Secret Subversion II: Mou Zongsan, Kant, and Early Confucianism 9781351242219

Table of contents :
Cover
Half Title
Series Information
Title Page
Copyright Page
Table of Contents
Part I The Arrogation of Conscience
1 Practical Reason at the Maximum and the Historical Development of Confucianism
Note
2 Mind and Ontology
Notes
3 Intellectual Intuition and Thing-In-Itself
Notes
4 Supreme Good and Perfection Religion
Notes
Part II The Graftage of History
5 Moral Metaphysics and Historical Philosophy Under the Concern for Chinese Problems
Notes
6 The Conception and Implication of the Philosophy of History
Notes
7 Conscience, History, and Perfection
Notes
8 The Third Period of Confucian Development and the Theory of Self-Negation of Conscience
Notes
Bibliography
Index

Citation preview

Secret Subversion II

This title critically examines Mou Zongsan’s philosophical system of moral metaphysics on the level of metaphysics and historical philosophy, which combines Confucianism and Kantian philosophy. Mou Zongsan (1909–​ 1995) is one of the representatives of modern Confucianism and an important Chinese philosopher of the twentieth century. The two-​volume set looks into the problems in the moral metaphysics by Mou and his systematic subversion of Confucianism on three levels: ethics, metaphysics and historical philosophy. In this second volume, the author critiques Mou’s philosophical development of Confucianism on the latter two levels. The first part analyzes Mou’s view on conscience as ontology and his interpretation of the heavenly principles in Confucianism, arguing that his theory in fact abolishes Confucian cosmology based on modern scientific concepts and speaks for modern humanity. The second part focuses on Mou’s remolding of historical philosophy based on the concept of freedom in Kant, Hegel, and modern Western philosophy, then assesses his ideological distortions of historical and political concepts in the Confucian tradition. The title will appeal to scholars, students, and philosophers interested in Chinese philosophy, Confucian ethics, Neo-​Confucianism, and Comparative Philosophy. Tang Wenming is a professor in the Department of Philosophy and Deputy Director of the Institute for Ethics and Religions Studies at Tsinghua University, China. He is also Secretary General of the Chinese Confucian Academy. His research areas are ethics, Chinese philosophy, and religious studies.

Routledge Studies in Contemporary Chinese Philosophy

It is widely recognized that in science, industry, and technology China is a modern superpower. However, there is still a common stereotype that Chinese philosophy consists of nothing but the earnest repetition of quaint sayings from long-​dead sages. In actuality, philosophy in China today is vibrant and intellectually diverse. The aim of this series is to publish translations of the best and most representative works by contemporary Chinese philosophers. The books in this series include contemporary studies of the history of Chinese or Western philosophy, as well as original works of research in ethics, political philosophy, metaphysics, and other areas. Routledge Studies in Contemporary Chinese Philosophy seeks to fill the large gap that currently exists in the study of Chinese philosophy by providing high-​quality translations to English-​ language scholars. Series Editor: Bryan W. Van Norden, Vassar College, USA Yong Li, Wuhan University, China Titles in this series currently include: A History of Classical Chinese Thought LI Zehou, translated by Andrew Lambert Moral Partiality Yong Li Secret Subversion II Mou Zongsan, Kant, and Early Confucianism Tang Wenming For more information, please visit www.routle​dge.com/​Routle​dge-​Stud​ies-​in-​ Conte​mpor​ary-​Chin​ese-​Phi​loso​phy/​book-​ser​ies/​RSCCP

Secret Subversion II Mou Zongsan, Kant, and Early Confucianism Tang Wenming

This book is published with financial support from China Book International. First published in English 2023 by Routledge 4 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN and by Routledge 605 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10158 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2023 Tang Wenming The right of Tang Wenming to be identified as author of this work has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. English Version by permission of SDX Joint Publishing Company. British Library Cataloguing-​in-​Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging-​in-​Publication Data A catalog record has been requested for this book ISBN: 978-​0-​8153-​7443-​5 (hbk) ISBN: 978-​1-​032-​30789-​3 (pbk) ISBN: 978-​1-​351-​24221-​9 (ebk) DOI: 10.4324/​9781351242219 Typeset in Times New Roman by Newgen Publishing UK

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Contents

PART I

The Arrogation of Conscience

1

1 Practical Reason at the Maximum and the Historical Development of Confucianism

3

2 Mind and Ontology

7

3 Intellectual Intuition and Thing-​in-​Itself

35

4 Supreme Good and Perfection Religion

69

PART II

The Graftage of History

93

5 Moral Metaphysics and Historical Philosophy under the Concern for Chinese Problems

95

6 The Conception and Implication of the Philosophy of History

101

7 Conscience, History, and Perfection

118

8 The Third Period of Confucian Development and the Theory of Self-​Negation of Conscience

133

Acknowledgements Bibliography Index

164 165 171

Part I

The Arrogation of Conscience

1 Practical Reason at the Maximum and the Historical Development of Confucianism

In the overview of Ontological Mind and Ontological Human Nature, Mou Zongsan puts forward an ideological framework of what he called “moral metaphysics” by “maximizing practical reason” at the critical absorption of Kant philosophy. In his view, nothing else could better reflect the spirit of Confucianism than the ideological framework. To sum up, practical reason is also moral reason in his ideological system that contains the following three teachings: first, the “self-​rigidity and pure connotation” of moral reason whose key is autonomy; second, moral reason “may reach its metaphysical meaning on account of its universal sentiment”; and third, “to achieve the current presentation of ontological moral reason in practical capacity.1 Meanwhile, Mou Zongsan mirrors the “Yun-​ men Three Teachings” in Buddhism thought to describe these three teachings and he proposes that they constitute the “basic theoretical model of the Perfection Religion”: namely, first, the pure meaning of moral reason corresponds to the teaching of prominent insight and experience; second, the metaphysical meaning of moral reason corresponds to the teaching of harmonious fit; and third, the presentational meaning of moral reason corresponds to the teaching of varying with relevant circumstances. Such transformed “Mou-​men Three Teachings” constitute the basic teachings of Mou Zongsan’s Confucianism, which is kept by his followers and successors. Mou Zongsan’s evaluation of Kant and his historical interpretation of the Confucian tradition are in line with basic teachings. First of all, practical reason at the maximum is put forward in the dialogue with Kant, which includes his judgment of Kant’s moral philosophy. Mou Zongsan believes that Kant’s metaphysics of morals clearly reveals for the first time the significance of pure moral rationality in the history of western philosophy which is worthy of recognition, but because of the limitation of Kant’s Christian cultural background and perceptual thinking, he fails to maximize practical reason; instead, he only constructs a moral theology in the realm of metaphysics. Although he forebodes metaphysics of morals in theory, he does not really complete it. Rather, he attempts to bridge the moral world and the natural world with aesthetic judgment. In other words, Kant only expresses his high perspicacity in the first meaning of practical reason at the maximum, DOI: 10.4324/9781351242219-2

