and fall of dynasties, Confucians too assume that Heaven takes the side of the good. The difference between them derives from the Mohist's utilitarianism. The Confucian thinks of the right as done for its o w n sake, and frees himself f r o m the temptation to do w r o n g for the sake of gain by saying that wealth and poverty, long life and early death, are decreed for h i m b y Heaven and outside his control. H e can therefore act rightly w i t h an untroubled m i n d , leaving the consequences to Heaven. For the M o h i s t o n the other h a n d , j u d g i n g all conduct i n terms of benefit and h a r m , there can be no meaning i n a morality detached from consequences. H e is i n a position to discard the fiction that material welfare is unaffected by h o w one acts, and he sees a fatalism w h i c h clings to it as not encouraging but u n d e r m i n i n g morality. A t the same time he is driven i n the direction of another moralising fiction, that if you behave rightly you can be sure of your reward. In ordinary discourse the ming 'decree' of T'ien-ming 'Decree of Heaven' (which as Heaven's mandate to a dynasty is commonly translated 'Mandate of Heaven') h a d come to be used alone i n the sense of 'Destiny'. The M o h i s t , as we have n o t i c e d , actually argues for the non-existence of a thing called Destiny, on the grounds that no one has ever seen or heard it. H i s crucial objection however is to the practical effects of fatalism. Fatalism is one of the reasons w h y i n ancient times before the sage kings the 'kings, dukes and great men' failed to make the people rich, numerous, and orderly. "The fatalists pronounced: 'If destined to be rich we shall be rich, to be poor poor; if destined to be numerous we shall be numerous, to be few few; if destined to be orderly we shall be orderly, to be disorderly disorderly; if destined to live long we shall live long, to die young die young. What advantage is there i n m a k i n g efforts?" (35/3f, tr. W117) " H o w then do we k n o w that fatalism is the Way of the tyrants? Formerly the poor people of past ages were greedy for food and drink and idle i n doing their work, so that resources of food and clothing were insufficient and worries about cold and hunger came to them. They didn't know h o w to say T haven't tried hard enough, have lagged at work', they were sure to say 'It is m y inevitable destiny that I shall be poor'. Formerly the tyrant kings of past ages d i d not restrain the indulgences of eye and ear and the vicious intents of their hearts, w o u l d not take advice from near or 26

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far k i n , a n d so lost the throne a n d overturned the altars of the state; they d i d not say T haven't tried hard enough, I have governed badly', they were sure to say 'It was m y inevitable destiny to lose i t . ' " (35/36-39 tr. W122)

Divisions in the Mohist school The account of M o - t z u i n the 'Below i n the Empire' chapter of Chuangtzu mentions fierce arguments between factions w h i c h called each other 'heretical M o h i s t s ' . H a n Fei late i n the 3rd century B . C . also mentions that the school h a d split into three sects, f r o m w h i c h the three versions of the core chapters may be presumed to have c o m e . W h e n these are disentangled it can be seen that the 'Purist' series is designed to defend Mohist doctrine against rival thinkers w h o reject 'Concern for Everyone', support fatalism, or fail to recognise the Son of Heaven as himself a subject of Heaven, w h i l e the 'compromising' is aimed at 'kings, dukes, great men, knights a n d gentlemen' w h o might adopt M o h i s m as the ideology of the state. Evidently the issue over w h i c h the sects fought was the perennial one of doctrinal p u r i t y or accommodation to political realities. 'Below i n the Empire' mentions one of the competing factions as the 'Mohists of the South', among w h o m is counted a certain Teng-ling-tzu named b y H a n Fei as leader of one of the three sects. It w o u l d be especially difficult to maintain the p u r i t y of ideals i n m o v i n g f r o m the advanced N o r t h to the relatively backward South, where the great state of C h ' u was the last to cling to the principle of hereditary office.* Once i n the 'Reactionary' series there is a comparison of Heaven to the ruler of a state w h i c h takes as example the kings of the biggest Southern states, C h ' u a n d Y u e h , suggesting that this series does come f r o m the South. 27

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30

Accommodation, as might be expected, is greatest on the politically sensitive doctrines. O n 'Elevation of Worth' the Compromiser does not mention promotion of peasants, craftsmen, and traders, and is not explicit that appointment is to depend solely o n merit; the Reactionary dilutes the doctrine to the d e m a n d that those appointed be "not necessarily blood relations of kings, dukes a n d great m e n , enriched and ennobled without reason, or handsome of face." O n ' C o n f o r m i n g U p w a r d ' , the C o m p r o miser does have the chief at each level calling on the people to conform to 31

* Hsu 98 cf. 45-47. The generalisation that the political development of the South was backward is subject to the qualification that Ch'u was ahead of other states in putting conquered territories under appointed administrators instead of dividing them up into hereditary fiefs. But even these posts "were generally filled by sons of rulers or other nobles." (Hsu 93).

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the level above himself, but omits the crucial point that they also send up reports over his head; the Reactionary reverts from a bureaucratic to a completely feudal hierarchy of Emperor, rulers of states, and 'lords of families', w i t h each demanding conformity not to his o w n superior but to himself. A s for the difficult question of what to do if the Emperor himself is failing to conform to Heaven, the Compromiser simply says that he should reform his government, the Reactionary does not envisage his possible corruption at all. The Reactionary version of 'Rejection of Aggression' is lost, but the Compromiser not only differs f r o m the Purist i n acclaiming defensive war and the wars of the sage kings against the tyrants, he unobtrusively allows the just aggression, repeatedly describing the wellgoverned state as strong enough to "defend itself at home" and "go punishing a b r o a d " . Of especial interest is a change of attitude towards antiquity. The Purist certified his doctrines as those of the sage kings b y proving them, on utilitarian grounds, to be the wisest, not by historical evidence that they held them. H e is not far f r o m the practice w h i c h b y 300 B . C . h a d become normal, of putting one's words i n the mouths of traditional or frankly imaginary sages as a pure convention w i t h w h i c h rival thinkers do not quarrel. But i n the other two series the appeal to antiquity is w h o l l y serious and requires heavy documentation. The Compromiser says of Concern for Everyone: " H o w do we k n o w that the former sage Six Kings personally practiced it? Master M o - t z u says: It is not that I was alive i n their time and personally heard their voices, saw their faces; I k n o w it b y what they wrote on bamboo and silk, inscribed on metal a n d stone, carved on vessels, to pass d o w n to their descendants of future generations." (16/49f tr. W 44) H e proceeds to quote three of the Documents, one for each of the Three Dynasties, and one of the C h o u Songs. H e and the Reactionary constantly insist that the 'former kings' (a phrase stressing antiquity rather than w i s d o m , not used b y the Purist) judged their principles so important that they wrote them on bamboo a n d silk, inscribed them o n metal and stone, and they back the claim w i t h ample quotations very m u c h i n the manner of Protestant sectaries citing Scripture. There are scarcely any of these quotations i n the Purist series, and no emphasis o n their authority. For the Compromiser this text-hunting was perhaps no more than a tactical measure, to have an answer ready for Hteral-minded kings, dukes and great men, for he leaves untouched the 'Three Standards' (the Purist's Three Gnomons). The Reactionary however actually replaces the second of them ("the ears a n d eyes of the H u n d r e d Clans") by "the writings of the 32

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former kings". H e also expands the first test ("the practice of the sage kings") to "the intent of Heaven and the ghosts and the practice of the sage kings". To elevate the w i l l of Heaven and the spirits from the tested to one of the tests seems to i m p l y independent access to it, possibly through the shamans so influential i n the culture of C h ' u . We can well understand w h y the M o h i s t sects disputed so fiercely. It would seem to the Purist that out of eagerness for political power the true teaching of M o - t z u had been shamefully diluted by the Compromiser and utterly betrayed by the Reactionary. 3 3

3. RETREAT TO PRIVATE LIFE: THE YANGISTS The Analects has several stories of Confucius meeting hermits w h o refuse to contribute to good government by taking office. These may be later dramatisations of an issue w h i c h had not yet arisen i n Confucius' time, but a shirking of what for Confucians, Mohists, and later for Legalists is the responsibility of all w h o are of the knightly class is increasingly common from at latest the 4th century B . C . Two tendencies to withdrawal from politics to private life are discernible throughout the age of the philosophers. O n the one hand we have the moralistic hermit w h o retires to plough his o w n fields i n protest against the corruption of the times, and clings to his principles even if the price is starvation or suicide. O n the other we have the m a n w h o simply prefers the comforts of private life to the burdens and perils of the increasingly murderous struggle for power and possessions. A syncretistic writer i n Chuang-tzu classifying five ways of life damaging to good government sharply distinguishes the two types, as his second and fourth categories. "To have finicky ideas and superior conduct, to be estranged from the age and different f r o m the vulgar, to discourse loftily and criticise vindictively, interested only i n being high-minded—such are the tastes of the hermits of mountain and valley, the condemners of the age, who wither away or d r o w n themselves. . . . "To head for the woods and moors, settle i n an untroubled wilderness, angle for fish and live untroubled, interested only i n doing nothing—such are the tastes of the recluses of the riverside and seaside, the shunners of the age, the untroubled idlers." The image of an untroubled idler fishing i n the river rather suggests Chuang-tzu himself. But before the rise of Taoism, and to some extent right d o w n to 200 B . C , the name associated w i t h the second tendency is 1

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Yang C h u (Yang-tzu). Like so many of the philosophers, the main evidence of his date is a story of an audience with a datable ruler, i n his case K i n g H u i of L i a n g (370-319 B . C . ) . It may however be better to think of a movement it is convenient to c a l l ' Yangism' than of a single thinker called Yang C h u . Since tendencies i n p r e - H a n thought came to be classified retrospectively as schools w i t h founders like Confucianism and M o h i s m , there is always a danger that the name of one prominent representative has been picked out as a label. Yang C h u has no book recorded under his name even i n the oldest bibliography, that of the Han History, the surviving documents w h i c h expound the doctrines ascribed to h i m do not mention his name, and he is identified w i t h the doctrines only i n contexts contrasting h i m w i t h other philosophers, by the Confucian Mencius and the syncretistic Lit Spring and Autumn (c. 240 B . C . ) and Huai-nan-tzu (c. 140 B . C . ) . Mencius contrasts h i m w i t h M o - t z u , as representatives of opposite extremes. "Yang-tzu chose selfishness; if by plucking out one hair he could benefit the world he w o u l d not do it. M o - t z u was concerned for everyone; if by shaving from his crown right d o w n to his heels he could benefit the world he w o u l d do it."* The Lu Spring and Autumn" has h i m i n a list of 10 philosophers: "Confucius valued benevolence, M o T i valued being for everyone,. . . Yang C h u valued self. . . . " But the most informative is Huai-nan-tzu. "Singing to the strings and dancing to the d r u m to make music, deferential bows and turns to train one i n ceremony, elaborate funerals and prolonged m o u r n i n g to send off the dead—these Confucius advocated but M o - t z u condemned. Concern for everyone, elevation of worth, service to the ghosts, rejection of Destiny—these M o - t z u advocated but Yang-tzu condemned. Keeping one's nature intact, protecting one's genuineness, and not letting the body be tied by other things—these Yang-tzu advocated but Mencius condemned." Since the victory of Confucianism Yang C h u has been remembered as a pure egoist, on the authority of Mencius' polemic. But 20th-century scholarship, both Chinese a n d Western, prefers the testimony of Huainan-tzu, which has no axe to grind, and is excellently informed about Confucianism, M o h i s m , and no doubt Yangism as w e l l . Evidently egoism was not what Yang C h u taught, but something that Confucians justly 2

3

4

5

* Me 7A/26. Cf. also 3B/9 "Yang is for selfishness, which is to have no lord; Mo is concerned for everyone, which is to have no father. To have neither father nor lord is to be a bird or a beast."

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or unjustly read into his teaching. It has been noticed too that the three doctrines there ascribed to h i m are the themes of certain chapters of the Lu Spring and Autumn, w h i c h is a philosophical encyclopedia: C h . 1/2 'Life as Basic C h . 1/3 ' G i v i n g Weight to S e l f C h . 2/2 'Valuing Life' C h . 2/3 'The Essential Desires' C h . 21/4 'Be Aware of What It Is For'. More recently it has been noticed that a block of four chapters i n Chuangtzu is not Taoist but displays the same constellation of ideas: C h . 28 ' Y i e l d i n g the Throne' C h . 29 'Robber C h i n ' C h . 30 'Discourse o n Swords' C h . 3 1 'The O l d Fisherman' These chapters probably come f r o m a little after the fall of C h ' i n i n 209 B.C.* Thus we n o w have at our disposal a substantial Yangist literature, from a late stage of the movement, but unaffected by Taoism. The Chuang-tzu 'Primitivist' chapters mention "the argumentation fff (pien) of Yang and M o " . F r o m the Yangist chapters of the same book we can see how the Yangist style of argument differed from the Mohist. Except for 'Yielding the Throne' they consist entirely of dialogues, of which two i n 'Robber C h i h ' (between a Confucian and a worldly man, and between a worldly m a n and a Yangist) are genuine debates i n w h i c h both speakers have their say. There are no appeals to the sage kings, and Robber C h i h denounces all of them after a G o l d e n A g e long before the Yao and Shun w i t h w h o m Confucian and M o h i s t historiography starts. There is, however, m u c h citation of instances from history and legend, and this is the debating technique of w h i c h the Yangist seems most conscious. 'Yielding the Throne' consists of two series of examples collected from older sources, evidently for use i n debate; the first of them is of men admired by the Yangists, the second is of the moralistic hermits w h o m they despise. In 'Robber C h i h ' we find the debaters appealing to these and similar examples, w h i c h are meticulously classified and enumerated. The dialogues, unlike those i n Mo-tzu, are highly literary, and the narrative style of their settings is the most advanced i n pre-Han literature ('The O l d Fisherman' i n particular is not the usual summary anecdote framing 6

7

7

* Three chapters (excluding 'Discourse on Swords') were identified as Yangist by Kuan Feng in 1962.1 would also take 'Discourse on Swords' as a Yangist warning against injury of life by pointless bloodshed. For the dating, cf. G. Studies 307-313.

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dialogue but scene presented to the eye and ear). The Yangist pien i n Chuang-tzu is an art of persuasion w i t h as much rhetoric i n it as logic, and reminds one forcefully how honestly rational the Mohists are, i n their plodding early phase as well as i n the logically sophisticated Canons of the Later Mohists. The w o r d pien itself is used only i n a secondary sense, as the stative verb, 'eloquent, persuasive'. The literary sophistication may belong only to the last phase of the movement. It is lacking i n the Lu Spring and Autumn chapters, less reliable as a guide to style however, being essays conforming to the p l a n of the whole book. 8

The Yangist teachings A philosophy entitling members of the ruling class to resist the overwhelming moral pressures to take office remained a permanent necessity i n Imperial C h i n a . Yangism is the earliest, to be superseded i n due course by Taoism a n d , from the early centuries A . a , by B u d d h i s m . But Yangism differs from its successors i n having nothing mystical about it. It starts from the same calculations of benefit and harm as does M o h i s m , but its question is not ' H o w shall we benefit the world?' but 'What is truly beneficial to man?', more specifically 'What is truly beneficial to myself?' Is it wealth and power, as the vulgar suppose? O r the life and health of the b o d y and the satisfaction of the senses? The Mohists cared only for the useful, the Yangists ask 'Useful for what?'. Of the three doctrines ascribed to Yang C h u i n Huai-nan-tzu, 'Keeping one's nature intact' introduces the concept of h u m a n nature into Chinese philosophy. (Confucius' "By nature we are near to each other, by habituation we diverge" is a sociological rather than a philosophical observation). Hsing 'nature' is a n o u n derived from the verb sheng 4 . 'be born, live' (used causatively, 'generate'). It is graphically distinguished f r o m it by the addition of the 'heart' radical, w h i c h i n pre-Han texts may however have been supplied by later graphic standardisation. Even i n the graphically standardised texts available to us the radical is indifferently included or omitted i n such phrases as 'keep life/nature intact', 'nourish life/nature', 'harm life/nature', w h i c h belong to the ordinary terminology i n w h i c h questions of health h a d been discussed since far back i n the C h o u . For the Yangist, hsing is primarily the capacity, which may be injured by excess or by damage from outside, to live out the term of life w h i c h Heaven has destined for man. "It is the nature of water to be clear; m u d dirties it, so it fails to be clear. It is man's nature to live out his term; other things disturb h i m , so he fails 9

1 0

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to live out his term. A ' t h i n g ' is a means to nourish one's nature, not something one uses one's nature to nourish. O f the confused among the people of this age, most are u s i n g their natures to nourish other things, which is failing to k n o w the weighty f r o m the light. If you don't k n o w the weighty f r o m the light, the weighty is deemed light and the light weighty." ('Life as Basic') "Therefore the sage's attitude to sounds, sights and tastes is that w h e n beneficial to his nature he chooses them, w h e n h a r m f u l to his nature he refuses them. This is the Way of 'keeping one's nature intact'." ('Life as Basic') "Therefore the sage controls the m y r i a d things i n order to keep intact what he has f r o m Heaven. If what is from Heaven remains intact the spirit is harmonious, the eye a n d ear clear, the nose and mouth sensitive, the 360 joints all supple." ('Life as Basic') To injure health b y excess or risk life to multiply possessions is to forget that things are only means to the life generated i n us by Heaven; one's possessions are replaceable, one's life is not. A s for the second doctrine ascribed to Y a n g C h u , 'protecting one's genuineness' (chen _|L), Confucius is presented as asking the old fisherman about it. " 'Let me ask what y o u mean by "genuine".' 'The genuine is the most quintessential, the most sincere. What fails to be quintessential a n d sincere cannot move others. Thus forced tears however sorrowful fail to sadden, forced rages however formidable do not strike awe, forced affection however m u c h you smile w i l l not be returned. Genuine sorrow saddens without uttering a sound, genuine rage strikes awe before it bursts out, genuine affection is returned before you smile." (The O l d Fisherman') Confucius is denounced for preferring the ceremonial to the genuine. "Ceremony is what worldly custom has manufactured. The genuine is what we use to draw o n Heaven, it is spontaneous and irreplaceable. Therefore the sage, taking his standard f r o m Heaven, values the genuine and is untrammelled b y custom. The fool does the opposite; incapable of taking his standard f r o m Heaven he frets about m a n , ignorant of how to value the genuine he timidly lets himself be altered by custom, and so remains unsatisfied." ( T h e O l d Fisherman') A s for the third doctrine, 'not letting the body be tied by other things', the extreme example of endangering oneself by involvement w i t h another tiling is possession of a state or the Empire itself. The Yangist may judge it safe to accept a throne (in practice of course it w o u l d be an office), but may also prefer to renounce it rather than endanger his o w n life or the lives of 11

12

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other people. H i s principle that life is more important than any possession leads h i m to put the lives of the people before the advantages to himself of possessing the state. A n example is Tan-fu, an ancestor of the C h o u , w h o renounced P i n rather than endanger his people b y fighting the invading Ti. " 'To send to their deaths the sons a n d younger brothers of those w i t h w h o m I dwell is more than I could bear. Get on as best you can here, all of you. What difference does it make whether you are subjects to myself or to the Ti? Besides, I have heard that one does not let the means of nourishing do harm to what they nourish.' "He departed staff i n h a n d , and the people followed i n procession behind h i m . Then he founded a state under M o u n t C h ' i . The Great K i n g Tan-fu may be pronounced capable of honouring life. O n e capable of honouring life, though rich a n d noble, does not let what nourishes do harm to his person, though poor a n d lowly does not let a benefit be a tie to the body." ('Be Aware of What It Is For , also i n 'Yielding the Throne') The more characteristic case is the refusal of a throne for the sake of one's o w n health. But even here the preference for life over possessions is assumed to extend to the lives of others, w i t h the paradoxical consequence that the m a n least likely to want the state is the best m a n to rule it. "Yao resigned the E m p i r e to Tzu-chou C h i h - f u , w h o replied: 'It might not be a bad idea to make me Emperor. However, just now I have an ailment w h i c h is w o r r y i n g me. I am going to have it treated, and have no time n o w to bother about the Empire.' "The Empire is the weightiest thing of all, but he w o u l d not harm his life for the sake of it, and how m u c h less for any other thing! O n l y the man who cares nothing for the Empire deserves to be entrusted w i t h the Empire." ('Valuing Life', also i n 'Yielding the Throne'). Fidelity to one's nature, genuineness, not being tied by possessions, are all themes w h i c h pass into Taoism; even the thought that the m a n w h o puts his o w n life before the Empire is the best man to rule it reappears as a typical Taoist paradox i n Lao-tzu. But i n philosophical Taoism health and life are nourished by not interfering w i t h spontaneity by calculations of benefit and h a r m , while Yangist t h i n k i n g is a meticulous weighing of means and ends. Ends, w h i c h i n M o h i s m as we saw tend to disappear from sight, are discussed w i t h the verb wei 'do for, do for the sake o f . Thus the selfishness of w h i c h M e n c i u s accuses Yang C h u is wei wo Mj4ki 'doing for m y o w n sake'. 'Robber C h i h ' has a debate between a Confucian w h o claims to "do for the sake of behaving well" and a worldly man w h o accuses h i m of " d o i n g for the sake of reputation" and describes 7

13

14

15

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himself as " d o i n g for the sake of benefit"; a Yangist then criticises both for "neglecting what d o i n g is for a n d m a k i n g a h u m a n sacrifice of oneself for what it is not f o r " . The Lu Spring and Autumn has an essay on the same theme. "One's person is what d o i n g is for the sake of, the Empire is a means to doing for the sake of it. Be fully aware of what something is for, and what is weightier a n d what lighter w i l l be grasped. Suppose we have a man w h o cuts off his o w n head i n exchange for a cap, or executes his o w n person i n exchange for a coat; the world w i l l certainly think h i m deluded. W h y ? A cap is a means to adorn the head, a coat is a means to adorn the person. If you execute the adorned to get the means of adornment you do not know what it is for." ('Be Aware of What It Is F o r ' . ) We have noticed that Confucius seems not to think i n terms of choice between alternatives. But w i t h the appearance of rival doctrines choice moves to the conceptual foreground. The w o r d ch'u $ L 'take', w h e n used in explicit or implicit contrast w i t h words for 'refuse', is regularly translatable by 'choose'. The estimating of 'heavier' and 'lighter' alternatives implies the image of balancing on scales also familiar i n the West. The metaphor of the crossroads, the absence of w h i c h Fingarette notices i n the Analects, turns u p i n an anecdote told variously of M o - t z u and of Yang C h u . H s i i n - t z u cites it i n connexion w i t h respect or neglect for merit i n appointing ministers. "Yang C h u wailed at the forked road saying: 'Isn't this where you take a half step w r o n g a n d wake u p a thousand miles astray?'. Grievously he bewailed it. This too is a fork to glory a n d disgrace, safety and danger, survival and r u i n , far more grievous than the fork i n the r o a d . " 17

18

19

20

21

The supposed egoism of Yang Chu It is by now plain that the Yangist does not think of himself as Mencius sees h i m , as a selfish m a n w h o prefers his o w n comfort to taking office and benefiting the people. H e can justly claim to be concerned for life i n general, not just his o w n ; the 'Discourse on Swords', for example, is a protest against the useless bloodshed of the swordfighting enjoyed by rulers as a spectator sport. There is however something a little shifty about that dictum " O n l y the m a n w h o cares nothing for the Empire deserves to be entrusted with the E m p i r e " . If not a principled egoist, the Yangist is at any rate an individualist concerned to benefit his o w n person and leave others to do the same. "The most genuine i n the Way is for maintaining one's person, its

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leftovers for ruling a state, its dirt and weeds for ruling the Empire." ('Valuing L i f e ' ) "If one estimates the trouble something w i l l cost, anticipates reverses, judges it harmful to one's nature, and therefore refuses to accept it, that is not out of a need for praise and repute. W h e n Yao and Shun abdicated the throne it was not out of benevolence to the w o r l d , they wouldn't for the sake of vainglory injure life. W h e n Shan C h i i a n and H s u Y u would not accept the offer of the throne, it was no empty gesture of humility, they would not by taking on its tasks injure themselves. A l l these men took the beneficial course a n d refused the harmful, and if the world cites them as examples of men of excellence, by all means let us give them the credit, but it was not to w i n praise and repute that they d i d it." ('Robber C h i h ' ) . 22

23

That Confucians and Mohists w o u l d be b o u n d to see Yangists as preachers of selfishness shows u p clearly in a dialogue put i n the mouths of Yang C h u and a disciple M e n g Sun-yang and Mo-tzu's chief disciple C h ' i n K u - l i , w h i c h survives i n the 'Yang C h u ' chapter of Lieh-tzu (c. A . D . 300). In this late book Yang C h u is used as spokesman of a hedonism which prefers the full enjoyment of the moment to length of life, but the present dialogue is one of several episodes borrowed from earlier sources and seems to be M o h i s t i n o r i g i n . A s i n Mencius' denunciation of Yang Chu,. the conventional posing of the issue as between a part of the body and an external possession is sharpened to the extreme case, whether to exchange a single hair for the whole w o r l d . 24

" C h ' i n K u - l i asked Yang C h u : 'If you could help the whole world by the loss of a hair off your body, would you do it?' 'The world w o u l d surely not be helped by a single hair.' 'Supposing it d i d help, w o u l d you do it?' Yang C h u d i d not answer h i m . M e n g Sun-yang said: 'You have not fathomed what is i n the Master's heart. Let me say it. Supposing for a bit of your skin y o u could get a thousand i n gold, would you give it?' T would.' 'Supposing that by cutting off a limb at the joint you could w i n a state, would you do it?' C h ' i n K u - l i was silent for a while. 'That one hair matters less than skin', said M e n g Sun-yang, 'and skin less than a limb, is plain enough. However, go on adding to the one hair and it amounts to as m u c h as skin, go on a d d i n g more skin and it amounts

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to as much as one limb. A single hair is certainly one thing among the myriad parts of the body, h o w can one treat it lightly?' " Here the M o h i s t speaks of " h e l p i n g the whole w o r l d " , the Yangist of " w i n n i n g a state", but neither quibbles over the difference. Both mean the same thing, the achievement of political power w h i c h is on the one hand the only means of benefiting the people i n general, on the other hand the supreme goal of personal ambition. Yang Chu's principle that one's body is more important than the greatest of the external things w h i c h are used to nourish it forbids h i m , w h e n the M o h i s t has pushed h i m into a corner, to say that he w o u l d give a hair to benefit the world by good government. Yang C h u is embarrassed, but his disciple recovers the initiative by forcing the Mohist to admit his reluctance to sacrifice a limb for the opportunity to benefit a state. But what Mencius a n d C h ' i n Ku-Ii see as Yangist selfishness is very far from being a principled egoism. One may indeed raise the question whether Chinese thought ever poses the problem of philosophical egoism as it is understood i n the West. Some translators, including myself i n the past, have translated the phrase wei wo applied by Mencius to Yang C h u by 'egoism' instead of 'selfishness'. But one has the impression that Chinese thinkers perceive persons as inherently social beings w h o are more or less selfish rather than as isolated individuals w h o w i l l be pure egoists unless taught morality. This is suggested, for example, by one of the five dialogues of M o - t z u a n d a certain Wu-ma-tzu w h o declares that "To ignore the men of today and praise the former kings is to praise rotten bones" and explicitly defends selfishness. "Wu-ma-tzu said to M o - t z u : T am different from y o u , I am incapable of concern for everyone. I am more concerned for m e n of Tsou than of Y u e h , of L u than of Tsou, of m y district than of L u , of m y family than of m y district, for m y parents than for the rest of the family, for m y o w n person than for m y parents, because I judge by nearness to myself. If y o u hit me it hurts, if you hit someone else it doesn't. W h y should it be what doesn't hurt that I ward off rather than what does? Therefore, by existence of myself, there are occasions for killing someone else on account of myself, none for killing myself on account of a benefit.' 'Are you going to hide your morality?', said Master M o - t z u , 'or tell others about it?'. ' W h y should I hide m y morality? I shall tell others about it.' 'In that case, if one m a n , ten m e n , the whole world, are persuaded by 2 5

26

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you, then one m a n , ten m e n , the whole w o r l d , will w i s h to kill you to benefit themselves. If one m a n , ten m e n , the whole w o r l d , are not persuaded by y o u , then one m a n , ten m e n , the whole world, w i l l w i s h to kill you as a practitioner of dangerous tenets. If whether persuaded or not they w i s h to kill y o u , it's a case of "What gets you hanged is your o w n mouth"; you are the one w h o b y establishing it as a norm gets yourself killed.' 'To w h o m is your tenet beneficial?', Master M o - t z u added. 'If as beneficial to no one you refuse to say it, you might as well not have a mouth.' "* M o - t z u , anticipating the paradoxes of self-reference w h i c h interested the Later M o h i s t s , sees a contradiction i n preaching selfishness: to affirm the principle publicly is to disobey it. Wu-ma-tzu's arguments draw a clear line between m y o w n pains w h i c h hurt me and other people's w h i c h do not, and could be used i n favour of a true egoism. The striking thing however is that he is u s i n g them to defend a relative selfishness; he has a 'morality' (yi) w h i c h prescribes doing more or less to people according to their distance from himself. It w o u l d be Confucianism if it were not for that final step of preferring himself to his parents. M o - t z u is credited w i t h another argument against selfishness, set i n the characteristic Yangist f o r m , balancing parts of the body against external possessions. If this and the W u - m a - t z u dialogue are genuine, doctrines associated w i t h Y a n g C h u go back to 400 B . C . or earlier. It is likely however that the Mo-tzu dialogue chapters contain dramatisations of issues facing the school after their founder's death. "In the m y r i a d affairs nothing is to be valued above the right. Suppose you tell a m a n 'I'll give you a cap and shoes if you let me cut off your hands and feet', w i l l he do it? Certainly he w i l l not. W h y ? Because cap and shoes are less valuable than hands and feet. If y o u continue 'I'll give you the Empire if you let me execute your person', w i l l he do it? Certainly he will not. W h y ? Because the E m p i r e is less valuable than one's person." One is startled to see M o - t z u apparently conceding the whole Yangist case. But there is one more step to go. " O n e w i l l fight to the death over a single w o r d , w h i c h is the right being more valuable than one's o w n person. Therefore I say: 'In the myriad affairs nothing is to be valued above the right'." This answer may be unexpected, but the assumption behind it deserves pondering. O n e might be inclined to object that the m a n w h o 27

28

* Mo 46/52-60, tr.Mei219f. Reading ^

|jt ^

for

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risks his life to avenge a n insult is motivated by pride, w h i c h is egoistic, not by a moral principle. But his pride is stirred because he accepts that he w o u l d be justly despised as a coward if he refuses to do the socially prescribed t h i n g for a m a n i n his position. O n what egoistic calculation can he prefer death to shame as merely a n unpleasant emotion? The example is well chosen, as a moral reaction likely to be more rather than less common i n a state of moral anarchy. It seems that i n one way or another we cannot escape valuing life below yi, 'the right', the w o r d w h i c h when used of a conception of the right we have been translating 'morality'. This connects w i t h a problem we noted earlier, w h y the Mohist conceives the primaeval war of all against all as a clash, not between interests, but between moralities. We may conclude that he sees i n d i v i d uals, even at the extreme of competition, as always recognising some code applicable both to themselves and to others, although they cannot arrive at harmony until united i n a n organised society w i t h a single code. If so, he has no conception of a n absolute egoism, only of varying degrees of selfishness and unselfishness. Perhaps philosophical egoism is conceivable only i n a h i g h l y atomised society such as our o w n , perhaps it is not conceptually coherent at a l l . Is it plain that an.egoist can reject humility, gratitude, kindness a n d love as interfering w i t h his o w n interests, without being committed to rejecting pride, revenge, cruelty and hate, w h i c h can clash w i t h the same interests? But if one continues discarding passions by this logic, how m u c h of the m a n is left? Without p u r s u i n g this thought,* we may doubt whether a theoretically pure egoism w o u l d be conceived by individuals so closely cemented b y k i n relations as the ancient Chinese. 29

Valuation of the right above life is not incompatible w i t h valuation of life above possessions, a n d one Yangist essay successfully integrates them. The passage starts w i t h a quotation from a certain Tzu-hua-tzu, said elsewhere to have dissuaded M a r q u i s Chao of H a n (358-333 B.C.) from war by arguing that if he w o u l d not give one hand i n exchange for the Empire it is illogical to risk his life fighting over a small territory. "Tzu-hua-tzu said: 'The complete life is highest, the depleted life next, death next, the oppressed life lowest.' Hence w h e n one says 'Honour life' it is the complete life w h i c h is meant. In 'complete' life the six desires all get what suits them, i n 'depleted life' they get part of what suits them; and with depletion of life the honouring of it decreases, the more the depletion the less we honour it. In 'death' we have no means of k n o w i n g and revert to the unborn. In 'oppressed life' none of the six desires gets what suits it, 30

" 1 have developed this argument in Reason and Spontaneity 14-29

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all get what we utterly hate. Examples are subjection and disgrace. N o disgrace is greater than for w r o n g d o i n g (= the not yi), so wrongdoing is of the oppressed life, but is not the only oppressed life. Hence it is said: 'The oppressed life is worse than death.'" ('Valuing L i f e ' ) . We conclude w i t h the most eloquent of Yangist discourses, the conclusion of Robber Chih's diatribe against Confucius. " N o w let me tell you what m a n essentially is. The eyes desire to look on beauty, the ears to listen to music, the mouth to discern flavours, intent and energy to find fulfilment. L o n g life for m a n is at most a hundred years, at the mean eighty, at the least sixty; excluding sickness and hardship, bereavement and m o u r n i n g , worries and troubles, the days left to us to open our mouths i n a smile w i l l i n the course of a month be four or five at most. Heaven and earth are boundless, man's death has its time; w h e n he takes u p that life provided for a time to lodge i n the midst of the boundless, his passing is as sudden as a thoroughbred steed galloping past a chink i n the wall. Whoever cannot gratify his intents and fancies and find nurture for the years destined for h i m , is not the m a n w h o has fathomed the Way. "Everything you say I reject. Away w i t h y o u , quick, r u n back home, not a w o r d more about it. Your Way is a crazy obsession, a thing of deception, trickery, vanity, falsehood. It w i l l not serve to keep the genuine in us intact, what is there to discuss?" ('Robber C h i h ' ) . 31

32

4. IDEALISATION OF THE SMALL COMMUNITY: THE UTOPIA OF SHEN-NUNG The Yangist chapters of Chuang-tzu show a special aversion to the moralistic hermits a n d the self-sacrificing ancients w h o m they revered, i n particular the brothers Po Y i a n d Shu C h ' i , w h o at the rise of C h o u refused to accept the new dynasty, and starved to death under M o u n t Shou-yang. 'Yielding the Throne' reproduces i n chronological order as examples for debate a series of stories about the moralists' heroes, stripped of approving comments i n the sources; the text as we have it breaks off with the two brothers. Robber C h i h uses the same example w i t h some more recent ones, and concludes: "These six are worth no more than a dead dog i n the street, a stray pig, a beggar w i t h his b o w l . They were all m e n w h o to get themselves a name made light of death, and d i d not remember to nurture life from the roots to their destined old age." Later tradition assumed that the moralistic hermits judged the 1

2

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65

corruption of the age b y more or less Confucian standards. Thus Ssu-ma C h ' i e n , writing the biography of Po Y i and Shu C h ' i , takes it for granted that they refused allegiance to C h o u out of loyalty to the defeated Shang. But i n the corners of the literature we catch tantalising glimpses of quite different ideas—that every m a n should work for his living, that rulership should depend o n merit a n d not be hereditary, that the sage ruler teaches but does not enforce b y punishment. Confucian and M o h i s t teachers, often reproached for eating at others' expense, sometimes found themselves at a moral disadvantage against these hermits industriously working their o w n fields. O n e of the M o - t z u dialogues has h i m debating w i t h a certain W u L i i w h o thinks it his duty to support himself by ploughing a n d m a k i n g pots; M o - t z u answers this implicit reproach to himself as a teacher b y arguing i n detail that the inventor of agriculture d i d more good b y t e a d u n g people to plough than he w o u l d by ploughing himself. N o r were the things w h i c h touched the hermits' consciences always the traditionally recognised sorts of misgovernment. C h ' e n C h u n g , of one of the greatest families of C h ' i , living w i t h his mother and an elder brother on the latter's stipend from the state, left the house because he judged the income unrighteous, and supported himself by weaving sandals, nearly d y i n g of starvation; he once vomited u p the meat of a goose on hearing it was a gift from his brother. One idea w h i c h flourished i n these circles was the Utopia of Shenn u n g , w h i c h at least one hermit community tried to put into practice.* Shen-nung ('Divine Farmer') is the legendary inventor of agriculture, and appears i n royal calendars as a farmer's g o d . H e marks one stage i n a process w h i c h can be traced right through the classical age, the invention or adoption of prehistoric Emperors representing new philosophical or political ideals. Confucius h a d introduced the pre-dynastic Yao and S h u n , unmentioned i n the early C h o u literature, as the immediate predecessors of Y u , founder of the H s i a dynasty. Their names always remain the symbols of the two m a i n moralistic schools, the Confucians and Mohists. The Mohists, however, late i n their history settled on Y u as their patron sage, because of his self-sacrificing labours draining the Flood. The name of Shen-nung appears i n the 4th century B . C . as representative of a 3

4

5

6

* The argument on which this chapter is based is developed at length in 'The Nung-chia "School of the Tillers" and the Origins of Peasant Utopianism in China', G. Studies 67-110. In that paper I assumed that the idealisers of Shen-nung were known as Nung-chia in their own time. But it now seems to me more probable that Nung-chia is no more than the Han bibliographer's heading for farming manuals, and 1 have switched to a more conservative translation, 'Farmers' School'.

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coherent and quite distinctive political ideal. Throughout the literature d o w n to the 2nd century B . C . he is the head of a decentralised empire of tiny fiefs, w h o ploughs w i t h his o w n hands and reigns i n universal peace without ministers, laws or punishments. H i s function as ruler is limited to teaching agriculture, inspecting the fields, and maintaining a constant grain supply b y storing i n good years and issuing i n bad. The Way of Shennung has the look of a peasant ideal; as w i t h the Mohists, we seem to glimpse something from outside the r u l i n g class. There is the difference, however, that the Mohists seem to be rising into the knightly class, while the recluse ploughing his o w n fields is rather sinking d o w n from it. Shennung finally slipped into Confucian historiography i n the 'Great A p p e n dix' of the Yi, but as inventor of agriculture and of markets, without reference to his questionable methods of government. The Legalist Kuantzu has a note: "Therefore the Emperors i n the Documents amount to eight but Shen-nung is not included among them, because i n his time there were no stations and one m a n could not employ another." 7

The Golden Age of Shen-nung The H a n bibliography, w h i c h retrospectively classified the philosophers i n ten schools, each w i t h its strengths and weaknesses, listed farming manuals under the heading 'Farmers' School'. Its strength was i n p r o v i d i n g useful agricultural information, its weakness that some "thought there was no point i n serving the sage kings, wished to make the ruler plough side by side w i t h his subjects, and upset the degrees of superior and inferior." The first book on the list, entered as pre-Han, carries the title Shen-nung. The book is long lost, but syncretistic writings such as Huai-nan-tzu (c. 140 B.C.) preserve a great deal of information about the legendary Emperor, backed by quotations from what may have been chapters of the book, the ' L a w ' , the 'Teaching', the 'Numbers', and the 'Prohibition' of Shen-nung. "Therefore the 'Law of Shen-nung' says: 'If i n the prime of life a man does not plough, someone i n the world w i l l go hungry because of it; if i n the prime of life a w o m a n does not weave, someone i n the world will be cold because of it.' Therefore he himself ploughed with his o w n hands, and his wife herself wove, to give a lead to the world. "In g u i d i n g the people, he d i d not value commodities difficult to obtain, d i d not treasure things without use. Consequently, any who d i d not work hard at ploughing had no means to support life; any w h o d i d not work hard at weaving had nothing w i t h w h i c h to clothe the body. Whether 8

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one h a d ample or less than enough was each person's o w n responsibility. Food and clothing were abundant, crimes and vices d i d not breed; they lived untroubled i n security and happiness, a n d the world ran on an even level. So there was no scope for Confucius and Tseng Shen [his disciple] to exercise their goodness, or for M e n g Pen and C h ' e n g C h i n g [men of valour] to put people i n awe of them."* The Chinese Emperor's three ceremonial pushes o n the plough on N e w Year's Day, once imitated i n the 18th century b y the K i n g of France, may well have originated i n the Shen-nung ideal. But Shen-nung and the rulers of his line really w o r k e d for their living like everybody else. "The rulers of the House of Shen-nung carried loads on their backs, their wives carried loads o n their heads, to govern the Empire. Yao said: 'Compared w i t h Shen-nung I a m like the twilight to the dawn.' " That the Way of Shen-nung is a contemporary ideal read back into the past is once mentioned i n Huai-nan-tzu: "Vulgar people mostly honour the past above the present; therefore those w h o cultivate a Way have to credit it to Shen-nung or the Yellow Emperor before it can be taken seriously". Elsewhere, however, it is accepted that under the first farmer, Shennung, and his predecessor the first hunter, Fu-hsi, order was maintained without rewards or punishments, commands or restrictions, but denied that the same Way is realisable today. "What i n ancient times was a means to order would nowadays be a means to disorder. Shen-nung a n d Fu-hsi applied neither rewards nor punishments, yet the people d i d no w r o n g . However, one w h o establishes an admimstration cannot if he dispenses w i t h laws bring the people to order." "In former times, under Shen-nung there were no restrictions or commands but the people followed h i m ; under Yao and Shun there were restrictions and commands but no punishments. The House of the Hsia Emperors kept their w o r d , the m e n of Y i n [Shang] swore oaths, the men of Chou made covenants. " C o m i n g d o w n to the present age, m e n are shameless and careless of disgrace, greedy for gain and seldom embarrassed. If you w i s h to put them i n order b y means of the Way of Shen-nung, their disorder w i l l be inevitable." This historical scheme is not the one already orthodox by the time of 9

10

11

* HN (ch. 11) Liu LV22B. Cf. also LSCC (ch. 21/4) Hsu 21/11A, where the quotation is ascribed to the Teaching of Shen-nung'.

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Huai-nan-tzu, w h i c h has the Yellow Emperor intervening between Shennung and Yao. It is peculiar also i n that historical decline is on the one hand an increase of restrictions, on the other a deterioration of the mutual trust on w h i c h the old order depended, culminating i n the proliferation of covenants under the C h o u . That this scheme belongs to the Shen-nung doctrine is confirmed by the earliest full account of the legend of Po Y i and Shu C h ' i , i n the Lii Spring and Autumn.t In this the brothers denounce the C h o u , not for u s u r p i n g the throne, but for ruling by force instead of by the peaceful policies of Shen-nung. The immediate occasion for the protest is the sight of the C h o u m a k i n g alliances w i t h nobles against the Shang, i n covenants w i t h three copies smeared w i t h the blood of sacrificial victims, one for each party and a third to be buried. They are witnessing the final breakdown of mutual trust. We find the same historical scheme without the Yellow Emperor i n a p o e m ascribed elsewhere to the two brothers. "Climb that Western mountain, Pick its herbs. They exchange tyranny for tyranny And don't know that they do wrong. Shen-nung, Shun, the Hsia are as though they had never been. Who deserves our allegiance? Alas! Away we go. The mandate has dwindled away." 12

O n the issue of whether power is most secure w h e n centralised or when delegated to fiefholders, w h i c h became crucial under the C h ' i n , the regime of Shen-nung is cited as the one w i t h the most fiefs. Small fiefs appear also i n a chapter of Lao-tzu w h i c h two early sources take to be a description of the U t o p i a w h i c h ended i n the age of Shen-nung: " M a k e fiefs small a n d their people few, ensure that though there are arms for a troop or battalion they are not used, ensure that the people take death too seriously to move far away [that is, are sufficiently content w i t h life to stay], and even if they have boats and carriages there is no occasion to ride them, even if they have armour and weapons there is no occasion to display them. Ensure that m e n return to the use of knotted cords [the aids to memory before writing], want n o sweeter food or finer dress, are content to be where they are, delight i n their customs. Neighbouring fiefs 13

14

t LSCC (ch. 12/4) Hsu 12/8B-10A. Also Cz 28/74-86, tr. G. 232f, which however abbreviates the covenants.

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w i l l see each other i n the distance, hear the sound of each other's cocks and dogs, but the people w i l l grow old and die without ever coming or going." The Utopia of Shen-nung appears to be an anarchistic order based on mutual trust i n small communities, and one may well ask what function is left for an Emperor a n d nobles w h o work w i t h their o w n hands for a living, and do not c o m m a n d , make laws, reward or p u n i s h , go to war. The answer is that they have their uses for agriculture. 15

"Formerly, when Shen-nung ruled the Empire . . . The mild rain fell when it was due, The five grains flourished. In spring they sprouted, in summer grew up, In autumn were harvested, in winter stored. There were monthly inspections, there were seasonal trials, At the year's end they reported how much had been done. In due season the grains were tasted And offered as a sacrifice in the Hall of Light." 16

"The 'Prohibition of Shen-nung': 'What grows up through spring and autumn is not to be injured or obstructed; carefully tend what is beneficial in the land, so that the m y r i a d things complete their growth; do not snatch away what benefits the people, and the farmers w i l l work i n accord w i t h the seasons." Another passage anticipates the 'Constantly balanced granary', the storing of grain i n good years and issuing of it i n bad, w h i c h became one of the foundations of economic policy i n Imperial C h i n a , and the main precedent cited by H e n r y Wallace i n introducing a similar policy i n the United States i n 1938. "The ' N u m b e r s of Shen-nung' says: 'If one grain fails, take less of the one grain, and let the issue of the grain be tenfold; if two grains fail, take less of the two grains, a n d again let the issue of the grain be tenfold.' Maintain a full supply: give the old grain to those without food, lend new seed to those without seed. Hence there w i l l be no tenfold prices and no profiteering people." This combination of the practical w i t h the naive does rather suggest the viewpoint of peasants w h o see no reason w h y the ruler should not be working for his l i v i n g as they do, and reflect that if he d i d he w o u l d not be grabbing a share of their crops and w o u l d be too busy to fight wars. The Shen-nung ideal is of a w o r l d of village communities where a man's w o r d 17

18

19

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can be trusted by his neighbours without the need of oaths and covenants, where only idle hands make mischief a n d disputes are better settled by local custom than by calling i n the law, under leaders w h o work their o w n fields and are obeyed because everyone can see the point of their decisions.

Hsu Hsing The Shen-nung idealists, lost to sight i n an underworld of mostly nameless recluses, just once come into full view. A b o u t 315 B . C . Mencius tried to w i n back a Confucian w h o h a d joined them, C h ' e n H s i a n g . This accident has saved f r o m oblivion the community of a certain H s u H s i n g , w h o came from the great state of C h ' u i n the south to the little northeastern state of T'eng. Mencius' account puts at our disposal the only principled challenge to economic privilege, and the only reasoned defence of it, to be found i n the extant literature. "There was a m a n w h o professed the tenets of Shen-nung, H s u H s i n g , w h o travelled f r o m C h ' u to T'eng, approached the gate and announced to D u k e W e n : 'A m a n f r o m far away, I have heard that your lordship is conducting benevolent government, and w i s h to be granted a place to live a n d to become your subject.' The D u k e gave h i m a place. H e had several dozen disciples, w h o all wore coarse cloth and wove sandals and mats for a living. " C h ' e n H s i a n g and his younger brother H s i n , disciples of C h ' e n Liang [a Confucian], travelled f r o m S u n g to T'eng w i t h ploughshares on their backs. 'We have heard,' they said, 'that your lordship conducts sagely government, w h i c h is to be a sage yourself. We w i s h to be subjects of a sage.' " C h ' e n H s i a n g saw H s u H s i n g and was delighted, abjured all his o w n learning and learned from h i m . W h e n C h ' e n H s i a n g saw Mencius he expounded H s u Hsing's tenets, saying 'As for the lord of T'eng, he is a worthy ruler indeed, but he has not yet heard the Way. The worthiest feed themselves by ploughing side by side w i t h the people, rule w h i l e cooking their o w n meals. N o w however T'eng has granaries and treasuries, w h i c h amounts to supporting oneself by oppressing the people. Is he then so worthy?' " Mencius replies b y calling attention to the division of labour. " ' D o e s H s u H s i n g eat only grain he has planted himself?', said Mencius. 2 0

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H e does.' T)oes H s u H s i n g wear only cloth he has woven himself?' ' N o . H e wears coarse hemp.' T)oes he wear a cap?' 'He does.' 'What sort does he wear?' 'He wears coarse silk.' 'Does he weave it himself?' Tvfo, he gets it i n exchange for grain.' ' W h y not weave it himself?' I t w o u l d interfere w i t h ploughing.' 'Does he cook w i t h metal a n d earthenware pots, does he plough w i t h iron?' 'Yes.' 'Does he make them himself?' ' N o , gets them for grain.' 'Getting tools and vessels for grain is not reckoned to be oppressing the potter and smith; a n d the potter and smith getting grain for the tools and vessels, is that reckoned to be oppressing the farmer? In any case, why doesn't H s u H s i n g become potter a n d smith himself, so that he can use only things f r o m inside his o w n house? W h y all this complicated trading w i t h the various crafts? W h y does H s u H s i n g put u p w i t h all the bother?' 'Obviously y o u can't do the work of the various crafts and plough as well.' 'Then is ruling the Empire the one thing y o u can do and plough as well? There is the great man's w o r k , there is the small man's work. In any case the things made by the various crafts are at the disposal of each one of us; if we are to use only what we make ourselves, that's to bring everyone in the world to distress. Hence the saying "Some exert their wits, some exert their strength. Exerters of their wits rule, exerters of their strength are ruled. The ruled feed others, the rulers are fed by others." It is the general scheme throughout the w o r l d . ' " After being denounced at length for betraying Confucianism to join "the shrike-tongued m a n from the Southern barbarians w h o denies the Way of the former kings", C h ' e n Hsiang raises another point. "If we follow the Way of H s u H s i n g there w i l l not be two prices i n the market and there w i l l be no dishonesty i n the capital. Even if you send a mere boy to market no one w i l l cheat h i m . Cloth or silk of the same length

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will be equal i n price; hemp or flax or raw silk of the same weight will be equal i n price; the five grains i n the same quantities w i l l be equal i n price; shoes of the same size w i l l be equal i n price.' 'The inequality of things', said Mencius, 'is an essential of the things. Some are worth twice or five times, ten or one hundred times, a thousand or ten thousand times as m u c h as others. In reducing them to the same, you w i l l be disordering the Empire. If fine shoes are the same i n price as rough ones, who w i l l make them? To follow the Way of H s u H s i n g is to draw everyone into committing dishonesties. H o w w o u l d one be able to govern the state?'" Here Mencius has missed the point. By the Way of Shen-nung you store grain i n good years a n d issue it i n bad, w h i c h keeps prices steady. Consequently "there w i l l be no tenfold prices and no profiteering people." C h ' e n H s i a n g would be referring to this w h e n he says that "there w i l l not be two prices i n the market and there w i l l be no dishonesty i n the capital." He is concerned w i t h keeping prices steady rather than equal, although unlike Mencius (who is t h i n k i n g of the varied goods available i n a city) he advocates a simple life i n w h i c h variety is a minor consideration and there is consequently not much variation i n price. H e has the right to take quantity as the representative factor i n price just as he takes ploughing as representative of manual labour.

The influence of the Shen-nung ideal The Shen-nung ideal influenced the other eremeticist movement of the period, w h i c h leads f r o m Yangism to Taoism; through them it is ancestral to all Chinese Utopianism. A s a practical manual of agriculture the lost Shen-nung even made a mark on the ruthlessly authoritarian Legalists, for w h o m the m a i n concerns of state were agriculture and war. Agricultural manuals are among the categories exempted from the 'Burning of the Books' i n 213 B . C . The Legalists' use of Shen-nung is attested by a note on the book by the bibliographer L i u H s i a n g (79-08 B . C ) : "I suspect it is what L i K ' u e i and L o r d Shang talk about." L i K ' u e i and L o r d Shang are the first two authors listed i n the Legalist section of the H a n bibliography. L i K ' u e i , chief minister of Marquis Wen of Wei (424-397 B . C ) , whose lost book however, to judge b y our general experience of early Chinese texts, w o u l d have contained later material,* is remembered as the 2 1

22

* Legalist texts ascribed to chief ministers are suspect in any case; it seems to have been a convention to write in the name of a great minister, presumably of one's own state (Kuan-tzu, Book of Lord Shang). Cf. p. 267f below.

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first to propose the policy of storing and issuing grain, also recommended i n the 'Numbers of Shen-nung'. If the Legalists d i d get this idea from Shennung, we can understand w h y the other work mentioned by L i u Hsiang, the still extant Bookof Lord Shang(c. 240 B . C . ) , is so respectful of the Golden Age of Shen-nung. "In the age of Shen-nung, they were fed by the ploughing of the men, clothed b y the weaving of the women; he ruled without the use of punishments a n d administration, he reigned without resorting to weapons and armour. W h e n Shen-nung died, they took advantage of strength to conquer the weak, of numbers to oppress the few. Therefore the Yellow Emperor instituted the formalities of ruler and minister and of superior and inferior, the ceremonies for father and son and for elder and younger, the u n i o n of couples as husband a n d wife. A t home he put to work the executioner's axe, abroad he employed weapons and armour. So it was a change i n the times. Seen from this viewpoint, it is not that Shen-nung was loftier than the Yellow Emperor; that his name is none the less honoured was because he was suited to his times." In accepting the reality of Shen-nung, L o r d Shang has to deny that his example is relevant today. H e requires a founder of the state and of war to mark the start of the present order. The role is filled by the legendary warrior H u a n g - t i ('Yellow Emperor'), whose defeated enemy Yen-ti was later to be identified w i t h S h e n - n u n g . O n e might ask w h y L o r d Shang chose to treat the Way of Shen-nung as superseded by historical change, as does Huai-nan-tzu; w h y not simply reject it as inherently impracticable? But the development a n d expansion of the Chinese states was a constant process of conquering and absorbing smaller and more loosely organised communities. That i n such communities there can be order not imposed from above was a fact fully appreciated by Legalists such as H a n F e i ; it attracted attention especially i n the case of the dangerous barbarians of the Western frontier. Thus i n one story a D u k e of C h i n asks an emissary of the Jung w h y they fight so w e l l , and is told that government i n C h i n a has been deteriorating ever since "that supreme sage the Yellow Emperor invented ceremony and music, laws and measures"; the Jung need no institutions to make their k i n g just and his subjects loyal, "the government of the whole state is like one person ruling his o w n life, we do not k n o w how we are ruled." Legalism triumphed temporarily with the reunification of the Empire by the C h ' i n . But d u r i n g the interlude of civil war between the fall of C h ' i n in 209 B . C . a n d victory of H a n i n 202 B . C . the Shen-nung ideal revived among Yangists and Taoists weary of a state ordered solely by laws and punishments. The 'Primitivist' a n d Yangist chapters of Chuang-tzu, 23

24

25

26

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datable to this p e r i o d , t accept the interposition of the Yellow Emperor as inventor of the state and of war, but take his reign as the start of decline. The 'Primitivist' has Shen-nung as last ruler i n a Utopia of immemorial age. The Yangist 'Robber C h i h ' however sees Shen-nung as the culmination of a preceding progress. "Moreover I have heard that i n ancient times the birds and beasts outnumbered m e n , so m e n all lived i n nests to escape danger. In the daytime they gathered acorns a n d chestnuts, at nightfall perched i n the treetops, and so were named the people of the House of Yu-ch'ao ('Nester'). In ancient times m e n d i d not k n o w h o w to clothe themselves; i n summer they piled u p quantities of firewood, and w h e n winter came burned it, and so were named the people of Chih-sheng ('Know how to live'). In the age of Shen-nung 27

28

They slept sound, They woke fresh. The people knew their mothers, But did not know their fathers, And lived together with the deer. They fed themselves by ploughing, clothed themselves by weaving, and there was no mischief i n their hearts. This was the culmination of utmost Potency. "However, the Yellow Emperor was unable to maintain Potency at its utmost, he battled w i t h C h ' i h - y u i n the field of C h o - l u , and made the blood stream for a h u n d r e d miles. Yao and S h u n arose, and instituted ministers: T'ang expelled his lord, K i n g W u killed C h o u . From this time on men took advantage of strength to bully the weak, of numbers to oppress the few. Since T'ang and W u [founders of Shang and Chou] they have all been the troublemaking sort." W i t h the rise of the H a n the Yellow Emperor revives and joins Shenn u n g , Yao, S h u n and Y i i among the sage emperors adopted as patrons of rival schools. The school was Huang-Lao, w h i c h appealed to the authority of Lao-tzu as teacher and of the Yellow Emperor as founder of the state. A fragmentary book f r o m this period, Yii-tzu, advises us to "follow only the rulers as far back as the Yellow Emperor a n d d o w n to S h u n and Y i i " , and a further stray fragment explains w h y : "The Yellow Emperor knew from the age of ten that Shen-nung was wrong and reformed his goverment." 29

30

t For the Primitivist, whom I date about 205 B . C , cf. p. 306-11 below.

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5. THE SHARPENING OF RATIONAL DEBATE: THE SOPHISTS In C h i n a rationality develops w i t h the controversies of the schools, and dwindles as they fade after 200 B.C. W i t h the debates of Mohists and Yangists fully launched, and the Confucians pulled into them, attention begins to shift f r o m the practice to the theory of pien 'arguing out alternatives', the distinguishing of the right alternative from the w r o n g . During the 4th century B.C. we meet for the first time thinkers who are fascinated b y the mechanics of argumentation, delight i n paradoxes, astonish their audiences b y ' m a k i n g the inadmissible admissible'. W h e n during the H a n the philosophers were classed i n the Six Schools these, and others w i t h more practical interests i n n a m i n g , came to be k n o w n retrospectively as the School of Names. Earlier they were k n o w n simply as pien che flf^jf-'those w h o argue out', sometimes translated 'Dialecticians'. Confucians, Taoists and Legalists alike scorn them for wasting their time on abstractions such as 'the similar and the different', 'the hard and white', 'the limitless' a n d 'the dimensionless'. O n l y the Mohists do not join i n this general derision; some of the same themes appear i n the Later Mohist Canons, from w h i c h we learn that the hard and white represent mutually pervasive properties i n general, a n d that the limitless and the dimensionless have the full technical sense of the infinite and the point (the latter however understood b y the Mohists as the starting point of a measurement). It is customary to call these thinkers 'sophists' and compare them to the Greek propounders of paradoxes, to the Eleatics however rather than to the Sophists proper. A l t h o u g h they have little i n common w i t h the latter,* the label 'Sophist' does call attention to a configuration of tendencies at the birth of rational discourse w h i c h is common to Greece and C h i n a . In both traditions we meet thinkers w h o delight i n propositions w h i c h defy common sense, a n d consequently are derided as frivolous and irresponsible. In both, these thinkers belong to the early period w h e n reason is a newly discovered tool not yet under control, seeming to give one the power to prove or disprove anything. In both, the exuberance w i t h w h i c h they play w i t h this astonishing new toy leads not only to 'sophistries' but to paradoxes of lasting philosophical significance. In both, the pride and pleasure i n logical acrobatics calls attention to the relation between words a n d things. In both, to exult i n one's skill i n proving both sides of a case pushes i n the direction of relativism. N o t h i n g 1

2

* Cf. Reding, Fondements 455-500. Reding 280-346 translates all early stories about Hui Shih.

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could be more disorientating, more disruptive, than reason first awakening to and revelling i n its powers. O n e may well wonder how philosophy ever gets past this stage, w i t h the most ancient paradoxes forever returning to plague it. The first discovery of uninhibited reason is that it leads inevitably to absurd conclusions. So w h y go farther? The Greeks d i d get past this initial disorientation, the Chinese never d i d . The most famous of the Sophists were H u i Shih, a chief minister of K i n g H u i of Wei (or L i a n g , 370-319 B . C . ) and friend of the Taoist C h u a n g tzu, and K u n g - s u n L u n g , w h o entertained his patron the L o r d of P'ingyuan i n Chao (died 252 B . C . ) w i t h his notorious argument that a white horse is not a horse. Since it was the Mohists w h o started and remained at the forefront i n philosophical argumentation, one notices without surprise that as advisers of princes both show the influence of the Mohist doctrines of non-aggression and concern for everyone. There are stories of both of them advising princes against war, i n one of w h i c h K u n g - s u n L u n g i n reproaching K i n g H u i of Chao (298-266 B . C . ) directly appeals to the principle of concern for everyone; a n d the Ten Theses of H u i Shih, w h i c h we shall consider shortly, culminate i n a n appeal to "let concern spread to all the m y r i a d things." 3

Hui Shih The sparseness of the remains of H u i Shih is perhaps the most regrettable of all the losses i n ancient Chinese literature, for everything recorded of h i m suggests that he was unique among the early thinkers for his breadth of talents and interests, a true Renaissance m a n . * The leaders of most schools aspired at least i n theory to guide some ruler on the path they identified as the Way; but if we except the great statesmen to w h o m some Legalist works are dubiously ascribed, they were lucky to get even minor offices or sinecures. H o w d i d a sophist become chief minister i n the state of Wei? A n d h o w is it that we keep meeting this most successful man of the world i n the company of that disreputable layabout Chuang-tzu, w h o mocks his rigid logic but laments h i m after his death as his only truly stimulating opponent? N o t that his various roles are incompatible, for from a direction different f r o m Chuang-tzu's his fellow statesmen, too, see h i m as having too theoretical a m i n d . " H u i Shih composed a law code for K i n g H u i of Wei. W h e n it was finished he showed it to the people, w h o all thought it good. He presented it to K i n g H u i , w h o thought it good and showed it to Ti C h i e n . 4

* I owe this observation to conversation with Christoph Harbsmeier.

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'It's g o o d ' , said T i C h i e n . ' W i l l it work?' 'No.' 'If it's good w h y won't it work?' 'Suppose we have m e n hfting a heavy log. Those i n front chant "Heave ho!", those behind join i n . For lifting a heavy log that's good enough. Not that there aren't the airs of C h e n g a n d Wei to sing, but they wouldn't be so suitable. The state is the heaviest log there is to lift.' " There is a story of H u i Shih being worried that Chuang-tzu wants to supersede h i m as chief minister. H e gets the lofty reply: "In the South there is a b i r d , its name is the phoenix, do you know of it? The phoenix came u p from the South Sea to fly to the N o r t h Sea; it would rest on no tree but the sterculia, w o u l d eat nothing but the seeds of the bamboo, w o u l d d r i n k only f r o m the sweetest springs. Just then an o w l had found a rotting mouse. A s the phoenix flew over, it looked up and glared at it, 'Shoo!'. N o w a m I to take it that for the sake of that state of Wei of yours you want to shoo at m e ? " N o doubt it was i n his humbler days that H u i Shih was close to Chuang-tzu, and they saw less of each other w h e n he rose h i g h i n the world. H u i Shih's m i n d , to judge from another story, had a further dimension missing f r o m almost all thinkers of the classical period, a genuine curiosity about the explanation of natural phenomena. D o w n to about 250 B . C . proto-scientific theorising belongs to the world of astronomers, diviners, and physicians; no one i n the philosophical schools shows any interest i n cosmology, or, except for the Later Mohists w h o studied optics a n d mechanics, i n any science. Yet we read of H u i Shih: "There was a strange m a n of the South called H u a n g Liao, w h o asked why heaven d i d not collapse or earth subside, and the reasons (ku ) for w i n d , rain, and thunder. H u i Shih answered without hesitation, replied without t h i n k i n g , h a d explanations for all the myriad things, never stopped explaining, said more and more and still thought he hadn't said enough, h a d some marvel to a d d . " In the Later M o h i s t sciences ku is used strictly of causes; d i d H u i Shih offer genuinely causal explanations as we find them i n the M o h i s t optics and mechanics, or was he satisfied w i t h the correlative system-building they avoided but w h i c h was always to be the mainstream of cosmological speculation? Unless archaeology turns u p new documents we shall never know. H u i Shih owes his place as one of the major thinkers of C h i n a entirely to a single passage i n the earliest history of the schools, the 'Below i n the Empire' chapter of Chuang-tzu. 5

6

7

8

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" H u i S h i n had m a n y formulas, his books filled five carts, but his Way was eccentric, his words were off centre. He tabulated the ideas of things, saying: (1) The ultimately great has nothing outside it, call it the 'Greatest One'. The ultimately small has nothing inside it, call it the 'Smallest One'. (2) The dimensionless cannot be accumulated, yet its girth is a thousand miles. (3) Heaven is as low as earth, the mountains are level w i t h the marshes. (4) Simultaneously w i t h being at noon the s u n declines, simultaneously w i t h being alive a thing dies. (5) Being similar o n the large scale yet different from the similar on a small scale, it is this we call 'similar a n d different o n a small scale'. The myriad things to the last one being similar, to the last one being different, it is this we call 'similar a n d different o n a large scale'. (6) The south has no limit yet does have a limit. (7) I go to Y i i e h today yet arrived yesterday. (8) L i n k e d rings can be disconnected. (9) I k n o w the centre of the world: north of Yen up i n the north, south of Yiieh d o w n i n the south, you are there. (10) Let concern spread to all the myriad things; heaven and earth count as one unit." We number the theses purely for convenience, and there can be no certainty that H u i Shih presented them as a united sequence. But they do make an impression of homogeneity, exposing paradoxes w h i c h result from dividing and counting, a n d g u i d i n g towards the conclusion that all things are one, like Zeno's paradoxes.* W i t h the loss of H u i Shih's explanations there is little point i n attempting a close analysis, but one can offer a tentative account on the following lines: (1) C o u n t i n g is relative to division; either the infinite whole or the indivisible point w h i c h is its smallest division may be counted as one. (2) The indivisible division presents a paradox; any quantity is the sum of its smallest divisions, yet the s u m of points remains a point. (3) The infinite whole presents another paradox; since from any * The standard interpretation of Hui Shih's theses as spatio-temporal paradoxes has recently been challenged by Reding, who tries the different approach of relating them to political issues from which they might be plucked out of context and presented as sophistical absurdities by hostile thinkers. (Reding, Fondements 350-377).

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position the distance upwards a n d downwards is infinite, mountains should be level w i t h marshes. (4) The indivisible division of time, the moment, likewise presents a paradox; the last moment of life is the first of death, so a thing is simultaneously alive and dead. (5) In d i v i d i n g and n a m i n g , we assume that we can give, for example, the name 'horse' to objects similar to each other and different from other objects;! but if we p u s h similarity and difference further horses turn out to be both different f r o m each other a n d similar to everything else. (6) Space presents the further paradox that it both must and cannot have a limit. (7) C o m b i n i n g the indivisible divisions of space and time, it appears that if I cross the line between one state a n d another at the moment between one day and the next, I both left one state today and reached the other yesterday. (8) If indivisible divisions truly exist, it follows that connected rings can be fined d o w n to pure circles and passed through each other without resistance. (9) Space if infinite has its centre everywhere. (10) Since division leads to contradiction don't divide at all, and therefore be as concerned for all other things as for yourself. A t what level of sophistication d i d H u i Shih defend his theses? That, for example, space both must a n d cannot have a hmit is for many of us the first philosophical thought we pick u p i n childhood; one w o u l d like to know how rigorously H u i Shih succeeded i n formulating the paradox. There is a discussion of it i n Lieh-tzu (c. A . D . 300) w h i c h seems o n both internal and external evidence to have been borrowed from a lost chapter of Chuang-tzu. "T'ang of Y i n asked C h i of H s i a 'Have there been things from the very first?' 'Unless there were things f r o m the very first, how w o u l d there be things now? W o u l d it be admissible for the m e n after us to say there are no things now?' 'Does no thing then precede or succeed another?' 'The ends and starts of things Have no limit f r o m w h i c h they began The start of one is the e n d of another, 10

t This assumption is explicit in the Canons and Hstin-tzu, cf. p. 140f, 265 below.

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The end of one is the start of another, H o w w o u l d we k n o w w h i c h comes first? But of what is outside things, of what preceded events, I do not know.' 'Are there then limit and exhaustibility above and below and i n the eight directions?' T do not know.' "T'ang persisted i n asking. C h i said: 'Since on the one h a n d what is nothing is limitless and on the other what is something is inexhaustible, how would I know of them? But outside the limitless there is nothing else w h i c h is limitless, inside the inexhaustible there is nothing else w h i c h is inexhaustible. Beside the limitless nothing else is limitless, beside the inexhaustible nothing else is inexhaustible. This is w h y I k n o w that they are limitless and inexhaustible, without k n o w i n g that they are limited and exhaustible.' "* If N o t h i n g is infinite there is a second infinite (since the infinite has nothing outside it?), a n d if Something is infinitely divisible a second infinitely-divisible (there being something, the point, inside its finest divisions?)—a contradiction, so they are finite. This may well be Chuangtzu's version of his friend's lost proof that space is infinite yet also finite, but translated into the poetic language of Taoism. H u i Shih himself no doubt preferred the drily analytic style w h i c h we find i n K u n g - s u n L u n g and the Later Mohists. Stories of C h u a n g - t z u m a k i n g f u n of h i m for being too logical give some impression of his style. "Chuang-tzu a n d H u i Shih were strolling o n the bridge above the River H a o . 'Out s w i m the m i n n o w s so free and easy', said C h u a n g - t z u . 'That's how the fish are h a p p y ' 'You are not a fish. Whence do you k n o w the fish are happy?' 'You aren't me, whence do you k n o w I don't k n o w the fish are happy?' 'We'll grant that not being you I don't k n o w about y o u . Then granted you are not a fish, the case is complete that you don't k n o w the fish are happy.' 'Let's go back to where we started. W h e n you said "Whence do you know the fish are happy?", y o u asked me the question already k n o w i n g that I knew. I knew it f r o m u p above the Hao.' " Here Chuang-tzu's final stroke of w i t is not necessarily mere exploitation of the accident that of the ways of asking ' H o w do you know?' n

* Lieh-tzu (ch. 5) 5/1A, tr. G 94-96. The postulation of a lacuna in the text now seems to me unnecessary.

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in Chinese H u i Shih happened to ask w i t h an 'whence?' rather than for example w i t h ho-yi T>y what means?'. For Chuang-tzu all knowing is relative to viewpoint. There is no answer to ' H o w do you know?' except a clarification of the viewpoint from w h i c h y o u know, w h i c h relates to the whole of your concrete situation. There is another dialogue w h i c h suggests that H u i Shih shares the Later M o h i s t view that the function of names is to communicate that an object is like the objects one knows by the n a m e . It is interesting to see that his example of a definition is not by genus and differentia but by analogue and differentia. The K i n g criticises his chief minister for using too many analogical illustrations i n his discourse. " ' W h e n y o u speak of affairs, sir, I w i s h you w o u l d simply speak directly, w i t h no analogies.' 'Let's suppose we have a m a n w h o does not k n o w about tan', said H u i Shih. 'If he says "What are the characteristics of a tan like?", and you answer "Like a tan", w i l l it be communicated?' 'It w i l l not.' 'If then y o u answer instead "A tan i n its characteristics is like a bow, but with a string made of bamboo", w i l l he k n o w ? ' 'It could be k n o w n . ' 'It is inherent i n explanation,' continued H u i Shih, 'that by using what he does know to communicate what he does not y o u cause the other man to k n o w it. For Your Majesty n o w to say " N o analogies" is inadmissible.' " 'Below i n the Empire' has a further list of 21 sophisms, heterogeneous, and ascribed to the Sophists i n general. They include some more spatiotemporal paradoxes: "A stick one foot long, if y o u take away half every day, will not be exhausted i n ten thousand ages." "A wheel does not touch the g r o u n d " (it touches it nowhere because the point of contact is dimensionless?). "The L-square is not square, the compasses cannot make circles" (because they can only approximate to the geometrically perfect figures?). " W h e n the arrow is at its fastest there is a time w h e n it neither travels nor is at rest" (between the first moment of flight and last of rest on the string?). There are two more of w h i c h we do have clear pre-Han evidence i n the Mohist Canons. (1) "The eye does not see." The eye is a means to seeing, does not itself see. Cf. Canon B 46 "The knower sees by means of the eye a n d the eye by means of fire but the fire 12

1 3

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does not see. . . . Seeing by means of the eye is like seeing by means of the fire." (2) "The shadow of a flying bird has never stirred." The shadow does not move, it appears or disappears w i t h the arrival or obstruction of the light, as explained i n Canon B17 at the head of a series on the shadow as an interference phenomenon. Canon: "The shadow does not shift. Explained by: being re-made. Explanation: Where the light reaches the shadow disappears."

Kung-sun Lung K u n g - s u n L u n g deserves fuller treatment than H u i Shih for a reason w h i c h overrides all others, that we are not i n the frustrating position of having to guess what his arguments w o u l d be. We have not only his theses but his demonstrations, w h i c h for logical sophistication have no equal i n the literature except for those i n the last part of the M o h i s t Canons, w h i c h are very m u c h shorter. There are however two great obstacles to the understanding of K u n g - s u n L u n g . The first is textual; it has only lately been recognised that the book called Kung-sun Lung tzu was forged between A . D . 300 and 600, and that the second half of it is a mixture of banality a n d nonsense contrived w i t h the aid of misunderstood scraps of the Canons. But it preserves three p r e - H a n essays, the 'White Horse', 'Pointings and Things' and 'Left and Right', all examples of pien as the arguing out of alternatives, i n the form either of dialogue or of a case followed by its refutation. A m o n g these the 'White Horse' shows evidence of dislocation among the questions and answers of the dialogue; we shall follow a rearrangement adopted on purely textual grounds some time before the proposal of the present interpretation. The second obstacle is conceptual, the difficulty of finding an angle of approach from w h i c h the arguments w i l l make sense. The difficulty shows up very plainly i n the 'White Horse'; the arguments are clear, yet the first seems an obvious non sequitur (" 'Horse' is that by w h i c h we name the shape, 'white' is that by w h i c h we name the colour. To name the colour is not to name the shape. Therefore I say A white horse is not a horse'") and the rest seem to assume an elementary confusion of identity and class membership. A s the understanding of Chinese argumentation progresses error on this scale becomes less and less credible. Fung Y u - l a n tried to make the 'White Horse' thesis more interesting by taking it to deny the identity of the universals 'white horse' and 'horse'. But there is no evidence of a Realist doctrine of universals i n ancient C h i n a . Discussions 14

15

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of the common name, i n the Canons a n d Hsun-tzu, take what we w o u l d call Nominalism for granted; and to credit them w i t h conceiving universals without asking whether they recognised common names as problematic is as though one were to identify some piece of porcelain as a milk bottle, because of its shape, without asking whether the Chinese drink milk. More recent attempts to prove the arguments valid b y translating them into symbolic logic I find equally u n c o n v i n c i n g . Recently C h a d H a n s e n has proposed a radical shift of viewpoint, as following f r o m his questionable but important hypothesis that Chinese nouns resemble the mass nouns rather than the count nouns of IndoEuropean languages. This w o u l d mean that ma Mj 'horse' functions like the English mass n o u n 'sand', a n d different mfl'will be conceived as like scattered grains of sand; the class/member relation becomes one k i n d of whole/part relation, distinguished f r o m others by the similarity of parts. It is notable that the Canons use the same terms, chien J§t 'collection' and t'i |§L 'unit', to cover both relations, w i t h the latter defined as "a part i n a chien." A l t h o u g h I disagree w i t h the detail of Hansen's interpretation, his shift of angle opens u p a new perspective from w h i c h the previously unrelated fall into place. Without being committed to the mass-noun hypothesis, one is awakened to the recognition that K u n g - s u n L u n g does present the white horse as a whole of w h i c h white and horse are parts. Of the other two essays of K u n g - s u n L u n g , the 'Left and Right' is explicitly about whole and part. There are m a n y rival interpretations of 'Pointings and Things', but the only one w h i c h takes account of its apparent organisation as argument followed b y refutation already before Hansen's breakthrough took the theme to be the pointing out of part from w h o l e . This raises the possibility of a reading of the three essays w i t h a common thread r u n n i n g through all. It has the further advantage that the question of whether one can make divisions without contradiction is a k n o w n preoccupation of the age, central to both H u i Shih and Chuang-tzu.* In Chinese as i n English it is common sense that 'horse' being more general than 'white horse' one is entitled to say 'A white horse is a horse'; to put it i n a Western terminology, the relation affirmed is of class membership, not of identity. This obvious point is already made i n a story of K u n g - s u n L u n g being refuted b y the simple common sense of a descendant of Confucius, K ' u n g C h ' u a n . The Sophist h a d cited an instance of Confucius himself appearing to differentiate a 'man of C h ' u ' from a 'man', to w h i c h K ' u n g C h ' u a n answers: 17

18

19

20

21

* The present intepretation of the essays is developed at length in G Studies 193-215.

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"Whenever we say ' m a n ' we refer to m e n i n general, just as whenever we say 'horse' we refer to horses i n general. ' C h ' u ' by itself is the state, 'white' b y itself is the colour. If y o u w i s h to w i d e n the 'man' i n it you have to leave out the ' C h ' u ' , if y o u w i s h to specify the name of the colour you must not leave out the 'white' ."t But K u n g - s u n Lung's tactic is to by-pass class and member by imposing a different whole/part division. H i s style of argument was commonly described as 'separation of the chien-pai ^ .** The phrase chien-pai 'hard and white' was long misunderstood i n the deceptive light of a forged chapter entitled ' H a r d and White', w h i c h distinguishes i n a stone the hardness k n o w n b y touch f r o m the whiteness k n o w n by sight. This implies an awareness of sense perception as problematic for w h i c h there is no firm evidence i n C h i n a before the arrival of B u d d h i s m . But it is plain from the Canons that chien pai was a technical term for mutual pervasives, a metaphorical extension from hardness and whiteness to cover such pairs as space and duration, length and b r e a d t h . The Canons define it among the geometrical terms: Canon A66: "Chien-pai is not excluding each other. Explanation: Different positions do not fill each other. Not being each other is excluding each other." The mutually pervasive shape and colour of the white horse is itself an example of the chien-pai w h i c h the Sophist separated. Thus H s u Shen (fl. A . D . 100), commenting o n a reference to 'separating the chien-pai', says " K u n g - s u n L u n g was a m a n of Chao w h o enjoyed hair-splitting and paradoxical talk. O n the grounds that 'white' and 'horse' cannot be joined as one thing he separated them and deemed them t w o . " N o w if we separate the mutually pervasive white a n d horse i n the white horse, then we have only to apply the principle that the whole is not one of its parts to infer that the white horse is not the horse w h i c h is one of its components. This principle appears i n the Canons i n the form ' O x and horse are not horse'. It is criticised o n the grounds that we have no more right to say 'x and y are not y' than 'x and y are y'; if y being non-x makes the pair non-x then x being x w o u l d make the pair x; what should be said is 'x and y are non-x and non-y'. Canon B 67: "There are the same grounds for denying that ox and horse 22

23

t K'ung-ts'ung-tzu v. 1, 75B-76A. For evidence that this compilation of the 3rd century A . D . is here reproducing an older source, cf. G Studies 179 nl8. ** For chien-pai, cf. G Logic 170-176.

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are not horse as for admitting it. Explained by: the combination [chien, the collection interprétable either as whole or as class] Explanation: If it is admissible that one not being ox they are not ox, then one being ox although the other is not, it is admissible that they are ox. Therefore, if it is inadmissible to say either ' O x and horse are not ox' or 'Ox and horse are ox', then, it being admissible of one but not the other, it is likewise inadmissible to say ' " O x and horse are ox" is inadmissible.' Moreover, if neither ox nor horse is two, but ox and horse are two, then, without ox being non-ox or horse being non-horse, there is no difficulty about ' O x and non-ox are non-ox and non-horse'." This meticulous criticism of 'x and y are not y" would be pointless unless the principle was being used in analysing controversial issues. It can be seen that it w o u l d make an ideal weapon for K u n g - s u n L u n g . If he perceives that it has nothing to do w i t h the physical separability of oxen and horses he can astonish his audience by extending it to the mutually pervasive, 'separating the chien-pai' by proving that since hardness and whiteness are not hardness, and shape and colour are not shape, the shape horse combined w i t h the colour white are not a horse. Since the genuine remains of K u n g - s u n L u n g are so sparse, we shall do h i m the honour of translating them complete.

The 'White Horse' We mark the order of the questions and answers ( Q , A ) i n the extant text by numbers, i n the present rearrangement by letters. (A-D/l-4) Q . "Is it admissible that a white horse is not a horse? A . It is admissible. Q. Why? A . 'Horse' is that by w h i c h we name the shape, 'white' is that by w h i c h we name the colour. To name the colour is not to name the shape. Therefore I say, 'A white horse is not a horse'." If we are thinking of the white horse as a member of the class of horses this is a non-sequitur; all that is proved is that the colour white is not a horse. But it is valid for K u n g - s u n L u n g because he is confining the name 'horse' to one of the two parts of the whole 'white horse'. The grounds for claiming that ox and horse are not ox was, as we learn from the Canon, that "one not being ox they are not ox". O n the same lines he has only to show that one member of the combination 'white horse' is not a horse, and his case is proved. If we allow h i m to make his rather dubious analysis of the

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white horse into two mutually pervasive parts, and confine the name 'horse' to one of them, what could be plainer than that the white horse is not the part of it so named? He is playing a trick on us of course. In ordinary Chinese discourse a thing is described as 'having shape and colour' (both conceived as inside it), not as being the shape, w i t h the colour outside it. But there is an asymmetry w h i c h disguises this sleight-of-hand. The 'Five colours' are fully enumerable, green, red, yellow, white, black; but shapes are innumerable, w i t h square a n d r o u n d commonly taken as representative. H o w does one describe the shape of a horse except as like a horse? One can imagine an alert objector stopping K u n g - s u n L u n g i n his tracks right at the start: 'Inadmissible. What names the shape is not 'horse' but 'like a horse'." He misses the opportunity, and from now on the Sophist is i n full command. O n K u n g - s u n Lung's analysis to say 'A white horse is a horse' is like taking literally the English synechdoche ' m y trusty blade' for 'sword' and saying A sword is a blade'. To test our interpretation let us from now on compare the argument stage b y stage w i t h a parallel demonstration that A sword is not a blade', i n w h i c h the w o r d ' s w o r d ' is everywhere substitutable by 'hilt and blade'. The objector is obstinately clinging to the misunderstanding that one is denying that sword-blades are blades, taking the proposition as analogous to 'A sword is not a weapon'. Analogue A - D . Q . Is it admissible that a sword is not a blade? A . Yes. Q . W h y ? A . The blade is the steel, the hilt is the handle. The handle is not the steel. So the sword is not the blade. From the second exchange onwards it is plain that the objector, like K ' u n g C h ' u a n and like ourselves, does understand the sophism as excluding white horses f r o m horses; the common sense interpretation is the same i n Chinese as i n English, K u n g - s u n L u n g is attacking from an angle as unfamiliar to his contemporaries as to us. The difficulty is to find anything w r o n g w i t h his logic once one has let his initial definitions pass. The objector's first reaction is that if no coloured horses were horses there would be no horses i n the w o r l d , overlooking the point that if the horse is the shape every combination of horse and colour includes a horse. (EF/7,8) Q . "You deem a horse w h i c h has colour not a horse. It is not the case that the world has colourless horses; is it admissible that the world has no horses? A . Certainly horses have colour, w h i c h is w h y one has white horses; supposing that horses were colourless, and one h a d only simple horses, how would one select a white horse? Therefore the white is not the horse.

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A white horse is horse a n d white combined; horse and white . . . . horse. (Commentator's paraphrase of the mutilated passage: "White and horse are two things. W h e n we b r i n g together the two things as a common body, one may not one-sidedly call them 'horse'"). Therefore I say, 'A white horse is not a horse'." The Sophist has turned the objection neatly r o u n d . That the uncompounded horses w h i c h do not exist would be colourless proves that the colour is added to the horse, and puts us back where we started; the whole which is horse and colour is not the part w h i c h is horse. If we are right i n identifying a lacuna tillable f r o m the anonymous old commentary (probably from the 7th century A . D . * ) , the Sophist concludes by saying explicitly that you cannot call the combination after one of its parts. Analogue E E Q . Then you deem a blade w i t h handle not a blade. There are no blades without handles i n use; are there then no blades i n use? A . Of course blades have handles, otherwise there w o u l d be no swords. Supposing blades had no handles and were simply blades, where would you find a sword? You have only confirmed that the hilt is not the blade. The sword is the hilt and the blade. (?You cannot one-sidedly use 'blade' for both hilt a n d blade?). So a sword is not a blade. In d i v i d i n g shape from colour K u n g - s u n L u n g invites the accusation that he is abolishing the link between them; 'white horse' does not add to all horses all the white of horses, snow and jade as 'ox and horse' adds all oxen to all horses, it is a chien pai combination referring only to what is both white and a horse. This is the objector's next point. (GH/9,14) Q . "If horse not yet combined w i t h white is deemed horse, and white not yet combined w i t h horse is deemed white, and you put horse and white together under the compound name 'white horse', this is applying the same name to them combined as uncombined, w h i c h is inadmissible. Therefore I say, 'It is inadmissible that a white horse is not a horse.' A . 'White' does not fix anything as white; that may be left out of account. 'White horse' mentions the white fixing something as white; what fixes something as white is not the white. 'Horse' selects or excludes none of the colours, therefore one may answer it with either a yellow or a black. 'White horse' selects some colour a n d excludes others, and the yellow and the black are both excluded on grounds of colour; therefore one may answer to it only w i t h a white horse. To exclude none is not to exclude some. Therefore I say 'A white horse is not a horse'." * Cf. G Studies 152-155 for the date of the commentary.

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The Sophist is as well aware as the objector that a white horse, unlike ox and horse, is a combination of mutually pervasive parts. The weapon which has armed h i m for his startling 'separation of the chien-pai' is the perception that the principle 'x a n d y are not y' applies just as well to the mutually pervasive as to ox and horse. A white horse differs from a patch of white a n d a horse i n that on the one hand it fixes what is white, on the other excludes horses of any other colour. Yet it remains the case that what excludes no colour ('horse') is not what excludes some colours ('white horse'). This is the first of the places where, if we assume the issue to be membership of the class of horses, he seems to be proving only that not all horses are white horses, confusing identity and class membership. But if he is thinking i n terms of whole and part the reversal makes no difference, since the part is no more the whole than the whole is the part. One sees also that he is not, as K ' u n g C h ' u a n supposed, missing the point that 'horse' is more general than 'white horse'; he has re-interpreted it as the liberty of horse to combine w i t h other colours besides white. Analogue G H . Q . If blades not yet joined to hilts are deemed blades, and hilts not yet joined to blades are deemed hilts, and you use the name 'swords' for all hilts a n d all blades together, this is applying the same name to them combined or uncombined, w h i c h is inadmissible. A . 'Hilt' does not specify what is hilted, 'sword' does; 'blade' does not exclude any handle, 'sword' excludes all but hilts. So the blade w h i c h does not exclude is not the sword w h i c h does. So the sword is not the blade. The objector now points out that it is not simply, as the Sophist implies, that wherever there is a white horse there is a horse inside it; having a white horse is 'called' or 'deemed' having a horse. It is above all i n this sequence that on a class/member analysis K u n g - s u n L u n g seems to be confusing class membership w i t h identity. (I J/5,6) Q . " H a v i n g a w h i t e horse cannot be called 'lacking a horse'. What cannot be called 'lacking a horse' is having a horse. If having a white horse is deemed having a horse, w h y if judged to be white is it not a horse? A . Someone w h o seeks a horse w i l l be just as satisfied w i t h a yellow or a black horse; someone w h o seeks a white horse w i l l not be satisfied w i t h a yellow or a black horse. S u p p o s i n g that a white horse were after all a horse, what they seek w o u l d be one and the same; that what they seek w o u l d be one and the same is because the white w o u l d not be different from the horse. If what they seek is not different, w h y is it that such horses as the yellow a n d the black are admissible i n the former case but not i n the latter? Admissible a n d inadmissible are plainly contradictory. Therefore that a yellow and a black horse are one and the same i n that they may

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answer to 'having a horse' but not to 'having a white horse' is conclusive proof that a white horse is not a horse." Here the Sophist arrives at his clinching proof, and instead of repeating his formulaic "Therefore I say 'A white horse is not a horse';" declares his case finally proved. Plain as it is that white horses are not the horses w h i c h are parts of themselves, it is plainer still that they are not the horses w h i c h combine w i t h other colours. If we misread h i m i n terms of class and member, it w i l l seem on the contrary that he is sinking ever deeper into his confusion of identity a n d class membership. This misunderstanding results f r o m treating the thesis he attacks as analogous, not w i t h A sword is a blade' but w i t h 'A sword is a weapon', w h i c h puts the sword inside the class of weapons, so that to object to it that spears are also weapons w o u l d be an elementary mistake. 'A sword is a blade' on the other hand puts the s w o r d inside its o w n blade, excluding the hilt but filling the blade, therefore identical w i t h it. To object to it that sword and blade cannot be identical because blades w i t h other handles than hilts are not swords w o u l d be fully valid. If someone insists that a sword is a blade one could only suppose that he makes no distinction between hilt and blade; similarly o n the Sophist's analysis if a white horse were a horse "the white w o u l d not be different f r o m the horse." Analogue I J. Q . H a v i n g a sword is not describable as lacking a blade, therefore is having a blade. W h y then if it is hilted isn't it a blade? A . If you ask for a blade any k i n d of handle w i l l do, but not if y o u ask for a sword. Supposing that the sword were the blade y o u w o u l d be asking for the same thing i n both cases, because there w o u l d be no difference between hilt and blade. The objector n o w protests that he is not claiming that there is no difference between the colour white and a horse. ' H a v i n g a white horse' is reduced to 'having a horse' by deleting the 'white' while continuing to refer to the same horse. (K-N/13,10-12) Q . "In 'having a white horse cannot be called "lacking a horse"', the point is that one separates off the white. Without separating off the white, having a white horse could not be called 'having a horse'. Therefore the reason w h y it is deemed having a horse is the horse alone, it is not having a white horse w h i c h is deemed having a horse. Therefore its being deemed having a horse ( ? . . . . ? ) ; it cannot refer to any horse. A . If you deem having a white horse having a horse, is it admissible to say that having a horse is to be deemed having a yellow horse? Q . Inadmissible. A . To deem having a horse different from having a yellow horse is to

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differentiate a yellow horse f r o m a horse. To differentiate a yellow horse from a horse is to deem a yellow horse not a horse. To deem a yellow horse not a horse, yet i n the case of a white horse deem it having a horse, this is 'Flying things go underwater, inner and outer coffins are i n different places', it is the world's worst fallacy and inconsistency." The objector's deletion of 'white', like K ' u n g Ch'uan's, w o u l d be to the point if the issue were the generality of names. But K u n g - s u n L u n g attacks from a direction to w h i c h the objector never orientates himself. A s he has posed the issue, if omitting the colours of white horse and yellow horse is enough to show the identity of each w i t h the horse w h i c h is part of it, then since the part is c o m m o n to both they are identical w i t h each other. Analogue K - N . Q . In 'having a sword is having a blade' one separates off the hilt f r o m the sword. The reason w h y it is deemed having a blade is the blade only, not the whole sword, but also not any blade. A . Is having a blade to be deemed having a scythe? Q . N o . A . To deem having a blade different from having a scythe is to differentiate a scythe from a blade, so a scythe is not a blade. To admit of a scythe what you deny of a sword is the worst kind of inconsistency." O n this analysis the 'White Horse' is a relentlessly logical working out of the implications of its suspect premisses. Once tricked by the initial analysis into accepting 'horse' as the name of the shape, w i t h the colour outside it, the objector is trapped i n an aberrant description of the white horse w h i c h fits it consistently but implies that it is not a horse. We may see the argument as an intellectual game to astonish and amuse the court of the L o r d of P'ing-yiian. But it is a potentially instructive game; it shows, to those w h o notice that he has shifted the name 'horse' to the shape excluding the colour, that the move changes the logical implications yet allows an equally consistent description of the object. There could be a coherent description of the world i n w h i c h only the shape of what we now call 'horse' is meant by 'horse', even one i n w h i c h horses are called 'oxen' and oxen 'horses', and it w o u l d require no logical acrobatics to prove that what is commonly called a horse is not a horse. Chuang-tzu, w h o i n spite of his mockery of logic had a subtler m i n d than the sensible K ' u n g C h ' u a n , saw deeper than he d i d into the 'White Horse' argument, to judge by a fleeting reference to it: "Rather than use the horse to show a horse is not a horse, use what is not a horse." 24

'Pointings and Things' This brief essay has long fascinated logically minded readers, w h o have never reached agreement even on its theme. M o s t have started from

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identifications of its crucial term chih %n (noun, 'finger,' or verb 'point out') w i t h some concept of Western philosophy (universal, quality, class, meaning) but failed to arrive at a logically consecutive or even a syntactically consistent reading. But any firm solution must start from the opposite direction, from its background i n the literature of the time, w h i c h provides more evidence than has commonly been recognised. (1) The verb chih 'point out' (nominalised, 'what is pointed out') is used of gesture, of discourse i n general, but also specifically of the meaning of names, for example Hsiin-tzu's "They instituted names to point out objects" and a Taoist's "These three, 'comprehensive', 'throughout', 'all', are different names for the same object, what they point out is one." (2) Several of the Explanations of the Canons (the nearest relatives of 'Pointings and Things' i n the literature) fall into two parts, argument and refutation, w i t h nothing to mark the changeover. This essay, w h i c h falls into two parts, of w h i c h the first says "chih is not chih" and the second "it is not that chih is not chih", is surely of the same form. Recognition of this form forbids us to read the essay as a mere string of disconnected observations, a n d imposes the constraints necessary for testable interpretation. 25

26

(3) A few tantalising references i n Taoist literature to a paradox of pointing suggest that it h a d something to do w i t h pointing out part from whole. C h u a n g - t z u , mentioning it besides K u n g - s u n Lung's horse, concludes "Heaven and earth are the one chih, the m y r i a d things are the one h o r s e " . 'Below i n the E m p i r e ' i n Chuang-tzu mentions among the paradoxes of the Sophists "Pointing out one does not reach, reaching one does not d e t a c h , " w h i c h reappears i n Taoist phraseology among three ascribed to K u n g - s u n L u n g i n Lieh-tzu (c. A . D . 300), admittedly a late and unreliable authority: " H a v i n g ideas, you don't fix it: having pointings-out, you don't reach it: having things you don't exhaust it." A friend of K u n g - s u n L u n g then gives brief explanations. "Without ideas, you fix the same i n them: without pointings-out, you reach them all: what exhausts things there constantly is."* Since the whole essay revolves r o u n d three concepts, w o r l d , things (of which "each has its o w n name") a n d chih, we shall take chih simply as 'point out, the pointed-out', and assume that the pointing out is always either of things or of w o r l d . The pointing out of w o r l d w o u l d have to be meaning it b y the name ' w o r l d ' . This involves a very suitable paradox; 27

28

* Lieh-tzu (ch. 4) 4/7A, reading

for

, a common corruption in the Canons (G Logic 460)

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since one uses names to point out things f r o m each other, how can 'world' function as a name? To say of 'comprehensive', 'throughout' and 'all' that "what they point out is one" already raises this poblem, and on the tongue of a Taoist may well be intentionally paradoxical. The supreme test of this as of a n y other interpretation is whether it succeeds or fails i n giving a logically consecutive reading of the essay. (Thesis) " W h e n no thing is not the pointed-out, to point out is not to point it out. (Argument) Without pointing out of things from world, there is nothing by w h i c h to call things not the pointed-out. If the world itself is treated as the things, may they be called the pointed-out? That 'pointed-out' is something the world does not have i n it, those 'things' the w o r l d does have i n i t . t It is inadmissible that what the world does have i n it be deemed what it does not." W h e n the scope of meaning is extended to everything a paradox arises. The name ' w o r l d ' does not point anything out, yet no thing is not what it points out. M a y one point out world b y identifying it w i t h the things one points out inside it? But that w o u l d violate the principle we observed behind the 'White Horse', that whole is not part nor part whole: "It is inadmissible that what the w o r l d does have i n it [that is, its parts] be deemed what it does not." O n e might object that although the world is not any of its parts it is the s u m of them all, a n d this w i l l i n due course turn out to be the answer i n the refutation. (Argument continued) "There being no pointing out of w o r l d , the things may not be called the pointed-out, w h i c h is 'it not being to point it out,' w h i c h is 'no thing not being the pointed-out'. That there being no p o i n t i n g out of world the things may not be called the pointed-out is there not being anything not the pointed-out, w h i c h is 'no thing not being the pointed-out', w h i c h is 'to point out not being to point it out'." Here we mark the phrases referring back to the original thesis by inverted commas. The paradox throws one back and forth between three untenable

+ The particle combinationyeh eke - t ^ j ^ " is a quotation device (G Logic 140f, 465), marking that 'chih' and 'thing' refer as before, presumably as in the thesis itself. For other syntactic questions raised by the translation, cf. G Logic 457-468, G Studies 210-215.