4  The Arrogation of Conscience but never touches on the second and third teachings. The dialogue with Kant also reflects his certain affirmation on perceptual thinking and the sciences based on this thinking, which constitutes the main topic of the third stage of Confucianism advocated by him. Secondly, the theoretical origin of practical reason at the maximum lies in the understanding of Mou Zongsan of Song-​Ming Neo Confucianism, which is also the theoretical basis for Mou’s interpretation of Song-​Ming Neo Confucianism. He holds that, while measured with moral metaphysics, Song-​Ming Neo Confucianism can actually be identified as a system with three factions. Zhou Dunyi, Zhangzai, and Cheng Hao point out the unity of ontological mind and ontological human nature by means of the mutual domination between the subjective and objective sides, all of which constructs the perfection religion model of practical reason at the maximum. Thus, the new system of Song-​Ming Neo Confucianism comes into being. And subsequently, the system is divided into three factions: The first would be Hu Wufeng and Liu Jishan, who focus on “the evolution from the objective side to the subjective side” and “directly inherit the Perfection Religion of Cheng Hao” with the two teachings of “NijueTizheng” and “mind determining nature.” The second faction constitutes Lu Jiuyuan and Wang Yangming who focus on “the evolution from the subjective side to the objective side.” Though the objective side is “not so reasonable,” which “makes a sense of deficiency,” it finally turns perfect with the theory of “insight of bright and clear mind, extension of mind, and thorough nourishing of mind.” And the third faction would include Cheng Yi and Zhu Xi, who interpret mind and nature as different concepts within the teaching of a “suitable path” and stress “merely being but not at the same time activity” in principle and the natural body, as well as laying emphasis on investigating things to extend knowledge in mind cultivation. This is not only difficult to perfect but will also be merely the heteronomous morality. Moreover, the former two factions “in opposite directions of a circle” becomes a larger faction in the system of Song-​Ming Neo Confucianism, while the latter represents it like “appointing a son rather than the wife’s eldest son as the Greater Head of a branch of a family” from another direction as the horizontal system. Lastly, the thought of a practical reason at the maximum is also the theoretical basis for Mou Zongsan to interpret pre-​Qin Confucianism and the relationship between pre-​Qin Confucianism and Song-​Ming Neo Confucianism. In the view of Mou Zongsan, although the Confucian orthodoxy was inherited from monarchs Yao, Shun and Yu, Tang, Wen, Wu, and Zhou Gong, it was actually formed and developed by Confucius. The grand rules of moral cultivation teachings developed from pre-​Qin Confucianism with “Analects of Confucius, Mencius, Zhong Yong (Doctrine of the Mean), and Yi Ching (the Book of Changes) the main texts of inheritance for Confucianism constitutes a moral philosophy with disposition as the fundamental”; namely, the doctrine of a learning sound in theory. On the other hand, the central issue of Song-​Ming Neo Confucianism “firstly discusses the possible transcendental basis of moral practice,” which is the issue of ontology and practice with

Practical Reason at the Maximum and Development of Confucianism  5 the mind being a major concern. More specifically, the grand rules of moral cultivation teachings developed from pre-​Qin Confucianism are the original model of the metaphysics of morals whose moral practice’s subjective basis (mind), objective basis (nature), and the noumenon of ontology (heaven) form close meaning relationships. Although the three are not unified, they foreshadow the possibility and necessity of unity: this points out Confucius’ so-​ called “practice your benevolence and you will understand Heaven,” it also includes Mencius’ so-​called “show your mind so that you can know your nature and Heaven,” and the so-​called “What Heaven has conferred is what is called The Nature”—​an accordance with this nature which is called, in turn, “The Path of Duty” in Zhong Yong, the so-​called “changes of all will lead to all with their respective lives, values and position” in Yi Ching. The Song-​Ming Neo Confucianism develops pre-​Qin Confucianism in the direction of the unity of the mind, nature and heaven, and thus completes moral metaphysics, which is the reason for developing a new theory. As for the doctrine of a learning that is sound in practice, it is the political philosophy of Confucianism. Although Yao, Shun, and Yu are ideals for sustenance, pre-​Qin Confucianism “didn’t form a final model, but presents a general tendency” and even in Song-​Ming Neo Confucianism “there were still few contributions” which were still “developed only in the twilight.” All of which now calls for a third-​stage development of Confucianism with the intellectual aspect of ontology as the main theme. What is most valuable for the three-​stage theory of Confucianism’s development lies in its consideration of both spirit and system and what corresponds to the theme of Yi-​xia distinction in the stage division time; but in terms of its specific content, there are still serious problems. The three-​stage theory of Confucianism’s development actually characterizes the Confucianism development as an historical progress of the rather inconsistent pace between inner sage-​hood and outer kingliness. The first stage was considered to be a primitive stage of Confucian development, which was just taking shape primarily in both inner sage-​hood and outer kingliness. The second stage was deemed to be the completion of inner sage-​hood and the inaction of outer kingliness. Therefore, the third stage will have the mission portrayed as the maximum completion of kingliness without the premise of fully affirming the progress of the second stage. Obviously, as long as it is accepted that what Mou Zongsan himself did to recognize that spiritual development itself is an historical process, then this would also be the implementation process of spirit in the objective field, correspondingly separating the themes of inner sage-​ hood and outer kingliness and unilaterally talking about their completion. Whether it is the completion of inner sage-​hood or of outer kingliness—​it will definitely contribute to a lack of legitimacy. Taking a step back, therefore, even if we acknowledge the doctrinal legitimacy of separating inner sage-​hood from outer kingliness in addition to viewing the convenience of theoretical interpretation and the necessity of classification, then, what shall be faced and explained is none other than the reason why the pace presentation of inner sage-​hood and outer kingliness is so inconsistent, let alone

6  The Arrogation of Conscience considering whether or not to regard the internalization of spirit as the completion of inner sage-​hood. In fact, separating the narrative of inner sage-​ hood and outer kingliness is actually the schizophrenic symptom of Chinese culture in the modern context. What this seemingly “putting aside one matter for another” narrative can achieve is only the self-​understanding of Chinese cultural spirit in a splitting state. The way to actually overcome it should lie in a thorough rethinking on such a radical narration. In this regard, the highest ideological achievement of modern Neo Confucianism by Mou Zongsan of the moral metaphysics system is constructed on the basis of the path of practical reason at the maximum, to a large extent, and can be regarded as the highest self-​understanding of Chinese culture encountering spiritual crises in modern times. There is no doubt that though the highest self-​awareness cannot get rid of the stage of distress in the struggle for recognition, it is quite praiseworthy. However, whatever evaluation it receives, a comprehensive review is necessary. Generally speaking, in terms of being the basis to interpret historical Confucianism, Mou Zongsan’s Confucian ideology, named after moral metaphysics, is mainly manifested in the three interrelated aspects: first, integrate the previous mind, nature, and passion with different connotations into a substantiated good will by means of Kant’s good will and then unify the substantiated good will—​mind conscience—​and heaven and the heaven ontology of theory of existence. The second aspect is to follow intellectual intuition and the thing-​in-​itself and other thoughts of Kant in discussing the unique and brilliant points of Chinese philosophy, which includes Confucianism, Taoism and Buddhism, and in responding to western philosophy on the metaphysical level; even as he mainly adopts Kantianism. And the last aspect is to give play to the perfection religion ideology in Buddhist tradition, which is associated with Kant’s views on Supreme Good in further characterizing different views of perfection in Confucianism, Taoism, Buddhism, and Christianity, thereby distinguishing different teachings. In this regard, we can put forward a lot of questions; for example, whether or not it means the arrogation of conscience, while integrating conscious mind with the universal noumenon. Does it mean a final development toward nihilism or at least to mysticism, while understanding the intellectual intuition as a sort of “knowledge of ignorance” and understanding the object itself as a non-​factual concept of value? Is it appropriate to associate the original Buddhist tradition of perfection religion with Kant’s Supreme Good? Finally, can we hold the fundamental position of Confucianism while solving the doctrinal problems of China and the west in the form of an ideological judgment?

Note 1 Mou Zongsan: Ontological Mind and Ontological Human Nature (I), Shanghai Chinese Classics Publishing House, 1999, p. 100.

2 Mind and Ontology

One of Mou Zongsan’s theoretical points in understanding China and the West is to examine and interpret the conscious mind in traditional Confucianism in association with Kant’s good will. Good will is the core concept of Kant’s moral philosophy, and it is essential to characterize its overall theoretical context to properly understand this concept. Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals is recognized as a programmatic work in Kant’s moral philosophy. In fact, from the three chapter titles of the book we can clearly realize the three progressive levels of Kant’s moral philosophy: popular moral philosophy, moral metaphysics and critique of practical reason1 which are explained as follows. In the beginning of the first part of Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, Kant emphasizes the moral value of good will with the tone of “the beginning of all things.” In this world, even out of this world, good will is the only thing that can be considered to be unconditionally good... The reason why good will is good doesn’t lie in its contribution to the good result, neither would it because of the good deeds it presents while achieving its intended target, but rather in its kindness; that is to say, it is an unrestrained goodness. In the following text, Kant further points out that the sheer goodness of will has “absolute value.” Though it’s not “unique and complete goodness,” when compared to other forms of “goodness,” it “must be the Supreme Good” and other forms of goodness will take it as the premise. Kant doesn’t show his argumentation on it because he thinks it is moral knowledge “consented by all with common reason” and that good will is “inherent in natural healthy reason itself.” That is to say, this can easily resort to common sense without any argumentation. How to correctly understand the moral value of behavior is the key in transforming from a common rational moral knowledge to a philosophical moral knowledge. With semantic research and pragmatic analysis on the concept of obligation “containing a good will concept,” Kant points out that a behavior’s moral worth doesn’t depend on whether it conforms to obligation, but in whether the behavior is out of duty. Thus, Kant draws three DOI: 10.4324/9781351242219-3

8  The Arrogation of Conscience propositions about morality: (1) Behavior with moral worth can only be out of obligation rather than preference; (2) The moral worth of a behavior out of obligation is not the goal it desires to reach, but lies in the norm deciding it; that is to say, it does not depend on the realization of a behavioral target, but rather lies in the determined principle for the occurrence of behavior that any target, regardless of any desire, only depends on; (3) and, finally, that obligation is the necessity of behavior respecting the law. Understanding the moral worth of behavior depends on the fact that it is out of duty, which is the level realized by popular moral philosophies. In the second part of Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, Kant mainly discusses how to turn from popular moral philosophy to moral metaphysics. The key lies in the strict and pure groundwork of morality on reason.2 Kant states that though popular moral philosophy can grasp moral behavior from motivation out of duty, in understanding the moral motivation, it often resorts to other things except good will. As a result, “a disgusting mixture cobbled together with a disordered mixing of observation and a half-​cooked principle” is produced in moral cognition.3 To avoid the phenomenon of only being satisfied with a smattering of knowledge and truly defend the moral dignity, moral philosophy must be “the base of Metaphysics”; that is to say, all moral concepts must be “completely and congenitally located in and rooted in reason.”4 In fact, in the first part of the elaboration of good will, Kant has put forward a view of natural teleology to illustrate the fact that the real mission of practical reason is to produce good will.5 In the second part, Kant expounds further and more clearly that: since will—​the ability acting upon principle—​is the fundamental characteristic of rational existence, and the guidance of law on behavior must be based on reason, then the existence of will actually shows that pure reason itself has its own practical ability. In other words, will is nothing more than practical reason.6 If the will is not free from the influence of inclination apart from receiving rational regulations, good conduct under the guidance of practical reason becomes an objectively necessary but subjectively accidental behavior. In this case, the rule of practical reason is expressed as the order, because the objectively necessary law is mandatory over the subjectively accidental motivation. The “order,” therefore, does not apply to the will of God, or the divine will in general meaning: there is no question of “ought to” because the will itself is bound to be inconsistent with the law. Order as a formula is only suitable for expressing the relationship between will’s objective law and the subjective imperfection of the will of the existence with reason. For example, the relationship with the subjective imperfection of the people’s will.7 The rule of practical reason is presented as the imperative in people, the imperfect rational being, which also determines the practice of rational order and is different from any hypothetical imperative acting with means, but is

Mind and Ontology  9 inevitably categorical, and the statement of this categorical imperative is only “a priori synthetic practice proposition.”8 Kant, therefore, gives a formula for the categorical imperative: “act only according to that maxim whereby you can at the same time will that it should be a universal law.”9 It is obvious that the formula of categorical imperative is and can only be verifiable, as it is and can only be pure form. So the question is how to apply this formula to some specific codes of conduct and fulfill its inspection function. In other words, the questions is how to understand “your willingness” in the formula in some concrete contexts. Kant is fully aware of the importance of the problem, so he proposes a variant of the formula. If the formula in accordance with its content is called the formula of universal law, the variant of the formula by Kant can be called the formula of the law of nature: “act as if the maxims of your action were to become, through your will, a universal law of nature.”10 As for the reason of the conversion from the formula of universal law to the formula of natural law, Kant has later made a special statement that he titled “Typical of Pure Practical Judgment.” In his work The Critique of Practical Reason, he writes as follows: firstly, practical judgment must be a tool to apply what is universally asserted in a rule to the specific behavior. Secondly, the special difficulties faced by the practical judgment is that the practical law with objective necessity is completely from the ultra-​perceptual world, but the behavior that must be applied with the practical law happens in the perceptual world, and the practical law is not like the natural law rationally regulated by theory which relies on the pattern provided by imagination “to congenitally present the purely intellectual concept determined by the law to feeling.” Thirdly, “a favorable prospect” of practical judgment is that attributing a possible behavior of the sensuous world to the practical law does not involve the possibility of this behavior occurring in the perceptual world, because though what takes effect here is also the causality belonging to the pure concept of the understanding, it’s different from the free causality of natural causality; that is to say, “the pure decisive action of law on will is to connect the concept of causality with the conditions totally different from those constituting natural connection.” Finally, since the practical law has no other dependent cognitive abilities of itself, apart from intellectuality while applying itself to natural objects, practical law can only have a natural law in terms of the form specifically presented to the perceptual object, which is what Kant called typical of pure practical judgment.11 Kant believes that by the formula of natural law, the categorical imperative can directly inspect the specific standards of behavior in the perceptual world. That is to say, the moral law is regarded as a natural law, which has the basis of experience-​based judgment. For example, in Kant’s examples, a person may make false promises on purpose for his own interests even though he is not ready to fulfill them, though he can never impose the will to make his a false promise become a universal law of nature. A promise will be impossible, and thus the code of conduct to “make a false promise for his own interests” will cancel itself out.

10  The Arrogation of Conscience The natural law formula of the categorical imperative focuses on the rule of practical reason in the form of standards, while the rule of practical reason on the material of standards is related to purpose, because purpose is one of the material factors of behavior. In this regard, the proper act of practical reason is to take an objective free purpose only from the practical reason as “the highest restrictive condition of all subjective purposes.” This objective free purpose, of course, can only be derived from the analysis of practical reason, and thus it can only be a rational being itself which is distinguished from the personality of the irrational being.12 This means that any subjective purpose cannot violate objective free purpose, and the reason for all subjective purposes having admissibility and legitimacy in practice is that these subjective purposes are desired as purposes of rational beings. Therefore, another formula for the categorical imperative in the association with purpose’s representation is as follows: “when you act in this way, you shall always take both the human nature in your personality and the human nature in any other personality as a purpose, and not just regard them as the mean.” Obviously, whether or not the natural law formula or the formula of humanity as end in itself, it actually focuses on the practical ability of rationality itself; that is, the rational being shall and is able to conduct self-​affirmation, self-​defense, and self-​assistance, rather than self-​negation, self-​troubling, and self-​defeating in its existence. A third practical principle of will is derived from the natural law formula or the formula of humanity as an end in itself which is regarded as the “maximum condition for the harmony of will and the universal practical reason.” This is what is called “the will of every rational being is the idea of the universal legislative will”—​the autonomy concept. Here, the third practical principle is expressed in the form of a concept, but it can also be rewritten as an imperative form. So this is the third formulation of categorical imperative, which is called the formula of self-​legislation. The concept of autonomy or self-​legislation focuses on the mutual equal recognition of rational beings, meaning the complete rule of practical reason on codes, which also implies a concept of the kingdom of ends; namely, “the systematic ally for multiple rational beings ruled and guided under the common objective law.” With the proposal of the concept of autonomy, the constructive analysis of moral metaphysics has reached its peak because in the context of its theory, autonomy of will is the “highest principle of morality.” Here, Kant makes a specialized analysis on those realistic-​looking moral principles based on the concept of heteronomy of will, pointing out that both the happiness principle of experience and rational perfection concept (which can be both ontological and theological) cannot lay the real foundation for morality. They will fall into antinomy, although moral sense concepts at the happiness level and general perfection concepts will not damage morality. Thus, the remaining question is how autonomy of will makes itself possible as a congenital comprehensive practical proposition that is transformed from the level of metaphysics of morals to the level of the critique of practical reason, because the problem