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positions: (1) the name ' w o r l d ' does not point out anything: (2) it points out something w h i c h things are not: (3) it points out everything. In the refutation K u n g - s u n L u n g sorts out the problem by introducing the term chien 'collection' (used b y the Later Mohists of whole or class i n contrast w i t h part or member) and a distinction between pu wei ^•j&j 'is not deemed' a n d / d %Y 'is not'. These enable h i m to clarify the point that although a thing is not deemed the w o r l d ('world' is not its name), it does not follow that things are not the w o r l d as parts of a whole. (Refutation) "There being n o pointing out of world derives from each thing having its o w n name and not being deemed the pointedout. W h e n though not deemed the pointed-out we call them the pointed-out, we collect together the not deemed the pointed-out. It is inadmissible to take your step from having i n it the not deemed the pointed-out to having nothing i n it not deemed the pointed-out." A thing is deemed a n ox or horse, not the world; we apply the name 'world' to all of them added together. The proponent's error was to make the jump f r o m no part being deemed the world (his "It is inadmissible that what world does have i n it be deemed what it does not") to " N o thing is not the pointed-out" understood as every part being deemed the world. (Refutation continued) "Moreover pointings-out are what world itself collects together. There being no pointing out of world is there undeniably being pointings-out of things, w h i c h is your 'there not being anything not the pointed-out, w h i c h is no thing not being the pointed-out'. It is not that to point out is not to point it out, it is pointing out combined w i t h a thing w h i c h is not pointing it out." By 'ox' and 'horse' we point things out from each other, b y 'world' we aggregate all the pointings-out. This allows us to say of 'world' that " N o thing is not the pointed-out," w h i c h is not equivalent to saying that each thing is deemed to be the w o r l d . It is the act of pointing combined with a specific thing w h i c h is not the pointing w h i c h extends over the whole world. (Refutation concluded) "Supposing that w i t h i n world there were no pointing out of things, what w o u l d we have the opportunity to call not the pointed-out? If w i t h i n the w o r l d there were no things, what w o u l d we have the opportunity to call the pointed-out? If there were pointing out of w o r l d but no pointing out of things, what w o u l d we have the opportunity to call not the pointed-out, call having i n it no

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thing not the pointed-out? Moreover if pointing out inherently and i n itself is deemed not pointing it out, how is it that it depends on things in combination w i t h w h i c h it is deemed pointing them out?" Here K u n g - s u n L u n g concludes b y showing that to speak either of being or not being what is pointed out by ' w o r l d ' always depends on pointing out things. H i s refutation shows that he was interested i n resolving paradoxes as well as i n startling people with them.

Left and Right This dialogue, w h i c h is explicitly about part and whole, tries to p i n d o w n the difference between 1 + 1' a n d '2'. In the Chinese numerical system the figure 2 doubles the figure 1, horizontally as strokes i n the graphs ( · , — ), vertically as rods on the counting board.** Since the ones are said m the dialogue to be on left and right, K u n g - s u n L u n g is evidently demonstrating his point visually, by placing counting rods apart and then combining them to make the figure 2 . t t We can achieve the same effect by using the Roman numerals: I I II (Thesis) "Is there I i n II? —There is no I i n II. (Objection) Is the I over on the right i n II? —No. Is the I over on the left i n II? —No. If neither the I over o n the left nor the I over on the right is i n II, how is it that II is the one over on the left combined w i t h the I over o n the right?* (Answer) Is it admissible that the I over on the right be called II? —Inadmissible. Is it admissible that the I over o n the left be called II? —Inadmissible. ** For the counting rods used for calculation before the introduction of the abacus, cf. Needham v. 3, 59, 70-72. tt T owe the observation about the relevance of counting rods for the 'Left and Right' to D. C. Lau. * For the grounds for transposing this sentence from its isolated position at the end of the dialogue, cf. G Studies 195 n5.

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Is it admissible that the I over o n the right combined w i t h the I over on the left be called II? —Admissible. — W h e n the I over o n the right has the other combined with it, may it be called altered? —Admissible. Altered from what? — F r o m being the I over on the right. If it has altered f r o m being the I over on the right, how can it be called the I over on the right? If it has not altered, h o w can it be called altered?" The difference between the combined and the uncombined is the issue which K u n g - s u n L u n g examined i n the third exchange of the 'White Horse' i n terms of 'white' and 'horse'.

6. THE DISCOVERY OF SUBJECTIVITY: SUNG HSING Late i n the 4th century B . C . we find i n Mencius and Chuang-tzu a shift of attention inwards, to the heart, for ancient C h i n a the organ of thought and of approval and disapproval, a n d an explicit division of the inner and the outer m a n . We shall here consider two other early representatives of this tendency, S u n g H s i n g a n d the anonymous author of the Nei yeh 'Inward Training' i n Kuan-tzu. Sung H s i n g a n d a colleague or disciple, Y i n W e n , were members of the Chi-hsia A c a d e m y of scholars patronised by K i n g H s i i a n (319-301 B . C . ) of C h ' i . They have left no writings,* but the 'Below i n the Empire' chapter of Chuang-tzu presents them as the leaders of one of the five great trends i n pre-Han thought. It mentions among their doctrines the Mohist-sounding 'Forbid aggression and disband troops', and describes their followers, distinguished by a cap called the ' M o u n t H u a ' , as travelling to preach throughout the Empire i n the same devoted and self-sacrificing spirit as the Mohists. H s i i n - t z u i n his 'Rejecting the Twelve Philosophers' pairs Sung H s i n g w i t h M o - t z u as "elevating the effective and useful, making much of thrift and blurring degrees and ranks". Mencius met Sung H s i n g travelling to dissuade the rulers of C h ' u and C h ' i n from going to war, on the characteristically M o h i s t grounds that neither w i l l benefit from i t . 1

2

* The extant book entitled Yin Wen tzu is from about A . D . 200, to judge by its affinity to the Lao-tzu weichih li-lueh of Wang Pi (A. D. 226-249). Cf. Daor 1-39.

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Mencius, w h o detested utilitarian calculations, complimented h i m on his good intentions but objected that he w o u l d only be encouraging rulers to think of advantage rather than of the benevolent and the right. Where S u n g H s i n g differs from the Mohists is i n a new prescription for achieving their reforms, the changing of the inner man by becoming aware of restricted viewpoints (pie yu %\] ^ : g] 'separating pens'), the freeing of self-respect f r o m the judgment of others, and recognition that man artificially inflates his few essential needs. Confucius and M o - t z u understand 'conduct' (hsing tff) as social behaviour, Sung H s i n g calls attention to 'the conduct w h i c h is the heart's' (hsin chih hsing |-jj[ ) cf. G ut sup. 214—216.

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Such descriptions as 'black m a n ' and 'concerned for m a n k i n d ' do not fit perfectly, and allow such subtle turns as the proposal that since a man w i t h b l i n d eyes is a b l i n d m a n a m a n w i t h white skin and black eyes is a black m a n . t O n e has then to decide w h i c h part of the body or w h i c h members of marikind to take as the criterion. A97 (Canon) " M a k e the criterion stay, i n order to distinguish courses. (Explanation) It the other m a n , referring to a respect i n w h i c h it is so, deems it so i n the instance here, refer to respects i n w h i c h it is not so a n d inquire about them. (For example, the sage has respects i n w h i c h he is not, yet he is)." In discourse y o u choose the name of object or criterion or kind w h i c h stays for a period of time, y o u 'make it stay'. N o complication arises however w h e n the fit is exact, as w i t h the circle. A98 (Canon) "The exact nowhere is not. (Explanation) The matching and the assent enter knowledge together. W h e n after explanation you assent to more than that they match (for example, to a circle being nowhere rectilinear) or without explanation y o u assent o n the basis of the matching, it is as though it were so of itself." Returning to the inexact, having distinguished courses b y the criterion, y o u have to fix the k i n d ; you decide that the particular object is 'this' (shih ^ ), of the species i n question. O n e can then proceed along the course chosen from the present instance to others. B l (Canon) " M a k e the k i n d stay, i n order to make the other m a n proceed. Explained by: the sameness. (Explanation) The other, o n the grounds that it is so of the instance here, argues that it is so of this; I, o n the grounds that it is not so of the instance here, doubt that it is so of this. B2 (Canon) If the fours differ, explain the difficulty of extending from k i n d to k i n d . Explained by: m a k i n g 'the wide or the narrow' or 'all of the thing' stay. (Explanation) If said to have four feet, is it a n animal? O r is it living thing or b i r d ? — ' a l l of the thing' and 'the wide or the narrow'. If what is so of the instance here were necessarily so of this, all w o u l d be m i l u deer." The m i l u deer was said to have four eyes, because of deep cavities under the eyes. If I describe the instance here as four-eyed and fourt The sophism 'A white dog is black" in Cz 33/77 tr. G 284 is plausibly explained on these lines by the commentator Ssu-ma Piao (died A.IJ. 306). Cf. G ut sup. 344,493.

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footed, I commit myself to describing all m i l u deer but not all animals as four-eyed, all animals but not all living things as four-footed. It is to be noticed that the M o h i s t is not talking about inductive inference. H i s theme here is not inference from the k n o w n to the u n k n o w n but consistent description of the already k n o w n . The last of these sections already bedevils w i t h textual problems, w h i c h multiply as the series continues. O f the rest we shall note only that the next examines h o w names change their functions i n combination. Thus w h e n the name 'both' is added to the name 'two' and to the name 'fight' to make 'Both (are) two' and 'Both fight', we find that both do fight but they are not both two, although the objects remain two. For the authors of the Canons even a grammatical particle such as chii 'all, both' is a name, and there is no evidence that they are aware of the sentence except as a combination of names.

The revised art of discourse in 'Names and Objects' Like Expounding the Canons, the fragmentary treatise Names and Objects follows the widespread convention of taking the title from the first words ("Names and objects do not connect necessarily"). It is i n fact concerned with sentences rather than names, and may be seen as an attempt to reconstitute the art of discourse i n the light of the discovery of the sentence. The fragments o n names show advances i n classifying types of naming and also i n terminology. Instead of the traditional use of ox and horse as logical counters we once find the w o r d mou (commonly used as substitute for tabooed names) adapted as 'x'. In the following the opening sentences probably refer to the 'horse' and ' C h ' i n horse' of another fragment: Names and Objects 2. " O f the named by shape and characteristics, you necessarily k n o w that this is x if you know x. Of those one cannot name by shape and characteristics, even if you do not know that this is x, y o u may k n o w x. The named by residence and migration, if they have entered the confines are all this; if they leave there, by this criterion they are not. O f the named by residence and migration, district and village names, ' C h ' i ' , ' C h i n g ' and the like are all instances; of the named by shape and characteristics, 'mountain', ' h i l l ' , 'house', 'shrine' and the like are all instances."

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The two following fragments probably go together, m a k i n g 'big' an example of n a m i n g b y number or measure. The first is the opening passage of the treatise: "Names and Objects. Names a n d objects do not connect necessarily. If this stone is w h i t e , w h e n y o u break u p this stone all of it is the same as what is white; but even though this stone is b i g , it is not the same as what is b i g . " Then: "In the case of a n y t h i n g named otherwise than by reference to number or measure, w h e n y o u break it u p all of it is this. Therefore one man's finger is not one m a n , but this one man's finger is this one m a n ; one face of a cube is not a cube, but the face of a w o o d e n cube is the w o o d e n cube." The last half of the treatise is fortunately intact. It argues at length that sentences w h i c h appear to be structurally alike may, because of idiomatic shifts i n the combining of names, have different logical implications. Thus it may seem obvious that if we can say 'White horses are horses, riding white horses is r i d i n g horses', we can also say 'Robbers are people, killing robbers is kilhng people'. But sha tao |jL j£. 'kilUng robbers' is the ordinary term for executing robbers, while sha jen ^ . A . 'killing people' has the pejorative sense of murder or massacre, so that the sentence appears to declare that it is w r o n g to execute robbers. In the M o h i s t terminology, it does not follow that if robbers are 'this' (people) it is 'so' that one is killing people. The M o h i s t does not however analyse these idioms, instead he declares that "a t h i n g i n some cases is this a n d it is so, i n others is this but it is not so, i n others is not this yet it is so", a n d classifies sentences accordingly. 'Robbers are people' belongs to the second of the classes, w i t h other sentences w h i c h display the same k i n d of treacherous idiomatic shift. Names and Objects 15. "Huo's parent is another, but Huo's serving her parent is not 'serving another' [shih jen ^ A . 'serving a husband']. H e r younger brother is a handsome m a n , but loving her younger brother is not loving a handsome m a n . [loving h i m for his looks]. A carriage is w o o d , but r i d i n g a carriage is not riding w o o d [idiom untraced]. A boat is w o o d , entering a boat is not entering w o o d [piercing or soaking into it]. Robbers are people; abounding i n robbers is not abounding i n people, being without robbers is not being without people.

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H o w shall we make this clear? D i s l i k i n g the abundance of robbers is not disliking the abundance of people, desiring to be without robbers is not desiring to be without people. The whole world agrees i n accepting these; but if such is the case, there is no longer any difficulty i n allowing that, although robbers are people, concern for robbers is not concern for people, unconcern for robbers is not unconcern for people, killing robbers is not killing people. This claim is the same i n k i n d as the others; the world does not condemn itself for u p h o l d i n g the others, yet condemns the Mohists for u p h o l d i n g this one. Is there any reason for it but being, as the saying goes, 'clogged w i t h i n and closed without'? These are cases of being this but it not being so." The error the M o h i s t is criticising arises from putting 'Robbers are people' i n the first of the three classes, for w h i c h he offers four examples: Names and Objects 14. "White horses are horses, riding white horses is r i d i n g horses. Black horses are horses, riding black horses is riding horses. Tsang is a person, being concerned for Tsang is to be concerned for persons. H u o is a person, to be concerned for H u o is to be concerned for persons. These are cases of being this a n d it being so." N u m b e r is irrelevant to these examples a n d is unmarked i n the Chinese original; one could as well translate i n the singular, but that would conceal the idiomatic shifts i n the sentences. Since Tsang and H u o are slaves too humble for one to be concerned for anything about them except that they are persons, someone concerned for them is concerned for anyone as a person. Similarly, ' H e rides a white horse' or 'He rides white horses' entitles us to infer that ' H e rides horses' i n the sense that he can ride any horse. In this class however the shifts do not affect the validity of the conclusion. It may be noticed that i n both of the classes we have examined sentences are grouped without any regard for idiomatic or logical differences between them. The assumption is that differentiation is carried only far enough to settle one's particular problem. But after completing the three classes the M o h i s t goes back to his first class and points out a difference between the two pairs of generalised conclusions. Here quantification is for the first time relevant. Names and Objects 17. "Concern for persons depends on concern for all persons, only then is one deemed to be concerned for

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persons. Unconcern for persons does not depend on unconcern for all persons; one is not concerned for all persons, and by this criterion is deemed not to be concerned for persons. R i d i n g horses does not depend on riding all horses before being deemed to ride horses; one rides some horse, and by this criterion is deemed to ride horses. W h e n it comes to not riding horses, it does depend on not riding any horse at all, only then does one not ride horses. These are cases i n w h i c h one applies to all and the other not." It can be seen that the M o h i s t classifications of parallel sentences, whether they introduce quantification or not, have nothing to do with syllogistic demonstration. The reason w h y one cannot simply answer "Well, I prefer to put 'Robbers are people' i n your first class and proceed to 'Killing robbers is killing p e o p l e ' " is that to do so w o u l d dissolve the idiom; the meaning w o u l d shift to the unproblematic 'A robber is a man, to kill a robber is to k i l l a man', w i t h w h i c h the M o h i s t may be presumed to have no quarrel. Logical necessity belongs not to his art of discourse but to his quite different art of argumentation. The message of Names and Objects is more like Wittgenstein's than Aristotle's. Names and Objects 12. " O f things i n general, if there are respects i n w h i c h they are the same, it does not follow that they are altogether the same. The parallelism of sentences is exact only up to a certain point. If something is so of them there are reasons w h y it is so; but although its being so of them is the same, the reasons w h y it is so are not necessarily the same. If we accept a claim we have reasons to accept it; but although we are the same i n accepting it, the reasons w h y we accept it are not necessarily the same. Therefore sentences w h i c h illustrate, parallelise, adduce and infer become different as they proceed, become dangerous w h e n they change direction, fail w h e n carried too far, become detached f r o m their base w h e n we let them drift, so that we must on no account be careless with them, and must not use them too rigidly. Hence saying has many methods, separate kinds, different reasons, w h i c h must not be looked at only from one side." In shifting attention to the sentence (tz'u |§^-), has the M o h i s t become aware of it as more than a string of names? This might be a difficult achievement i n a language without morphological differences to distinguish the functions of words i n the sentence. That he is aware of some k i n d of advance on the Canons is plain from a passage w h i c h repeats the four

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types of sameness listed i n Canon A 8 6 , followed b y "Sameness w i t h the same name"; it then lists four new ones followed b y "Sameness w i t h the same root." Names and Objects 6. "Sameness of the separated off, sameness of the accessory, sameness i n being this, sameness i n being so." What does it intend b y the 'root'? Comparison w i t h the parallel sentences described as similar or different i n being 'this' or 'so' fully elucidates the last two types. 'Sameness i n being this' corresponds to the sharing of a n o u n complement ( ' . . . . are horses'), i n being 'so' to the sharing of a nominalised verbal phrase ('riding horses'). In Classical Chinese syntax the former is the core of a nominal sentence and is substitutable b y shih 'this', w h i l e a verb or verbal phrase ( ' . . . . rides horses') is the core of a verbal sentence and is substitutable by jan 'so'. The core can stand alone as the sentence or be expanded by the addition of the subject or other optional elements; it is not conveniently treated as predicated of a subject. W i t h less confidence the 'sameness of the separated o f f may be taken as corresponding to the sharing of a'negative core ( ' . . . . are not horses'), of the 'accessory' as corresponding to a core ( ' . . . . is white') transferred to a dependent position ('white horse'). It seems then that Names and Objects, unlike the Canons, recognises the sentence as a structured whole, i n w h i c h the 'root' is what we call the sentence core, the assertive element i n it. This is confirmed b y the description of the sentence: Names and Objects 10. "The 'sentence' is that w h i c h is born i n accordance w i t h the fact, grows to full length i n accordance w i t h a pattern, a n d proceeds according to its k i n d . " (That is, y o u do or do not proceed from 'Robbers are people' to ' K i l l i n g robbers is killing people' according to the class i n w h i c h you place it.) The distinguishing of the sentence from a string of names w o u l d follow f r o m the recognition that the knowledge conveyed by sentences is different from the mere idea or image (yi -4§C) evoked by names. This point is made i n a couple of the fragments: Names and Objects 3. " K n o w i n g is different from having an image." " H a v i n g the image of a pillar is not having an image of w o o d , but having a n image of the w o o d of this pillar. H a v i n g a n image of the finger as being the m a n is not having an image of the man. H a v i n g an image of something as being a catch of game o n the other hand is having an image of the birds."

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In identifying the first of the Later M o h i s t disciplines as an art of discourse, w e are not d e n y i n g that the sentences i n the form 'x is y, to do something to x is to d o it to xf are conceived as m a k i n g valid or invalid inferences. The steps i n the procedure for dealing w i t h , for example, 'Robbers are people'—taking illustrations ('Her brother is a handsome man', 'A boat is wood'), r u n n i n g them parallel, checking them ('How shall we make this clear?'), and concluding w i t h ' K i l l i n g robbers is not killing people'—are all given names, and the last is t'ui ^ f i 'inference': Names and Objects 11. " 'Illustrating' is referring to another thing to make it clearer. 'Parallelising' is putting sentences side by side and letting all proceed. 'Adducing' is saying 'If it is so i n your case, w h y may it not be so i n mine too?'. 'Inferring' is using something i n w h i c h the one he rejects is the same as those he accepts to make h i m accept the former." But neither here nor i n his art of argumentation (which does claim logical necessity) is the M o h i s t interested i n establishing logical forms. H e lays out his parallels, not i n a fumbling search for the syllogism, but to show where the mutability of words i n different combinations vitiates inferences, b y false parallelism i n the descriptions from w h i c h the inferences start. It is this w h i c h gives m u c h of Names and Objects its curiously Wittgensteinian look. The resemblance to Wittgenstein is not altogether fanciful, if we think of Western a n d Chinese thought as moving in opposite directions past the same place. The West, after seeking necessary truths by logic for some 2,000 years, becomes aware of questionable assimilations and differentiations behind the formulation of the questions themselves, a n d discovers that instead of refuting a proposition y o u can undermine it by uncovering implicit paradigms and unnoticed distinctions. O n e might say that the West is now venturing out _of logic into the M o h i s t art of discourse, w h i c h does not pretend to logical necessity. Chinese philosophising o n the other h a n d , conducted i n a language without the morphological distinctions w h i c h call attention to the logical relations i n sentence structure, is very aware of discourse as a patterning of like and unlike i n w h i c h the most visible danger to thought is from false parallels. The M o h i s t therefore develops procedures for testing description, but w h e n he goes o n to the argumentation w h i c h does have logical necessity he sees that as a quite separate discipline, i n w h i c h the clarity and inevitability of every step makes it unnecessary to lay d o w n procedures. We shall be returning to this theme w h e n we examine correlative s y s t e m - b u i l d i n g . 13

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The second discipline: ethics (knowledge of how to act) H o w to live a n d to act being the central concern of M o h i s m as of all Chinese philosophy, the ethical propositions were prepared first, i n Expounding the Canons; the Canons have only the ethical definitions. Of the four sources of doubt, the one corresponding to knowledge of how to act is 'the undemanding'. O n e cannot judge how much credit to give a person if the right course is also the easy one. BIO Explanation "If the thing he lifts is light and the thing he puts d o w n heavy, it is not a test of strength (for example, a stone and a feather); if he shaves the w o o d along the grain it is not a test of strength—'the u n d e m a n d i n g ' . " Given the central importance of ethics for the Mohist, and his success in producing a system of interlocking definitions, one might perhaps expect that this discipline w o u l d be credited w i t h logical necessity. But he is well aware that his a priori system shows only that the benevolent and the right are what the wisest m a n w o u l d desire on behalf of m a n k i n d , and does not show what action is benevolent or right i n a particular situation. This is the very first point made i n the ethical propositions: Expounding the Canons 2. "Everything w h i c h the sage desires or dislikes beforehand on behalf of m a n , men learn from h i m as necessary through its essentials; but i n the case of desires and dislikes born from the conditions they encounter, men do not learn from h i m as necessary through the essentials. The sage's fostering care is benevolent but without the concern w h i c h benefits. The concern w h i c h benefits is born of thinking. Yesterday's thinking is not today's thinking, yesterday's concern for m a n is not today's concern for m a n . The concern for m a n i n concern for H u o is born from triinking about Huo's benefit, not about Tsang's benefit; but the concern for m a n i n concern for Tsang is the concern for m a n i n concern for H u o . Even if by getting rid of the concern for them the world w o u l d be benefited one cannot get r i d of it. Yesterday's wall to the wits is not today's wall to the wits." A fragment w h i c h seems to refer back to concern, thinking and benefit as the 'three things' continues: * Cf. Canons B57, 58, which contrast the idea or mental picture of a pillar as 'known beforehand' with that of a hammer, which is 'not yet knowable', because identified not by shape but by function.

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" O n l y w h e n the three things are all complete are they sufficient to generate the enjoyment of benefit i n the world. The sage has concern but does not have affirmations w h i c h benefit current situations, that is, affirmations about the transient. Even if there were no m e n at all i n the w o r l d , what our master M o - t z u affirmed w o u l d still be present." The necessary, w h i c h by definition is the unending, w o u l d be invulnerable to change even if there were no h u m a n beings to know it. (Elsewhere, i n recommending taking one's time over the answer to a profound question, the M o h i s t does not go quite as far as this: "Among Heaven's constants its presence is prolonged w i t h man"). Practical decision o n the other h a n d depends o n weighing benefit a n d h a r m i n variable circumstances. It deals w i t h the 'not yet knowable' (opposite of 'known beforehand')* on the other side of the wall, and w i t h desires w h i c h are not eternal but are made to stay over a period of time. A75 (Canon) "If the benefit or harm outside the wall is not yet knowable, but you w i l l get money if you h u r r y for it, then to refuse to h u r r y for it is to take the doubt as grounds i n making .desire stay." H o w then does one decide w h i c h course is beneficial to Tsang or H u o or oneself i n the circumstances not of yesterday but of today? The M o h i s t , as we have seen, distinguishes the immediately desired from the desired after 'weighing' (ch'uan JftlL). In the weighing of benefit and harm one prefers the total to the unit, h u m a n i t y to individual, body to finger. Expounding the Canons 8. "Weighing light and heavy among those taken as the units is what is meant b y 'weighing'. The w r o n g alternative w h e n weighed becoming the right, a n d the w r o n g rejected as the w r o n g , are the 'weighed' a n d the 'immediate'. C u t t i n g off a finger to save a n arm is choosing the larger among benefits a n d the smaller among harms. C h o o s i n g the smaller among harms is choosing not the harmful but the beneficial; the choices open to you are under the control of others. W h e n you encounter a robber, to save your life at the cost of an arm is beneficial, the encounter w i t h the robber is harmful. Cutting off a finger or an a r m is choosing the smaller among harms; one desires it because there is no alternative, it is not that one desires it immediately. C h o o s i n g the larger among benefits is not a matter of having n o alternative, choosing the smaller among harms is. C h o o s i n g between things y o u do not yet have is 14

15

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choosing the greater among benefits, renouncing one or other of things you already have is choosing the smaller among harms." The w e i g h i n g of benefit a n d h a r m , imagined i n terms of h a r m to the parts of the body, is a procedure shared by Yangists and Mohists, and even on occasion b y M e n c i u s . t In the Yangist version, however, the weighing of the benefit to oneself is not reconciled w i t h the care for the lives of all w h i c h makes a Yangist the best person to put o n the throne, should he find it safe to accept it. A s we saw, the possibility of a pure philosophical egoism seems not to be conceived even b y Yangists. The Later M o h i s t ethic o n the other h a n d achieves a perfect consistency; you prefer the world to yourself o n the same grounds that y o u prefer an arm to a finger. The M o h i s t does however have the problem of reconciling a n equal concern for everyone w i t h greater care for parents a n d ruler than for others, the issue w h i c h led M e n c i u s to accuse the M o h i s t Yi-tzu of having "two roots." The M o h i s t s do not question that each person has his portion i n society, permanent i n the case of the family, and requiring h i m to do more for some than for others. Expounding the Canons 9. " D o i n g more or less for those for w h o m it is right to do more or less is what is meant by 'grading'. Creditors, ruler, superiors, the aged, one's elders, near and far k i n , are all among those for w h o m one does more. D o i n g more for the elder one is not doing less for the younger. O n e does more or less according to the degree of kinship, as far as the remotest degree where no issue of right arises." But being obliged to do more for some people does not imply having any more love or concern for them. The M o h i s t declares w i t h ruthless consistency that the righteous m a n has n o more love for his parents than for others. Expounding the Canons 12. "Concern is as m u c h for another's parents as for one's o w n . " (Ut sup. 9) " B y the standard laid d o w n b y the sage, you forget your parents w h e n they die, for the sake of the world. D o i n g more for parents is your portion, and finishes w i t h the ceremonies of death and farewell." The model for the pure concern for a person, irrespective of praise or blame, usefulness or moral w o r t h , is concern for oneself. Expounding the Canons 10. "Concern for m a n does not exclude 16

17

18

t Cf. Me 6A/14, quoted p. 131 above. Mencius too is contrasting chien 'total' and t'i 'unit', although it is there convenient to translate the chien as 'for every part' and t'i as 'member'.

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oneself, one is oneself among those for w h o m one is concerned." "Tsang's concern for himself is not for the sake of the others w h o are concerned for himself. Those for w h o m one does more do not exclude oneself, but the concern is neither more nor less; and giving special attention to oneself is not o n account of one's worth." A 7 (Canon) " C o n c e r n for oneself is not for the sake of making oneself useful. It is not like concern for a horse." Concern being simply the desire to benefit a n d dislike of harming either others or oneself it does not increase or decrease w i t h numbers, and being purely for the person's o w n sake is equal for all. Expounding the Canons 4. (on the proposition "Even if a million were born i n one day concern w o u l d not be more") "Supposing that the whole w o r l d w o u l d be harmed if of all m e n Tsang were to die, I w o u l d make a point of caring for Tsang ten thousand times more, but m y concern for Tsang w o u l d not be more." (Lit sup. 13) "Concern for everyone is equal, and equal to concern for one." The one exception to the perfect equality of concern (if one corrupt fragment is to be trusted) is that the persons most beneficial to the world deserve additional concern. Expounding the Canons 5. "Being for the sake of the world more concerned for Y u is being concerned for the sake of the m a n Y i i was." The Later M o h i s t ethic provides a further example of M o h i s m seeming to diverge from the Chinese i n the direction of the Western n o r m . It is built not o n the social relationships of father and son, ruler and subject (these enter only i n the social organisation i n w h i c h each has his portion), but on individuals benefiting themselves, each other, a n d the w o r l d , w h i c h is the totality of individuals. The yi, 'right', w h i c h b y its etymology is the appropriate to social position, is redefined as the beneficial. We may see here another aspect of the M o h i s t reaction to the challenge of Yang C h u . Morality on the defensive against the Yangist 'valuing of self becomes the valuing of other selves as m u c h as y o u value your o w n . One may hesitate however to say that M o h i s m reached the Kantian concept of the individual as an end i n himself, since it has n o objection to the killing of the innocent if it is to the benefit of all. The military chapters of Mo-tzu follow the accepted practice i n the case of serious crimes of executing the offender's whole family. The Later M o h i s t s were aware of a moral problem here, to judge by one of the ethical propositions: 19

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Expounding the Canons 6. "Being concerned for them equally, one chooses one m a n among them for execution." The mutilated comment contains the fragment: "If equally beneficial to the w o r l d , there is nothing to choose between them. If a death and a life are equally beneficial, there is nothing to choose between them."

The third discipline: the sciences (knowledge of objects) The scientific Canons consist of a series of geometrical definitions and a series of propositions on optics, mechanics, a n d economics. The two on economics defend the fixing of prices b y supply and d e m a n d . We have already noticed the greatest achievement of the geometrical section, the chain of definitions establishing the circle as ' k n o w n beforehand'. We have also h a d occasion to quote a couple of passages w h i c h incidentally reveal i n the M o h i s t something like the Greek reverence for geometry as the model of exact knowledge, "If square it w i l l not rotate" (presumably the wheel) as example of knowledge b y explanation, and "The circle is nowhere rectilinear" as example of explanation preceding assent. There is no evidence however that the Mohists formulated geometrical proofs, the absence of w h i c h is one of the crucial gaps i n Chinese as compared w i t h Greek thought. Thus the Chou pi, the earliest geometrical text (dating i n its present form from early Han), recognises that the sides of a right-angled triangle are i n the proportions 3, 4, and 5; and a diagram belonging to or perhaps added to the commentary of Chao C h u n - c h ' i n g (c. A . D . 200) lays out four right-angled triangles against a grid of squares, enabling us after counting and calculating to see that the squares of the sides w i l l be equal to 9,16, and 25 of them.* A s a visual demonstration it is elegant a n d economical, but it is not the verbalised proof w h i c h i n the West served as model for demonstration i n physics. The basic concepts of M o h i s t geometry are not line and point but the measurement and its starting-point (tuan iffi, ). A61 (Canon) "The 'starting-point' is the dimensionless unit w h i c h precedes all others." To treat all points as starting-points w o u l d avoid H u i Shih's paradox 20

21

* The diagram is reproduced in Needham v. 3/22 Fig. 50 (cf. also 95f).

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"The dimensionless cannot be accumulated, yet its girth is one thousand miles" (assuming this to mean that the s u m of points remains a point, yet any quantity is the s u m of its smallest parts, w h i c h are points). Plato, as reported by A r i s t o t l e , made a similar move i n substituting arche grammes (beginning of line) for stigma (point). The M o h i s t seems to make it also with the moment, treating it as the commencement of a period. A44 (Canon) "To 'commence' is to come p l u m b w i t h the time. (Explanation) There is a time of movement w h i c h has duration and another w h i c h is durationless. The commencement is p l u m b w i t h the durationless." Turning n o w to the physical sciences, the Mohist's thinking is strictly causal, not the Y i n - Y a n g system-building w h i c h broke into the philosophical schools f r o m the w o r l d of diviners, astronomers, physicians, and musicians late i n the 3 r d century B.C. In C h i n a , as i n Europe u p to the Scientific Revolution i n the 17th century, the choice was almost exclusively between proto-scientific cosmos-building b y classification as similar or different, allowing inference for the similarities, and the piecemeal causal explanations indispensable to technology, w h i c h give m u c h more useful results but do not a d d u p to a cosmology. The Later M o h i s t enterprise, like those led b y Archimedes i n Greece a n d b y Grosseteste i n 13th-century Europe, is one of those brief episodes w h i c h look i n retrospect like breakaways f r o m correlative system-building i n the direction of what we now recognise as true science. We may see the school as driven to causal explanation, o n the one h a n d b y a logical rigour distrustful of the looseness of correlative t h i n k i n g , o n the other by a habit of piecemeal causal explanation instilled i n them b y their background i n the crafts and their work as military engineers. Causes are referred to as ku $C 'reasons'. The ku (cognate w i t h ku 'ancient times') is i n the first place what is at the origin of something; the w o r d can also be used of a thing i n its original state or of the fact behind a statement.t It is the very first term to be defined; we fill gaps conjecturally i n the mutilated Explanation. A l (Canon) "The 'reason' for something is what it must get before it w i l l come about. (Explanation) Minor reason: having this, it w i l l not necessarily be so: lacking this, necessarily it w i l l not be so. It is the unit . (Like having a starting-point.) 22

t Cf. p. 124f above, and the translation of ku as 'facf in Names and Objects 10, quoted p. 154 above.

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Major reason: having this, it w i l l necessarily : lacking be so. (Like the appearing bringing about the seeing)." The minor reason is the necessary condition, the major the necessary and sufficient condition. Causation is referred to by the verb shih ^ , used primarily of employing a person. The M o h i s t is careful to distinguish its senses i n the series of Canons o n ambiguous terms. A 7 7 (Canon) "Shih. To tell, a reason. (Explanation) To give orders is to 'tell': the thing does not necessarily come about. Dampness is a 'reason': it necessarily depends on what is done corning about." Dampness is one of the causes of illness, w h i c h is the Mohist's stock example of a phenomenon w i t h multiple causes. One can command without being obeyed, but cannot cause without the effect coming about. A l t h o u g h the sciences, like argumentation, are concerned w i t h necessary connexions, the multiplicity of causes allows the possibility of doubt, from w h i c h only the argumentation of the fourth discipline is exempt. A m o n g the four sources of doubt the one corresponding to the sciences is the coinciding, w i t h the example again taken f r o m illness. BIO (Canon) "The unknowability of whether a fighter's collapse is because of the w i n e he drank or the midday sun—the 'coinciding'." The Later M o h i s t corpus never mentions such current proto-scientific concepts as Y i n a n d Yang or the symbols and numbers of the Yi. It does once mention, but to reject it, the theory that the Five Processes conquer each other i n a regular cycle (fire, metal, w o o d , soil, water, fire . . . . ) . B43 (Canon) "The Five Processes have no regular conquests. Explained by: being the appropriate. (Explanation) That the fire melts the metal is because there is a lot of fire, that the metal uses u p the charcoal is because there is a lot of metal." We have seen that the M o h i s t distinguishes three types of connexion, the exact, the appropriate, a n d the necessary. By classing Five-Process theory under the appropriate the M o h i s t is perhaps allowing it a place i n disciplines such as medicine confused b y multiplicity of causation, but he is denying it the necessity of the sciences i n w h i c h he is interested. H e selects his examples exclusively from optics a n d mechanics, disciplines w h i c h have no place among the traditional proto-sciences, but w h i c h allow the strictly causal explanations w h i c h alone satisfy h i m . One notices throughout the scientific Explanations the constant recurrence of the word 23

2 4

25

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163

pi 'necessarily'. H e is not, as may be claimed of Archimedes, i n sight of post-Galilean science (he does not mathematise his results), but he does i n practice confine himself rigorously to solutions w h i c h are geometrically visualised a n d experimentally testable. We take as example a Canon on the inversion of the shadow i n a concave mirror. B23 (Canon) " W h e n the mirror is concave the shadow is at one time smaller a n d inverted, at another time larger and upright. Explained by: outside or inside the centre. (Explanation) Inside the centre. If the m a n looking at himself is near the centre, everything mirrored is larger and the shadow too is larger; if he is far f r o m the centre, everything mirrored is smaller and the shadow too is smaller: and it is necessarily upright. This is because the light opens out f r o m the centre, skirts the upright object a n d prolongs its rectilinear course. Outside the centre. It the m a n l o o k i n g at himself is near the centre, everything mirrored is larger and the shadow too is larger; if he is far f r o m the centre everything mirrored is smaller and the shadow too is smaller; but it is necessarily inverted. This is because the light converges and prolongs its rectlLinear course." The 'centre' is the centre of curvature, w h i c h the M o h i s t does not distinguish f r o m the focal point. The 'inside' is the mirror side, the 'outside' the observer's. The observer is moving the mirror towards and away f r o m h i m . W h e n he is between centre a n d mirror the image is upright, w h e n he is outside the centre the image is inverted; i n either case it is larger the nearer he is to the centre. The explanation of the phenomena is that the light travels rectilinearly, a n d converges on and diverges from the centre of curvature. This explains the inversion (cf. B19 "The legs cover the light f r o m below, a n d therefore form a shadow above; the head covers the light f r o m above, a n d therefore forms a shadow below.") and also, by the w i d e n i n g of the angle, the enlargement. H e is conceiving a geometrical figure not visible to the eye (cf. B19 "the criss-cross has a starting-point from w h i c h it is prolonged w i t h the shadow"). But he takes the commonsense v i e w that the light converges before reaching the mirror; it w o u l d require a m u c h more advanced optics to recognise that, i n spite of the fact that we see the inverted image o n the mirror surface, the light converges only after being reflected back. The principle of the lever appears i n the Explanation of a lost Canon, but without Archimedes' mathematics. B25b. "The side of it on w h i c h you lay the weight w i l l necessarily

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decline, because the two sides are equal i n weight and leverage. If you level them up, the tip w i l l be longer than the butt; and w h e n you lay equal weights on both sides the tip w i l l necessarily fall, because the tip has gained i n leverage." The n o u n ch'tian ^ here translated 'leverage' is the w o r d for the counterpoise on the steelyard and for its positional advantage, also commonly used for the leverage exerted by political or social position. (As a verb we have already met it i n the sense of ' w e i g h ' . ) The Mohist explanations operate w i t h such concepts usable ad hoc, and take only the first steps towards u n i f y i n g them. The principle that all weight tends down vertically is brought i n to explain w h y a weight heavy enough to lift a wheeled ladder can be stopped by a fragile support: B27. "Whenever a weight is not suspended from above or checked from below or forced from the side it descends vertically; slanting is because something interferes w i t h it. That the weight w h i c h makes the ladder glide fails to descend is because it hangs vertically. That i n the present case if you erect a foot-rule on flat ground the weight fails to descend is because it has no inclination to the side." The M o h i s t mechanics has terms for several kinds of p u l l or support. But i n discussing the 'supporting f r o m below' w h i c h holds up a wall the Mohist notices that it is the same as the 'checking from below' w h i c h stops a descending weight. B29. "Let a square stone be one foot from the ground, put stones underneath it, hang a thread above it, allow the thread to reach just as far as the square stone. That the square stone does not fall is because it is 'supported f r o m below'. Attach the thread, get rid of the stones; that it does not fall is because it is suspended from above. The thread snapping is because of the pull of the square stone. Without any alteration but the substitution of a name, it is a case of 'checking f r o m below'." Outside the M o h i s t corpus, there is another early document w h i c h completely breaks w i t h the methods of Chinese proto-science. This is a series of notes preserved at the end of the astronomical chapter of Huainan-tzu (c. 140 B.C.), w h i c h explains h o w to estimate the true directions of the cardinal points and the dimensions of the universe by measuring the sun's shadow as cast b y a vertical post, the gnomon.* The results are so out of accord w i t h the three k n o w n schools of ancient Chinese astronomy that 26

* This document is fully translated and analysed by Cullen op. cit.

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it has sometimes been taken as a relic of an u n k n o w n school, and it is tempting to speculate that it is of M o h i s t origin. But the great interest of the document is that its calculations start f r o m a measurement introduced as hypothetical by the counterfactual chia-shih $ki$L 'falsely supposing'. Instead of elaborating a system of numerological symmetries, the author describes the observations and calculations w h i c h w o u l d in theory reveal the dimensions of the universe, a n d his reasoning is not invalidated i n principle by his w r o n g factual assumptions (that the earth is flat, that the sun is attached to the sky).

"If you w i s h to k n o w the measurements of w i d t h and length to east, west, north, a n d south, set u p four gnomons to make a right-angled figure one li square ( A B C D ) . Ten or more days before the spring or autumn equinox, aligning along the gnomons on the north side of the square (AB), watch the sun f r o m its first emergence to full sunrise, and wait until it coincides w i t h them (ABS). W h e n it does coincide, they (AB) are i n line with the sun. O n each occasion, aligning along the gnomons on the south side (DC) watch it and take the measurement inward from the gnomon ahead (CX) as divisor. < . . . . ? > Divide by it the length between the standing gnomons [i.e., divide 1 // by C X ] i n order to k n o w the measurements to east and west from here. "Supposing that you observe the sun rise one inch inwards from the gnomon ahead (CX), that is to get one li to an inch. One li amounts to 18,000 inches, so f r o m here eastwards you get 18,000 li. Observing the sun just as it sets, if it is half an inch inwards from the gnomon ahead, you get one // to half an inch. D i v i d i n g the number of inches amounting to one // by half an inch you get 36,000 li. B y the division you have the measurement i n li from here westwards. A d d i n g them you have the measurement i n li eastwards and westwards, w h i c h is the extreme diameter." The measurements of one inch and of half an inch are thus 27

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hypothetical (and of course impossible i n practice at such a distance), and so is the estimate of 18,000 + 36,000 = 54,000 li for the diameter of the universe. The document ends w i t h a proposal for calculating the height of the sky by the same method w h i c h Eratosthenes (276-196 B . C . ) i n Greece used to measure the Earth.

1,000 //

20,000 //•

"If y o u w i s h to k n o w the height of the sky, plant gnomons 10 feet high 1,000 li apart due north and south. Measure their shadows on the same day. If that of the north gnomon is 2 feet and the south gnomon 1.9, it follows that every 1,000 li further south the shadow shortens by 0.1 and 20,000 li south there is no shadow, w h i c h is being directly under the sun. "At the position where you have a height of 10 feet to a shadow of 2 feet, the height is 5 times the distance southwards; so if you take the number of li from here to the position under the sun and multiply by 5, making 100,000 li, y o u have the height of the sky. Supposing a place where shadow and gnomon are equal, height and distance w i l l be equal."

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The fourth discipline: argumentation (knowledge of names) The fourth discipline is the only one without a counterpart among the four sources of doubt, presumably because its necessity is not obscured by the possibility of coinciding conditions. ("The 'necessary' admit and do not doubt"). We do not k n o w the names of the rest of the Mohist disciplines, although one may speculate that, for example, the first would be lun i&n , the ordinary w o r d for the ordered discourse w h i c h sorts things out into their grades or categories. But it seems clear that i n the Canons (although not i n Names and Objects)^ the fourth is pien, the arguing out of alternatives to decide w h i c h is 'this', the right one, and w h i c h 'not this', the w r o n g one. It is defined i n terms of a w o r d probably to be identified with fan ^ 'converse', a M o h i s t coinage w h i c h we have met already. This is used, for example, of the coin as price of the grain having as converse the grain being the price of the c o i n . A s s u m i n g this identification, the M o h i s t thinks i n terms, not of 'is x' and 'is not x' as contradictories, but of n a m i n g something 'x' having as converse naming everything else 'non-x'. A73 (Canon) "'Converse' is if inadmissible then on both sides inadmissible. (Explanation) The oxen, a n d non-oxen separated off, w i l l i n all cases make two sides.* If without what one judges by, they are not." A74 (Canon). " Argumentation' is disputing over the converse. To w i n i n argumentation is to fit the fact. (Explanation). " O n e calling it 'ox' and the other 'non-ox' is disputing over the converse. In this they do not both fit the fact, and if they do not both fit necessarily one of them does not fit (Not like fitting 'dog')." This definition implies what we w o u l d call the principle of the excluded middle. Once a name is adopted, whatever the object to w h i c h you apply it, it necessarily either fits it or not. The test w o u l d be whether it fits the standard for the name; the definition of 'standard' w h c h we quoted elsewhere comes f r o m the same sequence on argumentation. To Chuang-tzu's claim that there is no victory i n argument the Mohist 28

29

30

31

32

t Argumentation as described in Names and Objects 6 covers all the disciplines. * The translation in G ut sup. 318 is here revised in the light of the grammatical study of fan Tlj in Harbsmeier Aspects 153-165.

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replies that i n argumentation i n its strict sense it is necessary that one and only one of the two claims fits the fact. It is "not like fitting ' d o g ' " , w h e n the question is whether the object is a whelp or a dog. B35 (Canon) "To call argumentation 'without winner' necessarily does not fit the fact. Explained by: argumentation. (Explanation) It is called either the same thing or different things. If the same thing one calling it ' w h e l p ' and the other 'dog', or if different things one calling it 'ox' and the other 'horse', and neither fitting the fact, is failure to engage i n argumentation. In 'argumentation', one calls it this, the other not this, and the one w h o fits the fact w i n s . " For the M o h i s t , to say that there is no victor i n argumentation is to apply the complex name 'without w i n n e r ' to the objects w h i c h are instances of argumentation. Consequently, he sees all issues as of 'this/not this' on the analogy of 'ox/non-ox'. A s for the logical relations between names, he speaks of them as 'following f r o m each other' or 'excluding each other', or says that 'one cannot be dismissed without the other', but shows no interest i n logical forms. A l t h o u g h well aware of the difficulties of relating names to objects i n the art of discourse, he seems to see the lucid and self-evident relations between names as raising no theoretical problems. Chinese civilization never abstracted the forms i n w h i c h we observe it reasoning i n practice, as i n this curiously familiar-sounding syllogism of Wang C h ' u n g (A.D. 27-C. 100): " M a n is a thing; though honoured as k i n g or noble, by nature he is no different from other things. N o thing does not die, how can m a n be immortal?" It may be noticed that i n the Canon defending argumentation the Mohist does not say that Chuang-tzu's claim is false but that it "does not fit-the-fact (tang ^ )." Tang 'be p l u m b w i t h ' is his usual term for the name 'fitting' the object or i n general for words 'fitting the fact'. Its correspondence w i t h our o w n w o r d 'truth' is however limited to the connecting of names w i t h objects; a name i n combination w i t h other names is judged 'admissible' (k'o "5T), like "A white horse is not a horse" at the start of K u n g - s u n Lung's dialogue. For anyone bored w i t h the ambiguities and complications of Truth it is refreshing to be introduced to this alternative terminology, i n w h i c h one can, so to speak, pronounce '2 and 2 make 4' to be valid and 'Paris is i n France' to be a fact without ever having to bother about truth. Of other terms related to our Truth, being 'this' or 'so' is affirmed not of words but of things, and hsin 'ftf 'trustworthy' of the relation of words not to the things but the speaker's thought: 33

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169

Names and Objects 13. "A thing i n some cases is this and it is so, i n others is this but it is not so. . . . " A14 (Canon) " 'Trustworthiness' is the saying agreeing w i t h the idea." Besides the interlocking definitions, the occasional examples of fully developed demonstrations i n the fourth discipline confirm that the Later Mohist has that combination of the sense of rigorous proof w i t h indifference to logical forms w h i c h characterised Western science between the decline of scholasticism and the 19th-century revival of logic. The following examples resolve the problems of whether the doctrine of 'concern for everyone' is reconcilable w i t h the possibility that the cosmos is infinite and inhabited by an infinite number of m e n , and whether it is reconcilable w i t h ignorance of the number of men. B73 (Canon) "Their being limitless is not incompatible w i t h it being for every one of them. Explained by: whether it is filled or not. (Explanation) (Objection) The south if limited is exhaustible, if limitless is inexhaustible. If whether it is limited or limitless is not yet knowable, then whether it is exhaustible or not, whether men fill it or not, a n d whether m e n are exhaustible or not, are likewise not yet knowable, and it is inconsistent to treat it as necessary that concern for m e n may exhaust them. (Refutation) If m e n do not fill the limitless, men are limited, a n d there is no difficulty about exhausting the limited. If they do fill the limitless, the limitless has been exhausted, and there is no difficulty about exhausting the limitless." B74 (Canon) " W i t h o u t k n o w i n g their number one knows that it is for all of them. Explained by: the questioner. (Explanation) If they ar two, we do k n o w their number. In ' H o w do we k n o w that concern for the people extends to both of them?', some of the people are left out of the question. If his question is about all m e n , concern is for all w h o m he asks about." In both Canons the logical issues involved i n the defence of concern for everyone are detached and formulated without reference either to m e n or to concern. In the Explanations most of the key words have already been defined i n the senses understood, 'limit', 'fill', 'exhaust', ' k n o w ' , 'necess a r y ' , not to mention the lost definitions of the words i n chien at 'concern for everyone'. In the first Explanation the objector sees clearly that his argument cannot establish more than that since the number of men may be infinite the possibility of universal concern "cannot be treated as necessary". But this is enough to require an answer, since it is the dearest conviction of the Later Mohists that their moral concepts are logically 35

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necessary. The objector no doubt knows the now-lost arguments for both sides of H u i Shih's "The south has no limit yet does have a limit", but sees that for purposes of his argument it is sufficient to affirm that "whether it is limited or limitless is not yet knowable" (not knowable a priori, the opposite of ' k n o w n beforehand'). The M o h i s t i n his turn narrows his answer to the crucial point that "there is no difficulty about exhausting the limitless", w h i c h he proves very neatly i n two sentences.* 36

3. FROM YANGISM TO CHUANG-TZU'S TAOISM: RECONCILIATION WITH HEAVEN BY RETURN TO SPONTANEITY The name 'Taoism' C h u a n g - t z u is traditionally classed as the second great Taoist, after Lao-tzu, the supposed contemporary of Confucius. However, the book Lao-tzu is unattested until about 250 B . C . , m u c h later than the K i n g H u i of Liang (370-319 B . C . ) w h o h a d Chung-tzu's friend H u i S h i h as minister. Moreover the two books differ considerably i n thought, and it was some time before they came to be classed together. Chuang-tzu is the one ancient collection of writings of a n d for outsiders w h o preferred private life to office, while Lao-tzu, although attractive to the same readership, presents itself as another guide to the art of rulership. The two names were not at first associated; H s u n - t z u mentions them separately i n different lists of philosophers, and the classification of five schools i n the 'Below i n the Empire' chapter of Chuang-tzu puts them apart i n fourth and fifth places. The Taoist school, like all the others except the Confucian and M o h i s t , is a retrospective creation, a n d the most confusing of them a l l . 1

The mystical statecraft of Lao-tzu quickly attracted the attention of the Legalists a n d already influenced H a n Fei (died 233 B . C . ) . O f the varieties of Lao-fzM-centred syncretism competing for acceptance at court f r o m the rise of H a n i n 206 B . C . the most influential at first was called 'Huang-Lao' after Lao-tzu and the Yellow Emperor (Huang-ti). Little was k n o w n of it until the discovery i n an early H a n tomb at Ma-wang-tui of a manuscript of Lao-tzu w i t h attached documents connected w i t h the Yellow Emperor. W i t h this n e w evidence we can recognise the doctrine as a fusion of Legalism w i t h the teaching of Lao-tzu, the latter still not associated w i t h Chuang-tzu. Since the Yellow Emperor was the legendary inventor of the 2

* For other demonstrations from the fourth discipline, see pp. 84f, 140f above, pp. 183-86 below.

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state a n d of war (denounced as such i n certain chapters of Chuang-tzu), he was presumably chosen to give ancient authority to the Legalist strand. W i t h the classification of the Six Schools b y the court historiographer Ssu-ma T'an (died 110 B . C . ) we arrive at last at the Taoist School, the Taochia 'School of the Way'. The historiographer, w h o prefers it to the other schools, evidently understands b y it the Lao-fzu-centred syncretism of his o w n time. A s a court official he is classifying schools b y their respective advantages a n d disadvantages as guides to statecraft, and he w o u l d not be counting C h u a n g - t z u among the thinkers w h o really matter. However, w i t h the full apportioning of philosophers among a finite number of schools there w o u l d be n o room for C h u a n g - t z u except i n the Taoist, and this is where he appears i n the bibliographical chapter of the Han History. The fang shih 7/ i ' m e n of secret arts' w h o , using the Yin-Yang cosmology, were p r o m i s i n g Emperors the secret of immortality, w o u l d be classed b y Ssu-ma T'an not as Taoist but as 'School of Y i n and Yang.' It seems however that H u a n g - L a o was already absorbing Yin-Yang, and that the appeals to the Yellow Emperor a n d Lao-tzu throughout the later literature of alchemy, medicine, a n d magic go back to this period, w h e n these names carried special authority at court. That the tendencies gathering around Lao-tzu were coming to centre on the elixir of life implies that C h u a n g - t z u was still seen as marginal, reconciliation w i t h death being at the very heart of his philosophy. It is from about A . D. 200, w i t h the breakdown of the H a n a n d a n e w period of political disunion a n d disillusion, that the School of the Way ceases to be judged primarily by its relevance to government, and C h u a n g - t z u comes into his o w n . From this time Chuang-tzu w i t h the commentary of K u o H s i a n g (died c. A . D . 312) stands i n the classical literature beside Lao-tzu w i t h the commentary of Wang P i ( A . D . 226-249) as one of the classics of philosophical Taoism. 3

In the sub-culture despised b y the literati, the fusion of Huang-Lao and Y i n - Y a n g m i n g l i n g w i t h folk belief generated the popular religion called Tao-chiao 'Doctrine of the Way', the foundation of w h i c h b y C h a n g Tao-ling is traditionally dated to A . D . 142. Here w e do find a persisting organisation, not indeed a philosophical school, but a church of w h i c h the sects to the present day trace their ancestry to C h a n g Tao-ling. M i c h e l Strickmann has proposed to clear away confusions by confining the label 'Taoist' to this religion, w h i c h was long dismissed b y scholars as a degenerate descendant of the noble philosophy of Lao-tzu and C h u a n g tzu, but is nowadays studied on its o w n terms as the indigenous religion of China over nearly two m i l l e n i a . Beyond the generalisation that since the victory about 100 B . C . of Confucianism, w h i c h is public, respectable, conventional and practical, 4

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that other side of Chinese culture w h i c h is private, disreputable, magical, spontaneous, poetic, has tended to cohere around the name of Lao-tzu, it would be pointless to look for features common to everything called Taoism. However, Strickmann himself acknowledges that we cannot quite dispense w i t h the term 'philosophical Taoism' for the thought of Lao-tzu and Chuang-tzu (and also, one may a d d , of later writings primarily inspired by them, such as Lieh-tzu, forged i n the name of a pre-Han sage about A . D . 300). In spite of the differences between anti-political Chuangtzu and political Lao-tzu, their retrospective classification under the School of the Way is by no means groundless. They do share one basic insight, that while other things move spontaneously on the course proper to them, man has separated himself f r o m the Way by reflecting, posing alternatives, and formulating principles of action. This has generally impressed Westerners as the most remarkable, the most distinctively Chinese, of the exportable thoughts of ancient C h i n a . O n e might try coining a new name for it, perhaps inclusive of C h ' a n or Z e n , its continuation i n Chinese B u d d h i s m , but the name under w h i c h it has long passed among us is Taoism. It does not follow however that we have to look for any direct link between C h u a n g - t z u and the author of Lao-tzu. Philosophical Taoism as a retrospective classification is like, for example, the 20th-century coinage 'Existentialism'; to think of Lao-tzu as founder a n d C h u a n g - t z u as his heir (or the reverse) is as though, having chosen Kierkegaard and Nietzsche as the first Existentialists, one were to assume that Nietzsche was Kierkegaard's disciple. In any case a historian of Chinese thought must retain the same liberty to reshuffle names as w h e n we p u s h Kierkegaard temporarily into the background and shift Nietzsche and Heidegger to the ancestral line of hermeneutics, perspectivism, and deconstruction.

The book 'Chuang-tzu' A s a full-length book for the individual w h o wants to live his o w n life free of the burdens of office Chuang-tzu is unique i n p r e - H a n literature. It does contain passages on the art of government, but these are i n the manner of early H a n syncretism, a n d probably come from the compilers i n the 2nd century B.C. The book is i n effect an anthology of writings w i t h philosophies justifying withdrawal to private life, passing under the name of their greatest representative, a n d i n c l u d i n g a batch of chapters w h i c h are not Taoist at all but Yangist. Without going deeply into its textual problems,* we may distinguish five m a i n elements. * I shall be assuming the conclusions of my textual study of Chuang-tzu in Studies 283-321.

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(1) Writings of C h u a n g - t z u (c. 320 B . C . ) (2) Writings classable only as 'School of C h u a n g - t z u ' . (3) The essays of a writer we here label the 'Primitivist', datable w i t h unusual precision to the period of civil war between the fall of C h ' i n a n d victory of H a n , between 209 and 202 B . C . (4) The Yangist chapters, f r o m i n or near the same period. (5) The final Syncretist stratum, 2nd century, B . C . The collection as it has come d o w n to us, i n a n abridgement by the commentator K u o H s i a n g (died c. A . D . 312), is organised i n three parts: (1) The 'Inner Chapters' (chs. 1-7), collections of sayings, dialogues, verses, stories, brief essays, each grouped around a topic summed u p i n the chapter title. A l l bear the i n d i v i d u a l stamp of a thinker and writer of genius, commonly recognised as C h u a n g - t z u himself. It is likely that he jeftriothingiuJLd by later editors. (2) The 'Outer Chapters' (chs. 8-22), entitled arbitrarily b y words taken from the first sentence. These start w i t h the Primitivist essays, w h i c h end i n the m i d d l e of chapter 11; the rest are 'School of Chuang-tzu' w i t h Syncretist interludes.t (3) The Tvlixed Chapters' (chs. 23-33), entitled like the 'Outer' from the opening words, except for the block of Yangist chapters (chs. 28-31), w h i c h have titles s u m m i n g u p the content. The book ends w i t h the Syncretist 'Below i n the E m p i r e ' (ch. 33), the earliest history of the schools. The remaining chapters (chs. 23-27, 32) are ragbags of odds a n d ends, many so badly fragmented as to suggest the assembling of broken or misplaced items f r o m the scrolls of bamboo strips o n w h i c h Chinese books were written before the discovery of paper. A good deal of Chuangtzu is unintelligible i n the present state of scholarship, a n d i n these chapters m u c h is likely to remain so. But they include considerable patches w h i c h look like authentic jottings of C h u a n g - t z u himself, judged too fragmented for inclusion i n the 'Inner Chapters'.** Chuang-tzu has h a d several English translators (including Giles, Legge, Burton Watson, and for four-fifths of the book, myself), and w i t h the further progress of scholarship w i l l deserve more. A disadvantage is that most translators have treated this extraordinary medley as what we t1 identify as Prirnitivist Cz chs. 8-11/28,12/95-102 and probably 14/60-74 (translated together Cz tr. G 200-217); as Syncretist chs. 11/66-12/18,13/1-45, 60-64,14/1-5, and ch. 15, as well as ch. 33 in the "Mixed Chapters' (translated together, Cz tr. G 259-285). ** Passages likely to be by Chuang-tzu include Cz 23/42-44, 52-67, 72-74; 24/38-48, 61-65, 88-98,101111; 25/15-20, 33-38, 51-59; 26/31-33; 27/1-21 (translated together, Cz tr. G100-111).

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nowadays understand b y a book, divided into chapters to be paragraphed as continuous prose a n d reproduced complete whether or not consecutive or even intelligible, smoothing the breaks, reducing the verse to prose. This works only for integral chapters such as the Primitivist essays; elsewhere it can give the dangerously misleading impression that a thinker i n brief intense bursts, like Nietzsche or the Blake of Marriage of Heaven and Hell, is an amiably rambling o l d wiseacre continually forgetting what he is talking about.

Stories about Chuang-tzu Ssu-ma C h ' i e n records of C h u a n g C h o u (Chuang-tzu) that he lived i n the reigns of K i n g s H u i of L i a n g or Wei (370-319 B.C.) and H s i i a n of C h ' i (319-301 B . C ) , came from the district of M e n g i n the present province of H o n a n , and held a minor post there at C h ' i - y u a n ('Lacquer Garden') w h i c h he abandoned for private l i f e . The account finishes w i t h a story of h i m refusing to be made Prime Minister by K i n g Wei of C h ' u (339-329 B . C ) . Chuang-tzu has other such tales, not to be taken seriously as history, but giving v i v i d glimpses of h o w hermits revenged themselves i n imagination against the worldly. "Chuang-tzu was fishing i n P ' u river. The K i n g of C h ' u sent two grandees to approach h i m w i t h the message: T have a gift to tie y o u , m y whole state.' Chuang-tzu, intent on the fishing-rod, d i d not turn his head. T hear that i n C h ' u there is a sacred tortoise', he said, ' w h i c h has been dead for three thousand years. H i s Majesty keeps it wrapped up i n a box at the top of the hall i n the shrine of his ancestors. Would this tortoise rather be dead, to be honoured as preserved bones? O r w o u l d it rather be alive and dragging its tail i n the m u d ? ' 'It w o u l d rather be alive and dragging its tail i n the m u d . ' 'Away w i t h you! I'll drag m y tail i n the m u d . ' " (Cz 17/81-84, tr. G122) Other stories have h i m weaving sandals for a living i n a back street, or being seen by a k i n g i n a patched g o w n and shoes tied up w i t h string, and answering the condescension of successful men of the world w i t h repartee w h i c h might well be treasured for a future occasion by hermits i n the same straits. The tales are not, however, like those of Lao-tzu i n the same book, exemplary stories about the archetypal Taoist sage; they suggest rather the anecdotes w h i c h gather r o u n d a person of striking personality, Oscar Wilde, Einstein, W i n s t o n C h u r c h i l l . We have already quoted a couple about C h u a n g - t z u and his friend H u i S h i h . Here is another, w h i c h 5

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suggests that however m u c h he mocks H u i Shih's logic it was i n their clash of minds that his o w n anti-rationalist position defined itself. " C h u a n g - t z u , among the mourners i n a funeral procession, was passing by the grave of H u i S h i h . H e turned round and said to his attendants 'There was a m a n of Y i n g w h o , w h e n he got a smear of plaster no thicker than a fly's w i n g on the tip of his nose, w o u l d make Carpenter Shih slice it off. Carpenter S h i h w o u l d raise the w i n d w h i r l i n g his hatchet, wait for the moment, and slice it; every speck of the plaster w o u l d be gone without hurt to the nose, w h i l e the m a n of Y i n g stood there perfectly composed. ' L o r d Y u a n of S u n g heard about it, summoned Carpenter Shih and said "Let me see you do it." ' A s for m y side of the act", said Carpenter Shih, "I d i d use to be able to slice it. However, m y partner has been dead for a long time." 'Since the Master d i e d , I have h a d no one to use as a partner, no one w i t h w h o m to talk about t h i n g s . ' " (Cz 24/48-51, tr. G124) Besides the mockery of logic there is m u c h else to connect the person in the stories w i t h the voice we hear i n the 'Inner Chapters', the humour, poetry and fascination w i t h birds, animals, and trees, and such themes as the value of uselessness, violation of the funeral rites w h i c h for Chinese are the most sacred of all, a n d above all the lyrical, ecstatic acceptance of death—extravagances a n d irreverences almost absent even i n the 'Outer' and ' M i x e d ' chapters of the same book. " W h e n Chuang-tzu's wife died, H u i Shih came to condole. A s for Chuang-tzu, he was squatting w i t h his knees out, d r u m m i n g on a pot and singing. ' W h e n y o u have lived w i t h someone', said H u i Shih, 'and brought up children, and g r o w n old together, to refuse to bewail her death would be bad enough, but to d r u m on a pot and s i n g — c o u l d there be anything more shameful?' ' N o t so. W h e n she first d i e d , do y o u suppose I was able not to feel the loss? I peered back into her beginnings; there was a time before there was a life. Not only was there no life, there was a time before there was a shape. Not only was there no shape, there was a time before there was the ch'i. M i n g l e d together i n the amorphous something altered, and there was the ch'i; by alteration i n the ch'i there was the shape, by alteration of the shape there was the life. N o w once more altered she has gone over to death. This is to be companion w i t h spring a n d a u t u m n , summer and winter, i n the procession of the four seasons. W h e n someone was about to lie d o w n a n d

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sleep i n the greatest of mansions, I w i t h m y sobbing knew no better than to bewail her. The thought came to me that I was being uncomprehending towards destiny, so I s t o p p e d . ' " (Cz 18/15-19, tr. G 123f). We cannot expect to learn from such anecdotes what we most want to know about the life of a thinker, the course of his development. There is however one story w h i c h differs from the rest i n showing Chuang-tzu i n doubt and changing his m i n d . H e is poaching i n the game reserve at Tiaoling; he is taking aim at a huge magpie w h i c h does not see h i m because it is intent on a mantis w h i c h itself has eyes only for a cicada resting i n the shade. " ' H m m ! ' said C h u a n g - t z u uneasily. 'It is inherent i n things that they are ties to each other, that one k i n d calls u p another.'" (Cz 20/61-68, tr. G 118) H e throws d o w n his crossbow a n d as he runs away notices that he i n his turn has been seen by the gamekeeper. Afterwards he is troubled for three days. This episode, w h i c h is full of Yangist-sounding phrases ("ties to each other," "forgetting his genuineness," "preserving the body"), may be read as his awakening f r o m the Yangist illusion that one can w i n security by avoiding ties w i t h other things, his first step to reconciliation w i t h the dissolution of personal identity i n universal process.

The assault on reason Like all great anti-rationalists, C h u a n g - t z u has his reasons for not listening to reason. H e develops them i n pieces mostly assembled i n the second of the 'Inner Chapters', 'The Sorting W h i c h Evens Things O u t ' , a scattered series of notes w h i c h conveys more than anything else i n ancient Chinese the sensation of a m a n t h m k i n g aloud. We see from it how Chuang-tzu learned f r o m , i n course of defying, his rationalistic mentor H u i Shih. The ten theses of H u i S h i h may be read as paradoxes showing that all division leads to contradiction a n d therefore everything is one, a conclusion intended to justify the M o h i s t doctrine of 'concern for everyone'. But if this is his intention he has come dangerously near to discrediting his o w n tool, analytic t h i n k i n g . H e wishes to discredit only spatio-temporal distinctions, but it w i l l take only one more step to observe that to analyse is to make distinctions, a n d dismiss reason for the immediate experience of an undifferentiated w o r l d , transforming 'All are one' from a moral to a mystical affirmation. In the terminology of argumentation, as we have met it i n the Canons, a thing or state of affairs either 'is-this' (shih), for example a horse, or 'is-not'

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(fei), a n d it is either 'so' (jan) or not so that one rides the horse. These demonstratives call attention, as English 'true' does not, to the point that the relation affirmed is between objects a n d man-made names open to change a n d to disagreement. A s near demonstratives they also suggest that we approve or reject i n terms of nearness to or distance from ourselves. That names have a merely conventional relation to objects was being taken for granted b y H s i i n - t z u i n the next century, and what was to become its stock illustration, a joke about a merchant w h o tries to b u y undressed jade (p'u i n C h e n g dialect) and is offered rat-meat (p'u i n C h o u dialect), turns u p soon afterwards.* But i n C h u a n g - t z u one enjoys the shock of the discovery w h e n it was still new, the apparent overthrow of all received ideas w h e n it is first seen that i n principle anything might be called anything. "Said C h u a n g - t z u 'If archers w h o hit what they haven't fixed ahead as the target were to be called good archers, everyone i n the w o r l d w o u l d be as great an archer as Yi—admissible?' Admissible,' said H u i S h i h . 'If the w o r l d has no common "this" for "It's this", and each of us takes as this what is this for h i m , everyone i n the w o r l d is as great a sage as Yao—admissible?' 'Admissible.' 'Then of the four doctrines of the Confucians and Mohists, Yang and P i n g , * * w h i c h w i t h your o w n , sir, make five, w h i c h is really this?'" (Cz 24/38-41, tr. G101) The term 'fix ahead' (ch'i M ) was commonly used of agreeing i n advance o n a name i n argumentation, t B u t it was undeniable, for example, that the first two schools mentioned differ radically o n the definition of the moral term o n w h i c h their conflicts centre, yi 'the right'. Confucians understood it as conduct fitting to one's position i n family and state, Mohists redefined it f r o m their utilitarian standpoint as the beneficial. N o r could they simply adjust to each other's viewpoints as they might w h e n b u y i n g jade and being offered rat-meat. Each i n judging 8

* Cf. G. Studies 338 n32. The story of the misunderstanding of p'u is first attested in Shih-tzu B, 7B and Chan-kuo-ts'e (Ch'in 3) 1/44, tr. Crump, 113. ** Ping has not been firmly identified. + This use of ch'i appears seven times in Hsiin-tzu's 'Correction of Names'. Cf. also Cz 17/22,24,22/44, 25/67 and LSCC (ch. 18/5) Hsu 18/16A. It is not in the Later Mohist terminology.

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by his 'this' or 'not this' assumes an absolute viewpoint w h i c h is 'here' for everyone. But is there even real disagreement between debaters w h o are only u s i n g 'this' i n relation to distance from themselves? This suggestion astounds H u i Shih: "Just n o w those Confucians a n d Mohists, Yang a n d P i n g , are challenging me i n argumentation. We formulate sentences to refute each other, shout to browbeat each other. A r e you seriously suggesting that they have never denied m y position?". Chuang-tzu replies w i t h what seem to be examples of quarrels caused by misunderstandings over words, but w i t h the loss of the stories to w h i c h he alludes we lose track of h i m at this p o i n t . In one of his many aspects he is himself a true sophist, fascinated by the subversion of received opinions and intoxicated b y the plunge w h i c h imperils rationality i n the course of discovering its possibilities. H e is also, even i n the flow of reason itself, a poet w h o changes course as n e w insights explode, elliptical even w h e n most logical. O n e of his persisting thoughts is that i n accepting what fits i n w i t h one's ideas as 'this' a n d rejecting what does not, analytic thinking lights u p only a lesser whole around the thinker and casts the rest into darkness. (Chinese shares our familiar visual metaphor, using ming $ 'bright', written w i t h a graph combining s u n and moon, for clarity of understanding as well as of eyesight or of a mirror.). "Saying is not blowing breath, saying says something; the only trouble is that what it says is never fixed. D o we really say something? O r have we never said anything? If we think it different from the twitter of fledgelings, is there a proof for argumentation? O r isn't there any proof? By what is the Way obscured, that there should be a genuine or a false? By what is saying obscured, that sometimes 'It's this', sometimes 'It's not'? Wherever we walk how can the Way be absent? Wherever saying is present h o w can it be inadmissible? "The Way is obscured b y formation of the lesser, saying is obscured by its foliage a n d flowers. Consequently we have the 'It's this, it's not' of Confucians a n d Mohists, b y w h i c h what for one is this for the other is not, what for one is not for the other is. If you w i s h to affirm what they deny and deny what they affirm, the best means is illumination." (Cz 2/23-27, tr. G52) Chuang-tzu, for w h o m all things are i n flux, defying our efforts to fix them by n a m i n g , finds a universal significance i n H u i Shih's paradox "Simultaneously w i t h being at n o o n the s u n declines, simultaneously w i t h being alive a thing dies"; i n change, contradictories are admissible i n 9

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the same moment. H e thinks too that we do regularly what for the Mohists was a special case, n a m i n g the whole by the part one chooses to 'go by' (yin j£) , w h i c h i n its n o m i n a l usage we translate 'criterion'). " N o t h i n g is not that, no t h i n g is not this. If you make yourself 'that' they do not appear, if y o u k n o w of yourself y o u k n o w of them. Hence it is said: 'That comes out f r o m this, this likewise goes by that', the opinion that that and this are born simultaneously. However, 'Simultaneously w i t h being alive one dies', a n d simultaneously w i t h d y i n g one is alive. The admissible is simultaneously inadmissible, the inadmissible is simultaneously admissible. What going b y something is this going by something is not, what going b y something is not going by something is this. This is w h y the sage does not take this course, but opens them u p to the light of Heaven; his too is the 'This' according to what one goes by'." (Cz 2/27-29, tr. G 52) "This too is that, that too is this. There they say 'It's this, it's not' from one point of view, here we say 'It's this, it's not' from another point of view. A r e there really this and that? O r really no this and that? Where neither this nor that finds its opposite is called the axis of the Way. W h e n once the axis is found at the centre of the circle there is no limit to responding w i t h either, on the one h a n d no limit to what is this, o n the other no limit to what is not. Therefore I say 'The best means is illumination'." (Cz 2/29-31, tr. G 53) Not only does it depend o n viewpoint w h i c h of alternatives you pick as 'this', it is a matter of convenience where you draw the line and whether you draw it at all. W h y then go to the trouble of arguing w i t h K u n g - s u n L u n g over the problems of the white horse and of pointing out from the whole?* F r o m the ultimate viewpoint, where d i v i d i n g has not yet begun, the cosmos is the horse and there are no divisions of it to be horses. 10

"Rather than use the pointed-out to show that 'to point out is not to point it out', use what is not the pointed-out. Rather than use the horse to * There is a chronological difficulty about taking Chuang-tzu to be directly criticising Kung-sun Lung, who was a client of the Lord of P'ing-yuan (died 251 B . C ) . The sophisms may be older than Kung-sun Lung, who in any case on our interpretation is not defending but refuting the thesis that 'to point out is not to point it out' (cf. pp. 90-94 above). The difficulty is not insuperable if Chuang-tzu was old enough and Kung-sun Lung young enough. However, Kung-sun Lung is never mentioned in the book except in the historical 'Below in the Empire' chapter and in an 'Outer Chapter' story of the sophist overwhelmed when he "hears the words of Chuang-tzu" (Cz 17/65-81 tr. G 154-156)—but not necessarily from Chuang-tzu's own mouth.

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show that 'a horse is not a horse' use what is not a horse. Heaven and earth are the single pointed-out, the m y r i a d things are a single horse." (Cz 2/3133, tr. G 54) "The knowledge of the m e n of o l d h a d arrived at something—at what had it arrived? There were some w h o thought there had not yet begun to be things—the utmost, the exhaustive, there is no more to a d d . The next thought there were things but there had not yet begun to be borders. The next thought there were borders to them but there had not yet begun to be 'It's this, it's not'. The lighting u p of this and not this is the reason w h y the Way becomes deficient." (Cz 2/40-42 tr. G 54) Chuang-tzu shares that common a n d elusive feeling that the whole is more than the s u m of its parts, that analysis always leaves something out, that neither side of a dichotomy is wholly true. "To 'divide', then, is to have something u n d i v i d e d ; to 'argue out alternatives' is to have something w h i c h . i s neither alternative. 'What?', you ask. The sage keeps it i n his breast, common men argue it out to show it to each other. Hence I say, to 'argue out alternatives' is to have something you fail to see." (Cz 2/57f, tr. G 57) In Chuang-tzu's flashes of elliptical argument he once tries to p i n d o w n what it is that the dichotomies leave out. The art of argumentation, as defined i n the Canons, assumes that if y o u a d d non-oxen to oxen there is nothing left over. " N o w suppose that I speak of something, and do not know whether it is of a k i n d w i t h this or not of a k i n d . If those of a k i n d and those not of a k i n d are treated as of a k i n d w i t h each other, there w i l l no longer be any difference f r o m that." (Cz 2/47f, tr. G 55). But before the b e g i n n i n g of things there were neither oxen nor nonoxen. C a n we, by a further negation and addition, incorporate this remainder into the totality? "However, let's try to say it. There is 'beginning', there is 'not yet having begun the having a beginning'." But i n saying this retrospectively we speak as though things were somehow present before they began, and a further negation i n the same form leads only to an infinite regress: "—There is 'there not yet having begun to be that "not yet having begun the having a beginning"'." It is also c o m m o n to oxen and non-oxen that they are 'something' in contrast w i t h 'nothing' (the Chinese words are the nominalised existential verbs yu ^JT there is' and wu 'there is not'). A s empty space nothingness is a measurable part of cosmos; can we arrive at the totality by adding N o t h i n g to Something? C h u a n g - t z u , as do Taoists i n general w h e n they 11

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do not simply equate the Way w i t h N o t h i n g , thinks of Something and Nothing as d i v i d i n g out of a whole w h i c h is neither one nor the other ("Who knows that Something and N o t h i n g , death and life, have a single ancestor? H e shall be m y f r i e n d . " ) So the result is the same infinite regress: "There is 'something', there is 'nothing'. —There is 'there not yet having begun to be nothing'. —There is 'there not yet having begun to be that "there not yet having begun to be nothing"'." In any case there was a contradiction at the start, i n saying 'There is nothing' (yu wu 'There is what there is not'). "All of a sudden there is nothing, and we do not yet k n o w of something and nothing really w h i c h there is and w h i c h there is not. N o w for m y part I have already referred to something, but do not yet k n o w whether m y reference really referred to something or really d i d not refer to anything." If all division leads to contradiction must there not be at least one admissible statement, that everything is one? That h a d been H u i Shih's last thesis. C h u a n g - t z u , i n a characteristic move, first restates it i n the most rhapsodic of his styles, then refutes it like Plato discussing the One and its name i n The Sophist. " N o t h i n g i n the w o r l d is bigger than the tip of an autumn hair, and M o u n t T'ai is small; no one outlives the cut-off i n childhood, and P'engtsu died young; heaven a n d earth were born together w i t h me, and the myriad things and I are one. — N o w that we are one, can I still say something? A l r e a d y having called us one, d i d I succeed i n not saying something? One and the saying make two, two a n d one make three. Proceeding f r o m here even an expert calculator cannot get to the end of it, m u c h less a plain m a n . Therefore if we take the step f r o m nothing to something we arrive at three, and how much worse if we take the step f r o m something to something! Take no step at all, and the ' " T h i s " according to what you go by' comes to an end." (Cz 2/51-55 tr. G 56) Chuang-tzu never does say that everything is one, always puts the thought subjectively, as the sage treating as one.* In one dialogue a sage is pressed to acknowledge that there must be something that he knows: " 'Would you k n o w something of w h i c h things agreed "It's this"?' 12

* Cf. Cz 1/32,2/35-37, 5/7f, 12 tr. G 46, 53, 77 An 'Outer Chapter' story has the Yellow Emperor stating flatly that "the myriad things are the One" (Cz 22/12, tr. G160). But the point of this story is that the Yellow Emperor is himself aware of being remote from the Way because he puts it into words.

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' H o w w o u l d I k n o w it?' ' D o you k n o w what y o u do not k n o w ? ' ' H o w w o u l d I k n o w it?' 'Then does no thing k n o w anything?' ' H o w w o u l d I k n o w it? However, let me try to say i t — " H o w do I k n o w that what I call k n o w i n g is not ignorance? H o w do I k n o w that what I call ignorance is not k n o w i n g ? " ' " (Cz 2/64-67, tr. G 58) The point of the first answer is presumably that what f r o m no viewpoint is 'that' could not be judged 'this'. But does one not at least know what it is one does not know? Another contradiction, or so C h u a n g tzu thinks, like M e n o i n Plato's dialogue. Then doesn't one k n o w that no thing knows anything? A third contradiction. The only consistent formulation is by the question casting doubt. Chuang-tzu attacks our faith i n knowledge f r o m other directions. W h y do we trust the heart, the organ of thought, and allow it to take charge of the body? Isn't it merely one of m a n y organs each w i t h its o w n function w i t h i n an order w h i c h comes f r o m outside us, that Way to be walked w h i c h it vainly tries to fix i n rules of conduct? " ' W i t h o u t 'that' there is no T , without T no choice between alternatives.' "This is somewhere near it, but we do not k n o w i n whose service they are being employed. It is as though there were something genuinely i n charge, and the only trouble is that we cannot find a sign of it. That it can be walked is true enough, but we do not see its shape; it has identity (ch'ing) but no shape. O f the h u n d r e d joints, nine orifices, six viscera all present a n d complete, w h i c h should I recognise as more k i n to me than another? A r e you people pleased w i t h them all? Rather, you have a favourite organ among them. O n your assumption, does it have the rest of them as its vassals a n d concubines? A r e its vassals and concubines inadequate to order each other? Isn't it rather that they take turns as each other's lord a n d vassals? O r rather than that, they have a genuine lord present i n them. If we seek without success to grasp its identity, that never either adds to or detracts f r o m its genuineness." (Cz 2/14-18 tr. G 51) There is another reason w h y that question ' H o w do I k n o w that what I call k n o w i n g is not ignorance?' is unanswerable, w h i c h Chuang-tzu introduces twice i n almost the same words: "Said C h u a n g - t z u to H u i S h i h 'Confucius b y the age of sixty h a d sixty times changed his mind; whenever he began by j u d g i n g "It's this" he ended by judging "It's not".

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We do not yet k n o w of a n y t h i n g we n o w affirm that we shall not deny it 59 times over.'" (Cz 27/10f cf. 25/51-54 tr. G102)

The Later Mohist defence of reason We found it convenient to discuss the Later Mohists before C h u a n g tzu, to provide an advance picture of the k i n d of disputation w h i c h he assails. But some at least of the Canons are later than C h u a n g - t z u , and several propositions of the fourth discipline defend argumentation against criticisms to be f o u n d i n his writings. They do not name h i m , but the Canons always do discuss theses impersonally and on their merits, without n a m i n g their advocates. We have then a continuing controversy over the place of reason, i n w h i c h Chuang-tzu answers H u i Shih and is i n turn answered by the M o h i s t s . For anyone w h o wants to estimate h o w near Greek a n d Chinese philosophy came to each other, and h o w and w h y they diverged, this debate is of central importance. O f the three parties, we cannot do justice to H u i S h i h , whose writings are lost; but for the Mohists we have fully developed demonstrations i n their o w n words. We have already quoted the Canon w h i c h explains that i n strict argumentation there is by definition (by the Mohist definition, C h u a n g - t z u would say!) necessarily a winner. The target was perhaps this passage on w i n n i n g i n disputation. "You and 1 having been made to argue over alternatives, if it is you not I that w i n s , is it really i n your case that 'it's this', i n mine that 'it's not'? O r if it is I not y o u that w i n s , i n m y case that 'it's this', i n yours that 'it's not'? Is one of them this a n d the other not? O r are both this or both not? If you and I are unable to k n o w it of each other, other people w i l l surely be i n the dark because of us. W h o m shall I call i n to decide it? If I get someone of your party or of mine to decide it, being already of your party or of mine h o w can he decide it? If he's of a party different f r o m or the same as both of us, being already of a different or the same h o w can he decide it? So y o u and I and he are all unable to k n o w it of each other, a n d shall we find someone else to depend on?" (Cz 2/84-90, tr. G 60) 13

The M o h i s t as we saw answers that strict argumentation is confined to issues of the type 'ox a n d non-ox', i n w h i c h one alternative necessarily fits the object and the other not. A s for the relativity of the demonstratives used i n judgments, the M o h i s t finds it irrelevant as long as the difference between the alternatives is maintained. B68 (Canon) "You cannot treat here as there without reversing here

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and there. Explained by: their difference. (Explanation) In correct use of names, it is admissible to reverse here and there. A s long as treatment as there stays there and as here here, to treat here as there is inadmissible; but it is admissible if there is to be treated as here. If you treat here as there on condition that there and here stay there and here, there w i l l likewise be treated as here." The point that what matters is the difference is made also i n connexion w i t h arbitrary renaming. The Mohists do not deny that naming is conventional (an issue not discussed i n the corpus), but hold emphatically that it is bound b y the differences between objects. The example is extending the name 'crane' to something w h i c h , judging b y other instances of this stock illustration, w o u l d be the d o g . The extension does not make dogs into cranes, because you cannot conversely include cranes among 'dogs' without depriving both creatures of names specific to them. This w o u l d make it impossible to 'proceed'* from what is so of a dog or crane to other creatures of the same k i n d . B72 (Canon) "That it is specifically what I call it is inadmissible unless that is its name. Explained by: the converse. (Explanation) To call this 'crane' is admissible, but still it is not the crane itself. To call that and this both 'this' is inadmissible; the sayer w o u l d never have anything w h i c h is specifically what it is called. If that goes o n being specifically what it is called, what I call it w i l l not 'proceed'; if that is not specifically what it is called, what it is called w i l l not 'proceed'." Chuang-tzu once recommends us to leave all distinctions behind and experience everything as both this a n d so i n a gigantic 'Yes!' to the universe: "Treat even the not this as this, the not so as so. If this and so are really this and so, there is n o difference for argumentation from not this and not so." (Cz 2/9 cf, G 60). There is no clear line between C h u a n g - t z u as sophist a n d as poet finding words to abolish the distance between self and other, and we shall not attempt to analyse this utterance. The M o h i s t implies that it was supported by some argument dependent o n the fallacy that, unlike a name, the demonstrative 'this' as it flits f r o m one thing to the next does not stay i n any over a period of time. B82 (Canon) "You cannot treat as this without treating only this as 14

* For 'proceeding' (hsing ^

), cf. p. 149 above.

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this. Explained by: not all-inclusive. (Explanation) (Argument) O f the ones not this, this one is about to be treated as this. 'This' as of n o w i n staying i n this does not stay i n this, therefore 'this' does not stay. (Refutation) If 'this' does not stay, it does treat something as this but does not stay i n it. 'This' as of now i n not staying i n this does stay i n this. Therefore you cannot show that 'this' does not stay without showing that it does." We mentioned that C h u a n g - t z u like M e n o assumes that you cannot know what you do not k n o w . The M o h i s t sees the flaw i n this ambiguous formulation; you can k n o w the name without k n o w i n g the object. B48 (Canon) " O n e does k n o w what one does not know. Explained by: choosing by means of the names. (Explanation) If you mix together what he does and what he does not k n o w a n d ask about them, he is obliged to say 'This I know, this I do not k n o w ' . To be able both to choose the one and exclude the other is to k n o w them both." The most interesting of the M o h i s t answers to Chuang-tzu are two arguments cognate w i t h Aristotle's refutations of 'All propositions are true' and A l l propositions are false'. They are adapted to positions which could be credited to C h u a n g - t z u and so are not symmetrical. The first may be taken as answer to "The admissible is simultaneously inadmissible," the latter as another answer to "Treat even the not this as this." B71 (Canon) "To deem all saying inconsistent w i t h itself is inconsistent w i t h itself. Explained by: what he says himself. (Explanation) To be inconsistent w i t h itself is to be inadmissible. If what this m a n says is admissible, there is saying to be judged admissible, a n d so not inconsistent w i t h itself. If what this m a n says is not admissible, to suppose that it fits the fact is necessarily ill-considered." B79 (Canon) "To reject denial is inconsistent w i t h itself. Explained by: not rejecting it. (Explanation) If he does not reject his o w n denial, he does not reject denial. Whether the rejection is to be rejected or not, it is not rejecting denial." In the first of the pair one again notices that the M o h i s t does not combine admissibility (logical) and fitting (factual) under a single concept of t r u t h . The inconsistent (pei Of, generally the inconsistent w i t h itself) is one variety of the inadmissible, and what is inadmissible necessarily 15

16

17

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does not fit the fact. The Taoist teaching that learning is useless (of Lao-tzu however rather than Chuang-tzu) is easily disposed of as another example of the self-falsifying. B77 (Canon) "That it is useful to learn: explained by the denial. (Explanation) H e supposes that he does not k n o w that it is useless to learn, and therefore informs h i m . This is causing h i m to k n o w that it is useless to learn, w h i c h is teaching. If he supposes that it is useless to learn, i n teaching he is inconsistent w i t h himself." Throughout one sees the M o h i s t trying to extract from Chuang-tzu's many-sided language propositions he can put i n a refutable form. To the extent that he succeeds, his answers are just to Chuang-tzu. But whether one is satisfied or repelled by this attempt to p i n d o w n Chuang-tzu's insights might serve anyone as test of h o w rationalistic or anti-rationalistic his ultimate sympathies are.

Spontaneity Chuang-tzu's scepticism is not i n itself a novelty for the Western reader, far from it; what is perhaps strange to h i m , i n Chuang-tzu as i n Nietzsche, is that there is no vertigo i n the doubt, w h i c h pervades the most rhapsodic passages of a philosophical poet w h o seems always after the episode of the giant magpie to gaze on life and death with unwavering assurance. But there is anguish i n ethical scepticism only if one feels bound to choose without having grounds to choose. For C h u a n g - t z u , to pose alternatives and ask ' W h i c h is beneficial, w h i c h harmful?' and ' W h i c h is right, w h i c h wrong?', and try to formulate the Way as a set of rules for ordering Empire, family and i n d i v i d u a l , is the fundamental error in life. People w h o really k n o w what they are doing, such as cooks, carpenters, swimmers, boatmen, cicada-catchers, do not go i n much for analysing, posing alternatives and reasoning from first principles, they no longer even bear i n m i n d any rules they were taught as apprentices; they attend to the total situation a n d respond, trusting to a knack w h i c h they cannot explain i n words, the h a n d m o v i n g of itself as the eye gazes with unflagging concentration. The many 'School of Chuang-tzu' stories about craftsmen (only that of C o o k T i n g is f r o m the chapters ascribable to the master himself) are especially illuminating to the Westerner grappling to understand Taoism. We learn f r o m them that the Taoist art of living is a supremely intelligent responsiveness w h i c h w o u l d be undermined by analysing and choosing, and that grasping the Way is an unverbalisable Tcnowing h o w ' rather than ' k n o w i n g that'. The sage adapts to the course 18

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of things instead of t r y i n g to impose his w i l l u p o n it, like the swimmer who stays afloat under a huge waterfall: "I enter w i t h the inflow and emerge w i t h the outflow, follow the Way of the water and do not impose m y selfishness on it. That is how I stay afloat i n i t . " ( C z l 9 / 5 2 f tr. G136). He concentrates attention and lets the act happen of itself, like the hunchback catching cicadas on a sticky r o d : " T settle m y b o d y like a rooted rreetrunk, I hold m y arm like the branch of a withered tree; out of all the vastness of heaven and earth, the multitude of the m y r i a d things, it is only of the wings of a cicada that I am aware. I don't let m y gaze wander or waver, I w o u l d not take all the myriad things i n exchange for the wings of a cicada. H o w could I help but succeed?' "Confucius turned and said to his disciples: 'Intent sustained u n d i v i d e d W i l l verge o n the daimonic'. Wouldn't it be that venerable hunchback it is about?'" (Cz 19/19-21 tr. G 138) Sagehood can no more be put into words than the knack of the carpenter. " D u k e H u a n was reading a book at the top of the hall, wheelwright Pien was c h i p p i n g a wheel at the bottom of the hall. He put aside his mallet and chisel and went u p to ask D u k e H u a n 'May I ask what words m y lord is reading?' 'The words of a sage.' 'Is the sage alive?' 'He's dead.' 'In that case what m y lord is reading is the dregs of the men of old, isn't it?' 'What business is it of a wheelwright to criticise what I read? If you can explain yourself, well and good; if not, you die.' 'Speaking for myself, I see it i n terms of m y o w n work. If I chip at a wheel too slowly, the chisel slides and does not grip; if too fast, it jams and catches i n the w o o d . N o t too slow, not too fast; I feel it i n the hand and respond from the heart, the m o u t h cannot put it into words, there is a knack i n it somewhere w h i c h I cannot convey to m y son and w h i c h m y son cannot learn from me. This is h o w through m y seventy years I have grown old chipping at wheels. The men of old and their untransmittable message are dead. Then what m y lord is reading is the dregs of the men of old, isn't it?'" (Cz 13/68-75, tr. G 139f)

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In responding w i t h the immediacy of echo to sound or shadow to shape the sage hits i n any particular situation on that single course w h i c h is uniquely appropriate yet fits no rules. This course, w h i c h meanders shifting direction w i t h v a r y i n g conditions like water finding its o w n channel, is the Tao, 'Way', i n the sense specific to Taoism; and all things unerringly follow where it tends except that inveterate analyser and wordmonger, M a n , w h o misses it b y sticking rigidly to the verbally formulated codes laid d o w n i n books as the Way of the Sage or the Way of the Former Kings. A s for the te, 'Potency', paired w i t h Tao ever since Confucius, it is the spontaneous aptitude, the inherent capacity of a thing to perform its specific functions successfully. Like the Way, it belongs to man no more nor less than to other things; we read in one 'Outer Chapter' story that the training of a fighting cock ends w h e n its te is complete. Even i n m a n , since there is no mind/body dichotomy i n ancient C h i n a , it includes not only the full potentialities of the sage but such physical powers as eyesight and hearing, and C h u a n g - t z u sees it as a difficulty requiring explanation that the man of highest Potency does not necessarily grow up strong a n d beautiful.* The Way is already a n object of inner experience i n the 'Inward Training', where w i t h the stilling of the passions the daimon enters and the ch'i spontaneously streams on the morally right course. What is new i n Chuang-tzu is that he sees m a n as coinciding w i t h the Way by ceasing to draw distinctions. To be o h the unformulable path is to merge into the unnameable whole, so that what we are trying to p i n d o w n by the name 'Way' is revealed as nothing less than the universe flowing from its ultimate source (not just the course of its flow, w h i c h w o u l d be to draw a distinction). "As for the Way, it has identity, you can put your trust i n it, but it does nothing, has no shape. It can be handed d o w n but not taken as one's o w n , can be grasped but not seen. Itself the trunk, itself the root, since before there was a heaven and an earth inherently f r o m of old it is what it was. It hallows ghosts a n d hallows G o d , t engenders heaven, engenders earth; it is farther than the utmost pole but is not reckoned high, it is under the sixway-oriented but is not reckoned deep, it was born before heaven and earth but is not reckoned long-lasting, it is elder to the most ancient but is not reckoned old " (Cz 6/29-31 tr. G 86). 19

* Cf. the story of Uglyface T'o, Cz 5/31-49 tr. G 79-81 tShen Ti 7^

'hallows God', literally 'daimonises Ti', the high god of the Shang, still used in the

Chou as an alternative to Heaven when wishing to personify.

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The stories about craftsmen help us to find our bearings w h e n Chuang-tzu is at his most mystical. One has the impression that for h i m , and for Taoists i n general, illumination is not an all-or-nothing satori, and that there are only differences of degree between Cook Ting's perfect grace i n carving an ox and the ecstasy of Tzu-ch'i of Nan-kuo: "Tzu-ch'i of N a n - k u o reclined elbow on armrest, looked up at the sky and exhaled, i n a trance as though he had lost the counterpart of himself. Yen-ch'eng T z u - y u stood i n waiting before h i m . 'What is this?', he said. ' C a n the frame really be made to be like withered w o o d , the heart like dead ashes? The reclining man here now is not the reclining m a n of yesterday' 'You do well to ask that, T z u - y u ! This time I had lost m y o w n self, d i d you know it? " ' (Cz 2/1-3, tr. G 48) One sees also f r o m the craftsman stories that Taoist spontaneity is not 'thoughtless' i n the sense of 'heedless', o n the contrary it demands intense concentration o n the situation. N o r is it implied that every relevant facet is perceived immediately i n a moment of insight; w h e n Cook T i n g carving an ox arrives at a n especially intricate knot of bone and muscle he pauses, contemplates until everything is clear to h i m , then slices through w i t h a single deft stroke. A l t h o u g h C h u a n g - t z u rejects pien 'argumentation', disputation over posed alternatives, he always uses i n a favourable sense lun ifa 'sorting, grading', the coherent thought and discourse w h i c h arranges things i n their proper relations. We have mentioned a possibility that this is what the Later M o h i s t s w o u l d have called their first discipline, with pien as their f o u r t h . In c o m m o n usage lun tended to i m p l y grading in terms of relative value, but Chuang-tzu's k i n d is, to quote the title attached to his second chapter, 'The sorting w h i c h evens things out'.** It w o u l d cover all common-sense t h i n k i n g about objective facts i n order to arrive at a coherent picture of the conditions before responding. What Chuang-tzu does forbid is t h i n k i n g about what I or others ought to do about the situation, instead of simply answering w i t h the spontaneous act or spontaneous approval or disapproval. The sage, we are told, 'assesses' actions but does not argue over them, 'sorts' physical events but does not assess them, and as for what is outside the cosmos—presumably that remainder left over f r o m the total of oxen and non-oxen—he 'locates' it but does not include it i n the sorting. "The Way has never h a d borders, saying has never had norms. It is by 20

** The title Ch'i wu lun ^f"

ffe" may however also be understood (on a different syntactic

analysis) as 'The Discourse on Evening Things Out'.