Mind and Ontology  11 can only be carried out on the latter level and cannot be solved within the former. The critique of practical reason is centered on the concept of freedom. This is, of course, because “the concept of freedom is the key to expound will autonomy.” At the opening of the Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, Kant has shown that by virtue of general reason, we can realize the moral law inside our minds; that is to say, the moral law is “directly realized” by us and is the “rational fact” directly shown in our minds. Following this, Kant further points out that “since reason presents moral law as the basis for the decision never letting any perceptual condition prevail and completely independent from perceptual condition, so the moral law simply leads to the concept of freedom.”13 That is, the moral law is known to us congenitally and thus the “possibility of freedom” is known to us congenitally since freedom is the condition of the moral law.14 However, with the analysis of the concept of free will, we can only “deduce the morality and its principle” but cannot get the categorical imperative as a comprehensive proposition. Therefore, a “third party related to both parties” which is precisely the “the third knowledge freedom is shown to us and we have the third innate idea which “is needed to connect the two kinds of knowledge together” so as to make integration possible. Here the “third knowledge” is no other than practical interest, the significantly stressed theme in the critique of practical reason.15 In Kant’s argument, interest refers to the “the dependence of accidentally determinable will on rational principle” relative to “dependence of desire ability on feeling” in the inclination and the need as the performance of inclination. So interest lies only in “the will not always consistent with reason” such as the will of people, and never lies in the divine will, e.g. the will of God. Interest, then, existing in people’s will is also divided into two types: one being the interest in behavior itself, i.e. the dependence of will on the rational principle itself which is the so-​called practical interest and also named “moral interest” by Kant. The other is identified as the interest on the behavior object which is the dependence of will on rational principle for the sake of inclination. That is, in this case, rationality only provides practice rules to meet the need of inclination which is what Kant names “pathological interest.”16 The following three points can be inferred from the existence of practical interest: first, human will can be decided by accident which shows that people, as perceptual beings, live in a world of perceptual sensibility. So inclination is presented as the dependence on sensibility. Secondly, people as rational beings can imagine themselves living in a world of reason, and thus they require themselves to act completely in accordance with the principle of rationality. Third, people as both rational beings and perceptual beings (limited rational beings) are active in the perceptual world and rational world, while the latter status which is related to this, “freedom is set as the inherent nature of the will of all rational beings”—​will make people have the ability to make their own perceptual beings subject to rational beings. That is to say, to make people have the ability to let their wills determined by their inclinations

12  The Arrogation of Conscience and needs subject to the principle of reason and to show the dependence on the principle of reason. In other words, moral law is mutually conditional with freedom inevitably requiring practical interest. The more detailed exposition of Kant on practical interest can be seen as the part of “Power of Pure Practical Reason” in the Critique of Practical Reason because behaviors, only out of obligation, have moral worth. Therefore, the essence of behavioral moral law lies in “the direct determination of moral law on will” which requires that “the objective decisive basis of behavior must always and simultaneously be the only and fully subjective decisive basis on behavior.”17 The direct determination of moral law on will is subjectively shown as “a negative effect applied to emotion,” namely “rejecting emotional impulses, and preventing inclination conflicting with the moral law,” so it is a kind of emotion able to be reasonably called “moral emotion” by us. The suppression and negative effect of moral emotion after all is “the completely prostration to conceit” or humility.18 In addition to the negative effects on improper inclination, there is also a positive force in the moral law; that is, the self-​affirmation force while it establishes its legitimate dominance in the hearts of humans. This makes the moral law itself an object of reverence. Therefore, the moral emotion with moral law the sufficient basis shows its reverence for moral law in a positive sense. The reverence for moral law is not another power toward morality, but rather “morality itself subjectively regarded as power.”19 In this case, Kant concludes that moral sensibility—​the ability interested in the moral principle—​is the unique feeling that can be completely congenitally recognized and its inevitability can be perceived by us. One can answer the question of how the categorical imperative is possible after obtaining the congenital knowledge of practical interests or moral emotions. In this regard, Kant states, the reason why a categorical imperative is possible is that the concept of freedom makes one a member of the rational world. If I were a member of the world, all my actions “will always be in line with will autonomy.” However, since I sense with intuition that I am also a member of the perceptual world, it can only be judged that my behavior ought to be in line with self-​discipline of will. The absolute “ought to” means a congenital synthetic proposition since the concept of a similar will of the intellectual world is added to the will controlling the perceptual inclination of me. This is a pure and self-​practical will, which, according to reason, contains the highest condition of the former will. This way is roughly similar to adding the intellectual concept showing itself as the general law form to the perceptual world intuition so that the congenital synthetic propositions being the establishment basis of all natural knowledge can possibly be the same. The key point here is that perceptual being and rational being belong to the same will within which the pure reason inherent with practical ability directly

Mind and Ontology  13 and necessarily determines the will controlled by perceptual inclination. Kant, in this regard, compares categorical imperative, the congenital comprehensive practical proposition, with the situation in the theoretical knowledge, which more clearly shows that the possibility of categorical imperative lies mainly in practical interests and moral emotion. We know that the analytics of the critique of practical reason is composed of the principle of concept and motivation, where the principle discusses free will and moral law: concept concerns how the will determines good and evil, and the implement object, and motivation concerns how the will determines the emotion and work on human mind. The latter two include the influence of the will on the perceptual world. But Kant’s meaning is clear. The direct determination of the will on emotion is the basis for the will to decide the good and evil. In other words, the reason why the will can be imposed on the object is that the will can influence the human mind. The application of practical judgment or typical of practical judgment depends on one’s willingness to imagine nature in this manner, or the “as if ” in the natural law formula of categorical imperative depends on the assumption under a subjective intention. With regard to this, if free will is the keystone of Kant’s moral philosophy, practical interests or moral emotion is the key to open the door of Kant’s moral philosophy. Only in this way can morality open the door of nature and be truly implemented to experience. To this end, the analysis of the critique practical reason is finished.20 In terms of the analytics, if questions are furthered raised, it is bound to ask questions like: Why are people directly interested in morality? Why is pure reason practical? How is freedom possible? The last question is all inclusive, which raises the possibility of freedom in the objective level. The first two questions are two different question expressions on a subjective level, because “it is through interest that rationality turns practical and becomes a reason to decide will” and freedom is pure practical causality.21 For all three questions, Kant believes that human reason cannot give a reasonable reply. In other words, any attempt and effort to answer these questions will be futile because a pure critique of reason has enabled us to understand why these problems cannot be understood. For the sake of rational prudence and maintaining necessary silence on the question of how freedom can be possible is regarded as “the final line of all practical philosophies,” Kant says. The above is the whole context of Kant’s moral philosophy. Mou Zongsan believes that the “excellence” of Kant’s moral philosophy is that it excludes experiential content but discusses morality in terms of good will, which for the first time in the history of western philosophy presents a “thorough and purely” moral concept. We know that another important reason why Mou Zongsan values this view of Kant so much is that he interprets the original goodness of human nature of Mencius as the harbinger of Kant’s view, trying to take advantage of Kant’s thought to expound the Confucian doctrine. However, there are some fundamental differences between Mencius’ theory of good nature and Kant’s theory of good will.22

14  The Arrogation of Conscience In Kant’s opinion, we deduce the following: as for morality, the overarching thought is the decisive action of reason on will, which is applied to talking about autonomy of will and universal law because the universal law originates from the autonomy of will; it is only in pure form and verifiable—​only stressing the consistent requirement in form of reason—​which inevitably maintains itself but never defeats itself in practice. In Mencius, although the pure goodness of heaven-​endowed nature can be a certain analogy to Kant’s pure goodness of will in their respective positions in the theoretical context and meaning, the four cardinal virtues: humanity, justice, propriety, and wisdom in nature are widely different from the universal law formula. In their pure form, they are only being used to perform the inspection function. In other words, if we quote Mencius’ “All things are already complete in us” and take the Song Confucians’ “nature as ideal pattern” into consideration to illustrate that nature contains the heavenly principles of all, we see that not only heavenly principles are real reasons, but also that the nature of humanity, justice, propriety, and wisdom as the principle of heavenly principles is the real reason. Taking a step back, if the four cardinal virtues: humanity, justice, propriety, and wisdom are different from the common law, but still take the moral principles with a pure form—​such as the earliest “do unto others as you would be done” called the “golden rule” by some Christian theologians, then such mind-​mindedness principle of practice obviously has the characteristic of formalism. It has also been given a very important position in Confucian thought along the lines of: as a basis, even after necessary interpretation the practical principle of “do unto others as you would be done” can be interpreted as a variant of the universal law but only as long as one considers that the significance of a principle must be correctly understood in its whole theory context. The difference presented here is a fundamental one. Specifically, if we make an association of the following two ideas, there would be no necessity for repetition that such association is both appropriate and necessary in the whole context of Confucian thought. The idea of “do unto others as you would be done” in understanding its practical principle with the thought of treat with the reverence due to age the elders in your own family, so that the elders in the families of others shall be similarly treated; treat with the kindness due to youth the young in your own family, so that the young in the families of others shall be similarly treated. As the necessity for a consistent form, the idea of “do unto others as you would be done” can only provide the theoretical legitimacy for “the elders in the families of others shall be similarly treated” and “the young in the families of others shall be similarly treated” but cannot provide the theoretical legitimacy for “treat with the reverence due to age the elders in your own family” and “treat with the kindness due to youth the young in your own

Mind and Ontology  15 family.” However, it is obvious that “the elders in the families of others shall be similarly treated” and “the young in the families of others shall be similarly treated” but be based on “treat with the reverence due to age the elders in your own family” and “treat with the kindness due to youth the young in your own family.”23 In other words, even if we only follow the sense of “feeling of commiseration”: they will feel so, not as a ground on which they may gain the favor of the child’s parents, nor as a ground on which they may seek the praise of their neighbors and friends, nor from a dislike to the reputation of having been unmoved by such a thing To understand the meaning of what Mencius named “good nature” and unreservedly to apply Kant’s good will to understand the core concept of “good nature,” we still have to consider the interior theoretical structure in Mencius thought so that we can have a more accurate understanding of it. Obviously, in addition to interpreting “benevolence” with the “feeling of commiseration,” Mencius also associates “benevolence” with significance of human relationships: “Filial affection for parents is the working of benevolence. Respect for elders is the working of righteousness” (Mencius • Jinxin I). What’s more, whether from Mencius’ thought individually or from the traditional Confucian thought, in the understanding of “benevolence,” “long inherited norms and ethnics” are obviously more fundamental than “feeling of commiseration.” This also means that even if we can admit that there are mutual illuminating implications between Confucian ethics and Kant’s moral philosophy in some aspects, what must be concerned is that their fundamental views on man—​as the starting point of their own theories—​are rather different. Kant’s basic provision of man is “rational being,” which constitutes the starting point of Kant’s moral philosophy. Mencius’ basic definition on man is “familial being,” which constitutes the starting point of Mencius’ ethics.24 The difference in the starting points has led to significant differences in many aspects. For example, by defining man as a rational being, Kant puts forward a very important proposition in his moral philosophy; that is, everyone has a moral agency, while Mencius, through the theory of good nature, proposes a very important preposition in his familial thought, that is, everyone can be the sages Yao and Shun. Superficially, the two are similar, but they are actually quite different. Yao and Shun as sages are repeatedly mentioned in Mencius, but it should be noted that the core understanding of Mencius on “sage” is “fulfilling ethics.” In the analysis of “everyone can be Yao and Shun,” Mencius states: “The course of Yao and Shun was simply that of filial piety and fraternal duty” (Mencius • Gaozi II). He also says: “The compass and square produce perfect circles and squares. By the sages, the human relationships are perfectly exhibited” (Mencius • Li Lou I). But the

16  The Arrogation of Conscience ethical theories cannot necessarily be included in Kant’s deontological system. Moral saints in Kant’s sense are far from the Confucian sages exhibiting perfect human relationship.25 In this regard, the kingdom of ends derived from a purely rational practical ability by Kant has a totally different charm from the ideal kingdom in Confucianism. This is clear when we make a simple comparison between the kingdom of ends of Kant and the ideal of great unity in Confucianism. In the description of Book of Rites • Li Yun, one of the most important characteristics of the Datong order in “when the Grand course was pursued, a public and common spirit ruled all under the sky” is “men did not love their parents only, nor treat as children only their own sons.” This is in contrast to the “everyone loves (above all others) his own parents and cherishes (as) children (only) his own sons” in the well-​off order of the “now that the Grand course has fallen into disuse and obscurity, the kingdom is a family inheritance.” Meanwhile, the Datong order is still the order of “males had their proper works, and females had their homes,” that is to say, here the rule that “one loves (above all others) his own parents and cherishes (as) children (only) his own sons” is the foundation of “men did not love their parents only, nor treat as children only their own sons,” where the latter is not the breakthrough of the former, but is to give extended application on the basis of the former. This is actually the same thing as Mencius’ ideal of treat with the reverence due to age the elders in your own family, so that the elders in the families of others shall be similarly treated; treat with the kindness due to youth the young in your own family, so that the young in the families of others shall be similarly treated. From the standpoint of Confucianism, the Kantian kingdom of ends is likely to be a world without righteousness that should prevail between father and son, and distance for kinship, and thus life is not worth living. We know that Mencius has criticized the universal love advocated by Mohist to be an ignorance of father and thus the theory is denounced as a theory of beasts.26 What is more serious is that Kant’s universal law formula has inherently great trouble when applied to experience. As stated previously, the natural law formula of the categorical imperative is a variant of the universal law formula, and the main purpose of Kant’s argument for the variant is to apply the universal law to experience. In this regard, Kant illustrates the application method in detail when discussing the “typical of practical judgment”: the judgment law of pure practical reason being: ask yourself, if a behavior you desire to act will occur through a law of nature, and you are part of the nature, will you regard it as a possibility through your will? In fact, everyone judges the good and evil of a behavior on morality in accordance with the rule.