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a 'This' w h i c h deems that a boundary is marked. Let me say something about the m a r k i n g of boundaries. You can locate as there and enclose by a line, sort out and assess, divide u p a n d argue over alternatives, compete over and fight over; these I call our Eight Potencies. What is outside the cosmos the sage locates as there but does not sort out. What is w i t h i n the cosmos the sage sorts out a n d does not assess. The records of the former kings i n the successive reigns i n the A n n a l s the sage assesses, but does not argue over." (Cz 2/55-57 tr. G 57). Here the term ' " T h i s " w h i c h deems' (wei shih ^ ) is a technical coinage of Chuang-tzu's contrasting w i t h his ' " T h i s " according to what you go b y ' (yin shih J3EJ ^ ).tt It is all right to make fluid distinctions varying w i t h circumstances, it is w h e n we make rigid distinctions misleading us into j u d g i n g that something is permanently what it is temporarily convenient to name it that thinking goes w r o n g . The phrase commonly translated 'spontaneous' is tzu jan f| ,4* 'so of itself'; the sage "constantly goes b y the spontaneous and does not add anything to the process of life", and " i n the spontaneity of according w i t h things has no room for selfishness". But a phrase more characteristic of Chuang-tzu may seem to contrast w i t h it, pu te y i ^ £f- £ j , that than w h i c h one 'cannot do otherwise', the 'inevitable'. The sage "treating all abodes as one finds his lodgings i n the inevitable", and "by trusting to the inevitable nurtures the centre of h i m . " U n l i k e Mohists and Yangists seeking grounds for right choice Chuang-tzu's ideal is to have no choice at all, because reflecting the situation w i t h perfect clarity y o u can respond only i n one way. If 'spontaneous' suggests freedom a n d 'inevitable' compulsion, that is o n l y another of the dichotomies we should be leaving behind. The inevitability w o u l d be that of the artist's casually drawn line, or of the single possible w o r d w h i c h a poet finds or fails to find. The centrality of the concept of the inevitable is demonstrated by its place i n the most surprising of the examples of accommodation to the rationalism of sophists and M o h i s t s w h i c h turn u p i n various corners of Chuang-tzu. A 'School of C h u a n g - t z u ' passage actually sketches a chain of definitions of all major Taoist concepts, imitating the a priori ethical system of the Later Mohists; it borrows one M o h i s t definition a n d echoes the Explanation of another. The M o h i s t s established the benevolent and the right as what the sage desires 'beforehand' by interlocking definitions built u p f r o m the undefined 'desire'. The Taoist however wants to show that the Way is, not 21

22

23

tt The distinction between yin shih and wei shih was proposed in G 'Chuang-tzu's Essay', 143f and slightly modified in G Cz Textual Notes 6f.

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that w h i c h the sage desires, but the course on w h i c h he inevitably finds himself i n his iUuminated state. "The 'Way' is Potency's laying out, 'life' is Potency's lighting up, one's 'nature' is the resources for life. The motions f r o m one's nature are called 'doing , d o i n g becoming contrived is called 'erring'. " ' K n o w i n g ' is the contact, 'knowledge' is the representation; what k n o w i n g does not k n o w is as though peered a t . "It is what sets m o v i n g o n the course that is inevitable w h i c h is called 'Potency , it is motion all being f r o m oneself w h i c h is called 'order'. The names are opposed but the objects all take their direction f r o m each other." (Cz 23/70-72, tr. G190) The definitions show u p the contrast between the two fundamentals of Chinese moral philosophy, the spontaneous or inevitable reaction wise or unwise, a n d the knowledge of the object by w h i c h one evaluates it as wise or unwise. The chain of definitions (inevitable and ordered, Potency, Way and Life, nature) belongs to the former, the definitions of k n o w i n g and knowledge stand outside. 7

24

7

The illumination of spontaneity The analogy of the craftsman to the Taoist sage has the limitation that the sage, instead of putting his u n t h i n k i n g dexterity i n the service of ends, is spontaneous f r o m the very centre of his being. In terms of the traditional Chinese dichotomy, of m a n w h o thinks and chooses and Heaven w h i c h does all that is independent of man's w i l l , his motions derive not from himself as m a n but from Heaven working through h i m . Shall we say then that i n discarding all traditional imperatives Chuang-tzu has substituted a new one of his o w n , 'Be spontaneous'? That has long been a common interpretation of Taoism. But w i t h spontaneity the question always arises of w h i c h k i n d is being recommended. Western romanticism extols intensity of spontaneous emotion however much it distorts reality by subjectivity, Taoism the spontaneous incipience of the act w h e n reflecting the situation objectively. The craftsman stories are again instructive i n exemplifying the sort of spontaneity into w h i c h emotion can enter only as disturbance, obscuring the situation as it is objectively—that is, once more following the craftsman analogy, as one must see it to respond successfully. C h u a n g - t z u inherits what we claim as a presupposition of his tradition since Confucius, that action starts from spontaneity and is guided b y w i s d o m , but instead of laying d o w n rules by which the wise m a n adjusts spontaneous inclination to measure, he

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reduces w i s d o m itself to its essence, the dispassionate mirroring of things as they are. The metaphor of the mirror can be traced through early and late strata of Chuang-tzu. "The utmost m a n uses the heart like a mirror; he does not escort things as they go or welcome them as they come, he responds and does not store." (Cz7/32ftr. G98) The sage does not use the heart to plan ahead, only to reflect the perfect image of the situation before he responds. Like a mirror, it reflects only the present, does not 'store' the past experience w h i c h traps i n obsolete attitudes; the sage perceives and responds to every situation as new. The metaphor is at its fullest development i n late strata i n Chuang-tzu. " W i t h i n yourself, no fixed positions: Things as they take shape disclose themselves. M o v i n g , be like water, Still, be like a mirror, Respond like an echo." (Cz 33/56f, tr. G 281) The first couplet relates the^sage's perfect flexibility to the objectivity of his vision; the external situation as it takes shape presents itself from moment to moment as it objectively is. H e is as fluid as water w h i c h is unimpeded because i n moving it adapts to the contours of the ground, his response is as immediate as the echo to the sound. " W h e n the sage is still, it is not that he is still because he says 'It is good to be still'; he is still because none among the myriad things is sufficient to disturb his heart. If water is still, its clarity lights up the hairs of beard and eyebrows, its evenness is p l u m b w i t h the carpenter's level; the greatest of craftsmen take their standard f r o m it. If mere water clarifies when it is still, how much more the stillness of the quintessential-and-daimonic, the heart of the sage! It is the reflector of heaven and earth, the mirror of the myriad things. "Emptiness and stillness, calm a n d indifference, quiescence, D o i n g Nothing, are the even level of heaven and earth, the utmost reach the Way and Potency; therefore emperor, k i n g or sage finds rest in them. A t rest he empties, e m p t y i n g is filled, a n d what fills h i m sorts itself out. Emptying he is still, i n stillness he is moved, and w h e n he moves he succeeds." (Cz 13/2-6, tr. G 259). The essential point here is that the sage's heart is not subject to the agitations w h i c h obscure the common man's clarity of vision, to w h i c h Chuang-tzu himself is represented as confessing after seeing the giant magpie: "I have been looking at reflections i n m u d d y water, have gone astray from the clear p o o l . " E v e n i n the 'sorting' (lun) w h i c h is the kind of 25

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thinking permitted to Taoists, the sage is not exerting the heart; he keeps the heart empty a n d lets the external scene fill it, sort itself out i n its o w n objective relations, and then 'move' h i m . H i s heart has the 'evenness', the neutrality to all h u m a n goals, of the universe itself. H a v i n g achieved this mirror-like lucidity he no longer has to evaluate, even to judge that 'It is good to be still'; it is enough that he does not value anything i n the universe above his o w n clarity of vision ("None among the myriad things is sufficient to disturb his heart"). H i s response i n unclouded illumination of his situation is perfectly apt to the goal to w h i c h at that moment he spontaneously tends; " w h e n he moves he succeeds." H i s Potency, aptitude, knack, is at its height, his act coincides exactly w i t h the Way. Looking back, we find two stages i n Chuang-tzu's thought: (1) A l l principles for grounding rules of conduct are themselves groundless. (2) A t the rock bottom of scepticism there remain spontaneity and a single imperative to guide it, ' M i r r o r things as they are', w h i c h b y the logic of our quasi-syllogism permits only the reaction w h e n most aware. A Westerner following this line of thought might expect spontaneity guided only by awareness to be egoistic, unless h u m a n nature is morally good. But i n ancient C h i n a no one except Mencius and his followers supposes that h u m a n nature is g o o d , a n d no one, even a Yangist, conceives an absolute egoism as distinct f r o m a relative selfishness. The general assumption—an explicable a n d defensible one —seems to be that awareness of other people guides spontaneity from selfishness towards responsiveness f r o m other viewpoints. Confucius learns to "follow what the heart desires without transgressing rule" by the practice of shu Tikening-to-oneself'. C h u a n g - t z u is interested not i n man's nature but i n his Potency, to be developed until the impulses aroused w h e n mirroring perfectly prevail over the passions w h i c h cloud the mirror ("Wherever desires a n d cravings are deep, the impulse w h i c h is from Heaven is s h a l l o w " ) . The 'Inner Chapters' never use the w o r d hsing 'nature'; the 'Outer Chapters' do, but say that "by the training of our nature we recover P o t e n c y " . The Taoist sage is unselfish, neither by acting out his nature nor by obeying moral principle, but by seeing through all dichotomies i n c l u d i n g self a n d other. ("The utmost m a n has no self"). It appears f r o m one obscure sentence that i n ceasing to choose and simply 'being about to' the sage thinks of other people as T . To explain the mystery of a m a n w h o has become famous as a mourner without feeling sorrow, C h u a n g - t z u says " W h e n another m a n wails he wails too; it is simply that all the way u p 26

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from that w h i c h they depend o n to be-about-to-be, he is w i t h h i m i n recognising h i m as T . H o w w o u l d I k n o w what it is I call recognising as 'I'?" (Cz 6/80, tr. G 91) Whatever is to be made of this, there is no doubt that the sage ruler mirroring the w o r l d is conceived as responding on behalf of all without thinking of himself as concerned for other people. "The benefits of his bounty extend to a m y r i a d ages, but it is not deemed concern for m a n " (Cz 6/11, tr. G 91). Or, according to a later writer i n the book, the sage is concerned for m a n k i n d but does not k n o w it until others tell h i m , as a beautiful w o m a n knows that she is beautiful only after seeing herself i n a m i r r o r . 31

Waking and dream Throughout this book we have contrasted Chuang-tzu's position w i t h the rationalism of sophists a n d Later M o h i s t s not as 'irrationalist' but as 'anti-rationalist', assuming a distinction developed at length elsewhere. The anti-rationalist plays d o w n or denies the place of reason i n becoming aware of objective reality, the irrationalist treats reality itself as rejectable for, or as malleable to, imagination. There can be no doubt o n w h i c h side of the line C h u a n g - t z u falls. H e accepts without question that we have to take the w o r l d as it is, denies only that analytic reason can show us how it is. What the thinker p o s i n g alternatives is t r y i n g vainly to p i n d o w n i n words is objectively there: the w o o d w h i c h the wheelwright is chiselling, the famine or rebellion w h i c h confronts the ruler; i n the stillness of the sage's heart it shows u p as plain and undistorted as a face i n calm water. Whether or not what he sees is a dream—the question raised i n the famous tale of C h u a n g - t z u dreaming he is a b u t t e r f l y — h e has to accept it as given. H e may name a n d classify things as he pleases, as horse or nonhorse, dream or w a k i n g , but if he sees things as he pleases, lets the passions blur the mirror of perception, his spontaneous move w i l l no longer accord w i t h the Way. You cannot on Chuang-tzu's position treat truth as one value among others to be weighed against the rest, and ask Nietzsche's truly irrationalist question: "Granted we want truth, why not rather untruth? A n d uncertainty? Even ignorance?". 32

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Even i n Chuang-tzu the thought that life might be a dream seems peculiar to C h u a n g - t z u himself; it is among those w h i c h disappear after the 'Inner Chapters'. It was not to take root i n C h i n a until after the Buddhists re-introduced it f r o m India. A Westerner easily misconceives it i n terms of his o w n reality/appearance dichotomy. Since words for the

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existing a n d the real apply i n Chinese primarily to concrete t h i n g s , to doubt their reality does not even for C h u a n g - t z u i m p l y something more real behind them disguised b y the veil of appearance. The centre of interest for C h u a n g - t z u is that w a k i n g or dreaming we cannot k n o w the answer to the question ' A m I clreaming or awake?'. This unknowability is the perfect illustration of his point that the posing of alternatives does not give us knowledge. We must unmake even the fundamental distinctions, 'sometmng/nothing', 'waking/dream', if we are to return to the Way. "We dream of banqueting a n d at d a w n wail a n d weep, dream of wailing and weeping a n d at d a w n go out to hunt. W h i l e we dream we do not k n o w we are dreaming, a n d i n the m i d d l e of a dream interpret a dream within it; not until we wake do we k n o w that we were dreaming. O n l y after the ultimate awakening shall we k n o w that this is the ultimate dream. Yet fools think they are awake, so confident that they k n o w what they are, princes, herdsmen, incorrigible! You a n d Confucius are both dreams, and I w h o call y o u a dream a m also a dream." (Cz 2/81-83, tr. G 59f) Here C h u a n g - t z u follows out the implications of one alternative, but i n his other references the point is i n the undecidibility of the issue. " H e does not k n o w whether he is C h o u w h o dreams he is a butterfly or a butterfly w h o dreams he is C h o u . " (Cz 2/95f, tr. G 61) "You dream that y o u are a b i r d a n d fly away into the sky, dream that you are a fish a n d plunge into the deep. There's no k n o w i n g whether the man w h o speaks n o w is the waker or the dreamer." (Cz 6/81, tr. G 91) 35

Heaven and man The most obstinate of the dichotomies w h i c h C h u a n g - t z u strives to throw off is that of Heaven a n d m a n . In following through one alternative, he can declare that the sage "has the shape of a m a n , is without what is essentially m a n " , that he lives w h o l l y possessed by Heaven. H u i Shih enters and raises the obvious objection. " ' C a n a m a n really be without the essential (ch'ing) to man?' 'He can.' 'If a m a n is without the essential to m a n , h o w can we call h i m a man?' 'The Way gives h i m the features, Heaven gives h i m the shape, h o w can we refuse to call h i m a man?' 'But since we do call h i m a m a n , h o w can he be without the essential to man?' 'Judging "It's this, it's not" is what I mean b y the essential to man. What I mean by being without the essential is that the m a n does not

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inwardly w o u n d his person b y likes and dislikes, that he constantly goes by the spontaneous a n d does not add anything to the process of l i f e . ' " (Cz 5/55-58, tr. G 82) A m I then o n the Way only w h e n as a m a n I dissolve a n d let Heaven act through me? Here we find a recurrent tension i n Chuang-tzu's thought. H e does not expect to live i n a permanent ecstasy m o v i n g like a sleepwalker guided by Heaven; he recognises that one must be sometimes "of Heaven's party" a n d sometimes "of man's party", and declares that "someone i n w h o m neither Heaven nor m a n is victor over the other, this is what is meant by the Genuine M a n . " The clearest statement of a compromise, sketched a n d immediately dismissed as inadequate (one of Chuang-tzu's characteristic moves) is at the head of the chapter 'The teacher w h o is ultimate ancestor . "To k n o w what is Heaven's d o i n g and what is man's is the utmost i n knowledge. Whoever k n o w s what Heaven does lives the life generated by Heaven. Whoever k n o w s what m a n does uses what his wits k n o w about to nurture what they do not k n o w about. To last out the years assigned you by Heaven and not be cut off i n m i d course, this is perfection of knowledge." (Cz 6/lf, tr. G 84) W h e n ceasing to analyse, simply attending and responding, our behaviour belongs w i t h the birth, growth, decay and death of the body among the spontaneous processes generated by Heaven. We are then doing, without k n o w i n g h o w we do it, what Heaven destines for us. Paradoxically, to enact the destined is, since we are always tempted to think out a better way, "the most difficult thing of a l l " . However, although m y body matures a n d decays as Heaven decrees independently of m y w i l l , as a t h i n k i n g m a n I have to assist the process by feeding m y body a n d taking care of m y health. Similarly I nurture a spontaneous skill by the thought a n d effort of apprenticeship, a n d sagehood by C h u a n g tzu's o w n phOosophising. But i n formulating the distinction C h u a n g - t z u has at once to remind himself that it is an artificial division made only while reasoning as a m a n , obscuring a fundamental continuity. H e returns to the questions he had raised about the arbitrariness of n a m i n g . "However, there's a difficulty. K n o w i n g depends on something w h i c h it fits (tang); the trouble is that what it depends o n is never fixed. H o w do I know that the doer I call 'Heaven' is not the man? H o w do I k n o w the doer I call the ' m a n ' is not Heaven?" The dichotomy is seen to break d o w n i n the unknowability of whether the agent of m y o w n actions is myself or Heaven acting through me, like 3 6

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that of w a k i n g a n d dream i n the unknowability of whether I a m not now dreaming. O n e 'School of C h u a n g - t z u ' dialogue does take the line that the agent is always Heaven. " 'What do you mean by " M a n is one w i t h H e a v e n ? " ' 'What is of m a n is of Heaven, and what is of Heaven is of Heaven too. That m a n is unable to possess what is Heaven's is his nature.'" (Cz 20/60f, tr. G168). Following another line, if everything h u m a n were eliminated what would be left for Heaven except the animal? "To be skilled i n what is Heaven's and deft i n what is man's, only the perfect m a n is capable of that. O n l y the animal is able to be animal, only the animal is able to be Heaven's. The perfect m a n hates Heaven, hates what is from Heaven i n m a n , a n d above all the question 'Is it i n me from Heaven or f r o m m a n ? ' " (Cz 23/73f, tr. G106). There cannot for C h u a n g - t z u be any ultimate discontinuity between the spontaneous a n d the thinking person. A t the centre of himself the sage is spontaneous, belongs w h o l l y to Heaven, does not yet make any distinction between benefit and harm, self and other, even Heaven and man ("For the sage there has never yet begun to be Heaven, never yet begun to be m a n " ) . A t the periphery he is a thinking man, finding means to the goals towards w h i c h Heaven moves h i m , and collecting the information towards w h i c h he is moved to respond. O n this periphery he does make distinctions, although only as provisional and relative (the '"this" according to what he goes b y ' , not the ' " t h i s " w h i c h deems'), and deliberately pursues what he likes and avoids what he dislikes. We have here the exact opposite of the Western rationalist's conception of himself as reasoning Ego objectivising his o w n spontaneous tendencies, aptitudes, and strengths as means i n the service of his ends. "The Genuine M e n of old let what is Heaven's await what comes, d i d not let man intrude on Heaven. . . . Hence they were one both w i t h what they liked and what they disliked, were one both w h e n they were one and when they were not. W h e n one they were of Heaven's party, w h e n not one of man's party. Someone i n w h o m neither Heaven nor m a n is victor over the other, this is what is meant b y the Genuine M a n . " (Cz 6/19f; cf. 24/97f tr. G85). That the sage's spontaneity is at the centre of h i m , not the periphery, may be illustrated f r o m a dialogue put into the mouths of Confucius and his favourite disciple Yen H u i . L i k e the 'Inward Training' and Mencius, Chuang-tzu conceives training for the Way as the refining of the energising fluids, the ch'i, by controlled posture and breathing ("The 38

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breathing of the Genuine M a n is from d o w n i n his heels, the breathing of plain men is f r o m their throats"). The effect is to refine and ratify the ch'i to perfect tenuousness, so that it circulates freely through the relatively dense and inert w h i c h it activates. W h e n preparing to act, you 'fast the heart', empty it of the thought normally accepted as its function as an organ, and wait for the now perfectly attenuated fluid to respond and move i n one direction or the other. " U n i f y your attention. Rather than listen w i t h the ear, listen w i t h the heart. Rather than listen w i t h the heart, listen w i t h the ch'i. Listening stops at the ear, the heart at what tallies w i t h it. A s for the ch'i, it is the tenuous and passive towards other things. O n l y the Way accumulates the tenuous. The attenuating is the fasting of the heart." (Cz 4/26-28, tr. G 68) In renouncing control of the ch'i selfhood dissolves; yet paradoxically in ceasing to distinguish myself from what all the time has been acting through me, I become for the first time the true agent of m y actions. It is by grasping this point that H u i convinces Confucius that he understands: " W h e n H u i has never yet succeeded i n being the agent, a deed derives from H u i . W h e n he does succeed i n becoming its agent, there has never begun to be a H u i . " There is a possibility of misunderstanding here w h i c h the analogy of sage to craftsman may again help us to avoid. To dissolve man i n Heaven, suspend divisions, treat everything as one, may sound like self-immersion in a universal blur. But if the craftsman masters his skill only after passing the apprentice stage of posing alternatives and following verbal instructions it is because he is now m a k i n g finer discriminations than he can put in words. Behind the arguing out of alternatives the primary sense of pien is d i s c r i m i n a t i o n , and "the greatest pien is u n s p o k e n . " The oneness of the Taoist vision seems to be of a k i n d w i t h the ' U n i t y w i t h i n Variety' of Western aesthetics. 39

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To think i n terms of U n i t y w i t h i n Variety helps to resolve the apparent contradiction that the process b y w h i c h the sage ceases to differentiate himself is regularly described not as a blending w i t h things but as a detachment f r o m them. Other people become entangled i n circumstance, sink under the burden of their possessions, but the sage, to quote a slogan from the 'Outer Chapters', 'treats things as things a n d is not turned into a thing by t h i n g s ' . H e withdraws inwards towards a viewpoint from w h i c h even his o w n b o d y is perceived as external. One adept is described as externalising first the w o r l d , then the things w h i c h support life, finally life itself. Others are said to "treat their o w n flesh-and-bone as external to 42

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them", to "travel o n the inside of the flesh-and-bone". The withdrawal is not a n exploration of i n w a r d experience; o n the contrary, Chuang-tzu's attitude to the w o r l d is uncompromisingly extroverted. The sage as he steps back into himself is still l o o k i n g outward; he "uses the eye to look at the eye", he "has ears a n d eyes as images he perceives", he takes his stand at "the ultimate eye." There being no mind/body dichotomy i n ancient C h i n a , he is not of course l o o k i n g out o n matter from a realm of pure spirit. In detaching himself f r o m the m a n y he is returning to the 'root' or 'trunk' or 'seed' f r o m w h i c h they grow, into the 'ancestor f r o m w h i c h they descend, the 'gate' out of w h i c h they emerge, the 'axis' round w h i c h they revolve. It is at the common point f r o m w h i c h they all start that they are found to merge together and w i t h oneself i n a single whole, just a s — although C h u a n g - t z u does not himself make this application of his 'root' metaphor—different branches t u r n out w h e n traced back to be one and the same tree. 44

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Language The denial that the Way is communicable i n words is a familiar paradox of Taoism. The first line of Lao-tzu, "The Way that can be told is not the constant Way", inevitably tempts humorists, Chinese or Western, to ask w h y the author went o n to write the book.* The irony is especially acute i n the case of C h u a n g - t z u , a master of sophisticated argument, aphorism, anecdote, lyrical prose a n d gnomic verse w h o professes a boundless scepticism about the possibility of ever saying anything. O n closer inspection the joke loses most of its point. Taoists are t r y i n g to convey a knack, a n aptitude, a way of l i v i n g , a n d w h e n the carpenter tells D u k e H u a n that he cannot put into words h o w much pressure to exert i n chiselling w o o d we both understand a n d agree. W i t h philosophers w h o profess to k n o w unformulable truths, a n ineffable reality, no doubt w e have the right to become impatient, but Taoists are not flunking of the Way as ultimate Truth or Reality. They merely have the good sense to remind us of the limitations of the language w h i c h they use to guide us towards that altered perspective o n the w o r l d a n d that knack of living. To point the direction they use stories, verses, maxims, any verbal means w h i c h come to h a n d . Far f r o m having no need for words they require all available * Cf. The Philosophers, a satirical verse by Po Chii-yi (A.D. 772-846) translated by Waley, Chinese Poems, 173.

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resources of literary art, w h i c h is w h y all the classics of philosophical Taoism (Lao-tzu, Chuang-tzu a n d , f r o m a later time, Lieh-tzu) have won important places i n the literary history of C h i n a . We have quoted enough verbatim f r o m C h u a n g - t z u to exhibit how he poses alternatives only to undermine them, by showing the contradictories to require each other or the issue to be undecidable, or by pushing the commonly rejected side, or both sides together, and how his language as it leaves both behind turns into poetry. We have also met enough of his double questions to see that w h e n he doubts the difference between human speech and b i r d s o n g , his "Is there a proof for argumentation? O r isn't there any proof?" w i l l not be an idle i n q u i r y ; there w i l l be a logical point behind it w h i c h we might risk putting i n our o w n terms as ' H o w can I prove that language is meaningful without u s i n g it on the assumption that it is?' (Like his M o h i s t critics he has an eye for the traps of selfreference.) It is characteristic of C h u a n g - t z u both to talk to us on the assumption that his words mean something and to play w i t h the opposite thought that the voices of competing thinkers are like the w i n d through hollows of different shapes or a n organ-player b l o w i n g through tubes of varying lengths, m a k i n g clashing noises to be reconciled only by the return to silence. If C h u a n g - t z u looks 'modern' i n his sense of the complexities and inadequacies of language, he certainly does not share our temptation to slide towards linguistic solipsism. H i s epistemology is that of ancient C h i n a generally, naive realism. H e has a perfect confidence that not only things but our ideas (yi ) of t h e m — w h i c h i n the first place w o u l d be their i m a g e s — w o u l d still be there if we could get r i d of the nuisance of having to talk about them. "The bait is the means to get the fish where y o u want it, catch the fish and you forget the bait. The snare is the means to get the rabbit where you want it, catch the rabbit and y o u forget the snare. Words are the means to get the idea where y o u want it, catch on to the idea and you forget about the words. Where shall I f i n d a m a n w h o forgets about words, a n d have a w o r d w i t h h i m ? " (Cz 26/48f, tr. G190). A ' M i x e d Chapter' section closely related to 'The sorting w h i c h evens things out' classifies three modes of discourse of varying effectiveness available to those no longer victim to the illusion of logical demonstration. "Saying from a lodging-place works nine times out of ten, weighted saying works seven times out of ten. Spillover saying is new every day, smooth it out on the whetstone of Heaven." (Cz 27/1, tr. G106). Explanations follow: 46

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(1) 'Saying f r o m a lodging-place':—"You borrow a standpoint outside to sort the matter out". This is traditionally taken as the expression of ideas through imaginary conversations, a universally accepted convention. However, i n Chuang-tzu's terminology to 'lodge' (yu ^ ) is to assume the temporary standpoints f r o m w h i c h the sage judges w i t h the " T h i s " according to what he goes by', i n contrast w i t h the fixed positions from w h i c h the unenlightened apply 'the "This" w h i c h deems'. Chuang-tzu seems to be referring to persuasion by argumentum ad hominem, the only k i n d of victory i n debate w h i c h w o u l d have any point for h i m . You temporarily lodge at the other man's standpoint, because the meanings he gives to words are for h i m the only meanings, and he w i l l not debate on any other basis. (2) 'Weighted saying':—"It is what you say on your o w n authority." This has to be backed b y depth of experience, not merely the respect due to o l d age ("A m a n without the Way of M a n is to be called an obsolete man"). The aphorism w o u l d be the most concentrated example. (3) 'Spillover s a y i n g : — " U s e it to go b y and let the stream find its o w n channels, this is the way to last out your years." This is the most important, and is given more space than the other two together. It is traditionally, and this time convincingly, assumed to take its name f r o m a k i n d of vessel designed to tip and right itself w h e n filled too near the b r i m . It is the speech proper to the intelligent spontaneity of Taoist behaviour i n general, a fluid language w h i c h keeps its equilibrium through changing meanings and viewpoints. Words are inherently out of joint w i t h things, and w h e n they seem to be saying least may be saying most. "If you refrain f r o m saying, everything is even; the even is uneven with saying, saying is uneven w i t h the even. Hence the dictum 'In saying say nothing'. If i n saying y o u say nothing, all your life you say without ever saying, all your life y o u refuse to say without ever failing to say. What from somewhere is admissible f r o m somewhere else is not, what from somewhere is so f r o m somewhere else is n o t . . . . " (Cz 27/5-7, tr. G107). For C h u a n g - t z u words do order themselves i n discourse, not according to any rules of argumentation, but by that unanalysable knack w h i c h he discerns at the back of all successful behaviour, and w h i c h he sees as the sign that Heaven is w o r k i n g through us. We might illustrate 'spillover saying' by the way he handles the w o r d 'know.' The Later Mohists are careful to define 'wits' and ' k n o w ' , and to distinguish k n o w i n g how to act from k n o w i n g names, objects and h o w to connect t h e m . Chuang-tzu on the contrary delights i n the balancing act of dancing f r o m one usage to another i n the course of a single sentence. 48

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"The m y r i a d things have somewhere f r o m w h i c h they grow but no one sees the root, somewhere f r o m w h i c h they come forth but no one sees the gate. M e n all honour what w i t knows, but none knows h o w to k n o w by depending on what his wits do not k n o w ; may that not be called the supreme uncertainty?" (Cz 25/52f, tr. G102).

Reconciliation with death However far C h u a n g - t z u departs f r o m the Yangism f r o m w h i c h we suspect that he started, he never doubts that it is by trusting to the Way that you "protect the body, keep life intact, nourish your parents, last out your years." This however is only a minor advantage of a Way w h i c h reconciles w i t h the possibility of bodily mutilation and the certainty of death. Suffering does not preoccupy C h u a n g - t z u , or any other pre-Buddhist thinker i n C h i n a . L i k e the rest he is neither optimist nor pessimist, and takes it for granted that sorrow and joy alternate like night and day, death and life. The disaster ranked second only to death is deformity or mutilation of the body; thus Confucians recognised it as a duty to return one's body to the ancestors intact as w h e n one received it f r o m them. H o w to reconcile oneself to disaster to the b o d y is therefore a crux for C h u a n g tzu. The 'Inner Chapters' show a remarkable interest, not shared by later Taoists even i n Chuang-tzu itself, i n cripples, freaks, mutilated criminals, w h o are able to accept a n d remain inwardly unaltered b y their condition. The criminal w i t h a chopped foot carries about w i t h h i m the visible proof of his crime and betrayal of his ancestors, but C h u a n g - t z u admires one who "looks at things only for that i n w h i c h they are one, does not see what they have lost; he regards losing his o w n foot as he would throwing off mud." The liberation f r o m selfhood is seen above all as a t r i u m p h over death. Chuang-tzu's position is not that personal consciousness w i l l survive death, rather that i n grasping the Way one's viewpoint shifts f r o m T shall no longer exist' to something like 'In losing selfhood I shall remain what at bottom I have always been, identical w i t h all the endlessly transforming phenomena of the universe.' N o t h i n g i n his unusual sensibility is more striking than the lyrical, ecstatic tone i n w h i c h he writes of death. This does not reflect a disgust w i t h life, nor is it a matter of treating death as a beautiful abstraction. In 'The Teacher W h o Is the Ultimate Ancestor', i n w h i c h most of Chuang-tzu's writings o n this theme are collected, a d y i n g m a n drags himself to a well to look at his disfigured body and wonder 50

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what 'the M a k e r of Things' is t u r n i n g it into; a sage lolls carelessly against the doorpost talking to his d y i n g friend after shooing away his weeping family; others appal a disciple of Confucius by playing the zither and doing o d d jobs beside the corpse. C h u a n g - t z u himself i n various stories goes to sleep pillowed o n a s k u l l , is f o u n d t h u m p i n g a pot (the most vulgar k i n d of music-making) o n the death of his wife, and on his deathbed laughs at his disciples for preferring to have h i m decently buried and eaten by the worms than left i n the open to be eaten b y the birds. A l t h o u g h Chuang-tzu generally discusses the Way i n impersonal terms (not that personal/impersonal w o u l d apply to it any more than other dichotomies), on the theme of death he tends to personify, representing the sage as i n his lifetime 'fellow m a n w i t h the M a k e r of Things', w h o w i l l i n due course transform h i m into something else. The concept of a M a k e r of Things (tsao wu che ^7 ^f- ), w h i c h reappears i n later literature only as a poetic conceit borrowed f r o m C h u a n g - t z u , is remarkable since the m y r i a d things were universally conceived as not created but generated by Heaven or by heaven and earth. E v e n i n Chuang-tzu it seems peculiar to Chuang-tzu himself. The same is true of the physical confrontation w i t h death, and mockery of the rites of m o u r n i n g , for Chinese the most sacred of all. This is quite without the morbidity of the stress on corruptibility i n the lateMediaeval art of Europe, w h i c h reminds of the horrors of mortality for the good of our souls. It seems rather that for C h u a n g - t z u the ultimate test is to be able to look directly at the facts of one's o w n physical decomposition without horror, to accept one's dissolution as part of the universal process of transformation. "Soon Master L a i fell i l l , a n d lay panting on the verge of death. H i s wife and children stood i n a circle bewailing h i m . Master L i went to ask after h i m . 'Shoo! O u t of the way!' he said, 'Don't startle h i m while he transforms.' He lolled against Lai's door and talked w i t h h i m . 'Wonderful, the process w h i c h fashions and transforms us! What is it going to turn you into, i n what direction w i l l it use you to go? W i l l it make you into a rat's liver? O r a fly's leg?' A child that has father a n d mother, go east or west, north or south, has only their commands to obey; a n d for m a n the Y i n a n d Yang are more than father a n d mother. Something other than me approaches, I die; and if I were to refuse to listen it w o u l d be defiance on m y part, how can I blame him? That hugest of clumps of soil loaded me w i t h a body, h a d me toiling through a life, eased me w i t h o l d age, rests me w i t h death; therefore that I

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found it good to live is the very reason w h y I find it good to die. If today a master swordsmith were smelting metal, a n d the metal should j u m p u p and say "I insist on being made into an Excalibur," the swordsmith w o u l d surely think it metal w i t h a curse on it. If n o w having once happened on the shape of a m a n , I were to say "I'll be a m a n , nothing but a m a n " , he that fashions and transforms us w o u l d surely think me a baleful sort of man. N o w if once a n d for all I think of heaven and earth as a vast foundry, and the fashioner a n d transformer as the master smith, wherever I am going w h y should I object? I'll fall into a sound sleep a n d wake u p f r e s h . ' " (Cz 6/53-60, tr. G 88f)

A 'School of Chuang-tzu' development: the 'Great Man' metaphysic A generalisation about Chinese philosophy to w h i c h there are few exceptions before the arrival of B u d d h i s m from India is that it shows no impulse to metaphysical system-building. Metaphysical issues arise, of course, one of w h i c h , the split between Heaven and m a n , we take to be central to its development. But i n struggling w i t h problems raised by the traditional cosmos such thinkers as Mencius and Chuang-tzu show little tendency to stand back and make an organised whole of their revised world-picture. Ancient Chinese thinking at its most logical, as i n K u n g sun L u n g and the Later Mohists, concentrates on specific problems. There may be a metaphysic behind H u i Shih's ten theses—we shall return to this p o i n t — b u t i n the absence of his explanations there is Little to go on. The early Mohists organise their teaching i n ten doctrines defended i n ten organised essays, but are no nearer than anyone else to organising a cosmic scheme. There is no doubt a sense i n w h i c h everyone from Confucius downwards has an implicit metaphysic i n w h i c h Heaven and man, Way and Potency, have their places and functions, but if we w i s h to clarify it we have to correlate a lot of piecemeal evidence and work out the scheme for ourselves. Of the three major responses to the 4th-century metaphysical crisis, the most rationalistic, Later M o h i s m , is positively anti-metaphysical. The Mohists turned their backs on the whole question of the relation between Heaven and m a n , and sought for ethics purely logical foundations. It is i n the other two, among followers of Mencius and Chuang-tzu, that we find the few exceptions to our generalisaton. We have seen that the 'Doctrine of the M e a n ' does go some way towards systematising Mencius' conception of man's place i n the u n i v e r s e . O n the Taoist side one full52

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blown metaphysician, the 'Great M a n ' writer, makes a very good job of tidying u p C h u a n g - t z u . A divergence w i t h i n the school of Chuang-tzu, i n the 3rd and perhaps down into the 2nd century B . C . , is between the rationalising tendencies centred on the A u t u m n Floods' chapter and the denationalising centred on 'Knowledge Roams N o r t h ' . In the latter to speak articulately about the Way is enough to show one's ignorance of it; the proof of insight is that you refuse to speak, or try but forget what you meant to say, or fall into a trance while being told, or see i n a flash stimulated by some aphorism w h i c h on reflection is seen to be meaningless, or burst into improvising song, or are moved by music without understanding what it is doing to y o u . In one of the stories Confucius propounds something very like the koans ('What is the sound of one h a n d clapping?') w i t h w h i c h Z e n Buddhists set out to smash the frame of conceptual t h i n k i n g a thousand years later. " "There is no past and no present, no beginning and no end, before you have c h i l d r e n a n d g r a n d c h i l d r e n y o u d o have c h i l d r e n a n d grandchildren—admissible?' "Jan C h ' i u failed to reply. 'Enough, that y o u failed to answer. . . . " ' (Cz 22/73f, tr. G164) A t the opposite extreme are two lengthy philosophical dialogues, closely related to each other, the ' A u t u m n Floods' (at the head of the chapter of that name) and the 'Know-little' dialogue at the end of the 'Tseyang' chapter. These, together w i t h the 'Snail' dialogue (also i n 'Tseyang'), and some fragments w h i c h may come from the broken end of the 'Autumn Floods' dialogue, expound a coherent metaphysic centred on the concepts of the Great M a n (ta jen ) and his 'great scope' (to fang ^ -jf ). These terms must have been the slogans of a particular school; one exchange mentions a 'School of the Great Scope', another puts the Great M a n above the sage.* The only other example of either slogan i n Chuang-tzu is where at first sight one w o u l d least expect it, i n 'Knowledge Roams N o r t h ' . Here personified Knowledge i n his foolishness requests and receives from the Yellow Emperor a verbal exposition of the Way, i n w h i c h he is told that "the m y r i a d things are the One"; it is mentioned that only the Great M a n easily returns to the root of t h i n g s . But the Yellow 55

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*Cz 17/5, 25/31, tr. G145,154. The three dialogues about the Great Man and his Great Scope are the Autumn Floods' (Cz 17/1-53), the 'Snail' (Cz 25/20-33) and the 'Know-little' (Cz 25/59-82). Three scattered fragments on the integrity, the teaching, and the conduct of the Great Man (Cz 24/70-73,11/63-66, and the misplaced 17/24-28) may be from the fragmented conclusion of the 'Autumn Floods'. Cf. tr. G144-157 and Textual notes 37-41.

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Emperor then repudiates his o w n account by adding that he and Knowledge are both far from the Way precisely because they know. Even here, then, 'Great M a n ' serves as the sign of an intellectualised Taoism. In the Great M a n dialogues on the contrary the value of knowledge is unquestioned and the speaker called 'Know-little' rightly wants to know more. Not only does the Great M a n have a comprehensive view of the cosmos, the capacity to see himself i n proportion w i t h i n it is precisely what distinguishes h i m as a Great M a n . The 'Autumn Floods' tells how the god of the Yellow River, riding the current i n autumn to the river mouth, sees w i t h amazement the vastness of the ocean a n d seeks instruction from the sea-god Jo, w h o confesses that " w i t h i n the compass of heaven and earth I a m no more than a pebble or a bush on a great mountain." The rivergod asks "In that case, w o u l d it be admissible for me to judge heaven and earth great and the tip of a hair small?" (Cz 17/14f, tr. G145) The sea-god answers that, beyond and w i t h i n , the greater and smaller continue indefinitely. The river-god n o w asks whether there are an infinitely great and infinitely small, i n words w h i c h rephrase H u i Shih's first thesis ("The ultimately great has nothing outside i t . . . . The ultimately small has nothing inside it.") " 'Debaters of the age all say that the most quintessential has no shape at all, the greatest cannot be encompassed. Is this trustworthy fact?'" The reply is that there is a difference i n k i n d between finite and infinite, and that the distinction between small and great, quintessential and massive, belongs only to the former. " ' W h e n the great is seen from the viewpoint of the minute, some is out of sight; w h e n the minute is seen from the viewpoint of the great, it is invisible. The quintessential is the small as it ceases to be discernible, the outlying is the great receding out of sight, therefore their differentiation is for convenience; it is a matter of the situation from w h i c h one is seeing. The quintessential a n d the massive we specify i n things w h i c h do have shape. What has no shape at a l l , number cannot divide; what cannot be encompassed, number cannot exhaust. Those w h i c h can be sorted i n words are the more massive among things, those w h i c h can be conveyed through ideas are the more quintessential among things. A s for what words cannot sort or ideas convey, we do not specify anything i n it as quintessential or massive." The river-god is now worried as to where i n this infinity one is to find a

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viewpoint f r o m w h i c h to establish norms for right and w r o n g , and is told that there is none. " 'Whether beyond or w i t h i n the realm of things, to what viewpoint must one attain if one is to find norms for noble and base, small and great?' 'If we examine them i n relation to the Way, things are neither noble nor base; if i n relation to other things, they see themselves as noble and others as base; if i n relation to custom, the nobility and baseness do not depend on themselves. 'Examining them i n terms of degree, if going by a standpoint from which it is great you see it as great, not one of the myriad things is not great; if going by a standpoint from w h i c h you see it as small, not one of the myriad things is not small. W h e n you k n o w that heaven and earth amount to a grain of rice, that the tip of a hair amounts to a hill or a mountain, the quantities of degree w i l l be perceived. 'Examining them i n terms of achievements, if going by a standpoint from w h i c h it has them you see it as having, not one of the myriad things does not have them; if going by a standpoint f r o m w h i c h it lacks them you see it as lacking, not one of the m y r i a d things does not lack them. W h e n you k n o w that east and west are opposites yet cannot do without each other, portions i n achievement w i l l be settled. 'Examining them i n terms of inclinations, if going by a standpoint from w h i c h it is right you see it as right, not one of the myriad things is not right; if going by a standpoint from w h i c h it is w r o n g you see it as wrong, not one of the m y r i a d things is not w r o n g . W h e n you k n o w that sage Yao and tyrant C h i e h each thought himself right and the other wrong, the commitments behind the inclinations w i l l be perceived.'" G o o d a n d bad depend not on fixed standards but on particular circumstances. The sea-god illustrates the point from what for ancient Chinese is the obvious example of the self-evidently good or bad, the gain or loss of a throne. " 'In former times, S h u n took the throne yielded by Yao and became Emperor, C h i h took the throne yielded by K ' u a i and was ruined. T'ang and W u fought for a throne and reigned, Po-kung fought for a throne and perished. Judging by these cases, the propriety of contending or deferring, the conduct of a Yao or a C h i e h , w i l l be noble at one time and base at another, and is not to be taken as a constant. . . . If then we say ' W h y not take the right as our authority and do without the w r o n g , take the ordered as our authority and do away w i t h the unruly?', this is failing to understand the pattern of heaven and earth, and the myriad things as they

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essentially are. It is as though you were to take heaven as your authority and do without earth, take the Y i n as your authority and do without the Yang; that it is impracticable is plain enough'." In the river-god's questions a note hardly heard elsewhere i n the literature becomes increasingly distinct, the terror of man's insignificance in infinite space turning to the vertigo of moral nihilism. W i t h an infinity of viewpoints and no fixed standards, whence the confidence of C h u a n g tzu and his school i n the unique act inevitable i n its particular conditions? " 'If that is so, what shall I do and what shall I not do? O n what final consideration am I to refuse or accept, prefer or discard?' 'If we examine them i n terms of the Way, What shall we think noble, what shall we think base? This is called drifting back to the source. Don't fix a sphere for your intent, Or you'll be too lame to walk the Way. What shall we belittle, what shall we make much of? This is called letting their turns come r o u n d . Don't walk always on one course. You'll be at odds and evens with the Way. . . . " The sea-god continues i n r h y m e d verse over 28 lines, then returns to prose: " 'This is how to tell the range of the grand summing-up and to sort out the patterns of the m y r i a d things. A thing's life is like a stampede, a gallop, at every prompting it alters, there is never a time w h e n it does not shift. What shall we do? What shall we not do? It is inherent i n everything that it w i l l transform of itself.'" Here then rational discourse ends, there only remains submergence i n universal process and poetry to point the direction w h i c h spontaneity w i l l take if you see all things i n proportion. But the river-god, one is glad to see, refuses to be fobbed off w i t h poetry and insists on pushing his question farther. If it is simply a matter of spontaneous transformation what is there to value i n the Way? The sea-god's answer, almost disappointingly moderate and sensible, is that it is good to possess the Way precisely because you react seeing all things i n proportion.* " 'But i n that case what is there to value i n the Way?' 'Whoever knows the Way is sure of penetrating the patterns, whoever * Another fragment (Cz 22/16-21) likely to be from the Autumn Floods' is introduced as the beginning of the answer in tr. G 148f. I regret that by an oversight this transposition was not noted except in the conversion table on p. 38.

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penetrates the patterns is sure to be clear-headed i n weighing things, whoever is clear-headed i n w e i g h i n g things w i l l not use other things to his o w n harm. The m a n of utmost Potency Fire cannot b u r n , Water cannot d r o w n , Heat and cold cannot harm, Beasts and birds cannot r e n d , which is not to say that he ignores them; it means that since he is perspicacious about safety and danger, secure i n fortune and misfortune, careful i n approaching and s h u n n i n g , none of them is able to harm h i m . A s the saying goes, "Heaven is w i t h i n , m a n is without," and Potency goes on residing i n what is from H e a v e n . ' " So here we are again at that rock-bottom assumption that the good is the spontaneous reaction—from Heaven, from one's Potency—which is in fullest awareness of h o w things are patterned. If we assume that Taoist weighing of things (unlike M o h i s t and Yangist, w h i c h introduce standards) is solely an objective estimation of greater and lesser effects on each other and o n oneself, the sea-god's answer is logical i n terms of our quasisyllogism. W h e n C h u a n g - t z u tried to differentiate the whole from the sum of its parts he d i d not i n any writings w h i c h survive use an argument w h i c h one might have expected f r o m a friend of H u i S h i h , that infinity is more than the sum of finite quantities. But this is fundamental to the thinking of the Great M a n writer, exhibited especially i n the questions of Know-little to the Grand Impartial Reconciler. This dialogue shares w i t h K u n g - s u n L u n g and the Later Mohists both terminology (t'i/chien 'part/whole', chih 'point o u t ' ) and stock examples (horse, dog). " N o w the fact that w h e n y o u point out from each other the hundred parts of the horse you do not find the horse, yet there the horse is tethered i n front of you, is because you stand the h u n d r e d parts on another level to call them 'horse'." (Cz 25/6f, tr. G151) Know-little asks about n a m i n g the totality of things; the G r a n d Impartial Reconciler answers by taking as illustration the word ' m y r i a d ' , in Chinese as i n English primarily the number 10,000 but used for an indefinitely large number. " 'If so, is it adequate to call that the "Way"?' ' N o . Suppose you were counting off the number of things you w o u l d not stop at one m y r i a d , yet we specify them as "the myriad things", for we use a high number as a label for what we are counting towards. Similarly, heaven and earth are the greatest of shapes, and Y i n and Yang the greatest 57

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of ch'i, and 'Way' covers both of them impartially. If we are going by the greatness of them to label what we continue towards, that is admissible, but once we do have it, can we treat it as comparable w i t h anything else? Then if we use it i n c h o p p i n g to bits and arguing over alternatives, and treat it as analogous w i t h dog or horse, it w i l l be m u c h less adequate than they are.'" Horse and dog are both members of the menagerie of animal examples common to sophists and Mohists, but it is interesting that i n extant materials we find them together only i n the Explanation of the Canon defending argumentation against C h u a n g - t z u . This suggests that we have here a further stage i n the continuing debate on reason we have traced from H u i Shih a n d C h u a n g - t z u through the Later Mohists. Responding perhaps to the M o h i s t criticisms, the Great M a n writer acknowledges the validity of pien w i t h i n the scope of the finite, but reserves the infinite for the Way. H e proceeds to contrast the two realms. The finite are the things "of w h i c h name and object can be recorded, of which even the most quintessential and least discernible can be noted," which "words exhaust a n d knowledge attains." But "the m a n w h o perceives the Way does not pursue them to where they vanish or explore the source from w h i c h they arise. This is the point where discussion stops." The difference i n k i n d is reaffirmed w h e n Know-little inquires about two rival views of the universal process ascribed to philosophers no longer k n o w n to us, " C h i Chen's that nothing does it, and Chieh-tzu's that something causes it." The reply is that the question can be raised only inside the realm of the finite, and that the Way being infinite is neither something nor nothing. A s i n the A u t u m n Floods', there is a reference to H u i Shih's first thesis. " T f y o u chop u p into divisions, the ultimately quintessential is ungradable, the ultimately great cannot be encompassed. W i t h "Something causes it" and " N o t h i n g does it" we never escape from the realm of things, yet persist i n supposing that we have passed beyond it. A "something w h i c h causes" is an object, A "nothing w h i c h does" is a v o i d . There is a name, there is an object — T h e n it occupies a place w i t h other things. There is no name, there is no object — T h e n it occupies the v o i d between things.'" " 'The Way cannot be treated as something, or as nothing either. "Way" as a name is what we borrow to walk it. "Something causes it" and 59

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" N o t h i n g does it" are at single corners of the realm of things; what have they to do w i t h the Great Scope?'." One is struck by the close connexions of these dialogues w i t h the Sophists, i n particular w i t h H u i Shih. A l t h o u g h the Great M a n d i d not necessarily write all episodes i n the A u t u m n Floods' chapter, it may be significant that i n two of them C h u a n g - t z u scores off H u i Shih and i n another off K u n g - s u n L u n g . Moreover i n the 'Snail' dialogue, where a Great M a n introduces a k i n g to the comprehensive vision by a story of wars w i t h thousands of victims between microscopic states on the two horns of a snail, he has been introduced to the k i n g by none other than H u i Shih. One is tempted to speculate that H u i Shih himself drew out the relativistic implications of his theses i n a metaphysic of w h i c h this is the Taoist version. Perhaps the title of 'China's first metaphysician' should be added to the varied honours we have accorded H u i S h i h . But as always there is the difficulty that H u i Shih has left us no writings at all. 6 0

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HEAVEN A N D M A N G O THEIR OWN WAYS W e have seen that of the three main responses to the metaphysical crisis only the Mencian doctrine of the goodness of h u m a n nature successfully re-unites Heaven and man. But even w i t h i n Confucianism this solution never became an orthodoxy until the Neo-Confucians of the S u n g dynasty ( A . D . 960-1279). D u r i n g the 3rd century B . C . we find a broad consensus that process outside man's control takes a course independent of his morality. Heaven, although never entirely detached from h u m a n analogies, is increasingly seen as merely the superior member of the pair heaven and earth. M a n is coming to think of himself, not so m u c h as under Heaven as between heaven and earth, even—a thought we have met already i n the 'Doctrine of the M e a n ' and w i l l meet again i n H s i i n - t z u — a s the indispensable third completing a cosmic triad. Lao-tzu, like Chuang-tzu, invites m a n to abandon his fixed principles and put himself i n accord w i t h the universal Way as the trend of his o w n spontaneity. O n the other h a n d the Confucian H s i i n - t z u sees Heaven as generating m a n w i t h anarchic desires w h i c h he has to learn to control, and putting resources at man's disposal without caring how he uses or misuses them. The Legalist H a n Fei also sees natural desires as anarchic, but as manipulable for the common good by a system of rewards and punishments w h i c h w i l l function as automatically as the beam and counterpoise of the balance. W i t h H s i i n - t z u a n d H a n Fei the modern Westerner finds himself i n a climate of thought w h i c h is wholly familiar. They have the sense of the real as objective and value-free, confronting m a n as there whether he likes it or not, and—here they differ from the Taoists—to be manipulated for his o w n independent ends. It is that splitting off of m a n from the cosmos i n w h i c h he formerly belonged, to w h i c h we of the West have for some centuries been painfully adjusting ourselves. Traditional China however never d i d get used to it. By the end of the century the philosophers are borrowing from the previously ignored proto-sciences a style of correlative system-building w h i c h promises to reintegrate h u m a n morality i n the universal order. There are no clear breaks between the periods into w h i c h we have chosen to divide Chinese intellectual history, and both the Canons and the Great M a n metaphysic very probably belong to the 3rd century B . C .

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However, i n the texts here chosen to typify the period, the debate over pien 'argumentation' w h i c h we have traced from H u i Shih to the Great M a n philosopher seems already to be past. We find neither the autonomous realm of reason emerging i n the Canons nor the poetic discourse i n open revolt against reason w h i c h erupts i n C h u a n g - t z u . O n the one hand Hsiin-tzu a n d H a n Fei write the coherently argued essays pioneered by the early Mohists, w i t h m u c h greater sophistication a n d attention to definitions; on the other, Lao-tzu presents itself as a full-scale philosophical poem, a genre (perhaps originating i n shamanistic hymns) of w h i c h we have so far encountered only the 'Inward Training'. But there is no sense of collision between logic and poetry, such as appears i n Chuang-tzu and the Later Mohists. The two are accepted as alternative modes of philosophical discourse, roughly corresponding to the realms of means and ends, although the purpose of some of the r h y m e d verse is no doubt merely mnemonic. A passage already quoted from the A u t u m n Floods' implies that you talk about the finite i n prose a n d the infinite i n verse. H s i i n - t z u not only has his collected poems inside his works, he bursts into rhymed verse at places i n philosophical essays such as the 'Discourse on Heaven'. H a n Fei, ruthlessly prosaic i n developing his theory of statecraft, has two chapters of comments o n the poem Lao-tzu and writes a couple more in the same style himself. Confucius, M o - t z u , and Mencius, not to speak of K u n g - s u n L u n g a n d the Later Mohists, had hardly used verse except i n illustrative quotations. Another feature of the 3rd century B . C . is a common recognition that times have changed: appeal to the sage kings has become little more than a convention. It is not that everyone w o u l d say w i t h Wu-ma-tzu talking to M o - t z u or the carpenter to D u k e H u a n that the men of old are now nothing but rotten bones. That is the Taoist and Legalist view, but there is another, that one must seek the principles w h i c h remain constant through changing times and unaffected by the unreliable evidence about the past. This is the position of the Later M o h i s t s and of H s i i n - t z u . We illustrate it here from the chapter 'Scrutinising the Present' i n the Lii Spring and Autumn. It starts w i t h the historical difficulties ("The standards of the ancient kings are documents passed d o w n through former generations; people have added to them, people have abridged them. . . . M a n y of the ancient namings are unintelligible i n the speech of today"), and continues: "The standards of the former kings all answered some need of the time. The time doesn't come d o w n to us w i t h the standard; and even if the standard does come d o w n to now, it can't be taken as standard. Dismiss, then, the formulated standards of the former kings, and take as standard the reasons w h y they made standards. What were those reasons? They 1

2

3

4

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were m e n , and myself likewise a m a m a n . Therefore if I scrutinise myself I may k n o w other m e n , if I scrutinise the present I may k n o w the past. It is simply that past and present are one, others and myself the same." Instead of following the standards or laws (fa) w h i c h the sage kings are dubiously recorded to have promulgated, you infer from the needs of m e n i n the present what the sages w o u l d have ordained for the present. "There was a m a n of C h ' u fording the Yangtse whose sword fell from the boat into the water. A t once he cut a notch i n the boat and announced 'This is where m y sword fell f r o m ' . The boat stopped, and from where he had made the notch they went into the water to seek it. The boat had travelled on but the sword had not; wasn't he deluded to seek the sword like that? Governing one's state w i t h the old standards is just the same. The time has shifted but the standard has not; how can you expect to govern w i t h these?" A s an illustration of the completed split between Heaven and m a n we may take this dialogue f r o m a minor syncretistic text probably mainly of the late 3rd century B.C., Ho-kuan-tzu. "P'ang-tzu asked H o - k u a n - t z u 'In the Way of the Sage what is to be put first?' 'Put m a n first.' 'In the Way of M a n what is to be put first?' 'Put arms first.' ' W h y put m a n first instead of Heaven?' 'Heaven is too lofty to be easily k n o w n , its blessings cannot be pleaded for nor its disasters escaped; to imitate Heaven w o u l d be cruelty. Earth is broad and big, deep a n d thick, it benefits much but awes little; to imitate Earth w o u l d be abasement. The seasons call up and cast down and take each other's places without uniformity; to imitate the seasons w o u l d be inconsistency. These three cannot institute reforms or implant customs, therefore the sage does not imitate t h e m . " (By arms, it later turns out, H o - k u a n - t z u means 'ceremony, the right, loyalty and trustworthiness'). 5

6

1. LAO-TZU'S TAOISM: THE ART OF RULING BY SPONTANEITY Old Tan and the book Lao-tzu In ancient C h i n a , if y o u w i s h e d to pass your work under a name more likely to attract attention than your o w n , the obvious choice was a great

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statesman of past centuries or a legendary sage emperor. There is however a subtler trick, very suitable to esoteric w i s d o m . It is the multiple twist of hiding your pseudonymous work openly under a pseudonym presumed to conceal the identity of someone w h o while remaining h u m b l y i n the shadows taught some famous m a n the secret of his success. Thus a book w h i c h lifts, i n a properly opaque style, a corner of the arts of the greatest diplomats of legend, Su C h ' i n (died 321 B . C . ) and C h a n g Y i (died 310 B . C . ) , is ascribed to someone k n o w n only as a recluse under w h o m they both studied and only under the name 'Master of the Valley of Ghosts' (Kuei-kutzu).* Another mysterious collection carries the title 'Master w i t h the Pheasant C a p ' (Ho-kuan-tzu), p s e u d o n y m of another recluse supposed to have taught P'ang H s u a n , the Chao general w h o defeated Yen i n 242 B . C Neither of these books succeeded i n attracting much attention, or indeed left external evidence of its existence i n the classical period, although both are likely to be from the 3rd or 2nd centuries B . C . t The great success i n this line is the Tao te ching 'Classic of the Way and of Potency', w h i c h w o n a fascinated audience from its appearance about 250 B . C under the name of the ' O l d Master' (Lao-tzu), understood to be that O l d Tan (Lao Tan) of whom only one story is told i n pre-Han sources, that he was visited for instruction by none other than Confucius himself. Apart from the Later Mohists, w h o w i t h the impersonality of their school effaced themselves i n the work, we k n o w something about the lives and personalities of most of the major Chinese thinkers, however thick the overlay of legend. The author of Lao-tzu is the great exception. However, his pseudonymity itself is informative i n its o w n way. To write under the name of the Yellow Emperor suggests nothing about y o u , not even megalomania. But one may suspect some measure of self-dramatisation i n pretending to be the eminence grise behind some famous diplomat, general or teacher. The enigmatic styles of these books, Lao-tzu, Kuei-ku-tzu, Hokuan-tzu, tempt one to imagine a disregarded unsuccessful man, w i t h drawn and timid, fantasising as a secret power i n history w h o disdained public notice. The author of Lao-tzu, one seems to divine, has learned i n perpetual fear that habit of evasive speech so fruitful to the discovery of twisted paths to truth through falsehood, w h i c h another breed of poet * This does not apply to the last of the three parts of Kuei-ku-tzu, which is commonly acknowledged to be later. For the date of Ho-kuan-tzu, cf. p. 296n below. f In 1973 two silk manuscripts of Lao-tzu were discovered in a Han tomb at Ma-wang-tui, one (with four Huang-Lao documents added) datable by taboo characters as from the reign of Hui Ti (194-188 B . C ) , the other earlier than 195 B.C. D. C. Lau (Lz tr. Lau Classics) provides both text and translation of both standard and Ma-wang-tui versions.

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learns through versifying flatteries of great men. If it pleases one to indulge this fancy, one may see h i m as the perfect instance of the neglected genius w h o by the writing of the book makes the fantasy come true. The story of Confucius consulting O l d Tan is common to Confucian, Taoist and eclectic sources. For Confucians it has the authority of the Classics themselves, being found i n the 'Questions of Tseng-tzu' i n the Record of Ceremony, w i t h O l d Tan as simply a teacher of rites w h o m Confucius consults about funerals. The very earliest reference to the meeting is a casual mention as common knowledge i n the Chuang-tzu 'Inner Chapters'. The 'Outer Chapters' have a whole cycle of dialogues i n which Confucius h u m b l y accepts from O l d Tan instruction i n Taoism, of Chuang-tzu's k i n d however rather than the book Lao-tzu's. The one point in common between Confucian and Taoist versions is that even i n the former O l d Tan as teacher addresses Confucius by his personal name C h ' i u . W h y w o u l d Confucians borrow this detail from the Taoists, w h o exploit it to humble Confucius? A possible answer is that it is the Taoists who are the borrowers, and that O l d Tan as Taoist originated as one of the various figures surrounding Confucius w h o m Chuang-tzu likes to use as spokesmen of his o w n thoughts. H i s unique advantage, that even Confucians acknowledge that he condescended to their o w n founder, would explain his rapidly g r o w i n g importance i n Taoist legend. A Confucian origin is also suggested by the o d d fact that even the 'Outer Chapters' represent h i m as a keeper of archives of C h o u , a dry-as-dust occupation surely more suitable to a Confucian than to a Taoist hero. W h y too w o u l d Taoists fail so long to provide O l d Tan w i t h a surname unless they were borrowing h i m f r o m elsewhere? H i s traditional surname and personal name (Li Erh) are not attested before Ssu-ma Ch'ien's biography.** 1

2

However all this may be, the most famous and frequently translated of Chinese books had been written and circulated i n Lao-tzu's name by about 250 B.C. Both H s i i n - t z u a n d the Lti Spring and Autumn mention h i m i n lists of philosophers and credit h i m w i t h the policy of w i n n i n g by yielding which distinguishes Lao-tzu from Chuang-tzu. Since the 'Inner Chapters' show no clear evidencett of acquaintance w i t h Lao-tzu the book is 3

** The argument that Old Tan was borrowed by Taoists from a Confucian story is developed at length in G Studies 111-124. ft As Robert Henricks has pointed out to me, there is a tantalising resemblance between a phrase in a discourse of Old Tan in Cz 7/15 and another found no less than four times in Lao-tzu (Lz 2,10, 51 and 77); both share the words pulfu shin ^

/ ^

'\4f 'does not depend on it'. But although suggestive, this is

far from being clear evidence of influence by Lao-tzu in the 'Inner Chapters'.

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conveniently treated after C h u a n g - t z u , although there is no positive proof that it is later. Chinese literature is often said to have no long poems, but this judgment depends o n conventions of classification. Lao-tzu is not classed as a shih , for w h i c h ' p o e m ' is the standard English equivalent, but for a Westerner it is without doubt a long philosophical poem or poem cycle, much of it r h y m e d . Its traditional division into two parts is at least as old as the two manuscripts of the 2nd century B . C . discovered at Ma-wang-tui,* w h i c h give them the titles 'The Potency' (#38-81) and 'The Way' (#1-37) and reverse the order. The 81 stanzas (9 times 9) of the standard text however were probably divided b y later editors for convenience of reading; the manuscripts mark only a few such divisions.t This poet is not, like Lucretius or Dante, the versifier of a philosophy borrowed f r o m elsewhere. H i s interweaving of metaphors, water, valley, root, gate, mother, w i t h Way itself as only another of them, is not the illustration of abstract thoughts, it is the thinking itself. Lao-tzu is the masterpiece of a k i n d of intelligence at the opposite pole from the logical. It concentrates instead of explicating, starkly juxtaposes instead of filling in gaps; a 'therefore' or 'this is w h y ' , almost arbitrarily placed, is no more than a signal that there is action at a distance between the aphorisms however disconnected. A t the root of the t h m k i n g , pervading this book of evasions a n d retreats disguised b y a p s e u d o n y m , is one dominant emotion, fear. In Lao-tzu we are breathing an air very different f r o m the perfect fearlessness of C h u a n g - t z u ("The test that one holds fast to the Beginning is the fact of not being a f r a i d " ) . t t t The pressing concern is w i t h h o w the small state and the small m a n survive i n a world of murderously competing powers. It is i n searching for a pattern i n things w h i c h opens a prospect of eluding danger that the author finds his o w n approach to the two great concepts for w h i c h each school has its o w n interpretation, the Way the sage walks a n d the Potency i n h i m which empowers h i m to walk it. L i k e C h u a n g - t z u he holds that we discover the Way by abandoning the prescribed courses of conduct w h i c h Confucians and others try to formulate i n words, unlearning the rigid divisions fixed by names, and training the spontaneous harmonising of the ch'i w h i c h 4

* Cf. Lau's account (ut sup. 155-184) of the Ma-wang-tui text, which isricherin grammatical particles than the standard text, and has solved various old problems arising from grammatical ambiguities, t Cf. Henricks 'On the Chapter Divisions'. ttt The sense of fear at the back of Lao-tzu is noticed by Lau, who is reminded of Hobbes's remark that his mother gave birth to twins, himself and fear (Lz tr. Lau Chinese Classics, xxvi).

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sets us o n the course of heaven, earth and the myriad things w h i c h are 'so of themselves'. This position sets both drinkers the problem of finding a language adequate to deal w i t h a fluid whole w i t h w h i c h we lose touch i n dividing ourselves from it by the distinguishing, n a m i n g , and immobilisation of parts. To cope w i t h it C h u a n g - t z u moves freely between many styles, Lao-tzu perfects just one.

The Way The style is perfectly illustrated b y the famous opening stanza dismissing all possibility of formulating the Way as a set of verbal instructions. In the first couplet we adapt English 'way' to Chinese tao, which has the same double use, nominal ('way') and verbal ('tell as the way') as the ming 'name' of the next couplet. (In translating Lao-tzu one cannot disturb the symmetrical placing of contrasting words without obscuring the movement of the thought). "The Way that can be 'Way'-ed Is not the constant Way. The name that can be named Is not the constant name. What has no name is the beginning of heaven and earth, What has a name is the mother of the myriad things. Therefore by constantly having no desire observe the sublimest in it, By constantly having desire observe where it tends. The two have the same source but different names: Call it the same, the 'Dark'. The darkest of the dark Is the gate of the sublime in everything.** It might seem that Lao-tzu h a d only to tell us straightforwardly that the Way is inexpressible i n words, is the source of all things, and is discovered i n ridding oneself of desire. That however is not quite what it wants to say. The trouble w i t h words is not that they do not fit at all but that they always fit imperfectly; they can help us towards the Way, but only if each formulation i n its inadequacy is balanced b y the opposite w h i c h diverges ** The text of the newly discovered Ma-wang-tui manuscripts by its additional particles forbids the alternative punctuation by which lines 5 to 8 may be read as about Nothing and Something (" 'Nothing' names the beginning of heaven and earth . . . . " ) . In line 8 it establishes chiao

a

« a verb, which I take

to be the one sometimes translated 'seek' but meaning rather 'take the direction (not necessarily intentionally) in which something is going to happen'. Cf. Lau ut sup. 169f.

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i n the other direction. "Correct saying is as though w r o n g way r o u n d " . C a n there be a name for that f r o m w h i c h n a m i n g divides things out? It was a point w h i c h h a d been debated by the sophists (if we have rightly interpreted K u n g - s u n Lung's 'Pomtings and Things'), and C h u a n g - t z u and his school refused to call the whole the 'Way' or the ' O n e ' . The approach of Lao-tzu is to lay out couplets w h i c h , juxtaposed as parallel, imply both that there is and that there is not a constant Way w i t h a constant name, a n d then try out the two alternatives i n turn. C a l l the Way nameless, a n d it is put back to the time before there were things distinguished by names; name it, and it becomes itself a thing out of w h i c h all others have g r o w n . The text proceeds to its first 'Therefore', marking as usual not an inference but the collision of abruptly juxtaposed statements w h i c h forces us to seek connexions where least expected. H o w does the Way being w i t h or without a name connect w i t h the sage being w i t h or without desires? A n answer is that d i v i d i n g out and n a m i n g both are guided b y a n d guide desire a n d dislike. There is a paradox i n desire as i n naming; to return to the u n d i v i d e d Way y o u have to cease desiring one thing more than another; yet Taoism loses all point unless w h e n distinctions cease y o u do f i n d yourself drawn i n the direction w h i c h is the Way. C h u a n g - t z u h a d distinguished shallow cravings f r o m the deeper impulse w h i c h is f r o m H e a v e n . Lao-tzu's method is simply to smash the dichotomy of desire a n d desirelessness b y contradictory commands both constantly to be without desire and constantly to desire. A r r i v i n g at the last pair of couplets, what are "the two"? "Named/nameless", or "desire/ desirelessness", or "the sublimest i n it/where it tends"? A n y or all, but the dichotomy on w h i c h the whole stanza focuses is "named/nameless". H a v i n g tried out both sides of the dichotomy the text n o w throws it aside; to name as 'nameless' is itself to divide named and nameless i n what is ultimately the same. "Call them the same, the ' D a r k ' " , use a new name to propel y o u towards the darkness beyond n a m i n g , a n d momentarily discard the name 'Way itself for the 'gate' out of w h i c h things come i n the mystery of the commencement of distinctions. We offer this analysis w i t h the same k i n d of reservations as one w o u l d for any other p o e m . The aphorisms of Lao-tzu hit the reader as successive blows f r o m opposite sides w h i c h seem somehow to be driving the m i n d i n one direction, leaving it to h i m to choose whether he needs more prosaic words to explain to himself where he is going. The text itself never departs from that language i n w h i c h the sayer can himself say "The knower does not say, the sayer does not k n o w " . O n the one hand we have to cut up, name, set the limits w i t h i n w h i c h each person "knows where to stop" (but 5

6

7

7

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remembering that "the greatest cutting-up does not sever"); o n the other we have to recognise what seems the diminishing remainder still to be divided as the inexhaustible block out of w h i c h they are cut, the ' U n h e w n ' (p'u $L ). F r o m this point of view the Way as the still-undivided stuff is the nameless. O r again, to change the metaphor, it is like the apparently negligible depression of the ground w h i c h is setting the direction of the river towards the sea. 8

"The Way is constantly nameless. Though the Unhewn is small No one in the world is able to make it his vassal. If lords and kings are able to hold it fast The myriad things will pay homage of themselves. Heaven and earth will join to send down the sweet dew, The people with no one commanding them of themselves will even out. Only when it is cut up are there names. When also there are names No matter who will know where to stop. By knowing where to stop one can escape danger. One may compare the position of the Way in the world to the relation of a small valley to the river and the sea." (#32) 9

F r o m another point of view, it is convenient to think of the Way as itself a thing w h i c h has a name. 'As for the thing the Way is It is vague and dim. Dim! Vague! Within it is a model. Vague! Dim! Within it is a thing. . . . From the present to the past Its name does not depart" (#21) You can get nearer and nearer to discerning it first as an image or model (hsiang ||L ), then as taking shape as a thing, yet it is itself the indefinite out of w h i c h the thing defines itself. The thing at all times has its name, not however as continuing to have it from past to present, but from the viewpoint of the namer looking back into the past. Lao-tzu frequently calls the u n d i v i d e d the One, although generally i n relation to the m a n or thing w h i c h "embraces the O n e " or "grasps the One". A s a name however the O n e is no more adequate than any other. A s soon as y o u try to conceive the Way you conceive the One, but as soon as

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you conceive the One y o u conceive the many. Unlike C h u a n g - t z u , Lao-tzu does not raise this as a logical point. U s i n g the language i n w h i c h the Way is itself a thing w i t h a name a n d "mother of the m y r i a d things", it converts a logical into a generative sequence. "The Way generates the One, the One two, the two three, the three the myriad things." (#42) In seeking the O n e behind the many, as also i n seeking the constant behind the changing, Lao-tzu is u s i n g concepts w h i c h seem fully identifiable w i t h our o w n . There is however an important difference from the Western tradition, that no Chinese thinker conceives the One and the constant as Being or Reality behind the veil of appearance. This is inherent in the Classical Chinese language, i n w h i c h the existential verbs yu 'there is' a n d wu 'there is not' (nominalisable as 'what there is, something' and 'what there is not, nothing') are used only of concrete things, as are shih ~% 'real' and hsii Jj[ 'unreal' (primarily 'solid, full' and 'tenuous, empty'; the w o r d we have translated 'objects' i n contrast with ming %j 'names' is nominalised shih 'solids'). The further one moves from treating the Way as a thing w i t h a name like a n ox or a horse, the less unsuitable it becomes to identify it w i t h N o t h i n g , although it precedes the division of Something and N o t h i n g . We may note also that Chinese, like most languages outside the Indo-European family, does not share one of the philosophically most important a n d questionable features of this family, that the existential verb 'to be' is used also for the copulative relation, so that for Western philosophy a thing has a being w h i c h embraces both its existence a n d its essence, what it is per se* For Lao-tzu as much as for the Later Mohists you k n o w not the essence of a thing but what name fits it; hence the enormous importance of naming and renaming throughout the poem. From this point of v i e w we may understand why, i n spite of full recognition of its inadequacy, the preferred Chinese name for the undivided should be the Way. If we ourselves w o u l d prefer to think of it as absolute Reality that is because our philosophy i n general has been a search for being, reality, truth, while for the Chinese the question was always 'Where is the Way?' Chinese thinkers want to k n o w how to live, how to organise community and, at the very end of the pre-Han period, how to relate community to cosmos. A s for what is real, what exists, visible to the eye, audible to the ear, solid to the touch, what questions * For the problem of the relation between the Indo-European verb 'to be' and Western ontology ci. G Studies 322-359 and pp. 406-13 below.

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does it raise? F r o m the Western viewpoint, pre-Buddhist Chinese philosophy is epistemologically naive. For the Chinese however the purpose of seeking the one behind the many is to find, not something more real than what appears to the senses, but a constant Way behind the changing and conflicting ways of life and government claimed by competing schools as the Way of the sage kings. What matters about the dissolution of boundaries w h e n the fixity of n a m i n g loses its hold on us is that, i n no longer splitting off deciding self from spontaneously changing other, we find ourselves m o v i n g on the same course as heaven and earth through their natural cycles. If n a m i n g this course 'Way' merely distinguishes one aspect of the u n d i v i d e d , so does every other name for it; and if we may equally well call it the U n h e w n , the block out of which things are cut, or their mother or their root, the valley w h i c h is the lowest and emptiest i n them or the gate through w h i c h they come, by all means let us use the other metaphors as correctives. But what matters for the conduct of life is the direction i n w h i c h it sets one moving.

Reversal The most characteristic gesture of Lao-tzu to overturn accepted descriptions is the reversal of priorities i n chains of oppositions. A Something Doing something Knowledge Male Full Above Before Moving Big Strong Hard Straight

B Nothing Doing nothing Ignorance Female Empty Below Behind Still Small Weak Soft Bent

In instructing the weak i n the strategy of survival, Lao-tzu regularly advises h i m to prefer B to A , passive to active—in the terminology soon to become standard (but used only once i n this text), Y i n to Yang. This inversion is hardly found i n Chuang-tzu but astonished and impressed readers of Lao-tzu f r o m the beginning. In contrasting different philosophies Hsfin-tzu says: "Lao-tzu h a d some insight into drawing i n , none into stretching out" (Another of his lists has "Chuang-tzu saw no farther 10

11

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than Heaven and did not k n o w man"). A list of doctrines i n the Lu Spring and Autumn has " O l d Tan valued weakness (= y i e l d i n g ) " . For the modern reader too the most distinctive impression made by this philosophical poem is likely to be of a pattern r u n n i n g through everything w h i c h is the reverse of the one with w h i c h he is familiar. It exposes a cycle by w h i c h whatever becomes strong, h a r d , above, before, and something, has been and i n due course w i l l revert to being weak, soft, below, behind and nothing. The passive member is the foundation on w h i c h the active rises ("Therefore the noble has the mean as trunk, the high has the low as base", "The heavy is root of the light, the still is lord of the restless"). It is the passive w h i c h is vital, fluid, fecund ("When alive m a n is soft and weak, w h e n dead he is hard and strong"; "In the world's intercourse the female constantly by stillness conquers the male. It is because she is still that it is proper for her to be below."). In action the passivity of the sage is female; i n contemplation the suspension of the thinking by w h i c h the heart controls the breath and other energising fluids of the ch'i, allowing them to harmonise by themselves and set the direction of spontaneous motion, is rather a return f r o m adulthood to the state of the newborn babe. (As i n Chuang-tzu the training of the ch'i may be presumed to be a breathing exercise). 12

13

14

15

"In concentrating the ch'i to utmost softness, Are you able to be a babe? . . . . When the gates of Heaven open and shut, Are you able to play the female?" (#10) "Who contains abundance of Potency may be compared to a baby. Poisonous insects will not bite it, Savage beasts will not pounce on it, Birds of prey will not snatch it. Its bones are weak and muscles soft but its grip is firm. Not yet knowing the union of male and female its penis rises —the utmost in vitality. To day's end howling it does not get hoarse —the utmost in harmonising. Knowing how to harmonise is to be 'constant'. Knowing how to be constant is 'illumination'. The added on to living is the 'baleful'. The heart imposing service on the ch'i is 'forcing'. A thing which as soon as grown ages Call 'off the Way'. What is off the Way has too early an end." (#55)

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The virtues of different passive combinations are explored through interrelated metaphors among w h i c h , for example, the valley (empty, below) suggests the generative i n the female (who is soft, weak, below) and connects as channel w i t h water, w h i c h as likewise soft, weak and below has advantages of its o w n : "The highest good is like water. Water is good at benefiting the myriad things but does not compete, it settles i n the place w h i c h the multitude dislikes and so is near to the Way." (#8) " N o t h i n g i n the world is softer and weaker than water, but as assailer of the hard and strong nothing can conquer it, because there is nothing with w h i c h to replace it. That the weak conquers the strong and the soft the hard everyone i n the w o r l d knows yet no one is able to act o n . " (#78) Precisely because it is soft, water moves more freely than stone, and above it; and i n finding its way through the smallest crack it is surpassed only by N o t h i n g , w h i c h does not need even a crack to fill the place vacated by Something. "The softest i n the w o r l d gallops over the hardest i n the world, Nothing finds a way i n where there is no crack. This is how I k n o w that D o i n g N o t h i n g has advantages. To the teaching w h i c h is unspoken, the advantages of D o i n g N o t h i n g , the world seldom attains." (#43) The most startling of the reversals is the elevation of N o t h i n g above Something. "Thirty spokes share one hub; just where it is nothing is the usefulness of the cart. You knead clay to make a vessel; just where it is nothing is the usefulness of the vessel. You bore doors and windows to make a room; just where it is nothing is the usefulness of the room. Therefore it is where they are something that we find them beneficial, it is where they are nothing that we f i n d them useful." (#11) The spontaneous course of things, w h i c h we defy i n struggling to be powerful and superior, is from u p to d o w n , from strong to weak, and then upwards again after renewal by this return to the source. "Returning is the motion of the Way, Weakness is the usefulness of the Way. The myriad things of the world are born from something, And something is born from nothing." (#40) "Refine to the emptiest, Hold fast to the stillest. As the myriad things arise side by side, By that I watch them revert. Of all things in their teeming growth

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Each by reversion goes home to its root. Going home to the root is 'stilling', Call it 'reversion to the destined'. Reversion to the destined is the 'constant', Knowing how to be constant is 'illumination'." (#16) Reversion is to the source of all fecundity, the dark, the valley and the female, the gate and root of all things. "The daimon of the valley never dies. Call it the 'dark female'. The gate of the dark female Call the 'root of heaven and earth'. Elusive, as though present. However much you use, it will not wear out." (#6) 'Way' is no more than one of the names one tries out for what, w h e n treating it as a nameable thing, one conceives as the mother of the myriad things w h i c h is also the root to w h i c h they revert. "There is a thing formed in confusion, Born before heaven and earth. Silent! Void! It stands alone without changing, Travels round without tiring. It may be deemed the mother of the world. I do not know its name, style it 'Way', Force a name on it, 'Great'. Great is 'gone on and on', Gone on and on is 'far', Far is 'returned'." (#25) A n alternative to saying that the name 'Way' is inadequate is to accept it but proceed to identify something still further back, the first of what if continued w o u l d be an infinite series. The same stanza ends by picking the 'so of itself (tzu jan || ), pure spontaneity. "For standard m a n has earth, earth has Heaven, Heaven has the Way, the Way has the so of itself." The poet conceives his o w n language as adequate to the extent that i n its constant passage from one re-naming to the next it goes on springing, like the action w h i c h is " D o i n g N o t h i n g " , from this ultimate ancestor. " M y speech is very easy to understand, very easy to practice, but no one i n the world is able to understand and practice it. Speech has an ancestor, doing has a lord. (#70)

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The reversals i n Lao-tzu have a modern parallel i n Jacques Derrida's project of deconstructing the chains of oppositions underlying the logocentric tradition of the West. The parallel is indeed so striking that there is danger of missing the differences. In contrasting A with B the West tends to see them as conflicting, C h i n a as complementary, a difference w h i c h forces itself o n attention i n the Y i n - Y a n g classifications. Derrida explains the Western aspiration to abolish B i n favour of A by a logocentric, ultimately phonocentric orientation w h i c h starts its chains of oppositions from the pair 'signified/signifier'. In silent speech, w i t h vocal articulation suspended for apparently wordless thought, the signifier seems dissolved in the full presence of the signified. That w h e n written the signifier does not as i n speech blow away i n the w i n d leaving only its meaning behind has been treated as irrelevant, since writing appears external to language, a mere representation of speech. Starting from the abolition of the signifier from thought a n d of w r i t i n g f r o m language, the West has aspired throughout a wide range of oppositions (reality/appearance, nature/ culture, life/death, good/evil. . . .) to dissolve B i n the pure being, the full presence of A . O n e of Derrida's methods of deconstructing the oppositions is to reverse them, for example elevating writing above speech— writing is not a representation of speech, speech is writing w h i c h lasts only long enough to be read b y the ear; language is not living speech i n contrast w i t h dead marks o n paper, it is what has meaning even if speaker or writer is dead. The affinity of Lao-tzu a n d Derrida is that both use reversal to deconstruct chains i n w h i c h A is traditionally preferred to B, and i n breaking d o w n the dichotomy offer us a glimpse of another line w h i c h runs athwart it—for Lao-tzu the Way, for Derrida the Trace. Both use a language w h i c h already escapes the opposition 'logic/poetry', a language i n w h i c h contradictory statements do not cancel out, because if made i n the appropriate sequence or combination they set you i n the true direction. The Chinese tradition however is not logocentric i n Derrida's sense, centred on living speech and the full presence of the signified. Reversals i n Lao-tzu are merely of relative superiority, they are not experiments i n abolishing A i n revenge against the traditional effort to abolish B. The Chinese opposition ming/shih 'name/object' is very unlike the Saussurian 'signifier/signified' w h i c h Derrida takes to be implicit i n Western thought from the beginning. A name is used to 'point out' (chih) an object, and if appropriate to it 'fits' (tang).* Nominalised chih is sometimes conveniently 16

* For chih and tang cf. p. 91,168 above.

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translated by 'meaning'.t But Classical Chinese nominalises the verb by syntactic position alone, without the morphological changes such as number termination w h i c h i n Indo-European languages encourage hypostatisation by assimilation to nouns. There is consequently no tendency (as I at one time supposed myself) for the chih of names to turn, like 'meanings' or the 'signified', into third entities on the same level as the objects and the sounds of the names. In the hypostatising terminology of Saussurian linguistics signifier a n d signified are two entities combined i n the sign, specifically compared to the two sides of a sheet of paper; signifying has somehow disappeared, and for Derrida the object too has dissolved into the signified ("There is nothing outside the text"). For a Chinese thinker o n the other h a n d there w o u l d be nothing, except the present or absent oxen to w h i c h his use of 'ox' points, w h i c h could be credited w i t h existence or reality i n detachment from the phonic exterior of the sign. A further consideration, that the Chinese w o u l d i n any case be saved from phonocentrism b y the habit of recognising words as written rather than as spoken, may be significant i n the long r u n but seems less relevant to the classical age. Most teaching and debate was oral, doctrine was what someone 'said' and T have heard . . . . ' , and the issue of names and objects was always discussed i n terms of the spoken, not the written. A great difference from Derrida is that Lao-tzu does not of course share the background of his very Western conclusion that philosophy losing hope of discovering reality as the full presence of A has to be satisfied w i t h the trace of it, w h i c h on inspection turns out to be only the trace of a trace of a Perhaps Lao-tzu's Way is how the Trace w i l l look to us w h e n we are no longer haunted b y the ghost of that transcendent Reality the death of w h i c h Derrida proclaims. For Lao-tzu as for Derrida reversal is not a switch from preferring A to preferring B, aiming to become weak, soft, below instead of strong, hard, and above. Since all h u m a n effort is against a downward pull towards B, that direction is a first approximation to the Way of spontaneous process, to be adjusted next to the u p w a r d impulse after renewal from the fecund bottom of B. The reversal smashes the dichotomy of A a n d B; i n preferring 17

18

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t In G Logic, 457-468, my first attempt to translate 'Pointings and Things' on my whole/part interpretation, I did translate chih by 'meaning'. The translation starts: "When no thing is not the meaning the meaning is not the meaning. When there is no meaning one thing rather than another within the world, no one can call a thing not his meaning... . " (cf. p. 92 above: "When no thing is not the pointedout, to point out is not to point it out. Without pointing out of things from world, there is nothing by which to call things not the pointed-out."

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to be submissive the sage does not cease to be oriented towards strength, for he recognises that surviving by yielding to a rising power is the road to victory over it w h e n its climax is past. Thus since everything w h i c h goes up w i l l come d o w n , you may help to strengthen an enemy i n order to hasten the moment of his decline. "If you wish to shrink it, Be sure to stretch it. If you wish to weaken it, Be sure to strengthen it. If you wish it cast aside, Be sure to raise it up. If you wish to take from it, Be sure to give to it. This call the 'subtlest illumination'. The soft and weak conquers the hard and strong." (#36) A t the earliest stage of a rising force you can still stop it, afterwards it is too late. "When stable it is easily upheld, When not yet portending it is easily planned for. When brittle it is easily broken, When flimsy it is easily dispersed. Do to it before it is something, Order it before it is disordered. A tree the span of both arms round is born from the tip of a hair, A terrace nine storeys high rises from a pile of earth, A journey of a thousand miles starts from under the foot." (#64) A g a i n , it is by refraining f r o m rising too h i g h that one escapes the fall. "Rather than hold it steady to fill it to the brim Better stop pouring. What you hammer to a fine point You cannot keep sharp for long. When gold and jewels fill the hall No one can protect it. To be haughty when rich and noble Brings disaster on oneself. That one's task fulfilled one's person withdraws is the Way of Heaven." (#9)

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The image of the vessel w h i c h tips over w h e n filled to the b r i m is that of Chuang-tzu's 'spillover s a y i n g ' . The difference i n application is significant; C h u a n g - t z u lets it tip over i n the faith that it w i l l right itself, Lao-tzu takes no risks. If it is b y yielding that the weak becomes stronger, might one say that the sage is simply u s i n g submission as a means to conquer, so that at bottom he still draws the dichotomy and prefers A to B? N o , for that w o u l d imply analysis and calculation of means to e n d . The sage, perfectly murriinated about his situation, gravitates towards his survival w i t h the spontaneity of natural process; he simply settles i n a direction towards both the preceding submission and later conquest. "Heaven persists, earth endures. The reason why heaven and earth are able to persist and endure is that they do not generate themselves, that is why they are able to be persistently generated. Therefore the sage Puts his own person behind yet his person is ahead, Puts his own person outside yet his person survives. Is it not because he is without selfishness that he is able to be successfully selfish?" (#7). 20

The 'therefore' once again forces us to peer after apparently invisible connexions. Heaven a n d earth last for ever because, unlike m a n , they do not try to prolong their existence; if m a n follows their example by not caring about his existence, treating his o w n person as he does the things outside h i m , he finds himself o n the course most favourable to his o w n survival. But is there not a rather obvious flaw i n the analogy, that if heaven and earth w i l l last as l o n g as there is anything, it is because b y definition they are everything? But then again—it is to such immediate clashes w i t h common sense that these aphorisms owe so m u c h of their pregnancy—if the sage i n his perfect unselfishness is no longer distinguishing himself from heaven a n d earth is he not i n some sense participating i n their immortality, as he is for Chuang-tzu? The effect of the reversal might also be described, not as the choice of B instead of A , but as a balancing of A a n d B. H u m a n codes of conduct prefer A , Heaven's Way is to equalise A a n d B. "The Way of Heaven, is it not like stretching a bow? The high it presses down, The low it lifts up. Excess it reduces, Deficiency it augments.

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The Way of Heaven reduces the excessive and augments the deficient. Man's way is otherwise. It reduces the insufficient to make presents to the excessive. Who is able, being in excess, to have wherewith to take and present to Heaven?.* Is it only one who possesses Heaven?" (#77) Here the split between Heaven and M a n is fully i n the open. A t first sight one might take Lao-tzu to say that m a n is unjust but Heaven just. But the point is rather that m a n always strives to enlarge A at the expense of B, fighting the natural course of things w h i c h reverts to B and so balances A and B. The sage has learned to accord w i t h a Way independent of the w i l l of m a n , b y m a k i n g presents to Heaven out of his o w n excess. Elsewhere we are told that the natural course of things is un-jen, cruel, ruthless, treating everything w h i c h rises a n d passes away as like the straw dogs honoured before being used for sacrifice and afterwards thrown away and trampled. "Heaven and earth are ruthless, They treat the myriad things as straw dogs. The sage is ruthless He treats the people as straw dogs. Between heaven and earth is it not as with a bellows? Emptied it does not collapse, Moving it emits more and more. Too many words soon run out. Better hold fast to what is within. (#5) We do f i n d one passage w h i c h i n affirming seems also to deny the amorality of Heaven. "To the Way of Heaven none is more kin than another, It is constantly on the side of the good man." (#79) But good/bad do not belong to the chains of oppositions w h i c h Lao-tzu deconstructs; without any qualification it is better to follow the Way than not. The good m a n is the one w h o b y adapting himself to the Way has learned both to survive a n d (a theme however of C h u a n g - t z u rather than Lao-tzu) reconcile himself to misfortune a n d death; it is because alone among men he is o n the side of the Way that the Way works i n his favour.

* Reading

for

"~p" with Ma-wang-tui text.

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Doing nothing The paradox that the way to attain a goal is to cease to aim at it deliberately is most explicit i n the constant appeals to 'do nothing' (wu wei). This term, w h i c h goes back to C o n f u c i u s , is often translated by such innocuous phrases as 'non-action' to avoid giving the impression that Taoists recommend idleness, but it seems better to keep the paradoxical force of the Chinese expression. Wei is ordinary h u m a n action, deliberated for a purpose, i n contrast w i t h the spontaneous processes of nature which are 'so of themselves'. M a n takes pride i n distinguishing himself from nature by his purposive action; Lao-tzu by a classic reversal describes the behaviour of the sage as D o i n g N o t h i n g . * 21

"The Way constantly does nothing yet there is nothing it does not do. If lords and kings are able to hold fast to it The myriad things of themselves will be transformed." (#37) There are other contexts however i n w h i c h it w i l l be described not as 'doing nothing' but as ' d o i n g b u t . . . . ' : "To generate but without taking possession, To do but without presuming on it, To lead but without managing, This caU the 'Dark Potency'." (#10 = #51) The essential thing is not to interfere w h e n things are already r u n n i n g well by themselves. "The more taboos in the world The poorer the people: The more the sharp tools among the people The stupider the state. The more men's arts and skills, The more oddities arise: The more laws and edicts are proclaimed The more thieves and bandits there will be. * Some commentators and translators seek other meanings than 'do' for wei when ljw-tiu uses the word approvingly (Lz 2, 10, 51, 81), to reconcile the usage with the doctrine of 'doing nothing', (cf. Lau, who translates 'benefit'). But to call the sage's behaviour at one moment 'doing nothing' and at another 'doing but.. . . ' seems to me a characteristic Taoist reminder that no word you use will ever fit perfectly.