Mind and Ontology  17 In summary, what Kant means here is that any natural law we act upon nature—​ whether from rational theory or from practical reason—​ cannot be contradictory, which is the inevitable requirement for reason to show its authority over the natural body. In other words, if a law of practice makes nature in contradiction while acting upon nature, or leads to natural dialectics, it must be because an error emerges in the rational practice, and such an error is the moral “ought not to.” This in fact implies a view of nature based on the teleology position of reason. That is, reason itself must and can imagine nature to be a teleological system through the issued and non-​contradictory laws of it which is the only law for reason to abide by in practice. But the problem is that we can know with careful analysis whether a practical law can be consistent and will not lead to the contradiction in the form in its application to nature or whether experience does not only lie in reason itself, but is related to or even strongly depends on nature or experience. Kant’s four examples in the Groundwork of Metaphysics of Morals are respectively expressed in the form of codes of conduct as in: commit suicide when the continuation of life will only result in pain rather than getting more satisfaction; borrow money and promise to repay when in need of money even if one knows that one cannot repay it. Although there are full opportunities, they prefer to do nothing rather than work hard to develop and increase their talents. If everything comes off satisfactorily without receiving the help of others, there is no need to help others. We know that Kant’s examples are not random but related to his division of obligation. Specifically, the four examples respectively correspond to perfect obligation for self, perfect obligation for others, the imperfect obligation to self and imperfect obligation to others. However, Kant has brought about different reasons to expound why these four principles cannot be a universal law of nature, which are mostly criticized. The reason why the first code of conduct cannot be a universal law of nature is regarded as if imagined that way, people can immediately see that by virtue of the same emotion, nature with the purpose to promote the growth of life should take destroying life as its laws; this is a paradox which can be used as the being of nature.27 Macintyre comments that Kant adopts a “notorious poor argument,” and he also ridicules it in that “it is tantamount to saying anyone holding the code willing to ‘permanently have the hair cut short’ is self-​contradictory, because such an inclination “is contradictory to’ the growth impulse of hair inherent in all of us.”28 The key here is the resort to a natural end (promote life growth), and that is to say, what we see here is not that—​or at least not directly—​law is merely out of the form consistency of reason, and the consistency of law applied to nature depends on the setting of a natural purpose beyond reason. Of course, here a defense for Kant can be that it is the reason that sets the natural purpose, but revealing the importance of natural purpose in Kant’s

18  The Arrogation of Conscience inference is enough to illustrate the consistency of law in form does not purely depend on the rationality, but is related to the contents involved in the law. The reason why the second code of conduct cannot be a universal law of nature is regarded as that if imagined that way, “promise and promise itself will be impossible, because people cannot believe his promise, and all such purely deceptive expressions will be regarded as jokes.”29 As has been mentioned above, the corollary here is that since the promise becomes impossible, the code of conduct of the false promise will fall on self-​cancellation. Generally speaking, for behavior involving others, if the code of conduct may lead to such behavior being canceled in practice, this code of conduct is self-​defeating. In terms of Kant’s practical judgment rule, this example—​ corresponding to perfect obligations to others—​is the most typical, but the test principle stated by Kant still fails to exclude some obviously immoral codes. For example, the code of conduct “stealing to raising money in the treatment of the mother with disease” is considered immoral by the majority, but if it is generalized as a natural law, it will not cancel the conduct of treating the mother in practice, nor will it cancel the theft conduct in practice, and thus it will not fall into the self-​defeating and self-​canceling dilemma. For a further example of Macintyre, “persecute all with false religious beliefs,” the code of conduct can also go through Kant’s test, but few people will regard it as a universal moral law.30 The reason why the third code of conduct cannot be a universal law of nature is regarded as that “as a rational being, he must be willing to develop all his capacities since these abilities serving him are given to him for all possible purposes.”31 It is clear that Kant once again resorts to the natural teleology, that is, it’s impossible to infer “must be willing to develop all his capacities” only from the “rational being.” Furthermore, it is not directly related to the formal consistency of reason, because we must first determine that he is willing to think that way and then there will be contradictions. The reason why the fourth code of conduct cannot be a universal law of nature is regarded as that a will making such determination will conflict with itself, because in many possible cases, people need others’ love and sympathy. When one has such a law of nature for his own will, he will be deprived of all hopes of his expectation to get help.32 Kant’s description here actually indicates that if a person foresees himself not encountering the help from others in the future through the deliberation of his living conditions, that is to say, if he would like to consider it in this way, his will of deciding not to receive help from others, which means that whether the will to make a practical decision is self-​contradictory depends on any natural or empirical conditions. Though Kant believes that the tests of the four codes of conduct are subject to the same principle, he is also aware that a perfect obligation (corresponding

Mind and Ontology  19 to the first two codes of conduct) and imperfect obligations (corresponding to the latter two codes of conduct) are different: some behaviors with their codes are impossible to be consistently thought of as a universal law of nature, let alone making them the universal laws at our will. There are some behaviors that are not actually found in terms of their inner impossibilities, but we are not willing to upgrade them to the universal laws of nature, because such will is to be contradictory to itself. It is easy to notice that the former goes against the strict or narrow sense of obligation, and the latter goes against the obligations in a broad sense. These examples have fully shown that all obligations are dependent on the same principle in terms of the types of compulsion (not the object of action).33 The above analyses precisely show that if there is no relevant natural teleology concept, the contradiction tested out in the first two codes—​Kant’s so-​ called “internal impossibility”—​will not be found, so the actors’ will becomes most crucial here. That would refer to “the same principle” by Kant. However, the will of the doer, apart from a small portion of consistency at the level of prohibiting man from doing wrong, may have to add some restrictions, leaving the rest to particularity and differentiation. In consequence, Kant’s universalism on moral values will not only be able to accommodate ethical pluralism, the formula of universal law will also be in unexpected trouble when applied in nature or experience because then the situation which goes just as “do unto others as you would be done,” as criticized by Kant, will also be an excuse for immoral behavior. These fundamental differences existing between Mencius’ theory of the original goodness of human nature and Kant’s theory of good will fully show that although there are some superficial similarities between the two, they are, in fact still dubious. Therefore, if Confucianism is examined and interpreted with Kant’s moral concept the basic starting point by Mou Zongsan, would not only be a conceptual simplification and merger be needed, but would also require a systematic distortion of the overall context of Confucianism. However, Mou Zongsan does not allow the systematic distortion to develop out of hand because he soon began to criticize Kant from the perspective of the relationship between morality and metaphysics. Mou Zongsan’s criticism of Kant is based on his distinction between “Metaphysics of morals” and “moral metaphysics”: the terms ‘metaphysics of morals’ and ‘moral metaphysics’ are different, where the former is a metaphysical inquiry about ‘morals’ with the discussion of the basic principle of morals metaphysically, the focus, and thus the research subject, is moral, rather than ‘metaphysics’ itself, and metaphysics is a borrowing. The latter mainly focuses on metaphysics (containing ontology and cosmology). Looking at it from the ‘moral

20  The Arrogation of Conscience approach’ and penetrating the origin (nature of mind) seen with ‘morality being’ at the origin of the universe is the development from moral to metaphysics, but it enters from the ‘moral approach’, and thus the ‘moral metaphysics’, which seems that Kant gets close to God and the immortality of the soul via practical reason to establish its objective validity. It is called “moral theology” in terms of theology. But Kant establishes “moral theology” only with the religious tradition and not fully showing a specific “moral metaphysics” independently with practical reason formally illustrated by him. From the overall context of Kant’s moral philosophy, Mou Zongsan’s criticism means he recognizes Kant’s metaphysical level thinking of morals but disagrees with Kant’s thinking at the level of critique of practical reason. In terms of the source of Mou Zongsan ideology, metaphysics of morals originates mainly from his understanding of Kant, while moral metaphysics mainly comes from his understanding on Confucianism—​particularly Song-​ Ming Neo Confucianism. Therefore, the metaphysics of morals means he takes Kant’s moral concept to interpret Confucianism, while moral metaphysics means that he stands from the position of Confucianism to criticize Kant. However, even if we don’t take the fundamental differences between the Confucian conception of the ethical and Kantian conception of morality, “moral metaphysics” put forward in the comparison tension indicates the twisty identity on both Kant’s philosophy and Confucian ideology. Metaphysics is most concerned in Kant’s philosophy. With regard to the research field and object of metaphysics, Kant adopts a popular view in the curriculum system of German universities of his time. This view divides metaphysics into two parts: general metaphysics and special metaphysics. (The former is almost the ontology, and the latter generally includes three categories: rational cosmology, rational theology and rational psychology.34) We know that the “Transcendental Logic” part of Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason is divided into transcendental analytic and transcendental dialectic, and such division corresponds to the above division of metaphysics. Specifically, first of all, in view of this, “ontology assumes it can provide the congenitally synthetic knowledge of general objects in a systematic doctrine.” An important conclusion of transcendental analytics is that “what intellectual congenital can do is nothing more than forecasting the form of common experience.” In other words, “the intellectual theory is just certain principles explaining phenomena.” Therefore, Kant proposes to replace the relatively arrogant ontology with relatively modest transcendental analytic.35 Second, transcendental dialectic is meant to reveal all sorts of transcendental illusions due to misuse of reason and the field derived from these transcendental illusions in various categories of the special metaphysics. In this regard, Kant’s critical philosophy is a critique of metaphysics and also a critical metaphysics. Therefore, in “Pure Rational Architecture,” we read the views and classification of metaphysics Kant proposes on the basis of critical philosophy:

Mind and Ontology  21 all purely innate knowledge constitutes a special unity because of their unique special cognitive ability within; metaphysics is a philosophy that should present the knowledge in the unity of such system... The metaphysics in a narrow sense is composed of transcendental philosophy and purely rational naturology. The former only studies the intellectual aspect, and reason itself in the system of all concepts and principles related to general objects, rather than that the assumed object will be given out (i.e. ontology); the latter examines the nature, the total of all given objects, which is thus the naturology.36 Naturology is divided as immanent physiology and transcendent physiology according to the different uses of reason while examining nature. The former includes rational physics and rational psychology, and the latter includes rational cosmology and rational theology. From the above analysis, we can see that although Mou Zongsan emphasizes metaphysics as much as Kant, and there is not much difference in terms of their metaphysics fields, he is unlike Kant, who takes rational criticism as metaphysical basis. In other words, his understanding of metaphysics is essentially different from Kant’s critique philosophy. It is through critique metaphysics that Kant faces the actual situation of metaphysics, the miserable exiled former Queen. He reveals how transcendental illusion comes into being, and on the other hand, he lays the foundation for metaphysics again, and thus reconstructs metaphysics. In this regard, Mou Zongsan’s understanding lacks due sympathy. As mentioned earlier, Mou Zongsan’s criticism of Kant is that Kant fails to establish a moral metaphysics and only establishes a moral theology. What is impermeable of this criticism is that now that he has recognized Kant’s certain achievement in rational theology as a branch of rational naturology, namely, establishing the moral theology based on the refutation of fallacy of natural theology, he should also recognize Kant’s achievements in various branches of rational naturology. Mou Zongsan notices Kant “gets close to God and the immortality of the soul via practical reason to establish its objective validity,” that is, achievements in both rational theology and rational psychology coming from the approach of practical reason, but he fails to notice that Kant has also made certain achievements in rational cosmology via the approach of practical reason. Kant once stated: once the substantiality of the concept of freedom is proved through an unquestionable law of practical reason, the concept of freedom will constitute the capstone of a building of the pure reason and speculative reason system, and all other simple concepts (God and the concept of immortality) without supports in the speculative reason will now connect with this concept and work with it and get stability and objective reality through it. That is to say, this possibility is proven since freedom is realistic and because the concept reveals itself via the law and morality.37

22  The Arrogation of Conscience Mou Tsungsan notices that Kant rests God and the concept of immortality on the basis of the concept of freedom, but he does not notice that Kant’s concept of freedom corresponds directly to the rational cosmology in metaphysics. Kant talks of two freedoms, one of which is transcendental freedom, also known as freedom in the cosmological sense and referring to an “absolute spontaneity” or an “ability to automatically start a state.” Reason sets up the concept for itself to stop the possible infinite loop in the sequence of natural causality so that reason can think of “the absolute totality of all conditions in causality.” The other is the practical freedom referring to “the determination independent of the force of the emotional impulse,” which in turn, is displayed through the moral law.38 For the relationship between practical freedom and transcendental freedom, on the one hand, practical freedom is based on “transcendental freedom,” but on the other hand, as shown in the above citation, it is practical freedom that proves the reality of transcendental freedom. Therefore, Kant, in his critical philosophy, entrusts the rational cosmology to the concept of transcendental freedom, and practical freedom is considered as a real proof of transcendental freedom. Thereupon we can say that Kant establishes a moral cosmology only because the freedom that shall and must be revealed by the moral law is given the core status in it. Thus, according to Mou Zongsan’s definition of “moral metaphysics,” we can conclude that Kant’s “moral metaphysics,” strictly speaking, the part of the rational naturology, proceeds this way: establish a moral cosmology (the moral approach), through the approach of practical freedom on the basis of which it identifies the existence of God and the immortality of the soul, which is on account of the inevitability of the Supreme Good and thus establishing the moral theology and moral psychology. In other words, the three identifications of practical reason, in fact, reflect Kant’s “moral metaphysics.” Another reason for Mou Zongsan’s unawareness on this issue is that, to a certain extent, he ignores the differences between the postulate of practical reason and the hypothesis of theoretical reason which Kant has once clearly discussed: the need for pure reason in its speculative application merely leads to assumption, but the need for pure practical reason leads to identification. Because in the former case, I start from the derivative and lift myself to the height I desire in the basis sequence, and a source basis is needed, but rather give the derivative (such as the causal relationship between things and changes in the world) the objective reality, it only aims to fully meet my reason of exploring the derivative. On the contrary, the need for pure practical reason is built on the basis of an obligation. Namely, there is an obligation that enables something (the Supreme Good) to be the object of my will and makes every effort to promote it, but I must preinstall the possibility and the conditions of such possibility, namely, God, freedom and immortality because I cannot prove them by virtue of the speculative

Mind and Ontology  23 reason, although I cannot refute them. The obligation is established on the basis of certain moral laws certainly independent from these given and demonstrably true ones. To constrain us to make an unconditionally and rightful law action in this scope as perfect as possible, there is no need to cite other internal characters of things, hidden ends of the world order or the theoretical opinion of a dominate world ruler for further support.39 The notable differences between practical identification and theoretical assumption are that the latter is only a reasonable assumption in order to meet the needs of rational inquiry, a theory basis made to explain the presupposition, but the former is a reasonable identification inevitably made to meet the needs of practice. Whether it is real in the rational application of the theory cannot be affirmed and denied, but in the rational practical application, it must be regarded and recognized is real.40 Specifically, a positive sense of freedom, the existence of God and the immortality of the soul as the identification of pure reason in practice is not the basis of moral behavior, but the inevitable faith object because of the authenticity of moral behavior. For faith (Glaube in Germany), Kant once explained: faith is the moral way of thinking when one confirms something difficult to be achieved with rational perception. So it is the basic principle held by the soul, used to set something that must be preset as the possible conditions of the ultimate purpose of morality as real for the sake of obligations, although we have no any insight over its possibility and impossibility.41 In other words, identifying a positive sense of freedom, the existence of God and the immortality of the soul in the sense of practical reason not only means that they as the presupposition that can explain the possible conditions of the highest moral ultimate purpose, but also means that man, as the practitioner who truly practices freedom, truly believes in God, earnestly believe in the immortality of the soul. As translator of the three critiques of Kant, Mou Zongsan, though there is a rather clear distinction made by Kant in theory assumption and practice identification, does not pay full attention to the differences of the two. That is, he does not pay full attention to the nature and significance considered as true of practical identification. More directly, he does not pay full attention to the real function of practical identification in the soushl.42 This is not only shown in his translation of “postulate” as “standard of supposition” and his multiple applications of “supposition” while discussing about the identification of practical reason, but also obviously implied in the widely quoted story in his work Ontological Mind and Ontological Human Nature: Thirty years ago, when I was in Beijing University, Mr. Xiong and Feng Youlan were chatting one day. Feng named the conscience stated by