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Hence the sage says 'If I do nothing, of themselves the people are transformed. If I love stillness, of themselves the people are correct. If I meddle in nothing, of themselves the people are rich. If I desire nothing, of themselves the people are unhewn.'" (#57) This is not quite a faith that all things w i l l go right if left alone; Taoists do not share the M e n c i a n position on the purely Confucian issue of the goodness of h u m a n nature. The assumption as i n C h u a n g - t z u is that spontaneity comes out right to the extent that people are aware of their circumstances and of each other. Consultation of our quasi-syllogism will confirm that its imperative could be applied i n opposite w a y s — become a sage aware of all possible factors, or simplify your situation to bring it w i t h i n the limits of your knowledge. The second is the one inevitably preferred for the people by this instinctively cautious thinker who, as H s i i n - t z u said, understands only how to draw i n , not to stretch out. The passage just quoted itself illustrates a suspicion of the spread of new skills, and a passage we have connected w i t h the Shen-nung i d e a l has the people of U t o p i a living i n sight of each other's villages without ever wanting to leave their o w n . The people are best ordered w h e n interfered w i t h least, but only if there are no thoughts i n their hearts of a better life elsewhere, no advertisements between the television programmes to tempt them w i t h the promise of 'goods difficult to obtain'. "Not elevating worth will stop the people competing, not valuing goods difficult to obtain will stop them becoming robbers, not displaying the desirable will stop their hearts being disorderly. This is why the sage's ordering Empties their hearts, Fills their bellies: Weakens their intents, Strengthens their bones, And constantly ensures that the people know nothing and desire nothing. 22

23

24

Ensure that the knowing never dare to do. If you do the doing of nothing everything will be in order." (#3) The ideal state i n w h i c h everything runs itself requires the placing of the ignorant masses i n the simple circumstances i n w h i c h they will react and interact i n sufficient awareness, w i t h all complexities left to the enlightened heart of the sage. T h e n he has nothing to do but maintain the concord by m i n i m a l interference to maximum effect, discerning the

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incipient danger before it develops a n d " d o i n g to it before it is something." 25

The mystical and the practical It is by n o w time to ask a question w h i c h some may think would have been better answered at the beginning: what is the book about? Mystical philosophy? Derridan deconstructionism? The art of government? Even the art of war, as was w i d e l y held i n C h i n a at the time of the Cultural Revolution? O r the little man's strategy of survival, w h i c h Brecht read into the book? Certainly the audience to w h i c h Lao-tzu (unlike Chuang-tzu) is directly addressed is the ruler of a state—a small state, one might guess, w h i c h has to bend w i t h the w i n d to survive among stronger states. Its strategy of retreating before a rising power until it overstretches itself and passes the point of decline has very practical applications i n government, military strategy and wrestling—Japanese Judo ('the Way of Weakness') is named straight from the terminology of Lao-tzu. But what of the vision of oneness it shares w i t h Chuang-tzu? C a n it really be advising rulers that to govern their states requires nothing less than the ultimate mystical illumination? The question 'What is it about?' is however not necessarily any more relevant to Lao-tzu than to other poetry. That it is hard to p i n d o w n the theme of a poem we take as a sign of richness: Lao-tzu as philosophical poem has a structure w h i c h helps to illuminate patterns r u n n i n g through many branches of life, but as a text standing by itself has as much to do with one as w i t h another. W h e n for example Frank L l o y d Wright drew from "Just where it is nothing is the usefulness of the r o o m " the lesson that in architecture the spaces matter as m u c h as the m a s o n r y it w o u l d be hardly to the point to accuse h i m of misreading; the metaphor is apt just because the pattern it exposes shows up especially clearly i n the construction of a house. Lao-tzu is a rare case of a poem w h i c h for readers i n tune w i t h it seems to work even through the feeblest translations, and no one w h o has glimpsed a coherence i n its imagery has altogether failed to understand it. ( " M y speech is very easy to understand, very easy to p r a c t i c e . . . . "). Nor need it surprise us that the pattern should r u n through the strategies of performers as unlike as the mystic, the ruler and the wrestler. The Western classification of certain experiences long absent f r o m or marginal to our tradition as 'mystical' is closely connected with our u n Chinese habit of p u z z l i n g about ultimate reality. We still tend to evaluate the mystical by whether or not we think it provides an additional and superior access to reality independent of sense perception and reason, 26

and treat as incidental any improvements i n mental and physical health said to result f r o m the practice of meditation. 'Mystical' can be a misleading w o r d w h e n applied to experience conceptualised i n terms not of reality but of the Way. The Taoist relaxes the body, calms the m i n d , loosens the grip of categories made habitual by naming, frees the current of thought for more fluid differentiations and assimilations, and instead of pondering choices lets his problems solve themselves as inclination spontaneously finds its o w n direction, w h i c h is the Way. He does not have to make decisions based on standards of good and bad because, granted only that enlightenment is better than ignorance, it is self-evident that among spontaneous inclinations the one prevailing i n greatest clarity of m i n d , other things being equal, w i l l be the best, the one i n accord w i t h the Way. Self-cultivation of this k i n d has been rooting itself i n the West also over the last century or so, and has made increasingly familiar a stretch of previously neglected experience w h i c h has both a deep and a shallow end. A t the deep end the theoretical limit w o u l d be the step from the fluidity to the disappearance of distinctions, i n the absolute illumination w h i c h may still deserve to be called 'mystical'. A t the shallow end, the self-cultivation may serve as a means to relaxation, poise, loosening of habit, creativity, quickening of responsiveness, for the Chinese wrestler or Californian businessman u s i n g meditative techniques to enhance his efficiency. The author of Lao-tzu certainly sounds familiar w i t h the deep end, but the book has had many readers w h o , far from sharing the Taoist renunciation of fixed goals, sought i n it only a mental discipline i n the service of their ends. Even the Confucian appraisal of the philosophical schools i n the bibliographical chapter of the H a n History recommends as the strength of the Taoists that they teach, as "the lore of the ruler facing south", how to "hold fast to oneself by clarity and emptiness". A training of the m i n d i n clarity and 'emptiness' (flexibility, openness) is recognised as an aid to the application of Confucian virtues i n government, misused however by Taoists w h o w i s h to "discard both the benevolent and the right, and say 'By trusting solely to clarity and emptiness one can r u l e ' . " 27

2. HSUN-TZU'S CONFUCIANISM: MORALITY As MAN'S INVENTION TO CONTROL HIS NATURE Recognition that spontaneous process takes a course independent of man's morality had become so much the dominant trend i n the 3rd century B . C . that it is shared by the greatest Confucian of the time, H s i i n C h ' i n g (Hsun-tzu). N o t that it dominated Confucianism even at this

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period, for the school had split into competing sects, and the eight listed by his o w n one-time disciple the Legalist H a n Fei include both the sect of Mencius and that of Tzu-ssu from w h i c h it had branched. H s u n - t z u himself denounces the 'worthless Ju' or 'vulgar Ju' of other sects as vigorously as the rival schools. H e is familiar with a wide range of the latter, including two thinkers later to be classed as Legalist, Shen Tao and Shen Pu-hai. A l t h o u g h a fierce defender of Confucian orthodoxy, his attitude to them is already that of the Chuang-tzu 'Below i n the Empire' chapter and of the H a n bibliography, criticising not as wholly w r o n g but as one-sided, lacking the comprehensive vision attained only by Confucius and an otherwise u n k n o w n T z u - k u n g , * the founder presumably of his o w n sect. " M o - t z u seeing no farther than utility d i d not understand culture, Sung H s i n g seeing no farther than desire d i d not understand fulfilment, Shen Tao seeing no farther than law d i d not appreciate personal worth, Shen Pu-hai seeing no farther than the power-base d i d not appreciate wisdom, H u i Shih seeing no farther than wordings was ignorant of objects, C h u a n g - t z u seeing no farther than what is Heaven's was ignorant of what is man's." (Hs 21/21f, tr. W125) This k i n d of pointed s u m m i n g - u p is characteristic of H s u n - t z u ; the names w h i c h recur are M o - t z u , Sung H s i n g , H u i Shih and Shen Tao. The longest list is i n the chapter 'Against the Twelve Masters', w h i c h actually includes the Confucians Tzu-ssu and Mencius among the twelve, and for good measure concludes w i t h a denunciation of the 'worthless Ju' of the sects of Tzu-chang, Tzu-hsia and T z u - y u , all of them first-generation disciples of Confucius. One has the impression that H s u n - t z u is one of those whose thought thrives on controversy and w h o , without ever acknowledging it, are continually learning from those they criticise. That his conception of the Correction of Names is completely refurbished from the sophists or the Later Mohists is plain enough, and he uses without hesitation such M o h i s t terms as 'elevation of worth and employment of ability', 'concern for everyone' a n d 'thrift i n utilisation'. Elevation of worth is indeed one of his firmest principles; unlike Mencius, he has come fully to terms w i t h the new bureaucratised states i n w h i c h promotion from below is no longer merely an exception to the hereditary principle admitted i n cases of extraordinary merit. "Even the sons and grandsons of kings, dukes, and h i g h officers, if they are incapable of adhering to the ceremonial and the right, reduce to 1

* The disciple Tzu-kung of the Analects has a different name which happens to be similarly romanised.

commoners. Even the sons and grandsons of commoners, if they accumulate culture and learning, correct their personal conduct and are capable of adhering to the ceremonial and the right, promote to chief minister or h i g h officer" (Hs 9/2f, tr. W 33) Sung Hsing's doctrine that the desires of man's ch'ing, the essential to being h u m a n , are few i n number, w o u l d be the starting-point of his o w n thinking about the reconciliation and satisfaction of desires i n organised society. A l t h o u g h he insists that society is held together primarily by custom, ceremony, he fully recognises the importance of law and punishment, the preoccupations of Shen Tao, and seems at times on the verge of the Legalism to w h i c h his disciples L i Ssu and H a n Fei were soon converted. That throughout the classical period rationality is the fruit of controversy is a generalisation of w h i c h there is no clearer instance than H s i i n - t z u . He uses more than one mode of discourse, including verse, but no other p r e - H a n thinker has organised the full range of his basic ideas i n such coherently reasoned essays. Ssu-ma C h ' i e n gives a brief sketch of Hsiin-tzu's life immediately after dealing w i t h the thinkers w h o m K i n g H s i i a n of C h ' i attracted to his C h i hsia Academy. After the death of the last of them, i n the time of K i n g Hsiang (283-265 B . C . ) , H s i i n - t z u from Chao was the most eminent of the teachers i n C h ' i , and three times performed the wine sacrifice as head of the Academy. It w o u l d be here that he sharpened his case for Confucianism by debate w i t h the spokesmen of rival schools. However, somebody slandered h i m , and i n 255 B . C . , having moved to C h ' u , he was appointed magistrate i n Lan-ling i n the south of the Shan-tung peninsula by the chief minister, the L o r d of C h ' u n - s h e n . After the murder of the L o r d of C h ' u n shen i n 238 B . C . he was dismissed. " H s i i n - t z u detested the policies of a corrupt age, w i t h misruling princes of doomed states coming one after another, w h o instead of p u r s u i n g the Great Way busied themselves w i t h shamans and trusted i n omens, while vulgar scholars and petty minds like Chuang-tzu frivolously threw custom into confusion", so he settled down i n Lan-ling to edit his works. H s i i n - t z u seems to have lived to a great age, and there is conflicting evidence about his life before and after this p e r i o d . But we learn from his own book that he visited C h ' i n , and was impressed by the growing power of that state on the north-west borders of Chinese civilizaton, w h i c h by policies so very far from Confucianism was soon to conquer the rest. We read of h i m praising to the M a r q u i s of Y i n g (chief minister there from 266 to 255 B.C.) the simple manners and obedient spirit of its people, the honesty of officials and efficiency of government, but he complains that 2

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there are scarcely any Ju to teach the true principles of kingship. He has an audience w i t h K i n g Chao (306-251 B . C . ) of C h ' i n i n w h i c h he tries to answer the King's blunt "The Ju are no use i n r u n n i n g a state". In another dialogue he tries to dissuade one L i Ssu, w h o says: " C h ' i n has been victorious for four generations, its arms prevail everywhere w i t h i n the four seas, it overawes the lords of the states. It does it not by the benevolent and the right, but simply by following expediency." This L i Ssu was later by Legalist policies to become chief minister of the First Emperor. According to Ssu-ma C h ' i e n he studied w i t h H a n Fei under H s i i n - t z u , but left h i m to seek employment i n C h ' i n i n 247 B . C . It may be mentioned that K i n g Chao, w i t h i n a few years of the audience, broke the back of H s i i n tzu's native state of Chao on the terrible battlefield of C h ' a n g - p ' i n g i n 260 B . C He executed on the battlefield the entire surrendered army of Chao, amounting if we can trust Ssu-ma Ch'ien's figures to more than 400,000.* H s i i n - t z u is defending Confucian moralism at a time w h e n very bleak winds are blowing. 6

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Heaven For H s i i n - t z u as for others the w o r l d outside man consists of Heaven and Earth, w i t h Heaven as the dominant partner, directing all w h i c h is outside man's control. A modern reader may wonder to find so little even in the major philosophers to show that this power is distinguished from the sky itself. This I think is because, even for philosophers, Heaven is the sky. In the absence of any spirit/matter dichotomy, there are only degrees of substantiality; man's thoughts and feelings are less solid than his body, but only as the sky is more tenuous than the earth below it. The ch'i, the energetic fluid, w h i c h inside m a n is the breath and other vitalising forces of the body, is also outside h i m as air; and once a cosmogony develops, i n Huai-nan-tzu (c. 140 B . C ) , w i t h the m y r i a d things solidifying out of and dissolving into ch'i, it is inevitable that Heaven is seen as the finer w h i c h rises to the top and Earth as the denser w h i c h sinks to the bottom. The highest controlling power, the purest intelligence, whether i n the cosmos or i n m a n himself, is conceivable only as the ultimately rarified which moves freely everywhere and has not yet begun to immobilise itself by assuming shape; and h o w w o u l d that differ i n k i n d from the air above us? The Heaven of the philosophers approaches the impersonality of the Way 10

* That the figure, like many of ancient battle losses, is impossibly high, is argued convincingly by Bodde (Twitchett and Fairbank 99f).

that things follow and the patterns (li) w h i c h are specific to them, but there is never i n the classical period a full identification with them; the Way indeed is increasingly described as the 'Way of Heaven' or 'of Heaven and Earth'. However m u c h the concept was depersonalised, there was no paradigm shift freeing thought f r o m the underlying analogy of Heaven with a h u m a n ruler. Like Confucius, H s i i n - t z u has a man-centred view w h i c h does not quite fit our categories of 'humanist' and 'rationalist'. Heaven and Earth follow a Way independent of man's w i l l , leaving resources at his disposal without advising h o w to use them. It is for m a n to find the Way proper to himself, by w h i c h he co-operates i n society to utilise these resources for his o w n benefit. If this looks like a 'scientific' approach to nature— especially w h e n he is speaking of the universe as patternless until patterned by man—there is also i n H s i i n - t z u a certain residual awe of the sacred i n nature w h i c h discourages curiosity or interference except for practical ends. H i s hostility to attempts to discover or influence Heaven's will by divination or prayer is because he sees them as violations of Heaven's secrets as well as shirkings of man's responsibility to look after his o w n affairs. His 'Discourse on Heaven' is i n the first place an answer to all who expect Heaven to tell us what to do, i n particular those w h o through divination a n d the increasingly influential Yin-Yang cosmology seek guidance from auspicious or baleful omens. "Heaven has a constant course, neither maintained for sage Yao nor abandoned for tyrant C h i e h . If you respond to it by order it is auspicious, if you respond to it by disorder it is baleful." (Hs 17/1, tr. W 79) O n the one h a n d , "if you make the basic [agriculture] strong and utilisation thrifty, Heaven cannot make you poor", and "flood and drought cannot reduce you to famine"; on the other "if the basis is neglected and utilisation wasteful, Heaven cannot make you r i c h " , and "there will be famine before flood and drought arrive". Similarly w i t h "adequate diet and timely exercise" you w i l l be healthy however hot or cold the weather, and if "you cultivate the Way w i t h singleness of purpose" you w i l l be lucky whatever the malign influences. "If we enjoy the same seasons as orderly ages but differ from orderly ages i n suffering disasters, it is inadmissible to blame Heaven, it is because of the Way that we follow." For H s i i n - t z u , as for the Mencian author of the 'Doctrine of the M e a n ' , it is man's greatness that he completes a triad w i t h heaven and earth. "What comes about without being done, is got without being sought,

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these we say are i n Heaven's charge. O n such as these a man however profound does not exert his forethought, however great does not exert his capability, however shrewd does not exert his perspicacity; this we call refraining from competing over what is i n Heaven's charge. Heaven has its seasons, earth its resources, m a n his order; this we call his capability to align himself as the third. It is a delusion to neglect the means by which he aligns as the third and go begging from the other two." Hsiin-tzu's strongest statement of man's active participation is i n verse: "Instead of magnifying Heaven and contemplating it, Why not domesticate and curb it? Instead of being subservient to Heaven and singing its praises, Why not curb its decree and put it to use? Instead of looking out for the seasons and awaiting their bounty, Why not respond to them and make them serve you? Instead of being passive towards things and overwhelmed by their multitude, Why not unleash capabilities and transform them? Instead of contemplating things in their independence, Why not make them a pattern from which none escapes? Instead of depending on the means by which things come to birth, Why not be owner of the means by which things come to completion? Therefore if you put aside what is man's to contemplate what is Heaven's, you let the essential in the myriad things escape you." (Hs 17/44-16, tr. W 86) Unusual phenomena have none of the significance omen-seekers find in them. " W h e n a meteor falls or w o o d sings, everyone i n the state is frightened and asks ' W h y ? ' . N o point i n asking why. These are alterations between Heaven and Earth and transformations of Y i n and Yang w h i c h are rare events: to wonder at them is admissible, but it is w r o n g to be awed by them. Eclipses of sun and m o o n , unseasonable w i n d and rain, the occasional sight of a strange star, have been happening i n every generation. If the ruler is enlightened and administration regular, even if they all occur i n the same reign there is no h a r m i n them; if the ruler is benighted and administration irregular, even if not one of them occurs it w i l l do h i m no good." There is no objection to such practices as divination as accepted

rituals, but they have nothing to do w i t h telling the future. It is the understanding or misunderstanding of their social function w h i c h is auspicious or baleful. "We pray for rain and it rains, why? N o point i n asking, it is the same as if it rains w h e n we d i d not pray. Rescuing the sun or moon from an eclipse, praying i n time of drought, deciding a great matter only after divining w i t h tortoise-shell or yarrow sticks, are not because one expects to get what one asks, but to impose culture on what we do. Hence the gentleman thinks of them as cultured but the H u n d r e d Clans think of them as daimonic. To think of them as cultured is auspicious, as daimonic is baleful." A s for what is truly 'daimonic', powerful, and intelligent i n a way higher than and alien to the h u m a n , for w h i c h the Chinese word is shen, it is a mystery w h i c h we should not follow the diviners i n trying to approach. In this respect one might say that H s i i n - t z u is positively antiscientific, that he discourages the curiosity about the reasons for events of diviners, physicians, and other proto-scientists only just beginning to force themselves on the notice of the philosophical schools. "The constellations revolve i n sequence, sun and moon take turns to shine, the four seasons i n succession guide, the Y i n and Yang universally transform, w i n d and rain reach everywhere, of the myriad things each gets the harmonies by w h i c h it is born, the nourishment by w h i c h it is completed. That of w h i c h , without seeing the work, we see the results, we call the 'daimonic': that w h i c h , though all k n o w it is the means to their completion, none knows i n its absence of shape, we call 'Heaven'. O n l y the sage may be deemed to refrain from seeking to know Heaven." (Hs 17/8-10, W 80). The sense of a mystery at the heart of things is seldom altogether missing i n early Chinese thinkers, except i n the Legalists and perhaps the Mohists (whose explicit theism is curiously empty of a sense of the numinous). The definitive statement of it i n the Confucian Classics is i n the 'Great A p p e n d i x ' of the Yz: "It is the unfathomable i n the Y i n and Yang w h i c h is called the 'daimonic'." For H s i i n - t z u legitimate curiosity is limited to the h u m a n and to the directly useful to m a n , and when speaking of excess knowledge he can sound like a Taoist. "Therefore the greatest dexterity is i n what he refuses to do, the greatest w i s d o m i n what he refuses to think about. H i s attention to Heaven stops at the visible models [sun, moon, stars] by w h i c h to fix dates ahead; his attention to earth, at the visibly appropriate to increase of 11

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growth; his attention to the four seasons, at the visible phases usable for work; his attention to Y i n and Yang, at the visible harmonies by w h i c h to put i n order." (Hs 17/16-18, tr. W 81f). According to the 'Discourse on Heaven', Heaven has generated man as an organism analogous to a community. The heart is 'the ruler from Heaven', the senses are 'the officials f r o m Heaven', and all other things 'the nourishment from Heaven'. A s counterpart presumably of the people below, "liking and disliking, being pleased w i t h or angry w i t h , sadness and joy" are 'the ch'ing from Heaven', using that w o r d ch'ing w h i c h for Sung H s i n g , Mencius, C h u a n g - t z u and the Later Mohists meant whatever i n X is essential to being named ' X ' . H s i i n - t z u is the first to use it rather of the authentic i n m a n w h i c h is disguised by ritual and morality, therefore his passions. W h e n all these components are functioning properly m a n has fully at his disposal everything else i n the universe: "Heaven and earth are reduced to officials a n d the m y r i a d things to servants." This account of man's place i n the cosmos is unusual i n Hsun-tzu's writings i n making no reference to the conflicts between the passions. We are told only that man should "nourish the authentic (ch'ing) from Heaven i n h i m " , not "go contrary to the authentic f r o m Heaven i n h i m . " It is possible that the essay is early, and that d u r i n g Hsiin-tzu's long life i n increasingly desperate times his view of h u m a n nature darkened; his more usual emphasis is on the anarchy of the passions, w h i c h are to be satisfied certainly, but are satisfiable only after we have learned by an arduous moral training to reduce them to order. In the verse quoted above we let pass without comment the couplet: "Instead of contemplating things i n their independence, W h y not make them a pattern f r o m w h i c h none escapes?" Pattern (li jFg ) is the arrangement of father and son, ruler and subject, within the grand scheme of things, i n the places w h i c h are fitting (yi) and w i t h the duties w h i c h fit them as the Right (yi). According to the view being newly elaborated by Tsou Yen and the cosmologists, this is the pattern of the whole cosmos, w i t h Heaven and Earth corresponding to superior and inferior among m e n . H s i i n - t z u is remarkable i n holding that this order is not the Way of Heaven, w h i c h is merely the regularity of the cycles of the seasons and the heavenly bodies; it arises from man as the third, patterning things from his o w n point of view. To quote a passage to w h i c h we shall later supply the context, the m y r i a d things are "without fittingness (yi) except i n having uses for m a n . " "The Way is not the Way of Heaven, nor the Way of Earth, it is what 12

13

man uses to make his way, what the gentleman adopts as the Way." (Hs 8/24, tr. Dubs 96) "Therefore Heaven and Earth generate the gentleman, and the gentleman patterns Heaven and Earth. The gentleman is the third aligned with Heaven and Earth, the totaliser of the m y r i a d things, the father and mother of the people. Without the gentleman, Heaven and Earth would be unpatterned, the ceremonial and the right unorganised, there would be no ruler and teacher above, no father and son below; it is this that is called utmost disorder. Ruler and minister, father and son, elder brother and younger, husband and wife, one beginning or ending as another ends or begins, share the same pattern w i t h Heaven and Earth, the same duration with a m y r i a d ages; it is this that is called the most fundamental." (Hs 9/6567, tr. W44f) Is H s i i n - t z u saying that m a n imposes his o w n meaning on an otherwise meaningless universe? H e is very near to this modern idea. But although "without the gentleman Heaven and Earth are unpatterned", h u m a n institutions "share the same pattern w i t h Heaven and Earth". We shall later be examining the systems of correspondences by w h i c h cosmology was being elaborated. We may understand H s i i n - t z u as meaning, not that m a n personifies Heaven and Earth after the analogy of ruler and minister, father and son, but rather that the ratio 'Heaven : Earth :: ruler: minister' is as valid as ' r u l e r : minister:: father: son', but of course requires m a n to complete it. Elsewhere H s i i n - t z u not only explains how ceremonies and musical performances are adjusted to the cosmic regularities, but once i n a poetic passage treats ceremony as the source of order in the universe. 14

"By this Heaven and Earth join. By this sun and moon shine, By this the four seasons proceed, By this the stars take their courses, By this Yangtse and Yellow River flow, By this the myriad things flourish, By this love and hate are apt, By this favour and anger are just." (Hs 19/26f, tr. W 94) But a little further on f r o m this passage i n the 'Discourse on Ceremony' he writes i n prose: " W h e n Heaven and Earth join, the m y r i a d things are generated; w h e n Y i n and Yang meet, alterations and transformations arise; w h e n nature

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and artifice join, the world is brought to order. Heaven is capable of generating things but not of m a k i n g distinctions between them, Earth of sustaining man but not of bringing h i m to order; the myriad things w i t h i n Space, and all w h o belong among living m e n , await the sage to allot them their portions." (Hs 19/77-79, tr. W103)

Human nature Hsiin-tzu's attack on the M e n c i a n theory of h u m a n nature illustrates the progress of argumentation i n the Confucian school. Mencius' case has to be re-assembled f r o m scattered dialogues and discourses; H s i i n - t z u develops his i n a consecutive essay, ' O u r Nature Is Bad', with Mencius as the named target, and a terminology clarified here and elsewhere i n the book by scrupulous definitions. The main definitions stand appropriately at the head of another essay, 'Correction of Names'. They fall into seven pairs, three of them defining the same word i n different senses. He may well have marked them as different words by radicals eliminated by later graphic standardisation, since for one pair a graphic differentiation is made just once i n the text as we have it (chih ' k n o w ' distinguished from chih 'wits' by addition of the 'sun' radical as i n the Canons, where it is also partially euminated by graphic standardisation). In any case translation forces us to shift between verbal, adjectival and nominal forms of the English w o r d . Besides distinguishing the wits from k n o w i n g like the Later Mohists, he makes a corresponding distinction for neng jfc 'capable, able'. "The means i n m a n by w h i c h he knows is called the 'wits': the meeting of the wits w i t h something is called ' k n o w i n g ' . The means i n m a n by w h i c h he is capable is called 'capability'; the meeting of capability w i t h something is called 'being capable o f . " (Hs 22/5f, tr. W140) Previously hsing 'nature' had been used without distinguishing maris nature f r o m his spontaneous processes; H s i i n - t z u draws a distinction strictly parallel w i t h the preceding, and extends it to the opposite of nature, wei ^ 'artifice' (wei ^b, 'do' written w i t h the 'man' radical, so 'man-made'). "The means by w h i c h something generated is so is called its 'nature'; its nature harmonising what is generated, the quintessential as it meets something being aroused and responding spontaneously without working for it, is called 'the natural'." (Hs 22/2f, tr. W139) "Capability being acted on by the thinking of the heart is called 15

'artifice'; the matured only after accumulation of thinking about it and habituation of capability to it is called 'the artificial'." (Hs 22/4 tr. W 139f). The pair 'arousal' (kan ) d 'response' (ying ^ ), oddly similar to modern 'stimulation' a n d 'response' if we extract the latter from their neurological background, were becoming current i n this period for describing the spontaneous reactions w h i c h precede thought; we find them also i n the 'Outer Chapters' of Chuang-tzu and the appendices of the Yi. Here the initial reactions are ascribed to the quintessences (ching), w h i c h we first encountered i n the 'Inward Training'; as the purest of the ch'i they would be the fluids f r o m w h i c h spontaneous motions start. Artifice, as culture, morality, ceremony, disguises the ch'ing of m a n , what he is i n himself. By this period however, i n discussions of ritual i n the Record of Ceremony and Han Fei-tzu as well as i n Hsiin-tzu, one notices that ch'ing is shifting i n usage w h e n applied to m a n . * Rather than the essential to being named ' m a n ' , what distinguishes h i m from other creatures, it is now the genuine and unassumed w h i c h underlies and threatens to break through the civilized exterior, therefore primarily the passions. In later Chinese ch'ing comes to mean the passions; i n Hsiin-tzu this is the reference of the w o r d but it may be doubted whether it is yet the sense. For this text a convenient equivalent is 'the authentic'. According to H s i i n tzu's 'Discourse o n Ceremony', "The cultured and patterned, and the authentic and useful, becoming each other's exterior and interior, a n d m i x i n g as they proceed together, is the midstream of ceremony." (Hs 19/38f, tr. W 96) 'Correction of Names' defines the authentic i n contrast w i t h thinking. "The liking or dislike, pleasure i n or anger against, sadness or joy w h i c h are from our nature are called the 'authentic' i n us. The authentic i n us being such, the heart m a k i n g choices on behalf of it is called 'thinking'." (Hs 22/3f, tr. W139) Later i n the same essay, again using 'response' i n implicit contrast with 'arousal', H s i i n - t z u writes: " O u r nature is the tendency w h i c h is f r o m Heaven, the authentic i n us is the stuff of our nature, desire is the response of the authentic i n us." (Hs 22/63, tr. W151) ' O u r Nature Is Bad' starts off o n a fine note of challenge. "Man's nature is bad, the good i n h i m is artifice. N o w man's nature from birth has the love of profit i n it; he follows this, therefore jostling a n d grabbing spring up and forbearance a n d deference are missing from h i m . From birth he has a

n

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* For the changing sense of ch'ing, cf. G Studies 64f.

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jealousy and hatred i n h i m : he follows these, therefore injury and violence spring u p and loyalty and trustworthiness are missing from h i m . From birth he has the desires of ear a n d eye and the love of women and song i n h i m ; he follows these, therefore excess and disorder spring up and the ceremonial and the right, culture and pattern are missing from h i m . Consequently, if you indulge man's nature, if y o u follow the authentic i n man, you inevitably start off i n jostling and grabbing, take the course of violation of allotments and disordering of pattern, and become settled i n crime. Hence there must be transformation by teachers and standards, the Way of the ceremonial and the right, before you can start off i n forbearance and deference, take the course of the cultured and patterned, and become settled i n the ordered." (Hs 23/1-4, tr. W157) Man's nature has to be forced straight like crooked w o o d , sharpened like blunt metal—very un-Mencian similes w h i c h the Legalists also use for reshaping m a n by harsh law. "Hence crooked w o o d inevitably requires steaming and bending with the arrow-straightener to straighten it, blunt metal inevitably requires the whetstone to sharpen it; and granted that man's nature is bad, it inevitably requires teachers and standards to correct it, the ceremonial and the right to order it." If we look at Hsiin-tzu's very careful definitions, it is clear that his argument starts f r o m a conception of h u m a n nature quite different from Mencius', and for a Western reader m u c h easier to grasp. Mencius thinks in terms of a natural tendency to goodness as to long life, actualised only if nourished by educaton as the healthy body is nourished by food. For H s i i n - t z u on the other h a n d whatever has been affected by education is by definition not man's nature, w h i c h consists of the inclinations born as his energies first respond to external stimulation, before the beginnings of thought. Hsiin-tzu's case against Mencius, although lucid and coherent, is consequently always a little off target. "Mencius says: 'The nature of men w h o learn is good'. I say that this is not so, it is failure to k n o w man's nature, failure to discern the distinction between nature and artifice. In everyone nature is the tendency w h i c h is from Heaven; it cannot be learned, cannot be w o r k e d for. The ceremonial and the right were generated b y the sages; they are what man becomes capable of by learning, accomplishes by working for them. That i n man which cannot be learned or worked for is called his nature, that i n man which he may become capable of by learning, may accomplish by working for it, is called artifice." H s i i n - t z u represents Mencius as holding that m a n becomes wicked by

losing his nature, and answers that i n that case what should be as natural to us as sight to the eye a n d hearing to the ear must be lost to us from birth. However, if h u m a n nature is w h o l l y immoral, there is a profound question for H s i i n - t z u to answer. "A questioner says: 'If man's nature is bad, from what were ceremony and right born?'." H s i i n - t z u answers that they were invented by the sages as pots and tools were invented by the artifice of potters and craftsmen. "The sage by accumulation of thought, by habituation to the artificial, generated the ceremonial and the right, a n d initiated standards and measures. Consequently, the ceremonial and the right, standards and measures, were born f r o m the sage's artifice, were not originally born from man's nature." The proposal that the sages simply invented morality, as something useful to m a n like pots and tools, is perhaps less remarkable i n C h i n a than in a culture such as our o w n w h i c h has inherited its morality from a revealed religion. It seems to have been generally assumed that rules of conduct (as distinct from the disinterested concern for others w h i c h lies behind them) have their origin i n the w i s d o m of the sages. Confucius himself said that " m a n is able to enlarge the Way, it is not that the Way is able to enlarge m a n " , a n d the M o h i s t ' C o n f o r m i n g U p w a r d s ' treats a universal morality as, if not an invention, at any rate a unification of the moralities of conflicting individuals and families by the sage rulers of antiquity. However, no one had yet questioned that i n discovering his wisest course m a n also discovers what Heaven has decreed for h i m . Taoists w h o recognise that Heaven and the Way diverge from man's moral rules take the side of Heaven against them. Hsiin-tzu's claim has no full parallel except i n Legalism, w h i c h recognises no morality but the law laid down by the ruler. It might be asked h o w m a n comes to invent and let himself be bound by a morality unless it has a basis i n his nature. "A questioner says: 'The ceremonial and the right, the accumulated and the artificial, are from man's nature, and that is w h y the sage is able to generate them'. I answer that this is not so. The potter by kneading clay generates a pot; is then the clay of the pot f r o m the nature of the potter? A carpenter by carving w o o d generates a tool; is then the wood of the tool from the nature of the carpenter?" The point of the comparison is that useful institutions may be as independent of h u m a n nature as useful tools, and that without going outside his nature m a n may desire social order as useful to h i m i n the same 17

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way as tools. A t this point we may pause to consider whether H s i i n - t z u has reached the limits of traditional Chinese moral philosophising based on the spontaneous preferences of the wisest. Should the logic of his position force h i m to postulate a transcendent Right independent of inclination? Elsewhere he says that m e n have both 'desire for profit' and 'love of the right', and that neither is abolished except i n the extremes of good or bad government. Does then the love of right also belong to human nature? Here we have to r e m i n d ourselves that the badness of human nature is not being conceived as egoism. That absolute egoism w h i c h i n the West haunts moral philosophy as solipsism haunts epistemology appears to be a blank i n the philosophical consciousness of C h i n a , whether for sociological or for philosophical reasons—for philosophical, I have argued elsewhere. For H s i i n - t z u h u m a n nature is bad i n that desires are anarchic, i n conflict both w i t h i n and between individuals. But since disordered desires frustrate one another, the intelligent man as he learns will spontaneously come to desire the order w h i c h will make it possible to satisfy them. Love of the right is not then incompatible w i t h the badness of man's nature, o n the contrary may be claimed to confirm it. "All man's desire to become good is because his nature is bad. The meagre wishes to be ample, the ugly to be beautiful, the constricted to have scope, the poor to be rich, the lowly to be noble; what you lack w i t h i n you have to seek outside. Hence being rich y o u do not w i s h for wealth, being noble you do not w i s h for position; for what you do have w i t h i n , you surely will not go outside." Hsun-tzu's doctrine has important differences from the Western idea of Original S i n , of w h i c h one is too easily reminded w h e n for example his slogan is translated 'Man's nature is evil'. H e does not of course have the Christian conception of a corrupted nature i n permanent rebellion, successfully kept under only w i t h the help of divine grace. He holds that the gentleman can by unremitting accumulation of stern thought and effort bring his conflicting desires to orderliness, and so "transform his nature"; the metaphor of the arrow-straightener implies that human nature has to be bent by force, but can be bent permanently straight. It is interesting that H s i i n - t z u constantly speaks of morality as being 'born' from or 'generated' b y the sage's artifice, using the same verb sheng from w h i c h hsing 'nature' itself derives; even w h e n introducing pots and tools as the analogy he speaks of the craftsman as 'generating' them from clay and w o o d . The sage transforms h u m a n nature by re-directing the generative process, so that i n the end like Confucius he can follow his 19

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heart's desire without transgressing rule. According to the chapter 'Grand Summary', " S h u n said: T am the one w h o sets i n order by following desire'. Therefore the generating of ceremony is for the sake of those from the worthier d o w n to ordinary people, not for the perfected sage. However, it is also the means of perfecting himself as a sage; unless he learned he would not have been perfected." (Hs 27/llf) H s i i n - t z u holds that w i t h sufficient thought and effort it is possible for the man-in-the-street to equal the sage Y i i ; on this point he fully agrees with M e n c i u s . "In general the reason w h y Y i i became Y u was that he practiced the benevolent and the right, the standard and the correct. It follows that all these have a pattern to them by w h i c h it is possible to k n o w and become capable of them. However, any m a n i n the street has the stuff i n h i m by w h i c h it is possible to k n o w them, a n d the resources by which it is possible to become capable of them. Consequently, that it is possible for h i m to become a Y i i is plain." (Hs 23/60-63, tr. W166). The evidence that anyone can become a sage is that he does have the understanding of ordinary moral obligations w h i c h by a process of accumulation may become sagehood. "It is possible for any man-in-the-street, at home to k n o w what is right between father a n d son, abroad to k n o w what is correct between ruler and subject. Consequently it is plain that the stuff by w h i c h it is possible to know and the resources by w h i c h it is possible to become capable, are present i n the man-in-the-street." Morality has the pattern (li) by w h i c h it is knowable by thought; man has, presumably i n his nature, the equipment by w h i c h , although his desires r u n the other way, it is possible for h i m to know it. Here H s i i n - t z u draws a distinction between the possibility and the capability. 'Capability' (neng) is a term we have met i n his series of contrastive definitions. The word used to pronounce something physically possible is k'o 'admissible' (morally or logically) w i t h w h i c h we are already familiar i n argumentation; an affirmation pronounced k'o is valid, an action or process merely possible. "It w i l l be said: 'If sagehood is achievable by accumulation, w h y is it not however accumulable b y everyone?' I answer that it is possible for us, but not possible that we be made to. Hence it is possible for the vulgar m a n to become a gentleman, but he refuses, and for the gentleman to become a vulgar man but he refuses. For one of them to become the other is always 21

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possible, however they do not, because although it is possible for us it is not possible that we be made to. Therefore it may be agreed that it is possible for the man-in-the-street to become a Y i i , but it is not necessarily so that he is capable of it; but even if he is not, that is not incompatible with it being possible for h i m to become a Y i i . It is possible for the feet to walk everywhere i n the w o r l d , but there has never been anyone capable of it; it has always been possible for craftsmen, farmers and merchants to do each other's jobs, but they have never been capable of doing them." We develop the capability of doing some things at the cost of others equally possible to us. Sagehood is possible for all, and a few do become capable of it, but most of us lose the opportunity by developing capabilities i n other directions. We noticed that H s i i n - t z u criticises the doctrine of natural goodness from a definition of h u m a n nature w h i c h is not that of Mencius, so that his objections although lucidly argued are not quite to the point. It is indeed far from easy to locate any issue of fact o n w h i c h they disagree. Both recognise the need of learning, the moral acceptability of all fully reconcilable desires, the function of the heart as arbiter between them, and the possibility of anyone becoming a sage; and if one of them prefers to see education as nourishing a spontaneous tendency to good, the other as disciplining a spontaneous tendency to disorder, on what tests w o u l d one decide between them?* A s is arguably the case w i t h Western disagreements over h u m a n nature, the issue seems to come d o w n to different proportions of trust or distrust i n h u m a n spontaneity, w i t h practical consequences for education. It is worthy of remark that pre-Han thinkers scarcely ever say 'Man's nature is good/bad/neither/a mixture of both/good in some and bad i n others' except i n controversy or in formulae summing up doctrines. Mencius never says it is good except i n debate w i t h Kao-tzu and i n answer to a disciple asking w h y he disagrees w i t h the three current doctrines; and elsewhere i n the book we find only one narrative statement that i n conversation w i t h a crown prince he "preached that our nature is g o o d " . The 'Admonitions' i n Kuan-tzu w h i c h seem to reflect Kao-tzu's position o n h u m a n nature never says there is neither good nor bad i n it; it is Kao-tzu i n debate w i t h Mencius, a n d the disciple w h o asks about the three doctrines, w h o formulate his thesis i n these terms. The other documents w h i c h take the Mencian position, the 'Doctrine of the M e a n ' and the appendices of the Yi, never positively say that h u m a n nature is 23

* Cf. Lau "Theories of Human Nature'.

good. H s i i n - t z u never says it is bad except i n the chapter ' O u r Nature Is Bad' w h i c h is a direct answer to Mencius. It is not i n question that M e n c i u s and H s i i n - t z u have complex and distinctive theories of m a n arising f r o m opposite attitudes of trust or distrust i n spontaneity. However, since they use their respective slogans only as convenient labels a n d pivots of debate, one may suspect that they had some i n k l i n g that the formulae u n d u l y simplify what they have to say. In the case of H s i i n - t z u there is good reason to doubt whether the label he pinned on himself to distinguish himself from Mencius gives an adequate idea of his position. According to H s i i n - t z u , Heaven and earth are morally neutral, and the spontaneous course of things goes neither for nor against man; the conflicting desires w i t h w h i c h Heaven has endowed us, like the cycles of the seasons a n d resources of earth, are simply neutral facts with which we have to deal. Man's nature, like his environment, has to be reduced to order if he is to satisfy his desires; but there can be no culture without something to cultivate, and aside from ' O u r Nature Is Bad' H s i i n tzu's tendency is to think of nature and culture as each making its contribution to the good life. " O u r nature is the basic and original, the raw material; artifice is culturing and patterning, developing to the full. Without nature there would be nothing on w h i c h to impose artifice, without artifice nature is incapable of beautifying itself. O n l y after nature and artifice join is there achievement of the fame of perfect sagehood and success i n u n i f y i n g the world. Therefore it is said: ' W h e n Heaven and earth join, the myriad things are generated; w h e n Y i n and Yang meet, the alterations and transformations arise; w h e n nature and artifice join, the world is i n order." (Hs 19/76-78, tr. W 102f)

The heart We have seen that his doctrine of h u m a n nature by no means requires H s i i n - t z u to abandon what we have identified as an assumption common to all the schools, that the good is what the wisest spontaneously desire. The desires i n their natural state are bad only i n the sense of being anarchic, and to seek to conquer them requires only enough intelligence to see that to reconcile and order them is a condition of satisfying them. He is i n fact optimistic about man's prospect of satisfying the most varied desires if he organises his resources rightly; this is one of the sides to h i m which looks 'scientific', although like all Chinese thinkers of the classical

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age he assumes the technology of his time without any Baconian anticipations of progress. H e dismisses both S u n g Hsing's proposal to reduce desires and the strand i n the paradoxical thought of Lao-tzu w h i c h recommends desirelessness. "Whoever speaks of order as depending on the abolition of desire is one so helpless to guide desires that he finds it troublesome to have them at all. Whoever speaks of order as depending on reduction of desires is one so helpless to regulate desires that he finds it troublesome to have so many. Those with desires and those without are different i n k i n d , the living and the dead, not the ordered a n d the disordered. Those w i t h many desires and those with few are different i n k i n d , i n the number of those essential to them [few for animals, m a n y for man], not i n order and disorder." (Hs 22/55-57, tr. W150). What matters is to use the heart, the organ of thought, to judge whether or not action to satisfy a desire is admissible (k'o), whether it fits the pattern of affairs as physically possible or morally allowable. "Therefore w h e n performance stops short of desire, it is because the heart checks it; but if the heart's judgment as admissible coincides with pattern, however many the desires what harm is it to order? When performance goes beyond desire, it is because the heart makes it do so; but if the heart's judgment as admissible misses pattern, however few the desires what can save us f r o m disorder? Therefore order and disorder depend on what the heart judges admissible, not on what the authentic i n us desires." (Hs 22/60-62, tr. W151) Like Yangists a n d Mohists H s i i n - t z u discusses choice i n terms of weighing desires, w i t h the same metaphor of the scales. "The sage knows the i l l effects of the heart's training, sees the calamities from obstructed vision, and therefore whatever he desires or dislikes, whether at start or end, far or near, ample or trivial, past or present, w i t h the myriad things each one spread out before h i m he coincides w i t h the scales as they settle. For this reason things i n their multitude however diverse cannot shut each other off from his view and disorder his gradings. What am I calling the 'scales'? I mean the Way." (Hs 21/28-30, tr. W 126f). H s i i n - t z u is of course very different f r o m Chuang-tzu i n insisting that to follow the Way one must employ the heart to think and to control the body. He shares w i t h C h u a n g - t z u , however, a good deal of the psychological terminology of the time, although w i t h considerable differences i n the usage: 'emptiness', 'stillness', the 'daimonic and clear-seeing' (shen ming). "The heart is the ruler of the body and master of the daimonic-and-

clear-seeing. It issues commands and has nothing from w h i c h it receives them. It forbids itself to or makes itself do, takes from or to itself, makes itself go or stop. Hence the mouth can be forced to be silent or to speak, and the body to bend or stretch, but the heart cannot be forced to change an idea. What it approves it accepts, what it rejects it refuses." (Hs 21/4446, tr. W129). " H o w does m a n k n o w the Way? By the heart. H o w does the heart know? By being empty, unified, and still. The heart never ceases to store, yet something i n it is to be called empty; to be multiple, yet something i n it is to be called unified; to move, yet something i n it is to be called still. From birth man has knowledge, and i n knowledge there is memory; 'memory' is storing, yet something i n it is to be called empty—not letting the alreadystored interfere w i t h the about-to-be-received is called being empty. From birth the heart has knowledge, and i n knowledge there is difference; of the 'different' it knows each at the same time, and if it knows each at the same time is multiple, yet something i n it is to be called unified—not letting one of them interfere w i t h another is called being unified. The heart w h e n sleeping dreams, w h e n idling takes its o w n course, w h e n employed makes plans, so never ceases to move, yet something i n it is to be called still—not letting dream and play disorder knowledge is called being still." (Hs 21/34-39, tr. W127f). According to C h u a n g - t z u "the utmost m a n uses the heart like a mirror, he does not escort things as they go or welcome them as they come, he responds and does not store." He responds to everything as new, refuses to let an accumulation of memories tie h i m i n obsolete habits. For Hsiin-tzu on the contrary knowledge depends on storing memories; but the heart of the sage does at bottom remain empty i n always remaining open to new impressions. C h u a n g - t z u recommends seeing everything as one, while H s i i n - t z u holds that knowledge depends on differentiation but that the heart must nonetheless remain basically one to unify its knowledge however diverse, not accepting one item at the cost of another. Finally, beneath all its motions is a stillness, not of Taoist contemplation but of unchanging knowledge, unaffected by the transitory play of thought and imagination. But although H s i i n - t z u trusts to the heart's judgments while C h u a n g - t z u does not, the underlying psychological picture is the same. For both, m a n starts by responding i n the light of his developing understanding to the things w h i c h stimulate h i m , and is on the Way w h e n his understanding attains the perfection of the 'daimonic and clear-seeing'. Each uses for his o w n purposes the simile of the perfect reflection i n a mirror or i n clear water. 24

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"Hence man's heart may be compared to a p a n of water. If you lay it level and do not disturb it, the m u d d y settles below and the transparent above, so that it is adequate to see whiskers and eyebrows and discern the pattern of them. But if a faint breeze passes over, and the m u d d y is stirred up below a n d the transparent blurred above, you cannot perceive even the general outline correctly. It is the same w i t h the heart. Therefore we guide it by pattern, nurture it by clarifying, and if no thing upsets it, it is adequate to fix the right alternative and the w r o n g and decide the doubtful and confusable. But if the smallest thing tugs at it, then the correct is distorted outside and the heart upset w i t h i n , so that it is inadequate to decide between the broadest patterns." (Hs 21/55-58, tr. W 131f) H s i i n - t z u gives a string of examples of judgment distorted by fear of the dark, drunkenness, seeing double w h e n you press an eyeball, big things looking small i n the distance. Characteristically he uses them to combat superstition. "Whenever someone sees a ghost, you can be sure he identified it at a time of panic i n bewildering circumstances. These are the times w h e n people think that there is what there isn't and there isn't what there is." (Hs 21/76f, tr. W 134f). One has the impression that although for H s i i n - t z u thinking is inferring from the regularities of 'patterns' (li) he conceives it primarily as correlation rather than analysis. The correlative system-building with the Y i n and Yang and the Five Processes, soon to come into fashion, is as foreign to h i m as to all thinkers d o w n to H a n Fei; but for h i m , as for all but Sophists and Later Mohists, intelligence is what Anglo-Saxons call 'common sense', the sort w h i c h values a synthesising grasp of how things hang together above analysis, and w h i c h prefers not to p u s h analysis farther than is needed to resolve issues arising i n controversy. Throughout our quotations it may be noticed that even by the standards of pre-Han writing his style is highly parallelistic. There is nothing artificial about his parallels, but they testify that for h i m too the process of thought is a continuing play of comparison and contrast, w h i c h analysis serves to keep on course by defining key terms and making such fine discriminations as between social and moral disgrace or between possibility and capability. H e has no sympathy for analyses pushed beyond the limits of usefulness, by H u i Shih or by another Sophist whose book Teng Hsi-tzu is now lost. 25

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"That mountains and abysses are level, and Heaven and earth side by side, that C h ' i n i n the far west and C h ' i i n the far east overlap, that

[mountains?] enter into ears and come out of mouths,* that a hook has whiskers and an egg has hair, these are arguments difficult to sustain but H u i Shih and Teng H s i were capable of it. However, the gentleman does not value them, because they have nothing to do w i t h the ceremonial and the right." (Hs 3/2-4).

Ceremony and music The conflict over h u m a n nature gives Mencius and H s i i n - t z u different attitudes to what h a d been the two m a i n preoccupations of Confucius, ceremony and the jen w h i c h was i n process of defining itself as benevolence. M e n c i u s puts more stress on the benevolence w h i c h flows spontaneously from the goodness of man's nature. H s i i n - t z u on the other hand sees ceremony as the alternative to punishment i n imposing order on man's anarchic desires. A s for yi, 'the right, morality', its importance remains constant, although less obtrusive than the other two. For H s i i n tzu yi (not, as for the West, reason) is the defining characteristic of the human; he says so explicitly i n laying out a chain of being from the mineral through the vegetable and animal to m a n . "Water and fire have ch'i but not life, plants and trees have life but not knowledge, birds and animals have knowledge but not morality; man has ch'i, life, knowledge and morality as well, and so of all that is i n the world he is the most noble. H e lacks the force of the ox, does not run as fast as the horse, yet ox and horse are his to use, w h y ? Because men are capable of association and they are not. H o w are men capable of association? By apportioning. H o w are they capable of m a k i n g association effective? By morality. Consequently, apportioning according to morality they harmonise, harmonising they unite, united they have more forces, with more forces they are stronger, being stronger they conquer other things, and so can live secure i n their homes. Hence that they synchronise w i t h the four seasons, and share out the m y r i a d things, to the benefit of everyone i n the world, has no other reason than that they achieved it by morality i n apportioning." (Hs 9/69-73, tr. W 45f) The allotment of 'portions' (fen) we have already met as a Later Mohist concept. Without the morality (yi) w h i c h supports it, there is nothing i n the universal scheme of things w h i c h makes one thing more 'fitting' (yi) 27

* Cf. Cz 33/75, tr. G 284, where one of the paradoxes of the Sophists is 'Mountains come out of mouths' (you can think of them as not rising from earth but descending from holes in the sky?).

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than another except i n relation to the anarchic desires of men; there are only the number of things and the nature of m a n , w h i c h prefers the more in number to the less. "The m y r i a d things in the same Space being different units, without fittingness except i n having uses for m a n , is their number: that grades of men dwelling side by side seek the same by different Ways, desire the same but differ i n knowledge, is our nature. In that all judge something or other admissible, the wise and the foolish are the same; but i n the judgments being different, wise and foolish diverge. If those similar i n status but different i n knowledge behave selfishly without suffering for it, and indulge desire without restriction, the people's hearts w i l l rebel and become intractable. In such circumstances the wise w i l l not succeed i n ordering, i n w h i c h case achievement and reputation w i l l not take form, i n w h i c h case the multitude w i l l have no settled stations, i n w h i c h case there will be no institution of ruler and subject. Without ruler to curb subject or superior to curb inferior, the whole world w i l l indulge desire to the injury of life. Desiring or disliking the same things, there w i l l be too few things to satisfy desires, and since they are too few there will inevitably be competition." (Hs 10/1-5, tr. Dubs 151) H s i i n - t z u , like Mencius criticising H s u H s i n g , now appeals to the division of labour. "Hence the products of all the h u n d r e d crafts are the means of support for any one m a n , but capabilities are not capable of every craft nor men of every office. If we dwell apart without mutual dependence we are poor, if we associate without apportioning we compete. Poverty is a misfortune and competition a disaster. The best way to ward off misfortune and disaster is to make m e n associate by clarifying portions." (Hs 10/5-7, tr. Dubs 152) Like Confucius H s i i n - t z u looks back to the institutions of early C h o u , which rival schools were now disparaging on the still more venerable authority of Shen-nung, the Yellow Emperor and others coming to be classified among the Five Emperors placed before the Three Dynasties. H s i i n - t z u however was not a native of L u , where the C h o u tradition was claimed to be still alive. N o r is his special concern w i t h the more recent of the sage rulers (the 'later kings', as he calls them) inspired, as i n Confucius, by a faith i n the superiority of C h o u to its predecessors. H i s position is that the principles of ideal government are the same at all times, but there are no adequate records of it before the C h o u . "Irresponsible people say: 'Past and present are essentially different, and the Ways by 28

w h i c h they are ordered or disordered are different." The foolish multitude is misled by this claim, but they "can be deceived about something i n front of their eyes, not to speak of the tradition of a thousand generations". W h y is not the sage deceived? Because he can think out the ideal form of government by himself. This thinking begins with what Confucius called shu 'likening to oneself, although H s i i n - t z u does not use the word i n the present context. You discover how relations between people should be ordered by measuring them by analogy to yourself. " W h y is the sage not deceived? The sage is one who measures by himself. Hence he measures m a n by m a n , authentic by authentic, kind by kind; he measures achievement by explanation and observes everything by the Way. Past and present are one; if kinds are not violated, however long it continues the pattern is the same." (Hs 5/35f, tr. Dubs 74) A l t h o u g h H s i i n - t z u is fond of illustrating points from the Songs, his appeal is regularly to argument rather than to the authority even of early Chou. He objects to the 'vulgar Ju' not only that "they do not know how to take their standard from the later kings" but that they "do not k n o w how to give the topmost place to the ceremonial and the right and diminishing importance to the Songs a n d Documents" and that they "do nothing but study odds and ends a n d follow the Songs and Documents" The 'Discourse on Ceremony' starts by declaring that the whole purpose of enlightened conventions is to enable the desires of all to be satisfied according to their places i n the social hierarchy. "From what does ceremony originate? M a n f r o m birth has desires, and what desiring he fails to get it is beyond his capabilities not to seek; and if he seeks it without measuring of degrees and marking out of portions, it is beyond his capabilities not to compete. W i t h competition there is disorder and w i t h disorder poverty. The former kings hated the disorder, and therefore instituted the ceremonial and the right to allot portions, i n order to nurture man's desires and provide what he seeks, and ensure that the desires are never i n excess of the things and the things never inadequate to the desires, the two developing i n support of each other. It is from this that ceremony originates." (Hs 19/1-3 tr. W 88) This is the crux of his disagreement w i t h the Mohists, from w h o m he has without acknowledgement learned so much. The Mohists, who think in terms of perpetual shortage a n d not of the apportioning by ceremony which restrains desires and increases production, fail with both the things and the desires, w h i c h are mutually dependent. "Hence if m a n unifies them through the ceremonial and the right, he 29

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wins on both sides; if he unifies them through the authentic and the natural, he loses on both sides. Hence the Ju are the ones w h o w i l l enable man to w i n on both sides, the Mohists the ones w h o w i l l cause h i m to lose on both sides; this is where the Ju a n d the Mohists diverge." (Hs 19/21f, tr. W91) In perfection of ceremony natural desires and dislikes are cultured without loss of authenticity. But such perfection is rare, and authenticity may even have to be recovered by return to the oneness before portions are allocated. "Therefore at its most complete, the authentic and the cultured are both at their fullest; at the next, the authentic and the cultured prevail in turn; at the least, one reverts to the authentic and so returns to universal oneness." (Hs 19/26, tr. W 94). Ceremony, w h i c h i n the widest sense is the totality of social convention, centres on control of the passions w h e n they are most dangerous, at the extremes of joy and grief. "Ceremony is that w h i c h trims the long and augments the short, reduces the excessive and increases the inadequate, universalises the acculturing of concern and respect, a n d enhances the beauty of practicing the right. Hence though embellishment and austerity, singing and wailing, cheerfulness and mournfulness are opposites, ceremony uses each of them, evokes them w h e n timely and guides them i n turn. Hence embellishment, singing and cheerfulness are the means to maintain oneself i n tranquility i n presence of the auspicious, while austerity, wailing and mournfulness are the means to maintain oneself when disquieted i n the presence of the baleful. Therefore its institutions do not exaggerate the embellished to become pretty and charming, or the austere to emaciation and self-neglect, singing and cheerfulness to indulgence and license or wailing and mournfulness to depression and injury to l i f e — such is the midstream of ceremony." (Hs 19/63-67, tr. W lOOf) Like all Confucians H s u n - t z u gives first place to the funeral ceremonies and ancestral sacrifices w h i c h are the ultimate expressions of filial piety. He explains i n detail w h y the authentic emotion of grief has to be guided by a process of m o u r n i n g lasting three years, a period w h i c h to everyone but Confucians seems unnecessarily long. W h e n Confucius speaks of sacrificing to spirits "as though they were present" we are left to speculate whether he thinks of them as surviving or not. Hsiin-tzu however leaves no room for doubt; the ancestors are dead and gone, the whole purpose of the rite is to guide the grief and reverence of the 32

descendants. O n the debated question of whether or not the dead 'have knowledge', whether they are conscious, he takes it for granted that they are not. "To neglect w h e n dead someone you cared for w h e n alive is to respect h i m while he has knowledge and be rude to h i m w h e n hasn't." (Hs 19/44, tr. W 97) "I say then sacrifice is memory and imagination, contemplation and yearning at their most authentic, the utmost in loyalty and trustworthiness, love and respect, the perfection of ceremonial formality and cultured demeanour. If it were not for the sages no one w o u l d be capable of understanding it. The sage understands it clearly, knights and gentlemen practice it steadily, officials have it as a responsibility, the H u n d r e d Clans incorporate it into custom. A m o n g gentlemen it is deemed Way of M a n ; among the H u n d r e d Clans, it is deemed the service of ghosts." (Hs 19/117122, tr. W109f). A l t h o u g h H s i i n - t z u puts the m a i n stress on the ordering and refining of the passions, he does see ceremony as rooting m a n not only i n family and state but i n cosmos. The split from Heaven does not mean for h i m man's isolation i n an alien universe. "Ceremony has three roots. Heaven and earth are the root of generation, the ancestors are the root of one's k i n d , ruler and teacher are the root of order. Without Heaven and earth, from what w o u l d one be generated? Without ancestors, from what w o u l d one descend? Without ruler and teacher, by what w o u l d one be ordered? If just one of the three were missing there w o u l d be no fixity for m a n . Therefore by ceremony one serves heaven above and earth below, honours ancestors and exalts ruler and teacher; these are the three roots of ceremony." (Hs 19/13-15, tr. W 91). It would seem that it is primarily by the sacrifices by Emperor to Heaven and by lords of fiefs to the gods of earth (to w h i c h H s i i n - t z u proceeds i n his next sentences) that m a n as the third joins his Way to theirs to put himself inside the universal pattern. The affinity of ceremony and music h a d been recognised by the Ju since Confucius himself, but Hsiin-tzu's 'Discourse on M u s i c ' is the first document w h i c h theorises about it. The Mohists ignored ceremony and specifically condemned music; this is the issue w h i c h shows up most clearly the difference between the two great moralistic schools, the Confucians w h o see morality as inseparable from a tradition of conventional behaviour, the Mohists w h o detach it as a set of abstract principles. We have n o t i c e d that ytieh 'music' (inclusive of dance) is written w i t h the 33

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same graph as lo 'joy', and i n spite of a very early phonetic differentiation was originally the same w o r d , comparable w i t h English 'entertainment' or 'amusement'. The 'Discourse on M u s i c ' begins: " M u s i c is joy (= entertainment is an entertaining), what the authentic i n man inevitably refuses to do without. Therefore, man being incapable of dispensing with joy, w h e n he enjoys he inevitably breaks out i n sound, expresses i n movement a n d pause; and i n the Way of M a n , the modifications w h i c h are the crafting of one's nature are nowhere else but in the sounds, and the movement and pause. Hence man being incapable of doing without joy, and w h e n he enjoys of d o i n g without expression, if in expression he is u n g u i d e d he is incapable of avoiding disorder. The former kings hated the disorder, so instituted the songs of the Ya and Sung to guide it, to ensure that their sounds were enjoyable but not licentious, their words eloquent but not florid, that their variations, complexities, richness of texture a n d tempo should be adequate to stir man's heart to good, and that vicious ch'i have nowhere through w h i c h to come i n touch with it. This is the secret of the music established by the former kings, w h y does M o - t z u condemn it?" (Hs 20/1-5, tr. W112) M u s i c , then, like ceremony, acts directly on man's tastes, it can modify his natural inclinations for the better. Sounds and movements act on the vitalising fluids, the ch'i, by 'arousal' a n d 'response'. "Whenever depraved sounds arouse man, discordant ch'i responds to it, and i n modelling itself disorder is generated; w h e n correct sounds arouse m a n , accordant ch'i responds to it, and as it takes form order is generated." (Hs 20/26-28, tr. W116) H s i i n - t z u inherits from Confucius a conviction of the profound effects of music for better or for worse, as the music of the former kings or as "the lascivious songs of C h e n g a n d Wei." The Greeks had the same conception of the moral power of music, w h i c h came to seem strange to the West w i t h the prevalence of a purely aesthetic conception, for w h i c h there are only differences of taste, whether on a scale of good and bad, or to be dismissed with a degustibus non disputandum. Jazz and rock, flamboyantly subversive not only of esthetic but of all conventional values, have reawakened us to the power of music to m o d i f y the whole attitude to life of those w h o fully respond to it. For H s i i n - t z u the music and its dance can like ceremony show man his place i n the pattern of Heaven and earth. "The gentleman uses the bells and drums to guide intent, the zithers to delight the heart. H e dances w i t h shield and battleaxe, adorns w i t h feathers and yaktails, accompanies w i t h stone chimes and flutes. So the

clear and bright i n it < m e l o d y ? > has Heaven for m o d e l the broad and vast has earth as model, and the looking up and d o w n and circling r o u n d has its likeness to the four seasons." (Hs 20/28f, tr. W116) Ceremony a n d music are alike i n setting the community on the Way by improving effects w h i c h start from the clarifying of the senses concentrated on sounds and sights and from the harmonising of the bodily forces. "Hence w i t h the performing of music intent clarifies, with training i n ceremony conduct matures. Ear and eye hear and see more clearly, the blood and ch'i are harmonious a n d calm. They shift manners and replace customs, until the whole w o r l d is at peace, and the honourable and good delight i n each other." (Hs 28/29T, tr. W U6f). Ceremony and music differ i n that music inspires a sense of unity, ceremony of harmonious but graded functions, w i t h different forms for superior and inferior. "Hence w h e n the music is i n the temple of the royal ancestors, and ruler and subject, superior a n d inferior, listen to it together, all of them harmonise i n reverence; w h e n it is i n the household, and father and son, and elder and younger brother, listen to it together, all harmonise i n kinship; w h e n it is i n the neighbourhood, and elder and younger listen to it together, all harmonise i n obedience." (Hs 20/5f, tr. W113). "Moreover 'music' is the unalterable i n harmonising, 'ceremony' is the irreplaceable i n patterning. M u s i c joins the similar, ceremony separates the different. The centralising by ceremony and music threads together men's hearts." (Hs 20/33f, tr. W117).

Theory of naming Hsiin-tzu's practice of working out i n essay form all of what he sees as his main ideas makes his 'Correction of Names' the fullest and most easily intelligible of p r e - H a n writings on the relation between names and objects. It has close connexions w i t h the Canons, and may be seen as largely a digest of Later M o h i s t disputation for Confucian use. It starts by laying down standards for the correct use of names, as established by the later kings' w h o m he recognises as better documented than the earlier. 'As for the names established by the later kings, for names of punishments follow the Shang dynasty, for names of titles the C h o u , for cultural names the ceremonies, for the miscellaneous names applied to the

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myriad things follow what has been fixed ahead everywhere as the established custom of the Chinese peoples. A s for districts i n remote regions with different customs, let them go by these and accept them as current." (Hs 22/lf, tr. W139) Next come 14 definitions of miscellaneous names, half of w h i c h we have utilised already; they have the same place i n the essay as the 75 definitions w h i c h introduce the Canons. U s i n g a comparison between naming and measuring found also i n the Canons ("A name by what you are clear about corrects what y o u do not k n o w . . . . Like measuring an u n k n o w n length by a foot r u l e . " H s i i n - t z u declares that to use names differently f r o m established usage is like falsifying tallies and measures. "Hence hair-splitting wordings a n d invention of names on your o w n authority, to disorder correct names and put people i n doubt and confusion, multiplying argument and litigation between persons, are to be pronounced the worst of subversions, to be condemned like the crime of falsifying tallies and measures." W i t h the breakdown of C h o u , names are n o w i n confusion. "If a true king should arise, he w i l l certainly follow some of the old names and invent some new names. Consequently it is indispensable to scrutinise the purpose of having names, and the evidence for assimilating and differentiating, and the pivotal requirements for instituting names." The rest of the essay scrutinises the 'purpose', 'evidence' and 'pivotal requirements' i n turn, then classifies under them three kinds of fallacy resulting from different ways of manipulating names and objects. Two points w h i c h we have treated as implicit throughout Chinese philosophy show up especially clearly. O n e is the assumption that naming starts from dividing and classifying as similar or different, w h i c h H a n s e n connects with the affinity of Chinese nouns to the mass rather than the count nouns of Indo-European languages. The other is an absence of the fact/value distinction. Since we are already spontaneously reacting to things before dividing them up, a clarifying of the similarities and contrasts between the sage's reactions to them is assumed to be inseparable from his act of naming. A comparison w i t h the Canons shows that the purpose, evidence and pivotal requirements of n a m i n g correspond to the three Later Mohist branches of knowledge w h i c h concern names and objects, and that they are treated i n the same sequence as i n the Canons. The essay has one more section, on the weighing of benefit and harm; it seems irrelevant to the rest until one sees that it corresponds w i t h the one remaining Mohist discipline, k n o w i n g h o w to act. 34

35

The purpose of having names

Fallacies Disordering names by confusion in operating with names

Mohist Disciplines Knowing how to connect names with objects (discourse)

The evidence for assimilating and differentiating

Disordering names by confusion in operating with objects

Knowing objects (the sciences)

The pivotal requirements for instituting names

Disordering objects by confusion in operating with names

Knowing names (argumentation)

(1) The purpose of having names H s i i n - t z u like the Later Mohists thinks of objects as concrete bits of stuff; the function of names is to 'point them out' from each other, by assimilating them to and differentiating them from other objects. The verb chih 'point out' is the one nominalised by K u n g - s u n L u n g i n his 'Pointings and Things'. " W h e n w i t h differences i n expression and divergence i n thought we communicate w i t h each other, a n d different things are obscurely confounded i n name or as objects, the noble and the base w i l l not be clarified, the same and the different w i l l not be distinguished; i n such cases intent will inevitably be hampered by failure to communicate, and action will inevitably suffer from frustration a n d obstruction. Therefore the wise made for them apportionments a n d distinctions and instituted names to point out objects, i n the first place i n order to clarify noble and base, secondly to distinguish same a n d different. W h e n noble and base are clarified, and same and different distinguished, intent is not hampered by failure to communicate a n d action does not suffer from frustration a n d obstruction. This is the purpose of having names." The purpose of names, then, is to show u p clearly the similar and the different, particularly i n grades of value ('noble and base'). Even if there are no errors of fact or logic, w h i c h belong to the next two categories, there may be the mistake of n a m i n g inconsistently. The Later M o h i s t art of consistent description is the one we label 'discourse', w h i c h appears i n its final form i n the fragmentary essay Names and Objects. That this is what H s i i n - t z u is talking about here becomes clear w h e n he proceeds to list the corresponding fallacies. A c c o r d i n g to Names and Objects one has to distinguish types of sentence a n d decide before describing something which type is applicable (which alternative 'proceeds' from a sentence to others of the same type). Thus one may be tempted to say 'Killing robbers

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is killing people', assimilating to ' R i d i n g white horses is riding horses'; but on closer inspection it turns out that ' K i l l i n g robbers is not killing people' ('killing people' being understood as murder), parallel w i t h ' L o v i n g her younger brother is not loving a handsome m a n ' . H s i i n - t z u uses the same example, but takes the common-sense view that the alternative w h i c h 'proceeds' is the one parallel w i t h ' R i d i n g white horses is riding horses'. '"To be insulted is not disgraceful', 'The sage has no concern for h i m s e l f , ' K i l l i n g robbers is not killing people', these are cases of disordering names by confusion i n operating w i t h names. It you test them by the purpose of having names, and observe w h i c h alternative proceeds, you w i l l be able to exclude them f r o m consideration." The second of the fallacies is u n k n o w n , but 'To be insulted is not disgraceful' is the thesis of Sung H s i n g w h i c h H s i i n - t z u criticised elsewhere on the grounds that it confuses moral w i t h social disgrace. 36

(2) The evidence for assimilating and differentiating " O n what evidence then does one assimilate and differentiate? O n the evidence of the senses. For whatever is the same i n k i n d and the same i n essentials (ch'ing), the representation of a thing by the senses is the same; therefore having compared them we find them similar and mistakable for each other a n d treat them as interchangeable; this is w h y we agree to fix them ahead by using a conventional name for them generally. Shape, parts, colour, and pattern are differentiated by the eye; the distinct sounds of voice or instrument, clear or thick, soft or loud,by the ear; the distinct tastes, sweet, bitter, salty, m i l d , acrid, sour, by the mouth; the distinct smells of savoury or putrid food, fragrant or rotting herbs, of p i g , dog, horse, and ox, by the nose; pains a n d itches, cold and hot, smooth and rough, light and heavy, by the parts of the body; explanations and reasons, pleasure i n a n d anger against, sadness and joy, love, hate and desire, by the heart. The heart has the knowledge w h i c h specifies what they are. W i t h the knowledge w h i c h specifies, it is possible on the evidence of the ear to k n o w sounds, on the evidence of the eye to k n o w shapes. However for the knowledge w h i c h specifies to be possible necessarily requires the senses to coincide w i t h them i n their kinds. If w i t h the five senses i n touch with them y o u do not know, or w i t h the heart specifying them y o u cannot explain why, no one w i l l fail to say that you do not know. This is the evidence for assimilating and differentiating." This corresponds to the M o h i s t knowledge of objects, and as i n the

Canons it is recognised that knowledge is not attained through the five senses a l o n e . A g a i n H s i i n - t z u lists three fallacies belonging to the category, errors due to defying the evidence of the senses. " ' M o u n t a i n s and abysses are level', 'The essential desires are few , 'Fine meats do not make tastier, nor the music of the great bell more joyful', these are cases of disordering names by confusion i n operating with objects. If y o u test them by the evidence for assimilating and differentiating and observe w h i c h accords, you will be able to exclude them from consideration." H s i i n - t z u elsewhere objects to Sung Hsing's 'The essential desires are few' that it is a matter of simple fact that the senses arouse a multitude of desires. The third thesis is unattested, but his answer to the thesis of H u i Shih w h i c h he quotes here and elsewhere as 'Mountains and abysses are l e v e l ' w o u l d no doubt be that however subtle the argument anyone can see that mountains are higher. 37

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(3) The pivotal requirements for instituting names H a v i n g explained how the senses and the heart assimilate and differentiate objects, H s i i n - t z u continues with the n a m i n g of the similar by the same name. This is essentially the Later M o h i s t position (in Western terms, N o m i n a l i s m not Realism), but he has more to say about the overlapping and varying generality of names, and of their origin i n convention. " O n l y then do we proceed to name them, if they are similar similarly, if different differently. If a single name is enough to communicate, make it single; if not, combine. If the single is nowhere i n conflict with the combined, it is the more general; but general though it is, there is no harm in it. K n o w i n g that different objects have different names, and therefore causing every different object to have a different name, so that they cannot be disordered, w o u l d be no better than causing all different objects to have the same name. Hence although the m y r i a d things are so numerous there are times w h e n we w i s h to refer to them overall, so call them 'things'. 'Thing' is the name of broadest generality; in pushing generalisation further, beyond the general is the more general, and only at the point where there is nothing more general do we stop. There are times when we wish to refer to some rather than others, so call them 'birds' or 'animals'. 'Bird' and 'animal' are the names of broadest distinction; i n pushing distinction further, there is distinction w i t h i n distinction, and only at the point where there is no further distinction do we stop.

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"Names have no inherent appropriateness, we name by convention; when the convention is fixed and the custom established, we call them appropriate, and what differs f r o m the convention we call inappropriate. N o object belongs inherently to a name, we name by convention, and when the convention is fixed and the custom established, we call it the object's name. Names do have inherent goodness; w h e n straightforward, easy and not inconsistent, we call them good names." That as i n the Later M o h i s t dialectic 'objects' (shih "ff") are concrete and particular, i n contrast w i t h 'things' (wu $b )/ used generally, is especially clear i n the next paragraph. "There are things w i t h the same characteristics but different i n place, and things w i t h different characteristics but the same i n place; they are to be distinguished. Those deemed different i n place though the same i n characteristics, though joinable are to be called two objects. Those deemed different i n that the characteristics have altered without division of the object are called transformed; what has transformation without division is called one object. This is h o w i n affairs we test objects and fix number. These are the pivotal requirements for instituting names." This third category corresponds to the M o h i s t k n o w i n g of names, w h i c h is the sphere of logical inference. Two of the three fallacies i n this class are unattested elsewhere and doubtfully intelligible; but it is plain that this is the one category i n w h i c h fallacies are to be refuted logically. " 'You introduce yourself by what is not your name (?)', 'The pillar has the ox (?)', 'A horse is not a horse', these are cases of disordering objects by confusion i n operating w i t h names. If y o u test them by the convention for the name, and use the accepted to refute the rejected, you will be able to exclude them from consideration." A horse is not a horse' is evidently K u n g - s u n Lung's 'A white horse is not a horse'. H s u n - t z u no doubt agrees w i t h K ' u n g C h ' u a n that the objection to this sophism is simply that 'horse' is more general than 'white horse'. It w o u l d be a perfect instance of his observation under this category that a single name ('horse') is more general than a combination including it ('white horse') but if they are fully compatible may be applied to the same object. It may be noticed that this thesis is seen as factually wrong ('disordering objects') but ' K i l l i n g robbers is not killing people' merely as confused description ('disordering names'). This difference i n classification makes sense since the latter thesis, even for the Mohists w h o defended it, d i d not alter the fact that 'Robbers are people'. The parallelism of the three categories w o u l d have led us to expect the test here to be by the 'pivotal requirements for instituting names'. Instead 40

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it is by a sub-class of that, the 'convention for the name', from w h i c h one infers by "using the accepted to refute the rejected." The Mohist inference through chains of definitions w o u l d fit well into this description. H s i i n tzu like the Later Mohists has no deductive forms like the syllogism, but does mark off deductive inference as a separate type of thinking. Under the enlightened rulers of the past there was no need for explanation or argumentation because the gentleman was i n power and could enforce correct policies by punishment. U n h a p p i l y this is no longer the case. " N o w the sage kings are gone, the world is disordered, wicked doctrines arise, and the gentleman has no power w i t h w h i c h to oversee them or punishments w i t h w h i c h to forbid them, so argues out alternatives and explains. O n l y w h e n the object is not communicated does one name, only w h e n n a m i n g fails to communicate does one fix ahead, only when fixing ahead fails to communicate does one explain, only when explanation fails to communicate does one argue over alternatives." The term ch'i J$ 'fix ahead' (used primarily of fixing a date') appears widely i n the literature of d i s p u t a t i o n , apparently of concurring beforehand on the use of a name i n debate, presumably by an agreed definition. A s for the sentence, H s i i n - t z u has little to say about it, and it remains unclear whether he sees it as more than a string of names. "Objects being communicated w h e n the names are heard is the use of names. Enchaining to make a text is the l i n k i n g of names. W h e n uses and links are both grasped one is said to k n o w the name. A 'name' is the means to fix ahead the enchained objects. A 'sentence' is a combination of the names of different objects i n order to sort out a single idea." 41

3. LEGALISM: AN AMORAL SCIENCE OF STATECRAFT D u r i n g the 3rd century B . C . , as the intensifying struggle between the states approached its final crisis, rulers were hardly pretending any longer to listen to the moralising of Confucians and Mohists, they preferred more practical teachers of statecraft. Except for the books of H a n Fei (died 233 B . C . ) , the greatest of them, and of a predecessor the Chi-hsia academician Shen Tao (fl. 310 B . C . ) of w h o m only fragments survive, the writings on statecraft carry the names of famous ministers i n certain of the states: Kuan-tzu (Kuan C h u n g , chief minister i n C h ' i , died 645 B . C . ) , the lost Litzu (Li K ' u e i , chief minister of M a r q u i s W e n [424-387 B . C ] of Wei), Shang-

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tzu (Lord Shang, chief minister of C h ' i n , died 338 B . C ) , and the book of Shen Pu-hai (chief minister i n H a n , died 337 B . C . ) , another of w h i c h only fragments survive. Of these the two w h i c h we possess complete are much later than their supposed authors. Kuan-tzu is a miscellany of writings from the 4th, 3rd, and 2nd centuries B . C ; the chapters of Shang-tzu datable by historical references come from about 240 B . C . Presumably it was the convention for a state to ascribe its tradition of political thought to one of its chief ministers. In the early H a n w h e n Ssu-ma T'an classified the philosophers under his Six Schools he grouped the teachers of realistic statecraft under a 'School of L a w ' (Fa chia), for w h i c h the current English abbreviation is 'Legalists'. A l l these books have come to be k n o w n as Legalist, even the very heterogeneous Kuan-tzu, classed as Taoist i n the H a n bibliography. Law is not however the central concept of all of them. H a n Fei sees Lord Shang's thought as centred o n law but Shen Pu-hai's on 'methods' (shu #f ), techniques for controlling administrators, a distinction born out by Shang-tzu and the remains of Shen Pu-hai; he himself declares law and method both indispensable. Elsewhere he mentions Shen Tao as giving central importance to the power-base (shih ^ ) ; some take this as evidence of a third tendency preferring the power-base to law. However, law is prominent i n the Shen Tao fragments, and H s i i n - t z u (who seems not to k n o w Shang-tzu), associates law primarily w i t h Shen Tao and names Shen Pu-hai as doctrinaire of the power-base. N o doubt the relative importance of law, method, and power-base for the different thinkers was a matter of emphasis. But they do have common ground i n the conviction that good government depends, not as Confucians a n d Mohists supposed on the moral worth of persons, but on the functioning of sound institutions. O n l y Kuan-tzu gives both morality and law places i n the organisation of the state, i n proportions not very different from the Confucian Hsiin-tzu's. The great synthesiser of Legalism is H a n Fei, and the simplest approach to his rather shadowy predecessors is through the issues on w h i c h he argues for or against them. According to Ssu-ma Ch'ien's biography, H a n Fei belonged to the ruling family i n the state of H a n , and studied under H s i i n - t z u w i t h L i Ssu, w h o was later to be chief minister i n C h ' i n . U n l i k e the teachers of other schools, w h o (with the remarkable exception of H u i Shih) seldom got w i t h i n sight of high office, H a n Fei d i d in the last year of his life find access to the scene of real politics. H e had failed to w i n employment i n H a n , but his writings attracted the attention 1

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of the K i n g of C h ' i n w h o was to become First Emperor. In 234 B . C . he was sent as H a n envoy to C h ' i n , where he was at once slandered by his old fellow-student the minister L i Ssu. He was imprisoned and accepted the proffered option of suicide i n 233 B . C . H e was nonetheless the most immediately relevant to his times of all Chinese thinkers, the theoretician of the policies by w h i c h the First Emperor and L i Ssu united C h i n a and laid the foundations of the bureaucratised empire w h i c h replaced C h o u feudalism. H i s personal fate, like that of Lord Shang (ripped to pieces by chariots i n 338 B . C . ) and L i Ssu (cut i n two at the waist i n 208 B . C . ) helps one to appreciate w h y Yangists and Taoists recommended the relative security of private life. The lengthy book Han Fei tzu raises the usual textual problems about how m u c h was actually written by H a n Fei, but most of it is homogeneous i n thought and unlikely to be m u c h later than his time. H o w old is the Legalist tradition? A s i n intellectual history generally, in C h i n a or elsewhere, chronological sequences are to a great extent imposed by ourselves for convenience. Legalism comes into the open towards the end of the classical period, but something like it must have long existed as an arcanum of government. Ever since centralisation and bureaucratisation began, statesmen w o u l d have been thinking more i n the style of H a n Fei than of Confucius. However there is more i n Legalism than a cynicism w h i c h , w i t h the intensification of struggle, drops its last disguises. These are political philosophers, the first i n C h i n a to start not from how society ought to be but how it is. H a n Fei has often been compared w i t h Machiavelli, but as Schwartz observes Machiavelli taught an art rather than a science of politics while the Legalists "seem closer i n spirit to certain 19th- and 20th-century social-scientific 'model builders' " . Since we are accustomed to think of the social sciences as late and perhaps questionable attempts to extend to h u m a n behaviour approaches first developed i n astronomy and physics this may seem a surprising claim; how w o u l d thinkers 'proto-scientific' elsewhere become 'scientific' i n politics? But it is perhaps not so remarkable i n a supremely man-centred and politically oriented culture, inclined to causal thinking only w h e n it promises immediately useful results. To quote Schwartz again, "we may find i n C h i n a more anticipations of contemporary Western social sciences than of the natural sciences", and i n spite of M a x Weber's claim that Chinese bureaucracy remained patrimonial, "however rudimentary its details, Shen Pu-hai's 'model' of bureaucratic organisation is much closer to Weber's modern ideal-type than to any notion of patrimonial bureaucracy," m u c h closer than anything i n Greco-Roman thought. 6

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Adapting to change The Book of the Lord Shang or Shang-tzu opens w i t h a debate i n the presence of D u k e Hsiao of C h ' i n (361-338 B.C.) to "consider the changes i n the affairs of the age, inquire into the basis for correcting standards, seek the Way to employ the people." This dialogue, a highly literary fiction i n a stilted parallelistic style i n w h i c h K u n g - s u n Yang (Lord Shang) persuades the Duke to change w i t h the times, is the classic statement of the Legalist attitude to antiquity. The D u k e , supported by his grandees K a n L u n g and Tu C h i h , is afraid that the world will criticise h i m if he alters the li 'ceremonies, conventions' and fa 'standards, laws' handed d o w n from the past. These are words of w h i c h we generally translate li i n Confucian contexts by 'ceremony' and fa i n Legalist b y 'law'. We are here however at a stage i n terminological change where we shall have to take liberties, as when we used 'nobility' for jen at the transitional stage represented by Confucius. For Legalists the li have no significance except as the customs current at the time (Shen Tao says explicitly "For the li follow custom" ), and i n this dialogue we translate it 'convention'. A s for fa, it is the old word for a model or standard for imitation, n o w assuming a specialised sense as the standards enforced b y punishments, so laws. In this dialogue we continue to translate it 'standard'. Lord Shang enters the debate i n answer to the conservatism of K a n Lung. " ' Y o u are saying what vulgar o p i n i o n says. O r d i n a r y people stay content w i t h the familiar, scholars remain immersed i n the second-hand. These are both the sort one uses to fill offices and uphold the standard [ = law], not the sort one consults w h e n going outside the standard. The Three Dynasties reigned b y dissimilar conventions [ = ceremonies], the Five Overlords lorded b y dissimilar standards. Hence the wise invent the standards b y w h i c h the foolish are curbed, the worthy reform the conventions by w h i c h the inadequate are constrained. It is pointless to speak of affairs w i t h m e n constrained b y convention, or to discuss the altered w i t h men curbed by the standard. Have no more doubts, m y lord.' " 'I have heard', said Tu C h i h , 'that unless benefit is hundredfold one does not alter a standard, unless results are tenfold one does not replace a tool. I have heard that if y o u take antiquity as standard there w i l l be no mistake, if you conform to convention there w i l l be no deviation. M y lord, think about that.' 9

" K u n g - s u n Yang (Lord Shang) said: 'Former generations did not share the same doctrines; w h i c h antiquity shall we take as standard? The Emperors and Kings d i d not repeat each other; to w h i c h convention shall

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we conform? Fu-hsi and Shen-nung taught and d i d not punish; the Yellow Emperor, Yao and S h u n punished but spared the families of the condemned. C o m i n g d o w n to Kings Wen and W u , each established standards fitted to the times, instituted conventions as affairs prompted them. Since conventions a n d standards were fixed according to the times, restrictions and commands were appropriate to the circumstances, and armaments a n d equipment each convenient for its purpose. I say then that there is more than one Way to b r i n g order to one's generation, and to do what is best for the state one does not have to take antiquity as standard. T'ang and W u rose to kingship without following antiquity, Y i n and H s i a fell to r u i n without change of conventions. Consequently, rejection of antiquity is not necessarily to be condemned, and conformity to convention does not deserve to be made m u c h of. Have no more doubts, m y l o r d . ' " (Shang-tzu [ch. 1] K a o l 6 f , tr. D170-73) The denial that ancient authority is necessarily relevant to changing times is by this period c o m m o n to Legalists, Taoists, Later Mohists, syncretists, to everyone except Confucians; on the other hand it does not stop even Legalists f r o m occasionally falling into the convention of ascribing their o w n doctrines to the former kings. But Shang-tzu and Han Fei tzu are unique i n seeking a root historical cause of changing conditions, w h i c h they find i n population growth. The Mohists, and H s i i n - t z u also, had assumed that the benevolent and the right prevail only under sagely government and that nothing preceded the origin of the state except a primaeval war of all against all. Shang-tzu instead presents a scheme of three historical periods; men are united at first by blood ties ('sticking to kin'), then by moral persuasion ('elevating worth'), finally by government ('honouring rank'), the first two breaking d o w n w h e n increase of population leads to competition. " W h e n Heaven and earth were established m a n k i n d was born. A t this time people knew their mothers but d i d not k n o w their fathers. Their Way was to stick to k i n and be selfish i n their concerns. Sticking to k i n they diverged, being selfish i n their concerns they were insecure. The population multiplied, and since their aims led to divergence and instability the people fell into disorder. "At this time people aimed to conquer and settled issues by force. A i m i n g to conquer led to contention, settling issues by force to accusation. W i t h nothing to judge the correctness of accusations, no one could live out his life. Therefore m e n of worth established the unprejudiced and correct, instituted the unselfish, and the people delighted i n benevolence. A t this time, sticking to k i n was abandoned for elevating worth.

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"The benevolent always take concern for others as their aim, but the worthy make it their Way to excel each other. The people multiplied, with nothing to control them; and w h e n m a k i n g it their Way to excel each other had been going on for a long time they again fell into disorder. Therefore the sages w h o came next originated divisions between lands, between properties, and between m a n and w o m a n . Portions being fixed were unenforceable without controls, so they established prohibitions. The prohibitions being established were unenforceable w i t h no one i n charge of them, so they established officials. The officials being installed were insufficient w i t h no one to u n i f y them, so they established a ruler. W h e n they established a ruler, elevating worth was abandoned for honouring rank. "In the remotest ages, then, they stuck to k i n and were selfish i n their concerns; i n the m i d d l e ages they elevated worth and delighted i n benevolence; i n recent ages they have honoured rank and dignified officials." (Shang-tzu [ch. 7] K a o 73f, tr. D 225f) Since H a n Fei and L i Ssu studied under H s i i n - t z u it is often assumed that Legalism inherits Hsiin-tzu's doctrine of the badness of h u m a n nature. Certainly it sees the people of the age as ruthlessly selfish and responsive only to the hope of reward and fear of punishment. However, the goodness or badness of h u m a n nature is a purely Confucian issue. The Legalists think of h u m a n behaviour not i n genetic but i n sociological terms. The 'Extravagance' chapter of Kuan-tzu, acknowledging that punishment was unnecessary w i t h the more abundant resources of ancient times, says explicitly: "It is not a matter of man's nature, but of poverty."* Indeed the Legalists freely acknowledge, w h i c h no Confucian does, that an underpopulated society can be held together by moral ties without any government at all. We have noticed elsewhere that Shang-tzu accepts the historicity of the G o l d e n A g e of Shen-nung (presumably i n its "middle ages"), an acceptance perhaps encouraged by experience of the homogeneity of small tribal populations on the edges of the great states. It sees the change f r o m voluntary co-operation i n the small community to subjection by force i n the great state neither as degeneration (as do Taoists and the Yangist author of 'Robber Chih'), nor as progress, simply as adaptation to changing conditions. H a n Fei has a similar view of history, w i t h the growth of population seen i n Malthusian fashion as a geometrical progression. 10

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"In ancient times the men d i d not plough, because the fruit of herbs and trees was sufficient for food; the w o m e n d i d not weave, because the skins of animals were sufficient for clothes. Provision was adequate without the effort of work, there was a small population with excess of resources; consequently people d i d not compete. This is w h y the people were orderly of their o w n accord without the bestowing of rich rewards or infliction of heavy punishments. Nowadays it is not exceptional for a man to have five children, the children i n their turn have five children, and before the grandfather dies he has 25 grandchildren. This is w h y there is a numerous population w i t h sparse resources, work is laborious and provision scanty; therefore people compete, and even by doubling rewards and multiplying punishments there is no escape from disorder. . . . It follows that the generosity w i t h resources i n ancient times was not benevolence, it was because resources were ample; the competition and robbery of today is not dishonesty, it is because resources are sparse." (HF [ch. 49] C h ' e n 1040f, tr. Liao 2/276f) H a n Fei objects to ancient authority, not only that times change, but that historical evidence is uncertain. The eight Confucian and three Mohist sects all give different versions of the teaching of the Three Dynasties they profess to follow. "It being some seven h u n d r e d years since the foundation of C h o u , some two thousand years since the foundation of H s i a , they are unable to fix w h i c h is the genuine Confucianism or M o h i s m ; if now you wish to inquire into the Way of Yao and S h u n three thousand years ago, may I suggest that one can hardly be certain of it? To be certain of it without evidence is foolishness, to appeal to it though unable to be certain of it is fraud." (HF [ch. 50] C h ' e n 1080, tr. Liao 2/299)

Standards and laws The term fa 'standard' first attracted our attention i n the Canons, where the instance is u s i n g the idea of a circle, another circle or the compasses as the standard for identifying a circle. Outside logical contexts the fa is more usually a standard or exemplar to be imitated in action, but still characteristically illustrated from geometrical instruments. Thus Mencius tells us that the craftsman's clear eye and skill of hand and the ruler's benevolent heart w i l l not achieve effective results without the aid of standards, the carpenter's compasses and L-square, the benevolent government of the sage kings to be taken as models. "Hence it is said, 'Goodness alone is insufficient for governing, standards alone 12

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cannot work of themselves'." The comprehensiveness of the term may be illustrated by the essay 'Seven Standards' i n Kuan-tzu, w h i c h is of great interest as presenting what amounts to a total categorisation of the knowledge required by the ruler. It uses fa generally of all seven but also specifically of N o . 3 (we introduce the numbers for convenience). "[1.] What are rooted i n the ch'i of Heaven and earth, i n the harmonising of cold and hot, the natures of water and soil, the life of man, birds, animals, plants and trees, w h i c h though things are so many belong equally to all of them a n d never alter, are called 'principles (tse |Jij)'. [2.] Exemplar, name, the timely, the resembling, the k i n d , the comparable, the characteristics, are called 'models (hsiang ||L )'. [3.] Foot and i n c h , the carpenter's ink and line, compasses and L-square, the scales, the volume measures and the grain leveler, are called 'standards (fa)'. [4.] Imbuing, rearing, wearing away, prolonging, taming, habituating, are called 'transformings'. [5.] G i v i n g to or taking f r o m , endangering or securing, benefiting or harming, m a k i n g difficult or easy, opening or closing, killing or giving life, are called 'incentives and deterrents'. [6.] Being genuine and sincere, being generous and bountiful, measuring and likening-to-oneself (shu), are called 'the methods of the heart'. [7.] Consistencies, weights, sizes, densities, distances, quantities, are called 'statistics'." (Kz ch. 6, l/22f, tr. R G 128f) Of these items N o . 1 has attracted attention for its bearing on the question of whether the concept of laws of nature appears i n Chinese thought. Tse, like other words for n o r m , rule or principle, tends to be used without any 'is/ought' distinction between those w h i c h physical phenomena do follow and those w h i c h m a n should follow. Here it does seem that w i t h the establishing of the split between Heaven and m a n , tse is being reserved for the sphere of the former. There is certainly a recognition at this period that physical principles are independent of moral; and i n that it is the former w h i c h are 'decreed' (ming) by Heaven, there is even something i n common w i t h the metaphorical structure of our 'laws of nature' conceived after the analogy of laws ordained by a divine ruler. In the 'Seven Standards' tse are constants i n the objective conditions w i t h w h i c h man has to deal. "If without being clear about the principles you w i s h to position exemplars and demarcate controls, it w i l l be like estimating east and west from a rotating potter's wheel, or w i s h i n g to hold the tip steady while you are shaking the r o d . " 13

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The models (hsiang) of N o . 2 correspond roughly w i t h the standards of the Canons, by comparison w i t h w h i c h one decides what the object is. But they are seen purely from the viewpoint of the administrator, w h o if ignorant of people's qualities w i l l fit them into the w r o n g jobs. "If without being clear about the models you w i s h to sort out talents and become aware of h o w to employ them, it w i l l be like cutting off the long to make it short, or a d d i n g to the short to make it long." N o . 3, the standards i n the narrowest sense, include compasses and L-square; they are the instruments and measures specifically designed for exact comparison by w h i c h to fix universally accepted figures or measurements. The unification of weights and measures throughout the Empire was soon to be a prominent item i n the C h ' i n unification of fa. Nos. 4 through 6 are methods taken as standard, for transforming or reforming the people, correcting by reward and punishment, and training the ruler. The last ('methods of the heart') is one of the elements i n the Kuan-tzu statecraft w h i c h is foreign to classic Legalism, and we shall not be meeting it again. Finally, N o . 7 are the statistics already proving indispensable w i t h the increasing complexity of states. The state bureaucracies were coming to see things as manageable to the extent that they were countable and measurable. The essential novelty of the Legalist position is i n its repudiation of an assumption expressed almost i n the same words by Mencius and by H s i i n - t z u , that "Fa alone cannot work by itself". If standards are fully formulated they can work automatically; the ruler has simply to compare a man's act w i t h the w o r d i n g of the standard, and respond with the reward or punishment laid d o w n for it, without being swayed either by benevolent or by selfish considerations. W i t h the characteristic Chinese tendency to think i n pairs, reward and punishment are seen as parallel, although it is the standards enforced by punishment (what for us is penal law) w h i c h get fully codified. The scope of fa thus contracts towards what in Western terms is law; but even among those classed as Legalists it can include, for example, methods of regulating the bureaucracy. "The ruler must have clear standards and correct exemplars, as though letting the scales hang to weigh light and heavy, as the means to u n i f y the team of ministers." (Shen Pu-hai 3) The old metaphors of compass and L-square assume enormous significance i n Legalism, and above all the metaphor of the scales; they illustrate the mechanical precision and objectivity of the law. "The scales are the means of finding the number for a weight. That i n spite of everything people do not try to influence them is not because at heart they don't want profit; the counterpoise is unable for their sakes to 15

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increase or decrease its number, the beam is unable for their sakes to estimate as lighter or heavier. M e n don't try to influence the scales because they k n o w it w o u l d be useless. So w h e n there is a clear-sighted ruler on the throne officials have no opportunity to bend the law, magistrates have no opportunity to practice partiality. The people k n o w it w o u l d be useless to try to influence the magistrates, so bribes are not passed to the magistrates; the scales stand level and correct waiting for the load, so traitors and tricksters have no opportunity to get decisions partial to themselves." (Kz [ch. 67] 3/55) The conception of the standard enforced by punishment as the basis of political order must have been developing gradually among practical statesmen from the first appearance of public codes of punishment i n the 6th century B . C . It can be seen from the accounts i n the Tso Commentary that the publication of codes was a decisive step i n the bureaucratisation of the states, highly controversial, and widely felt to violate the old personto-person relations of feudalism. In 536 B . C . Tzu-ch'an, chief minister of Cheng, inscribed a code of punishments on metal. A critic, Shu Hsiang, objected that the former kings maintained order by instilling the benevolent and the right, choosing wise and loyal officials and severely punishing crimes, but without publicly formulated laws, w h i c h can only lead to litigation. "If the people k n o w about the statutes, they w i l l not be i n awe of their superiors, they w i l l all have contentious hearts, testing by what is written d o w n , taking any opportunity to w i n their o w n way; it w i l l be impossible to deal w i t h t h e m . " In 513 B . C . the ruler of C h i n "levied from the state of C h i n one ku of iron, i n order to smelt a punishment tripod and make public the code of punishments written by Fan H s i i a n - t z u " (this by the way is the earliest reference to iron i n Chinese literature). The Tso Commentary records the horror of Confucius himself that matters w h i c h should be settled i n private by the noble class according to their family traditions are now to be judged by impersonal laws exposed to the sight of a l l . The accusation that law undermines the differences between noble and mean has a very definite meaning w h e n it comes to Legalism; against the general practice i n C h i n a both before and since, the Legalists treated all below the ruler as equal before the law. Soon after the fall of the C h ' i n dynasty one of the Confucian C h i a Yi's m a i n objections to the tyranny of its Legalist policies was that the people lose respect for their betters unless gentlemen are permitted suicide instead of execution, and are exempt from bonds, beating, a n d m u t i l a t i o n . L o r d Shang as chief minister of 16

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C h ' i n is said to have refused i n principle to spare even the C r o w n Prince, and to have solved the problem of how to deny h i m exemption without actually punishing h i m by p u n i s h i n g his tutor instead. The book ascribed to h i m affirms this u n d e v i a t i n g rule i n the essay 'Rewards a n d Punishments'. "What I mean b y ' u n i f y i n g punishment' is that for punishment there are no differences of rank. F r o m ministers and generals d o w n to officers and commoners any w h o disobeys the royal command, defies the state prohibitions, disrupts controls f r o m above, is condemned to death without reprieve. O n e does not reduce the punishment for the sake of credit for deeds before his lapse, nor leave the law unapplied for the sake of good conduct before he erred. Loyal ministers and filial sons are judged without fail according to the extent of their error." (Shang-tzu [ch. 17] Kao 130, tr. D278f) "Law does not flatter the noble, the carpenter's line does not bend w i t h the crooked. What law imposes the wise are unable to refuse, the brave do not dare to contest. Punishment of error does not avoid the great ministers, reward for good does not overlook commoners." (HF [ch. 6] C h ' e n 88, tr. W 28) H a n Fei argues from m a n y directions that harsh law is more effective than benevolence or honesty i n benefiting the people. Few people, even the paragons Tseng and S h i h , can be trusted to remain honest when they can get away w i t h it: "If you lay out cheap goods i n a dark corner, even Tseng a n d Shih would be under suspicion; if y o u hang u p a hundred i n gold i n the marketplace, even the greatest thief w o u l d not take it. The difference is in whether it w i l l be k n o w n ; therefore w h e n a clear-sighted ruler governs a state he has many to police it, comes d o w n heavily on crime, and ensures that people are forbidden b y law rather than restrained by honesty." (HF [ch. 46] C h ' e n 950, tr. Liao 2/241) People's concern for each other, on w h i c h Confucians and Mohists depend, is a weak motive even at its most intense as family love. "The mother's love for the son is twice the father's, but the father's orders to the son are ten times more effective than the mother's. The magistrate has no love for the people at all, but his orders to the people are a myriad times more effective than their fathers'." (HF [ch. 46] C h ' e n 950, tr. Liao 2/241) Policies motivated b y benevolence do good only on the short r u n . " N o w of families m a k i n g a livelihood, if here they are callous about each other's hunger a n d cold, a n d force each other to work hard, the

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family w h i c h even if they happen on the troubles of military occupation or the hardships of famine w i l l have w a r m clothes and fine food is sure to be this one; if there they clothe and feed each other out of pity and let each other idle out of kindness, the family w h i c h i n the famine of a bad year marries off the wife and sells the children into slavery is sure to be that one. Therefore the Way proper to the law is to be harsh at first but beneficial i n the long run; the Way proper to benevolence is to be indulgent in the short r u n but afterwards r u n out of resources. The sage weighs light against heavy and extracts the most beneficial, so he employs the callousness of the law a n d rejects the pity of the benevolent man." (HF [ch. 46] C h ' e n 950, tr. Liao 2/242)

The debate over power, morality and law The Legalist orders the state not by moral appeals but by fitting the T w o Handles', reward and punishment, to the likes and dislikes w h i c h belong to man's ch'ing, what he essentially is. A Legalist digest called the 'Eight Canons' puts it succinctly at the start. "In ordering the Empire one must always take as basis what is essential i n m a n . What is essential i n m a n is to have likes and dislikes, w h i c h is w h y reward and punishment are effective. Once they are effective, prohibitions and commands can be established and the Way of Order is complete. The ruler grasps the Handles and occupies the powerbase, and so his orders are carried out and his prohibitions deter. The Handles are the controls for killing and giving life; the power-base is the requisite for conquering the multitude." (HF [ch. 48] C h ' e n 996, tr. Liao 2/258) The image of water tending downwards, w h i c h Mencius used of man's natural proneness to g o o d is put to characteristically Legalist effect i n Shang-tzu: "The people are to benefit as water is to going downwards; they will take one direction as easily as another. What, simply to get benefit from it, the people w i l l do depends on what the ruler w i l l be giving them." (Shangtzu [ch. 23] Kao 171, tr. D 316) One chapter i n Han Fei tzu, 'Objections to the Primacy of the Powerbase', presents a three-sided discussion of the relation between power, morality and law. It starts w i t h a quotation from Shen Tao on the ineffectiveness of moral influence w h i c h is not backed by a 'power-base' (shih , a situation of strength, or on occasion weakness, i n relation to circumstances, for example strategic position on the battlefield). Shen Tao 19

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is then criticised at length b y a moralist, apparently a Confucian of the school of H s i i n - t z u . Since H a n Fei studied under H s i i n - t z u , w h o frequently mentions Shen Tao among rival thinkers (although not on the issue of power), one may guess that H a n Fei is here m a k i n g his reckoning with his old master's defence of morality i n politics. The essay concludes with H a n Fei's case, that what is missing i n Shen Tao's doctrine of power is not morality but law. "Shen Tao says: 'If the flying dragon rides the clouds and the soaring serpent floats i n the mist, yet w h e n cloud or mist dissolves they might as well be earthworms or ants, it is because they have lost what they were riding. W h e n men of w o r t h are crushed by the unworthy, it is because their p u l l is light and position lowly; w h e n the unworthy are reduced to submitting to them, it is because their p u l l is heavy and position high. Yao as a commoner couldn't rule three m e n , yet C h i e h as Emperor could ruin the world; by this I k n o w the dependability of power and position, the unenviability of worthiness and w i s d o m . That an arrow flies h i g h from a weak crossbow is because it is driven u p by the w i n d ; that the orders of the personally unworthy are executed is because they have the multitude to help them. W h e n Yao was teaching among menials the people would not listen; w h e n the time came that he reigned over the world f r o m the southfacing throne his orders were executed, his prohibitions deterred. Judging by this, worthiness and w i s d o m are not enough to w i n submission from the multitude, while power and position are all you need to crush the worthy." (HF [ch. 40] C h ' e n 886, tr. Liao 2/199) The Confucian answers that although the dragon depends on support by the cloud, the fact that he can ride it while the earthworm cannot is because of the superior qualities of the dragon. Similarly it is because Yao is morally superior to C h i e h that w h e n i n power he brings order to the state while C h i e h disorders it. The power-base is like the horses and chariot w h i c h the great Wang L i a n g can drive a thousand miles i n a day, but w h i c h a slave cannot handle without making himself a laughingstock. The great problem is that power i n the w r o n g hands is positively dangerous, but the virtuous w h o can use it rightly are the minority. It is here that this speaker most reminds us of H s i i n - t z u , for he assumes that human nature is bad. "It is not that there is any ability i n the power-base itself to get itself invariably employed by the worthy rather than the unworthy. The world is ordered w h e n it is the worthy w h o are employing it, disordered w h e n it is the unworthy. It belongs to man's essential nature that the worthy are fewer than the unworthy, and the benefits of authority and power being

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available to unworthy m e n w h o disorder the age, it follows that those w h o use the power-base to disorder rather than order the world are the majority. The power-base is what facilitates and benefits the orderly and the disorderly alike. . . . Supposing that C h i e h and C h o u had been commoners, before they had taken the first step they w o u l d have been executed w i t h all their k i n . The power-base is the nurturer of the tigerish and wolfish heart and the accomplisher of tyrannical deeds. This is the world's greatest misfortune." Here we have what H a n Fei might well see as a fatal admission by his master H s u n - t z u ; if government depends on the moral worth of rulers, to admit that there w i l l be few good rulers condemns the world to almost uninterrupted misgovernment. H a n Fei now replies to both positions, w h i c h he sums u p as "judging the power-base all that is needed to put offices i n order" and "order necessarily depending on men of worth." H i s answer is that what matters is whether the power-base itself is fully ordered; if it is, it w i l l continue to impose orderly government throughout the Empire irrespective of the moral worth of the ruler. Both Shen Tao and the Confucian have been using shih 'power-base' i n its common sense of a natural position of advantage i n relation to others; but the strength of a throne depends on institutions made by man. "The power-base is something w i t h a single name but innumerable variations. If it necessarily derived from the spontaneous there w o u l d be no point i n talking about the power-base. W h e n I speak of the power-base it is of something instituted by man. N o w it is not that I deny what he says about there being order w h e n Yao a n d S h u n , and disorder w h e n C h i e h and C h o u , got the power-base; the point is that it was not something that a single m a n could institute. That w h e n a Yao or Shun is born and on the throne even ten Chiehs and Chous could not disrupt order is because the power-base w o u l d be ordered; and conversely if the throne were Chieh's or Chou's." For H a n Fei then political order depends not on power as such, and not on moral worth at all, but on the power-base itself being ordered, by which he means that it has settled a n d clearly defined laws rigorously enforced. H e continues w i t h a story w h i c h is the source of the later cliche mao-tun jff 'spear a n d shield', w h i c h i n due course became the standard word for 'contradiction'. "A m a n selling spears a n d shields was praising his shields as so hard that nothing could penetrate them. Immediately afterwards he said i n praise of his spears ' M y spears are so sharp they w i l l penetrate anything'. W h e n someone answered 'What if I penetrate your shield with your

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spear?' he was at a loss to answer. If y o u deem them as 'impenetrable shield' and a 'spear w h i c h penetrates anything', the two names cannot both be made to stand. That the Way of the Worthy may not be forbidden, yet it is the Way of Power to forbid anything, is a 'spear and shield' explanation. That worth and the power-base have no room for each other is plain enough." Here the folksy little story Lifts the argument to an unexpected level of abstraction. H a n Fei is saying that to conceive the state power as a 'spear which penetrates a n y t h i n g ' , entitled to forbid anything, is incompatible with treating morality as an 'impenetrable shield', w h i c h no power is entitled to forbid. To conceive Yao and S h u n as combining power with morality amounts to arming them w i t h both the shield and the spear. The issue is of course one w h i c h i n other forms arises i n Western political philosophy, at its simplest i n any clash between the authority of law and of a moral code by w h i c h one judges a law unjust. H a n Fei n o w takes u p the Confucian's admission that good government w h i c h depends o n good m e n , a permanent minority, w i l l be the exception rather than the rule, and shows that Legalism escapes this dilemma. "Moreover if a Yao or S h u n , a C h i e h or C h o u , appears once i n a thousand generations, this is being born shoulder to shoulder and treading on each other's heels, yet generations w h i c h were orderly continued i n between. M y concern w h e n I speak of the power-base is with the rulers i n between. Those i n between do not reach as high as Yao and Shun or sink as l o w as C h i e h and C h o u . W h e n by embracing the law they occupy the power-base there is order, w h e n by rejecting the law they lose the power-base there is disorder. If now one abandons the power-base and rejects law expecting order only w h e n a Yao or S h u n arrives there w i l l be one generation of order for a thousand of disorder; if one embraces law and occupies the power-base expecting disorder only w h e n a C h i e h or Chou arrives, there w i l l be one generation of disorder for a thousand of order." H a n Fei concludes the chapter by taking u p the Confucian's example of charioteering. There is a n art of d r i v i n g w h i c h the average man can master; the Confucian has used his illustration as though the only choice were between the genius of great drivers like Wang Liang and the clumsiness of the m a n w h o has never learned to drive. In the Legalist conception of the law there is a shift from the man-toman relations of feudalism, i n w h i c h the fa as standards are the examples of actions and persons to be imitated, to the impersonal relations of

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bureaucracy, i n w h i c h the standards have become laws backed by reward and punishment. There is a similar shift i n the concept of power. In Legalism we do not hear m u c h about the te 'potency', the power i n a man w h i c h inspires awe i n his presence. Power is seen i n terms of occupying the key position i n impersonally functioning institutions.

Control of the bureaucracy A further issue d i v i d i n g the thinkers w h o came to be classed as Legalists is the relative importance of the laws advocated by Lord Shang and the 'methods' (shu) of bureaucratic control evolved b y Shen Pu-hai. H a n Fei e x a m i n i n g this issue finds both indispensable for good government. " N o w Shen Pu-hai speaks of method but L o r d Shang deals i n laws. Method is bestowing office suiting assignments to qualifications, making responsible for the object as laid d o w n by the name, holding fast to the Handles w h i c h deal death or life, and testing the abilities of all the ministers. These are i n the hands of the ruler. Law is having the statutes publicly available i n the government offices, punishments w h i c h the people k n o w for certain w i l l be applied, rewards given consistently for punctiliousness i n the law, a n d punishments imposed consistently on violators of the decrees. These are what the subjects take as their exemplars. Without method for the ruler there are abuses u p above, without law for the subject there is disorder d o w n below. Neither is dispensable, both are tools for emperor or king." (HF [ch. 43] C h ' e n 906, tr. Liao 2/212) According to H a n Fei, Shen Pu-hai failed to w i n hegemony for H a n because he neglected to u n i f y the laws, leaving the old statutes of C h i n (of w h i c h H a n was a succession state) to stand side by side w i t h the new ones of H a n itself. L o r d Shang o n the other hand failed to w i n hegemony for C h ' i n because of lack of method i n controlling ministers. The effect of C h ' i n conquests had been to strengthen not the ruler but his ministers, w h o were enfiefed i n the n e w lands. (When C h ' i n imposed Legalist policies on the united E m p i r e it d i d i n fact abandon the policy of enfiefment.) Elsewhere H a n Fei distinguishes between law as public and method as private, the arcanum of the ruler ("Therefore it is best that law be manifest, but method one does not w i s h to be seen"). It is possible that the distinction between the two terms sharpened with the need to contrast 20

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the doctrines of L o r d Shang and Shen Pu-hai; the fragments of the latter, admittedly sparse, do not use shu 'method' but include it w i t h i n fa 'standard'. "Marquis C h a o of H a n said to Shen Pu-hai 'Standards and degrees are not at all easy to a p p l y ' 'By standards', said Shen Pu-hai, 'one bestows rewards for visible results, and assigns offices as qualified by ability. N o w my lord institutes standards and degrees yet listens to the pleas of courtiers, that is w h y they are hard to apply." (HF [ch. 32] C h ' e n 662, tr. Liao 2/58 Shen Pu-hai 23) The story continues w i t h Shen Pu-hai later himself pleading for office for a cousin, and apologizing w h e n the M a r q u i s points out the contradiction. Shen Pu-hai's doctrine that office should depend on ability, not favour, descends from the M o h i s t principle of 'elevating worth and employing ability'. The novelties credited to Shen Pu-hai are the doctrines summarised by H a n Fei as " m a k i n g responsible for the object as laid d o w n by the name" and "testing the abilities of all the ministers". The testing of abilities was to become a permanent concern of government i n C h i n a , leading to the development from the H a n onwards of the civil service examinations. Since Europe adopted civil-service examinations only after becoming familiar w i t h the Chinese institutions idealised by 18th-century philosophes, one may agree w i t h C r e e l i n seeing Shen Pu-hai as the ancestor of a now-worldwide institution crucial to bureaucratic organisation. A s for the comparison of name a n d object, the checking of an administrator's acts against verbal formulations (the title of his office, the general law or particular command he should obey, any proposal of his o w n he is pledged to fulfil), it is essential to the Legalist enterprise of reducing all government to the automatic application of objective and exact criteria. In its full development in Han Fei tzu it contrasts sharply with the Confucian 'Correction of Names'. A l t h o u g h a Legalist system certainly assumes an accepted usage for fitting names to objects, titles to offices, H a n Fei is generally concerned not w i t h n a m i n g correctly but w i t h 'aligning' (ts'an ^ ) and 'matching' (wu ) the 'shape' (hsing jf£ ) of a man's performance against its 'name', the verbal formulation of his o w n proposal or the ruler's command. Hsing ming { j& ) 'shape and name' is from H a n Fei onward the technical name for checking against names i n contrast w i t h correcting them; Creel has proposed as English equivalent 'title and performance'. The term cheng ming 'correction of names', not used by H a n Fei, is however prominent in Kuan-tzu and i n the Shen Pu-hai fragments. Creel, 21

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who regards the cheng ming reference i n the Analects as a late interpolation, has suggested that the Confucians took the concept from Shen Pu-hai.* In historical terms however it seems preferable to suppose that Shen Pu-hai took over a Confucian concept belonging to a traditional world where everything has its correct name, and shifted its relevance to the checking of the deed against the name; by H a n Fei's time Legalism has shed its oldfashioned associations and adopted the new term 'shapes and names'. A n example of the transition is the last of the ' N i n e Maxims' i n Kuan-tzu, a book w h i c h keeps traditional morality side by side w i t h law. "Scrutinising names. Scrutinise the object according to the name, fix the name depending on the object. Name and object give birth to each other, and reversing become each other's ch'ing (the essential without w h i c h the object w i l l not fit the name). If name a n d object fit there is order, if not, disorder. "The name is born f r o m the object, the object from the potency, the potency from the patterning, the patterning from k n o w i n g , the knowing from the fitting." (Kz [ch. 55] 3/14 f ) Here the name is clearly not the words of a minister's proposal but rather his title; being a real minister (or k i n g , or father, or son) implies fulfilling the duties w h i c h belong to the name. Name and object interact; you must have the ch'ing of a minister to be named one, but then the name itself turns r o u n d to reveal a ch'ing w h i c h you must actualise if y o u are to live up to the name. W h e n name and object everywhere coincide there is perfect order i n w h i c h everyone fulfils his duties. The potency (te) specific to developing into a true minister or ruler itself develops i n coming to see one's place i n the pattern of things. This derives from knowing, a n d knowing from one's names fitting the objects. Development thus describes a full circle from fitting names to objects to becoming oneself adequate to one's name w i t h i n the social system to w h i c h one belongs. It may be noticed that the circle is complete only if, once again, development is seen as prompted by additions to knowledge but i n itself spontaneous. This doctrine of names seems indistinguishable from the Confucian. We may contrast H a n Fei's accounts of the technique of 'shape and name'. He insists o n a perfect matching of deeds a n d words, even w h e n a deviation w o u l d be beneficial o n the short r u n . "If the lord of m e n wishes to suppress treason, he is thorough i n joining shape w i t h name. Shape a n d name are the words and the task. 22

* Creel, Shen 116, cf. p. 24n above. Han Fei, without using the formula cheng ming, does once say "If names are correct things arefixed"(HF [ch 8] Ch'en 121, rr. W 36)

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When someone serving as minister puts a proposal i n words, the ruler entrusts h i m w i t h the task i n accordance w i t h his words, and solely according to the task makes h i m responsible for the result. If the result fits the task, the task w i t h the words, he is rewarded; if not, he is punished. Hence w h e n ministers whose words are bigger than the results are punished, the punishment is not for the small results but for the results not fitting the name. Ministers whose results are bigger than their words are likewise punished, not because one is displeased w i t h the big result, but because one judges the h a r m i n failure to fit the name more important than a big result. "Formerly Marquis Chao of H a n fell asleep drunk. The cap-bearer saw that his lord w o u l d be cold and spread a coat over h i m . W h e n he woke he was pleased and asked the courtiers ' W h o put the coat over me?'. 'The capbearer', they said. The Marquis consequently judged guilty both the coatbearer and the cap-bearer, the former for not doing his job, the latter for exceeding his job. It wasn't that he didn't m i n d being cold, but he deemed usurpation of office m u c h more harmful than cold." (HF [ch. 7] tr. W 31f)

Legalism and Lao-tzu In Shang-tzu and i n most of Han Fei tzu there is no attempt to relate the political philosophy to a general world-picture. But i n parts of Han Fei tzu there is a sustained effort to find a metaphysical context for Legalism i n the thought of Lao-tzu. Two chapters, 'Interpreting Lao-tzu' (ch. 20) and 'Illustrating Lao-tzu' (ch. 21) consist of notes on the book, lucid and sensible i n H a n Fei's usual manner, although w i t h little to mark them as Legalist; they are an early demonstration that one does not have to be a mystic to be excited by what one extracts from or reads into that astonishing text. There are also chapters, 'The Way of the Ruler' (ch. 5) and 'The Grand Total' (ch. 8) w h i c h develop a Lao-tzu-Legalist fusion, largely in rhymed verse like Lao-tzu itself. That this strand i n the thought is nearly confined to a few isolated chapters suggests, even on the debatable assumption that H a n Fei is the author, that it is a not wholly assimilated element. We shall keep to the convention of using H a n Fei's name; in any case the synthesis cannot be significantly later than his time, since it dominates the documents, some of them i n the name of the Yellow Emperor, attached to one of the Ma-wang-tui manuscripts of Lao-tzu. The Lao-fzw-Legalist synthesis seems i n fact to be the H u a n g - L a o ('doctrine of the Yellow Emperor and Lao-tzu') widely current at the beginning of the H a n . Ssu-ma C h ' i e n describes Shen Tao, Shen Pu-hai and H a n Fei as all

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studying H u a n g - L a o , w h i c h suggests that most Legalist writing available to h i m showed the influence of Lao-tzu w h i c h i n retrospect would mark it as H u a n g - L a o . 'Interpreting Lao-tzu' is remarkable for an examination of the relation between the Way a n d the 'patterns' (li 3S.) of things and affairs, understood like the 'principles' (tse) of the 'Seven Standards' i n Kuan-tzu as objective regularities i n nature w h i c h man utilises or else ignores at his o w n cost. We have already met the term li (not to be confused w i t h li 7f% 'ceremony', although perhaps related to it phonetically and semantically), i n H s i i n - t z u and the Great M a n philosopher; i n the N e o Confucianism of C h u H s i ( A . D . 1130-1200) it was to become the central metaphysical concept, i n terms of w h i c h Heaven, the Way, the Decree, and Nature were all re-defined. H a n Fei is the first to give an extended account of it. "All things w h i c h have shape are easily sliced out, easily hacked out. H o w 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 square or r o u n d and hard or soft and light or heavy and white or black w h i c h is called 'pattern'. The pattern being fixed the thing is easily hacked out." (HF [ch. 20] C h ' e n 377, tr. Liao 1/200) This is a striking example of the Chinese tendency, w h i c h Hansen explains by the grammatical resemblance of the nouns to Indo-European mass rather than count nouns, to treat things as divisions of the universe rather than the universe as the aggregate of t h i n g s . Distinctions are seen in binary terms, as i n the first place between pairs of opposites (with even figure and colour reduced to square/round and white/black); having drawn them, and recognised some recurring or persisting pattern (for example, large, r o u n d , h a r d , heavy, and white) we detach a stone from other things as we cut out a piece of cloth or chop off a piece of meat. Things are not conceived as isolated each w i t h its o w n essential and accidental properties; o n the contrary, distinguishing characteristics are seen as mostly relative (of the six selected i n this passage, all but figure and colour). "The Way is that through w h i c h the myriad things are so, that in w h i c h the m y r i a d patterns r u n together. A pattern is the texture of a thing as a whole, the Way is the means by w h i c h the myriad things become wholes. Hence it is said, 'The Way is what patterns them'. Things having patterns cannot encroach o n each other; consequently, the patterning of them is the cutting u p of things. Each of the myriad things has a different 23

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25

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pattern, and w i t h each having its o w n pattern there is no more of the Way. It runs together the patterns of the myriad things, therefore it necessarily transforms, and therefore has n o constant commitment to one or another. This is w h y the ch'i of living a n d d y i n g are received from it, w h y the myriad intelligences draw f r o m it, w h y the m y r i a d affairs rise and decline by it." (HF [ch. 20] C h ' e n 377, tr. Liao l/191f) By relating the universal Way to the local patterns of things H a n Fei is able to give a rational account of the opening sentence of Lao-tzu "The Way that can be 'Way'-ed [formulated i n words as the Way] is not the constant Way." Since the Way includes all the contrasting courses w h i c h things follow, the way w h i c h a thing may be described as following can only be one of the localised regularities. ' A l l patterns are apportionings of square or r o u n d , short or long, dense or loose, hard or soft. Hence it is only after a pattern is fixed that one can get to 'Way' it. In the fixed patterns, then, there are surviving or perishing, birth or d y i n g , flourishing or decaying; and the things which now survive and n o w perish, w h i c h die as suddenly as they are born, w h i c h first flourish a n d afterwards decay, may not be called 'constant'. O n l y that w h i c h was born w i t h the d i v i d i n g of heaven and earth and until their dissolution w i l l not die or decay may be called constant." (HF [ch. 20] C h ' e n 369, tr. Liao l/194f) H a n Fei reminds us frequently throughout the essay that the purpose of grasping the patterns (of death and life, rise and decline) is strictly practical. "If thinking is thorough you grasp the patterns i n affairs. . . . If you grasp the patterns i n affairs you are certain to achieve results." (HF [ch. 20] C h ' e n 341, tr. Liao 1/176) The term li has sometimes (by myself among others) been translated 'principle'. This might suggest that the t h i n k i n g here is primarily deductive and inductive. But it is rather a matter of correlating affairs through w h i c h the same pattern is seen to r u n : "Therefore observing it i n terms of pattern, if employing a great multitude you keep changing things around you achieve few results, if storing a great vessel you keep shifting it somewhere else it w i l l be badly damaged, if i n boiling a small fish you keep on meddling with it you rob it of freshness, if i n ordering a great state you keep altering the laws the people w i l l suffer from it. This is w h y a ruler w h o has the Way values stillness and does not keep on altering laws." (HF [ch. 20] C h ' e n 355, tr. Liao 1/185) The Way itself, since it embraces all opposites, is neutral to man's

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prospects, and whether one succeeds or fails depends entirely on how one uses its patterns. "The Way may be compared to water; if a d r o w n i n g man swallows too much he dies, if a thirsty m a n swallows just enough he lives. O r it may be compared to a sword or halberd; if a fool uses it to wreak revenge misfortune is born, if the sage uses it to p u n i s h crime good fortune results. So You get it to die by, You get it to live by. You get it to perish by, You get it to succeed by." (HF [ch. 20] C h ' e n 366, tr. Liao 17193) The poetic chapters 'Way of the Ruler' and 'The G r a n d Total' use a superficially paradoxical language like Lao-tzu but without its ambiguities; such terms as 'the Way', 'empty', 'still', ' D o i n g N o t h i n g ' , 'so of itself, become a code with a precise meaning w i t h i n the Legalist scheme. "The Way is the beginning of the myriad things, The skein of the right alternatives and the wrong. Hence the clear-sighted ruler holds fast to the beginning To k n o w the source of the m y r i a d things. He orders the threads i n the skein To k n o w the origins of good a n d ill. Therefore he waits i n stillness and emptiness, Lets the names of themselves command, Lets the tasks of themselves be fixed. Being empty he knows the facts about the object, Being still he becomes corrector of the moving. The one w h o has the words, of himself makes the name; The one w h o has the task, of himself makes the shape. Shape and name align as the same. Then the ruler has no task to do, refers it to the facts." (HF [ch. 5] C h ' e n 67, tr. W16) The ruler, empty of thoughts, desires, partialities of his o w n , concerned w i t h nothing i n the situation but the 'facts' (ch'ing how they are i n themselves irrespective of naming), selects his ministers by objectively comparing their abilities w i t h the demands of the offices. Inactive, doing nothing, he awaits their proposals, compares the project w i t h the results, and rewards or punishes. H i s o w n knowledge, ability, moral worth, warrior spirit, such as they may be, are wholly irrelevant; he simply performs his function i n the impersonal mechanism of state.

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"Hence having knowledge he does not use it to think, He makes the m y r i a d things k n o w their positions. H a v i n g worth he does not use it to act, He observes what it is that ministers and subjects act o n . H a v i n g courage he does not use it to rage, He draws out all the warlike i n his ministers. Hence by d o i n g without knowledge he possesses clearsightedness By doing without worthiness he gets results, By d o i n g without courage he achieves strength. The teamed ministers stick to their duties, The h u n d r e d officials have their o w n constants. O n the basis of ability he employs them, This is what one calls 'reinforcing the constant'" (HF [ch. 5] C h ' e n 67, tr. W17) It is as though H a n Fei and the author of Lao-tzu lived i n parallel universes. In Lao-tzu you adapt to the uncontrollable order i n the play of natural forces on all sides, w h i c h is that of the Way w h i c h cares nothing for man. H a n Fei on the other hand holds that you can understand and master the natural forces to create an automatic social order parallel w i t h that of Heaven and earth, into w h i c h the natural inclinations of man can be forced by the Two Handles of reward and punishment. He is indeed one of the minds i n w h i c h ancient C h i n a comes nearest to the modern West. H s i i n tzu too saw the order of Heaven a n d earth as no more than regularities which man can utilise; but H a n Fei is without even Hsiin-tzu's residual need for a cosmos i n w h i c h m a n finds a place by patterning it himself through ceremony. A metaphor w h i c h shows up sharply his difference from Lao-tzu is that of the tally, the w o o d or bamboo broken i n two pieces kept by debtor and creditor, the debt being proved by fitting one half to the other. Like the scales, compasses and L-square it is one of the instruments for precise unimpugnable decisions so prominent i n Legalist metaphor. Taking once again the case of the minister committing himself to a proposal: "The words once accepted, he grasps his tally; the task having progressed, he holds fast to his o w n half. Where the halves of the tally join is where reward and punishment are born." (HF [ch. 5] C h ' e n 68, tr. W19) It is assumed that obligations remain frozen however circumstances change, the point w h i c h the unfortunate cap-bearer of the Marquis of H a n failed to appreciate. He w o u l d have been luckier w i t h the author of Laotzu, for w h o m nothing ever remains the same.

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"This is w h y w h e n the sage holds the left half of the tally he does not hold the other man to his responsibility." The Legalist concept of fa shares several features w i t h that of law i n the West; it is precisely formulated, detached from all personal considerations, public, and invariable until publicly replaced. The ruler is himself bound by it i n i m p o s i n g punishments, although he is above it i n not being himself subject to its punishments. The great difference from Western law is that it is designed not as a protection to the citizen (even if it may protect him as a side effect), but as an instrument for effective control from above. The business of the Legalist state, at its full development by H a n Fei, is primarily war, and secondarily agriculture, the feeding of the people as fodder for war. The system is the most authoritarian ever conceived i n C h i n a , nothing less than totalitarian, a n d it centres all power on the ruler alone. The maintenance of that power is one of H a n Fei's principal concerns. "One w h o knows that the interests of ruler and minister are different will reign, one w h o thinks they are the same w i l l be dispossessed." (HF [ch. 48] C h ' e n 1005, tr. Liao 2/261) His detailed analyses of how rulers fail to deal w i t h this perennial problem amounts, as Hsiao says, to "a prophecy outlining all the failures of government that were to be committed by all the muddle-headed rulers of the two thousand-year imperial era." The question may be raised whether Legalism is concerned w i t h the public good at all, or solely w i t h the good of the ruler. A l l other Chinese philosophies conceive orderly government as to the good of everyone, if only to the degree proper to his station. But is Legalism anything more than a programme for unlimited power, to be put at the disposal of the one man at the top, i n the hope of w i n n i n g some of his rewards for oneself? In the case of Shang-tzu, it seems indeed to be nothing more. In spite of occasional remarks about the people being too stupid to see that the harsh laws are to their o w n benefit i n the long r u n , the author is unique for his brutal cynicism and relish i n the exercise of force. He is especially contemptuous of the morality w h i c h , at least i n its Confucian form, requires you to put family before state. "If you employ the good the people w i l l prefer their o w n k i n , if you employ the scoundrels the people w i l l prefer the system. To club together and keep your mouth shut is to be good, to be alienated from and spy on each other is to be a scoundrel. If you glorify the good, errors will be hidden; if you put scoundrels i n charge crime w i l l be punished . . . . Hence 27

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291

I say that if y o u use good men to rule you can be sure of disorder and utmost loss of territory, if you use scoundrels to rule you can be sure of order and utmost strength." (Shang-tzu [ch. 5] Kao 53, tr. D 207) "If i n war you perform what the enemy w o u l d not venture to perform, you w i l l be strong; if i n enterprises you undertake what the enemy would be ashamed to do, you have the advantage." (Shang-tzu [ch. 20] Kao 157, tr. D305) " H o w does one k n o w that a people has been made usable? If the people see war as a h u n g r y wolf sees meat, the people have been made usable. Generally war is something the people hate; one able to make the people delight i n war w i l l reign." (Shang-tzu [ch. 18] Kao 138, tr. D 286) There is not m u c h pretence that there can be a harmony of interests between people and state. "In government if y o u introduce the policies people hate the people are weakened; if policies they enjoy, they are strengthened. The people being weak the state is strong, the people being strong the state is weak." (Shang-tzu [ch. 20] K a o 160, tr. D 307) This is not however the tone of the great H a n Fei, whose cold and lucid m i n d simply accepts without fuss the harsh conditions of life as he sees it. He regards the people as disorderly, lazy, and too ignorant of their o w n interests to see that they benefit by the harsh punishment of crime, but there is no reason to doubt that he wants the order w h i c h is to be bought at so great a price for the sake of all. " W h e n the sage brings order to the people, he measures by the most basic; he does not indulge their desires, he simply looks ahead for what will benefit the people. Therefore w h e n he imposes punishments on them, it is not out of hatred of the people, it is basic to his concern for them." (HF [ch. 54] C h ' e n 1134, tr. Liao 2/326). There is i n any case something equivocal i n the place of the ruler i n H a n Fei's scheme. The ruler himself is reduced to one component i n the machinery of state; the ministers have all the ideas and do all the work, the ruler simply checks shape against name and rewards or punishes accordingly. H e has no functions w h i c h could not be performed by an elementary computer; indeed, a government could hardly attain the required elimination of the h u m a n factor without replacing the ruler by a computer. Since at time of writing we are still i n the habit of thinking of ourselves as governed by h u m a n beings rather than by machines, might one even say that i n H a n Fei's system it is ministers w h o do the ruling? Does the system make full sense unless seen from the viewpoint of the

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bureaucrat rather than the m a n at the top? One w o u l d not expect a king, however dazzled by the Taoist-sounding rhetoric, altogether to welcome being the umpire w h o never plays i n the game, preserving his perfect neutrality by ' d o i n g nothing', remaining 'still' and 'empty' of all inclinations w h i c h could bias h i m or knowledge w h i c h could intrude into the comparison of the project w i t h the result. Indeed he could hardly be reduced to this state unless overawed by the specialist knowledge w h i c h the bureaucrat wields and encourages h i m not to burden himself with. The bureaucrat on the other hand has realised his vision of perfect order, in w h i c h his o w n promotion or demotion is secure from arbitrary or prejudiced decisions from above. The aim of confining the Emperor to the acceptance of advice, visible i n a moralistic guise i n the Confucian bureaucracy of later centuries, may already be suspected i n Legalism. M u c h as one may be repelled by the amorality of the Legalists, it can be refreshing to turn to them after reading too much of the ineffective moralising of Confucians and Mohists. The Legalists stand alone i n appreciating that the realisation of beneficial policies depends on institutions rather than good intentions. In the clashes between Legalism and Confucianism one sees only too clearly that the Confucian conception of moral obligation as radiating outward i n d i m i n i s h i n g degrees from the family w o u l d i n practice justify the collective selfishness of the most powerful families. The initial resistance to the publication of law codes, as hindering the noble from deciding cases as they think best, was soon abandoned. But we have seen f r o m the example of C h i a Y i that the Confucian revulsion against inhumane punishments was i n the first place against inflicting on the upper class the punishments proper to the lower. A s for the Confucian preference for i m p o s i n g order by moral influence, and training i n ceremony rather than by punishment, only the leisured class w o u l d have time to master the rituals codified i n the Record of Ceremony, where we read that "Ceremony does not reach d o w n to the commoners, nor punishment u p to the grandee" (the intervening knightly class w o u l d be subject to both). 2 9

30

4. Two POLITICAL HERESIES 1. Criticism of hereditary monarchy The M o h i s t principle of 'elevation of worth' reflected the growing practice throughout the new bureaucratising states, and by the 3rd

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century B . C . was taken for granted even by Confucians. N o school, however, extended it to the throne itself. Since for all except Legalists good government depends on the w i s d o m of the ruler, or at any rate of his advisers, and it was accepted that w i t h misgovernment dynasties lose the right to rule, one might expect that some w o u l d have the dangerous thought of eliminating this exception, at least from the ideal government of the ancient sage kings. The thoughts w h i c h cannot safely be put i n writing (such as atheism i n Europe before the 18th century) present a special problem i n the history of thought; such evidence as we find is likely to be the tip of the iceberg. But it is surprising how often one does find this thought breaking surface i n literature between the 4th and 2nd centuries B . C . Two classes of exception to hereditary rulership were commonly accepted: the Shang and C h o u dynasties h a d overthrown their predecessors by force, and at the beginning of history there had been a stage before hereditary succession began, w h e n Yao passed the throne to Shun and S h u n to Y i i , founder of the first dynasty, the H s i a . For Confucians these irregularities were justified by the villainy of the dispossessed Emperors and by the sagehood of S h u n and Y i i , for the Legalist H a n Fei they were simple usurpations. But there is a significant difference between the two kinds of exception. The overthrow of the Shang by the C h o u was a historical fact w h i c h no one could afford to ignore. The predynastic abdications on the other hand were legend accepted on the evidence of documents forged i n an archaising style w h i c h were circulating widely by the 4th century B . C The 'Statutes of Yao', w h i c h got into the Documents i n the five Confucian Classics, tells how after a reign of 70 years Yao abdicated to S h u n , and a fragment i n the same archaising style i n the suspect last chapter of the Analects has S h u n passing the throne to Y i i as well as Yao to S h u n . Outside these sources Mo-tzu (where the 'Compromising' and 'Reactionary' series quote heavily from these suspect documents) uses the enthronement of S h u n , represented as a ploughman, potter, and fisherman, as one of its examples of 'Elevation of W o r t h ' . Mencius quotes the 'Statutes of Yao' on the succession of S h u n , although he refuses to believe that Yao actually abdicated before his death. The predynastic legend seriously embarrassed Mencius, w h o favoured the hereditary principle even for offices, and there seems no point i n it unless someone was using the safe and effective method of forgery to publicise his conviction that rulers should pass the throne to the best man, and before they are themselves senile. Whether the Mohists privately ex1

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tended the 'elevation of worth' to the ideal ruler we cannot know, but that there were m a n y people w h o d i d is plain from the evidence of Mencius himself: "Wan C h a n g inquired: 'People have a saying, "By the time of Y i i the Potency had decayed, he passed the throne not to the worthiest but to his o w n s o n . " ' D o you agree?" Mencius does not agree, a n d answers at some length. For h i m , the test of whether a ruler has the mandate of Heaven is support by the people, and he interprets the story i n these terms. Yao, Shun and Y i i all chose the worthiest and recommended h i m to Heaven as successor; after they died the recommended m a n waited to see whether the people preferred h i m to the son. Y i i recommended his minister Y i , but this time the people went over to the son C h ' i . W h y this choice committed them to the son for ever after is not explained b y Mencius; he is doing his best to explain the whole story away. There are several stories of kings of this period professing to follow Yao and S h u n by offering their thrones to a better man. K i n g H u i of Liang (370-319 B . C ) , w h o m Mencius visited, is later reported to have offered his throne to H u i S h i h . O n e episode, i n w h i c h a k i n g d i d give up his throne, is certainly historical, the abdication of T z u - k ' u a i of Yen to Tzu-chih, about 316 B . C * Mencius was questioned about it i n C h ' i , w h i c h was preparing to use it as an excuse to attack Yen; he saw the abdication as a dangerous breach of the hereditary principle justifying attack, although only, as he later explained, b y a ruler authorised b y H e a v e n . Such abdications, whether real or pretended, historical or fictitious, w o u l d have no meaning unless it was widely believed that the true sage does pass the throne not to his son but to the best m a n . A s late as 78 B.C. a Confucian, Sui H u n g , after observing omens pointing to the coming of a new dynasty, got himself executed by sending up a memorial inviting the H a n Emperor to follow Yao's example b y abdicating to the worthiest commoner. The A d m o n i t i o n s ' , the chapter i n Kuan-tzu w h i c h shares the ideas w h i c h Mencius ascribes to K a o - t z u , states flatly that the sage ruler follows the example of Yao w h o passed the throne to S h u n after reigning seventy years. "He is benevolent, so refuses to use the Empire to his o w n profit; he does the right, so refuses to use the Empire to make a name for himself. He 6

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* HF (ch. 35) Ch'en 774-76, rr. Liao 2/128-131, quotes three varying accounts of the event, in each of which Tzu-k'uai is tricked into thinking he can win the reputation of Yao without losing control of the state.

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is benevolent, so does not keep the throne from generation to generation^ he does the right, so after seventy years gives u p the government. " What of H s i i n - t z u , w h o is as insistent as a M o h i s t or Legalist on appointment b y fitness for the job at every level below the throne? The main body of his book discusses the Yao a n d S h u n stories only i n connexion w i t h their supposed abdications d u r i n g their lifetimes, w h i c h he considers incompatible w i t h sagehood and the dignity of the throne. This however leaves open the question of hereditary succession. A m o n g the poems written at the end of his life, i n w h i c h one suspects that private thoughts may be coming to the surface, i n the chapter called by its verse form Ch'eng hsiang (very late, since it mentions the death of his patron the Lord of C h ' u n - s h e n i n 238 B.C.), there is one w h i c h traces the history of Imperial abdications. It uses several found elsewhere only i n Yangist and Taoist legend. There they testify to the sage's indifference to the throne as a worldly possession, but for H s i i n - t z u to his respect for the principle of elevation of worth. The history starts w i t h Yao and Shun ("Yao and S h u n elevating worth resigned their o w n thrones"; " S h u n resigned to the worthiest and became a commoner"), ignores Yii's foundation of the H s i a dynasty and proceeds from the minister H s i e h to his descendant T'ang who founded the Shang, ending w i t h his attempted abdications first to Pien Sui and then to W u K u a n g . There are by the way so many proper names that for once the reader of a Chinese poem i n translation may catch a glimpse of the rhymes. n

12

"Hsieh the dark king Begat Chao-ming Who was lord at Ti-shih And shifted to Shang. After fourteen generations There was T'ien-yi Who was Ch'eng T'ang. T'ien-yi T'ang Appraised and raised up the best man, Himself resigned to Pien Sui And raised up Wu Kuang." 13

A text w h i c h explicity ascribes the misgovernment of the present to t The clause is more usually understood as "so does not usurp a throne" (cf. RG 379), which weakens the point of mentioning Yao's abdication after reigning 70 years. I take tai the tabooed shih

, with Chang P'ei-lun (Kuo, Wen and Hsu 432).

as the T'ang substitute for

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the shift to hereditary succession is the book of the 'Master of the Pheasant C a p ' (Ho-kuan-tzu), w h i c h we mentioned w i t h Lao-tzu among the mysterious works disguised under the names of otherwise u n k n o w n teachers of famous men. A couple of chapters avoid the taboo on the personal name of the First Emperor (221-210 B.C.), and the rest cannot be far from the same period.** It assumes that its view of succession is general among those w h o prefer morality to self-interest. "Yao passed on the Empire to Shun; consequently, lovers of the right judge Yao wise, lovers of profit judge h i m foolish. T'ang and W u [the founders of the Shang and Chou] banished or murdered their predecessors to profit their o w n sons; lovers of the right judge them to be without the Way, lovers of profit judge that they acted worthily. In those dynasties they d i d not pass on to the worthiest, that is w h y there was a banished lord; their lords loved faction and flattery, that is w h y there was a murdered ruler. Wherever banishment and murder have been inflicted there w i l l be a ruined state. I have never seen any w h o enjoyed the throne in comfort and occupied it i n security." Elsewhere the book describes the ideal government of the primordial Nine A u g u s t Ones (Chiu huang A J J L )· "The supremely worthy became Emperor, the next i n worth became his chancellors, the lofty became lords of fiefs. That they reigned changing surnames instead of becoming ruler by ancestral lineage was because they wished to share the security of the good w h i c h is i n unity . . . . C o m i n g down to the times of ancestral lineages, those w h o though themselves unworthy sit facing south and call themselves by the royal 'We' and still escape final ruin are the ones w h o are able to receive instruction from knights w h o have the W a y . " That writers were cautious i n questioning hereditary succession is confirmed by the story of Po-ch'eng Tzu-kao, said to have received a fief from Yao w h i c h he kept under S h u n but resigned on the accession of Y u to plough the fields w i t h his o w n hands. In the more familiar accounts his objection to Y i i is that he relies on rewards and punishments. These seem 14

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** Cheng j[E. is avoided for its Ch'in substitute tuan

in ch. 1, 2. Ho-kuan-tzu, formerly dismissed

as a late forgery has attracted new attention because of parallels with the recently discovered Ma-wang-tui Yellow-Emperor manuscripts from the beginning of Han (Wu Kuang 151-165). The administrative system of ch. 9 uses the titles current in the pre-Han state of Ch'u; the argument at the beginning of ch. 8 that harsh punishments disturb the conquest cycle of the Five Processes looks like a criticism of Ch'in (which claimed to rule by the ascendancy of Water, p. 371 below). The language is pre-Han or early Han; thus the negative fu x$L is used over sixty rimes with verbs without object or with object chih

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however to be expurgated versions of an account preserved only i n a Former H a n miscellany. There he explains to Y i i : "Formerly, w h e n Yao ruled the Empire, he passed the whole Empire to another man, w h i c h is the utmost i n desirelessness; he gave his throne to the one he chose as worthiest, w h i c h is the utmost i n impartiality. H e displayed to the Empire conduct of the utmost desirelessness and utmost impartiality, therefore the people were induced without reward and awed without punishment. It was still so under S h u n . N o w you punish and reward yet the people desire a n d are m u c h inclined to partiality. This is because what you are meditating is a partiality [to pass the throne to your son] and the people k n o w it. The springing u p of greed and contention will start f r o m n o w ; from n o w the Potency w i l l decline, from now punishments by mutilation will multiply." Here the selfishness w h i c h causes the disorder of later times results from the Emperor's selfish intention to keep the throne for his o w n family. We find the same idea, w i t h precisely the same vocabulary (fan cheng 'fjf* ^ 'greed a n d contention', chih kung JL £^ 'utmost impartiality', ssu fe. 'partiality', yii 'desire'), showing itself guardedly here and there i n the Lii Spring and Autumn. In one of its stories K i n g H u i of Liang hypocritically offers his throne to his minister the sophist H u i Shih: "In ancient times the possessor of a state was always the worthiest man. N o w I am really not your equal, I w i s h y o u to allow me to pass the state to you. . . . If I pass it to the worthiest, the spirit of greed and contention will cease." The chapter 'Being R i d of Partiality' has the following as its first illustration: "Yao h a d ten sons, but instead of giving the throne to his son he transmitted it to S h u n . S h u n h a d nine sons, but instead of giving the throne to his son he transmitted it to Y i i . It was the utmost impartiality." In the chapter 'Way of the Circle' the ruler (like Heaven, w h i c h is round) circles freely around all affairs of state while his ministers (like Earth, w h i c h is square) stand square each w i t h his o w n fixed functions. However worthy the ruler he requires ministers to fill the complementary role. "Yao and S h u n were worthy rulers w h o both took the worthiest for successor instead of giving the throne to their o w n descendants; but even they i n establishing officials were sure to make them stand square. The rulers of the present all desire not to lose the throne for future generations, and give it to their o w n descendants, but i n establishing officials are unable to make them stand square, because they throw them into disorder 18

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by desire which is partial. W h y is that? Their desires reach far ahead but all they know is the near." Remarkably, the dangerous thought w h i c h Mencius refused to read into the 'Statutes of Yao' appears ascribed to Confucius himself i n another work w h i c h found its way into the Five Classics, the 'Revolutions of Ceremony' i n the Record of Ceremony. This Former H a n document contains the only early Confucian Utopia, and was later to become very important for K ' a n g Y u - w e i (1858-1927) and other reformers looking for evidence of democratic thought i n their o w n tradition. It distinguishes two ages, those of the Greater C o m m u n i t y (Ta t'ung |s] ) and of the Lesser Prosperity (Hsiao k'ang >h J§[ ). The latter is the time of the Three Dynasties and begins w i t h Y i i , so the former is the predynastic period. The body of the document explains the supreme importance of ceremony throughout the Lesser Prosperity and its changes through successive dynasties. What makes the 'Revolutions of Ceremony' unique i n early Confucian literature is its claim that i n the preceding G o l d e n A g e there was universal harmony without ceremony, formulated Right (yi) or preference for one's o w n family. A l t h o u g h there is no direct reference to a ruler it can hardly be doubted that even for so unusual a Confucian this w o u l d be the age of Yao and S h u n , as assumed by the commentator C h e n g H s i i a n (A.D. 127-200). " W h e n the Great Way prevailed there was impartiality throughout the world. They chose the worthy and capable, studied to be trustworthy and cultivated harmony (Cheng H s i i a n : "They abdicated the throne to a sage, did not keep it for the family"). Therefore they d i d not treat only their o w n parents as parents, their o w n sons as sons. They enabled the old to live out their term, the ablebodied to have employment, the young to be reared; they pitied the widow, orphan, childless and sick, and provided nurture for all. M e n had their portions, women had their home. They hated wealth going to waste, but not necessarily to hoard it for themselves; they hated effort not being exerted, but not necessarily for the sake of themselves. Therefore, plots having no outlet d i d not start up, and theft and banditry did not arise, so outer doors were left unshut. It is this one calls the Greater Community. "Now, the Great Way being already obscured, the world is identified with one's family (Cheng H s i i a n : "They transmit the throne to the son."). Each treats only his o w n parents as parents, only his o w n son as son. Wealth a n d effort are for the sake of oneself, it is hereditary succession w h i c h great m e n recognise as ceremonially required. It is by walls and moats that we secure ourselves, by ceremony and the right that we are regulated, i n order to keep ruler a n d subject correct, father and son 21

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sincere, elder and younger brother i n harmony, husband and wife i n accord, and i n order to institute restrictions and measures, to lay out fields and villages, to give preference to courage and knowledge; we treat achievements as our o w n . So as a result of this plots spring up, because of this war arises. Y i i , T'ang, W e n , W u , K i n g C h ' e n g and the D u k e of C h o u were the most eminent d u r i n g this time. There is not one of these six gentlemen w h o was not assiduous i n ceremony, i n order to manifest the right and verify the trustworthy, i n order to call attention to the erring and give a shaping to benevolence and a training to deference, and show the people existing norms. Wherever there is failure to follow this, those i n power are expelled, and the multitude recognises them as evildoers. It is this one calls the Lesser P r o s p e r i t y . " 22

2. The question of Chinese anarchism One of the constant assumptions of early Chinese political thought is that government is by its nature authoritarian, and that the only alternative to absolutism is the reduction or abolition of government. Theoretically, the alternative is an ideal set i n antiquity; i n more practical terms, it is a minimalisation of interference from above i n the affairs of individual, family, clan, and village conducting their o w n affairs i n accordance w i t h custom rather than externally imposed law. O n l y i n two of the schools, the Mohists and the Legalists, does everyone seem wholly satisfied w i t h the new centralised state. The other school w h i c h recognises the duty to take office, the Confucian, continues to hanker after C h o u feudalism even as it learns to adapt to changing circumstances. Thinkers who retreat into private life (the Shen-nung idealists, the Yangist author of 'Robber C h i h ' , the Taoists) all have visions of a world in w h i c h there are no public careers to flee from. To put it i n Western terms, one is tempted to say that the anti-authoritarian i n C h i n a is the anti-political, inclining not to democracy but to anarchism. Western anarchists have claimed Lao-tzu as one of themselves ever since his book became k n o w n i n the West i n the 19th century; more recently it has been suggested that even Confucius might be seen as an anarchist. N o one conceives any limits to power except moral limits—Legalists, not even those. It is assumed (again excepting the Legalists) that good government depends on the moral goodness of those w h o govern. The ideals of Mohists, just as m u c h as Legalists, are nothing less than totalitarian; h o w could a wise and good ruler do his best for his people unless he appoints and controls right d o w n to village level, ensures the 23

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moral reform of local custom, sees danger i n all signs of people 'allying with each other below' (hsia pi ~ F )? It may seem surprising that i n a tradition centred on the art of government, with a rich variety of political philosophies, no one as m u c h as glimpses the possibility of democratic institutions. But we need go no farther for an answer than M a x Weber's generalisation that the A s i a n world is one of huge states and tiny villages, i n w h i c h cities are primarily administrative and military centres where, however m u c h trade flourishes, the m a i n road to wealth is through office, so that the self-governing institutions of the Mediterranean trading cities could never develop. A l t h o u g h some of the smaller Chinese states have perhaps something of the look of Greek city states early i n their e v o l u t i o n , the great states of the classical age are already on the scale of European nations; and even i n Europe the possibility of extending democracy from the city to the nation-state is no older than the 18th century. O n the other h a n d we have the question of how far government, as distinct from the power to chop off heads, extends i n Oriental despotism. H o w far is the bureaucracy w h i c h imposes law controlling rather than being controlled by families and clans managing their o w n affairs by their o w n customs? To what extent does it truly govern (as distinct from tax and conscript for war or labour on public works) outside the walls of the cities? A striking dictum of Weber's is that i n Imperial China "a 'city' was the seat of the mandarin and was not self-governing; a 'village' was a self-governing settlement without a m a n d a r i n . " The considerable Chinese talent for self-government has up to our o w n times been exercised through kinship organisations, village communities or trade corporations well adapted, not to replace, but to evade or corrupt power at the centre. F r o m this standpoint the ideal of self-government i n Chinese political philosophy seems predestined to take a direction w h i c h in our terms w o u l d be anarchistic rather than democratic. There is some danger of overlooking the elements both of reality i n the Taoist rural Utopias and of fantasy i n the absolutist programmes of Mohists and Legalists. In the writings of the two latter we catch only occasional glimpses of centralised power r u n n i n g up against its limits. (Might one see Lao-tzu, o n one of its multiple readings each as legitimate as another, as reflecting a deeper understanding of how little despotic command can actually do against the uncontrollable forces of society?). The M o h i s t ' C o n f o r m i n g U p w a r d s ' bravely projects appointment by centralised authority right d o w n to village level, but the version w h i c h makes most concessions to practical difficulties (the one we call 'Reactionary') replaces 'village heads' b y 'lords of f a m i l i e s ' . Judging by later 24

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Chinese experience one w o u l d suppose that to appoint a village head would be merely to confirm h i m officially i n authority. We read a great deal in Kuan-tzu about the reforming of custom, but one essay i n this miscellany ('Correcting the A g e ' ) speaks instead of the sage ruler as simply following custom as it changes w i t h the times. A m o n g those remarkable social scientists the Legalists there is one w h o seems to have a uniquely objective and comprehensive v i e w of society as a whole, w i t h bureaucracy and law as no more than the frame w i t h i n w h i c h the people govern themselves by custom. This is Shen Tao, w h o m we have already met as a theoretician of centralised p o w e r . H s u n - t z u pairs h i m w i t h a certain T'ien P'ien i n his 'Against the Twelve Philosophers', and briefly summarises their doctrine: "Elevating standards (= laws) yet without standards, decrying study and fond of innovation, i n dealings above approving obedience to those above, i n dealings below approving accord w i t h custom. . . . " The fragments of his book, although mostly about law and the powerbase, have one w i t h a similar reference to custom. "For convention ( = ceremony) follow the custom, i n administration follow those above, on a mission follow your l o r d . " The full significance of this emerges i n the passage w h i c h , i n the T'ang anthologist's selection from his book w h i c h is our m a i n source for h i m , * stands at the head of his first essay. "Heaven w h i c h has the light does not care about m a n being i n the dark, earth w h i c h has the resources does not care about man being poor, the sage w h o has the Potency does not care about m a n being unstable. "Though Heaven does not care about m a n being i n the dark, since by opening doors and w i n d o w s m a n is sure of w i n n i n g himself light there is no more for Heaven to do. "Though earth does not care about m a n being poor, since by chopping down the trees and cutting away the grass m a n is sure of w i n n i n g himself wealth there is no more for earth to do. "Though the sage does not care about m a n being unstable, since the people by taking those above as their water-level and allying w i t h each other below are sure of w i n n i n g themselves stability there is no more for the sage to d o . " Government, then, is not the source of order; it simply establishes the condition for the people to order themselves by co-operation. For Shen Tao as a Legalist, this condition w o u l d be law deterring by punishment actions 28

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* Ch'un shu chih yao ch. 37. Cf. the textual study by Thompson, Shen Tzu.

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disruptive of harmony. The use of the term hsia pi 'allying w i t h each other below' is especially remarkable; Confucians, Mohists and Legalists alike use it pejoratively, of factionalism below, w h i c h threatens the ruler's authority. The Confucians cannot be counted w i t h the Mohists and Legalists among those dedicated to the authoritarian state. However much they may insist, as i n the 'Great L e a r n i n g ' , that it is through the example of piety to the father that one learns loyalty to the ruler, the Confucians remain committed to the family rather than the state, and to ceremony rather than law. They were becoming reconciled to the centralised state and were soon to dominate it, but their family-centred moralism conflicted w i t h that ideal of a true Weber-style bureaucracy briefly triumphant under the C h ' i n , and ruined its prospects for the rest of Imperial history. The solidarity with one's o w n family w h i c h according to the 'Great Learning' serves to nourish solidarity w i t h state and Empire also very much outweighs it, so that Confucians may see as not merely excusable but obligatory what for Legalists (and for us) is nepotism, corruption, the aggrandisement of one's o w n family at the expense of the weaker. Confucius himself h a d conceived the ideal of a society i n w h i c h all relations between persons function not by force but by ceremony, so that punishments w i l l lapse. It is possible to think of this as one of the varieties of Chinese 'anarchism', w i t h some stretching of the w o r d ; one w o u l d have to conceive a hierarchical anarchism, i n w h i c h the ceremonial acts w h i c h are perfectly voluntary for all participants include the issuing and obeying of a properly ritualised command of ruler to minister. The name more usually associated w i t h a Chinese anarchism is Laotzu, whose book assumes and indeed addresses itself to the ruler, but advises h i m to 'do nothing', leave things spontaneously to order themselves.! To what extent does tzu-jah 'being so of itself, w h i c h we translate 'spontaneity', overlap Western ideas of liberty? (We are I hope past that naive stage w h e n one asks of another culture ' D o they have a word for liberty?'). We have suggested that for Chinese moral philosophising the good is what the wisest spontaneously prefer. For Confucians as for Taoists social order is the harmonising of men's spontaneous inclinations, most commodiously as they develop and are awakened from other viewpoints through the closest personal relations, those of kinship; a sense that they are thwarted by too-consistently defined principles is near 33

t The question of Chinese anarchism is discussed from different angles by Frederick Bender, Roger T. Ames, David L. I lall, and John P. Clark in JCP10/1 (March '83).

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the root of that revulsion against M o h i s t 'concern for everyone', K u n g - s u n Lung's logic, H a n Fei's law, w h i c h turned C h i n a decisively against rationalism so soon after discovering its prospects. For Confucians however the attitudes of authority a n d deference emerge as spontaneously as any other, the patriarchal family itself being a supremely authoritarian institution. (Mencius offers as examples of "what m e n are capable of without learning" a n d " k n o w without t h i n k i n g " not only that "everyone i n infancy knows h o w to love his parents" but that " w h e n he grows he knows h o w to respect his elder brother"). Moreover it is by a hard training i n the Conventions that a Confucian learns what only after becoming wise he w i l l spontaneously prefer. It is here that Confucians and Taoists (and their respective counterparts i n the West) start off on divergent paths. For Taoists it is b y unlearning the conventions a n d ambitions w h i c h society tries to convince y o u that you share that y o u discover your true spontaneous tendency. The ideal Taoist society, then, is a community w h i c h encourages the spontaneous trend of inclination instead of distorting it by conceptualising it for you as 'knowledge', one i n which the sage nourishes you w i t h his Potency instead of forcing you for your o w n good. In earlier chapters we have traced the development from the Utopia of Shen-nung through Lao-tzu to the Primitivist and Yangist chapters of Chuang-tzu. Discussing Lao-tzu o n ' D o i n g N o t h i n g ' we noticed that its version of the ideal society requires on the one hand a very simple mode of life, o n the other a sage w h o keeps the masses ignorant of the multiple objects of desire w h i c h complicate civilization. We noticed a l s o that this is i n keeping w i t h a tradition of moral philosophy w h i c h starts from the value, not of spontaneity as such, but of spontaneity i n sufficient awareness, a n d so must recommend either expanding awareness or contracting experience w i t h i n the limits of awareness. A s a basis for a political ideal this is very different from the faith i n the absolute value of individual liberty w h i c h underlies Western anarchism. To risk an oxymoron as outrageous as 'hierarchic anarchism', this amounts to a paternalistic anarchism. Lao-tzu is unusual i n presenting it as an art of government from the viewpoint of the ruler, but the assumption is the same i n versions seen f r o m the subject's viewpoint, already visible i n the Shen-nung ideal, w i t h the ruler as teacher of agriculture to a simplehearted people w h o do not hanker after 'goods difficult to obtain', and developed i n detail i n the Primitivist essays. It w i l l perhaps be objected that no k i n d of an anarchist regime can have an Emperor, not to mention Shen-nung's thousands of fiefs. O n 34

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closer inspection however one sees that since the sage exerts no force and maintains the equilibrium of the order by the influence of his w i s d o m alone it is of no importance what title he carries or whether he carries one at all. Whether there is a named Emperor, unnamed sages or a universal innocence i n the childhood of m a n is an unimportant variable i n otherwise very similar accounts of the G o l d e n A g e . According to Huai-nan-tzu (c. 140 B.C.) decline began w i t h the very first Emperor at the beginning of verbal knowledge; i n the preceding perfection the nameless sages "exhaled and inhaled the ch'i of Y i n a n d Yang, and everything living reverently looked up to their Potency and harmoniously accorded w i t h i t . " Chuang-tzu has a story i m p l y i n g that the perfect order under Yao issued not from himself but from his subject H s u Y u , w h o , w h e n Yao offered h i m the throne, refused it on the grounds that it does not matter i n the least w h o is on the t h r o n e . In a Chuang-tzu 'Outer Chapters' story there is a ruler but the people treat h i m as though he were a natural object under w h i c h they shelter. Here one may notice that the 'elevation of worth and employment of ability' is seen negatively as a temptation to all to use knowledge to compete for power. "In an age of utmost Potency, they do not elevate worth or employ ability. The one above is like the treetop, the people are like w i l d deer. They are upright but do not k n o w h o w to think of it as the right, are concerned for each other but do not k n o w how to think of it as benevolence, are honest but do not k n o w how to think of it as loyalty, fit the fact but do not know how to think of it as trustworthiness. They make each other move as the insects stir i n spring, they do not think of it as a gift from above. Therefore their steps leave no footprints, their deeds leave no records behind t h e m . " In Lao-tzu the people k n o w that a ruler exists but think of everything as done by themselves. 37

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"The very highest, those underneath know to exist. The next, they are fond of and praise. The next, they are in awe of. The next, they slight. Only if he is not trustworthy enough is there distrust. Meticulous, his care for words! When his task is accomplished and work complete the Hundred Clans all say 'It was so with us of ourselves.' " 4 0

' M e n d i n g Nature', one of the 'Outer Chapters', does assume a universal balance of awareness and spontaneity without sages. This is

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appropriate because Utopia is placed not at an indefinite period i n the past but at the absolute origin; it is then inevitable that the unconscious equilibrium without sages to sustain it is sooner or later lost, without raising any problem of a Fall (rather as i n modern theories of a perfect balance of m a n and his environment i n the time of hunters and foodgatherers, upset by the discovery of agriculture). Morality is conceived to spring directly f r o m man's nature, but only as long as he preserves a perfect combination of k n o w i n g w i t h calm. "The men of old w h o cultivated the Way used calm to nurture knowing. They knew h o w to live but d i d not use k n o w i n g to do; one may say that they used k n o w i n g to nurture calm. W h e n k n o w i n g and calm nurture each other, harmony and pattern issue f r o m our nature. Potency is the harmony, the Way is the pattern. Potency harmonising everything is benevolence, the Way patterning everything is the right. . . . "The m e n of old lived i n the midst of the merged and featureless, and found tranquility and mildness w i t h those of their o w n time. A t this era the Y i n and Yang were harmonious and peaceful, gods and ghosts d i d no harm, the four seasons were perfectly proportioned, the myriad creatures were unharmed, all that lived escaped untimely death. Even if men d i d have knowledge, they had nothing to use it o n . It is this that is called being i n utmost oneness. A t this era things were done by nobody, and were constantly so of themselves. "A time came w h e n Potency declined, to the point w h e n Sui-jen and Fu-hsi took charge of the w o r l d . In consequence there was compliance but not oneness. Potency declined a stage further, to the point w h e n Shennung and the Yellow Emperor took charge of the world. In consequence there was stability but not compliance. . . . " Since the rise of rulers, the sage has h a d no choice but to withdraw from the world. "If he is lucky i n his times a n d there is full scope for h i m i n the world, he returns to the oneness and leaves no trace behind. If he is unlucky i n his times and there is no scope for h i m i n the w o r l d , he deepens his roots, secures the ultimate i n h i m a n d waits. This is the Way to save your l i f e . " Ho-kuan-tzu also has a primitive Utopia without lord and vassal. " W h e n Potency was at its culmination there were no paths over the mountains, no bridges over the marshes, no coming and going, no communication by boat or carriage. W h y ? The people were like children. Those w h o had cleverness d i d not use it to deceive and enslave each other, those w h o had strength d i d not use it to make each other vassal and lord. That is w h y y o u could peep d o w n into a crow's or magpie's nest, and from a herd of deer tie whichever y o u pleased on a l e a d . " 41

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The Chuang-tzu 'Primitivist' The great document of Taoist anarchism, if we are to allow the name to this generally paternalistic doctrine, is a block of four essays i n Chuang-tzu w h i c h we call 'Primitivist' (chs. 8-11, excluding the pieces w h i c h follow the essay i n the last chapter). These are the chapters w h i c h , except for the 'Inner Chapters' b y C h u a n g - t z u himself, stand out f r o m the rest of the book as most idiosyncratic i n style and thought.* It so happens that they can be dated w i t h unusual precision, placing them i n a historical setting w h i c h helps us to relate the U t o p i a n m y t h to real demands to contract the scope of government. The Primitivist wrote after the destruction of the state of C h ' i i n 221 B . C . w h i c h completed the C h ' i n reunification,! and the time of disunion i n w h i c h he writes can only be the brief interregnum of 209-202 B . C . between the fall of the C h ' i n dynasty and the final victory of the H a n . The philosophers, silenced under the uniquely repressive regime of C h ' i n , are already re-emerging to compete for influence. The Primitivist's great fear is that the Legalist tyranny of C h ' i n has gone only to be replaced by the moralistic tyranny of Confucians or Mohists. "In the present age the condemned to death lie back to back, the shackled i n cangues and stocks are elbow to elbow, there is always a mutilated m a n somewhere i n sight, yet it is just now that the Confucians and Mohists start putting on airs a n d come flipping back their sleeves among the fettered and manacled." (Cz ll/25f, tr. G 213) Morality, says the Primitivist, is useless i n ordering society, because it serves whoever w i n s power. Its rules are like the boxes and bolts with which we try to secure possessions against thieves; a strong enough thief carries off the whole box and only worries that the bolts w i l l not hold. It is the same w i t h the state; witness C h ' i w h i c h was so perfectly r u n . "However i n one m o r n i n g T'ien C h ' e n g killed the lord of C h ' i and stole his state. N o r was it only the state he stole; he stole it complete w i t h all its wise and sagely laws. So T'ien C h ' e n g has gone o n having the reputation of a thief and bandit, yet the m a n himself lived as secure as Yao or Shun; small states d i d not dare to condemn, great states d i d not dare to punish, and for twelve generations his house possessed the state of C h ' i . Then isn't it on the contrary that he stole the state of C h ' i complete w i t h all

* For the distinctiveness of the Primitivist's style, cf. G Studies 301-03. In addition to Cz 8-11/28 the fragment 12/95-102 is identifiable as Primitivist; it is likely to belong at 8/26, where I have placed it in my translation (Cz tr. G 202). t The "twelve generations" of the house of T'ien mentioned in the passage quoted below on this page ended with the destruction of the state. Cf. G Studies 305.

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its wise and sagely laws and used them to keep safe his robbing, thieving self?" (Cz 10/6-8, tr. G 207) In any case morality is necessary for the organisation of crime. "So w h e n one of Robber Chih's band asked h i m ' D o robbers too have the Way?', C h i h answered ' " W h e r e can you go unless you have the Way? A shrewd guess at where the things are h i d d e n i n the house is the sage's intuitiveness. Being first m a n i n is courage. Being last m a n out is righteousness. K n o w i n g whether or not you can b r i n g it off is w i s d o m . G i v i n g everyone fair shares is benevolence. Without the five at his disposal, no one i n the world could ever make a great robber.' "Judging by this, without the Way of the Sage the good man w o u l d not stand, without the Way of the Sage Robber C h i h w o u l d not walk. If the good m e n i n the world are fewer than the bad, the sages have benefited the world less than they have harmed it. W i t h the birth of the sages the great robbers arise. Smash the sages, turn the thieves and bandits loose, and for the first time the world w i l l be i n order." (Cz 10/10-15, tr. G 207f) Morality only puts you i n the service of the robber. "The m a n w h o steals a buckle is put to death, the m a n w h o steals a state becomes a prince, and at the gates of a prince you'll see the benevolent and the righteous. Then isn't this stealing the benevolence and righteousness, the sagehood and w i s d o m ? " (Cz 10/19T, tr. G 208) M a n is by nature like the horse w h e n he runs w i l d , not as the great trainer Po L o taught us to singe, shave, clip, and brand h i m , tie h i m w i t h martingale and crupper and cramp h i m i n stables. The error is i n supposing that you keep m a n i n order as Po L o trains a horse, a potter moulds clay, or a carpenter trims w o o d to fit compasses and L-square. "In m y o p i n i o n being good at governing the world is not like this. The people have a nature w h i c h is constant: By their weaving clothed, by their ploughing f e d — This call 'sharing the Potency'. In oneness and without faction— The name for it is 'Heaven-loosed'. . . . In the age w h e n Potency was at its utmost, m e n lived i n sameness w i t h the birds and animals, side by side as fellow clansmen w i t h the myriad creatures; how w o u l d they k n o w the gentleman from the small man? In sameness, k n o w i n g nothing! Not parted from their Potency. In sameness, desiring n o t h i n g ! — This call the 'simple and u n h e w n ' . In the simple and u n h e w n the nature of the people is found.

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"Then came the sages, trudging along after Benevolence, straining on tiptoe after Right, and for the first time the world was in doubt. . . . " (Cz 9/6-11, tr. G 204f) To impose order by force only results i n disorder; "ultimate Potency ceases to be shared, and our nature and destiny are frayed and s m u d g e d . " So there has been disorder ever since the Yellow Emperor "used Benevolence and Right to meddle w i t h the hearts of m e n , " ending that line of Emperors d o w n to Shen-nung of w h o m the Primitivist's favourite is the otherwise almost u n k n o w n H o - h s i i . "As for horses, w h e n they live out on the plains they eat the grass and drink the water, w h e n pleased they cross necks and stroke each other, when angry swing r o u n d and kick at each other. That is as far as a horse's knowledge goes. If you put yokes on their necks and hold them level with a crossbar, the horses w i l l k n o w how to smash the crossbar, wriggle out of the yokes, butt the carriage h o o d , spit out the bit and gnaw through the reins. So if even a horse's wits can do all the mischief of the robber, it's the fault o f P o L o . "In the time of the House of H o - h s i i , the people w h e n at home were unaware of what they were doing, w h e n travelling d i d not k n o w where they were going, basked i n the s u n chewing a morsel or strolled d r u m m i n g o n their bellies. This was as far as the capabilities of the people went. Then came the sages, b o w i n g a n d crouching to Ceremony and Music, groping i n the air for Benevolence and Right, i n order to soothe the hearts of the w o r l d , and for the first time the people were on tiptoes i n their eagerness for knowledge. Their competition became centred on profit, it could not have been otherwise. This too is the error of the sages." (Cz 9/1419, tr. G 205f) The Primitivist's furious attacks on sagehood, w i s d o m and knowledge may seem to make h i m an exception to our generalisation that even Taoists value not the spontaneous as such, but the reaction w i t h a clear vision of the object. But as w i t h Taoists generally the attack is on kinds of knowledge conceived as interfering w i t h awareness. The Primitivist identifies man's Potency w i t h the powers of the senses and heart i n their primitive purity, w h e n the eye is not dazzled by "greens and yellows and multicoloured vestments", the ear by "instruments of bronze and stone and silken strings a n d bamboo", the heart by Yangist and Mohist argumentation about "the h a r d and white, the same and the different". The consequences of civilization have been that man's nature is stimulated by luxury and sophistication to grow ambitions and desires as an excess like the superfluous flesh of webbed toes, and his Potency is diverted into 44

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offshoots like a sixth finger on the h a n d . Once they are grown he cannot bear to sacrifice them; "even someone w i t h webbed toes w i l l weep w h e n they are ripped apart, even someone w i t h a sixth finger w i l l scream w h e n it is bitten off. " Those thinkers of the rival schools w h o are coming out of their h i d i n g under the C h ' i n , n e w l y aroused by worldly ambitions, are making themselves the slaves, inwardly of the temptations of eye and ear, outwardly of duties and conventions. "If the Yangists and Mohists are just now starting to put on airs and think they are getting somewhere, it is not what I w o u l d call getting somewhere. If the m a n w h o gets somewhere is caught where he can't get out, is that what you think is getting somewhere? Then the pigeons and doves i n a cage must be supposed to have got somewhere too. A n d to have ambitions and avoidances, sounds and sights, blocking u p the inside of you, and leather cap or snipe-feather hat, memorandum tablet i n belt and trailing sash, constricting the outside of y o u , to be inwardly squeezed inside the bars of your p e n , outwardly lashed by coil on coil of rope, and complacently i n the middle of the ropes suppose that y o u have got somewhere, amounts to claiming that the condemned m a n w i t h his chained arms and manacled fingers, or a tiger or a leopard i n its cage, has got somewhere too." (Cz 12/98-102 tr. G 202) The problem is to restore m a n to the true course w h i c h is the Way, so that he grows again i n the right direction, w h i c h is different for different people. "The m a n on that absolutely true course does not lose the essentials of our nature and destiny. So his joins are not webbings, his forkings are not offshoots; the long i n h i m does not constitute a surplus, the short i n h i m does not constitute an insufficiency. Just so, though the duck's legs are short, if you added more on he w o u l d worry; though the crane's legs are long, if you lopped some off he w o u l d pine. Then what by nature is long is not to be l o p p e d off, what by nature is short is not to be added to; there is nothing to get rid of or to worry over. M a y I suggest that Benevolence and Right do not belong to the essentials of man? W h y is it that those benevolent people w o r r y so much?" (Cz 8/8-10, tr. G 200f) The moral and the immoral spring equally from the loss of this path. "Po Y i died for reputation at the foot of M o u n t Shou-yang, Robber C h i h for profit at the top of East Ridge. What the two men died for was not the same, but i n damaging life and injuring nature there was nothing to choose between them. W h y must it be Po Yi's alternative we judge right and Robber Chih's we judge wrong? . . . "To see something, but not w i t h your o w n eyes, to gain something, 4 8

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but not by your o w n grasp, this is gaining what is gain for other people, not gaining by your o w n grasp what is gain for yourself; it is being suited by what suits other people, not suiting yourself by what is suitable to yourself. Those suited by what suits other people, not suiting themselves with what is suitable to themselves, even Robber C h i h o n the one hand and Po Y i o n the other, are the same i n being vitiated by excess and aberration. I remain humble before the Way and the Potency, and that is w h y I w o u l d not venture either to act on the elevated tenets of Benevolence and Right or to perform the debased deeds of excess a n d aberration." (Cz 8/23-33, tr. G 202, 203) What then should one do if reluctantly driven to accept the throne of the Empire? "Therefore if the gentleman is left w i t h no choice but to preside over the w o r l d , his best policy is D o i n g N o t h i n g . O n l y by D o i n g Nothing will he find security i n the essentials of his nature and destiny." (Cz ll/13f, tr. G 212) There is however a positive side to this D o i n g Nothing: to remove people from the artificial stimulations w h i c h make them grow i n the w r o n g direction. It is here that we discover the positive function of those ancient Emperors d o w n to Shen-nung, and the single paternalist element in the Primitivist's otherwise flawless anarchism. "I have heard of keeping the world i n place and within bounds, I haven't heard of ordering the w o r l d . 'Keeping it i n place' is out of fear that everyone may indulge man's nature to excess: 'keeping it w i t h i n bounds' is out of fear that everyone may displace man's Potency. If everyone refused to indulge his nature to excess and displace his Potency, would there be any such thing as ordering the world?" (Cz 11/lf, tr. G 211) The ancient Emperors, it may be presumed, had no task but to keep the people ignorant of the arts a n d luxuries w h i c h were eventually to corrupt them, so that they still "found their o w n food sweet enough, their own dress beautiful enough, were happy i n their customs, content i n their abode", without even bothering to visit the next village.* By the time of the C h ' i n collapse a restoration of primitive simplicity w o u l d hardly be offered as practical politics. But it w o u l d be a time w h e n this k i n d of Utopia w i t h a social analysis behind it w o u l d be more than a nostalgic dream. The Primitivist's lively polemic might well be a force for personal liberation and the minimalisation of the scope of government, reminding rulers that suppression leads to revolt, encouraging knights to flee office * Cz 10/31f tr. G 209, a close parallel of Lz 80, quoted p. 68fabove.

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for the simpler life of the countryside, discouraging officials trying to reform peasants "happy i n their customs", impressing everyone w i t h the dangers of m e d d l i n g and advantages of leaving things alone. One may notice that i n the classical period even the most Utopian thinkers find it difficult to imagine a society without any ruler or sages at all; the only exceptions we have noticed are i n ' M e n d i n g Nature' and Hokuan-tzu. The concept of pure community explicitly described as without ruler and subject belongs rather to the revival of philosophical Taoism i n the 3rd century A . D .

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THE REUNIFICATION OF THE EMPIRE AND OF HEAVEN AND MAN T^he unique creative impetus i n the small states of the A x i a l Period flagged i n Greece and India w i t h the coming of the Macedonian and M a u r y a n empires. In Isreal it survived conquest by Babylon, but i n a small people stimulated by the threat of absorption to hold o n to its identity; and i n Iran the single figure of Zarathustra preceded the foundation of the Achaemenid empire. C h i n a too confirms that the principle 'Small is beautiful' holds for the political units i n w h i c h the thought of the O l d World cultures took its lasting shape. The three h u n d r e d years of radiant originality and variety end w i t h the unification by the C h ' i n i n 221 B . C , followed after brief disruption by the more stable unification under the H a n (206 B . C . - A . D . 220). The tendency is n o w towards syncretism, the formation of an Imperial administrative apparatus and ideology out of the usable elements i n the pre-Han schools, w i t h Confucianism at the forefront from about 100 B . C . The one significant novelty is the introduction of correlative cosmosbuilding, formerly the province of astronomers, diviners, musicmasters, physicians, and other technicians outside the philosophical schools. It is through a cosmology rooted i n the Y i n and Yang and the Five Processes, w h i c h by correlating moral w i t h physical categories incorporates human morality into the cosmic order, that the threatening gulf between Heaven and man was closed i n C h i n a before man h a d time to rethink himself as a solitary exception i n a morally neutral universe. The one older attempt to close it, the M e n c i a n doctrine of the goodness of h u m a n nature, for a long time to come tempted without fully convincing C h i n a . For 1,500 years, even i n times of philosophical stagnation, thinkers continued to debate whether h u m a n nature is good, bad, neutral, mixed, or good i n some and bad i n others. It seems always to have been suspected that the Mencian would be a deeper solution than the cosmological, if only one could get round the evidence of common experience that h u m a n nature is not good. D u r i n g the S u n g dynasty ( A . D . 960-1279) the Neo-Confucian movement, w h i c h i n spite of its fascination w i t h the Yi treated correlative systembuilding as marginal, again sought a true philosophical explanation of the

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relation between Heaven and m a n . C h ' e n g Y i (1033-1107) achieved a great paradigm-shift, by w h i c h li 'pattern', w h i c h has only a modest place in pre-Han thought, as i n the 'Great M a n ' writer and i n H a n Fei's 'Interpretation of Lao-tzu', moved to the centre, and 'Heaven', 'the Way', 'nature' and 'destiny' were redefined i n terms of it. With the dualist metaphysic of C h u H s i (1130-1200), i n w h i c h li patterns the ch'i, w h i c h already by the end of the classical period had become the universal fluid out of w h i c h all things condense and into w h i c h they dissolve, there was at last a context i n w h i c h the M e n c i a n doctrine of h u m a n nature could w i n acceptance as Confucian orthodoxy* We cannot leave the limits of this book to search the live currents i n later Chinese thinking; we must finish by watching older streams running together into a stable synthesis, as C h i n a achieves that equilibrium by w h i c h it has outlasted all other empires, and turns its back on just those tendencies w h i c h opened prospects i n our direction, the logical demonstrations of Sophists and Later Mohists, the neutralisation of nature by H s i i n - t z u and H a n Fei. N o t that this final stage is of merely historical interest. The ascendancy of Yin-Yang, the Five Processes and the Yi no doubt reflects an intellectual deterioration; but it touches on important issues, the relation between correlative and analytic thinking and of protoscience and modern science. The search for a unified world-view to back a politically unified world is common to East a n d West at the end of the A x i a l Period. It is symptomatic of the Chinese drive to stability and integration that it found its solution almost immediately, while the West's was delayed and only partial. The Macedonian a n d Roman empires opened the way for proselytising world religions, of w h i c h Christianity prevailed i n the Roman Empire only at the very end of its unity, although Christian Byzantium and the H o l y Roman Empire remained as foci for an ideal world unity. Chinese unification likewise opened the way to proselytising religions, Indian B u d d h i s m and the native 'Teaching of the Way' (religious Taoism). But the conversions of any number of Chinese Constantines never led to the lasting establishment of a new state religion. The problem had been solved at the start by the rapid adoption of the cosmology of the court astronomers a n d diviners, w h o m rulers must always have taken more seriously than the philosophers to w h o m they granted an occasional audience. The cosmology may be classed as 'proto-science', w i t h the negative implication that it lacks the strict testability of modern science, * For the Neo-Confucian solution as a paradigm shift cf. G Studies 412-435.

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but also the positive implication that it is science i n contrast w i t h religion, that it relates observable phenomena to each other rather than to transcendent beings. Such a system may include gods, but i n correlating them w i t h colours, sounds, numbers, it reduces them to the same level and denies them transcendence, t C h i n a w i t h its man-centred perspective preferred proto-science for the organising of its world-view, while the West made a delayed choice of religion and confined proto-science to the explanation of natural phenomena. The Chinese choice is of an integrated solution of the problems both of placing oneself i n the world and of manipulating it for one's purposes; the Western reserves the former for religion and leaves room for the latter to be solved i n its o w n way, an advantage perhaps for the ultimate emergence of modern science.

1. THE COSMOLOGISTS Proto-science and modern science The nature of Chinese science has raised problems for Westerners ever since they began to suspect that such basic inventions as the compass and gunpowder, paper and printing, h a d reached them from the Far East. It has been our habit to think of science a n d technology as from the first intimately connected, a n d gradually progressing side by side as causal thinking comes to prevail over the correlative thinking of primitive magic and Mediaeval proto-science. O u r bias inclines us therefore, either to think of C h i n a as on the verge of modern science but somehow (for reasons w h i c h it w o u l d be of great interest to discover) failing to reach it, or else to be suspicious of claims to Chinese priorities i n technology. The great work of Joseph N e e d h a m has brought this issue to a head. Granted that many of his findings remain controversial, there can no longer be any doubt about the immense fertility of C h i n a i n practical inventiveness; it may be an error of perspective even to see it as declining i n recent centuries, since the unprecedented acceleration of technological progress in the West has made all other cultures seem stagnant by comparison. O n the other hand it has become clear that traditional C h i n a was never i n sight of an alternative to the correlative system-building w h i c h distinguishes Mediaeval from post-Galilean science. Occasional episodes i n w h i c h t Cf. Lévi-Strauss's analysis of the systems of totemism (metaphorical in orientation) and of sacrifice (métonymie) as "on different levels from the epistemological point of view in that the latter "makes a nonexistent term, divinity, intervene" (Lévi-Strauss 294-302).

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causal thinking replaces correlative, notably the Later Mohist, pass as quickly as similar episodes i n the pre-modern West, the scientific m i n i revolution of Grosseteste a n d Roger Bacon, and the still more 'modern' Archimedean science i n Greece. This seems paradoxical only if we cling to certain increasingly discredited assumptions about the relations between science, causal thinking, and concern for the useful. There has been a persisting assumption that even if the Chinese d i d make great inventions they failed to exploit them, leaving them to be picked u p by foreigners w h o could appreciate their utility. Examples are the old legends that the Chinese having invented gunpowder a n d the compass used them only for firecrackers and geomancy, and that the use of the compass i n navigation attested i n Canton about A . D . 1100 was by A r a b traders. It is by now recognised that the supposed reference to the Arabs depends on a simple mistranslation, and that d u r i n g the same period the Chinese were using gunpowder for the ancestors of a variety of weapons the benefits of w h i c h we enjoy today. Inventions of their o w n w h i c h the Chinese neglected seem generally to be ones not obviously useful—equal temperament i n music, the Sung algebra, movable type (less convenient than block prmting for a script w i t h thousands of characters). It is i n any case hard to judge objectively whether the failure of a discovery to catch on i n another civilization has any significance; I a m always more surprised that you fail at once to appreciate m y idea than that I took so long to appreciate yours. We do not, for example, see a problem i n what might well be taken as one of the most remarkable examples i n history of cultural resistance to a foreign idea, the reluctance of the West to assimilate the place-value numeral systems long current f r o m C h i n a to the M i d d l e East and even i n Central America. N o t to mention that the Greeks failed to exploit the Babylonian system except i n the astronomy w h i c h they borrowed from Babylon, the A r a b i c ' numerals w h i c h came from India (ultimately, it appears, from C h i n a ) took almost the whole of the M i d d l e Ages to conquer Europe. The Syrian bishop Sebokht i n A . D . 662 already pointed out the Indian numerals as a proof that the Greeks d i d not know everything. O n e might have thought that this basic prerequisite of the Scientific Revolution w o u l d also have h a d overwhelming practical advantages. Yet a thousand years later John A u b r e y (1625-1697), w h o fully appreciated the newly discovered inverse square law of gravitation, could still report: "All old accounts are i n numeral letters. Even to m y remembrance, when I was a youth, gentleman's bailiffs i n the country used no other, e.g., 1

2

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i , ii, iii, iiii, v, v i , v i i , v i i i , ix, x, x i , etc; and to this day i n the accounts of the Exchequer." It must be taken for granted that i n C h i n a concern for the practically useful stimulated causal thinking i n technology as strongly as i n the West, and contributed as m u c h or more to material wellbeing until it was outstripped i n the last few centuries. But to suppose that this would be bringing C h i n a nearer to modern science assumes an obsolete conception of science as developing by continuous progress i n rationality. We now think i n terms rather of a Scientific Revolution about A . D . 1600, the 'discovery of h o w to discover', the quite sudden integration of the idea of explaining all natural phenomena by mathematised laws of nature testable by controlled experiment. The breakthrough was made by Galileo; even his contemporary Kepler, whose three planetary laws are the first modern laws of nature, still belongs to the old regime of correlative systembuilding. The Scientific Revolution appears as a unique and complex event, depending on a variety of social a n d other conditions including a confluence of discoveries (Greek, Indian, Chinese, Arabic, scarcely ever Roman) centred on the combining of Indian numerals a n d algebra with Greek logic a n d geometry. Since this crucial combination, for primarily geographical reasons, came about among the Arabs, afterwards passing to Latin Christendom, it becomes pointless to ask w h y the Scientific Revolution d i d not happen i n some other part of the world. The whole question of w h y the Chinese never arrived at modern science seems to me a pseudo-problem.* O n e generally asks w h y a n event d i d happen, not w h y the same complex set of conditions d i d not come together at some other time and place. Thus the formation of an empire, covering a fifth of mankind a n d still, after several thousand years, surviving even the extreme pressures of the 20th century, is a n event w h i c h like the Scientific Revolution has happened only once i n history. We may ask what unique conjunction of factors has stabilised C h i n a , w e do not ask ' W h y have not Egypt and Babylon lasted to the present day?'. 4

Both i n C h i n a a n d i n Europe u p to the Renaissance there is a n incongruity to the modern eye between the flourishing of causal thinking in technology a n d its failure to dislodge correlative thinking from cosmology. Success i n invention depends o n a habit of thinking causally, while on the other hand the technology proper to correlative schematising is magic; one has only to look at any proto-science, Western or Eastern, to * Cf. my 'China, Europe and the Origins of Modern Science' in Nakayama and Sivin 45-70, criticised in Qian 92-94 and passim.

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see that if one can predict at all by such correlations one can predict the death of kings and whether the lonely girl w i l l meet a dark handsome m a n next week. But there seems to be very little connexion between the extent to w h i c h a civilization uses causal thinking i n practice and i n the theory of its sciences. M a n k i n d has always had technology other than magic, and must always have depended on discoveries that w h e n you do x the consequence is generally y. It is a familiar observation that even preliterate cultures do not resort to magic w i t h i n fields, such as the crafts, w h i c h they understand causally. Both i n C h i n a and i n the ancient and Mediaeval West one meets a great deal of causal explanation and scepticism towards the excesses of correlative system-building. But piecemeal causal explanations do not add u p to a cosmos, or even to a single organised science. U n t i l the Scientific Revolution, the choice was between a correlative cosmos and no cosmos at all. Until the West grasped the complicated idea of formulating mathematised laws of nature and testing them by controlled experiment, its o w n temporary swings i n favour of causal explanation never broke the hold of correlative system-building. In the 15th and 16th centuries indeed the swing had been i n the opposite direction. The Renaissance, tiring of Aristotelian common sense, revived Pythagorean numerology, and by revelling i n its fantasies opened the way to the mathematisation of laws of nature. Inspired by Hermes Trismegistus and the Kabbalah, it conceived the prospect of conquering nature through magic before possessing the scientific means to realise it. (Prospero and Faustus are almost realistic pictures of the pioneers on the course w h i c h has led us to atom-splitting and space travel.) O n the very threshold of modern science Kepler was trying to fit his planetary laws into the symmetries of a cosmos i n which sun, stars, a n d planets correlate w i t h the persons of the Trinity. Even after Galileo correlative schematising remained indispensable i n any field not yet conquered by the new physics. N e w t o n himself could without incongruity busy himself w i t h alchemy and w i t h correlating historical events w i t h the predictions of the Apocalypse. In biology, brought very late w i t h i n the scope of modern science, German Naturphilosophie maintained the tradition of proto-scientific cosmos-building right into the 19th century; thus Lorenz O k e n (1779-1851) could still fit the Black, White, M o n g o l and A m e r i n d i a n races to the Four Elements, earth, fire, air and water. It seems from John B. Henderson's recent Development and Decline of Chinese Cosmology that it was a positive disadvantage to Chinese science that it d i d eventually see through the artificialities of its o w n Yin-Yang theorising. Throughout most of Chinese history sceptics merely became

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more cautious i n theorising themselves i n the same style. F r o m the 17th century, however, thinkers such as Wang Fu-chih (1619-1692) do attack the basis of the traditional proto-sciences. The coincidence i n time w i t h the Scientific Revolution is remarkable; but although Western mathematics and astronomy introduced by the Jesuits certainly contributed to the growing scepticism, the m a i n impetus seems to have come from the progress of indigenous studies such as observational astronomy, geography, and historical a n d textual criticism. The effect was a suspicion of all systems extended to Western science itself, a contentment w i t h piecemeal explanations, acceptance that nature is inherently untidy and that it is useless to demand the complete resolution of anomalies. The suspicion that anomaly is inherent i n nature, w h i c h could have debilitated modern science at the start, not quite escaped even by G a l i l e o , came to dominate Chinese science. O n e might draw the lesson that it was to the advantage of Western science that it d i d not see through the inadequacies of protoscience too early, before there was something not less but more systematic to put i n its place. We may note also that i n both C h i n a and the West the persistence of correlative schematising i n the sciences has nothing to do w i t h the level of sophistication of thought i n other fields. In the West the logic accepted as complete until the 19th century goes back to Aristotle, yet correlative thinking i n the sciences prevailed right up to 1600. If we ask w h y Western thought was for two thousand years 'primitive' i n one field and 'modern' in the other, there is an obvious answer; the solution of logical problems requires no resources outside one's o w n head, of scientific a vast quantity of discrete information w h i c h , until some alternative approach is found, can be organised and utilised only by classifying as similar or different and inferring f r o m similarities. A s for C h i n a , throughout the classical period correlative schematising belongs only to professions such as diviners and physicians; the philosophers from Confucius to H a n Fei do not engage i n it at all. Granted that analytic t h i n k i n g develops less among Chinese than among Greek philosophers, we find different levels of thinking i n philosophy a n d proto-science very much as i n the West. 5

Correlative thinking and correlative cosmos-building The Chinese cosmology w h i c h assumed its lasting shape by the beginning of the H a n is a vast system starting from chains of pairs correlated w i t h the Y i n and Yang, branching out into fours and fives (Four Seasons, Four Directions, Five Colours, Five Sounds, Five Tastes, Five

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Smells . . . .) correlated w i t h the Five Processes, a n d down through successive divisions correlated w i t h the Eight Trigrams and Sixty-four Hexagrams of the Yi. This scheme, i n w h i c h to explain and infer is to locate within the pattern, provides the organising concepts of proto-sciences such as astronomy, medicine, music, divination a n d , i n later centuries, alchemy and geomancy. The system-building of C h i n a , to w h i c h Marcel Granet's La pensée chinoise (1934) remains unsurpassed as an introduction, is not wholly strange to a Westerner w h o remembers the Four Elements, Four H u m o u r s and Pythagorean numerology i n the past of his o w n tradition, but d u r i n g the last few centuries this style of thinking has become so remote f r o m most of us that access is n o w difficult except for people temperamentally i n sympathy w i t h the one Western study i n w h i c h it still flourishes, occultism. It is not just that the explanations of Chinese as of Western Mediaeval a n d Renaissance proto-science may impress us as obscure or fallacious like the arguments of the philosophers; the trouble is that for post-Galilean science they are not explanations at all. However, the strangeness to us of Yin-Yang thinking, unlike that of Lao-tzu or 'A white horse is not a horse', has little to do w i t h being Chinese. What Granet saw as the difference between Chinese and Western thought may nowadays be seen as a transcultural difference between proto-science and modern science. Correlative cosmos-building is most conveniently approached as merely a n exotic example of the correlative thinking used by everyone, w h i c h underlies the operations of language itself. To analyse it we shall borrow f r o m structural linguistics the approach and terminology of Roman Jakobson.* We start f r o m the truism that thiriking is conducted i n sentences composed of words d r a w n from the vocabulary of one's language, and that the words are already grouping i n the 'language' (Saussure's langue) before entering the sentences of 'speech' (Saussure's parole). In speaking we on the one hand select words from pairs or larger sets ('paradigms'), on the other combine them i n phrases and sentences ('syntagms'). A 1. H e 2. posted 3. a 4. letter. Syntagm

Paradigm B They collected the mail.

* Jakobson, in particular pp. 239-259, 'Two Aspects of Language'.

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Verbal t h i n k i n g draws on a stock of paradigms already grouping syntagmatically i n chains of oppositions w h i c h at their simplest are binary. This time we number only for convenience without i m p l y i n g succession or completeness. A B Paradigm 1. Day Night 2. Light Darkness 3. Knowledge Ignorance 4. G o o d Evil Syntagm The proof of such a chain i n the background of thinking i n English is that before the formation of sentences the words already combine syntagmatically i n vocabulary or cliche: 'daylight', 'the light of k n o w l edge', 'the darkness of ignorance/of evil'. The paradigmatic relation is of similarity/contrast: A l : B l : : A 2 : B2 (Day compares w i t h night as light w i t h darkness). The syntagmatic relation is of contiguity/remoteness: A l : A 2 : : B l : B2 (Day connects w i t h light as night w i t h darkness). W h e n relations tend to similarity rather than contrast, or to contiguity rather than remoteness, one of a pair may substitute for another, by the figures of speech called 'metaphor' and 'metonymy': A B A B 1. K i n g Lion King Chairman 2. M e n Beasts Throne Chair K i n g compares w i t h lion as men w i t h beasts, so by metaphor the lion is king of the beasts and the k i n g a lion among men. K i n g connects with throne as chairman w i t h chair, so by metonymy the monarchy is the throne and the chairmanship is the chair. Before t h i n k i n g i n sentences we already 'think' i n the broad sense that we pattern experience i n chains of oppositions and expect the filling of gaps i n the pattern. W h e n the pattern is familiar this is no more than the recurrence of habitual expectation, w h e n a new pattern takes shape it is sudden insight, whether as the everyday intuitions of common sense or the illuminations of the visionary a n d the fantast. The expectations spring from and are initially confirmed by experience. We do regularly encounter light by day and darkness by night, the night does bring ignorance of surroundings and dangers a n d evils. Since the distinguishing of oppositions is guided by desire and aversion, w h i c h enchain the pairs with good and evil, someone t h i n k i n g correlatively is satisfied not only of what to

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expect but of what to approve and disapprove; values appear self-evident and he needs analytic t h i n k i n g only i n the service of what immediately presents itself as good. However, the connexions between light and knowledge, darkness and evil, are vaguer and less regular than between day and light, not to mention that there are times w h e n one even encounters darkness b y day. One is then forced to analyse the syntagmatic relations critically and seek the precise, invariable and so causal connexion. A tension grows between the pressure of fact and the need for the security of remaining inside a fully comprehensible world. Causal relations begin to interlock, opening the prospect of another cosmos, that of modern science, i n w h i c h prediction is more accurate than ever before but there is nothing to tell us what to approve or disapprove. O u r position however is that there never was a serious prospect that piecemeal causal explanation w o u l d interrelate i n a completed order until the 'discovery of how to discover' about 1600; previously, i n the West as i n C h i n a , the choice was between the cosmos of correlative system-building and no cosmos at all. The prevalence of correlative cosmology before Galileo ceases to surprise w h e n we recognize that even i n its most luxuriant elaborations it is the refining of a cosmos i n w h i c h the thinker already finds himself before analysis begins; the correlation of concepts precedes their analysis. I have only to discern, for example, that the sun and the K i n g are alike i n being 'above' i n power a n d glory, i n the proportional opposition 'sun : world :: k i n g : men', to find myself already i n a cosmos where both have intelligible places, so that I can infer from their similarity both what to expect and how to respond; I must bow d o w n i n awe to the K i n g as to the sun, grateful for his beneficence and reconciled to the incomprehensible caprices of unchallengable power. Causal t h i n k i n g on the other hand merely breaks things up, until the discovery of mathematised laws of nature re-unifies them i n another k i n d of cosmos. O n e might put it this way: while explaining analytically, attention is diverted f r o m the correlating of concepts i n the background; but as long as analysis has nothing to put i n front, correlative t h i n k i n g is necessarily i n the foreground. H o w does correlative relate to analytic thinking? The common-sense thinking of daily life may be conceived as a stream of correlation redirected by analysis whenever we have occasion to doubt a comparison or connexion. M u c h of the most accessible Chinese philosophising (Hsiintzu, H a n Fei) is of this sort, w i t h the correlations made more visible than i n English by the parallelism of phrases and sentences. We do get pure analytic thinking i n the Sophists and Later Mohists; it is what they

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understand b y pien 'argumentation'. But it is notable that even the Later Mohists offer no forms for argumentation w h i c h we w o u l d recognise as belonging to logic; the discipline w h i c h they do recognise as requiring formal procedures is the one w e have called the 'art of discourse', and i n Names and Objects the procedures are for criticising the parallelism of correlated sentences. F r o m another direction we have Lao-tzu resorting to a poetic language to undermine conventional oppositions, i n a manner w h i c h we have compared w i t h Derridan deconstruction. The Chinese assumption seems to be that you can criticise correlations but you cannot dispense w i t h them. The Western tradition on the other hand has long persisted i n trying to detach the analytic completely from its background i n the correlative, dismissing the latter as the loose argument from analogy w h i c h we need in practical life but exclude f r o m strict logic. It is only i n the last halfcentury, w i t h Ryle's exposure of the category mistake, Kuhn's proposal that all science assumes paradigms subverted not b y demonstration but by correlative switches, Derrida's uncovering of chains of oppositions at the back of logocentric thought, that the West seems finally to be losing faith i n its two-thousand-year-old enterprise. Wittgenstein showed that the similarities w h i c h we try to p i n d o w n by naming are 'family resemblances' by which A may be like B and B like C without A being like C , so that the hope of drawing an absolute distinction between literal and metaphorical meanings and fixing the former i n a system of mutually definable terms seems baseless outside logic a n d mathematics. We find correlations of the building-blocks of thought, of the same k i n d as i n the most exotic cosmologies, i n the operation of language itself, w h i c h may be claimed as the one activity to w h i c h correlative thinking is perfectly adequate. The learner becoming familiar w i t h the oppositions 'cat/cats', 'shoe/shoes', 'stone/stones' immediately fills the gap i n 'house/ ' with 'houses'; and if he slips into the error 'goose/gooses' and is corrected, he automatically correlates 'goose/geese' w i t h 'foot/feet', 'tooth/teeth'. In learning to speak grammatically it is analytic thinking w h i c h is inadequate, useful as it is as a preliminary tool; it is w h e n one is no longer deliberately a p p l y i n g a memorised rule distinguishing singular from plural that a foreign language is beginning to be mastered. The same correlative process is required for the understanding of utterances whether i n one's o w n language or another, the completion of an analysis into intertranslatable units being an unattainable ideal. Certainly no serious reader of Chinese philosophy can forget that his capacity to clarify in English never catches u p w i t h his understanding of the original, and

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that i n analysing he always has to uncover the metaphorical roots not only of the Chinese terms but of the English w h i c h he uses to explain them.* One of the first to appreciate that the analysis of concepts does not detach them from presupposed correlations was Ryle, the argument of whose Concept of Mind may be converted into the correlative ratios we have been using. Ryle sets out to discredit the dichotomy of a body w h i c h is extended i n space a n d a m i n d w h i c h is not. H e observes that our habit of treating the m i n d as different i n k i n d f r o m , yet interacting w i t h , the body w h i c h is a machine, implies crediting it w i t h a similarity, that its activities like the body's have causes and effects. The m i n d as 'ghost i n the machine' has to be conceived as 'a spectral machine'. This has led to well-known difficulties; h o w can w i l l i n g , w h i c h is non-spatial, cause the limbs to move in space, or the mind's perception of a colour be the effect of a process i n the optic nerve? Ryle sees the problem as arising from a n improper correlation at the back of thought: ' M i n d : head, hands, feet :: ruler : subjects' (the 'para-political myth'), w h i c h the advent of mechanistic science turned into ' M i n d : head, hands, feet :: governor engine : other engines' (the 'para-mechanical myth'). H e invites us instead to try out new correlations, ' M i n d : head, hands, feet :: University : colleges, libraries, playing fields', or ' M i n d : head, hands, feet :: British constitution : Parliament, judiciary, C h u r c h of E n g l a n d ' . O n this approach, analytic thinking can never escape the correlations deposited by habit or initiated by new insights; i n criticising one it has to surrender to another. W h e n we do become aware of alternatives, however, we can choose between them by judging whether arguments proceeding f r o m one or other lead into or avoid logical difficulties. We seem to be m o v i n g nearer to the classical Chinese philosophers i n taking correlation as prior to analysis (not of course nearer to the Yin-Yang proto-scientists). It is curious to notice that w h e n exposing, like a Later Mohist, overlooked distinctions between formally similar statements, Ryle falls into just the sort of parallelism we find i n Names and Objects. Thus i n pointing out the difference between tasks (aiming, treating, scanning) and achievements (hitting, curing, seeing), overlooked w h e n we assume them to be "co-ordinate species of activity or process", he writes: "This is w h y we can significantly say that someone has aimed i n vain or successfully, but not that he has hit the target i n vain or successfully; *C£. G Reason and Spontaneity 57-60 and ch. 1.5passim. This gives a fuller account of the dependence of analytic on what I there call 'analogical' thinking, a cruder version of the correlative thinking which I am now treating in Jakobsonian terms.

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that he has treated his patient assiduously or unassiduously, but not that he has cured h i m assiduously or unassiduously; that he scanned the hedgerow slowly or rapidly, systematically or haphazardly, but not that he saw the nest slowly or rapidly, systematically or haphazardly." 1

Cosmology before the Han Cosmological speculation, w h i c h is at the beginning of Greek philosophy, entered the main current of Chinese thought only at the very end of the classical p e r i o d . * D o w n to about 250 B . C . it belongs to a world right outside the philosophical schools, that of the court historiographers, astronomers, diviners, physicians, and musicmasters, and our information about it comes primarily from historical sources, notably the 4thcentury Tso Commentary. Thus i n 541 B . C . the physician H o , diagnosing the Marquis of Chin's illness as the effect of sexual excess and incurable, is represented as sketching for h i m the fundamentals of the proto-science of medicine. "Heaven has the Six Ch'i, w h i c h descending generate the Five Tastes, issue as the Five Colours, are evidenced by the Five Sounds, and i n excess generate the Six Diseases. The Six Ch'i are shade {yin ) and sunshine (yang ), w i n d and rain, dark and light. They divide to make the Four Seasons, i n sequence make the Five Rhythms, and i n excess bring about calamity. From shade i n excess cold diseases, from sunshine hot; from w i n d i n excess diseases of the extremities, from rain of the stomach; from dark i n excess delusions, f r o m light diseases of the heart. Woman being a thing of the sunshine but of the dark time, i n excess she generates the diseases of inward heat a n d delusion-inducing p o i s o n s . " The ch'i are the energetic fluids i n the atmosphere and inside the body, where they are primarily the breath. The words yin and yang here still have their pre-philosophical senses, shade and sunshine (used especially of the north or shady and south or sunny sides of a mountain), and are two of the six atmospheric influences. They are the sources of cold and heat rather than, as later, of dark and light, w h i c h are separately classed among the six. Besides the Six Ch'i belonging to Heaven the Tso Commentary has a set of Five Hsing %f ('goings') w h i c h belong to Earth, not yet as later classed as ch'i. These are associated, and later identified, w i t h w o o d , fire, soil, metal, and water. The term was until recently commonly translated 'Five Elements', although they are certainly not conceived as components of 1

* The detailed evidence for the claims in this chapter (as of much else in Part 4/1) is in G Yin-Yang.

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things; 'Five Phases' is the equivalent increasingly preferred. However, right d o w n to the syncretistic Huai-nan-tzu (c. 140 B . C . ) , the Five Hsing appear to be, not the materials, nor phases i n cycles, but processes such as fire rising and b u r n i n g , water wetting and sinking. W o o d , fire, soil, metal and water were called the Five Materials (ts'ai ffi ) or, w i t h the addition of grain, the Six Stores (fu /£}-), and were simply the basic resources for human l i v e l i h o o d . I therefore prefer the equivalent 'Five Processes' at least for the p r e - H a n period. The earliest reference is i n the 'Great Plan' (Hung fan) i n the Documents, not, as it claims, a work of early C h o u but unlikely to be later than 400 B . C . This lists i n nine enumerated sets the essentials for government, starting w i t h the five natural processes most useful to m a n and continuing w i t h the five kinds of conduct required of him. "1. The five processes. 1, water : 2, fire : 3, w o o d : 4, metal : 5, soil. Water : wetting, sinking. Fire : flaming, rising. Wood : bending, straight. M e t a l : yielding to m o u l d i n g . In soil one plants and harvests . . . . "2. The five things to do. 1, demeanour : 2, speech : 3, looking : 4, listening : 5, t h i n k i n g . Demeanour : respectful. Speech : accordant. Looking : seeing clearly. Listening : hearing clearly. T h i n k i n g : understanding . . . ." It is not surprising that after 100 B . C . the first series was understood as listing water, fire and the rest of them as themselves the Five Hsing, i n spite of the fact that the ordinary meaning of hsing is 'going'. But i n both series the concept is split into two components. In the second the thing to do is not the demeanour, nor the respect, but assuming a respectful demeanour; similarly the process is not water, nor wetting and sinking i n general, but water wetting and sinking. The hsing w o u l d seem to be the processes specific to each material, of w h i c h the workman takes advantage when he waters g r o u n d , sets alight f r o m below, carpenters following the grain, casts metal, plants grain. It was noticed from an early period that the processes conquer each other i n a regular cycle, water quenching fire, fire melting metal, metal cutting w o o d , w o o d digging soil, and coming round again with soil damming water; some at least of these conquests were i n use by the diviners of the Tso narrative. The conquests are always ascribed to the Five Processes (not the Five Materials or Six Stores), and there is some evidence that the term itself was established w i t h the discovery of the cycle. Although it is uncertain h o w far one can rely on the discourses ascribed to historical persons i n the Tso Commentary, it is noticeable that both the conquest cycle and the term Five Hsing appear quite suddenly during the 2

3

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last half-century of the record, starting from 517 B . C . and mostly i n answers between 513 a n d 484 B . C . by the Historiographer M o of C h i n to the noble Chao C h i e n - t z u of the same state, while the terms Five Materials and Six Stores are last attested i n 531 B . C . A s k e d i n 486 B.C.whether C h a o can successfully attack Sung, M o replies: " Y i n g (the C h a o surname) is a water name, T z u (the Sung surname) is a water position. N a m e and position match, it is not to be attacked. Yen-ti ('Flaming Emperor') was director of fire, the C h i a n g clan are his descendants; water conquers fire, it is admissible to attack the C h i a n g . " A l l the p r e - C h ' i n schools are indifferent if not hostile to the cosmology of the proto-sciences, generally ignoring even the Yi, the early C h o u manual of divination regularly consulted by statesmen i n the Tso Commentary and later included i n the Confucian Classics. Confucius himself set the example: "The Master d i d not speak of wonders, feats of strength, disturbances, the daimonic. " In the standard text of the Analects he once praises the Yi, but the reading is i n doubt.* Otherwise the first Confucian to mention the Yi is H s i i n - t z u , w h o cites it but does not name it among the Classics. H e also mentions Mencius as teaching the Five Hsing, but this is n o w k n o w n , from a Confucian document attached to a Ma-wang-tui manuscript of Lao-tzu, to refer not to the Five Processes but to five kinds of moral conduct. Not only the M o h i s t Canons but the military classic Sun-tzu declare flatly that "the Five Processes have no regular conquests". W i t h the apparent exception of H u i S h i h , of whose views we know nothing, the only philosophers w h o discuss scientific questions are the Later Mohists. But the Canons do not appeal to Y i n and Yang, Five Processes or the hexagrams; they confine themselves to strictly causal explanations i n optics and mechanics. Moreover, as we have seen, the practice has a principle behind it: conjunctions of events may be 'necessary' or merely 'appropriate', conjunction w i t h a cause is necessary but the conquest of metal by fire i n the cycle of the Five Processes is merely appropriate, the outcome depending on the quantities of fuel and m e t a l . Here we have what is perhaps the most striking Chinese parallel to those pre-modern Western swings towards causal explanation w h i c h do not lead to the 'discovery of h o w to discover'. The M o h i s t approximation to what we w o u l d nowadays approve as true scientific method is of course quite exceptional, resulting f r o m an interest i n logical clarification and also 5

6

7

8

9

10

11

* An 7/17 The alternative reading is preferred for example by Lau, Analects p. 88.

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in crafts such as military engineering w h i c h was almost limited to the Mohist school; but i n philosophical literature before about 250 B . C . it is the only k i n d of science that we find. One may however suspect one early influence from the protosciences; Yangists 'nurturing life' to last out its full term w o u l d be likely to borrow concepts f r o m medicine. The first evidence of this is from C h u a n g tzu, w h o i n the 'Inner Chapters' speaks of the sage "charioteering the changes of the Six Ch'i', presumably still including sunshine and shade among them, also of the ' i n w a r d heat' of a m a n making himself i l l by worry as "a yin-yang affliction", quite i n the manner of physician H o . The point at w h i c h Y i n and Yang detached themselves from the Six Ch'i is not easily determined. In later parts of Chuang-tzu, w h i c h may be of the late 3rd or even 2nd century B . C . , Y i n and Yang have definitely emerged as the two primal ch'i: 1 2

"Therefore heaven a n d earth are the greatest of shapes, Y i n and Yang are the greatest of ch'i. " A consequence of this development is that all things can now be conceived as condensing out of and dissolving into a universal ch'i w h i c h as Yang is pure and so free m o v i n g and active, and as Y i n is impure and so inert and passive. 13

"Man's life is the assembling of ch'i. The assembling is deemed birth, the disperal is deemed death. . . . R u n n i n g through the whole world there is nothing but the one ch'i." The general indifference of the schools to cosmology ends, from motives w h i c h seem to have been essentially political, w i t h the growing influence on rulers of Tsou Yen (c. 250 B . C . ) and his theories about Y i n Yang and the Five Processes. A l t h o u g h Ssu-ma T'an's retrospective classification of the philosophers under the 'Six Schools' includes a 'school of Y i n and Yang', Tsou Yen belongs to the world not of philosophers but of the court diviners and physicians of the Tso Commentary, except that he is a newcomer w i n n i n g the ear of princes by the promise of esoteric knowledge; his followers i n the states of C h ' i and Yen i n the far North East are the first to be remembered as fang shih ~?) i 'men of secret arts'. Like the cosmology documented i n the Tso Commentary, Tsou Yen's is k n o w n to us almost exclusively f r o m a historical source, the Historical Records of Ssuma C h ' i e n , for w h o m he is important for the influence of his ideas on the First Emperor. The historian himself contrasts the honours accorded Tsou Yen by rulers w i t h their indifference to such better men as Confucius and Mencius. A s for the philosophers, they do not even execrate or deride h i m as they do the 'egoist' Yang C h u or the sophist K u n g - s u n L u n g , they u

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simply ignore h i m , even i n the numerous lists of leaders of the various schools i n Hstin-tzu, the Chuang-tzu 'Below i n the Empire' chapter, the Lii Spring and Autumn, Shih-tzu a n d Huai-nan-tzu. Even after the triumph of cosmology d u r i n g the H a n they hardly mention Tsou Yen himself except to deride as fantasy some geographical speculations recorded by Ssu-ma C h ' i e n ; his voluminous works seem to have been unread and were soon lost.* Tsou Yen w o n public attention by the arresting thought that the rise and fall of dynasties is governed by the conquest order of the Five Potencies (te), the virtues or powers of the Five Processes by w h i c h water conquers fire and so on through the cycle. The C h o u reigned by the potency of fire w h i c h w i l l be conquered by water; its successor will be recognised by its adoption of the colour, number, season and so forth w h i c h correlates w i t h water i n a system of correspondances apparently already current i n court ritual. This scheme first enters the surviving literature i n the Lii Spring and Autumn. A l t h o u g h like other philosophical texts this never mentions Tsou Yen by name, it gives a full account of the dynastic cycle starting w i t h the Yellow Emperor, as well as laying out the full system of correlations i n its calendrical chapters. "Whenever emperor or k i n g is about to arise, Heaven is sure to display a good omen beforehand to the people below. In the time of the Yellow Emperor, Heaven displayed beforehand big earthworms and big ants [creatures of the soil]. The Yellow Emperor said 'The ch'i of soil has conquered.' Because the ch'i of soil had conquered, as his colour he honoured yellow, for his affairs took soil as norm [that is, he chose the correlates of s o i l ] . " The account continues through the dynasties as each ch'i is conquered by the next. A B C D E Yellow Emperor Hsia Shang Chou (Coming dynasty) Soil Wood Metal Fire Water Yellow Green White Red Black The First Emperor put the system into practice by proclaiming that the C h ' i n reigned by the potency of water, and adopting i n ritual the colour black and the rest of the correlates. It is to the political appeal of the system that we may ascribe the universal reclassification of the Five Processes as ch'i and as the prime correlates of sets of four and five, as the Y i n and Yang ch'i are the prime correlates for pairs. Some older schemes of ritual 15

* Cf. G Yin-Yang 11-15. For Ssii-ma Ch'ien's account of Tsou Yen, cf. Shih chi (ch. 74) 2344f, tr. Yang 71 f.

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correspondances survive i n the Kuan-tzu miscellany, but i n these the Five Processes are absent or secondary and are clearly distinguished from a corresponding series of ch'i recognisably descended from the Six Ch'i of the older cosmology. A further consequence of making the Five Processes prime correlates is that the order i n w h i c h they are fitted to the four seasons establishes a cycle i n w h i c h they generate each other, independent of the conquest cycle. B D A C E Spring Summer Autumn Winter Wood Fire Soil Metal Water W i t h the reunification of the Empire acceptance of the new cosmology became indispensable to success at court, where 'men of secret arts' from the North East, claiming the authority of Tsou Yen, w o n the favour of the First Emperor and of the H a n Emperor W u (140-87 B.C.) by promising the elixir of life. The suppression of the Classics under the C h ' i n drew the attention of the Confucians to the Yi, an ancient C h o u work tolerated by the C h ' i n as a book on that indispensable science, divination; from at latest very early i n the H a n they were i n c l u d i n g it among the Classics and expanding it w i t h appendices ascribed to Confucius himself. The appendices introduce into the Classics Y i n - Y a n g dualism but not the Five Processes. F r o m this time an orthodoxy rooted i n the Classics could no longer ignore cosmology. 16

Pairs: Yin and Yang Whichever position one takes on the disputed issue of whether all thinking is ultimately binary, there can be no doubt of the centrality of binary oppositions i n Chinese culture. Everywhere from the pairs and the sets of four, five or more i n cosmology to the parallelism of prose and the tone patterns of regulated verse we find groups w h i c h , even when the number is o d d , divide neatly into pairs w i t h one left over. The traditional cosmology as it settles into its lasting shape after 250 B . C . is ordered by lining up all binary oppositions along a single chain, w i t h one member Y i n and the other Yang. The Ch'eng, one of the additional documents on M a wang-tui manuscript B of Lao-tzu, not m u c h later than 250 B . C , provides the earliest comprehensive list of w h i c h we know. "Whenever sorting out be sure to use the Y i n and Yang to make plain the overall scheme. Heaven is Yang, Earth is Y i n . . . . " The list continues i n parallel phrases on the same model, ' X is Yang, Y is Y i n ' . J

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1. 2. 3. 4.

A Heaven Spring Summer Day

Yang

B Yin Earth Autumn Winter Night

Paradigm

5. Big states Small states 6. Important states Unimportant states 7. Action Inaction 8. Stretching Contracting 9. Ruler Minister Below 10. Above Woman 11. M a n 12. Father Child 13. Elder brother Younger brother 14. Older Younger 15. Noble Base 16. Getting on i n the world Being stuck where one is 17. Taking a wife, begetting a child Mourning 18. Controlling others Being controlled by others 19. Guest Host 20. Soldiers Labourers 21. Speech Silence 22. G i v i n g Receiving Syntagm Throughout the chain A is superior to B but the two are mutually dependent; it does not, like the illustrative series starting 'Day/night' w i t h which our argument b e g a n , lead to 'Good/evil'. A s has long been recognised, C h i n a tends to treat opposites as complementary, the West as conflicting. It is the explicitness of the Yin-Yang system w h i c h shows up this difference, the first between the conceptual schemes* to attract attention. That Western thought not only has a chain of oppositions at the back of it but has a preconception about their relation to be exposed and challenged has been appreciated only since Derrida. N o w that the links are becoming visible one begins to see an affinity even between Western attitudes as far apart as the Christian faith i n the immortality of the soul and the scientist's (before quantum mechanics) i n universal causation; 2

* By a 'conceptual scheme' I intend a system of names correlated prior to analysis, as explained on pp. 319-25 above. This is not the same as Quine's idea of the conceptual scheme as composed of sentences assumed to be true, criticised in Donald Davidson's 'On the Very Idea of a Conceptual Scheme'.

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given the pairs 'Life/death' and 'Necessity/chance', the West strives to abolish B and preserve only A . David H a l l and Roger A m e s i n Thinking Through Confucius suggest that the whole reductionist enterprise in Western philosophy may be seen as the conquest of B by a transcendent A , (for example the dissolution of things into component atoms w h i c h can themselves exist without composing things), and that comparison with the Chinese treatment of polarities can help us to see it i n perspective and criticise it. Let us n o w take the plunge into the most developed cosmogony i n early Chinese literature, at the beginning of the astronomical chapter of the syncretistic Huai-nan-tzu. In translating we italicise all sentences w i t h a 'Therefore. . . . '. " W h e n Heaven a n d Earth were not yet shaped, it was amorphous, vague, a blank, a blur; call it therefore 'the Primal Beginning'. The Way began in the tenuous and transparent, the tenuous and transparent generated Space and Time, Space and Time generated the ch'i. There was a shoreline i n the ch'i; the clear and soaring dissipated to become Heaven, the heavy and m u d d y congealed to become Earth. The concentration of the clear and subtle is easy, the concretion of the heavy and m u d d y is difficult; therefore Heaven was completed first and Earth afterwards. "The superimposed quintessences of Heaven and Earth became the Yang and Y i n , the concentrating quintessences of Y i n and Yang became the Four Seasons, the scattering quintessences of the Four Seasons became the myriad creatures. The hot ch'i of the accumulating Yang generated fire, the quintessence of the ch'i of fire became the sun; the cold ch'i of the accumulating Y i n became water, the quintessence of the ch'i of water became the moon; the overflow of the quintessences of sun and moon became the stars. Heaven received the sun, moon a n d stars, Earth received the showers of water a n d the dust and dirt." After a mythological interlude to explain corresponding asymmetries of Heaven and Earth, the account continues: "The Way of Heaven is to be r o u n d , the way of Earth is to be square. It is primary to the square to be d i m , primary to the round to shine. To shine is to expel ch'i, for which reason fire and sun cast the image outside. To be d i m is to hold ch'i i n , for which reason water and moon draw the image inside. What expels ch'i does to, what holds ch'i i n is transformed by. Therefore the Yang does to, the Yin is transformed by. "Of the ch'i inclining to Heaven, the raging became w i n d ; of the combining ch'i of Heaven a n d Earth, the harmonious became rain. When Y i n and Yang clashed, being roused they became thunder, crossing paths

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they became lightning, confusing they became mist. W h e n the Yang ch'i prevailed, it scattered to become rain and dew; when the Y i n ch'i prevailed, it congealed to become frost and snow. "The furred and feathered are the kinds which fly and r u n , and therefore belong to the Yang; the shelled and scaly are the kinds w h i c h hibernate and hide, and therefore belong to the Yin. The sun is ruler of the Yang, and for this reason in spring and summer the herd animals shed hair, and at the solstice the deer shed their horns; the moon is ancestor of the Y i n , which is why when the moon wanes the brains of fishes diminish, and when the moon dies the swollen oyster shrinks. "Fire goes u p and trails, water goes d o w n and flows; therefore the birds flying up go high, the fish when stirred go down. Things w h i c h are of a k i n d stir each other, what is at the root and what are at the tips respond to each other. Therefore when the Yang burner [concave mirror] sees the sun it ignites and makes fire, when the square 'chu' [an object laid out at night to catch the dew] sees the moon it moistens and makes water." Further examples follow, but these w i l l be enough. The cosmos is seen as evolving by division along a chain of binary oppositions. The Tao as 'Way', course, path, introduces the first opposition, between the amorphous as spatially extended and as temporally enduring, so that it becomes the mobile ch'i 'air, breath'. The ch'i, w h i c h we experience as the influences i n the atmosphere and i n the body w h i c h brighten or darken, activate or clog, divides into 'clear/muddy' (ch'ing yj^lcho if) , both written w i t h the 'water' radical and used primarily of water). W i t h the rising of the clear and sinking of the m u d d y they become Heaven and Earth. From this point onwards we notice the clauses falling into parallel pairs. Huai-nan-tzu orders its cosmos by taking crucial binary oppositions, as they are d r a w n i n Chinese culture, and arranging them i n the sequence w h i c h shapes the simplest and most comprehensive pattern. CH'I 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9.

A Clear and subtle Heaven Yang Hot Fire Sun Round Shines Expels

B Paradigm Heavy and m u d d y Earth Yin Cold Water Moon Square Is d i m Holds i n

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10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15.

Does to Scatters Rain or dew The furred or feathered Flies or runs Rises

Is transformed by Congeals Frost or snow The shelled or scaly Hibernates or hides Sinks

Syntagm Throughout the table A and B contrast as parallel structures, w i t h the connexions varying from one position to the next but corresponding at each. Positions 1,2 The clear becomes Heaven, the m u d d y becomes Earth. 3,5 The Yang generates fire, the Y i n generates water. 5,15 Fire rises, water sinks: 'fire/water' and 'rise/sink' share the connexion of agent and action. The cosmologist is i n effect trying to lay out the whole system of paradigmatic and syntagmatic relations w h i c h , we suggested, analytic thinking never ceases to assume but leaves implicit, and w h i c h prove vulnerable on examination w h e n presuppositions are questioned. One interest of such system-building is that it is the only k i n d of thinking w h i c h makes this try at bringing everything submerged to the surface. The result is a largely coherent but of course very simplified scheme. The cosmologist is now equipped to explain, not by isolated analogies, but by contrasts and connexions throughout the whole scheme; if fire contrasts with water i n that one goes u p and one goes d o w n , and birds contrast with fish as fire w i t h water, then birds like fire w i l l go u p and fish like water will go d o w n . Yang and Y i n are introduced as the quintessences, the purest ch'i, of Heaven and Earth, but it is not that he is a p p l y i n g a theory about them; for purposes of explanation and inference, Yang and Y i n function like our A' and 'B', they mark the series w i t h i n w h i c h something connects and the opposite series w i t h a member of w h i c h it contrasts.* In exploring proto-scientific t h i n k i n g it has been usual to start from what we find peculiar i n pre-modern views of nature; here we follow the example of Lévi-Strauss (although not the detail of his methods) i n starting from the opposite direction, from structures common to premodern and modern t h i n k i n g . To infer correlatively from how concepts interconnect is (except w h e n equating them by such a word as 'become') to 4

* The analysis of the Huai-nan-lzu cosmology which follows was first attempted in G Yin-Yang 33-40, where there are confusions which I hope now to have cleared up.

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think of them as interacting; the ancient Chinese think of the cosmos as like an organism, but this is consequence not cause of thinking correlatively. In the large area of ordinary life w h i c h is too complex and transient to be unravelled by analysis, so that we have to trust to spontaneous expectations springing from the immediate perception of pattern, we likewise see ourselves as involved i n a multiplicity of interacting factors. There are differences of course between commonsense thinking a n d correlative system-building, but the inferiority of the latter derives f r o m the poverty of information at its disposal. In the fluid patterning of shifting experience the thinker is on the near side of his analytically ordered information; on the far side is the immense realm w h i c h , before the time of Galileo, could be reduced to order only by the same k i n d of patterning. O u t there however correlative thinking loses the assurance and suppleness w i t h w h i c h we exercise it i n practical life. O n the near side, it is disciplined to an art by the recurrent defeat of expectations i n urgent situations; on the far side, obstacles to the flight of fancy are weaker and fewer. O n the near side, subtle discriminations can draw a constantly veering line between the similar and the contrasting, the contiguous and the remote, unhampered by verbal formulation; on the far side the rigidity of schemes is equalled by license i n applying them. O n the near there is too m u c h information to be confined by any system, on the far too little to correct any system. The effect of i m p o s i n g a scheme of Y i n - Y a n g type is to sharpen contrasts and blur connexions. The scheme can work only if two complementary conditions hold. (1) A l connects w i t h A 2 as B3 w i t h B2, and so for any corresponding elements. Thus at Positions 4, 5, water connects w i t h cold as fire w i t h hot. This forces the connexion between fire and hot to transfer to water and cold (a metaphoric shift); water is conceived, for modern science wrongly, as inherently cold as fire is inherently hot. (2) A l contrasts w i t h B l as A 2 w i t h B2, a n d so for any corresponding elements. Thus at Positions 5, 13, 15 birds contrast with fish as fire with water. This forces the connexions of fire w i t h rising and water w i t h sinking to transfer to birds and fish (a metonymic shift); the result is what is for us a false explanation of w h y startled birds fly u p and startled fish plunge deep. Once imprisoned i n formulae correlative thinking loses its capacity for fine discriminations. There is indeed a rough similarity between the contrasts between A and B all d o w n the table, enough to give a meaning to 'Yang' and ' Y i n ' , commonly described as the active and passive or the

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positive and negative principles (cf. "Therefore the Yang does to, the Y i n is transformed by"); but all i n all the similarity is a Wittgensteinian 'family resemblance', by w h i c h 1 can be like 2 and 2 like 3 without 1 being like 3. What the system does retain of the correlative thinking of practical life is just what post-Galilean science strives to escape, the incompleteness of explanations w h i c h assume interrelations w i t h all parts of an indefinitely limited structure. Should one ask why, if square connects w i t h moon as round w i t h s u n (Positions 6, 7) the m o o n is not square, one w o u l d be expected to look higher u p the chain and take into account that moon like sun connects w i t h Heaven, w h i c h is r o u n d . Every explanation therefore is modifiable from elsewhere i n an indefinitely extendable pattern, permitting a license w h i c h the cosmologist tries to restrict by his principle that the higher i n the chain is 'ruler' or 'ancestor' of the lower. A m o n g the sentences introduced by 'Therefore' italicised i n the translation we shall ignore the cosmologist's reason at the start for speaking of the 'Primal Beginning', as well as a genuinely causal explanation (Heaven took shape before Earth because the heavy takes longer to come together than the rarified) and an unimpeachable deduction (the Yang ch'i shines, 'to shine is to expel ch'i, 'what expels does to', and 'therefore the Yang does to'). Each correlative explanation presents what is seen as the crucial among the innumerable factors bearing on the case, very much as we pick out the crucial factor i n offering a causal explanation. We shall supply f r o m the total scheme what we take to be the other most relevant factors. It may be noticed that the conclusion is always a contrastive pair w h i c h is added to the chain of oppositions. The scheme explains only contrasting connexions (whether of becoming, generating, concave mirror interacting w i t h sun and fire), by the similarity to the contrasts between other connexions. Question 1. W h y do fire and sun radiate their glow and cast shadows outside, m o o n and water contain their glow and draw shadows within? Answer: Because to shine is to expel ch'i, to be d i m is to hold ch'i i n . Assumptions: H o l d i n g i n contrasts w i t h expelling as being d i m w i t h shining (and hibernating or h i d i n g w i t h flying or r u n n i n g , congealing with scattering), so holding i n connects w i t h dimness as expelling with shining (the metaphoric shift). Question 2. W h y are animals and birds Yang, invertebrates and fish Yin? Answer: Because the former r u n or fly, the latter hibernate or hide. Assumptions: R u n n i n g or flying contrasts w i t h hibernating or hiding

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as shining w i t h being d i m , expelling w i t h holding i n , rising w i t h sinking; being furred or feathered contrasts w i t h being shelled or scaly as scattering w i t h congealing, hot w i t h cold. A l l are contrasts of A w i t h B, so of Yang w i t h Y i n . Question 3. W h y do animals throw off hair and horns as the sun advances i n the early year and the fish and oysters shrink as the moon wanes i n the late month? Answer: Because the sun is ruler of Yang things and the moon is ancestor of Y i n things. Assumptions: A n i m a l s (Yang), s u n , heat, expelling and scattering interconnect as do fish (Yin), m o o n , cold, holding i n and congealing. Animals contrast w i t h fish as sun w i t h moon, so w h e n animals meet the advancing sun they get hot, expel, and scatter like the sun, whereas w h e n fish meet the w a n i n g m o o n they get cold, hold i n and congeal like the moon (the metonymic shift). A l l this is too obvious for the cosmologist to lay out explicitly; he asks only w h y sun and moon act on the things w i t h w h i c h they connect, rather than being acted on by them. The answer is that they are i n r u l i n g or ancestral positions higher u p i n the chain. Question 4. W h y w h e n disturbed do birds fly up but fish dive down? Answer: Because fire goes u p and water goes d o w n . Assumptions: Birds differ f r o m fish as fire from water. Fire and water differ i n respectively rising and sinking, so birds and fish differ likewise (the metonymic shift). Question 5. W h y does the Yang mirror draw fire from the sun and the square chu draw dew f r o m the moon? Answer: Because "things of a k i n d stir each other, the root and the tips respond to each other". Assumptions: This example contrasts strikingly w i t h the purely causal explanation of the inversion of the shadow i n the concave mirror i n the Mohist Canons. The cosmologist seeking to explain w h y the sun reflected i n a concave mirror ignites tinder looks for a structurally parallel phenomenon, and thinks that he has f o u n d it i n the square chu (of w h i c h there is little information, but said also to be a mirror) w h i c h accumulates dew w h e n laid out at night. The Yang mirror is Yang not only i n name but in being round; the chu is Y i n because square. Once their relation is seen, it becomes too obvious to deserve explicit mention that there are contrasting interconnections between s u n , concave mirror and fire and between moon, square chu and water. The cosmologist remarks only that each interaction being of members of the same column is because "things of a 5

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THE REUNIFICATION OF THE EMPIRE AND OF HEAVEN AND M A N

kind stir each other", and that the sun and moon acting on rather than reacting to other things is because, by their positions higher or lower i n the evolutionary branching, the former are 'root' and the latter 'tip'. We noticed one causal explanation, that Heaven took form before Earth because the clear and subtle coalesce more easily than the heavy and muddy. Should we expect correlative explanation to have lost its persuasiveness once explanations of this sort were appreciated? That would be to look at the problem f r o m the w r o n g angle. M o d e r n science is dissatisfied w i t h causal explanations until they can be subsumed under systematised laws of nature, a n d i n approaching the purity of physics tends to dispense w i t h them; similarly proto-science is dissatisfied w i t h them unless they can be fitted to a correlative scheme, and dispenses with them as the scheme approaches perfection. To explain a particular conjunction as an instance of a general recurrence after all only shifts the question one stage back, to w h y the events recur. The point may be illustrated by an account of the conquest cycle i n the 'Five Processes' chapter of the White Tiger Discussions (Po hu t'ung), based on a conference on the interpretation of the Classics at the White Tiger H a l l i n A . D . 79. The conquest cycle of the Five Processes, to w h i c h we shall r e t u r n , is independent of correlations. Consequently the discussants, although noted for the extravagance of their speculative cosmology, had to be content w i t h mere causal explanations of w h y water extinguishes fire, fire melts metal, metal cuts w o o d , w o o d digs soil and soil dams water. "As to w h y the Five Processes obstruct each other, by the nature of Heaven and Earth m u c h conquers little, therefore water conquers fire; quintessential conquers f i r m , therefore fire conquers metal; hard conquers soft, therefore metal conquers w o o d ; compact conquers loose, therefore w o o d conquers soil; solid conquers tenuous, therefore soil conquers water." These are seen as genuine explanations, not because they are causal but because they too correlate i n a scheme, w h i c h is w h y the unconvincing " M u c h conquers little" is needed to fit the first of them to the rest. Throughout the Huai-nan-tzu arguments it is never said that anything is similar to or different from anything else. To shift 'similarity/contrast' from the paradigmatic to the syntagmatic dimension and say ' X is like/ unlike Y ' , as Chinese thinkers do often enough outside cosmology, is to move away from correlative towards analytic thinking. A practice c o m m o n to Chinese a n d Western proto-science is correlation between the universe as macrocosm and m a n as microcosm. We shall take examples from Kepler's Epitome of Copernican Astronomy (which, i n 6

7

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spite of his three planetary laws, belongs not to modern but to Mediaeval science) and f r o m chs. 3 and 7 of Huai-nan-tzu. For the ancient Chinese, Heaven w i t h its revolving luminaries is round like the head, Earth spreading i n the four directions is rectangular like the feet; similarly for Kepler the curved represents G o d and the rectilinear H i s creatures, and since the most perfect rectilinear figures are the five regular solids, the distances between the planets correspond to their proportions, starting with the cube, tetrahedron and dodecahedron, since (it is as though Kepler were waiting to be analysed by a structuralist), " i n these figures there appears the first of the metaphysical oppositions, that between the same and the other or the different". H e correlates world w i t h soul, Huainan-tzu, w o r l d w i t h body. 8

9

Kepler A Perfections of world 1. Light 2. Heat 3. Movement 4. Harmony

Huai-nan-tzu

B Faculties of soul Sentient Vital Animal Rational

A Heaven Earth Four seasons Twelve months Sun and moon Wind and rain

B Head Feet Four limbs Twelve joints Ears and eyes Blood and bodily ch'i

In the proportional oppositions of Huai-nan-tzu, Heaven connects with Earth as head w i t h feet (former above latter); the four seasons connect with the twelve months as the four limbs w i t h their twelve joints (latter within former). O n the paradigmatic dimension (similarity/contrast), the relation is here of similarity; Heaven compares w i t h head as Earth w i t h feet, allowing the possibility of using one as metaphor for the other. Kepler in fact shifts metaphorically from B to A , writing: "The adornment of the world consists i n light; its life and growth i n heat; and, so to speak, its action i n movement; and its contemplation—wherein Aristotle places blessedness—in h a r m o n i e s . " H e also, at a point where his correlations approach Huai-nan-tzu'% Position 5, says the sun "is as if the eye of the world". Still avoiding the disputed issue of whether all thinking is at bottom binary, one may notice that the binary tends to leave out the maker of the opposition. 'Left/right', 'above/below', 'before/after' (not however T/you', 'here/there', 'now/then') i m p l y a spatial or temporal centre from w h i c h the opposition is d r a w n , inviting the expansion of the pair to a triad. Thus i n China the pair Heaven above and Earth below grows towards the end of the classical period to the triad Heaven, Earth and man. Kepler too has a taste for triads, w i t h ourselves living on the third member (the planets. 10

11

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among w h i c h Earth is itself a third, being located between the correlates of the primary and secondary regular solids). The symmetry of the following table provides one of the proofs by w h i c h the heliocentric theory won acceptance at the beginning of modern science. A B Between/within 12

(God) (Sphere) (Universe)

Holy Spirit Intermediate space Planets

Son Surface Stars

Father Centre Sun

Fours and fives: the Five Processes Turning now to larger paradigmatic sets, they tend to lack the apparent inevitability of binary oppositions. This inevitability is of course culture-bound, but even a Westerner w i t h some experience of Chinese thought can generally guess w h i c h of a pair is Y i n and w h i c h Yang; he is seldom so lucky correlating the Five Processes w i t h the Five Colours or the Five Tastes. In C h i n a too, the Five Processes were never as deeply rooted in the tradition as the Y i n and Yang. Larger sets are also harder to fit to the facts and to develop consistently. They function like the Western correlation of races w i t h the colours white, yellow, red, b r o w n and black, likewise branching from a pair, 'light/dark', w h i c h , if correspondences are not critically analysed, tends to correlate w i t h 'good/evil'. Here n a m i n g is by contrast w i t h i n the scheme rather than b y adequacy to the object; the M o n g o l is to the eye often whiter than the Caucasian, American Indians are red because the b r o w n people live i n A s i a and Polynesia. We classify peoples, indeed see them, as they are conventionally coloured; and schemes i n other cultures similarly develop through contrast and resist conflicting observation. Lévi-Strauss has called attention to the elaborate correlative schemes of pre-literate cultures and to their resemblance to those of "the naturalists and hermetics of antiquity and of the M i d d l e Ages, Galen, Pliny, Hermes Trismegistus, Albertus M a g n u s " , for example this one from the H o p i s : 1

2

(Directions) (Colours) (Animals) (Birds)

A NW Yellow Puma Oriole

B

SW Blue-green Bear Bluebird

C

SE Red Wild cat Parakeet

D

E

NE White Wolf Magpie

Zenith Black Vulture Swallow

F Nadir Multicolored Snake Warbler

The earliest schemes documented i n C h i n a are in various calendars regulating the ruler's conduct throughout the year. The standard one is i n

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the Lii Spring and Autumn, from w h i c h it passed into the Confucian tradition as the ' M o n t h l y Orders' i n the Record of Ceremony, Chapter 6. While pairs correlate w i t h Y i n and Yang, sets of four or five correlate w i t h what this text, like Tsou Y e n , calls 'potencies' (re), those of w o o d , fire, soil, metal and water, implicitly distinguishing their distinctive processes from the virtue or power by w h i c h each proceeds. We shall however follow later convention i n speaking only of the Five Processes themselves. We have seen that Tsou Yen explained the rise and fall of dynasties by the conquest cycle already employed by the diviners of the Tso Commentary: Soil (which dams water) Wood (which digs soil) Metal (which cuts wood) Fire (which melts metal) Water (which extinguishes fire). The full correlation of the Five Processes with other fours and fives is not attested before the Lii Spring and Autumn; the Kuan-tzu miscellany has probably older calendrical schemes i n w h i c h the Five Processes are missing, or attached i n a subsidiary position, or fitted to five divisions of the year without correlations.* Their correspondences w i t h the Four Seasons required a different sequence, w h i c h came to be interpreted as the order i n w h i c h the Five Processes generate each other: Wood (which catches fire) Fire (which reduces to ash) Soil (in w h i c h metals form) Metal (which liquifies w h e n melted) Water (which nourishes wood) We first consider the structural relations of the more easily analysable of the Lii Spring and Autumn series (tastes and smells, for example, are too indefinite and affected by subjective influences for us to see clearly how the Five Tastes and Five Smells fit the structural relations). 3

4

Five Processes

Numbers Four Seasons Four Directions Five Colours Five Creatures Five Notes

A Wood

8 Spring East Blue-green Scaly Chueh

B Fire

7 Summer South Red Feathered Chih

Between Soil

5

(Centre) Yellow Naked Kung

C Metal

9 Autumn West White Furred Shang

D Water

6 Winter North Black Shelled Yü

* Kz chs. 8, 9,40, 41, 85. For the evidence for their relatively early date, cf. G Yin-Yang 84-89.

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The numbers follow the enumeration of the Five Processes i n the 'Great Plan' of the Documents, continued into a second cycle to place 5 between 1-4 and 6-9. 5

Water

1 6

Fire

2 7

Wood

3 8

Metal

4 9

Soil

5

The reason for the choice of higher numbers was no doubt practical; the coming Emperor w h o w o u l d reign by the potency of water w o u l d hardly be content, for example, to ride a chariot drawn by only one horse. But w h y does the enumeration i n the Documents agree neither with the conquest nor w i t h the generation cycles of the Five Processes? One might answer that it is older than either cycle, and perhaps merely an arbitrary order i n enumeration. But then w h y w o u l d the later choice of numbers follow this order rather than either of the cycles w h i c h have a theoretical significance? One may suspect that it is the correlation of the numbers with the Four Directions w h i c h is most ancient, older than the Five Processes: South 2

East 3

Centre 5

West 4

North 1 (We follow Chinese practice i n putting N o r t h below South.) The positions w o u l d be counted from the throne i n the North from w h i c h the ruler faces South. The central position i n this diagram, corresponding to the 'Between' column of the table, represents the one left over from binary division, and in most cases is recognisable as the position from w h i c h the oppositions are drawn—the soil i n w h i c h the other materials are grounded, the number 5 midway between 1 and 9, the centre from w h i c h one sees i n the four directions, the creature without scales, feathers, fur or shell w h o is man, and the note Kung fundamental to the pentatonic scale. There is none for the Four Seasons because the only temporal centre corresponding to

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'We' and 'Here' is ' N o w ' . The Lti Spring and Autumn shirks this difficulty by simply appending the correlations for the non-existent middle season at the end of the 6th month, the last of summer. The calendar i n Huai-nantzu, Chapter 5, adopts the desperate solution of detaching the 6th month from summer as a separate season. In inferring from sets of four or five it is not that one is applying a theory about the Five Processes, any more than one applies a theory about Y i n and Yang to the binary oppositions. Inferences are from correspondences of series, w h i c h the introduction of the Five Processes into preexisting schemes served to identify like the letters at the top of our columns. The basic correlation, fully rooted i n observation and no doubt older than the Five Processes, is of the Four Seasons w i t h the Four Directions. W i t h i n both there is a proportional opposition: 1. 2. Syntagm

A Spring B Summer

C Autumn D Winter

Paradigm

A East B South

C West D North

(Spring compares w i t h autumn as summer w i t h winter, spring connects w i t h summer as autumn w i t h winter, and similarly w i t h the Four Directions). The two sets correlate because i n both of them A / C and B/D are observably the opposite positions of the sun i n its recurring cycles, its temporal positions through the year and its spatial through the day: B South Summer

A East Spring

Centre

North Winter D

West C Autumn

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T h i n k i n g w h i c h starts from this correlation w i l l already be predisposed to what may seem one of the oddest of ancient Chinese assumptions, that Heaven (Yang, so i n motion) is round like the head, and Earth (Yin, so at rest) is square or rectangular like the feet, following a chain w h i c h we might simplify as follows: A 1. Heaven 2. Motion round cardinal points 3. Round

B Earth Rest at cardinal points Square

The fitting of the Five Processes to the pre-existing scheme seems at first sight quite arbitrary, but once it is recognised that they have to fall into two pairs and a remainder may be seen to be bound by the structural relations. The numbers ascribed to them firmly identify the pairs: 1/2 6/7 Water/fire

3/4 8/9 Wood/metal

5 Soil

Even without the numbers 'water/fire' is a solidly established pair throughout the early literature; we have already noticed it i n the Huai-nantzu cosmogony, w h i c h ignored the other three, and it is the only pair shared by the Five Processes and the symbols of the Eight Trigrams i n the Yi. Soil is plainly destined for the isolated central position : wood grows in it, fire rises from it, metal is buried i n it, water sinks into it. The remaining pair w o u l d therefore have to be 'wood/metal'. We saw i n discussing the Huai-nan-tzu cosmogony that as the opposite of fire it is the virtue of water to withdraw into the dark a n d the cold, so that the fitting of 'fire/water to 'summer/winter' w o u l d seem inevitable. One can imagine that at this point the further observation that 'wood/metal' do contrast as 'spring/ autumn' (branches and leaves grow i n spring and turn brittle, rigid, metalic i n autumn), a n d then that the whole sequence is interprétable as the order i n w h i c h the Five Processes generate each other throughout the year, w o u l d impress w i t h a strong conviction of having perceived a true structural relationship. The fitting of the Five Colours lacks this inevitability. None of them stands out as qualified for the central position, and the one established opposition ('white/black') was not, as one might think theoretically conceivable, accepted as corresponding to 'summer/winter'. A n old calendrical scheme i n Kuan-tzu chapter 85, w h i c h links only the Four Seasons w i t h directions and colours, fits 'green/white' to 'spring/autumn' 6

7

7

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(the contrast of v i v i d a n d paling leaves) a n d 'yellow/black' to 'summer/ winter' (the contrast of sunshine and darkness). W i t h the introduction of the Five Processes into the scheme the second pair is changed to 'red/ black', and yellow, as the colour of soil, is reserved for the middle position. A l t h o u g h the tight scheme of the Seasons, Directions and Processes loosens i n extending to the colours and beyond, it interrelates remarkably with another sequence w h o l l y independent of it, the conquest cycle of the Five Processes. A m o n g Chinese proto-scientific concepts the conquest cycle stands out as independent of all correlations, and probably derives directly from observation of the basic resources at the workman's disposal. Struggling w i t h water, fire, metal, w o o d or soil, there is little room for disagreement as to w h i c h of the others is most required to d a m , quench, melt, cut or d i g the resisting material. Granted that fire as well as metal can conquer w o o d , one burns w o o d to get rid of it or to w a r m oneself, it is metal w h i c h is used to shape it to one's w i l l . In noticing that there is a single and different answer i n each case (at any rate before metal superseded w o o d e n spade and plough), and that the conquests connect i n an unbroken cycle, one w o u l d seem to have discovered i n the courses of action specific to the basic materials a regularity on Earth comparable to the cycles observed i n Heaven ("Heaven has the Three Ch'en j^. [sun, moon, stars], Earth has the Five Processes"). W h y is it then, ancient cosmologist a n d modern structuralist are alike compelled to ask, that when the two independent sequences are compared, it turns out that i n the one required to correlate w i t h the seasons and directions each Process is generating the immediate predecessor of the Process w h i c h it conquers? 8

(Conquests)

Fire

Metal

Wood

Soil

Water

Fire

(Generation)

Fire

Soil

Metal

Water

Wood

Fire

I

II

Soil...

I

To answer that the fitting of the Processes to seasons and directions must have been guided b y this symmetry w o u l d be to overlook the structural constraints w h i c h allowed no other option except to fit 'fire/ water' implausibly to 'spring/autumn' a n d 'wood/metal' to 'summer/ winter . One can only suppose that the symmetry is an effect, accidentally surviving the interposition of soil, of pairs of oppositions having to adjoin in the conquest cycle (since conquest implies opposition) but stand on 7

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facing sides of the square i n the pattern correlating with seasons and directions. The Chinese cosmologists themselves have a much neater explanation. Like scientists subsuming under a wider law of nature, they discover a larger structure w h i c h accounts for both sequences. Huai-nantzu chapter 4 postulates that each of the Five itself passes through five stages of rise and decline: 9

Birth Prime Ageing Immobilisation Death

Wood Water Metal Soil Fire

Fire /Wood Water Metal Soil

Soil Fire /Wood Water Metal

Metal Soil Fire /Wood Water

Water Metal Soil Fire /Wood

So at its prime each generates the one w h i c h is born and conquers the one w h i c h dies. One's first impression that the correlations of Chinese proto-science are inherently loose and arbitrary requires some qualification. It has a structure w h i c h loosens as it expands, but w i t h interrelations tight enough to impress a m o d e r n analyst as requiring explanation i n his o w n terms, genetic explanation; he may see the system as growing and integrating under the influence of chance factors rather as an organism develops by incorporating chance mutations. (The looseness w i t h w h i c h it has to be applied i n accounting for phenomena is another matter). It is not that the conquest cycle as a series of relations is too vague for us to acknowledge it as significant—water does quench fire, w h i c h does melt metal—but that for us any cycle of physical relations between things selected and associated solely for their utility to m a n can only be accidental. F r o m a modern viewpoint Chinese proto-science can be discovering significant connexions between phenomena only w h e n there are indeed parallel causal relations between things contrasted as Y i n or Yang, or there are causal relations w i t h the seasons or the directions, the two strong correlates of the Five Processes. Where the system takes leave altogether of what nowadays we w o u l d recognise as fact, its fruitful possibilities w i l l presumably be limited to the mathematical relations of numerology. Here we may consider a problem raised by the numbers i n the correlations. The Five Processes and their numbers correlate, as we have seen,* w i t h the four cardinal points arranged as i n a mandala around a centre. 10

* Cf. p. 342 above. For the importance of variations on this mandala-like figure throughout Chinese culture, cf. Major, 'Five Phases'.

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2,7 Fire

3,8 W o o d

Soil 5

Metal 4,9

Water 1,6

This, w i t h some further elaborations, is the diagram w h i c h from the Sung dynasty ( A . D . 960-1279) was identified as the 'River chart' (Ho t'u |i] ) mentioned i n the 'Great A p p e n d i x ' of the Yi. Reading from Soil at the centre through Metal and proceeding clockwise this gives the generation cycle (Soil, Metal, Water, W o o d , Fire, S o i l . . . . ) . Reversing Fire and Metal and reading through W o o d one w o u l d have the conquest cycle (Soil, W o o d , Metal, Fire, Water, Soil ). u

4,9 Metal

3,8 W o o d

Soil 5

Fire 2,7

Water L6

Suppose now we fill the intermediate positions w i t h the Y i n or even numbers, placed behind the Yang or o d d . This forms the diagram recognised since the Sung as the ' L o document' (Lo shu i j ) of the 'Great A p p e n d i x ' . 7

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348

Metal 2-i

9

4

Fire r-3

5 Soil

7-1

1

6

Wood L

8

Water W h y has this procedure resulted i n a magic square, w i t h the numbers adding u p to 15 i n every direction? Is it possible that the magic square was first discovered by this very operation? It is documented i n C h i n a from the 1st century A . D . , earlier than i n any other civilization, and became a speciality of Chinese mathematics, w h i c h by the 13th century had developed magic squares to the order of 10. A n alternative solution which has been p r o p o s e d ! is that the numbers of the Five Processes were themselves derived f r o m a magic square interpreted as a symbol of the conquest cycle. If so, the order of enumeration i n the 'Great Plan' derives not from the position of the throne but f r o m the magic square, w h i c h must be some 500 years earlier than its first documentation. It may seem that the first proposal assumes a nearly incredible mathematical coincidence w h i c h the second eliminates. But this impression fades o n closer examination. The Five Processes are a set of five each allotted a number and the number plus five. W h e n the mandala-like grouping round a centre is extended f r o m the cardinal to the intermediate points we have a five surrounded by pairs of numbers separated by five, w h i c h is already approaching the magic square. A numerologist at work o n it w i l l be trying out every option looking for some fascinating symmetry. A l l six ways of arranging the even numbers at the corners w i l l make a diagram readable either clockwise or anti-clockwise as representing the conquest, the generation or the 'Great P l a n ' order. The one w h i c h makes the magic square happens to lead to the conquest order, but w o u l d have been equally impressive if it had led to one of the others. The agreement with 1 2

13

14

t Major now prefers this alternative solution, 'Five Phases' 163 nl7

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the conquest cycle is therefore irrelevant; what matters is that the prospect of the magic square was latent from the start i n the allotment of numbers to a group of five correlated w i t h centre and cardinal points. Whether or not the discovery was made i n this w a y — i t is not a question to w h i c h one would expect a definitive answer—this well illustrates the possibility of speculation about the Five Processes leading to an important discovery. To the numerologist himself of course the agreement with the conquest order would seem h i g h l y relevant. O n e can imagine the joy and wonder of discovering that i n the observed order i n w h i c h the basic materials of Earth conquer each other (for anyone can see that fire melts metal, metal cuts wood, and so on round the cycle) each one at every stage is united to all the rest by changing numbers w h i c h always a d d u p to the same. Better still, the outer four derive from Soil at the centre through the two of Y i n and Yang; the numbers on either side of five always add up to twice five. The discovery of the Inverse Square L a w of gravitation itself would hardly have made a stronger impression of seeing right through to the mathematical secret of the cosmos. Another line of thought springing f r o m the contemplation of this mandala fitted to the cardinal points is traced by Needham i n v. 4/1 of Science and Civilization in China. The importance of placing oneself i n relation to the cosmic influences inspired an exploration of the Southpointing property of the lodestone and then of magnetised iron, and its use i n geomancy and, from about A . D . 1100, i n navigation. The principle of needle and dial, so fecund for technology, seems to have been the discovery of Chinese diviners a n d geomancers, whose compass has the needle pointing to the Five Processes and the Eight Trigrams of the Yi as well as to the cardinal points. The invention and development of the compass, however, i n having to survive the practical testing of effects, brings us d o w n to the realm of causal t h i n k i n g , irrelevant to protoscientific cosmology. Causal t h i n k i n g w o u l d have to be the m a i n factor i n the extraordinary fertility of invention i n C h i n a . We have insisted throughout that the organising of proto-sciences by correlation w i t h i n a society's patterning of concepts has nothing to do w i t h the extent to w h i c h the concepts are being used for causal explanation and practical invention, and that the only technology proper to correlative cosmos-building itself is magic, as i n Renaissance Europe, where Kepler earned his living as a court astrologer and Giordano Bruno, the great defender of the Copernican hypothesis, was primarily a master of the hermetic and cabbalistic arts. Magical thinking follows directly from correlative by confusion of the metaphoric and metonymic w i t h the literal, so that one sticks pins i n the 15

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THE REUNIFICATION OF THE EMPIRE AND OF HEAVEN AND M A N

wax image (Frazer's 'homoeopathic' magic) or practises on a strand of hair or a glove (his 'contagious' magic) as though they were the enemy himself. Frazer, as Jakobson noticed, distinguished the two kinds of magic by the same terms 'similarity' a n d 'contiguity' by w h i c h he himself distinguishes paradigm and syntagm.* We have so far been treating pre-Galilean cosmologies with some condescension as mere proto-science, the superseded predecessors of Newtonian physics. But a cosmos of the old k i n d has also an advantage to which post-Galilean science makes no claim; those w h o live i n it k n o w not only what is but what should be. In correlating one is not yet detached from the spontaneous comparing and connecting w h i c h precedes analysis, i n w h i c h expecting the same as before one is already responding i n favour of it or against; i n anticipating what will happen one knows how to act. The objectivised world of modern science dissolves this primitive synthesis of fact and value, a n d i n facilitating successful prediction leaves us to find our values elsewhere. M a n y are u n h a p p y to be thus exiled from the sources of value; Westerners today w h o toss coins to read the hexagrams seem actually to feel more at home i n the traditional cosmos of C h i n a . There m a n still stands at the centre of things i n interaction w i t h the rest, and has only to contrast A w i t h B to respond to them immediately as superior and inferior, better and worse. Seen f r o m this direction as a scheme relating m a n to community and cosmos, a correlative world-view discloses a much more favourable aspect. The primary social institution, language, is the one w i t h w h i c h it fully shares its structure a n d for w h i c h correlative thinking is perfectly adequate; although one may have to analyse paradigms and syntagms i n order to learn a language, one can speak it only w h e n correlating them without analysis. Institutions i n general require that for most of the time we adjust to pattern automatically, analysing only w h e n faced with an occasion for choice. Politics, sociology, a n d psychology have never attained that purity of analytic thinking w h i c h , on the analogy of physics, should be required b y their claim to be 'sciences'. Apart from all theories, much of ordinary practical life belongs irrevocably to correlative thinking. So does thinking i n the arts; and any correlative cosmology is poetically stimulating to those i n sympathy w i t h it, a treasury of metaphor and metonym. The thinking w h i c h relates 'white/black' to 'West/North', 'autumn/winter' or 'metal/water' no longer looks silly w h e n it relates them * Frazer 12. "Homoeopathic magic is founded on the association of ideas by similarity: contagions magic is founded on the association of ideas by contiguity." Cf. Jakobson v. 2/258

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to 'weddings/funerals', nor is one embarrassed that the Chinese choose white for funerals and the West black. Even the scientific pretensions look better f r o m the social perspective. They provide a solution to the universal problem of how to act i n insufficient knowledge. W h e n information is inadequate, it is better to decide by a diviner's prediction than not to decide at all, not to mention that a suitably opaque prognostication may stimulate rather than exempt from thought and decision. In tabulating correlations of fives we d i d not explain their function i n the source used, the calendrical chapters of the Lu Spring and Autumn. We repeat the major correlations.

(Five Processes) (Four Seasons) (Four Directions) (Five colours)

A Wood Spring East Blue-green

B Fire Summer South Red

Between Soil (Centre) Yellow

C

Metal Autumn West White

D

Water Winter North Black

Throughout the year the Yang ch'i waxes at the expense of the Y i n u p to the solstice i n the fifth month (the mid-summer month) and then wanes in favour of the Y i n u p to the solstice i n the 11th month (the mid-winter month). W i t h each season the G r a n d Historiographer announces w h i c h of the potencies of the Five Processes is now i n ascendancy, robes are changed to the appropriate colour, and the ruler occupies the appropriate quarter of the palace, from East to South to West to N o r t h , moving from month to month through the three rooms of a quarter. Thus at the beginning of the year, w h e n "the East w i n d melts the ice and the hibernating insects stir," the Historiographer reports "Such-and-such a day is the start of spring; the fullness of potency is i n W o o d . " The ruler, wearing blue-green, then leads out his nobles to welcome spring i n the East suburb, rewards civil officials, issues orders to be merciful and bountiful to the people, pushes the plough three times to encourage farming, and commands the superintendant of agriculture to take up residence i n the East suburb. Correspondingly, when "the chill winds come, the white dew falls and the cold cicada chirps" the Historiographer reports "Such-and-such a day is the start of autumn; the fullness of potency is i n Metal." The ruler wearing white leads out the nobles to welcome autumn i n the West suburb, rewards this time his military officials, and issues orders to learn the laws, repair the prisons and p u n i s h crime. Each month of the calendar ends w i t h a warning against neglect of the prescribed ritual and practical measures.

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"If i n the first spring month you enact the orders for summer, w i n d and rain w i l l be untimely, grass and trees w i l l wither early, the state will suffer alarms. If you enact the orders for autumn, the people w i l l suffer plagues, w h i r l w i n d s and rainstorms w i l l come frequently, brambles and weeds will spring up densely. If you enact the orders for winter, there will be damage from floods and disaster from snow and frost, and the first sowing w i l l not take root." 16

W i t h the conduct of the ruler through the four seasons we may compare the regime throughout the year recommended as healthy i n chapter 2 of the medical classic Inner Classic of the Yellow Emperor (Huang-ti nei-ching), uncertainly dated but not far f r o m the same period. While the ruler imitates Heaven by being generous i n spring and stern i n autumn, the healthy m a n helps the ch'i of the body (the vital forces nourished by the ch'i which are influences i n the atmosphere) to revive i n the kindness of spring and survive the severity of autumn. Both accounts conclude each sequence by recording the consequences of behaviour inappropriate to the season. In both, correlation w i t h the seasons presents the problem of having to omit the middle member of the five, w h i c h i n the case of the Five Viscera of the medical classic is the spleen. A

(Four Seasons) (Five Viscera)

Spring Coming to life Liver

B

Summer Growing up Heart

C

Autumn Gathering in Lungs

D

Winter Storing away Kidneys

The second position transfers metonymically from the crops to the ch'i of the body. "The three months of spring one calls 'the issuing and laying out'. Together Heaven and Earth give life, The myriad creatures thereby blossom. Sleep at night and rise early, Stroll at ease around the yard, Loose the hair, relax the body, A l l o w intent to come to life. Let it live, don't k i l l it: Give to it, don't steal from it: Reward it, don't p u n i s h it. "This is the response to the ch'i of spring, the way to nourish the coming to life. If you go against it you harm the liver and i n summer will suffer from chills; there w i l l be too little provision for the growing up.

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"The three months of summer one calls 'the thriving and fulfilment'. The ch'i of Heaven and Earth mingle, The m y r i a d creatures flower and ripen. Sleep at night and rise early, Don't be too greedy for the sunshine, Don't let intent get out of h a n d , Let flowering fulfil its growth, A l l o w the ch'i to seep out from y o u , A s though the not-to-be-wasted were outside. "This is the response to the ch'i of summer, the way to nourish the growing up. If you go against it you harm the heart and i n autumn will suffer from fevers; there w i l l be too little provision for the gathering i n . "The three months of autumn one calls 'the contained and calm'. The ch'i of Heaven is then gusty The ch'i of Earth is then bright. Sleep early, rise early, Be up w i t h the cock. Keep intents firm and stable, To ease the penalties of autumn. Gather i n the harvest of daimonic ch'i, Keep the ch'i of autumn calm. Don't let intent stray outside, Keep the ch'i i n the lungs clear. "This is the response to the ch'i of autumn, the way to nourish the gathering i n . If y o u go against it you harm the lungs and i n winter w i l l suffer from diarrhoea; there w i l l be too little provision for the storing away. "The three months of winter one calls 'the shutting u p and storing away'. Water freezes, ground cracks, Don't put strain on the Yang. Sleep early, rise late, Be sure to wait for the sunshine. Keep an intent as though l u r k i n g , h i d i n g , A s though it were a private thought, A s though you had succeeded already. A v o i d the cold, stay near the w a r m , Don't allow the seeping through the skin W h i c h lets the ch'i be quickly stolen away.

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"This is the response to the ch'i of winter, the way to nourish the storing away. If you go against it you harm the kidneys and i n spring will suffer from impotence; there w i l l be too little provision for the giving of life." Western medicine for some two thousand years used the same sort of correlations to explain the seasonal variations of diseases, as already i n the 17

Hippocratic Nat ure of Man (c. 400 B . C . ) . A

(Four seasons) (Four Humours)

Spring Hot-and-wet Blood

B

18

Summer Hot-and-dry Yellow bile

C Autumn Cold-and-dry Black bile

D

Winter Cold-and-wet Phlegm

This system relates to the Four Elements as the Chinese to the Five Processes, w i t h 'fire/water' correlating w i t h 'summer/winter' i n both: A

B

Air

Fire

C Earth

D

Water

Both the royal calendars and the medical regime place us i n a world w h i c h is not, like that of N e w t o n i a n science, b o u n d by invariable law. The interactions of things are seen as either orderly or chaotic; they are orderly to the extent that i n the symmetries of space and cycles of time the harmonious are together and the conflicting apart. The correlation of Four Directions w i t h Four Seasons establishes the framework of an order in which the contrasting (paradigmatic A , B . . . .) are distributed i n spatial and temporal positions w h i c h do not conflict, while the connected (syntagmatic 1, 2 . . . .) stand together harmoniously i n the same positions. This cosmology differs also from modern science i n that man's action belongs w i t h i n the total interaction, supporting or disturbing the order. That it is inside the interaction is especially plain i n the medical account, where the ch'i of the body is responding through the seasons to the ch'i of the atmosphere; even the 'intent' (chih), a word we met first i n the sayings of C o n f u c i u s , the nearest i n Classical Chinese to our ' w i l l ' , is far from being a Kantian w i l l detached from spontaneous inclination, it is impulse roused by spring and stabilised by autumn. In the sense that a regular recurrence exciting an impulse to corresponding movement is called a 'rhythm', the cycle of the seasons is not merely a recurrence usable for prediction but a r h y t h m w i t h w h i c h m a n like other creatures stays i n step. W h e n the ruler issues largesse i n spring and punishes i n autumn, it is not at all that he observes nature objectively and infers how to act from a set of 19

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artificial analogies and a logically unjustified j u m p from 'is' to 'ought'; he is spontaneously moved to generosity by the kindly breath of spring and to just wrath by the breath of autumn w h i c h kills the leaves w h e n their time has come. To interfere w i t h the natural r h y t h m w h i c h inclines h i m to benignity i n spring and severity i n autumn w o u l d damage his o w n capacity to reconcile the conflicting demands of the Benevolent and the Right. N o r is there anything artificial i n his wearing green i n spring and white in autumn; they are the colours w h i c h by Chinese custom w i l l put h i m i n the mood to respond fully to the seasons, as i n Western culture the spirit i n w h i c h you participate i n a w e d d i n g or funeral is assisted by the bride wearing white and the mourner black. In this cosmos it is hard to recognise the line we are accustomed to draw between fact, w h i c h belongs to science, and value w h i c h is outside it. Let us ask once again, for the last time, our recurrent question as to whether the line is genuinely absent or merely obscured. Suppose we try to draw it, taking as example the proportional opposition 'spring : bounty :: a u t u m n : punishment'. Paradigm Spring compares w i t h autumn as bounty w i t h punishment. Syntagm Spring connects w i t h bounty as autumn w i t h punishment. H o w does Heaven act i n the two seasons? Heaven generates life i n spring and kills it off i n autumn. H o w ought the ruler to act? The ruler ought to be bountiful i n spring and p u n i s h i n autumn. H o w ought one to take care of one's health? One ought to indulge the body i n spring and restrain it i n autumn. The question is whether there is here a hiatus between 'does' and 'ought to do'. That word 'ought', w h i c h has no equivalent i n the Chinese texts (although they do use the negative imperative), seems not quite apt; the texts tell us not what m a n ought to do but what he is stimulated to do when the cosmic interactions are orderly. Shall we look for the 'ought' further back, i n an obligation to take the measures w h i c h maintain rather than disturb the order? But i n the medical example one is not taking the measures good for one's health because one judges order better than disorder; they are the measures one is moved to take when one understands how the seasons act on the body. Similarly the actions prescribed for the ruler are the ones to w h i c h he is spontaneously moved, within the interactions of Heaven and Earth, if he understands how things compare and connect. M a n is i n spontaneous interaction w i t h things, but responds differently according to the degree of his understanding of their similarities and contrasts, connexion or isolation. The 'ought' then finally

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detaches itself as an imperative to k n o w h o w things compare and connect, in particular whether i n connecting they support or conflict w i t h each other, w h i c h is to k n o w their patterns (li) and the Way w h i c h unites them all; to k n o w what to do is to k n o w what one w o u l d be moved to do i n the sage's full knowledge of h o w things are related i n fact. Once again then value separates from fact only as the value of w i s d o m itself.

A Kuan-tzu cosmology based on water The Wu hsing, w h i c h we translate 'Five Processes', were until recently generally k n o w n i n English as the Five Elements. They differ however from the Four Elements of Greek and Mediaeval philosophy (fire, water, earth, air, w h i c h share three of the five) i n not being conceived as the constituents of things; they are related to the myriad things not by composition but by generation. Not that the resemblance is altogether fortuitous. The Greek difficulty about reconciling Being w i t h change tended to convert into unchanging elements variously combined what at first were, as i n C h i n a , the sources or stages of generative process. The Four Elements as presented by Empedocles (c. 450 B.C.) were called the 'Four Roots' (rizdmata). A m o n g them air h a d been chosen by Anaximenes (c. 550 B.C.) as the original stuff w h i c h by condensation becomes i n turn fire, w i n d , cloud, water, earth, stone, an exceptionally close parallel w i t h the condensing ch'i of C h i n a . Thales (c. 600 B . C ) , remembered as the earliest of Greek philosophers, was credited i n retrospect w i t h treating water as the primary stuff, although we cannot be sure that he claimed more than that things i n some way originated i n water. Thales too has a Chinese parallel, the author of the 'Water and Earth' chapter of Kuan-tzu. Like the Kuan-tzu calendar chapters, this conflicts i n some respects with the cosmology w h i c h crystalised about 250 B . C , and is likely to be earlier. It mentions neither Y i n a n d Yang nor the Five Processes, and has unorthodox correlations of the Five Tastes w i t h the Five Viscera. "Earth is the original source of the myriad things, the root of all that lives, that from w h i c h beautiful and ugly, worthy and unworthy, foolish and eminent are born. Water is the blood a n d ch'i of Earth, like that w h i c h courses through the muscles and veins. Hence it is said 'In water the stuff of everything is complete". The stuff (ts'ai) of a thing is the material i n it on w h i c h its functions depend (for example, the stuff a m a n is made of, his talents). The proof that all ts'ai are latent i n water is the presence i n it of the moral virtues, 1

2

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357

from w h i c h we select humility, a n example we have met already i n Laotzu. "While all m e n aim for the heights, itself alone aiming downwards is humility." But it is not only the moral w h i c h emerges f r o m water. "The water-level is ancestor of the Five Measures,* the pallid is the substance of the Five Colours, the insipid is the mean between the Five Tastes." Water is present everywhere, metal becomes it i n melting (it w i l l be remembered that i n the generation cycle too, M e t a l generates Water), and the growth of l i v i n g things depends o n the quantity of water i m b u i n g them. "This is w h y there is nothing it does not fill, nowhere it does not reside. It gathers i n Heaven and i n Earth, and is stored w i t h i n the myriad things; it is engendered from metal and stone, and gathers i n all that lives; hence it is said, 'Water is daimonic'. W h e n it gathers i n herbs and trees, the root gets its measure f r o m it, the flowers their number from it, the fruit their dimensions from it. W h e n birds and animals get it, bodies are plump, fur or plumage thrives, articulation of members is clearly manifest; that the myriad things all fulfil the prospects of their germination and attain the n o r m for them is because there is the proper measure of water within." Water is described as 'gathering i n ' , as 'generating' or as 'becoming' all the various kinds of thing. M a n himself grows f r o m a mingling of fluids. " M a n k i n d is water. W h e n the quintessential ch'i of m a n and woman combine, the water flowing takes shape." In the third month of gestation the Five Tastes begin (sour, salt, acrid, bitter, sweet), presumably from the insipidity characteristic of water; these generate the Five Viscera (spleen, lungs, kidneys, liver, heart), w h i c h then generate the rest of the body. B y the fifth month eyes, ears and other sense organs have opened, so that by the time of birth i n the tenth month we can see, hear and think, all because water "congealed and inert, became man". A m o n g other beings, the tortoise and the dragon owe their daimonic powers to being b o r n from water. The author n o w transfers to water the claim he originally made for Earth. 3

4

* The Five Measures are likely to be the five enumerated in Kz (ch. 78) 3/87, the counterpoise and beam of the steelyard, compasses and L-square, and the water-level. As the odd one left over from the rest the water-level would be in the basic position, like Soil in the Five Processes.

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"I say then, what is water? It is the original source of the myriad things, the ancestral home of all that lives, that from w h i c h beautiful and ugly, worthy and unworthy, foolish and eminent are engendered. H o w do we know that this is so?" He answers b y arguing that the temperamental differences between the peoples of the seven major states result f r o m differences i n the local waters, a n d draws the practical conclusion that the sage ruler morally transforms his people b y ensuring that the water throughout the state is the same and is pure. The interest of this essay is i n seeing Chinese thought on one of its bypaths coming to what i n the West is the first recorded philosophical idea, but discarding it to continue o n its o w n course.

The Yi D u r i n g the Shang dynasty one divined b y the cracks formed by burning holes i n bones or tortoise shells; the prognostications written on them provide the bulk of the earliest Chinese inscriptions. D u r i n g the early C h o u this method of divination was partially replaced b y a system employing 64 hexagrams, figures composed of 6 broken or unbroken lines. The hexagrams may be seen as combinations of 3-line figures, the 'Eight Trigrams', a possibility w h i c h follows f r o m the fact that 64 is the total of choices of alternatives for six lines. A l l are built u p from the bottom, each successive line selected b y a procedure for arbitrarily distributing and then counting off yarrow sticks. The hexagrams, together w i t h written auspices for the lines and for the figures as wholes, compose the oldest layer of the book called the Chou Yi {'Yi of Chou'), called also since its recognition as a classic the Yi ching {'Yi classic').* It is a manual of * The two major English translations of the Yi are by James Legge (first published as Yi King in the Sacred Books of the East, 1882) and by Caryl E Baynes from the German version of Richard Wilhelm (first published as / Ging: das Buch der Wandlungen, Jena 1924). Legge was a great 19th-century sinologist trying to be fair to a book altogether foreign to him; Wilhelm on the other hand, although his version is much freer, had a profound sympathy for the Yi, and attracted attention to it outside scholarly circles by introducing it to the analytic psychologist Jung. I therefore give references for translated passages to the Wilhelm-Baynes version; but my translations (which are more literal, and benefit from the advances in Classical Chinese grammatical studies over the last half century) are sometimes so different that readers hunting up the context may have trouble finding them on the page. The principal appendix to the Yi is the Hsi tz'u chuan ('Commentary on the Attached Verbalisations') or Ta chuan ('Great Commentary'). 1 follow Legge in calling it the 'Great Appendix'; Wilhelm-Baynes has it as the 'Great Treatise'.

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divination without philosophical relevance, and although the Tso Commentary records statesmen as consulting it as far back as 674 B.C., there is no certain reference to it by a philosopher before H s i i n - t z u , w h o still does not include it among the Classics. The C h ' i n ' B u r n i n g of the Books' spared writings o n divination including the Yi; its availability, and the temptation for persecuted people to trust i n omens, w o u l d explain the growing interest of Confucians i n the one relic of C h o u culture w h i c h they had neglected. Most or all of the appendices called the 'Ten Wings', w h i c h relate the diagrams to cosmology, later to be ascribed to Confucius himself, may be dated w i t h i n a few decades on either side of 200 B . c . t The meaning of Yi as the name of a system of divination is obscure, like m u c h else i n the terminology of the ancient manual. The graph ( ^ ) represents two words originally distinct i n pronunciation, yi 'easy' and yi 'substitute, exchange' (X replacing or changing places w i t h Y), w h i c h w i t h hua -ft, 'transform' (X changing into Y) and pien 'alter' (X changing but remaining X), is one of the three major Chinese words translatable by 'change'. Once the replacements of lines or diagrams were conceived i n philosophical terms as corresponding to such cosmic changes as sun alternating w i t h moon the title was identified as Yi 'substitutions, exchanges', and it is therefore commonly translated 'Book of Changes' (or w i t h less justification, 'Book of Change'). But F u n g Yu-lan, the great 20thcentury historian of Chinese philosophy, lent his authority to the theory that the name Yi was originally understood as 'easy'. That the Yi was intended as 'Divination M a d e Easy' may seem o d d to the modern reader struggling w i t h one of the most difficult of Chinese texts, but i n comparison w i t h the reading of oracles i n the cracks of bones and shells the C h o u system w i t h automatic procedures for selecting from written auspices may well have appealed as a rationalisation, a simplification. The issue w o u l d not be material if by the time of the Appendices, w h e n the Yi became philosophically significant, it was already understood as 'the Changes'. But i n fact the predominant use of the graph i n the Appendices is for yi 'easy'. They do once say, referring to the 'hard' (unbroken) and 'soft' (broken) lines taking each other's places i n the diagrams, that "the hard and soft substitute [yi] for each other", also that "the hard and soft pushing each other aside generate the alterations and transformations", and that " s u n and moon p u s h each other aside and light is generated from t h e m . . . . C o l d a n d hot p u s h each other aside and the year is completed by them." But although the Yi is not only the substitutions of the diagrams 1

2

3

4

t For the distinguishing and dating of successive layers of the Yi text, cf. Shchutskii 129-195. For the dating of the appendices, cf. Fung v. 1, 381f, Peterson 71-77.

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but the pattern of universal process w h i c h they symbolise, there is no clear example of yi used for the cosmic changes themselves, w h i c h are called alterations and transformations. We read that "Heaven and Earth have established positions a n d the Yi proceeds between them," but also, of the diagrams C h ' i e n (Heaven) and K ' u n (Earth), " C h ' i e n and K ' u n have a completed arrangement and the Yi goes on standing between t h e m " . Since it is not clear that Yi yet means 'Changes' even for the writers of the Appendices, I leave it untranslated. The evolution of binary oppositions (with the possibility of the 'Between' supervening at any stage) has a numerical structure, w h i c h for Chinese cosmology is the structure of the cosmos itself. A m o n g the classical thinkers, whose cosmos is no more than Heaven and Earth proceeding along the Way through the Four Seasons, the author of Lao-tzu has a glimpse of it: "The Way generates the One, the One generates the two, the two generate the three, the three generate the m y r i a d things." The 'Great M u s i c ' chapter of the Lu Spring and Autumn has a fuller account: "The source from w h i c h music comes is far back. It is born from measure, rooted i n the Supreme One. The Supreme One emits the Two Exemplars, the Two Exemplars emit the Y i n and Yang, the Y i n and Yang alter and t r a n s f o r m . . . . The Four Seasons arise i n turn, now hot now cold, now short now long, now soft now hard. A t the source from w h i c h the myriad things issue they are set going by the Supreme One, are transformed by the Y i n and Y a n g . " It is i n the ancient diagrams of the Yi that cosmologists discovered the perfect symbolism for the numerical structure of the evolving cosmos. W h e n the broken and unbroken lines are identified with Y i n and Yang, the building upwards of the hexagrams line by line with two choices for each line corresponds to the successive stages i n the generation of things. "Therefore i n the Yi there is the Supreme Pole, w h i c h generates the Two Exemplars. The Two Exemplars generate the Four Models, the Four Models generate the Eight Trigrams, the Eight Trigrams fix the auspicious and the baleful." (Great A p p e n d i x A , l l , tr. W B 318 f) The two alternatives at the first step are the 'exemplars' of all pairs (Heaven and Earth, Y i n a n d Yang. . . .), the four at the next step are the 'models' of all fours (Four Seasons, Four Directions. . . .), the eight at the third step are the trigrams, a n d so o n u p to the 64 hexagrams. The trigrams have a wide range of symbolism expounded i n the appendix 'Exposition of the Trigrams', but represent primarily the four pairs Heaven/Earth, 5

6

7

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mountain/marsh, water/fire, thunder/wind. This symbolism, attested i n the 4th century B . C . i n the Tso Commentary as already current among diviners, is independent of the system of the Five Processes, nowhere mentioned i n the Yi. 8

K'un Earth

Ken Mountains

K'an Water

Eight Trigrams Sun Chen Wind or Thunder wood

Li Fire

Tui Marshes

Ch'ien Heaven

Four Models

Two Exemplars A

—

Supreme Pole (unsymbolised)

Continuing to b u i l d upwards stage b y stage one arrives at the 64 hexagrams, not however i n the order of their arrangement i n the book, but in the A h e a d of Heaven' order, first attested i n the numerology of Shao Y u n g (A.D. 1011-1077). For a modern reader, the perfection of the diagrams as symbols of binary u n f o l d i n g is confirmed by the fact that if he substitutes the figures 0 and 1 for the broken and unbroken lines he can at each level read off the binary numerals counting from 0. Two Exemplars: 0,1 Four Models: 00, 01,10,11 (Decimal numerals 0 to 3) Eight Trigrams: 000,001,010,011,100,101,110, 111 (Decimal numerals 0 to 7) The completed hexagrams i n the A h e a d of Heaven' sequence then read as the binary numerals from 0 to 63. This correspondence has attracted the attention of Westerners ever since Leibniz, w h o noticed it almost immediately after he h a d established the foundations of binary arithmetic. N o t that the Chinese had discovered binary arithmetic, for the number ascribed to the unbroken or Yang line is 1 and to the broken or Y i n line is 2. They supposed themselves to have discovered the structure of the cosmos (which indeed was its significance for Leibniz), and h a d indeed 9

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discovered the structure of binary thinking as it organises a cosmos, the pattern i n the u n f o l d i n g of "the first of the metaphysical oppositions, that between the same and the other", w h i c h for Kepler too was still not the start but the end of cosmology. From another point of view, this system unfolding f r o m an origin unsymbolisable w i t h i n the system, laying d o w n both how things develop and how one is to respond to them as auspicious or baleful, is the perfect formulation of what Chinese thought understands by the Way. A n implication of the system is that any concrete phenomenon or situation w i l l , w h e n analysed into 6 stages, share the structure of one of the 64 hexagrams, and of the various images correlated with the hexagram and its parts. These structures and the images w h i c h exhibit them are called hsiang > translated 'models'. Hsiang, primarily 'elephant, ivory', may have assumed this meaning through carved ivories, but there is a different explanation i n H a n Fei's 'Interpretation of Lao-zu' w h i c h is illuminating even if grounded i n a misunderstanding. " M e n seldom see a live elephant, but finding the skeleton of a dead elephant they rely on their picturing of it to imagine it alive. Therefore everything people use to get the idea of or imagine is called a hsiang." This suggests that the hsiang is like a skeleton to be fleshed out, a structure rather than a delineated image. According to the Appendices the diagrams were invented i n order to display these structures. "In ancient times w h e n Fu-hsi reigned over the world, looking up he observed the models i n Heaven, looking d o w n he observed the standards on Earth. H e observed the markings on birds and animals, and how things fit together on Earth, a n d took comparisons near at hand i n himself and far away i n other things. Then he invented the Eight Trigrams, i n order to fathom the potency of the daimonic and clear-seeing, i n order to arrange the essentials of the m y r i a d things according to their kinds." ('Great A p p e n d i x ' B 2, tr. W B 328f) "Therefore, as for the models, the sage has the means to see the occulted i n the w o r l d , and finds analogues for it i n his representations. He models on the fitting together of things; this is w h y they are called 'models'." ('Great A p p e n d i x ' A 1 2 , tr. W B 324) The models correlate w i t h C h ' i e n and Heaven; fully shaped things (which as means at man's disposal are called 'instruments') correlate with K ' u n and Earth. "In Heaven they become complete as models, on Earth they become complete as shapes." ('Great A p p e n d i x ' A 1 , tr. W B 280) "Repeated generation is what is called the Yi, the completion of 10

n e r e

11

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models is what is called C h ' i e n , the imitation of standards is what is called K ' u n . " (ut sup. A 5, tr. W B 299f) "Visible it is called the model, shaped it is called the instrument." (ut sup. A 1 0 , tr. WB318) The hsiang 'model' is the only ancient Chinese concept w h i c h reminds one of the ideas and universals of our o w n Platonist tradition, but is i n several respects profoundly different. Ancient Chinese theories of naming (in the Canons and Hsiin-tzu), being 'nominalist' i n that particulars are assumed to be named by similarity to one of them taken as standard, have no place for universals. The sophism "The L-square is not square, the compasses cannot make circles" suggests recognition that any drawn geometrical figure is imperfect, but there is no suggestion i n the literature that perfect squares a n d circles are to be found somewhere outside the material world. Things of the same k i n d seem to be conceived i n the Appendices not as reproducing one model but as resembling many; models have the multivalence of poetic images. Moreover, although less substantial than fully shaped things, they are not essentially different. The models w h i c h Fu-hsi saw i n Heaven are none other than the heavenly bodies, things w h i c h existing i n the rarified regions above have not assumed definite outlines, a n d w h i c h as omens serve as models for human action. " O f the suspended models w h i c h are manifest and bright none is greater than the s u n and moon. . . . Heaven suspends models to show the auspicious and the baleful." ('Great A p p e n d i x ' A 1 1 , tr. W B 319f) The Way itself is only relatively insubstantial; material things w i t h their different uses for m a n are the Way above assuming shape below. " C h ' i e n a n d K ' u n have a completed arrangement and the Yi goes on standing between them. If C h ' i e n and K ' u n broken d o w n , there would be no means of seeing the Yi; if the Yi were invisible, C h ' i e n and K ' u n might be on the verge of ceasing. Therefore what is above the taking of shape is called the Way, what is below the taking of shape is called the instruments." ('Great A p p e n d i x ' A 1 2 , tr. W B 322f). This passage was to become a crux i n the controversy between dualists and monists i n the Neo-Confucianism of the S u n g and later. But for a reading of the Appendices i n their context i n the classical age a dualist interpretation must be rejected as anachronistic. The awakening of interest i n the ancient diagrams of the diviners opened a new approach to the problem of communication. The Later Mohists and H s i i n - t z u h a d trusted verbal language and theorised about the fitting of names to objects; C h u a n g - t z u and the Lao-tzu author on the 12

13

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other hand had exposed the limitations of language. In the Yi, Confucians discovered a new set of symbols conceived as iconic, diagrams structurally related to phenomena both directly and through the models. It was now possible for them to agree w i t h Taoists about the inadequacy of words without losing faith that everything is symbolisable. The solution is put i n the mouth of Confucius himself: "The Master said: 'Writing does not exhaust the said, saying does not exhaust the idea.' Then w o u l d it be that the ideas of the sages are unseeable? The Master said: 'The sages established models to exhaust the ideas, provided diagrams to exhaust genuine and false, attached verbalisations to them to exhaust what they had to say. . . . . ' " ('Great A p p e n d i x ' A 12 tr. WB322). The Yi also satisfied the Confucian need for a cosmology w h i c h would close the gap between Heaven and M a n by rooting morality i n the cosmic order. Once the unbroken (Ch'ien) and broken (K'un) lines are identified as Yang and Y i n , the first two hexagrams ( H i , ! ! ) , doublings of the trigrams C h ' i e n and K ' u n and called by the same names, come to represent all Yang-Yin pairs (Heaven/Earth, high/low, moving/still, hard/ soft, sun/moon, hot/cold, male/female), throughout w h i c h the superiority of A over B is seen as self-evident. "Heaven being august and Earth lowly, C h ' i e n and K ' u n are fixed. L o w l y and high being set forth, noble and base are i n position. M o v i n g and still having constancy, hard and soft are decided. . . . Sun and moon proceed i n cycles, cold and hot alternate. The Way of C h ' i e n completes the male, the Way of K ' u n completes the female. C h ' i e n is i n charge of the first beginmngs, K ' u n originates the completed thing." ('Great A p p e n d i x ' A 1 , tr. W B 280, 284f). The cosmology is seen as confirming an essentially Mencian view of h u m a n nature. " Y i n and Yang i n alternation is what is called the Way. The successor to it is the good, the completer of it is one's nature. The benevolent seeing it call it 'benevolence', the wise seeing it call it ' w i s d o m ' , the people employ it daily without k n o w i n g it." ('Great A p p e n d i x A 4, tr. W B 297f) G o o d and bad are assumed to originate w i t h the polarities; the Way itself seems never to be described as good by the classical philosophers. A s an example of Y i n a n d Yang alternating we may take Hexagram N o . 37, Chia-jen, 'the household' (§FH, equivalent to A B A B A A ) . The two most important lines of a hexagram are the central ones of the two component trigrams, N o s . 2 and 5 counting upwards, the most important of all being N o . 5, since it is i n the upper or outer trigram. We see that a Y i n or broken

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line, w h i c h i n the household corresponds to w o m a n , rightly occupies N o . 2 i n the lower or inner trigram, while a Yang or unbroken line, so male, has its proper place at N o . 5. "In Chia-jen w o m a n has her correct position inside the house, m a n his correct position outside the house. M a n a n d woman being correct is the supremely fitting between Heaven and Earth. Chia-jen has stern rulers in it, namely father and mother. Father acting as father, son as son, elder brother as elder brother, younger brother as younger brother, husband as husband and wife as wife, the Way of the family is correct. Correct the family and the whole world is settled." (Hexagram N o 37, T'uan appendix tr. W B 570). The system of the Yi develops correlative thinking i n two directions. O n the one h a n d it relates all pairs, fours and larger sets to abstract symbols interrelated w i t h mathematical rigour; on the other, the different patterns w h i c h can be read into the 64 arrangements of six lines, all with their o w n levels of symbolism, open up unlimited possibilities of correlation, w i t h no rules to judge between them. There is none of the rigidity of the Five Processes system, w h i c h may for example impose the Five Colours o n a parallel series w i t h little regard for the colours as they appear to the eye. F r o m the viewpoint of modern scientific explanation and prediction one must class it as not 'proto-science' but 'pseudoscience'*; whether there is another viewpoint from w h i c h it is not regress but progress is a question we leave open for the moment. In the first place the appendix 'Exposition of the Trigrams' presents a variety of correlations from w h i c h we select four series. A

B

Chen

Sun

C

Li

D

K'un

1. Thunder Wind or Fire Earth wood 2. E SE S SW 3. Moving Entering Attaching Docility 4. Eldest Eldest Middle Mother son daughter daughter

E

Tui

F

G

Ch'ien K'an

Marshes Heaven Water W Enjoying Youngest daughter

NW Virility Father

H

Ken Mountains

N NE Sinking Stopping Middle Youngest son son

* Cf. Needham v. 2,304-345, which treats the development of the Yi system as a disaster in the history of Chinese science.

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The first two series share one correlation w i t h the Five Processes system, 'Fire/Water' w i t h 'South/North'. The third series is of activities corresponding to the first, w i t h 'Heaven/Earth' as male and female correlating w i t h 'Virile/Docile'. The fourth, entirely independent except for 'Father/Mother', relates the trigrams to the family, crucial both to Confucian morality and to the general conception i n the Appendices of cosmic process as a cycle of generation by male Heaven and female Earth. In this case the correlations are completely bound by the family relations. The unbroken and broken lines must correlate w i t h male and female, the trigrams uniform throughout w i t h father and mother, the sequence upwards w i t h the sequence of birth. Since it is the rule that whether the whole trigram is Y i n or Yang is fixed by the single line contrasting w i t h the other two, everything else follows. We have seen that Heaven and Earth correlate w i t h C h ' i e n and K ' u n , whether as trigrams or as hexagrams, taking all other Yin-Yang pairs with them. But the three lines of any trigram also correlate w i t h Heaven, Earth and M a n ; the pairs then have to be distributed between the lines. "Formerly w h e n the sages invented the Yi, the purpose was to accord with the patterns of our nature and destiny. Hence they set up the Way of Heaven as ' Y i n and Yang', the Way of Earth as 'soft and h a r d ' , the way of M a n as 'the benevolent and the right'. H a v i n g put the three constituents side by side they doubled them, so the Yi completes a hexagram i n six strokes". ('Exposition of the Trigrams' 2, tr. W B 264) A g a i n , numbers are assigned to Heaven and Earth on the principle that i n each pair " C h ' i e n is i n charge of the first beginnings, K ' u n originates the completed t h i n g " . "Heaven, 1: Earth, 2. Heaven, 3: Earth, 4. Heaven, 5: Earth, 6. Heaven, 7: Earth, 8. Heaven, 9: Earth, 10." ('Great A p p e n d i x ' 10 tr. W B 308). This implies an ideal sequence of lines alternating all the way up the hexagram. This sequence provides one principle for explaining w h y the ancient text pronounces a step auspicious or baleful; a line should be unbroken at N o s . 3 or 5 from the bottom, broken at Nos. 2 and 4. It happens however that the apparently perfect Hexagram N o . 6 3 ^ = C h i chi (Already crossed over') has as its original prognostication "Beginning auspicious, end disorderly." But it is i n the nature of the system that anything can be made to fit. There is the further principle that to end on the broken line w h i c h completes the pair offers no further prospect of advance. In C h i - c h i "the hard and the soft are correct and the positions fit", but " w h e n it stops at the end it is disorderly, because its Way is 14

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exhausted." Each hexagram is incomplete i n that it corresponds to only one segment detached f r o m the process. The ideal sequence implies that the central lines of the trigrams, N o s . 2 and 5, respond to each other as opposites. But this further principle is applied to explain an auspicious prognostication even w h e n N o . 2 is unbroken and N o . 5 broken. Hexagram N o . 7 PL|I S h i h ('Army') "The hard is at the centre (No. 2) and is responded to (at N o . 5)" ( T ' u a n appendix', tr. W B 421). Hexagram N o . 32 H e n g ('Constant') "That regret disappears is because it is able to endure at the centre." ('Model appendix' on line 2, tr. W B 548). What w o u l d be the point of this unrestricted correlation, of w h i c h we have given only a few illustrations? We may note i n the first place that, unlike the system of the Five Processes as it applies for example to royal calendars, the Yi is primarily an art of decision-making i n particular situations, by the interpretation of vague and enigmatic instructions as to how circumstances w i l l develop and h o w to deal w i t h them. It does share with the royal calendars the u n d e r l y i n g assumption that m a n interacts with the events ordained by Heaven and discovers i n understanding them how to respond to them. "The great m a n joins his potency w i t h Heaven and Earth, joins his clarity w i t h the sun and m o o n , joins his sequences with the Four Seasons, joins what is auspicious or baleful for h i m w i t h the ghosts and gods. W h e n he acts ahead of Heaven, Heaven does not go counter to h i m ; w h e n he follows after Heaven, he is blessed w i t h opportunities from Heaven. If Heaven itself does not go counter to h i m how m u c h less man, how much less the ghosts and gods!" ('Words on the Text' appendix, on Hexagram No. 1, tr. W B 382f) The theory of the Five Processes, however, although it too bred techniques of d i v i n a t i o n , ! applies primarily to general and recurring situations such as the changing of ritual w i t h phases of the year, while the Yi is a guide to unique conjunctions of circumstance. The difference may not appear significant at first sight, since inference from correlations is the same i n both systems. For pure correlative thinking w h i c h ignores causality and can accept that water, winter and black share the same pattern as fire, summer and r e d , it is equally easy to accept that the t Cf. the system of fate-calculation described by Ho Peng Yoke, 27-32

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diviner's placing of 6 lines by shuffling yarrow sticks may share the pattern of the 6 stages of the situation he is divining; and i n a culture where, whatever the reservations of such thinkers as M o - t z u , H s u n - t z u and H a n Fei,* most people accepted that the success of divination is confirmed by common experience, the correlation w o u l d seem unquestionable. C o n temporary Western users of the Yi tend to follow Jung i n defending Chinese divination by appeal to an a-causal principle of 'synchronicity', which "takes the coincidence of events i n space and time as meaning something more than mere chance, namely a peculiar interdependence of objective events among themselves as well as w i t h the subjective (psychic) states of the observer or observers." 1 w o u l d suggest however that it is on the contrary by dismissing synchronicity and accepting the fall of yarrow sticks as mere chance that one comes to understand the function of free correlation i n the Yi. A n openness to chance influences loosing thought from preconceptions is indispensable to creative thinking. In responding to new and complex situations it is a practical necessity to shake u p habitual schemes and wake to new correlations of similarities and connexions. The correlations of the Five Processes scheme can be rigid because they are designed to establish the conduct appropriate to stable and recurring situations, such as the ruler wearing green i n spring and white i n autumn. The Yi on the other hand is designed for responding to unique and complex situations i n w h i c h correlative thinking must be fluid. In favour of this explanation is the remarkable interest i n inventions displayed by the 'Great A p p e n d i x ' . "There are four points o n w h i c h the Yi has the way of the Sages: who uses it to speak esteems its verbalisations, w h o uses it to move esteems its alterations, w h o uses it to design instruments esteems its models, who uses it to divine esteems its auspices." ('Great A p p e n d i x ' A 9, tr. W B 314) It is at first sight surprising that invention should be put beside 15

* References to divination by the pre-Ch'in thinkers generally combine scepticism with acceptance of its place in ritual. In one of the exemplary stories about Mo-tzu he is warned by a diviner not to travel North because his colour is black and 'Today God is killing the black dragon in the North"; he ignores the warning, fails to get through, but tells the diviner that the white failed too and that to listen to such advice would bring all travel to a stop (Mo 47/48-53, tr. Mei 228f). The military chapters however include divination in theritefor preparing against enemy attack (Mo ch. 68). Hsun-tzu classes divination with praying for rain, as aritualwhich puts a civilized polish on behaviour but has nothing to do with the outcome of events (cited p. 240f above). Han Fei derides rulers who decide by divination when to go to war, citing several examples of rulers defeated in spite of favourable auspices (HF ch. 19, Ch'en 307, tr. Liao l/156ff).

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divination as one of the purposes of the Yi. But the same appendix describes at length the development of civilization by the successive discoveries of the sages. The inventions w h i c h followed Fu-hsi's construction of the trigrams, of nets for hunting and fishing by Fu-hsi himself, of the plough and of markets by Shen-nung, of boats, domestication of ox and horse, mortar and pestle, bow and arrow, houses, coffins, writing, are all ascribed to insight into similarities and connexions inspired by contemplation of some trigram, for example: "They hollowed out w o o d to make boats, shaved w o o d to make oars. The advantage of boat and oars was to cross to the inaccessible and deliver over distances to the advantage of the whole world. Evidently they took it from H u a n ( I P f ) . " ('Great A p p e n d i x ' B 2, tr. W B 332) The suggestion is that the idea of a boat first came to someone pondering the hexagram composed of the trigram for w o o d (^=) on top of the trigram for water ( w i t h its attached auspice "Advantageous for crossing a great river." Has this something to do w i t h w h y the Chinese, without m o v i n g i n the direction of modern science, have proved themselves so good at basic inventions? Plainly the Yi is relevant, not to scientific explanation, but to the unexpected insight into a similarity or connexion w h i c h sparks off discovery, i n the sciences as elsewhere. The 64 hexagrams, instead of organising a cosmological scheme, lay out every possible way i n w h i c h w o o d , water or any other correlates of the trigrams can be put above or below a n d outside or inside each other, w h i c h are likewise every possible sequence for 6 steps correlatable w i t h Y i n and Yang. The precision, rigour a n d completeness of the scheme, qualities shared w i t h modern mathematised science but quite different i n purpose, serve on the one h a n d to clarify binary thinking, on the other to rid binary thinking of every preconception as to h o w concepts are related. The same explanation w i l l apply to the use of the Yi i n divination. There is no reason to doubt that divination systems do help many people to reach appropriate decisions i n situations w i t h too many u n k n o w n factors, and that the Yi is among the more successful of them. Unless we are to follow Jung i n postulating an a-causal principle of synchronicity, we must suppose that the Yi serves to break d o w n preconceptions by forcing the diviner to correlate his situation w i t h a chance sequence of six prognostications. If their meaning were unambiguous, the overwhelming probability w o u l d be that the prognostications w o u l d be either obviously inapplicable or grossly misleading. Since on the contrary the hexagrams open up an indefinite range of patterns for correlation, i n the calm of withdrawal into sacred space and time, the effect is to free the m i n d to take account of all information whether or not it conflicts w i t h preconceptions,

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awaken it to unnoticed similarities and connexions, and guide it to a settled decision adequate to the complexity of factors. This is conceived not as discursive t h i n k i n g but as a synthesising act i n w h i c h the diviner sees into and responds to everything at once, w i t h a lucidity mysterious to himself. The Yi is not a book w h i c h pretends to offer clear predictions but hides away i n tantalising obscurities; it assumes i n the diviner that k i n d of intelligence we have discussed i n connexion w i t h C h u a n g - t z u , opening out and responding to stimulation i n perfect tranquility, lucidity and flexibility. "The Yi thinks of nothing, does nothing: i n tranquility, unmoving, it fathoms what is at the back of everything i n the world. What else but that w h i c h i n all the w o r l d is most daimonic w o u l d be able to share i n this?" ('Great A p p e n d i x ' A 9, tr. W B 315) This comes close to personifying the Yi; one consults the yarrow sticks as though seeking advice from a daimonic presence. But the state of m i n d would be that of the diviner himself, w h o " t h i n k i n g of nothing and doing nothing" seems more a Taoist than a Confucian. It was i n Lao-tzu that we first noticed an attempt, comparable although from a different direction, to undermine established chains of oppositions. Perhaps it is significant that i n spite of the success of the Five Processes cosmology, no work expounding it ever w o n the authority of the Yi, w h i c h entered the Classics, or of Lao-tzu, the most influential of unorthodox writings. It is as though Chinese civilization has been careful to preserve a certain latitude i n the organisation of its cosmos, i n order that throughout its long history originality and creativity should never die out. 16

2. SYNCRETISM AND THE VICTORY OF CONFUCIANISM The age of the Warring States ended quite abruptly i n 221 B.C., the final struggle of the seven remaining states ending i n a few years w i t h the victory of C h ' i n . It was a unique situation; even the legendary Five Emperors before the H s i a , as his advisers told the K i n g of C h ' i n , had been suzereigns of feudal lords w h o m they were helpless to control; now "within the four seas everywhere there are commanderies and counties, decrees issue from a single centre, something there has never been since the remotest past, w h i c h the Five Emperors never attained." In response to their proposals for a new Imperial title he announced "I shall be First

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Emperor (Shih-huang-ti), later reigns shall be counted from me, Second, Third, to the 10,000th, the transmission w i l l never e n d . " Instead of declaring like the C h o u that Heaven h a d called h i m to overthrow his unrighteous predecessors, the First Emperor ascribed his victory to the natural course of history according to Tsou Yen's application of the conquest cycle of the Five Potencies, b y w h i c h Water prevails over the Fire w h i c h sustained C h o u . Since Water correlates w i t h winter, black, and the number 6, he shifted the N e w Year to the first of the tenth month, and ordered black robes and banners, and six horses for his chariot. The cosmic cycle justified not only his o w n power but the black and wintery policies of Legalism already imposed i n C h ' i n under Duke Hsiao (361-338 B.C.) by the reforms of L o r d Shang. " O n l y a resolute harshness, deciding all things b y law, incising and deleting without benevolence, generosity, mildness or righteousness, fits i n w i t h the numbers of the Five Potencies."* In the same year 221 B . C . the question came u p of whether he should follow the C h o u example by enfiefing his sons i n the conquered states. Instead he followed the advice of his Legalist minister L i Ssu, to reward not with lands but w i t h stipends out of the taxes, and divided the whole Empire into 36 commanderies. In 213 B . C . the proposal to enfief his sons and younger brothers o n the C h o u model was revived by the academician C h ' u n - y u Y u e h , w h o observed that "I have never heard of anyone w h o was able to last long without taking antiquity as his model i n affairs." This time L i Ssu recommended, not merely rejection, but the suppression of all the schools. " W h e n the lords of the states of other times were i n conflict, they were generous i n patronising wandering scholars. N o w the Empire is settled, decrees have one source, o n the one hand the family heads of the people work hard at farming a n d the crafts, on the other the knights become practiced i n the decrees and statutes. If scholars today take their examples not from the present but from the past a n d condemn our times, it w i l l delude the masses W h e n people hear that a decree has come d o w n , everyone w i l l criticise it i n terms of his o w n learning, w h e n at home w i l l privately disagree, w h e n abroad w i l l criticise it i n the streets." The First Emperor o n his recommendation then ordered the historiographers to burn all past records except those of the state of C h ' i n . H e 1

* Shih chi (ch. 6) 237f, tr. Chavannes, v. 2,128-30. The historicity of the First Emperor's commitment to the conquest cycle and the ascendancy of Water, which has been questioned, is defended by Bodde in Twitchett and Fairbank, v. 1, 96f.

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forbade private ownership of "the Songs, Documents, and sayings of the H u n d r e d Schools" (still allowed however to the officially recognised academicians, w h o even at this critical period seem to have included Confucians), a n d of a l l other books except "writings o n medicine, divination, and planting and sowing." H e ordered execution of the whole family of anyone w h o "appealed to the past to condemn the present."t A m o n g other measures w h i c h were to be the basis of the persisting although frequently interrupted unity of C h i n a was the unification of the script, that unique instrument of assimilation unaffected by temporal and spatial differentiation i n the spoken language; previously writing had been diversifying i n different states. But one unprecedented historical event, universal administrative unification, was soon followed by another w h i c h exposed its fragility, the first Empire-wide popular rebellion. The building of the Great Wall and other grand designs of the First Emperor overstretched the power of w h i c h he had forgotten the limits. In 209 B . C . , almost immediately after his death, rebellion broke out under the peasant C h ' e n Sheng, to end i n 202 B . C . w i t h the victory of L i u Pang (himself a commoner of obscure origin w h o began his career as a petty local official) and the foundation of the H a n . The H a n at first tried to combine the C h ' i n administrative system w i t h a restoration of the fiefs inside the commanderies, but after a succession of rebellions the fiefs were effectively eliminated under the Emperor W u (141-87 B . C ) . The Prince of Huai-nan (executed after rebellion i n 122 B . C . ) was the last of the territorial lords inviting philosophers to his court i n the manner of the rulers of the preC h ' i n states. F r o m n o w o n , it was no longer a matter of travelling from state to state offering a new theory of government, w h i c h might give the advantage to a ruler over his rivals. Competition was now for the ear of a single ruler, and adapted to the lowest common denominator of rulers, w i t h the aim of distracting them f r o m the realities of political power by frightening them w i t h omens or promising them the elixir of life. Chinese society was now settling into that equilibrium w h i c h i n spite of all changes it was never quite to lose, and its philosophies into that synthesis w h i c h i n the Introduction w e proposed half seriously to formulate as "the Chinese secret of social immortality": t Shih chi (ch. 6) 254f, tr. Chavannes, v. 2,169-74. Our information about the First Emperor comes from the Han dynasty which replaced the Ch'in, and from the historian Ssu-ma Ch'ien who like any literatus would be prejudiced against the burner of the books. Bodde accepts his account of the burning but dismisses as legend his story of the execution of 460 scholars in 212 B.C. (Twitchett and Fairbank, v. 1, 6972,95f.)

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(From Confucianism). A n ethic rooted, below the level of conscious reflection, i n the most fundamental social bonds, kinship and custom, which models the community o n the family, relates ruler/subject to father/ son and past/present to ancestor/descendant. (From Legalism). A rational statecraft w i t h the techniques to organise an empire of unprecedented size and partially homogenise custom throughout it. (From Yin-Yang). A proto-science w h i c h models the cosmos on the community. (From Taoism, reinforced from the Later H a n by Buddhism). Personal philosophies relating individual directly to cosmos, allowing room within the social order for the unassimilable w h i c h might disrupt the community. (From M o - t z u through the argumentation of the competing schools). A rationality confined to the useful, w h i c h leaves fundamental questions outside its range. The relative submergence a n d public repudiation of Legalism under the H a n was not the result simply of the universal revulsion against the brutality of C h ' i n policies and its exclusive reliance on force, a revulsion symbolised by the H a n abolition of punishment by mutilation. A n amoral statecraft w h i c h breaks explicitly w i t h all traditional models can work effectively only as the arcanum of government. The First Emperor himself required a public morality, and Confucian academicians to draft his proclamations. H e required also the proto-science of Tsou Yen, both for a theory of history to justify his rule, and to flatter his personal hope of physical immortality—for he was a pioneer also as the earliest ruler k n o w n to have embarked on the persistent Chinese quest for the elixir of life. The first abortive experiment i n the k i n d of syncretism w h i c h was to develop d u r i n g the H a n h a d been made i n C h ' i n itself early i n his o w n reign. It is the system of the Lii Spring and Autumn (Lii-shih ch'un-ch'iu), a philosophical encyclopedia compiled about 240 B . C . by the clients of L i i Pu-wei, chief minister of C h ' i n under his predecessor K i n g C h u a n g hsiang (249-247 B . C . ) a n d still i n office for a few years after his o w n accession as a child i n 246 B . C . L i i Pu-wei, w h o h a d been a rich merchant, is a remarkable example of the promotion from low status w h i c h had become common by the 3rd century B . C . H e fell from favour w h e n the king came of age, and committed suicide i n exile i n 235 B . C . H i s book, the humane doctrines of w h i c h are quite unlike those the K i n g of C h ' i n was soon to adopt, sets the lines of all later syncretism by detaching the indispensable elements of Legalist statecraft from the Legalist theory of the state, and combining them w i t h Confucian and to a lesser extent

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Mohist moralism, all inside the frame of Yin-Yang cosmology. Unlike later syncretisms it is not m u c h influenced by Lao-tzu; its organising doctrine, as Hsiao has pointed o u t , is not Taoist but Yangist, that the throne is no more than a means to the protection and fulfilment of personal life for both ruler and subject. Confucianism was becoming the overtly dominant element i n the synthesis from about 100 B . C . , but its victory was gradual. The H a n Emperors were not finally persuaded to derive their authority like the C h o u from the mandate of Heaven, and to sacrifice to Heaven rather than such gods as T'ai-yi ('Supreme One'), until near the end of the last century B . C * In the 2nd century B . C . the movement most influential i n court had been Huang-Lao, the 'doctrine of the Yellow Emperor and Lao-tzu'. Little was k n o w n about it until the discovery i n 1973 i n a Former H a n tomb at Ma-wang-tui of two silk manuscripts of Lao-tzu, one of w h i c h has four appended documents of w h i c h one is i n the form of dialogues between the Yellow Emperor and his ministers. These combine Lao-tzu w i t h Legalism; they identify the principle of rewarding and p u n i s h i n g according to the law and checking 'name' against 'shape' (title against performance) with the Way itself, a n d the ruler's abstention from intervening i n the impersonal mechanism of the state w i t h the sage's ' D o i n g N o t h i n g ' , a move already made i n a couple of chapters of Han Fei tzu w h i c h may or may not be by H a n Fei himself, t Other ingredients are Yin-Yang dualism, without systematic correlations or the Five Processes, and a little of the moral terminology of Confucianism (benevolence, the right, the gentleman). By being circulated under the name of the Yellow Emperor, this toned-down Legalism is given the ancient authority to w h i c h classic Legalism d i d not deign to pretend. Since the Yellow Emperor was the founder of the state and of war, w h o ended the G o l d e n A g e of Shen-nung when there were as yet no laws or punishments, his name w o u l d serve also to repudiate the Shen-nung Utopianism w h i c h had flourished briefly during the civil wars following the collapse of C h ' i n authoritarianism. But Lao-tzu, for all its ambiguities, cannot be convincingly exploited i n the interests of Legalism. In Huai-nan-tzu, compiled by the clients of the Prince of H u a i - n a n about 140 B . C , and i n the probably contemporary passages and chapters w h i c h are the latest stratum i n Chuang-tzu, we find a much more comprehensive synthesis i n w h i c h punishment and reward 2

3

* For the revival of the concept of the mandate of Heaven under the 1 lan, cf. Michael Loewe, in Twitchett and Fairbank v. 1, 733-37. For the 1 lan Imperial cults, cf. Loewe ut sup. 661-68. t HF chs. 5, 8. Cf. p. 285-89 above. For preliminary investigations of the newly discovered Yellow Emperor texts cf. the articles by Jan Yiin-hua.

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are detached f r o m the mechanical model of Legalism and subordinated to the spontaneity of the Way as expounded not only i n Lao-tzu but i n Chuang-tzu. The Chuang-tzu chapter 'Way of Heaven' identifies nine stages in learning h o w to govern, the understanding of 1. Heaven 2. The Way and the Potency 3. Benevolence a n d right 4. Portions and responsibilities 5. Shape and name (the comparison of title w i t h performance) 6. Grounds for appointment 7. Inquiry and inspection 8. A p p r o v i n g a n d condemning 9. Reward and punishment. O n l y the first two directly concern the ruler, w h o moves as spontaneously as Heaven, prompted according to the Way by the Potency i n himself, simply responding to events as they are mirrored i n the clarity of his heart, the Taoist sage as conceived by C h u a n g - t z u himself. In that his motions have the spontaneity of natural events he "does nothing"; his ministers on the other hand have fixed jobs to do, the understanding of w h i c h starts from the third stage, the learning of the Confucian virtues of benevolence and right. The remaining stages belong to the technique of administration i n w h i c h the Legalists have specialised. The writer insists that 'shape and name', and reward and punishment, w h i c h Legalists take as the basis of government, belong only to its periphery. " W h e n the m e n of old expounded the comprehensive Way, at the fifth of the stages 'shape and name' deserved a mention, by the ninth it was time to speak of reward and punishment. To be i n too m u c h of a h u r r y to expound 'shape a n d name' is to be ignorant of the root of them, to be i n too much of a h u r r y to expound reward and punishment is to be ignorant of their origin. The men whose words turn the Way upside d o w n , whose explanations take the direction counter to it, it is for others to govern, how would they be able to govern others? To be i n too much of a h u r r y to expound 'shape and name' and reward and punishment, this is to have the tools for k n o w i n g how to govern, it is not the way of k n o w i n g how to govern. Such m e n are employable by the Empire but inadequate to be employers of the Empire; it is these w h i c h are called the specialists, each w i t h his o w n little corner. The detail of ceremony and law, numbers and measures, 'shape and name', d i d exist among the men of o l d , but as means for those below to serve those above, not for those above to care for those below." 4

Another syncretistic chapter i n the latest stratum of Chuang-tzu,

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'Below i n the Empire', sets out to place all the thinkers earlier than Chuang-tzu i n its new scheme. For us these thinkers are the most creative in Chinese history, but the ideologist of a united Empire has a very different viewpoint. He assumes that the ancient sage Emperors, who knew all that there is to know, possessed a unified system of lore rooted in the Way m a n k i n d shares with Heaven and Earth, and ramifying out into the detail of rites, morals and administration. In the present decadence some of this lore survives where it belongs w i t h i n the official hierarchy, as administrative techniques preserved by the historiographers or as the teaching of Ju expert i n the Classics, but the rest has been fragmented and scattered over the H u n d r e d Schools of the philosophers 'Below i n the Empire'. Each has 'the tradition of a formula' (fang shu 7jT $if ), w h i c h is only one facet of the comprehensive 'tradition of the Way' (tao shu i|f -jtj"). The chapter examines what is to be accepted or discarded i n the teaching of philosophers presumed earlier than C h u a n g - t z u w h o m it groups i n five sets: 1. M o - t z u and his disciple C h ' i n K u - l i 2. Sung H s i n g and Y i n Wen 3. P'eng M e n g , T'ien P'ien and Shen Tao 4. K u a n - y i n and Lao-tzu 5. C h u a n g - t z u Of the writings of these thinkers we now possess only Mo-tzu, Lao-tzu, Chuang-tzu and a few fragments. H a v i n g finished w i t h the five, the chapter concludes by discussing the one school w h i c h is entirely worthless, H u i Shih and the Sophists. These d i d not even have the 'tradition of a formula'; H u i Shih " h a d m a n y formulae" and boasted "I depend on no tradition." This passage deriding H u i Shih because he was an original thinker remains our main source for the little we know about his thought. Features of the classification deserving of notice are that the Confucians are treated as officially recognised teachers of the Classics, not among the schools "Below i n the E m p i r e " , and that Lao-tzu and C h u a n g tzu are not yet associated under a Taoist school. The syncretist has an especial animus against the third group w h i c h is at first sight surprising, since his description of them as "evening out the myriad things" and rejecting self, knowledge, and judgment between alternatives would seem to apply as well to Lao-tzu and C h u a n g - t z u , w h o m w i t h reservations he approves. We k n o w however from the surviving fragments of Shen Tao that he was among the founders of the Legalist theory of the state, w h i c h the H u a n g - L a o school was confusing w i t h the teaching of Lao-tzu. The Way of Legalism has the impersonality of the true Way, its

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neutrality to self and to moral principle, but it is a mechanically functioning system into w h i c h people have to be forced by, as the syncretist says, " r o u n d i n g off the corners." H e derides it as a Way not for the living but for the dead, and pronounces: "that w h i c h they called the Way was not the Way, and even i n the right things they d i d they d i d not escape from being w r o n g . " A firm classification of the p r e - H a n schools begins with Ssu-ma T'an (died 110 B . C . ) , G r a n d Historiographer and father of Ssu-ma C h ' i e n . He recognises six schools: 1. Y i n - Y a n g 2. Ju (Confucian) 3. M o h i s t 4. School of Law (Legalist) 5. School of Names (Sophists and specialists i n 'shape and name') 6. School of the Way, first introduced as 'School of the Way and Potency' (Taoist). Here Tsou Yen's Y i n - Y a n g school and the Confucians are for the first time included among the philosophical schools, and the Sophists w i n a recognised place i n the School of Names, although as contributors to the administrative task of comparing 'shape and name'. Ssu-ma T'an does not name the thinkers, but L o r d Shang, Shen Pu-hai, and Shen Tao w o u l d come under the School of Law, and Lao-tzu, Chuang-tzu and Huang-Lao under the School of the Way. The 'men of secret arts' from the North East who promised the elixir of life to the First Emperor and to the Emperor W u of H a n w o u l d come under the Yin-Yang school; they had claimed the authority of Tsou Yen under the C h ' i n and there is no evidence that they yet passed as Taoists under the Former H a n . However, the name of Tsou Yen was already losing credit under the H a n , and like later alchemists they probably preferred to cite Lao-tzu a n d the Yellow Emperor, as the sages who inspired most awe d u r i n g the ascendancy of Huang-Lao. In any case, Yin-Yang t h i n k i n g was by n o w pervading all schools. For Ssu-ma T'an the comprehensive vision is that of Taoism, w h i c h transcends the one-sidedness of the other five schools. "I have examined the Y i n - Y a n g lore; it is too detailed and multiplies superstitious taboos, it keeps people restrained by excessive fears; but its phasing of the overall harmonies w i t h the four seasons is not to be neglected. "The Ju are learned but short on the essentials, strenuous but to little effect, w h i c h is w h y their practices cannot be observed i n full; but there is no substitute for their grading of ceremonial between ruler and minister, 5

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father and son, and of distinctions between husband and wife, elder and younger. "The Mohists take frugality to an unacceptable extreme, w h i c h is w h y their practices cannot be followed generally; but their strengthening of the basic and thrift i n utilising is not to be abandoned. "The School of Law is harsh a n d merciless; but their rectification of the spheres of ruler and subject, superior and inferior, cannot be improved on. "The School of Names makes people glib and prone to lose sight of the genuine; but it is indispensable to scrutinise their correcting of names and objects. "The School of the Way makes intelligence quintessential and daimonic, concentrated and unified, every prompting i n accord w i t h the formless, i n tranquility bringing the m y r i a d things to sufficiency. A s for the lore w h i c h is theirs, it is grounded i n the overall harmonies of the Y i n Yang school, selects the best from the Ju and Mohists, picks out the essentials of the Schools of Names a n d Law. It shifts w i t h the times and changes i n response to other things; i n establishing as custom and applying i n practice there is nothing to w h i c h it is inappropriate; its point is condensed but easy to hold on to, the effort is little but to much effect." Ssu-ma T'an is the first to give the name of Tao or Way to one philosophical tendency, and it is plainly the Lao-fzw-centred syncretism of the 2nd century B . C . 'School of the Way' seems indeed to be an abbreviation of 'School of the Way and Potency', the term he uses i n first introducing it. It no doubt had a powerful appeal to Emperors, as leaving them exempt from the moral rules applied to their subjects. For that very reason however it w o u l d finally be no more satisfactory as a public ideology than naked Legalism. Under the Emperor W u (140-87 B . C . ) Confucianism began to prevail, led by scholars such as Tung C h u n g - s h u (c. 179—c. 104 B . C . ) w h o learned from the Yin-Yang cosmologists the art of interpreting natural events as omens, and used them to make the Emperor worry about losing the favour of Heaven by failing to govern by Confucian standards of morality. The Confucians, like the 'Below i n the Empire' syncretist and Ssu-ma T'an, treat their rivals not as wholly w r o n g but as one-sided, an attitude w h i c h w o u l d have been inconceivable to Mencius but is already assumed by H s i i n - t z u . Since the 3rd century B . C . there had been a general shift f r o m 'You are w r o n g , I'm right' to 'You have a narrow view, I have a wide v i e w ' . We may see this as one more example of the Chinese tendency to rank A above B rather than eliminate B; as the tendency to compromise rather than conflict it is another factor i n the persisting stability of C h i n a . 6

7

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A l l that interests us now is the manner i n w h i c h the intellectual currents of the p r e - H a n period are coming to find their places i n an enduring synthesis. The process is completed i n the bibliographical chapter of the Han History by Pan K u (A.D. 32-92), itself based on the now lost Seven Summaries of the Imperial librarian L i u H s i n (died A . D . 23). The writers w h o for us are the philosophers of ancient C h i n a are classified as the Tzu -J- , those w h o have the w o r d tzu (primarily 'son') added to their surnames as the mark of a teacher, as i n 'Chuang-tzu', ' H s u n - t z u ' . They represent the second of six classes of literature. 1. The Six Classics (Yi, Documents, Songs, Ceremony, Annals, and the already lost Music), preserving that unsurpassable culture w h i c h lasted until the early C h o u , also their attendant literature including the Analects of Confucius. 2. The Tzu, now grouped i n nine schools (a tenth, the school of 'Small Talk', of popular w i s d o m picked u p i n the street, is pronounced occasionally instructive but unworthy to be ranked w i t h the rest). These divergent schools arose w h e n "the Way of the K i n g faded and the lords of the states ruled by force." Each has its o w n strengths and weaknesses, so that "although they have blind spots and shortcomings, their crucial tendencies being combined they are after all the branchings and outcomes of the Six Classics." 3. Poetry. 4. The art of war. 5. Shu shu Jf^-Sif (literally 'number lore'), computational sciences such as astronomy, the calendar, Five-Process theory, divination. 6. Fang chi 7j (literally 'prescriptive techniques'), life-giving sciences such as medicine, sexology, and the art of the elixir. The nine schools of the Tzu are headed by the school of the Ju, w h i c h " i n the Way is loftiest of a l l " , and has no weaknesses except i n its degenerate representatives. Nevertheless, there are gaps i n its knowledge which can be filled from the other schools. 1. The Ju. The books include Mencius and Hsun-tzu, but not the Analects w h i c h already appeared i n the literature of the Classics. The Ju "take pleasure i n the elegance of the Six Classics, lodge their thoughts within the bounds of Benevolence and Right, pass on the tradition of Yao and S h u n , and have Kings Wen and W u as their authorities and Confucius as founder." 2. The Taoists. The books include Lao-tzu and Chuang-tzu, but also Kuan-tzu, Ho-kuan-tzu a n d the 'Four classics of the Yellow Emperor', w h i c h may well be the four H u a n g - L a o documents found at Ma-wang-tui. But 8

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works on the Five Processes a n d the arts of longevity, w h i c h might later be classed as Taoist, are excluded from the Tzu and placed under the computational or life-giving sciences. Strengths of the Taoists: they "know how to grasp the crucial and cling to the basic, maintain oneself by clarity and emptiness, u p h o l d oneself by humility and yielding: this is the lore of the ruler w h o faces South." Weaknesses: some " w i s h to be rid of ceremony and learning, to discard both Benevolence and Right, and say 'By trusting solely to clarity a n d emptiness one may rule'." Here the Taoist training of the m i n d to perfect clarity a n d emptiness (in Western terms, rather to flexibility and openness) is recognised as an aspect of the art of government w h i c h Confucians neglect; but it is denied that this exempts the ruler f r o m Confucian morality. 3. Yin-Yang. The books, w h i c h include the voluminous writings of Tsou Yen, are n o w all lost. Strengths: they "reverently accord w i t h august Heaven, calculate the motions of s u n , moon and stars, reverently inform the people about the seasons." Weaknesses: some "are drawn into superstitious prohibitions, degenerate into fortune-tellers, neglect h u m a n affairs and leave things to the ghosts and gods." The lost books presumably provided the theoretical background for the more practical works classified under the sciences. 4. The Legalists. The writers include L o r d Shang, Shen Pu-hai, Shen Tao and H a n Fei. Strengths: "they make reward dependable and punishment inescapable, as a support to control by ceremony." Here we have the Confucian assumption that society is held together primarily by ceremony, only secondarily by law. Weaknesses: some "dispense w i t h reform by teaching, reject Benevolence and concern for others, w i s h to perfect government by trusting solely to punishment and law, to the extent of inflicting corporal punishment even on closest k i n , atrophying mercy and demeaning generosity." 5. School of Names. The writers include K u n g - s u n L u n g , H u i Shih, and also S u n g Hsing's associate Y i n Wen. A l l the books are now lost, apart from the three s u r v i v i n g pieces by K u n g - s u n L u n g . Strengths: the correcting of names required by Confucius. Weakness: hair-sph'tting. 6. Mohists. O f the books none now survive but Mo-tzu itself. Strengths: "valuing frugality," "concern for everyone," "elevation of worth," "assisting the ghosts" (by ancestral sacrifices), "rejection of Destiny," "conforming upwards" (by "regarding the Empire from the viewpoint of a filial son"). Here approval is extended to five out of the ten Mohist doctrines. Weaknesses: some "having seen the benefits of frugality, for the sake of it reject ceremony; and they extend the idea of

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concern for everyone to the point of ignoring the distinction between k i n and stranger." 7. Verticalists and Horizontalists (advocates of a 'vertical' alliance against C h ' i n i n the West or a 'horizontal' alliance against C h ' u i n the South). The books are n o w all lost. The bibliographer judges the diplomatic practices recommended both i n practical and i n moral terms. Strength: the diplomats "weigh up the affair before deciding what is suitable, attending to their orders rather than to how they are phrased." Weakness: i n some cases "the ruler becomes deceitful and no longer keeps his word." 8. Syncretists. Of the largely syncretistic literature of the C h ' i n and early H a n the bibliographer includes only works such as the Lit Spring and Autumn and Huai-nan-tzu w h i c h he cannot fit elsewhere into his scheme. Strengths: "they combine Ju and Mohist, join School of Names with Legalist, k n o w that these belong w i t h i n the articulation of the state, perceive that everything i n royal government is interconnected." Weakness: some "are m u d d l e d and do not focus their thought anywhere." 9. Farmers' School. The books, all n o w lost, are manuals of farming, mostly of the H a n , but starting from the Utopian Shen-nung. The bibliographer classes Shen-nung w i t h the rest purely for its technical information. That he includes agriculture under the Tzu rather than the sciences shows (as does his inclusion of Verticalists and Horizontalists) that for h i m the teaching of the Tzu is not limited to what we w o u l d call philosophy; it embraces all knowledge required for the organisation of state and society. Strengths: they "sow the h u n d r e d grains, and encourage agriculture and sericulture, to provide a sufficiency of food and clothing." Weaknesses: some "see no point i n serving a sage k i n g , w i s h to make the ruler plough side by side w i t h the subject, overthrow the grading of superior and inferior." A l t h o u g h Confucianism was i n due course to detach itself from direct engagement w i t h Y i n - Y a n g cosmology, i n the Former H a n it was grateful that the terrifying gap between Heaven and m a n acknowledged by H s i i n tzu h a d at last been closed, by the Five Process correlations rooting the Five Constants (benevolence, right, ceremony, w i s d o m , trustworthiness) i n the order of a moralised Heaven and Earth. It is likely that these correlations go back to Tsou Yen himself, since Ssu-ma C h ' i e n says of his system "If you get its essential drift, it always terminates i n benevolence and right, thrift and frugality, and the dealings between ruler and subject, superior and inferior, and the Six K i n / ' A b o u t 205 B.c.the Chuang-tzu Primitivist derides correlations of the moral norms w i t h the Five Viscera, 9

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protesting that this attempt to root Confucian morality i n man's nature makes benevolence and right like webbed toes or a sixth finger, functionless flesh w h i c h it is painful to tear off. In the 1st century A . D . the full context of these correlations appears i n the White Tiger Discussions. 10

(Five Processes) (Four Seasons) (Four Directions (Five Colours) (Five Viscera) (Five Norms)

A

Wood Spring East Green Liver Benevolence

B Fire Summer South Red Heart Ceremony

Between Soil

C Metal Autumn — (Centre) West Yellow White Spleen Lungs Trustworthiness Right

D Water Winter North Black Kidneys Wisdom

A s examples of the explanations of the correlations we take the contrastive pair 'benevolence/right', the Ufe-giving kindness and stern justice w h i c h we found corresponding to spring and autumn i n the calendrical scheme of the Lii Spring and Autumn. The two seasons are unmentioned but implicit i n the parallel sequences of sentences. "Of the Five Viscera, liver is benevolent and lungs righteous, heart ceremonial and kidneys wise, spleen is trustworthy. W h y is the liver benevolent? The liver is the quintessence of w o o d . The benevolent love to give life. The East is Yang, the m y r i a d things are first coming to life. Therefore the liver resembles w o o d , is green i n colour and has branches and leaves . . . . " W h y are the lungs righteous? The lungs are the quintessence of metal. The righteous judge crime. The West too is metal, is the killing off of the myriad things. Therefore the lungs resemble metal and are white i n colour." We take leave of ancient Chinese thought at a suitably low point i n its debasement, w h e n the excesses of correlative system-building have temporarily penetrated to the heart of philosophy, and ignore the great sceptic Wang C h ' u n g ( A . D . 27-C. 100) whose time we have already reached, and all the revivals and innovations of the next 2,000 years. In the same sense i n w h i c h we can say that the directions of Western thought were set i n the A x i a l Period by Greek philosophy and Hebrew religion, the main lines of Chinese thought are already laid d o w n . 11

APPENDIX 1

A CLASSIFICATION OF CHINESE MORAL PHILOSOPHIES IN TERMS OF THE QUASI-SYLLOGISM Chinese ethical thinking starts from the spontaneity of inclination and the value of w i s d o m . We have suggested that it follows an implicit logical form approximating to the syllogism, applicable directly to concrete situations. In awareness f r o m all viewpoints, spatial, temporal and personal, of everything relevant to the issue, I find myself moved towards X ; overlooking something relevant I find myself moved towards Y. In which direction shall I let myself be moved? Be aware of everything relevant to the issue. Therefore let yourself be moved towards X . Like the standard syllogism, a form into w h i c h Chinese thinking sometimes falls i n practice, this quasi-syllogism is never identified i n Chinese proto-logic. Let us start b y clarifying our presentation of it i n Western terms. It implies that 'awareness' (which we define as the capacity to take into account i n choices) varies i n degree, is welcomed or resisted as one is pulled i n one direction or another, and i n t u r n acts on inclination. A s s u m i n g the value of w i s d o m , reactions i n awareness w i l l be better than reactions i n ignorance. Inclination i n increasing or diminishing awareness shifts 'spontaneously', i n the sense that its swings are not chosen but caused b y the changes i n awareness. Factors are 'relevant' to the extent that they do act causally on inclination; the flavours of dishes, w h i c h spontaneously arouse desire or aversion, are relevant to choosing between them, the size of the d i n i n g room is not. A commitment that one is now sufficiently aware of everything relevant (without w h i c h there could be no confident choice) raises only the same difficulties as commitment to A l l men are mortal' and is to be dealt with i n the same way, for example by appeal to Popper's criterion of sustained failure to refute. 1

2

It is assumed, most explicitly i n the Confucian concept of shu 'likening to oneself, that to the extent that you see from another person's viewpoint you are also moved f r o m it, just as f r o m another spatial or temporal viewpoint of one's o w n . I have elsewhere defended this unfamiliar assumption. Here I w i s h only to try out the proposal that the underlying logic of the quasi-syllogism, valid or invalid, establishes the problematic of Chinese philosophy i n the classical age. Translating into these terms, the ideal sage w i l l for all Chinese schools be the m a n perfectly aware f r o m all viewpoints, w i t h the spontaneous desire and the ability to benefit all by orderly government. We may see the various schools as offering a full range of answers to questions raised by the quasi-syllogism. (1) What is wisdom? (1/1) K n o w i n g h o w to correlate. We have suggested that ancient China did not share the Western assumption that analytic thinking can wholly escape dependence o n correlative. The sage, however m u c h or little he may analyse, i n the first place distinguishes, classifies, and fixes by naming; he reacts similarly to the similar, connectedly to the connected, and i n distinguishing two sides spontaneously prefers one to the other. Cosmos and community divide into superior A and inferior B, Heaven/ Earth, ruler/subject, father/son. What each i n his position i n cosmos and community w o u l d spontaneously incline to do i n perfect awareness thus follows for Confucius immediately from correctness i n n a m i n g , that is, from n a m i n g w h i c h correctly assimilates, contrasts, and connects. Until you have yourself achieved this awareness you have to control spontaneity and obey the instructions of those w h o k n o w better, but afterwards like Confucius you can "follow the heart's desire without transgressing rule." (1/2) K n o w i n g h o w to analyse. Attention shifts f r o m correlation to analysis to the extent that controversy forces the schools into pien 'argumentation'. Later M o h i s m goes so far as to b u i l d its ethic by analysis of moral concepts, to prove them to be "what the sage desires or dislikes beforehand on behalf of m e n " ; even here the assumption is that the good is what the wisest spontaneously prefer. Attention shifts to analysis also i n schools concerned w i t h questions of means, the Legalists and to some extent the Mohists. There is a tendency to lose sight of the desires w h i c h means are designed to serve, even among the Mohists, w h o reject music as useless without d e n y i n g that it is enjoyable for itself. Legalism verges on a pure system of means, w i t h the ruler himself reduced either to a means or to an arbitrary w i l l outside the system. This explains w h y Legalism could find a philosophical basis only by identifying the ruler 3

4

5

6

7

with the Taoist sage, whose illumination confirms the value of the inclinations served by the state apparatus. (1/3) Illumination, the m i r r o r i n g of the particular situation without forcing it into classifications b y n a m i n g (Taoism). Knowledge itself tends to be identified with distinguishing and naming, and rejected as inadequate to the complexity of the moment. For Taoists, as much as for Confucians, the untrained have to control their spontaneity; but y o u surrender to pure spontaneity once you have unlearned the distinctions w h i c h channel inclination into habitual desires and dislikes. (2) What is the spontaneous i n man? (2/1) For most schools, the opposites 'desire/dislike' or (as i n the 'Doctrine of the Mean'), 'being pleased with/being angry w i t h ' , 'joy/ sorrow', from w h i c h all action starts. These reactions are described from the 3rd century B.C. i n the terminology of kan 'arousal' (by external things) and ying 'response', curiously similar to the stimulation and response of Western behaviourism. (2/2) Action itself w h e n it is wu wei 'doing nothing' (Taoism). Desire and dislike spring from distinguishing and classifying; the behaviour of the sage w h o has unlearned distinctions springs directly from impulsion which is neither desire nor dislike. Chuang-tzu sometimes calls it 'impulse' or 'impulse f r o m Heaven' (fieri chi^^u )· Taoism does not however, as B u d d h i s m was later to do, wholly refrain from calling it 'desire'. A l l names being inadequate, this name too may be used and undermined by paradox, as i n the first stanza of Lao-tzu, w h i c h requires us to be "constantly without desire" yet "constantly have desire". (3) H o w does one settle on the Way, w h i c h is the course preferred i n fullest awareness? (3/1) Let inclination settle i n one direction after contemplating the situation, without posing alternatives. This is the position not only of Taoists, w h o reject considered choice, but of Confucius, w h o seems not yet to have conceived i t . (3/2) Pose alternatives and wait for inclination to settle on one of them. W i t h considered choice we meet such metaphors as weighing and the crossroads (Mohists, Yangists, Mencius, H s i i n - t z u , Legalists). (4) H o w do spontaneous desire and dislike become unselfish? (4/1) One is spontaneously unselfish to the extent that one perceives the other man's likeness to oneself (Confucian shu), or unlearns the whole distinction between self and other ( H u i Shih, Taoism), and so is moved from other viewpoints as well as from one's o w n . In terms of the quasisyllogism, to let oneself be moved unselfishly w o u l d be a causally 8

necessary condition of obeying 'Be aware f r o m all viewpoints', so that its value w o u l d follow f r o m the quasi-syllogism alone, without any need to claim that man is unselfish by nature irrespective of awareness. (4/2) H u m a n nature is good (Mencius). One grows into spontaneous unselfishness by nourishing inclination on its natural line of development, but sinks into selfishness if the growth is thwarted or starved. This doctrine, although not needed to justify moral behaviour, is important to Mencius because it reunites Heaven and m a n , assures us that i n behaving morally we are not cutting ourselves off from the cosmic order. (4/3) H u m a n nature is bad (Hsiin-tzu). The individual's natural desires conflict w i t h each other and w i t h other men's, but spontaneous unselfishness follows extension of awareness to other viewpoints as i n 4/1. Recognising that conflicting desires frustrate one another, one spontaneously desires to reconcile them; the sage successfully trains them to harmonise w i t h one another, and w i t h other men's. (5) H o w is the sage moved to act from other viewpoints? (5/1) H e is moved equally on behalf of all (Mohism). (5/2) H e prefers k i n to strangers (Confucianism). (5/3) He prefers self to others (Yangism). The preference is a matter of degree; the pure egoism of acting solely on behalf of self seems not to be represented i n the tradition. (5/4) H e responds fluidly without distinctions and classifications, and so without constant preferences (Taoism). (6) H o w does the sage bring the ignorant into harmony w i t h the wise? (6/1) H e educates the educable by the refining of custom through ceremony (Confucianism), or by teaching them to distinguish the socially beneficial from the harmful (Mohism), or by training them to unlearn distinctions (Taoism). (6/2) H e simplifies life to a degree manageable even i n relative ignorance. By reducing the range of desirable things one can have small communities of voluntarily co-operating villagers (Shen-nung, Lao-tzu, the Chuang-tzu Primitivist). (6/3) H e constricts and steers desires and dislikes by reward and punishment, and so enforces obedience to the sage ruler (Legalism). (7) What is the relation between Heaven and man, between the Way of spontaneous process w i t h i n and outside man and the Way of human morality? (7/1) They harmonise w i t h i n a universal Way. For Yin-Yang thinking, this is shown by correlating the five moral norms of m a n with the Five Processes of cosmology. 9

(7/2) They are one i n the spontaneity of h u m a n nature, w h i c h is good (Mencius). (7/3) H u m a n nature is bad; train natural inclination to goodness by following the Way proper to m a n , not the Way of Heaven (Hsiin-tzu). (7/4) M a n departs f r o m Heaven by channelling his spontaneity through self-made divisions and classifications; unlearn them and return to the course w h i c h is from Heaven (Taoism). N o thinker i n this tradition objectivises the spontaneous i n man, as morally neutral inclination to be utilised or checked in the service of ends chosen independently, by deducing from rational principles or by an Existentialist leap i n the dark. To do so w o u l d lead to a quite different problematic, that of post-Kantian philosophy i n the West. Is it a limitation of Chinese thought that it overlooked the approach w h i c h seems natural to ourselves? It may be more profitable to ask the questions from the opposite direction. H o w d i d I as a Westerner get trapped into pretending that I can fully objectivise the spontaneous i n myself, shrink myself to a point of rational Ego p u r s u i n g ends independent of m y spontaneous goals, observing unmoved even m y o w n emotions? What have I gained from following a line of thought w h i c h first detached supposedly rational ends from the goals of inclination, then failed to discover any rational grounds for them? I may indeed choose duty against present inclination, but am I not even then choosing the course w h i c h I spontaneously prefer in the perhaps rare moments w h e n I can bring myself to see clearly from other people's viewpoints?

APPENDIX 2

THE RELATION OF CHINESE THOUGHT TO THE CHINESE LANGUAGE Chinese thought before the introduction of B u d d h i s m from India is the unique instance of a philosophical tradition w h i c h , as far as our information goes, is w h o l l y independent of traditions developed i n IndoEuropean languages (Arabic philosophy descends from Greek, Tibetan from Indian). It therefore provides the ideal test case for Whorf's hypothesis that the thought of a culture is guided and constrained by the structure of its language. Classical Chinese is a language of mainly monosyllabic words, each syllable w i t h its o w n written character, organised by word-order and the placing and functions of grammatical particles. The script is not, as used to be supposed, ideographic; different monosyllabic words, however near they approach synonymity, are written w i t h different graphs, and particles like other words have their o w n graphs. The combination of graphic wealth w i t h phonetic poverty has the result that the etymology of a word and its relation to similarly sounding monosyllables is displayed i n the structure of the graph rather than of the vocable. The graph serves also to identify the same w o r d throughout different Chinese dialects (which by the test of mutual intelligibility are i n m a n y cases distinct languages) and throughout the whole history of the script. The intelligibility of Classical Chinese however pronounced has been one of the great u n i f y i n g and stabilising factors i n Chinese civilization. The script evolved i n form until standardised w i t h the unification of the Empire, and new graphs continued to be devised for words newly coined or arising from the colloquial. The language written i n it has suffered two major revolutions. Texts older than the Analects are i n varying degrees 'pre-classical'; true Classical, first documented i n the writing d o w n of Confucian and M o h i s t oral teaching, perhaps originated

in the attempt to get nearer to the spoken language already diverging from the literary and its earlier texts show marked dialect differences among themselves. The spoken language i n due course diverged again from the literary; 'modern' Chinese was already being written under the T'ang (A.D. 618-907) and Sung (A.D. 960-1279), w i t h the recorded sayings of teachers, C h ' a n and Neo-Confucian, again standing out as especially colloquial. N e i g h b o u r i n g cultures have been able to treat the graphs as ideograms, assign them readings i n their o w n languages, and i n the case of the Japanese Kambun system, a d d special signs by w h i c h a Chinese text may be read i n the different w o r d order and w i t h the w o r d terminations and particles of the Japanese language, w h i c h is structurally as different from Chinese as either is from English. The monosyllabic words i n their modern pronunciation have a very high proportion of homophones; even i n this book the reader may notice how many words are romanised as shih or chih and distinguished only by the graphs. In archaic Chinese there were many more phonetic distinctions, but one may still wonder w i t h Rosemont, whether it was possible to speak it intelligibly unless there was already considerably more of the modern compounding of monosyllables into bisyllabic words than we find i n the texts. One is also struck by the bareness of Classical compared w i t h M o d e r n Chinese, w h i c h has words regularly distinguishing definite and indefinite, and singular, a few, and more i n number, distinctions close to those of English. O n e learns w i t h increasing experience that the bareness of the written language involves little loss of information, but one may again wonder whether the same w o u l d be the case i n living speech. The philosophers teach orally, always say T have heard . . . . ' not T have read . . . . ' , theorise about names i n terms of sound, not graphs, but when they write w o u l d not necessarily include every spoken w o r d . However, such abbreviation w o u l d not affect the syntax. Classical Chinese is not like headline or telegram English i n w h i c h you can drop the main verb. The philosophising of most cultures has been i n Indo-European or Semitic languages w i t h inflections w h i c h call attention to word classes and sentence structure. Their absence i n Chinese, with its sequences of uniform and unchanging monosyllables, rendered the Chinese to a considerable extent b l i n d to the structure of their o w n language. Linguistic scholarship concentrated on lexicography; grammatical consciousness, even in late Imperial C h i n a , was nearly limited to commentators' observations w h e n for example a n o u n is being used i n a verbal sentence position ("A dead w o r d [ssu tzu ] is being used as a live word [huo tzu 1

V^T-^p ]"), or to collecting particles (hsii tzu )$_ ^f- 'empty words') and defining them i n terms of each other. We have noticed how even among the Later Mohists the distinction between a sentence and a string of names was noticed only at the very end of the movement, i n Names and Objects. Even w i t h the resources of Western linguistics it is proving very difficult to analyse Classical Chinese syntax. It was widely assumed up to the middle of the present century that Classical Chinese has no parts of speech and no grammar apart from a w o r d order rather like that of English (subject-verbobject, adjective before n o u n , but also adverb before verb, to put it naively in English terms), so you simply look u p the characters and guess, the guesses improving w i t h increasing experience. A l t h o u g h there has been much progress since, n o adequate textbook of Classical Chinese is yet available, a n d m u c h of the information is still scattered over learned journals or belongs to the unwritten lore of different centres of learning.

2

That the sequences of punctuated phrases i n Classical texts constitute genuine sentences has long been plain to readers of Japanese Kambun, the apparatus of w h i c h makes it immediately obvious that a sequence is either a verbal sentence w i t h a m a i n verb (with the words translatable by adjectives counting as verbs) or else a nominal sentence w i t h a complement followed i n Japanese b y the verb nari, the copulative 'is'. Yet the assumption that you can identify anything as the main verb or supply one of your o w n as 'understood' has been extraordinarily persistent among sinologists w h o do not read Japanese; it has a lot to do w i t h the curiously unfocussed look of the English i n so many translations from Chinese. Translators were even failing to notice that a possessive subject marks as not a sentence but a nominalised clause until well into the present century. The conviction that Chinese has no parts of speech is still not extinct. But it is by n o w coming to be recognised, not only that nominal sentence positions such as subject and object are distinguishable from verbal (most particles being classifiable as pre-verbal, pre-nominal, interverbal and so forth), but that lexicographically words can be classed as nouns and verbs b y their behaviour i n these positions. Admittedly Chinese words have a syntactic mobility w h i c h at first sight seems unrestricted. But although such verbs as chiao jf^'teach' a n d ch'iang jjjj 'strong' move freely between verbal positions ('teaches', 'is-strong') and nominal ('teaching', 'strength'), their behaviour differs from that of the nouns shih 'teacher' a n d li J] 'strength', w h i c h cannot stand i n verbal positions (one finds only yu li 'has strength') or else do so with restricted distribution and a causative function (shih 'treats as 3

teacher'). Recently C i k o s k i and Harbsmeier have taken the first steps towards classifying ergative and neutral verbs, count, generic and mass nouns.* It is characteristic of the still-backward state of the art that until Cikoski's work on verbs, first published i n 1978, nobody knew how to tell whether an objectless transitive verb is active or passive except by guessing from context. Sinology still depends heavily on the k i n d of linguistic skill w h i c h picks u p a language without bothering m u c h about grammatical analysis. This approach can be successful w i t h many kinds of text, including the p r e - H a n 'philosophers' at their simpler—but not when they are really doing what a Western philosopher might guardedly acknowledge to be relevant to his profession. Imagine an exposition of Cogito ergo sum by someone w h o thinks it a matter of context whether the verbs are 1st- or 3rd-person and is not sure whether it is a sentence or not. The understanding of the M o h i s t Canons, for example, depends so much on grammatical issues that w h e n translating them i n Later Mohist Logic, Ethics and Science I was forced to devote more than 50 pages of the introduction to the grammar. To approach Chinese philosophy trusting to the dictionaries and one's instinct for the language is to fail to take it altogether seriously, and the practice has been a perpetual drag on progress i n discovering how m u c h or little that we call philosophising is actually there. Under these circumstances it is perhaps inevitable that i n the noman's-land on the common borders of linguistics, philosophy, and sinology, among those f r o m w h o m one looks for stimulating new approaches (Rosemont, H a n s e n , Hall), most generalisations about the Chinese language start from totally obsolete assumptions. D u r i n g the 1960s and 1970s, i n the controversy over Chomsky's postulation of linguistic universals, there were people offering Classical Chinese as a counter-example ("Apart from context, it was argued, grammatical relations could not be expressed i n Chinese"), or denying its relevance on the grounds that it is not a natural language. A s recently as 1974 Henry Rosemont was arguing that Classical Chinese is an artificial language, on the basis of observations w h i c h must seem extraordinary to anyone w h o has worked on its grammar, that "it may be seriously questioned whether the written language has a syntax at a l l , " "apart from context, no Chinese character has a grammatical function," "order is not fixed i n the classical 4

* Cikoski's 'Essays' 8/128-143, and the earlier and fuller account of the verb in his unpublished thesis 'Word-classes' 54-71. For Harbsmeier, cf. p. 402 below.

language," "virtually every passage is ambiguous," "syntactically correct but semantically anomalous passages like the famous 'colorless green ideas sleep furiously' cannot be communicated i n classical Chinese."t The very recent book of H a l l and A m e s , w h i c h I have so far been mentioning with nothing but praise, throws off the most amazing generalisations: "Classical Chinese is not, as are most Western languages, grounded i n the propositional utterance. The dominance of the noun function precludes limiting meaningful statements to those possessing the sentential, subject-predicate form. The tendency of classical Chinese philosophers to be concerned w i t h the ordering of names is a consequence of the dominance of the n o u n function. The striking claim that classical Chinese doesn't depend u p o n sentences and propositions for the expression of semantic content entails the consequence that all Chinese words are names, and that c o m p o u n d terms, phrases and sentences are strings of names. This consequence, i n t u r n , requires that one appreciate the lack of interest on the part of the early Chinese i n questions of 'truth' and 'falsity'. Words, as names, may be judged appropriate or inappropriate; only propositions may, i n the true sense, be true or false." N o grammatical evidence is offered for these claims; indeed we are explicitly told that "the claims we w i s h to make about classical Chinese are themselves consequences of the broader cultural contrasts for w h i c h we have repeatedly argued throughout this w o r k . " These broader cultural contrasts are i n themselves very interesting, and i n so far as H a l l and Ames are relating them to the discourse of Confucius rather than to the language as such they are fully relevant, but what have they to do w i t h such essentially grammatical issues? To speak of Chinese sentences as 5

6

+ Rosemont, 'Abstractions' 80, 82 nl5, 83. There is little point in trying to translate a nonsensical English sentence into a dead language with a largely unexplored grammar, but I cannot imagine any version of Chomsky's famous sentence which would be syntactically ambiguous. Taking lu yi

-%sT

for 'green ideas', wu se J * £ . jjj^ ('have-not colour') could not be subordinated to it without the particle chih

. Since chih is the particle of subordination inside a nominal combination, this would establish wu

se chih lu yi ('green ideas which have no colour") as a noun phrase. I fowever one deals with 'sleep furiously' the phrase will occupy the main verbal position, nu

Cbe-furious') and wo U^. (the usual pre-Han

word for'sleep') are verbs, and the two could hardly be juxtaposed without an inter-verbal particle such as erh

rrrj .

Wu se chih lit yi nu erh wo ('Green ideas which have no colour sleep raging') would be an odd-

looking sentence, and could no doubt be improved on, but there is no obscurity in its syntax. That few Chinese could be induced to play this game (any more than English speakers who are not highly conscious of grammar) goes without saying.

'strings of names' is to revert to the grammatical knowledge of the ancient Chinese themselves (and not quite catching up w i t h Names and Objects).** Grammatically the n o u n , far from being dominant i n function, seems to be less so i n Classical Chinese than i n Indo-European languages. IndoEuropean adjectives, i n languages w h i c h inflect them, are declined like nouns, even i n English require w h e n predicated the copula like nouns, and indeed i n one terminology are grouped w i t h substantives as nouns; the corresponding words i n Chinese share the pre-verbal particles and take the m a i n verbal position without the final particle yen which generally concludes a nominal sentence. Indo-European adjectives and verbs cannot stand i n syntactically nominal positions except i n nominalised forms w h i c h easily assimilate to concrete nouns to breed hypostatised entities; the corresponding Chinese words stand unaltered i n nominal positions. Moreover, the Indo-European sentence is nouncentred i n that the m a i n verb has to be predicated of a n o u n , its subject, from w h i c h it takes person and number; i n the Classical Chinese verbal sentence the subject is an optional element a n d the m i n i m a l form is the verb by itself. One might also ask why, even if they insist o n discussing the issue i n such general terms, H a l l and A m e s do not draw the opposite conclusion, that the verb is dominant, f r o m their attractive thesis that Chinese thinking assumes a 'process' rather than a 'substance' ontology. Hansen, from w h o m they take the idea of the dominance of the noun, treats it as inseparable from a substance ontology. H a l l and A m e s seem i n the quoted passage to imply that a Chinese sequence cannot be a sentence or a propositional utterance expressing a truth unless it has subject-predicate form. O n this Aristotelian principle one would have to agree that no truths were ever spoken i n C h i n a , for even a verbal sentence w i t h a subject is not conveniently analysed i n subject-predicate form. But surely for modern logic propositions require this form only w h e n quantified. 'It is raining' is just as m u c h true or false as A H men are mortal', although it has no logical subject, only the d u m m y 'it' supplied i n English to establish the person and number of the verb. Ridding oneself of the subject-predicate presupposition may itself be claimed as one advantage of an education i n Chinese w h i c h H a l l and Ames seem to have missed. Take the sentence w i t h w h i c h i n a Chuang-tzu story Lieh-tzu reports to his teacher after being sent to catch a m a n w h o is running away: Yi mieh yi fL >J^, ^ "(He) has vanished" 7

8

** Hansen, 'Truth' 517, has an appendix rejecting my claim that Names and Objects discovers the sentence, but without criticising or even mentioning my case for it (summarised pp. 153-55 above).

(Ergative verb mieh 'is-extinguished' preceded by the pre-verbal particle yi 'already' reinforced b y the perfective final particle yi limited to verbal sentences). It w o u l d be artificial to insist that mieh is predicated of an implicit subject; the agent is understood only i n the same sense as is the time and place of the event. This is none the less a sentence with a main verb; and what it says is true or false, to be accepted if the m a n has indeed disappeared but not if he is still present. W i t h this example we touch on a crucial issue, i n what sense the ancient Chinese display what H a l l and A m e s describe as a "lack of interest . . . i n questions of 'truth' and 'falsity'." It is a commonplace, repeated more than once i n the present book, that Chinese philosophising centres on the Way rather than on Truth. But we must insist i n the first place that this difference from our o w n tradition has nothing to do w i t h everyday questions of fact. Neither Western nor Chinese philosophy is concerned primarily w i t h factual issues; to the extent that they are, as i n Mohist argument for the existence of spirits, there is no significant difference from ourselves. If your wife announces 'Dinner is o n the table', or the corresponding words i n any language, you are disappointed if the dinner turns out to be still i n the oven; a language without sentences i n w h i c h it is impossible to affirm a fact w o u l d lack the communicative function without which it could not serve as a language. However much or little the words used to assent (Chinese jan 'so', yu 'there is', hsin 'trustworthy' and so forth) resemble or differ f r o m English 'true', one assents if and only if dinner is o n the table. H a n s e n has argued that even i n the Mohist discussion of spirits the question is not whether it is true that they exist but whether it is socially appropriate i n distinguishing the existing from the non-existent to put the spirits on one side or the other. But the issue being purely factual (whether spirits exist, are conscious, appear before men's eyes, reward the good and p u n i s h the wicked) w i t h the second of the three Mohist tests being a direct appeal to reports of seeing and hearing spirits, what w o u l d this difference amount to? H a n s e n objects that the other two Mohist tests, the authority of sages and the social consequences, are not for you and me relevant to truth, so truth is not what the M o h i s t is after. But even i n the modern West only the logically sophisticated fully succeed in detaching questions of truth from appeals to authority and to social benefit. We noticed that the three M o h i s t tests are very like those assumed in popular discussions of the existence of G o d . Moreover if the existence of spirits raised for Chinese only the question whether it is socially appropriate to affirm it, h o w was it ever possible to doubt it, since no one denied the social duty of sacrificing to spirits? Mohists reproach C o n f u 9

10

cians for both requiring sacrifice to the spirits and denying their existence. The common formula posing alternatives, 'If the dead have knowledge . . . . If the dead lack knowledge . . . . ' , w h i c h appears i n several of our quotations, implies that even outside philosophical circles the question was widely regarded as open, however socially appropriate it might be to behave as though the dead are conscious. Indeed Westerners have often been surprised b y the Chinese capacity to combine scepticism w i t h orthodox practice; the attitude of the philosophers to divination provides other examples. But does the Chinese confirming that, as his wife said, his dinner is on the table, necessarily have the concept of Truth? Let us say that to have the concept implies having a w o r d the meanings of w h i c h have the same range of family resemblances as 'true'. We use the w o r d 'true' i n the first place of such matters as whether the money, as you told me, is already i n the bank. Outside such factual issues, o n w h i c h we confront the Chinese and everyone else as inhabitants of the same w o r l d , we speak of the logical truth of tautologies, of the truth to life or nature of a fictitious narrative, of metaphysical truths, of the moral truths i n the Sermon on the M o u n t , extending the w o r d along chains of similarities l i n k i n g to the factual. Finally 'true' comes to be not m u c h more than the w o r d by w h i c h we assent to any k i n d of utterance to w h i c h we attach a certain importance. Such words asjan, yu and hsin w o u l d not be expected to, and do not, have the same metaphorical spread as 'true'. Even if one of them d i d approximate to it we should have to dismiss the correspondence as an amusing coincidence. To say that Chinese philosophers display a "lack of interest i n questions of truth and falsity" amounts then to saying that like Western they are not primarily concerned w i t h the factual, but unlike Western they do not use a w o r d w h i c h assimilates other questions to the factual. That they w o u l d have no concept of Truth is to be taken for granted, but is trivial. The game of demonstrating that some important concept of ours ('morality', 'ethics', 'rights', 'philosophy', 'civilization', 'science', 'art', what y o u will) is missing i n Chinese thought, although still popular, is quite pointless, since it can be played w i t h any philosophical term one chooses, a n d not only w i t h philosophical; i n that yang j ^ . embraces the goat ('mountain yang') as well as the sheep, the Chinese have no concept of sheep. O n e explores Chinese philosophy by comparing and contrasting Western a n d Chinese concepts. Even w h e n one fails to notice distinctions they may be expected to emerge if one finds it profitable to push analysis farther. H a l l a n d A m e s discuss also, together w i t h the supposed paucity of 11

12

13

entification i n Chinese w h i c h we shall consider shortly, a new proposal originally offered for modern Chinese by A l f r e d Bloom. "Another important characteristic of classical Chinese for our present concerns is the relative unimportance of the sorts of locutions termed 'counterfactuals'. Thus statements such as 'had it not been the case t h a t . . . so-and-so w o u l d have occurred' are not efficaciously present i n Chinese philosophy. "The relative absence of both a language of entification and of condition-contrary-to-fact expressions suggests that the classical Chinese would have found scientific and ethical reflections and deliberations unappealing. Both abstract nouns and conditionals are foundations of the sort of theoretical thinking w h i c h permits one's thoughts and attitudes to be detached f r o m the manner i n w h i c h one actively presents himself to the world. Theoretical t h i n k i n g presupposes that one can be objective and dispassionate i n the consideration of the differential consequences of alternative possibilities. The 'either-or' sensibility underlies the dominant modes of ethical and scientific t h i n k i n g . " A s a general reflection this is not without interest. One conclusion drawn is that "whereas Confucius presents a 'way without [ethical] crossroads', his reason for d o i n g so is embedded i n the character of the language he employs." That his apparent aversion to posing alternatives connects w i t h his presumed disinclination to use counterfactuals is not implausible, although one cannot resist noting that Confucius never sounds more himself than w h e n saying "If K u a n knew ceremony who doesn't k n o w ceremony?", or on another occasion i n a friendlier spirit of the same m a n , "If there had been no K u a n C h u n g we should be wearing our hair u n b o u n d and robes folded to the left". The trouble is that the unimportance of counterfactuals is presented as general throughout "classical Chinese p h i l o s o p h y " and "characteristic of Classical Chinese", that is, of the language itself. A s admitted i n a footnote, Bloom's case, based i n any case on modern Chinese, has already been damagingly criticised.* Classical Chinese has, among other ' i f words w i t h different 14

15

* Hall and Ames 364 n29. Cf. the review articles on Bloom by Wu Kuang-ming op. cit. and Fang Wanchuan op. cit. It is characteristic of the dangerous failure of communication between philosophical and grammatical specialists in Chinese studies that Hall and Ames do not mention the section entitled 'Counterfactual shih

' in Harbsmeier, Aspects 272-287, which attacks in detail the same questions

about the Chinese which they raise only in the most general terms: "Could they unambiguously articulate a counterfactual proposition? What sorts of counterfactual arguments did they use? And what did they use them for?" (Harbsmeier ut sup. 272f).

and still imperfectly analysed functions, a very common counterfactual shih ^ 'supposing that', often reinforced by chia -fpx 'falsely, pretending', w i t h a whole family of alternative phrases, not to mention the rather rare negative zoei 'if there were not', and the phrases of the type chin yu jen yu tz'u ^ X. jfc j i t ' N o w here we have a m a n w h o . . . . ' w h i c h regularly introduce imaginary examples. H a l l and A m e s therefore insist only on "the infrequent resort to such locutions i n Chinese philosophical argument". But philosophical argument starts only after Confucius and teems w i t h these locutions. We have seen that the argument of the type 'If I gave you a cap i n exchange for cutting off your head . . . . ' is an established convention of Yangist, M o h i s t , and Mencian disputation, that an essay of K u n g - s u n L u n g ends w i t h a whole string of counterfactuals, that there is even a n instance of hypothetical measurements of the universe starting off f r o m a number introduced counterfactually. The "way without a crossroads" ended w i t h Confucius; "ethical deliberation" and the image of the crossroads itself appeared w i t h the first rival schools. The 'either-or' sensibility awakens w i t h M o - t z u , pien 'argumentation' being essentially arguing out w h i c h of two alternatives is X and w h i c h is not. It may be admitted that w h e n philosophical argument dies d o w n China does show that aversion from the 'either-or' sensibility implied by Hall and Ames's general thesis (that C h i n a demands not the transcendence of A but its superiority to and interdependence w i t h B). The final tendency of the schools was towards syncretism; philosophers settle for T see the whole thing, you are one-sided' rather than T am right, you are w r o n g ' . But to say that "the deemphasis u p o n scientific and ethical reasoning of the sort most closely associated w i t h Western philosophy is intrinsically related to the relative absence of counterfactuals i n the classical Chinese p h i l o s o p h y " surely lacks all explanatory value. Given the richness of counterfactual resources i n the language itself, their presumed unimportance i n philosophical discourse w o u l d i n any case have to be the effect rather than the cause of any "deemphasis upon scientific and ethical reasoning." 16

17

18

19

20

21

In linking entification w i t h counterfactuals, H a l l and A m e s , again following Bloom, renew the traditional claim that the absence i n Chinese of morphological means of distinguishing the n o u n 'goodness' from the adjective 'good' or, as an example of a technical coinage, 'analyticity' from 'analytic', hinders the formation of abstract concepts. This does seem to me to be still an interesting and h i g h l y debatable question; but w h y is the claim always t h r o w n off as a generalisation without offering anything concrete for debate? A s w i t h such words as 'evil' w h i c h lack such

conveniences i n E n g l i s h , i n Chinese one identifies the word as nominal only b y putting it i n a syntactically nominal p o s i t i o n . However, i n English this does not interfere w i t h talking i n abstract terms about the 'problem of evil', 'nature of evil', 'conflict between good and evil'. To get the full hypostatising, not to say personifying effect, one perhaps needs a capital letter, ' E v i l ' , but is that a logical as distinct from a poetic or religious advantage? Let us take the w o r d hsiao 'filial piety'. In a verbal sentence this w i l l generally be i n a verbal position, where we may represent it by 'isfilial'. We shall italicise our equivalents for Chinese particles, such as tse '(if). . . then . . . .' and give them their English sentence-positions: 26

An. 2/20

If

Hsiao

tz'u

#

, i

tse

is-filial is-compassionate

chung

m

&

then

is-loyal

("If you are filial and compassionate you w i l l be loyal") In a nominal sentence (in w h i c h we represent the final particle yeh by 'is'), hsiao becomes 'being-filial', as i n the Later M o h i s t definition. Canon A13

Hsiao

—

# Being-filial

is

li

ch'in

yeh

#J

JL

4L

benefiting

parent

("Filial piety is benefiting parents"). In nominal sentences then Chinese syntax does not hinder treating hsiao as a concept, although it does interfere w i t h thinking of filial piety as somehow different f r o m children being filial, for example as the Platonic form of their behaviour. Here Chinese syntax shows the side of it w h i c h has a pleasing resemblance to symbolic logic, i n w h i c h y o u move the symbols around without having to manipulate parts of speech. But what of verbal sentences where hsiao stands i n a nominal position? There, w h e n lacking a possessive subject (X chih hsiao 'X's being filial'), it w i l l generally turn into 'the filial', the person w h o is filial, no longer the concept. The issue then reduces itself to whether it would be a restriction to the handling of abstract concepts not to be able to use them freely with verbs. In verbal sentences hsiao is used rarely of the concept except as object of a limited range of verbs, for example

An. 2/7

Tzu-yu

wen

hsiao

M Tzu-yu

ask-about

# being-filial

("Tzu-yu asked about filial piety"). Sometimes a w o r d i n changing position changes sense and becomes recognised as a n e w w o r d , distinguished b y phonetic and/or graphic differentiation. Thus i n nominal positions the verbs sheng 'be born, live' a n d ch'eng ]^ 'become whole' diverge into hsing ifjj: 'nature' a n d ch'eng 'integrity', while themselves remaining 'life' a n d 'becoming whole' i n a n o m i n a l p o s i t i o n . O f these hsing is classifiable lexicographically as a n o u n , i n that it cannot be freely used i n a verbal position. Later graphic standardisation perhaps eliminated many cases of concept-formation w h i c h failed to take root, like the Later-Mohist trifurcation of chih -fax ' k n o w ' into ' w i t / w o t / w i s e ' . The new word if a noun becomes assimilable to concrete nouns, opening the prospect of hypostatisation. This however happens only w i t h a change of sense. It cannot happen, for example, i n the m a n y cases where Chinese nominalises pairs of opposites, saying ta hsiao js^'h 'being big or small' and ch'ang tuan -rli^g. 'being long or short' where we w o u l d say 'size' and ' l e n g t h ' , or yu wu .at 'there b e i n g or not b e i n g ' , jan pu jan 7- ,4* 'being so or not so', shih fei ^ ^ 'being or not being this', i n the sort of contexts where we w o u l d be talking about being or truth. In an Indo-European language o n the other hand, nominalised forms being obligatory i n nominal positions, the prospect opens for a l l verbs a n d adjectives w i t h or without change of sense. Thus having fixed the concept of being true by the n o u n 'truth' we have the opportunity for unlimited variations, 'truth w i l l prevail', 'unveil the naked truth', 'flies i n the face of truth'. But are these metaphorical luxuries a logical advantage? We have touched briefly on the question whether 'meaning' and the 'signified' have not involved Western thought i n excesses of hypostatisation avoided by Chinese w i t h its verb chih 'point o u t ' . A l t h o u g h the question is a complicated one w h i c h I leave open, it may be suggested that Western philosophers w h o are behaving themselves do not take advantage of the liberty to use these nominal formations except w i t h a limited range of verbs w h i c h cluster round the copulative 'is'. To take at random the first four sections of Quine's paper 'Two Dogmas of E m p i r i c i s m ' , w h i c h are on 'analyticity', he never uses this word as subject of a verb, and otherwise 23

24

25

26

only w i t h such verbs as 'is', 'explain', 'assume', 'presuppose', 'derive', 'define', 'clarify', 'equate w i t h ' , 'take as', 'recognise'. Here there does seem to be something different about thinking i n Chinese, especially interesting i n that it may be seen either as the limitation of having to think concretely or as the virtue of avoiding hypostatisation. I think also that the thesis of C h a d Hansen that Chinese nouns resemble the mass rather than the count nouns of Indo-European languages has been a genuine forward step i n the understanding of Chinese thought, although I no longer as formerly find it persuasive. This treatment of nouns is most plausible for languages w h i c h regularly supplement numerals w i t h sortals, including modern but not Classical Chinese. In modern Chinese one counts m u c h as one counts cattle i n English: yi ko jen — I® A . 'one head of man' (one man), yi chung jen •— A.' breed of m a n ' (one k i n d of man), both formally indistinguishable from yi pei shui — fa /Jc 'one cup of water'. One might say that the sortals assimilate count to mass nouns, while our o w n number terminations do the reverse. It is not immediately obvious that this observation is relevant to Classical Chinese, w h i c h has neither the grammatical number of Indo-European count nouns nor the regular sortals of modern Chinese. However, the postulate that Classical nouns do approximate to mass rather than count nouns inspired Hansen to an insight from w h i c h we have profited i n the present book, that the tendency of Chinese thought is to divide d o w n rather than to add up, to think i n terms of whole/part rather than class/member. "The m i n d is not regarded as an internal picturing mechanism w h i c h represents the individual objects i n the world, but as a faculty that discriminates the boundaries of the substances or stuffs referred to by names. This 'cutting u p things' view contrasts strongly w i t h the traditional Platonic philosophical picture of objects w h i c h are understood as i n d i v i d u a l s or p a r t i c u l a r s w h i c h instantiate or 'have' properties (universals)". o n e

27

H a l l and A m e s , replacing Hansen's 'substance' b y a 'process' ontology, prefer to speak of 'field/focus' rather than 'whole/part'. But they adopt enthusiastically his claim that Classical Chinese does not have count nouns a n d draw the most radical conclusions, that i n the absence of classes of particulars to be picked out by index words language will be non-referential, "no ontological referencing serves to discipline the act of naming," "there is no object language i n the strict sense," "names 'reference' functions or roles w h i c h are themselves other names," "there

can be neither connotative nor denotative definition i n the strict sense." One is left wondering h o w it w o u l d be possible to write a historical narrative i n Chinese, a n d h o w a filial Confucian identifies his o w n father. A l l this is supposed to follow f r o m the absence of count nouns. But can we simply take the mass-noun hypothesis for granted, without the criteria on w h i c h the claim might be made of modern Chinese? -(Not that any such consequences w o u l d follow for modern Chinese!) Christoph Harbsmeier has pointed out to me i n correspondence that if we look for such grammatical tests it turns out that they differentiate types of n o u n i n Classical Chinese. H e suggests a three-fold classification:* (1) Mass nouns, w i t h numeral and sortal as i n modern Chinese (yi pei shui 'one cup of water'). (2) C o u n t nouns w i t h preceding numeral (erh ma — 'two horses'), or w i t h numeral and sortal after the n o u n (ma erh p'i 'horse, two head'). Counting being of individuals can be i n only one way. (3) Generic nouns, also w i t h preceding numeral, but counting kinds; these being variously divisible are also variously countable. Thus although ma 'horse' is a count n o u n , shou 'animal' and ch'u 'domestic animal' are generic (pai shou Hf 'the h u n d r e d kinds of animal', liu ch'u i | " 'the six kinds of domestic animal'). This classification, although not necessarily the final one w h i c h Harbsmeier w i l l commit himself to publishing, is already enough to show that the mass-noun hypothesis is no longer tenable, at least i n its original form. It is characteristic of the slow progress of Chinese grammar that it has taken the stimulus of Hansen's proposal to awaken us to these distinctions. But one may notice that the insight of Hansen w h i c h seemed especially valuable survives the upheaval. Most philosophical terms w h i c h allow counting at all, such as Tao 'Way', li 'pattern', ch'i 'air, breath', wu 'thing', w o u l d seem by this classification to be generic nouns. Thus Chinese thinkers refer indifferently to 'the one ch'i' (yi ch'i), to Y i n and Yang as 'the two ch'i' (erh ch'i), to sunshine, shade, w i n d , rain, light and dark as 'the six ch'i' (liu ch'i). It remains acceptable that Western philosophising i n languages w i t h number termination starts from the adding u p of particulars, leading at two of its limits to the reduction of cosmos and community to aggregates of atoms and of individual persons, while the Chinese operating w i t h generic nouns think i n terms of variously divisible Way, pattern, ch'i, a n d k i n d of thing. 28

* "The mass-noun hypothesis', to appear in Rosemont, Chinese Texts.

A n old thought about the Chinese language is that the absence of tense and number terminations w o u l d hinder logic. Like other such thoughts (no sentences, words all like nouns), it springs from the Westerner's reactions w h e n first confronted w i t h columns of supposed ideograms and wondering h o w they can represent a language at all. H o w well does this first impression stand u p to further experience? A s far as the utility of the distinctions is concerned, one soon learns that, for example, the occasional placing of a temporal particle is quite enough to clarify the time relations between events; one does not have to be reminded by the tense of the verb i n every narrative sentence of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire that the events occurred i n the past. N o r is it especially useful to k n o w whether there is one of a thing or between two and infinity; even i n English we do not say ' M e n went out of the room' but 'Two m e n . . . . ' , 'Some m e n . . . . ' . Waley explained several of the Chinese sophisms as resulting f r o m confusion between singular and plural or past and present, also between identity and class membership. A l t h o u g h none of his proposals is any longer tenable —indeed, they are no longer credible as the sort of mistake a Chinese thinker w o u l d make—Waley deserves credit for descending from the plane of h i g h abstraction on w h i c h these issues are generally discussed to come to grips w i t h particular cases. 29

30

However, although the distinctions made by Indo-European terminations are not of much use i n themselves (gender i n languages w h i c h mark it is frankly irrational, the English tense system is largely detached from time relations), it remains hard to shake off one's general impression that the necessity i n every sentence of i m p o s i n g the distinctions and keeping to them consistently w o u l d be a stimulus to logical thinking. In IndoEuropean languages learning to speak and write grammatically is to some extent a logical exercise, an education i n the ancient languages more highly inflected than one's o w n has traditionally been defended as a training of the m i n d , and the history of logic has been tied up with the history of grammar. The point is not that our languages are inherently more logical than Chinese. Classical Chinese, w i t h its unchanging words organised by syntax alone, has a beautifully logical structure, warped by idiom of course, but perhaps nearer to symbolic logic than any other language. But logic as a discipline w i l l develop only w i t h consciousness of thinking illogically. Is it perhaps that Indo-European languages, w h i c h force thought into a straitjacket, i m p o s i n g a subject, number, tense even when logically there should be none (in English we talk by such implicit rules-of-thumb as ' W h e n i n doubt put "It" for subject and use the present tense'), by their very irrationalities remind us of what rationality is? In

Classical Chinese on the other hand nothing compels the thinker to raise logical questions; unconscious of his o w n grammar, free to be vague or to clarify w i t h further particles as occasion arises, he seems to look out on the world through language as a perfectly transparent medium. H o w logically the Chinese think must therefore always be ascribed to extra-linguistic causes—above all, as the present book illustrates throughout, the extent of controversy between rival schools. The language itself tightens with the need for clear t h i n k i n g , as was the case w i t h English w h e n it replaced Latin as the m e d i u m for an Englishman's serious thoughts. The most striking illustration is the M o h i s t Canons, w h i c h consistently use only one particle for one function, a n d the same word i n the same sense i n syntactically regular sentences w h i c h sometimes defy current i d i o m — plainly the result of a deliberate decision, like the cleaning up of English in the 17th century by the Royal Society. Following this line of thought, one w o u l d expect that a training i n Classical Chinese style w o u l d be an education primarily i n sensitivity to similarities and differences, and so i n correlative rather than analytic thinking. The parallelism so noticeable i n Chinese style is not mere decoration but an indispensable a i d to syntax. G i v e n a language i n w h i c h sentences are structured by word-order, and not only can verbs stand i n nominal positions but nouns have causative and putative uses i n which they stand i n verbal positions, a sentence or clause of any length w i l l be structurally ambiguous unless clarified either by particles or by parallelism w i t h another similar i n structure. H s i i n - t z u and H a n Fei, for example, exploit the resources of both syntax and parallelism to b u i l d long and complex sentences. O n the other h a n d a poet or a Yin-Yang thinker, being primarily interested i n correlation, tends to dispense w i t h particles and rely on parallelism alone. The choice between these alternatives w i t h the rise or the w a n i n g of intellectual controversy returns i n later periods. Thus H a n Y i i (A.D. 768-824), the initiator of the Confucian revival w h i c h took the offensive against B u d d h i s m and Taoism and led to the NeoConfucianism of the S u n g , was also the rebel against the 'Parallel Prose' dominant for some centuries and founder of the 'Ancient Prose' movement w h i c h took its stylistic models f r o m such early Confucians as Mencius. A s an example of parallelism removing the need for particles we may take the m a i n clauses of two parallel sentences i n Huai-nan-tzu. "The clear being luminous, i n the water i n a cup you see the p u p i l of the eye. The m u d d y being dark, i n the water of the River you do not see Mount T'ai." The syntax of the m a i n clauses is established by w o r d order alone; 31

32

dependent words (which we bracket) precede what they depend o n , the subjectless verb precedes the object, and there is a n exposed element i n front. Exposed

Verb

Object

(Pei) shui

chien

mou-tzu

(He) shui (Cup) water (River) water

9tT

T'ai-shan see (not) see

pupil-of-eye M o u n t T'ai

("In the water i n a cup you see the p u p i l of the eye. . . . In the water of the River you do not see M o u n t T'ai.") H o w does the exposed element relate to verb and object? Solely by the proportional oppositions between the two clauses, w h i c h we may analyse in the same terminology w e used i n coming to grips w i t h Yin-Yang thinking; the vertical relations are paradigmatic, the horizontal syntagmatic. (1) Paradigmatic. The water i n a cup compares w i t h the water of the River as the p u p i l w i t h M o u n t T'ai (as minute by contrast). (2) Syntagmatic. The water i n a cup connects w i t h seeing the pupil as the water of the River w i t h seeing M o u n t T'ai (as contiguous w i t h the seen, what one sees it in). The first proportional opposition functions alike i n English and i n Chinese; it w o u l d be pointless to expand the translation to say explicitly " . . . you see even something as small as a p u p i l . . . you do not see even something as big as M o u n t T'ai." A sentence i n English as i n Chinese floats on a sea of unformulated similarities and contrasts; one correlates first and analyses afterwards. In the second case however the difference between the priorities for the two languages emerges, w i t h English making the nature of the contiguity explicit by the preposition ' i n ' ("In the water i n a cup . . . . "). Differently organised Chinese sentences unsupported by parallelism w o u l d likewise have to clarify the contiguity b y the prenominal particle yii jfc translatable i n such contexts b y ' i n ' . In this section I have been d o i n g m y best to discredit the persisting 33

habit of generalising about Classical Chinese from antiquated assumptions and without reference to its grammar. The book of H a l l and A m e s , i n many respects admirable, w h i c h opens u p possibilities of interaction with contemporary philosophy w h i c h I heartily welcome, has unfortunately presented itself as the m a i n target, providing both the most recent and the most extreme example. Back i n 1959, following Waley's precedent i n examining particular cases, I published a paper on the implications for comparative philosophy of the differences between Indo-European 'to be' and corresponding words a n d constructions i n Chinese. A t that time I was naive enough to expect that w i t h the appearance of one grammatically grounded study speculation without reference to the facts of the language would be recognised as obsolete. Clearly the hope was premature. But a claim that, for example, there are no sentences i n English, offered without even an alternative account of the grammatical differences between the socalled 'sentence' and the nominalised clause, w o u l d be meaningless; w h y is the claim supposed to be meaningful if the language is Chinese? I conclude by summarising for the general reader three detailed studies, to w h i c h specialists are referred for the full development of the arguments.*

Being The dependence of Western ontology on the pecularities of the IndoEuropean verb 'to be' is evident to anyone w h o observes from the vantage point of languages outside the Indo-European family. It is unusual for a language to use its existential verb also as copula, and far from universal to use the copula not only w i t h nouns ('Socrates is a man') but with adjectives ('Socrates is mortal'). In other language families the existential verb tends to overlap our 'have' rather than copulative 'be'; for the latter, there may be another verb, or there may be the nominal sentence with simple juxtaposition ('X Y') or w i t h pronoun resuming the subject ('X, this Y') or w i t h a particle (Classical Chinese ' X Y yeh'). A s for the adjective, it needs no copula i n languages w h i c h like Chinese class it not w i t h the noun but w i t h the verb. O u r 'be' may be seen as no more than an existential verb adapted as a stop-gap w o r d to satisfy a rule (not universal * 'Being in Philosophy and Linguistics' (on Greek, Arabic and Latin),' "Being" in Western Philosophy Compared with shihlfei and yulwu in Chinese Philosophy' (rewritten for non-sinologists as '"Being" in Classical Chinese'). 'Relating categories to question forms in pre-Han Chinese thought' (G Studies 360-411). For 'Being' in Greek and Arabic cf. the specialist studies of Kahn and of Shehadi.

even among Indo-European languages) that the sentence requires a m a i n verb. The existential/copulative distinction is reflected i n the ontological contrast between existence and essence. Historically, this pair of concepts emerged first i n Arabic philosophy, d u r i n g the stage w h e n the Western tradition was passing f r o m one Indo-European language (Greek) to another (Mediaeval Latin) through the m e d i u m of Semitic languages, Syriac, Arabic, and Hebrew. Greek philosophers, w i t h the notable exception of Aristotle, confused the existential verb w i t h the copula. Greek ousia, a n o u n derived from einai 'be', is still substance (what there is) as well as essence (what it is i n itself); even Aristotle, although translators resort to 'essence' and 'existence' to clarify h i m i n English, formulates the distinction not by technical terms but by cumbersome phrasings w i t h einai ("whether or not it simply is, not whether it is white or not", or "the ousia being not this or that but simply, or not simply but i n itself or accidentally"). The Arabs, philosophising i n a Semitic language w h i c h deals w i t h the existential and the copulative by different words and constructions, h a d to develop a new terminology centred on wujud 'existence' and mahiyyah ' q u i d d i t y ' . Simply by the m e d i u m of otherwise very literal translations into Arabic, Aristotle was transformed into a thinker w h o speaks sometimes of existence, sometimes of quiddity, never about being; and a new ontology emerged i n w h i c h existence does not belong to the quiddity of anything except the single necessary existent, G o d , w h o according to Ibn Slna (Avicenna, 980-1037) creates by adding existence to the quiddities of things. Latin translators from Arabic coined quidditas for mahiyyah but also reserved for it essentia (a derivative of esse "be' originally coined as a general equivalent of Greek ousia), while using esse itself for wujud; the difference was further clarified as the verb existere emerged to distinguish the latter. Consequently, for the Scholastics the essence and existence imported from the Arabs became incorporated into the Being inherited f r o m the Greeks, even i n the Latin translations of the Arabic philosophers themselves. A verb 'be' combining the two functions is unstable even i n IndoEuropean languages. In Greek, einai is primarily existential, and the nominal sentence without copula is common; i n modern languages on the other hand English 'be' and French etre are copulae, superseded for existence by 'there is' and ilya. A philosopher may archaise English to say T think, therefore I a m ' , but even a philosopher's English cannot stretch 'be' to cover all uses of einai and esse. One cannot, for example, replace 34

'There is no life on M a r s ' or 'Life does not exist on Mars' by 'Life is not on Mars', where the 'is' w o u l d be understood as the copula. Being has vanished altogether i n symbolic logic, w h i c h has distinct signs for the existential quantifier and for several copulae (for identity, class membership, class inclusion). The abstract n o u n 'being' remains of course as freely manipulable i n philosophical discourse as any other noun; but one may well ask i n what sense Western thinkers, however confidently they may talk of Being, may still be said to retain a concept w h i c h no longer has a place i n either their natural or their artificial languages.

Chinese concepts comparable with Being A s w i t h the concept of Truth, we refuse to play the pointless game of seeking a n d failing to find the concept of Being i n Chinese thought; instead we look for the relevant concepts w i t h w h i c h to compare it. Chinese philosophical discourse has three relevant verbs or pairs of verbs which can stand freely i n nominal positions. (1) Jan 'is-so', w i t h an opposite usable i n some contexts, fou -2? 'isnot-so'. Nominalised/an ('being-so') covers only verbal concepts; but since these cover everything we express adjectivally, Chinese pat 'is-white'is something 'so' of a horse, while for us 'white' is something the horse is. (2) Shih 'is-this', opposite fei 'is-not'. Shih unverbalised is a resumptive pronoun 'this' (the aforesaid, the one i n question). This pair apply i n the first place to nominal sentences, w h i c h have the final particle yeh without a copulative verb, but are negated by the copulative verb fei 'isnot' w i t h or without yeh. (We continue to italicise and displace the English equivalents of particles.)

6 Pai White

$)

&

^ yeh

ma

—

ma

horse

is

horse

—

( A White horse is a horse')

6

#

Mj C ^

Pai

ma

fei

ma(yeh)

White

horse

is-not

horse

( A white horse is not a horse')

)

In the corresponding uses shih is the unverbalised pronoun. X

—

shih

X

is

X

fei

X

is-not

yeh

this

— yeh —

There is however a complication w h i c h explains w h y all men 'argumentation' is conceived as debate over alternatives judged by verbalised shih and fei. Both yeh and fei may also be attached to whole sentences (with fei immediately preceding the verb), turning them into judgments between alternatives without nominalising them. Thus a k i n g asked by Mencius why, when moved to pity b y a n ox about to be sacrificed, he h a d substituted a sheep equally deserving of pity, says i n his reply: MelA/7

4

#

—

Wo

fei

t

Is-not

I

ai

^

It

ch'i

ts'ai

erh

^


('come-out') yu X come out from X ju \^ ('go-in') go into X li SL ('stand') stand i n X ta A . ('be-big') be bigger than X shang ^ ('suffer-wound') be wounded by X Questions asked of Units 3a or 3b: wu-hu ^ , or an 4 r or, yen ^ (preverbal), 'whence, whither, where?'. Cz 14/45 (of the Way) Units 2 -J-

&

Exclamatory final

3a

3b

particle

*

^ -

^

2 4-

3a &

3b =^

Tzu (wu-hu) ch'iu chih tsai . . . . Wo ch'iu chih You (where?) seek it ! .... I seek it * For a general account of the ergative verb, cf. Lyons 351f.

3c JL

yu in

*fc

tu shu measure number

You (where?) seek it! . . . . I seek it i n measure number (" 'Where do you seek i t ? ' . . . . T seek it i n measures and numbers'") One might take the category as Aristotle's relation, w i t h place losing its categorial status a n d reduced to one relation. But Aristotle's first six categories are immobilised b y detachment from any verb except 'is'; he asks the 'where (pou)' of 'Where is it?', not the 'whence (pothen)?' and 'whither (poi)T w h i c h require other verbs. The Chinese preoccupation o n the other h a n d is w i t h the direction of process away f r o m or towards persons and things, w i t h position as only the absence of direction away from. The directive category should then be none other than that central Chinese concept tao iff 'way', w i t h so ff\ 'place' as a stopping point of process. For a Westerner there seems to be a striking asymmetry of time and place i n Classical Chinese. Instead of our paired 'When?' and 'Where?' we find ho shih 'what time?', surprisingly rare and answered by an initial unit dependent on the rest of the sentence, and the very common wu-hu and its synonyms w i t h a range much wider than 'where?' and answered by a unit inside the verb-phrase w h i c h is the sentence core. Cz 18/33 1

2

3a

%

jL

3c it?

*

Hsi-che niao chih (Lu) (fori) Formerly (sea) bird stop in (Lu) ("Formerly a seabird stopped i n the outskirts of Lu")

if chiao outskirt

It is as though the direction or position were inherent i n the action, but the time is something external w i t h w h i c h the action coincides. It may be noticed that Whorf's examination of H o p i , the model for subsequent attempts to relate the thought of a people to its language, also found a dissociation of time and place; and that the rather Bergsonian look of the world-view he ascribed to the Hopis reminds us that our tendency to assimilate time to space has been criticised inside our o w n tradition. But we shall see under U n i t 3d that the parallelism of spatial a n d temporal measurements, f r o m w h i c h the assimilation starts, is the same for the Chinese as for ourselves. A difference of some importance is that while the West tends to put

the moral under the category of quality, Chinese philosophy deals with it through directive concepts. The virtues seem never to be included i n a person's chuang 'characteristics', the nearest equivalent of our 'quality'; they belong to his tao 'way', the way he behaves and more intimately to his te 'potency'. Mencius contrasts the two major virtues, Benevolence and Right, i n terms of position and path: Me 7A/33, 3a

2

Complement

Subject

7ZL Chu Dwelling

(wu-hu) (where?)

shih this.

tsai. Jen is-in. Benevolence

-£

yeh

4L

Lu

(wu-hu)

tsai.

Yi

—-

Path

(where?)

is-in.

Right

is

shih this.

yeh —

Dependent clause 3a

3b

CM

jen

3a

3b

yii

yi

Dwelling-in benevolence setting-course-by right, Main clause

A\ (((ta) (((great)

2

3

Perfective particle

A

^

f

If

A

jen man

chih)) 's))

shih action

pei is-completed

yi. —

("Where is the abode? Benevolence is that. Where is the path? Right is that. A b i d i n g i n benevolence a n d setting one's course by right, the work of the great m a n is completed.") Even good is conceived not as a quality but as a way of behaving. There is a formulaic introductory phrase w h i c h we shall not attempt to analyse:

A / # / il

X

X chih wei jenl wul tao X 's constituting man/ thing/ way ('As for the man/thing/way X is . . . . ') A s for the m a n X is . . . . ' introduces an account of his personal character. We find the formula w i t h 'way' i n an account of goodness by H s i i n - t z u : Hs 3/30

Post-nominal particle

it Shan

chih

Good

wei constituting

Pre-verbal

tao way

Inter-verbal Pre-verbal

particle

particle 5$,

(pu) (not)

— if

(pu) (not)

tu stand-alone

tse then

*

^

I'J

— if

(pu) (not)

hsing take-shape

tse then

Pre-verbal particle

3a

ch'eng is-integral

m

tse then

m

3c

ft (suf) (even-if)

tso arise

in

particle

m

if

*

che,

hsin heart,

(pu) (not)

*

(pu) (not)

tu, stand-alone,

at

hsing, take-shape,

A

hsien appear

A ch'u issue

— it's-that

^

yû in

7k

yû from

min people

éi

se, expression,

t

yen speech, Pre-verbal particles

3a

Final particle

(yu-jo wet) (still not-yet)

ts'ung follow.

yeh. —

('As for the way G o o d is, without integrity you w i l l not stand alone, if you do not stand alone it w i l l not take shape, a n d if it does not take shape, even if it arises i n the heart, shows i n the expression, and issues i n speech, the people still w i l l not follow you.") This passage, it may be noticed, is a good test case for a question we left o p e n , whether the absence of terminations to mark abstract nouns interferes w i t h forming an abstract concept of, for example, the good. The virtues specific to an individual w o u l d belong primarily to his te 'potency', but this too is a directive concept paired w i t h tao 'way' from Confucius onwards. Combinations i n w h i c h directive interrogatives such as wu-hu constantly recur are w i t h chili 4& 'know' ('Whence do you k n o w . . . ?'), neng H 'be able' ('Whence are you able . . . ? ) , te -f^- 'get to, succeed' ('Whence do you get t o . . . . ?). Their effect is to turn attention to the source of one's capacities f r o m w h i c h action on the Way starts, one's te 'potency', a word phonetically and semantically related to te 'get'. It is also through the directive unit that the Chinese tradition seeks the constant (ch'ang ^ ) behind the changing. The West tends to seek it through the subject, as eternal substance w i t h being both as existence and as being what is predicated of it; but for C h i n a there is nothing unchanging except the paths w h i c h things follow. Confucians think of the Way as formulable, i n particular as the ways laid d o w n for behaviour, known from the H a n onwards as the Five Constants, benevolence, the 46

right, ceremony, w i s d o m and trustworthiness. They can ask of the Way 'What is it?' (ho yeh), but as we s a w this question asks only for an itemisation of components: Hs 16/41 "What is the 'Way'? I say: ceremony, deference, loyalty, trustworthiness, are that." For Taoists on the contrary only the transient is formulable i n words: "The Way that can be 'Way-ed' is not the constant Way". One can ask only to be guided to where it is. Cz 22/44 " 'Where (wu-hu) is it, that w h i c h is called the Way?' C h u a n g tzu said 'There is nowhere it is n o t ' " (3d) Measurer. Question asked of Units 3abc: chi-ho 1^ 'rT 'how much?', answered w i t h the shu . j £ 'number'. This approximates to the Aristotelian category of quantity. A l t h o u g h there is asymmetry of time and place there is symmetry of temporal and spatial measurements, both relegated to this final unit i n the sentence. Me3A/4 47

2

3a

3b

shih serve

chih him

+

4L (Tzu (You

chih) 's)

hsiung ti elder younger brother brother

(((shu) shih)) ten several

3d

* nien year

("You and your brother served h i m for several tens of years.") MelA/5 3a

3b

3c

3d A=

(Hsi) (West)

sang lose

ti land

to

Ch 'in Ch'in

if

(((ch'i) pai)) (((seven) hundred))

2. li li

('In the West we lost 700 li of land to Ch'in.") Consequently the asymmetry of time and place does not prevent Chinese thought from pairing measured time and measured space. We noticed the parallel definitions of space and duration i n the Canons. Outside this text the pair are usually called yu ^ and chou ^ . Although conveniently translated 'Space' and 'Time' it is not clear that these are fully 46

abstracted as i n the Canons; they seem rather to be the 'cosmos-as-itextends' and the 'cosmos-as-it-endures'. A standard definition appears i n Huai-nan-tzu and elsewhere: H N ch. 23 (Liu 11/13B) "What goes back into the past and comes d o w n to the present is called Time, the four directions and above and below are called Space." *

*

*

The great interest i n exploring alien conceptual schemes is i n glimpsing how one's o w n looks from outside, i n perceiving for example that the Being of Western ontology is culture-bound, not a universally valid concept w h i c h by a lucky coincidence our o w n language family (Greek and Latin at least) happens to express perfectly, whereas Arabic and Chinese obscure it. However, the rooting of schemes i n the structures of language families is an enterprise hindered by more than one obstacle. One of them, the fear that Whorfianism plunges us into a chaos of linguistic relativism, may not be insuperable; I myself do not think it does,* and i n any case there are plenty of acute minds ready to welcome chaos. Another obstacle is practical. We professional sinologists are at best amateur philosophers; professional philosophers are hard-worked people with enough to do without undertaking the mastery of remote languages, and consequently reluctant to recognise that any linguistic barriers to their thinking w i l l be more clearly visible from outside than from within.

* My position on this crucial issue is developed in 'Conceptual schemes and linguistic relativism in relation to Chinese', Synthesis philosophica (Zagreb, Yugoslavia), forthcoming 1989, and Epistemological Questions on Classical Chinese Philosophy, ed. by H. Lenk, Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, forthcoming 1990.

Notes (See "Short Bibliography" at end of book for details of publications.) Introduction (pages 1-8) 1

Jaspers, Origin.

2 Schwartz 63

I.

3 Needham v. 5/2, 35 « Cf. G 'China, Europe' 48f

T H E B R E A K D O W N OF T H E W O R L D ORDER DECREED BY HEAVEN

1.

A Conservative Reaction: Confucius (pages 9-33)

1 Tso, Hsiang 29, Chao 2, tr. L 549f, 583

1» Fingarette 43

2 Schwartz 324

20

3 An 4/11, 13/3

21 Creel, 'Fingarette'. Schwartz 75-85

" An 11/17,13/9

22 Cf. p. 22 above.

5 Shuoyilan (ch. 18) 18/14B. Also Chia Yu (ch. 2),

23 Fingarette, 'Rosemont' 512

2/10B, tr. Kramers 238

Fingarette 55

24 Fingarette 18 Schwartz 79

Cf. p. 81 above. 2

13 Cf. Fung v. 2, 509-512, 534-544, 588-591, 642f,

«Lz 42

652-654.

2

LSCC (ch. 5/2) Hsu 5/4B-5A

14

8

Tso, Chuang 22, Chao 5 and 32

1 Jung's foreword to Wilhelm-Baynes, xxiv.

'Great Appendix' A1, cited p. 364 above.

5

is Cf. pp. 191-93 above.

2.

Syncretism and the Victory of Confucianism (pages 370-382)

i Shih chi (ch. 6) 236, tr. Chavannes, v. 2,127 2

Hsiao 556-70

? Cf. p. 236 above. Han shu ch. 30

8

3 Cf. p. 73f above.

Shih chi (ch. 74) 2344, tr. Yang 72

9

4

Cz 13/37-41, tr. G 262

io Cz 8/1-8, tr. G 200

5

Cz 33/41-54, tr. G 279f

« Po-hu-t'ung 8/2A, tr. Tjan v. 2, 567.

6 Shih chi (ch. 130)3289

Appendix 1 (pages 383-387) iCf. p. 29above.

Cf. p. 146 above.

6

2

Cf. p. 168 above.

7

Cf. p. 41 above.

3

G Reason and Spontaneity ch. 1.2

8

Cf. p. 27f above.

9

Cf. pp. 59-63 above.

4

5

Cf. p.322fabove. A «2/4, cf. p. 28 above.

Appendix 2 (pages 389-428) • Rosemont, 'Linguistic Innateness' 73f 2

Cf. p. 153f above.

3Mulliel81f,309f 4

Rosemont 'Linguistic Innateness' 135f, 146 nl9.

Hall and Ames 261-263

7

8

Cz7/28 Hansen, 'Truth'. 511-514

9

10 Cf. p. 37 above.

5 Hall and Ames 298f

"Cf. p. 48above.

6 Hall and Ames 261

i Cf. pp. 16, 38 above. 2

Cf. pp. 240f, 368n above.

13

32 HN (ch. 16) Liu 16/2B

"Hall and Ames 264f

33 Cf. p.320fabove.

15/1« 3/22,14/17

34 Aristotle, Posterior Analytics 89b 33, 90a 10.

Hall and Ames 364 n29

16

35 G Logic 118

1 Cf. pp. 59-63,131,157f above.

* Cf. p. 225 above.

1« Cf. p. 93f above.

3 7

7

Kuo Hsiang on Cz (ch. 2) Kuo 111.

»Cf. p. 165 above.

38 Republic 479, tr. Lee 242f

20 Cf. p. 373-81 above.

3s> Plato, tr. Wu Hsien-shu, A, 388f

21 Hall and Ames 364 n30

40 Fan Ping-ch'ing 497

Cf. Hsiin-tzu on the concept of good, cited

2 2

pp. 424-26 below.

41 Kant, tr. Smith 504f, tr. Lan Kung-wu 430 4 2

Benveniste 63-74

2 Cf. p. 135 above. 3

24 Cf. p.l39fabove.

4 3

Quine, Logical Point of View 20-37

Cf. Quine, 'Natural Kinds', Ontological Relativity 114-138

25 Cf. p. 228 above. 2 6

'Catégories de pensée et catégories de langue',

4 4

Cf. p. 322-25 above.

2 7

Hansen, Language 30

45 Cz 4/76, 20/62, 5/3

2 8

Hall and Ames 294,264.

« Cf. pp. 398-401 above.

29 Lz tr. Waley 63f 30 G Studies 331-334 31G Logic 111-113,161-165

4 7

Cf. p. 417 above.

48 Cf. p. 142 above.

ROMANISATION CONVERSION TABLE! WADE-GILES/PINYIN

This book employs the Wade-Giles romanization w h i c h prevails i n English-language studies of Chinese thought. The Pinyin romanization of the People's Republic (in w h i c h , for example, Chuang-tzu becomes Zhuangzi) is now also common. Pinyin spellings drop all apostrophes and hyphens. Otherwise they are identical to Wade-Giles, w i t h the following exceptions: Cha chai chan chang chao che chei chen cheng

zha zhai zhan zhang zhao zhe zhei zhen zheng

chi ch'i chia ch'ia chiang ch'iang chiao ch'iao chieh

ji qi jia qia jiang qiang jiao qiao jie

ch'ieh chien ch'ien

qie jian qian

chih ch'ih chin ch'in ching ch'ing chiu ch'iu chiung ch'iung cho ch'o chou chu chua chuai chuan chuang chui chun chung

zhi chi jin qin jing qing jiu qiu jiong qiong zhuo chuo zhou zhu zhua zhuai zhuan zhuang zhui zhun zhong

442 '

ROMANISATION CONVERSION TABLE '

chong

ch'ung chü ch'ü chüan ch'üan chüeh ch'üeh chün ch'ün

j qu Juan quan jue que jun qun

erh

er

ho hsi hsia hsiang hsiao hsieh hsien hsin hsing hsiu hsiung hsü hsüan hsüeh hsün

he xi xia xiang xiao xie xian xin xing xiu xiong xu xuan xue xun

u

y jan jang jao je jen jeng jih j° jou ju Juan

1

ran rang rao re ren reng ri ruo rou ru man

jui jun jung

rui run rong

ka kai kan kang kao ke,ko kei ken keng ko,ke k'o kou ku kua kuai kuan kuang kuei k'uei kun kung k'ung kuo

ga gai gan gang gao ge gei gen geng g ke gou e

g gua guai guan guang gui kui gun gong kong guo u

lieh lien lo lün lung lüan lüeh

lie lian luo lun long luan lue

mieh mien

mie mian

nieh nien

nie nian

WADE-GILES/PINYIN

nung ГШ nüeh

nong nu nue

о

e

pa pai pan pang pao pei pen peng Ρ piao pieh p'ieh pien

ba bai ban bang bao bei ben beng bi biao bie pie bian

p'ien pin ping po pou pu

pian bin bing bo bou bu

shih so ssu, szu sung

shi suo si song

szu, ssu

si

ta tai tan tang tao te tei teng

da dai dan dang dao de dei deng

ti

di

1

443

tiao tieh t'ieh tien t'ien ting tiu to t'o tou tsa ts'a tsai ts'ai tsan ts'an tsang ts'ang tsao

diao die tie dian tian ding diu duo tuo dou za ca zai cai zan can zang cang zao

ts'ao tse ts'e tsei tsen ts'en tseng ts'eng tso ts'o tsou

cao ze ce zei zen cen zeng ceng zuo cuo zou

ts'ou tsu ts'u tsuan ts'uan tsui ts'ui tsun ts'un tsung ts'ung

cou zu eu zuan cuan zui cui zun cun zong cong

444

tu tuan tui tun rung t'ung tzü tsü

ROMANISATION CONVERSION TABLE

du duan dui dun dong tong zi

yeh

ye

yen yu yung yü yuan yüeh

yan you yong yu yuan yue

ci

yün

yun

ABBREVIATIONS Texts An Cz HF HN Hs Kz LSCC Lz Me Mo

Analects Chuang-tzu Han Fei-tzu Huai-nan-tzu Hsun-tzu Kuan-tzu Lii-shih ch'un-ch'iu ('Lii Spring and Autumn') Lao-tzu Meng-tzu ('Mencius') Mo-tzu

Editions and Journals BSOAS Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies (London) BSS Basic Sinological Series (Kuo-hsueh chi-pen ts'ung-shu ed. HJAS HY J AOS JCP PEW SPPY SPTK tr.

edited Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies Harvard-Yenching Institute Sinological Index Series Journal of the American Oriental Society Journal of Chinese Philosophy Philosophy East and West Ssu-pu pei-yao ^^>i^^r Ssu-pu ts'ung-k'an d - S p ^ - f i ] translated

Translators D G L RG RK W WB

Duyvendak Graham Legge (Kuan-tzu) Rickett, 'Guanzi' (Kuan-tzu) Rickett, 'Kuan-tzu' Watson Wilhelm-Baynes

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j$L .

F A N G , Wan-chuan. "Chinese Language a n d Theoretical T h i n k i n g . " journal of Oriental Studies, v o l . 22, no. 1 (1984), 25-32. F I N G A R E T T E , Herbert. Confucius: The Secular as Sacred. N e w York: Harper Torchbooks, 1972. . "Following the ' O n e Thread' of the Analects" i n Rosemont and Schwartz (cited below), pp. 373-406. . "Response to Professor Rosemont," PEW vol. 28, no. 4 (1978), 511514. . "The Problem of Self i n the Analects." PEW 29 (1979) 129-140. . "Reply to Professor H a n s e n . " / C P vol. 7, no. 3 (1980) 259-266. . "The M u s i c of H u m a n i t y i n the Conversations of Confucius," ]CP, 10 (1983), 331-356. F O R K E , A l f r e d . "The Chinese Sophists," Journal of the China Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society 34 (1901-1902) 1-100. . World Conception of the Chinese. L o n d o n : A r t h u r Probsthain, 1925. . Geschichte der alten chinesischen Philosophie, (First e d ' n . 1927.) H a m b u r g : C r a m , DeGruyter & C o . , 1964. F R A Z E R , J. G . The Golden Bough. (Abridged ed'n.) L o n d o n : Macmillan & Co., 1941. F U N G Yu-lan. A Short History of Chinese Philosophy. Tr. by Derk Bodde. N e w York: M a c m i l l a n & C o . , 1958. . The Spirit of Chinese Philosophy. Tr. by E. R. Hughes. London: Kegan Paul, 1962.

. A History of Chinese Philosophy. Tr. by Derk Bodde. Princeton, N J : Princeton University Press, 1952,1953. GEPvNET, Jacques. China and the Christian Impact: A Conflict of Cultures. Tr. by Janet L l o y d . Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985. G R A H A M , A . C . (G) " K u n g - s u n Lung's 'Essay on meanings and things'." Journal of Oriental Studies, vol. 2, no. 2 (1955), 282-301. . (G) "The Dialogue Between Yang Ju a n d Chyntzyy." BSOAS, vol. 22, no. 2 (1959), 291-299. . (G) " 'Being' i n Western Philosophy Compared w i t h Shih/Fei and Yu/Wu i n Chinese Philosophy" Asia Major n.s. 7 (1959), 79-112. (Reprinted i n G's Studies.) . (G) " 'Being' i n Classical Chinese," i n Verhaar (cited below), vol. 1 (1967), pp. 1-39. . (G) "Chuang-tzu's Essay o n Seeing Things as E q u a l , " History of Religions 9 (1969/1970), 137-159. . (G) " ' B e i n g ' i n Linguistics a n d Philosophy," i n Verhaar (cited below), vol. 5 (1972), pp. 225-233. . (G) " C h i n a , Europe a n d the Origins of M o d e r n Science" i n Nakayama and S i v i n (cited below) pp. 45-70. . (G) Later Mohist Logic, Ethics and Science. H o n g K o n g : Chinese University Press; L o n d o n : School of Oriental and A f r i c a n Studies, 1978. . (G) Chuang-tzu: Textual Notes to a Partial Translation. London: School of Oriental and A f r i c a n Studies, 1982. . (G) "Value, Fact, and Facing Facts." Journal of Value Inquiry 19 (1985), 35-41. (G) Reason and Spontaneity. L o n d o n : C u r z o n Press, 1985.

. (G) Divisions in Early Monism Reflected in the Core Chapters ofMo-tzu. Singapore: National University of Singapore, Institute of East A s i a n Philosophies, 1985. . (G) Studies in Chinese Philosophy and Philosophical Literature. Singapore: National University of Singapore, Institute of East A s i a n Philosophies, 1986. . (G) Yin-Yang and the Nature of Correlative Thinking. Singapore: Institute of East A s i a n Philosophies, 1986. . (G) "A Neglected P r e - H a n Philosophical Text: Forthcoming, BSOAS, autumn, 1989.

Ho-kuan-tzu."

G R A N E T , Marcel. La pensée chinoise. Paris: A l b i n M i c h e l , 1934. G R A Z I A , Sebastian de. (ed.) Masters of Chinese Political Thought. N e w York: V i k i n g Press, 1973. H A L L , David L . , and A M E S , Roger T. Thinking Through Confucius. N e w York: State University of N e w York Press, 1987. Han Fei tzu (HF) -f . E d . by C h ' e n C h ' i - y u . Han Fei tzu chi-shih $$0~f : f ^ # Peking: C h u n g - h u a Book Co., 1958. Han Fei tzu (HF). Tr. by W. K . Liao, Han Probsthain, vol. 1,1938; vol. 2,1959.

Fei Tzu.

London: A r t h u r

Han Fei tzu (HF). Tr. by Burton Watson (W), Han Fei tzu: Basic Writings. (12 chs.) N e w York: C o l u m b i a University Press, 1964. H A N S E N , C h a d . Language and Logic in Ancient China. A n n Arbor: University of M i c h i g a n Press, 1983. . "Chinese Language, Chinese Philosophy and 'Truth'." Journal of Asian Studies 44 (1985), 491-517. Han shu

t% HF

:

(Han History) Peking: C h u n g - h u a Book Co., 1962.

H A R B S M E I E R , Christoph. Wilhelm von Humboldts Brief an Abel Remusat und die philosophische Grammatik des Altchinesischen. Stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt: Friedrich Fromann Verlag, 1979. . Aspects of Classical Chinese Syntax. Scandinavian Institute of A s i a n Studies M o n o g r a p h Series no. 45.· L o n d o n : C u r z o n Press, 1981. . "Language and Logic i n Ancient C h i n a , " i n N e e d h a m , vol. 7, no. 1 (forthcoming). H A W K E S , David. Ch'u-tz'u, the Songs of the South. Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1959. H E N D E R S O N , John B. Development and Decline of Chinese Cosmology. N e w York: Columbia University Press, 1984. H E N R I C K S , Robert G . "Examining the Ma-wang-tui Silk Texts of the Laotzu, w i t h Special Note of Their Differences from the Wang P i Text', Toung Pao 65 (1979), 166-199. . " O n the chapter divisions i n the Lao-tzu." BSOAS vol. 45, no. 3 (1982), 501-524. H I P P O C R A T E S . Hippocrates and the Fragments of Heracleitus. Tr. by W. H . S. Jones and E. T. Witherington, 4 vols. L o n d o n and N e w York: Loeb Classical Library, 1923-31. Ho-kuan-tzu

1

7v£ -J . (Wan-yu wen-k'u

^

).

Ho-kuan-tzu. Tr by Klaus K a r l Neugebauer, Hoh-kuan tsi. Eine Untersuchung der dialogischen Kapitel (mit Übersetzung und Annotationen) (7 chs.). Frankfurt am M e i n : Peter L a n g , 1986. Essays on Islamic Philosophy and Science. E d . b y George F. H o u r a n i . Albany, N Y : State University of N e w York Press, 1975. H O Peng Yoke. Li, qi and shu: An Introduction to "Science and Civilization in China." H o n g K o n g : H o n g K o n g University Press, 1985. H O U R A N I , George F. (ed.) Essays on Islamic Philosophy and Science. Albany, N Y : State University of N e w York Press, 1975.

H S I A O K u n g - c h u a n . A History of Chinese Political Thought. Tr. by F. W. Mote. V o l . 1. Princeton, N J : Princeton University Press, 1979. Hsin hsu 4fr Jf

SPTK.

H S U C h o - y u n . Ancient China in Transition. Stanford, C A : Stanford University Press, 1965. Hsiin-tzu (Hs) Tr. by H . H . Dubs, The works ofHsuntze. HY L o n d o n : A r t h u r Probsthain, 1928. Hsiin-tzu (Hs)

-f - H Y .

Hsiin-tzu (Hs) Tr. by Burton Watson (W), Hsiin Tzu: Basic Writings. (10 chs.) N e w York: Columbia University Press, 1963. Hsiin-tzu (Hs) Tr. by John Knoblock, Xunzi: A Translation and Study of the Complete Works, v o l . 1 (chs. 1-6). Stanford, C A : Stanford University Press, 1988. H U , Shih. The Development of the Logical Method in Ancient China. Shanghai: Commercial Press, 1922. Huai-nan-tzu r l j ~f~ E d . by L i u Wen-tien. Huai-nan hung-lieh chi-chieh : M£.| # · Shanghai: Commercial Press, 1933. Huang-ti nei-ching peror") SPTK.

f"

H

("Inner Classic of the Yellow E m -

J A K O B S O N , Roman. Selected Writings vol. 2. The Hague and Paris: M o u t o n , 1971. J A N Y u n - h u a . "Tao, Principle and L a w : The Three Key Concepts i n the Yellow Emperor Taoism." JCP, vol. 7, no. 3, (1980), 205-228. . T a o Y u a n or Tao: The O r i g i n ' , / C P vol. 7, no. 3, (1980), 195-204. . "The Silk Manuscripts on Taoism." T'oung Pao 63 (1977), 65-84. JASPERS, K a r l . The Origin and Goal of History. N e w Haven, C T : Yale University Press, 1953.

K A H N , Charles. "The Greek Verb 'to be' and the Concept of Being." Foundations of Language 2 (1966), 245-266. . "The Verb 'be' i n Ancient Greek." Verhaar (cited below), vol. 6 (1973), 1-486. K A I Z U K A , Shigeki. Confucius. Tr. by G . Bownas. L o n d o n : A l l e n & U n w i n , 1974. K A N D E L , J. E . Ein Beitrag zur Interpretationsgeschichte des abstrakten Denkens in China: die Lehren des Kung-sun Lung und deren Ausnahme in der Tradition. Hochberg: privately printed, 1976. K A N T , Immanuel. Critique of Pure Reason. Chinese translation by L a n K u n g - w u l t . < £ S ^ · K'ang-te ^ , Ch'un-ts'ui li-hsing p'i-p'an ^ M. 'f± jtt #'J · Peking: San-Lien Book Co., 1957. . Critique of Pure Reason. Tr. b y N o r m a n K e m p Smith. London: Macmillan, 1964. K A O , K u n g - y i and O B E N C H A I N , Diane B. " K u n g - s u n Lung's Chih wu lun and Semantics of Reference a n d Predication." JCP vol. 2, no. 3 (1975), 285-324. K A R L G R E N , Bernhard. " L e proto-chinois langue flexioneile." Journal asiatique 11 (1920), 205-232. . Grammata serica recensa. Bulletin of the Museum of Far-Eastern Antiquities, vol. 29. Stockholm, 1957. K E P L E R , Johannes. Epitome ofCopernican Astronomy. Books 4 and 5. Tr. by Charles G l e n n Wallis, i n Great Books of the World vol. 16. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1952. K I R K , G . S. a n d R A V E N , J. E. The Pre-Socratic Philosophers. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1960. K N O B L O C K , John H . "The Chronology of Xunzi's Works." Early China 8 (1982/1983), 29-52.

K R A M E R S , R. R K'ung Tzu Chia YU: The School Sayings of Confucius, Leiden, 1950. K U A N Feng W[ ^ i n Chuang-tzu che'hsüeh t'ao-lun chi | ± - J " ^ ^ % . Peking: C h u n g - h u a Book Co., 1962. Kuan-tzu (Kz) 1r

%

BSS

Kuan-tzu (Kz) Tr. by W. A l l y n Rickett (RK), Kuan-tzu. BSS. (10 chs.) H o n g K o n g : H o n g K o n g University Press, 1965. Kuan-tzu (Kz) Tr. by W. A l l y n Rickett (RG). Guanzi (35 chs.) Princeton, N J : Princeton University Press, 1985. K U H N , Thomas S. The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1970. Kung-sun Lung tzu. £j i f Peking: C h u n g - h u a Book C o . , 1959.

Ch'ien

Shih chi Tr. by Burton Watson (W), Records of the Historian. (19 chs.) N e w York: Columbia University Press, 1969.

Shih chi. Tr. b y Yang H s i e n - y i and Gladys Yang. Selections from "Records of the Historian." (31 chs.) Peking: Foreign Language Press, 1979. Shih chi. Tr. by Edouard Chavannes. Les mémoires historiques de Se-Ma Ts'ien. Vols. 1-6. (Fullest translation. First ed'n. 1895-1905.) Paris: Ernest Leroux, 1969. Shih ching f^M ("Songs") Tr. b y Bernhard Karlgren. The Book of Odes. Stockholm: M u s e u m of Far-Eastern Antiquities, 1950. Shih-tzu P-f- . SPPY. Shu ching ifF ("Documents") Tr. b y Bernhard Karlgren. The Book of Documents. Bulletin of the Museum of Far-Eastern Antiquities, vol. 22. Stockholm, 1950. Shuoyüan

i?u$L SPTK.

S I V I N , Nathan. Chinese Alchemy, Preliminary Studies. Cambridge, M A : Harvard University Press, 1968. . Cosmos and Computation in Early Chinese Mathematical Astronomy. Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1969. . (ed.) Science and Technology in East Asia. N e w York: Science History Publications, 1977. S O L O M O N , Bernard S. "The Assumptions of H u i Shih." Monumenta serica 28 (1969), 1-40. S T R I C K M A N N , M i c h e l . " O n the A l c h e m y of Ta'o H u n g - c h i n g . " Welch and Seidel (cited below), pp. 123-192. Ta hsüeh A . ^ ("Great learning") Tr. by Legge (L) (cited above), Classics. Ta hsüeh ("Great learning") Tr. by C h a n (cited above) pp. 84-94. T'ai-p'ingyü-lan

3^^$?%.

SPTK.

T H O M P S O N , Paul M . The Shen Tzu Fragments. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1979.

Tso chuan è_ i^- ("Tso Commentary") Tr. by Legge (L) (cited above) The Ch'un ts'ew with the Tso chuen, Classics vol. 5. T U Wei-ming. Humanity and Self-cultivation: Essays in Confucian Thought. Berkeley, C A : A s i a n Humanities Press, 1979. T W I T C H E T T , Denis a n d F A I R B A N K , John K . (eds.) The Cambridge History of China. Vol. 1. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986. V A N D E R L O O N , P. " O n the Transmission of K u a n - t z u . " T'oung Pao 41 (1952), 357-393. V A N D E R M E E R S C H , Léon. La formation du légisme. Paris: Ecole Française Extrême Orient, 1965. V E R H A A R , John W. M . (ed.) The Verb 'be' and its Synonyms. Foundations of Language, Supplementary Series. Dordrecht, Holland: D. Reidel, 1967ff. V E R V O O R N , Aat. "The Origins of Chinese Eremitism." Journal of the Institute of Chinese Studies of the Chinese University of Hong Kong 15 (1984) 249-295. W A L E Y , Arthur. Three Ways of Thought in Ancient China. L o n d o n : A l l e n & U n w i n , 1939. . Chinese Poems. L o n d o n : U n w i n Books, 1946. W E B E R , M a x . The Religion of China. Tr. b y H a n s H . Gerth. N e w York: Free Press, 1968. W E L C H , Holmes and S E I D E L , A n n a , (eds.) Facets of Taoism. N e w Haven and L o n d o n : Yale University Press, 1979. W H O R F , B. L . Language, Thought and Reality. N e w York: John Wiley, 1956. W I L H E L M , Hellmut. Change: Eight Lectures on the I Ching. Tr. by Carey F. Baynes. N e w York: Pantheon Books, 1960. ·. Heaven, Earth and Man in the Book of Changes. Seattle, W A : University of Washington Press, 1977.

W I L H E L M , Richard. Lectures on the I Ching. Tr. by Irene Eber. Princeton, N J : Princeton University Press, 1979. W I T T G E N S T E I N , L u d w i g . Philosophical Investigations. Tr. by G . E. M . Anscombe. O x f o r d : Basil Blackwell, 1953. W R I G H T , Frank L l o y d . Writings and Buildings. E d . by Edgar Kaufmann and Ben Raeburn. Cleveland, O H : World Publishing C o . , 1960. W U K u a n g ^ 7^ . Huang-Lao chih hsiieh t'ung-lun -?f ·%· Hangchou: Che-chiang Peoples' Press, 1985.

3p i§[

W U , K u a n g - m i n g . "Counterfactuals, Universals and Chinese T h i n k i n g . " PEW, vol. 37, no. 1 (1987) 84-94. YATES, Frances. Giordano Bruno and Routledge 6k Kegan Paul, 1964.

the Hermetic Tradition. L o n d o n :

YATES, Robin. Towards a Reconstruction of the Tactical Chapters of Mo-tzu (chiian 14), University of California (Berkeley) thesis, 1975. . "The Mohists on Warfare: Technology, Technique and Justification," i n Rosemont and Schwartz (cited above), pp. 549-603. Yiching h

$§lHY

Yi ching. I Ching, Book of Changes. Tr. by James Legge (L). Edited, w i t h introduction and study guide by C h ' u C h a i w i t h Winberg C h a i . HY (From 2nd ed'n. Sacred Books of the East, vol. 16, Oxford, 1899.) N e w York: Bantam Books, 1969. Yi ching. Tr. by Richard W i l h e l m , I Ging. Das Buch der Wandlungen, Jena: Diederichs, 1924. Yi ching. I Ching or Book of Changes. (Richard W i l h e l m translation rendered into English by C a r y F. Baynes [WB], foreword by C . G . Jung. Preface to third e d ' n . by Hellmut Wilhelm.) London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1968. Yü-tzu ^ ~f~ . (Taoist Patrology ed'n.)

N ÂME INDEX

A i , D u k e of L u ·$· #~ - 10 Albertus Magnus 340 Alexander the Great 5 Ames, Roger 30, 40, 332, 393-402, 406 Anaximenes 356 A n s e l m 412 Archimedes 161,163, 316 Aristarchus 6 Aristotle 6,136,153,161,185, 319, 339, 407, 412, 414-423 A u s t i n , J. L . 23 Bacon, Francis 252 Bacon, Roger 316 Baynes, C a r y l F. 358n Benveniste, Emile 414 Bergson, H e n r i 423 Blake, William 174 Bloom, A l f r e d 397f Bodde, Derk 33n, 238n, 371n, 372n Boethius 6 Brecht, Bertolt 234 Bruno, Giordano 349 C h a n g Tao-ling f f l x l j ^ t m Ch'ao, Prince, of C h o u JU i - J - M 34 Chao, Marquis of Hân 4$ m 63, 283, 285

Chao, K i n g of C h ' i n & Bg i 238 Chao Chien-tzu & jft - f - 327 Chao C h i i n - c h ' i n g ^jglfi? 160 Chao-ming № B$295 Ch'en Chung f ^ . ^ 6 5 C h ' e n H s i a n g pjt ^ 70-72 Ch'en Hsin 4^- 70 C h ' e n Liang ^ J^70 C h ' e n Sheng j ^ ^ 3 7 2 C h ' e n g , C h o u Emperor % i 299 Ch'eng Ching 67 C h ' e n g Fan $1 i f Ch'eng-tzu) 37 Cheng H s i i a n jf|S ^ 298 C h ' e n g Y i 3 £ g|i 314 C h ' i , & H s i a Emperor 294 C h ' i , Viscount of Wei $1^ f$-117 Chi (= ), interlocutor of T'ang 79 C h i a Y i |T ^ 21,110, 276, 292 Ch'iaoCh'ui * 5 J|39 C h i Chen -^j|L210 C h i e h ^ , last Hsia Emperor 116 and passim Chieh-tzu 4|--^210 C h i h ^ ( T z u - c h i h ) 207, 294 C h i h $ £ , Robber 55, 64, 74, 307, 309f Chih-sheng J L 74 Ch'ih-yu # 74

Chi-k'ang-tzu ^ J t -J" 14 C h i - l u # j & . SeeTzu-lu. C h ' i n K u - l i # ; f J f 60, 376 C h i n g , Duke of C h ' i |f- ^-ygs. 10, 24,32 C h i n g , C h o u Emperor 35 Ch'i-tiao K ' a i B3 H 8 Chomsky, N o a m 392f C h o u , Duke of Ji] 9 and passim Chöu , last Shang Emperor 116 and passim C h u if , armourer 39 C h u H s i & J : 132, 286, 314 C h u a n g C h o u vf± j|] (Chuangtzu) 76-81, 90, 96,170-204 and passim Chuang-hsiang, K i n g of Ch'in £ . £ J L i 3 7 3 C h u n g - k u n g /fxji ^ 19 Ch'un-shen, Lord of & ^ % 237, 295 Ch'un-yü Yüeh -}f -f ^ Churchill, Winston 174 Cikoski, John 392, 422 Confucius (K'ung C h ' i u

371

J£. )

9-33, 276 and passim Creel, Herrlee G . 24n, 283f C u l l e n , Christopher 164 Dante 218 Derrida, Jacques 227f, 234, 323, 331 Descartes 5 Einstein 174 Empedocles 356 Eratosthenes 166 FanCh'ih ^ - i £ l 6 , 2 1 FanHsüan-tzu Jr -J- 276

Fingarette, Herbert 14, 23-28, 59, 112 'First Emperor'. See Shih-huang-ti. Frazer, J. G . 350 Fu-hsi ffc 4fc 67, 271, 305, 362f, 369 FuTunfl£g|E42 Fu Tzu-chien --f - 1 1 8 F u n g Y. L . (Feng Y u lan )24n,82,359 Galen 340 Galileo 5, 315, 317-319, 335 Giles, Herbert A . 173 Granet, Marcel 320 Grosseteste, Robert 161, 316 H a l l , David 30, 40, 332, 392-402, 406 H a n Fei # # 267-292, 293 and passim Hansen, C h a d 83, 262, 286, 392, 394f, 461f HanYü ^$£404 Harbsmeier, Christoph 392, 397n Heidegger, Martin 172 Henderson, John B. 318 Henricks, Robert 217 Hermes Trismegistus 318, 340 Hero of Alexandria 6 Hippocrates 354 H o %v , physician 325, 328 Ho-hsü 308 Ho4§· J L 96 M o , historiographer ^ JE- 327 Moschus 4 Moses 4 M o T i # |£ (Mo-tzu) 33-53, 61f, 65 and passim Needham, Joseph 315, 349, 365n N e w t o n 41, 318, 350 Nietzsche 8,172,174,186,194 Nivison, Davidln O k e n , Lorenz 318 O l d Tan. See Lao Tan. P'angHsüan U M . 215f

(P'ang-tzu)

Pankenier, David I n Pan K u H 379

P'ei Wei'$LM&412

P'eng,01d ^ - ^ 1 0 P'engMeng # £ 3 7 2 P'eng-tsu ^ ^ £ 181 Pien, wheelwright M) 187 Pien Sui - f j§f 295 Pi-kan, Prince J L -fït^W Ping j]L , unidentified philosopher 177f P'ing-yuan, L o r d of ^ 90,179n Plato 161,181f, 363, 412 Pliny 340 Po-ch'eng Tzu-kao

^ 76,

Po C h u - y i & &199n Po-kung # ^ ^ 2 0 7 P o L o te-jg 307f Popper, Karl 29, 383 Po Y i #J H 64f, 68, 309f Pythagoras 4, 318, 320 Quine, W. V. 331n, 400 Reding, Jean-Paul 78n, 415f Rosemont, H e n r y 390, 392f Ryle, Gilbert 323-325 Saussure, Ferdinand de 227f, 320 Schwartz, Benjamin 4,14, 27, 35, 269 Sebokht316 Shan C h u a n -$r %- 60 Shang Yang ^ (Shang-tzu, L o r d Shang, K u n g - s u n Yang) 72f, 268-273, 276, 282f, 371, 380 S h a o Y u n g ^ p ^ 361

Shen-nung ; f t J t 65-73, 271, 305, 308, 369, 374 Shen Pu-hai ^ ^ ^ 236, 268f, 282f, 285, 377, 380 Shen Tao >\$l $>\ 112, 236f, 267f, 270, 278f, 285, 301, 377, 380 Shih 5cL, exemplary moralist 277 Shih, carpenter (S >S 175 Shih-huang-ti 4& J L -ifr (First E m peror) 32f, 269, 328, 370-372 and passim S h i h P ' u ^ 11 35 Shih Shih ^ 109,118,125,127 Shu C h ' i r k If- 64f, 68 Shu H s i a n g fa r#] 276 Shun # 12,14,115, 293-298 and passim Shu-sun T ' u n g H i f . 33 Smith, N o r m a n K e m p 413 Ssu-ma C h ' i e n ^ 32f and passim Ssu-ma N i u Mj 18 Ssu-ma Piao Mj 149 Ssu-ma T'an $\ .Sf, | £ 31, 377f and passim Strickmann, M i c h e l 171f Sui H u n g %k 294 Sui-jen 305 Sung H s i n g £ft (Sung-tzu, Sungjung ^ Sung K'eng ) 95-100,107, 236f, 264f, 376 Tan-fu f . 5 C 58 T'ang 1%, first Shang Emperor 74, 79f, 116, 295 and passim T e n g H s i #p^r 255 Teng-ling-tzu -fp -J- 51 Thales 356 Ti C h i e n | | Jf" 76f

TiehPi$L-#-49 T'ien C h ' e n g ffj 306 T'ien P'ien 07 , § f 301, 376 Ting, Duke of L u ·§- J C - ^ 10 Ting, Cook 186,189 Tsai Wo ^ ^ 28 Tseng Shen |f %~ (Tseng-tzu) 21, 67, 277 Tsou Yen Up 242, 328-330, 341, 371, 373, 377, 380f Tu, Earl of ifa 38 Tu C h i h ^ 270 Tung C h u n g - s h u i t " 1'f £ f 378 Tzu-ch'an - ^ ^ [ 2 7 6 Tzu-chang -J- ^ 236 Tzu-ch'i of Nan-kuo i*J#-f-#189 Tzu-chih. See C h i h . Tzu-chou C h i h - f u >}\] J t 5C 58 Tzu-hsia - f - J L l 8 , 236 Tzu-hua-tzu -J- j j £ -J- 63 Tzu-k'uai. SeeK'uai. T z u - k u n g - f - "Jf16-18, 20f T z u - k u n g - f ^ 236 Tzu-lu - f (Chi-lu -f- ^ - ) 15, 24 Tzu-ssu - f - ^ 111, 134, 236 T z u - y u ~f~ 236 Waley, A r t h u r 24n, 119,123, 403, 406 Wang C h ' u n g -3L 117,168, 382 WangFu-chih J L 319 Wang Liang J L ] ^ 279,281 Wang P i _3L Wj 95n, 171, 412 Watson, Burton 173 Weber, Max 269, 300, 302 Wei, K i n g of C h ' i # ^ J L 112 Wei, K i n g of C h ' u ^ J L 174 Wen, K i n g (father of K i n g

Wu) M X I 13,17and passim W e n , Duke of T'eng J& X 70 W e n , Marquis of Wei {£267 Wen, Duke of C h i n % X 2, 113 Whorf, B. L . 389, 423 Wilde, Oscar 174 W i l h e l m , Richard 358n Wittgenstein, L u d w i g 153,155, 323 Wright, Frank Lloyd 234 W u , H a n Emperor ^ ^ 330, 372, 377f W u , K i n g (first C h o u Emperor) H i £ 9 , 1 3 , 74,116and passim W u Hsien-shu & HF 412 WuKuang 7^295 Wu-ma-tzu Jg. „g, -f- 61f, 214 W u Lü ^ j | 65 Yang-ch'eng, L o r d of ^ 44 Yang C h u % ^ (Yang-tzu) 54-61, 108,159,177f

Yao 12,115, 293-298 and passim Yellow Emperor (Huang-ti ^ ) 68, 73f, 205f, 374, 379 and passim Yen-ch'eng T z u - y u M 189 Yen-ti ^ 73, 327 Yen Y i n g # |fL (Yen-tzu) 32 Yen Y i i a n $% ^ (Yen H u i ) 17, 22, 26,197 Y i r f , archer 39,177 Y i M. , minister of Y i i 294 Y i C h i h % 4 l (Yi-tzu) 43,158 Y i n g , Marquis of % fr£ 237 Y i n Wen f- x 95f, 376, 380 Y i Y a £ % 126 Y u , C h o u Emperor M A H 1 7 Y u .jij, (first Hsia Emperor) 65,159, 293-297 and passim Y i i a n , L o r d of Sung 5 £ 7^ % 175 Yu-ch'ao ^ ^ . 74 Yu-tzu -f-11 Zarathustra 1, 313 Zeno 78

UBjECT INDEX

(For some items, a selection of examples of the word used i n quoted passages is introduced by 'Examples:')

Abdications of rulers, 58, 292-297 Abstraction A n d Chinese language, 398-401, 413, 426 A d d u c i n g . See T'ui and yuan 'Ahead of Heaven'. SeeHsien Tien Ai 'concern, love' Mohist chien ai 'concern for everyone', 41-43, 76,110,146, 158-160,169, 236 Translation 'love' seldom fully appropriate, 41 A l i g n i n g and matching. See Is'an and wu Analects (Lun yu ), 9f, 379 Analogy, 81, 323 In Mencian arguments, 120 Later M o h i s t definition of p'i •Mi 'illustrating', 155 H u i Shih's defence of analogies, 81, 420 Cf. Correlative thinking Anarchism, 4, 69, 299-311 Ancestors, cult of, 4,11, 258f

Antiquity, authority of In C h i n a and i n West u p to 1700, 4f Appeal to C h o u or to the earliest, 12, 38, 256 To the wisest or to the earliest, 38f, 52 A s conventional or as dependent on historical evidence, 52 Authority of antiquity questioned from 4th c. B.C., 55, 142,214f Historical evidence questioned, 256, 273 Ancients as 'rotten bones', books as their 'dregs', 61,187 Innovadon defended, 39 A p p e a l to, forbidden b y First Emperor, 371f Revives under H a n , 374-82 A priori'. SeeHsien Argumentation. SeePien 'argumentation' Artifice. See Wei 'artifice'

Attention. See Chih 'intent' Axial Period, 1, 4f, 313f, 382 Being The Indo-European verb 'to be' and Western ontology, 222, 406-13 Semitic language structure and the 'existence/essence' dichotomy w h i c h developed i n A r a bic, 407 Problems of translating Western arguments about Being into modern Chinese, 412-4 Grammar of related Chinese words and constructions, 406414 For Chinese concepts comparable w i t h 'Being' i n its various usages cf. Yu 'there is', Shih 'is this', Jan 'so' Benefit and harm. See Li and hai Benevolence. See Jen 'benevolence' Binary distinctions, 286f, 321, 330, 360-2, 369 A n d triads, 339f O d d number as centre, 339f, 342f Leibniz's binary arithmetic and the Yi, 361 Cf. Oppositions Book of Lord Shang (Shang-tzu B u d d h i s m , 6f, 25, 56, 84,194, 202, 204, 314, 389, 404 Ch'an(Zen), 172, 205, 390 Bureaucratisation and centralisation Of states, w i t h decline of C h o u , 2f

Defended by Mohists, 45 By Legalists, 282-5 Opposed by early Confucians, 302 By Shen-nung school, 66 Completed b y C h ' i n and H a n unification, 370-372 Legalist and Weberian concepts of bureaucracy, 269 Cf. A n a r c h i s m , Shang t'ung 'Burning of the books', b y C h ' i n , 213, 371f Calendrical schemes In Lti spring and autumn, 329, 340f, 351-356 Kuan-tzu calendars earlier, 329f, 341, 344f, 356 Canons, Mohist, 81f, 84f, 137-170, 183-6, 84f, 210, 392, 416 Cf. Expounding the Canons, Names and objects Categories Aristotelian, 414f Relation of Chinese categorisation to language structure, 41^428 Causation In Later M o h i s t science, 161-3 Causal and correlative thinking, 97, 317f, 322, 327, 338, 349 Cf. Ku 'reason', shih 'to cause' Ceremony. See Li 'ceremony' Ch'ang Iff 'constant', 222, 287 Examples: 207, 219, 221, 224, 226, 289, 307, 364 Tr ' n o r m ' , Example: 189 Five Constants, 381, 426f Constant behind the changing not substance but path, 426

Cf. Change Change, 266 Chinese words for, 359 The Yi, 358-70 Change and constancy, 141-143, 426 Acknowledgement that times have changed, 55,141f, 270-3 Changes, Book of. See Yi (Yi ching) Characteristics. See Chuang 'char­ acteristics', Mao 'features' Chen -JL 'genuine', 182 In Yangism, 57, 64 The 'Genuine M a n ' , 196-8 Cheng ming SB. & 'correction of names', 116,184, 380 For Confucius, 23-25, 384 For Shen Pu-hai, 283f For H s i i n - t z u , 261-267 A n d hsing ming, 284 N a m i n g as Austin's 'performa­ tive utterance', 23 Ch'eng (Huang-Lao manuscript from Ma-wang-tui), 330 Ch'eng iJOt, 'integrity, sincerity', 133, 400 A n d Yangist 'genuineness', Ex­ ample ('sincere'): 57 In 'Great learning', 132 In 'Doctrine of the mean', 135 Use of 'integral, integrate' i n translation, 133 Chi 'impulse' (that from w h i c h movement starts: used for ex­ ample of the trigger of a cross­ bow), 193, 385 Ch'i 'fix ahead' (of laying d o w n i n advance the usage of a name), 177, 267 Examples: 262, 264

Ch'i J f . 'instruments' In Yi Appendices, things from the viewpoint of their utility to man, 362f Ch'i H j , untranslated (the activat­ ing fluids i n the atmosphere and the body), 101-104,197£, 210, 218, 224, 255, 260, 274, 287, 352^1 and passim Generic n o u n , 402 'Six Ch'i', 119, 325, 328, 330 Relation to ching 'quintessence', 101 'Flood-like' (hao-jan >φ $\ ), of Mencius, 118,126f; of 'Inward training', 100,103-188 Later is universal fluid out of w h i c h all things condense, 175, 238, 328, 332, 356 In Neo-Confucianism, 314 Chien j§C 'collection, total' and t'i fg'unit' Later Mohist concepts (embrac­ ing whole/part and class/ member), 83, 85,145,147, 209 Derived from verb chien 'put each of them together' (as i n chien at 'concern for everyone') and generic n o u n t'i 'member (of body)'. T'i defined, 145 Cf. M e n c i a n discussion of t'i 'members of body' and chien . . . ai 'concern for each of them', 131,158n A l s o K u n g - s u n Lung's 'collect­ ing together' the things pointed out, 93 H u i Shih's 'Heaven and earth are one unit', 78 Cf. Ai 'concern'

Chien-pai 'hard and white', 84-90, 308 Term for the mutually pervasive, 84,142 ' H a r d and white' sophism a misunderstanding of the Kungsun Lung-tzu forger, 84 Later M o h i s t definition, 84 Chih -&P 'know' and chih ·%* 'wisd o m ' (graphic differentiation erratic i n pre-Han texts, cf. 139) Later Mohist four branches and three sources of knowledge, 138, 262 K n o w i n g contrasted with supposing, 140n Example: 290 Contrasted w i t h perceiving, 140, 264f Contrasted w i t h having image, 154 The wits as a faculty, 140, 244 Knowledge of things as startingpoint of ethics i n 'Great learning', 134 Chuang-tzu's criticism of chih, 180-3,195f, 201f, 205f H s i i n - t z u on knowledge, 253, 264f W i s d o m as a Confucian virtue, 21,126,381 Definitions: Later Mohist, 140; Chuang-tzu, 191; Hsiin-tzu, 244 Chih 'to order' (put Empire, state or self i n order), 132f Chuang-tzu definition (of putting self i n order), 191 Chih 'pointing' K u n g - s u n Lung's 'Pointings and

things', 91-94,179f, 227f In Hsiin-tzu's 'Correction of names', 91, 263 In the 'Great M a n ' , 209 Cf. M e a n i n g Chih 'intent, attention' (sustained attention to something and the orientation of action towards it), 27,146 For Confucius, 27f Mohist doctrine of 'Heaven's i n tent', 48f In Chuang-tzu, 187 Compared w i t h Western concept of w i l l , 354 Examples: 241f, 260f, 263, 352f Chi-hsia %L f , Academy 95,100, 112, 237, 267 C h ' i n dynasty (221-209 B.C.), 2, 4 Reunification of the Empire by Legalist policies, 370-2 Suppression of schools, 32, 371f Ching jfjf" 'quintessence, quintessential' (the finest, purest and most vitalising of the ch'i 102, 334) Examples: 244f, 332, 338, 357, 382 A n d Yangist 'genuineness', Example: 57 In the 'Inward training', 101-104 Ching shen 'quintessential and daimonic', Examples: 192, 378 Ching as finest divisions, Examples: 206, 210 Ch'ing >\% , variously translated (how things and situations are i n themselves, independently of how we name or describe them), 98f

Of situations, tr 'fact', 206, 288 Of a thing, the sine qua non i n it for allowing it the name, the 'essentials', 97-100,128,144f, 195, 208, 237,240, 252, 264, 278, 284, 309, 362 Compared w i t h Aristotelian essence, 99,128, 410, 417 Of the Way, tr 'identity', 182,188 For H s i i n - t z u , the 'authentic' i n m a n , how he is without moral training, primarily the passions, 242-245 Chiu huang fu J L 'Nine A u g u s t Ones', 296 Choice, moral, 398f Insignificant for Confucius, 27f, 385 Significant for Mohists and Yangists, 59; for Mencius, 130f; for H s i i n - t z u , 245, 252-4 Metaphor of weighing on scales, 57-59, 252; of crossroads, 27, 59 Rejected by Taoists, 186 C h o u dynasty (c.1040-256 B.C.), 1 Date of foundation, In Its culture as Confucian ideal, 9-12, 31, 256 Chuang 'characteristics' Examples: 81, 266, 274 Related as category w o r d to C h i nese language structure, 420 Cf. Mao 'features' Chuang-tzu ^ ± -J" Composition of book, 172-174 Yangist chapters, 55 Primitivist chapters, 73f, 306-11 Syncretist stratum, 374-6 Chung 'loyalty, doing one's best

for others', 21 C h i a Yi's definition, 21 Ch'uan 'weighing' (of benefit and harm), 145,157, 209 N o u n ch'uan 'positional advantage' used for 'leverage' i n Later M o h i s t mechanics, 164 Chun-tzu j£ ^f - 'gentleman', 19 The exemplary person for C o n fucians, 19 Not for Mohists, 34 City Weber's contrast between European and Asiatic city, 300 Class/member, 82-90. See also Chienl t'i, Lei Class, social The four classes, knights, peasants, craftsmen, merchants, 3 Class war, 35 Mohists and craftsmen, 3, 33-35 Shen-nung school and peasants, 3, 66 L u Pu-wei as merchant, 373 A l l schools i n or near knightly class, 3 Increasing social mobility (cf. Shang hsieri), 2f, 35 Classics, Confucian, 31, 379 Late recognition of Yi, 327, 330, 359 Compass Geomancer's and mariner's, 316, 349 Concern. See Ai Concepts Comparing Chinese w i t h Western, 396 Never quite equivalent, 302, 396, 408

Conceptual schemes, 23, 331, 428 'Conforming upwards'. See Shang t'ung Confucian school Its centrality, 31-33 Eight sects, 236 Ascendancy from 100 B.C., 374, 378 Cf. JK Constant. See Ch'ang 'constant' 'Constantly balanced granary' Origins, 69, 73 Constituent. See Ts'ai Contradiction Relation to the converse i n Later Mohist argumentation, 167 H a n Fei's 'spear and shield', 280 Cf. Pei 'inconsistent' Correlative thinking A Jakobsonian description, 320-22 Its relation to analytic thinking, 322-4, 384,405, 416 Correlative system-building, 243, 322 In Huai-nan-tzu cosmogony, 333-8 Cosmos as organism, 334f Kepler's system, 339f H o p i system, 340 Western correlations of races, 318, 340 In Greek medicine, 354 In Chinese medicine, 326, 328, 352-4 In organising community i n relation to cosmos, 350, 356 Scepticism about correlative system-building, 162, 318f Cf. Lun 'sort out', Parallelism,

Causation Cosmogony In Huai-nan-tzu, 332-8 N o cosmogonic m y t h , 12 N o Creator, 203 Counterfactuals, 165, 397f. See also Shih 'to cause' Craftsmen, 2 A n d Mohist school, 33-35,161 In Chuang-tzu, 186-191,198 Criterion. See Yin 'go b y ' Crossroads A s metaphor for choice, 27-59 Custom In Confucianism, 6, 33 In M o h i s m , 40 In Legalism, 270, 301 In Yangism, 57 In Kuan-tzu, 301 In Taoism, 68, 310f Death Reconciliation w i t h death a central concern of Chuang-tzu, 175f, 202-204 Pursuit of physical immortality. See Elixir Question whether the dead have consciousness, 16f, 38, 259, 396 Deconstruction A s the strategy of Lao-tzu, 227229, 323 Definition Later Mohist, 110,137-169 passim H s i i n - t z u , 244f, 262 C h i a Y i , 21, llOf Development of the art of definition, llOf H u i Shih's definition by ana-

logue and differentia, 81 Interlocking definitions, HOf, 191 N o strict definition i n Chinese?, 402 N o m i n a l not real definition, 418 Democracy, 4,115, 299f Desire. See Yii 'desire' Despotism, Oriental, 300 Destiny. See Ming 'decree' Discourse Later Mohist art, 147-155 Possibly named lun 'sorting out', 167 ' D i v i d i n g d o w n and adding u p ' , as contrasting tendencies of C h i nese and of Western thought, 262, 286, 401, 417 Related to Chinese and IndoEuropean language structure, 401f, 411, 419 Divination In Shang and C h o u , 358 Scepticism about, 237, 239-241, 368, 396 By Wu hsing, 367 System of Yi, 358-370 'Doctrine of the M e a n ' (Chung yung ^ ) f ), 108,132,134-137, 204, 250 Documents (Shu ching ^ 6«? ), 10, 14, 31,293 'Great Plan', 326, 342, 348 Forgery of pre-Chou documents, 293 D o i n g nothing. See Wu wei 'doing nothing' Dream Later Mohist definition, 140 Chuang-tzu on dreaming, 194f In Hsiin-tzu, 253

Ego, 197, 387 Chuang-tzu o n T , 182,194 Egoism, philosophical Yangist selfishness is not egoism, 61-63,193, 386 Absence of egoism as a difference between Chinese and Western traditions, 61-63, 248, 386 'Elevation of worth'. See Shang hsien Elixir of life, 5,16,171, 372f, 379 Ends and means, themes related to T h i n k i n g i n terms of desire and intent rather than of goals; Confucius, 27 In terms of what action is 'for the sake o f (wei -Mj); Yangists (for one's person rather than possessions), 58f; Later Mohists (for each person including oneself), 145 Later Mohist definition of wei, 145 Joy self-evidently valuable for Confucians, not for Mohists, 41 Cf. Utilitarianism Entification, 398-400; See also Hypostatisation Equality, themes related to Elevation of worth. See Shang hsien H u m a n nature as equal i n all (good, bad, mixed, neutral) or as good i n some and bad i n others, 117f Equality of concern for each i n M o h i s m , 42f, 158f Economic egalitarianism i n

Shen-nung Utopianism, 66f, 70 Legalist equality before the law, 276f Taoist deconstruction of superior/inferior, 222-231 Essence, Aristotelian, 99,128, 222. See also Ch'ing A n d existence, 407 Ethics The Later Mohist ethical system, 144-146,156-160 The problematic of Chinese moral philosophy, 383-387 Examinations, civil service, 283 Excluded middle, 167 Exemplar. See Yi 'exemplar' Expounding the Canons, 109,138, 156-160 Fa j £ 'standard, law', 273-8 Examples: 226, 301, 362f Compasses and L-square as the typical fa, 273-5 Fa as standard i n naming for Later Mohists, 148,167, 273; their definition, 148 Changing standards, 215 Sages as the standard for M e n cius, 273f The 'Seven Standards' of Kuantzu, 274f Legalism: law as the standard enforced by punishment, 270, 275-8 Cf. Punishment Fact/value dichotomy Its absence i n classical Chinese thought, 29, 262, 274, 355 Its absence for correlative think-

ing, 321f, 350, 355 Cf. Quasi-syllogism, 'Ought' and 'is' Faculty. See Ts'ai 'Family resemblance', Wittgensteinian, 323, 336, 396 Fang shih 7T ' M e n of secret arts', 171, 328, 330, 377 Fang shu 'tradition of a formula' and Tao shu i j t -ST 'tradition of the Way', 376 Farmers' school (Nung chia %^*%-X 65n, 66, 381 Fatalism. See Ming 'decree' Fen 'portion' (one's socially fixed portion i n life) In Later M o h i s m , 146,158 In Hsun-tzu, 244, 255 Fief. See Kuo 'state' Five Emperors (pre-dynastic rulers from Yellow Emperor to Shun), 256, 370 Five Materials. See Wu ts'ai Five Processes. See Wu hsing 'Fixing ahead'. See Ch'i 'fix ahead' Four Elements, 320 Greek 'Four Elements' compared w i t h Wu hsing, 356 Their correlations, 318, 354 Cf. Wu hsing Four Humours, 320, 354 Freedom, themes related to, 302f A l l but Mohists and Legalists object to order imposed by force, 299 Confucianism: ceremony vs law, 13f, 302 Yangism: personal genuineness vs convention, 57 Taoism: personal spontaneity vs

Convention, 303-5 For comparable Chinese concepts, cf. Tzu and Tzu jan Cf. A n a r c h i s m Gentleman. SeeChün-tzu 'gentleman' Genuineness. See chen 'genuine' Geometry Mohist, 144 Absence of geometrical proofs i n Chinese tradition, 160 'Ghost i n the machine', 26 Ghosts. See Kuei 'ghosts' Gnomon In astronomy, 165f Mohist three tests of argument as 'Three Gnomons', 37, 52 G o d . See also Ti ' G o d ' , Tsao wu che N o Creator, 203 Gods Of mountains and rivers, 15, 38, 47-49. See also Shen 'daimon' Golden Rule, i n ethics, 20f G o o d . See Shan 'good' Grammar (of Classical Chinese). See Language, Chinese 'Great Learning' (Ta hsüeh ), 132-134, 302 'Great M a n ' writer (in Chuang-tzu), 205-211 'Greater community' and 'Lesser prosperity'. See Ta t'ung and hsiao k'ang Guilt and shame, 48 H a n dynasty (206 B . C . - A . D . 220), 3

H a n History (Han shu) ÜF bibliography, 66, 72, 235f, 268, 379-81

Han Fei tzu -f" , 269,380 ' H a r d and white'. See Chten-ptd Harmony. See Ho 'harmony' Heart. See Hsin 'hearf Heaven. See Tien 'Heaven' Hedonism, 60 Hereditary principle Progressively abandoned i n appointment for office, 2,373 Mohist 'elevation of worth'. See Shang hsien Some extend 'elevation of worth' to the throne itself, 292-9 Ho fa 'Harmony', 135, 305 Examples: l l f , 241f, 244,261, 298f Ho-kuan-tzu %^^f 215f, 2 % , 305, 311, 379 Date of composition, 296 Hopi Cosmological scheme, 340 Language, 423 Hsia dynasty First dynasty, of uncertain historicity, 1,14 Hsia pi ~ F tb'allying w i t h others below' A n d Mohist 'conforming u p wards', 46, 300 For Shen Tao, 301f Hsiang 'model' Examples: 261, 360, 364 In Lao-tzu, 221 In Yi, 362-364 One of 'Seven standards' i n Kuan-tzu, 274f A l s o tr 'image', 199 H a n Fei's etymology, 362 Heavenly bodies as, 241,363 Hsien %j 'beforehand' Later Mohist usage approxi-

mates to 'a priori', 110,143-147 Chains of definitions establishing the circle as k n o w n 'beforehand', 144; establishing the moral virtues as desired 'beforehand', 144-147,190 Hsien T'ien ^ ^ 'ahead of Heaven', 361 Acting ahead of Heaven, 367 Hsien T'ien sequence of hexagrams, 361 Hsz'n 'heart' (Organ of thought and judgment, not i n traditional C h i n a located i n the brain; the common translation ' m i n d ' is suitable only for post-Buddhist texts), 25f 'Heart inside the heart', 103 Chuang-tzu on, 182,192,198 Sung H s i n g o n , 95f 'Inward training' o n , 101 Mencius on, 131 H s i i n - t z u on, 245, 251-4, 264f Canons locate knowledge not i n heart but i n wits or intelligence, 140 Hsin -jg" 'trustworthy' Later Mohist definition, 169 Trustworthiness as one of five cardinal virtues, 381 Hsing 'nature' (of a specific thing) Relation to sheng J L 'life; generation', 56,118,135,191, 244, 248, 400 For Confucius, 15,18 Yangist 'keeping one's nature i n tact', 56f, 108 H u m a n nature for Shih Shih a

mixture of good and bad, 117, 125,127f For Kao-tzu neutral, 117-121 For Mencius good, 117-132 For H s i i n - t z u bad, 244-251 Victory of Mencian doctrine i n Sung Neo-Confucianism, 108, 213 Problem a purely Confucian issue, 193, 233, 272 Definition of Kao-tzu, 119; of 'Doctrine of the mean', 134; of H s i i n - t z u , 244; of Yi, 364; of Chuang-tzu, 191 Examples of non-human natures, 56,119,121, 274 Hsing î\£ 'shape' (the configuration w h i c h distinguishes a concrete thing from the amorphous) The Way has no shape, 182,188 Heaven and earth taking shape out of the ch'i, 175, 332 The Way above taking shape below as things w i t h functions, 363 Shape and colour of the white horse, 85f Of action taking the defined form by w h i c h it can be judged. See Hsing ming The point and the infinite do not have shape, 206 Hsing %J 'proceed' (literally 'go') Later Mohist technical term for proceeding from what is so i n an instance to what is so of the k i n d , 149,184 Used by H s i i n - t z u , 263f

Hsing also has an ethical usage as 'conduct', 96, 327 Cf. Wu hsing Hsing ming if} & 'shape and name', 283-285, 288, 374f Hsün-tzu sj -f-, 235-267 Huai-nan-tzu, 54, 304 Cosmogony, 238, 332-339 Procedure for measuring cosmos, 164-6 Huang-Lao ^ , 112,170, 286f, 374, 377, 379 ' H u n d r e d clans'. See Pai hsing ' H u n d r e d clans' Hypostatisation Encouraged b y Indo-European languages, 228, 394,399-401 Idea. See also Yi 'idea' Platonic ideas compared with hsiang 'models', 363 Identity Supposed confusion with class membership i n 'White horse', 82f The particle of identity chi t p , 410 'Identity' used to translate 'ch'ing' of Way. See Ch'ing. Impulse. See Chi 'impulse' Inconsistency. See Pei 'inconsistent' Individualism, themes related to Yangist 'valuing s e l f , 53-63 Later Mohist ethic rationalised i n terms of individuals, 159 Inevitable. See Pu te yi 'inevitable' Inference. See T'ui 'infer' Infinity. See Space Inner classic of the Yellow Emperor

(Huang-ti nei-ching & X 352-5 Inner/outer dichotomy. See also Subjectivity Instruments. See Ch'i 'instruments' Insult A s reason to fight, 62f Insult not a disgrace, 96f, 264 Integrity. See Ch'eng 'integrity' Intent. See Chih 'intent' Intention. See Yi 'idea' Invention M o - t z u defends invention, 39 N o looking forward to progress by invention, 251f China's fertility i n basic inventions, 315-7, 369 Invention i n 'Great A p p e n d i x ' , 368f 'Investigation of things'. See Ke wu 'Inward training' (Neiyeh P^) 100-105,112,188-245. Iron, late introduction of, 2, 276 Jan 'so' Jan 'so (= like it)' phonetically related to jo -£ 'like', 144 Cf. Shih a n d / r i , Tzu and Tzu jan Jen fc- 'Benevolence', (in the Analects translated 'nobility' 19) Relation to jen A . 'human beings' (originally the noble clansmen), 19,136 Confucius finds a disinterested benevolence central to being noble or h u m a n , 19-22 For Mencius benevolence has become the meaning of the w o r d , 112f

Definitions: Later Mohist, 146; H a n Fei, 111; Chia Y i , 110 In Lao-tzu, 231 In Hsiin-tzu, 255 Jesuits i n C h i n a , 15 Ju \% , 31, 377 Whether wholly Confucian, 31f Cf. Confucian school Judo, 234 Kabbalah, 4, 318 Kan jIL 'arouse' and ying Jff| 'respond', 135, 244, 260, 385 Resemblance to neurological stimulation and response, 245 Related to ergative verb functions, 422 Examples of Ying used alone, 192, 245 Kewu $r$J 'arriving at the things', 134 K i n d . See Lei K i n g . See Wang 'king' Knightly class. See Shih 'knights' Knowledge, 384f. See also Chih 'knowing', Mirror, Ming 'illumination' K o a n (Zen Buddhist), 205 K'o "31" 'admissible' (of affirmation) 'possible' (of process) The logically admissible, 168, 185. Examples: 75,85-87, 92-95,167,177,179,184f The morally admissible, 252 Physical possibility contrasted w i t h personal ability, 249f Ku ik. 'reason' (more literally 'what precedes, what is at the back o f ) , 41,161 Examples: 148,152,153 ('differ-

ent reasons'), 264 Later Mohist definition, 161f A s cause, 77 In other usages translated; 'original' (preceding state of a thing), 124f; 'Fact' (fact behind the statement), 154; 'what is at the back o f 370 A s particle ku 'therefore', passim 'Reason' occasionally also translates So-yi -ftj. JLy '(reason) why' Kuan-tzu - f - , 100, 267f, 379 'Inward training' (ch 49), 100-105 Admonitions' (ch 26), 118f, 250, 294 'Extravagance' (ch 35), 272 'Seven standards' (ch 6), 274f 'Nine maxims' (ch 55), 284 'Correcting the age' (ch 47), 301 Calendrical chapters, 330, 341, 344f, 356 'Water and earth' (ch 39), 356-8 Kuei 'ghosts' Sacrifice to spirits of ancestors, 15f, 47-49, lOOf, 258f Consciousness of dead widely questioned, 16f; affirmed by Mohists, 38; denied by H s i i n tzu, 259 Stories of seeing ghosts accepted i n Mo-tzu, 38; derided by H s i i n - t z u , 254 Kuei-ku-tzu Kung-sun Lung-tzu ^ f^ -JLast half of book a late forgery, 82 Date of anonymous commentary, 87 Kuo 11 'state, fief (the C h o u fiefs

SUBJECT INDEX

w h i c h developed into independent states) Fiefs, enfiefment, 2f, 68f, 371f Labour, division of M o - t z u , 65 Mencius, 70f H s i i n - t z u , 256 Language Inadequacy of language for Taoists, 178,199-202 Yi diagrams as supplementing verbal language i n Yi A p p e n dices, 363f Chuang-tzu's three ways to use language, 200f, 230 Cf. Cheng ming, Ming and shih, Tz'u Language, Chinese N o m i n a l and verbal sentences, 391, 399, 408-10, 416, 418 N o u n and verb, 391 Sentence and nominalised clause, 391, 406 Nominalisation of verb, 399f Ergative and neutral verbs, 392, 395, 421f Mass, count and generic nouns, 392, 420 Word order, 391 Grammatical particles, 391 Adjectives not nominal but verbal, 391, 394, 406, 418, 420 Little study of grammar in traditional C h i n a , 390f Subject and predicate, 154, 394f, 416, 418 Sortals, 401f Contrasted w i t h Indo-European languages, 228, 389-428

487

See also Script, Tz'u, Parallelism, Logic Lao tzu yfr-f-, 68, 215-235, 285290, 300 Law. See Fa 'standard' Laws of nature, 274 Legalist school (Fa chia ^"^L), 72f, 267-292 Legalism under C h ' i n and H a n , 371-380 Convention of ascribing texts to chief ministers, 72n, 267f Lei M ' k i n d ' , 417 Examples: 147-149,154,180, 257, 274, 333, 362 One of four types of the similar, 147f C o m m o n names as names of kinds, 140, 264 Incomparability of different kinds, 416 Lever, 163f Li ;fjt 'ceremony', 11 For Confucius, 11-18, 22-25; for Mohists, 40,158; for Yangists, 57; for Mencius, 112; for H s i i n tzu, 255-261; for Shang-tzu (translated 'convention'), 270f; forShenTao,270, 301 Li ^'J 'benefit, profit' and hai ^ 'harm' In M o h i s t utilitarianism, 37-41 In Yangism, 56-59 Li disliked by Mencius as utilitarian term, 41, 96,114 Later Mohist definitions, 145 Li M. pattern', 286, 356 'The patterned and the right', 126, 305 Li i n the 'Great M a n ' writer, 207-

209 Li i n Hsiin-tzu, 249-254 The pattern of heaven and earth is for H s i i n - t z u imposed b y m a n , 240, 242f H a n Fei on pattern and the Way, 286-8 In Neo-Confucianism, 286 A s structure of sentence, 154 Li-tzu 4, 72, 267 Lieh-tzu }\] - f - , 60, 79, 91,172, 200 'Likening to oneself. See Shu 'likening to oneself Life. See Hsing 'nature' Liu fu / f t 'Six Stores', 326 ' L o d g i n g ' . See Yu 'lodging' Logic Its historical transmission i n the West and i n C h i n a , 6f Buddhist, 7 Later Mohist proto-logic, 137-170 passim Logical exploration beginning i n the spirit of play, 7, 75f Chinese language and logic, 399, 403f, 408, 412 Cf. Pien 'argumentation', Rationality, Self-reference Love. See At 'concern' Loyalty. See Chung 'loyalty' Lii spring and autumn (Lii-shih ch'unch'iu) & ] ^ , 54f, 108, 214f, 217, 224, 297f Its syncretism centred o n not Lao-tzu but Yangism, 373f Its cosmological scheme, 329, 341-3, 351f, 354f Lun IBJ- 'sorting out' (arranging and grading i n coherent discourse)

The M o h i s t art of discourse may be lun, 167 Chuang-tzu allows lun but not argumentation, 189,192f Examples: 267, 330 Macrocosm and microcosm, 338f Magic Ceremony as magical for C o n fucius, 13, 23 Magic and proto-science, 318, 349f Homeopathic and contagious, 350 Magic square, 348f Maker of things. See Tsao wu che Mandala form, 342f, 346-8 Mandate of Heaven Overthrow of dynasties explained by loss of mandate, 1 In Mo-tzu, 47,52 In Mencius, 115-117, 294 Concept ignored b y C h ' i n and early H a n , 371, 374 Cf. Tien ming Mao |t'features', 420 Translated 'characteristics' (used verbally, 'describe') i n Later Mohist writings, where it replaces chuang 'characteristics' Examples: 140,148,150 'Mass noun hypothesis' 83, 262, 401f Ma-wang-tui manuscripts, 170, 216n, 218, 219n, 285, 296n, 327, 330, 374, 379 Mechanics Later Mohist, 163f Medicine, 162, 326, 328, 352-4 Meditation

In 'Inward training', 100-105 In Chuang-tzu, 109f Meaning Use of 'meant by' i n translating sentences w i t h wei 'call', 417 Relation to chih 'pointing', 227f Mencius (Meng-tzu), 111-132 Metaphor and metonym, 315n, 321, 335-7, 339, 349f, 352 M e t h o d . See Shu 'method' M i n d . See also Hsin 'heart' Ryle on, 324 Absence of mind/body dichotomy i n early C h i n a , 25,103, 188,199,238 Ming 8ft 'clarity, luminous, illumination', 178, 385 Examples used of clear sight: 140 Examples used of clear understanding: 105,140f Of the unverbalised k n o w i n g w h i c h clearly mirrors things, 178f, 224, 226, 229 For cognition Chuang-tzu prefers to chih ' k n o w ' , 178 The 'clear-sighted ruler', Examples: 288f Cf. Mirror, Shen ming Ming ^ 'decree, destiny' (primarily 'decree') Destiny as the decreed by Heaven,17 Destiny as an entity distinguished from Heaven, 38, 50 For Confucius 17; for C h u a n g tzu, 176,196; for Mencius, 129f, 136f Mohist attack o n fatalism, 38, 50f Cf. T'ien ming

Ming

'name' and shih ^ 'object', 91,191, 210, 227f, 284, 378 (Ming is related to ming 'decree', cf, 23; shih is literally 'solid, real', 140, cf. Shih and hsu)

Theories of naming: Later M o h ist, 138,140f, 150f; H s i i n - t z u , 261-7 N a m i n g i n Lao-tzu, 219-222, 226 N a m i n g is by convention, 177f, 184, 266 For Chuang-tzu, it is arbitrary, 177f, 196 See also Cheng ming, Hsing ming, Language, Wu 'thing' Mirror Inversion of image i n concave mirror, 163 M i r r o r i n g as metaphor for knowledge, 192, 253f Burning mirror, 333 M o d e l . See Hsiang 'model' Mohist school, 35 Three sects, 35,51-53 Social origin, 33-35 Ten doctrines, 35f A n d 'Protestant ethic and spirit of capitalism', 45 Later Mohist thought, 7, 81f, 107-111,137-170 A n d Sophists, 75f A n d H s i i n - t z u , 236, 257f, 261 M o n i s m and dualism In Neo-Confucianism, 363 Cf. O n e Morality. See Yi 'the right' Mo-tzu - l r -IfComposition of core chapters (ch 8-37), 35f

Composition of Later Mohist d i alectical chapters (ch 40-45), 137-139 Military chapters (ch 52-71), 34 Transmission of the text, 6 Mourning Confucian three-year mourning, 28f, 258f Mohist criticism, 39 Mockery of mourning by Chuang-tzu, 175f, 203 M u s i c . See Yuen 'music' Mysticism In 'Inward training', 100-105 In Mencius, 127 In Chuang-tzu, 189 In Lao-tzu, 234f Yangism not mystical, 56 Names. See Ming 'names', Cheng ming, Hsing ming Names and objects, Later M o h i s t treatise, 138,150-155, 263f, 391 Nature Of a specific thing. See Hsing 'nature' Cf. also Tien 'Heaven' (which at its least personal approximates to 'Nature' as an impersonal principle) and Tzu jan 'being so of itself (spontaneous or natural) Necessity. See Pi 'necessary' Needle and dial, 349 Neo-Confucianism, 404 A n d li 'pattern', 286, 314 A n d goodness of human nature, 108, 213, 313f M o n i s m and dualism, 363 N i n e August Ones. See Chiu huang

Nobility. See Jen 'benevolence' (Outside the Analects 'noble' represents other words than jen) N o m i n a l i s m and Realism, 81-83, 140f, 264f N o Realism i n Chinese tradition, 82f, 363 Chinese nominalism related to language structure, 410, 418, 421 Cf. Idea Numerals Place value system, 316f Numerology, 318, 341f, 344, 346, 360-362 One The O n e behind the many, 103, 202, 222 U n i t y of everything affirmed by H u i Shih, 78f; Chuang-tzu's criticisms, 181 U n i t y w i t h i n variety, 198 Taoist ambivalence towards the concept of the One, 181, 205, 221 U n i f y i n g function of the heart for H s i i n - t z u , 253 Ontological argument Compared w i t h K u o Hsiang's argument for the non-existence of a maker of things, 411f Translation i n modern Chinese, 412-4 Oppositions, chains of, 321 In Yin-Yang scheme, 223, 331, 333f Western contrasted w i t h C h i nese, 227, 378

SUBJECT INDEX

Cf. Binary distinctions Optics Later Mohist, 163 O p t i m i s m and pessimism, 202 Order. See Chih 'order' Original Sin (Christian), 248 ' O u g h t ' and 'Is', 355 N o word comparable with 'ought' distinguishing prescriptive utterance i n classical period, 355 Cf. Fact/value dichotomy Overlord. See Wang and Pa Paihsing W - i i ' H u n d r e d clans', 38 Paradigm and syntagm Jakobsonian, 320f, 333f, 338, 343, 350, 354f, 405 K u h n i a n paradigm-shift, 314n, 323 Parallelism, stylistic Relation to correlative thinking, 254, 324f, 404f, 419f Later Mohist definition of mou f f 'parallelising', 155 Pei ^ ' i n c o n s i s t e n t ' (used especially of claims w h i c h are selfrefuting because self-contradictory), 185f Philosophes (18th century) Respect for Confucius, 15, 22, 283 Pi ·,& necessary' Later Mohist concept of logical and causal necessity, 140n, 142 Later Mohist definition, 143 (Adverbial pi is regularly translated 'necessarily' only for the Later Mohist corpus 142-169

491

passim; for other texts, w h i c h use it more loosely, we use also 'surely, inevitably', etc.) Pieh yu %t\ Hj 'separating pens' (distinguishing the viewpoints restricted by different prejudices), 97 Pien f l f 'argumentation, arguing out alternatives' (literally 'distinguishing', between right and w r o n g alternatives), 36, 198,384,409 Later Mohist definition, 167 Origins i n early M o h i s m , 36 Sophists as pien che 'those w h o argue out', 75 Arguments of K u n g - s u n L u n g translated, 85-95 Later M o h i s t arguments translated, 84f, 140,141,169,183186 Yangist pien, 55f, 308 Chuang-tzu on pien, 178-180, 183,198 See also Lun Poetry Lao-tzu a philosophical poem, 218 Verse i n other philosophical texts, 100, 208, 214 Point, geometrical For H u i Shih, the 'dimensionless' (wu hou Jg£ J^. 'without bulk'), 78-80 For Later Mohists, the startingpoints of measurements (See tuan 'starting-point'), 75,160f Indivisibility, 206 Pointing. See Chih 'pointing' Population growth, 271-273

Portions. See Fen 'portions' Possibility. See K'o 'admissible' Power-base. See Shih 'power-base' Prices For Later Mohists, fixed by supply and demand, 34,160 'Primitivist' writer (in Chuang-tzu), 74, 306-311, 381f 'Principles'. Cf. Tse 'principles' Proceeding. See Hsing 'proceeding' Punishment Disliked by Confucius, 14 Rejected b y Shen-nung Utopians, 67, 73 Exalted by Legalists, 275-277 Mutilation abolished under H a n , 373 Penal law: i n early C h o u , 14; earliest public codes, 276 Pu te yi ^ 'the inevitable' (more literally 'what one cannot do otherwise'), 190f Pythagorean theorem, 160 Quality, Aristotelian, 413, 420f Moral qualities, 424 Cf. Chuang 'characteristics', Mao 'features' Quantifiers Later M o h i s t definitions, 144 'Quasi-syllogism', 29 A s explanation of w h y the 'fact/ value' distinction does not arise i n classical Chinese thought, 29,110,146,193, 209, 233 A s establishing the problematic of Chinese moral philosophy, 383 Valid for us too?, 387

Cf. Spontaneity Quintessence. See Ching 'quintessence' Rationality, 6f Develops with controversy between schools, 75 'Three Gnomons' of early M o hism, 37-39, 395 Analysis as criticism of correlation or as independent of correlation, 155 The two distinguished by Later Mohists as arts of discourse and of argumentation, 155 Distinguished by H s i i n - t z u , 267 Argumentation of Sophists, 7595; of Later Mohists, 139-170 In other schools analysis not detached from correlation, 254, 322f, 384 Chuang-tzu's anti-rationalism, 176-183 Later M o h i s m vs Chuang-tzu's anti-rationalism, 110,183-186 'Great M a n ' compromise, 204-11 Anti-rationalism and irrationalism, 194 M a n k i n d distinguished by morality not by reason, 129, 255 Cf. Logic, Science, Lun 'sorting', Pien 'argumentation' Reality and appearance The 'naive realism' of early C h i nese thought, 194, 200, 223 N o appearance/reality dichotomy, 194, 222f Tao not absolute reality, 199, 222f, 228, 234f Cf. Dream, Shih and hsu

Record of ceremony (Li chi f £,), 31,132, 217, 245, 292, 298f, 341 Relativism, 75 Linguistic, 414-416, 428 Religion C h o u cults of Heaven, gods and ancestors, 15 For Confucius, 15-18, 25, 48 For Mohists, 47 For Chuang-tzu, 48 Folk religion, 47 Right. O f the right thing to do i n one's social position, see yi 'right'. O f the right alternative i n judgments, seeshih 'is this'. River Chart and Lo Document, 347f Romanticism, Western Contrasted w i t h Taoism, 191 Sage. See Sheng 'sage' Sayings of the states (Km yii §1 f £ - ) , 100 School of names (Ming chia £ ^£) Retrospective H a n classification of Sophists and others, 75, 377-80 Schools, philosophical Ssu-ma T'ah's 'Six schools', 31, 171, 377f The nine schools of the Han History, 379-81 ]u (Confucians) as school, 31, 377 Mohists as school, 35 The rest retrospective classifications, 31 Suppression under C h ' i n , 371f Science The 17th c. Scientific Revolution, 317

Proto-science and modern science, 314f, 315-9 Science and magic, 318, 349f; and technology, 316f; a n d causal thinking, 317f; and correlative thinking, 317f Later Mohist science as causal thinking, 161-3, 316, 327 Yin-Yang cosmology as correlative thinking, 330-340 Legalism as social science, 269 Invention i n Yi appendices, 368f; i n Mo-tzu, 39 Scientific interests of H u i Shih, 77 H s u n - t z u 'scientific'?, 239-241, 251f Investigation of things i n 'Great learning', 134 H a n classification of sciences, 379f Failure of C h i n a to achieve m o d ern science a pseudo-problem, 317 See also Cause, Correlative thinking Script, Chinese, 5, 228, 389 Not ideographic, 389 Graphic differentiation of new terms, 19-27 passim, 56,133, 139,400 Standardisation by C h ' i n , 372 Self-deception, 133f Self-reference, logic of, 62,185f, 200 Sentence. See Tz'u 'sentence' 'Separating pens'. See Pieh yu Shamanism In C h ' u culture, 53, 237 A n d 'Inward training' medita-

tion, lOOf, 214 Shan J§- 'good' The most general evaluative concept (not prominent i n C h i nese philosophical terminology) defined by M e n cius, for w h o m h u m a n nature is shan, 146f 'Good/bad' dichotomy not deconstructed i n Lao-tzu, 231 In 'Great A p p e n d i x ' , 364 The Way not called good, 364 G o o d not conceived as quality but as a way, 424-426 Stillness of Taoist sage not called 'good', 192f ' G o o d ' names, 266 Shang or Y i n dynasty (?-c.l040 • B . C . ) , 1 , 4,14, 358 Shang hsien fgj 'elevation of worth' (promotion to office of best irrespective of birth) Mohist doctrine, 45, 51, 283, 292-4 Mencius dislikes, 45,115 H s i i n - t z u accepts, 45, 236f, 295 For Taoists objectionable as causing contention, 304 For Shang-tzu elevation of morally best is second of three historical phases, 271f Shang t'ung rnj |sj 'Conforming upwards' (centralisation of all authority) Mohist doctrine, 46f, 51, 300 'Shape and name'. See Hsing ming Shen ffi 'daimon, god' (verbal, 'be daimonic, be divine', used especially of the superlative i n sight of the sage, cf. 101)

A s 'gods', 15f, 47-49,115, 259 In 'Inward training', 100-105 Transitive use, tr. 'hallows', 188n Defined i n Yi A p p e n d i x , 241; i n Hsiin-tzu, 241 See Ching 'quintessence' Shen ming 'the daimonic and clearseeing', 101 Examples: 105, 362 In H s i i n - t z u , 252 Sheng ^ 'sage' (For all schools the ideal of the wisest man), 384 Different schools appeal to different ancient sage rulers, 6574 Shen-nung ideal, 64-74, 233, 374 The lost book Shen-nung %f J|_ , 66,72,381 Rejection of social and economic privilege and of rule by force, 66-72 In Yangist and Primitivist writings, 73f Criticised by Mencius, 70-72 Acknowledged as practicable i n the past but irrelevant to present by Legalists and Huainan-tzu, 67, 73, 271f Shih i 'knights' The knightly class, 2, 35, 292 'Scholars' only from H a n , 3 A l l philosophers in or near, 3 Increasing social fluidity, 35 Shih ^ 'Power-base' (primarily position of strength or weakness i n relation to situation), 278 Legalist discussions of the ruler's shih, 268, 278-282 Shih as an individual's social po-

sition, 97 A s 'situation' from w h i c h one sees, Example: 206 Shih -fit' to cause' Distinguished by Later Mohists from shih i n its primary sense, 'employ on a mission', 162 Chieh-tzu's 'Something causes it', 210 Outside technical contexts variously translated: 'make to', 249; 'be the agent', 198; 'make serve you', 240; 'employ', 182 Cf. as particle shih 'supposing that' (causing it to be that), counterfactual, 165, 397n, 398 Examples: 86, 88,93, 280, 410 Shih T ^ . 'this, is this' and fei 'is not' Used to judge between right and wrong alternatives i n pien 'argumentation' (when translated 'right' and ' w r o n g ' not to be confused with the moral concept yi, the 'right' as the socially fitting), 36,167f, 176183 Shih 'this' and jan 'so', 151,154, 168,184 Their relation to the grammar of nominal and verbal sentences, 154,408,420 Cf. Wei shih and yin shih Shih j|~ 'solid, full, real' and hsu ^ 'tenuous, empty, unreal', 222 O n l y the concrete is solid, real, 222 The empty or tenuous i n Taoism, 192,198, 235; i n Hsiin-tzu,

253; i n Han Fei tzu, 288 ' F u l l ' words and 'empty' words, 391 Cf. Ming and shih 'name and object' Shih-tzu f* -J- (syncretistic text, about 3rd century B . C ) , 20 Shu ^5 'likening to oneself The correlation of self and other crucial to Chinese ethical thinking, 20, 383 Shih-tzu definition, 20 For Confucius, 20f, 30,193, 385; Mencius, 109,127; 'Great learning', 133f; H s i i n - t z u , 20, 257; 'Seven standards', 274 Shu Hif 'method' (the traditional lore of a profession or craft) For Legalism, methods of bureaucratic organisation, 268 'Methods of heart', 274f Cf. Fang shu and Tao shu Similarity and difference four types i n Canons, 147f eight i n Names and objects, 153f In Jakobsonian linguistics, 321 In correlative thinking, 338, 404 A s theme of Sophists, 75, 78f; of Later Mohists, 147-155; of H s i i n - t z u , 264-6 Likeness as basis of naming, 140f, 264f; of a H u i Shih definition, 81 Cf. Analogy, Shu 'likening to oneself Six Stores. See Liufu Social contract, 46 Something and nothing. See Yu and Wu Songs (Shih ching tfM),

9-11,19,

31 Sophisms O f H u i S h i h , 78 O f K u n g - s u n L u n g , 85-95 Of other sophists, 81f, 91,149n Treatment of sophisms by Chuang-tzu, 80,178-181; b y Later Mohists, 81f, 149,160f; by 'Great M a n ' writer, 206, 210 Hsiin-tzu's dismissal of, 254f, 265f Supposed number and tense confusions, 403 Sophists Convenient term for the pien che 'those w h o argue out', 75 Greek Sophists, 75 Later classified under 'School of names', 75, 377f, 380 H u i Shih and K u n g - s u n L u n g , 76-95 Relation to Mohists, 75f Sorting. See Lun 'sorting out' Sorites, 24n Space and time Later M o h i s t definitions of yu ^ 'space' and chiu ^ 'dura­ tion', 142 Huai-nan-tzu definition of yu 'space' and chou 'time', 428 In Huai-nan-tzu cosmogony, 332 A s y m m e t r y of time and place i n Chinese language structure, 423, 427 Space finite or infinite, 78-80, 169f, 206, 209f 'Spillover saying' (chih yen J& ~B), 200t, 230 Spontaneity. See Tzu, and Tzu jan Of action, for Taoists, 186-194

Of the impulses to action, even for Confucians, 27f, 135 Spontaneity guided by knowl­ edge as the basis of Chinese ethics, 29,104,110,132,134, 191, 209, 248, 251, 284, 302f, 308, 355f, 383 In Western romanticism, 191 Spontaneity and h u m a n nature, 250f Spring and autumn (Ch'un-ch'iu Spring and autumn of Yen-tzu (Yentzu ch'un-ch'iu) -Щ--f~ j^f~ $L , 32 State. See Kuo 'state' Origin of government, 46, 73f, 255-257, 271f Stimulation and response. See Kan and Ying Stuff. See Ts'ai Subjectivity Absence of inner/outer dichot­ omy for Confucius, 25 Emergence of the distinction, 95-106,112f Morality external for Kao-tzu, internal for Mencius, 118-123 Substance Chinese thinking implies 'proc­ ess' rather than 'substance' ontology, 394,401 Aristotelian substance, 407,415 Suffering and mutilation In Chuang-tzu, 202 Sun-tzu Щ, -f-, 327 Supreme Pole. See T'ai chi Syllogism, 168, 267, 383 Synchronicity, 368f Syncretism, 5f, 171-173, 313, 398

Syncretist school, 381 System-building Metaphysical, 204 Correlative. See Correlative thinking Of social science. See Science Ta jen A . A . 'Great M a n ' and Ta fang A . 7T 'Great Scope', 205 Ta t'ung [sj 'Greater community' and hsiao k'ang M. 'lesser prosperity', 298 T'ai chi J^Jjzj*. 'Supreme Pole', 360 Tang % 'be plumb w i t h ' . In technical usage translated 'fit' (name fitting object), 'fit the fact', 168, 227 Examples: 285, 304 In Later M o h i s m , 167,185; Chuang-tzu, 196; Kuan-tzu, 284 Tr. 'plumb w i t h ' , 16 Tao £ff 'Way', (primarily 'path, road': for all schools the term for what they teach as man's proper course of action), 13f, 18, 362 1

Pairs w i t h te 'potency', 13,188, 218, 424, 426 A 'Doctrine of the M e a n ' definition i n terms of man's nature, 108 A Chuang-tzu definition i n terms ofte, 191 A s the path of heaven and earth as well as m a n , 18, 239 Verbal use of tao, 219 A Yi definition i n terms of Y i n and Yang, 364 For Taoists, the makeshift name for the unnameable i n union

w i t h w h i c h we are spontaneously on course, 188, 209f, 219-223, 226 Related as category w o r d to d i rective sentence position, 424 Not transcendent, 30, 363 Cf. Te 'potency', Li 'pattern' Taoist school (Tao chia ^ ) Lao-tzu and Chuang-tzu not associated before the H a n , 170, 376 Retrospectively classified under 'Taoist school' (Lao-tzw-centred syncretism) i n early H a n , 171,377f The Taoist church founded i n later H a n , 171, 314 The philosophy of spontaneity i n Lao-tzu, Chuang-tzu and their successors from the 3rd century A . D . ('Neo-Taoists') still conveniently called 'philosophical Taoism', 171f Cf. Huang-Lao Te 'potency' (personal capacity for the course of action w h i c h is the Way: phonetically related to te |lf- 'get' opposite of shih ^ ' l o s e ' ) , 13f, 25,193, 282, 308 Some translate it 'virtue', 13 Relation to the directive sentence position, 424,426 Five Potencies, 329, 341, 371 Definition i n Chuang-tzu, 191 Chuang-tzu's Eight Potencies, 190 Cf. Tao 'Way' Teleology, Aristotelian, 136 Things. See Wu 'things'

Three Ch'en ^ j t , 345 Three Dynasties The first three dynasties (Hsia, Shang, Chou), 12,14, 270 Ti ' G o d ' (high god of Shang dynasty), 1,188 T'ien ^ ' H e a v e n ' The high god of the C h o u , 1 Personal or impersonal, 17, 48f, 238f Confucius on, 17f Chuang-tzu on, 195-8 H s i i n - t z u o n , 238-244 Ho-kuan-tzu on, 215 Contrasted w i t h 'man', 107f, 191, 195-8, 239f Not transcendent, 30 The 4th c. B . C . metaphysical crisis as a split between Heaven and man, 107-110 Responsible for man's nature, 108, 245 A s ruling power and as the sky, 238 Mohist doctrine of 'Heaven's i n tent', 48f, 109 Cf. T'ien ming Reunification of Heaven and man, 313f, 381f T'ien ming ^ 4p- 'the decreed by Heaven' (of man's nature), 108, 134 See also Mandate of Heaven 'Tradition of a formula' and 'Tradition of the Way'. See Fang shu and Tao shu Transcendence, 30, 40, 42 Triad M a n as completing triad w i t h heaven and earth, 136, 213,

239f, 243, 259 Cf. Binary distinctions Tribalism A n d Shen-nung Utopia, 73 Legalists and the tribes of the West, 73 Trustworthy. See Hsin 'trustworthy' Truth, 168,177,194, 400 Truth and Way, 3 Ambiguities of 'true', 396 Does Chinese thought have the concept of Truth?, 393, 395f K'o 'admissible' and tang 'fit the fact', 168,185 For Chinese concepts comparable w i t h 'Truth' i n its various usages, cf. Chen 'genuine', Ch'eng 'integrity', Jan 'so', Shih 'is this', Hsin 'trustworthy', Tang 'fit the fact', K'o 'admissible', Ch'ing and Ku i n sense of 'fact' Ts'ai ffi , variously translated (primarily 'timber', the stuff i n a thing w h i c h its functions depend on, used for example of a person's talents), 356 Tr. 'the stuff he is made o f , 128 Tr. 'materials'. See Wu ts'ai Tr. 'faculty', 140 Tr. 'stuff, 245, 356 Tr. 'constituent', 366 Ts'an 'align' and wu ii. 'match' (title with performance) In Han Fei tzu, 283, 288 For examples of ts'an and wu i n other contexts cf., 144,149 Tsao wu che ijlf- 'Maker of things', 203,411 Tse H'J'principles'

Tse i n 'Seven standards' compared with laws of nature, 274, 286 Tso commentary (Tso chuan) t_ # 9f, 18, 276 and passim Proto-science i n , 325-8, 359, 361 Tuan 3$) 'emergent shoot, startingpoint' The 'Four Tuan' of Mencius, 126 A s the starting-point of a measurement, 160 Later Mohist definition, 160 T'ui 'infer' and yuan -JJL'adduce' (literally ' p u s h ' and 'pull') Later Mohist definitions, 155 T'ui lei 'extending from k i n d to k i n d ' , 149 T'ui of 'pushing' to higher generalisations or finer distinctions, 265 Tzu I] 'of itself, spontaneously' and Tzu jan 'so of itself, spontaneous', 190, 226, 288, 302f, 421 Examples: 136, 244, 280, 304f, 412 Tzu -f~, as term for philosophers, 379 Tz'u iff'sentence' Concept of sentence limited to Names and objects, 153, 267, 391 Mohist definiton, 154 Whether there are sentences i n Classical Chinese, 391, 393, 406 Universals. See Nominalism and Realism Utilitarianism

Mohist, 39-41 Yangist, 56 Its refinement i n Later M o h i s m , 144-146 Hostility of Mencius, 114 Chinese preoccupation w i t h the useful, 6f, 316f Utopias Shen-nung's, 65-70, 73f Taoist, 68f, 302-5,311 The Primitivist's, 306-311 In the 'Revolutions of ceremony', 298f Virtue. See Te 'potency' Wang _3L ' k i n g ' and Pa J| 'overlord', 1,113 Five Overlords, 270 War, 2f, 379 Condemnation of aggressive war by Mohists, 43, 52; by Sophists, 76; by Sung H s i n g , 95f Mohist specialisation i n defensive war, 33f, 44f Even defensive war ignored by Mo-tzu 'Purist', 44 Legalist militarism, 290f Water A s primal stuff, 356-8; for Thales, 356; for Kuan-tzu, 3568 A s Taoist metaphor, 192, 225, 357 Water tending downwards as metaphor for natural inclination, 121, 278 Swallowing little or much, 288 Water/fire opposition In C h i n a , 333-7, 344, 361, 366, 371

In the West, 354 Examples: 209, 255, 527 Way. See Tao Wei % 'artifice', 244 Hsiin-tzu's definition, 244f A s 'false' (contrasted with chen 'genuine'), Example: 178 Weighing Metaphor of scales for weighing courses of action, 27f, 57-59, 252, 275 See also Ch'uan 'weighing' Weights and measures In 'Seven standards', 274f Unification by C h ' i n , 275 Wei shih ^ '"This" which deems' and Yin shih 2] 7%. ' "This" according to what you go by' Technical terms i n Chuang-tzu, 179,181,190,197,201 'Western tradition' and 'Western civilization', 5 'White horse' Paradox of K u n g - s u n L u n g , 8 5 90,179f, 266, 408 Textual dislocation of 'White horse' dialogue, 82, 85 Whole/part and class/member, 8294,401 A n d 'field/focus', 401 See also Chienlt'i White Tiger discussions (Po hu t'ung

6

i t )/ 338, 382

W i l l . See Chih 'intent' Wu $7 'things' (kinds of things rather than particulars, w h i c h are shih 'objects'), 79f, 266 Generic n o u n , 402 Pointing out things from world,

91-94,180 Other things and self, 57,103 'Treating things as things' (wu wu), 198 'Thing' as the most general name, 140f, 265 Related as category word to C h i nese language structure, 418f Is Tao a thing?, 220f, 226 Cf. Ke wu Wu hsing J L ft 'Five Processes', 325, 340-356 (Some translate 'Five Elements' or 'Five Phases' cf., 326, 356) Not elements, 325f, 356 Conquest cycle, 296n, 326f, 329, 341, 345, 347 Conquest cycle rejected by Later Mohists, 162 Generation cycle, 330, 341, 345, 347 Supposed reference to use by Mencius a misunderstanding, 327 Absence i n Yi, 361 Wu ts'ai J L # 'Five Materials', 326 Wu wei Ja± ' D o i n g nothing' For Confucius, 14, 25 In Lao-tzu, 232-234, 385 In Legalism, 288-92, 374 Grammar of wei, 410,421 Yangists, 53-64,108f, 152,172f, 269 Contrasted w i t h moralistic hermits, 53, 55 Name of 'Yang C h u ' no more than a label, 54 Not philosophical egoists, 61-63 Yangism central to Lii spring and autumn syncretism, 373f

Hedonism of Lieh-tzu 'Yang C h u ' chapter not Yangist, 60 Yangist writings, 55 Chuang-tzu formerly Yangist?, 176 Yi jit'exemplar', 360 Examples: 274f, 360 Yi 'idea, intention: get idea of, intend' (the image rather than concept of a thing, and the movement to action with w h i c h one responds to it), 133, 200 Tr. 'have the image o f , 154 Tr. 'intend, intention', Examples: 103f, 132 Tr. 'idea', Examples: 78, 91,148, 156n, 169, 200, 206, 253,330, 362, 364 Yi 41, 'the right, righteous, morality' (the conduct prescribed as right for one's social position, distinct from shih which is the right of two alternatives i n argumentation), 11, 63, 97, 159, 298 Relation to yi 'fitting, appropriate', 11, 45, HOf, 242, 255f Definitions: Later Mohist, 146; H a n Fei, 111; C h i a Y i , 111 Conflict between Confucian and Mohist definitions, 177 External for Kao-tzu, internal for Mencius, 121-123 Is what distinguishes man from animal, 255 Morality unified by sages (Motzu), 45f; invented by sages (Hsiin-tzu), 247 Yi (Yi ching % £ f ), 9, 31,134,162,

358-70 Disputed meaning of title, 359f Dating of successive layers, 358f Reference i n Analects doubtful, 327 Not a classic for H s i i n - t z u , 327, 359 Recognition as classic, 330, 359 Available translations, 358n Philosophy of the Appendices, 136, 241, 250, 344, 347, 360-70 Yin 15) 'go by' (act or judge on the basis of) Its nominalisation i n Later M o hism (translated 'criterion'), 148f; definition, 148 In Chuang-tzu, 179 Cf. Wei shih and Yin shih Yin and Yang f£?% , 161, 203, 208f and passim A s shade and sunshine, two of the Six Oz'f, 325 Later emergence as the primal pair, the passive and active ch'i, 118, 328 Yin-Yang school, 328, 377 In proto-scientific explanation, 330-340 See also Opposition Yin Wen tzu X -J" Date of, 95n Yu 'there is, something' and wu jfe- 'there is not, nothing' Compared with Western 'Bei n g ' , 410^14 Something and nothing i n Chuang-tzu, 80,180f, 210; i n Lao-tzu, 219n, 222, 225; i n NeoTaoism, 411f In Classical Chinese grammar,

410f Yu "Mi 'lodging' (taking up position temporarily without settling there), 201 Yu $k. 'desire' For Confucius, 27 For Later Mohists: all ethical concepts grounded i n desire, 144-147 For Mencius: the good defined as the desirable, 126

Ambivalence towards desire i n Lao-tzu, 219f, 233, 252, 385 Fewness of essential desires for Sung H s i n g , 99f, 252, 265 Hsun-tzu's defence of the desires, 99f, 252, 256-8 Yueh $r 'music' For Confucius, l l f , 14 For M o - t z u , 40 Etymology ('joy'), 41, 259f Hsun-tzu's theory of, 259-61