24  The Arrogation of Conscience Wang Yangming as a hypothesis. Hearing that, Mr. Xiong was much surprised: “Conscience is a kind of presentation. How can you state that?” At that time, I was listening quietly beside, knowing that the basis of Feng’s words lies in Kant. (Feng doesn’t know Kant well all his life, and he just repeats Kant’s ideas. As to the conscience, he is more at a loss.) While hearing what Mr. Xiong said, I was in shock, feeling as if I had been in an entirely new world. I didn’t fully understand at the moment, but I always keep the core of “conscience is presentation” in mind and never forget it. It is not until now that I finally realize the reason.43 No matter what problem lies in Feng Youlan’s understanding, Mou Zongsan will always keep the freedom in Kant’s moral philosophy as a hypothetical view, which constitutes a key criticism of Mou Zongsan on Kant’s moral philosophy. However, from the above analysis, we can see that this criticism obviously ignores the role of the practical identification of Kant’s moral philosophy in the minds of practitioners. The opposition between presentation and hypothesis also relates to another important aspect of Mou Zongsan’s criticism of Kant. That is, he believes that Kant doesn’t touch the second connotation of practical reason at the maximum as well as the third connotation. This criticism, in a sense, is even more important than the former criticism, because in the view of Mou Zongsan, it is the third connotation that means of practical reason at the maximum, which also means the completion of “moral metaphysics.” The third connotation concerns how to understand moral emotion. In this regard, Mou Zongsan says: moral sense and moral emotion can be said from top to bottom. From the perspective of the lower level, it lies in reality, which cannot be applied to establish the law of morality, but it can also be raised to the level of transcendence, making it the most essential part to reflect the moral law and moral reason. But at what point can it begin to go to the surpassing level to be the most essential part? According to Orthodox Confucianism, it lies in the point when practicing to embody the ontology of nature, while in Kant’s words, it lies in the point of making practical efforts to reflect and present the moral principles and the supreme imperative. However, this is unnoticed in Kant’s moral philosophy, but it is the main subject of the orthodox Confucian doctrine. At this point, moral sense and moral emotion do not fall in the reality level, but are raised to the transcendence level and turned to be specific and universal moral feeling and moral mind, which is the reason why the Song-​Ming Confucianism inheriting the pre-​Qin Confucianism emphasizes the ontological nature, and the ontological mind and finally comes the unity of the mind and nature.44 In fact, from the above holistic analysis on Kant’s moral philosophy, it is noticeable that moral emotion is crucial in Kant. On the one hand, for the

Mind and Ontology  25 general so-​called moral emotion, in Kant’s opinion, it is incompetent to act as the basis of moral whether it is regarded as the foundation of the special structure of human nature or attributed to shaping social psychology, although he still agrees upon such moral emotions. On the other hand, Kant also points out a moral emotion really out of practical reason. “Such emotion is inseparable with the representation of moral law” and functions as the power of the pure practical reason and actually the key for moral law to open the door of experience. In other words, Kant regards moral emotion as something at the lower level as well as the upper level. What’s more, it is the most essential part to reflect the moral law. The above assertions of Mou Zongsan only refer to a text of Groundwork of Moral Metaphysics, which may lose the original meanings.45 However, this does not mean that Mou Zongsan’s criticism of Kant is completely pointless. What Mou Zongsan focuses on is actually the differences between the Confucian tradition he understands and the Christian tradition acting as the cultural background of Kantianism. Specifically, it mainly refers to the differences between the thought of heaven and human relationships in Confucian tradition and the God and man relationship in the Christian background. Therefore, if you ignore the problems existing in Mou Zongsan in the understanding of Kant and thus mercifully understand him, in fact, for Mou Zongsan, the really important question is, in the perspective of “moral metaphysics” agreed upon by both Kant and Confucianism in terms of the formal meaning, whether the three concepts as the identification of practical reason—​freedom, God and immortality—​should and is able to be made one? In the context of Kant’s thought, this problem simultaneously lies in two aspects and focuses on the views on God and the relationship between man and God: the first is the difference in the concept of whether only God have intellectual intuition or people may also have intellectual intuition? The second is whether it is necessary to identify the existence of God to confirm the inevitable link between morality and happiness—​the establishment of the theory of rounded goodness. Mou Zongsan apparently understands this. His writing the Intellectual Intuition and Chinese Philosophy, Phenomena and Noumena, and Theory of Rounded Goodness is to deal with these subsequent problems. Even if there is no brief review on the major viewpoints in Intellectual Intuition and Chinese Philosophy, Phenomena and Noumena, and Theory of Rounded Goodness, the following assertion can be drawn according to the above analysis: in comparing Confucian thought and Kant’s philosophy, Mou Zongsan not only narrows and ignores the differences between the two in some crucial aspects, he also exaggerates and even creates the differences of the two in other crucial aspects. This is of course not only reflected in his understanding of Kant, but also in his understanding of Confucianism. The key points of the “moral metaphysics” proposed by Mou Zongsan based on the position of Confucianism are nothing more than the following two points: first, discuss heaven from nature, and thus the ontological human nature unit as an entirety. Second, discuss nature from mind, and thus the

26  The Arrogation of Conscience ontological mind and ontological human nature unit as an entirety. In a sense, these two points correspond to the thoughts of “nature being reason” and “mind being reason” respectively in the Song-​Ming Neo Confucianism. However, as mentioned above, while interpreting his own understanding and developing specific argument, Mou Zongsan, like the Song-​ Ming Confucians, dates the argumentation basis of “moral metaphysics” back to Early Confucianism, holding that in original Confucian thought, although the mind, nature and heaven are not fully unified, the possibility and necessity have been heralded. In this regard, we should first point out, as Mou Zongsan says, whether Early Confucianism or Song-​Ming Neo Confucianism has indeed their inherent thought resources to support the unity of mind, nature and heaven. The problem, however, is that what is important is that the discussion over the unity of mind, nature and heaven in the context of ancient ideology is one thing, while it is another to talk about the unity of the mind, nature and heaven in the modern ideological context. In the context of modern Chinese structured by the Western grammar, it is an objectively special danger to take the understanding of traditional Chinese thinking in a logical and substantially ideological way for granted. In terms of what we have discussed, we know that we cannot interpret the “being” in “nature being reason” and “mind being reason” as the logical equity relationships. In other words, the “nature being reason” and “mind being reason” does not mean that the mind, nature and heaven are logically of the same entity: the unity of mind, nature and heaven is not equal to the being one of mind, nature, and heaven. Giving the above distinction is not to explain that Mou Zongsan has been trapped into this special hermeneutics danger at the expense of substantive thinking. On the contrary, it’s to avoid a misunderstanding of Mou Zongsan’s thoughts relative to it. Though Mou Zongsan critically uses the entity concept, the entity in his understanding is at least in a key aspect of Hegel’s “spirit is an entity as well as a subject” in terms of the western resources, which is reflected not only in his most emphasized conscience “presentation meaning,” emphasizing that the view that “all men may be Yaos and Shuns” shall not be understood as an abstract proposition in anthropology, but he also inspects “presentation” with “specific understanding.” Therefore, it seems that Mou Zongsan’s “moral metaphysics” means that he implies that Kant, Hegel, and other western ideological resources carry out a theoretical reconstruction of his authentic Confucianism. In terms of his reference to western resources, it indicates that he lies between Kant and Hegel, where a Kantian moral concept is the starting point of his theory’s reconstruction, and the spirit and the reflected thought constitution of Hegel is the key of his theory’s reconstruction. However, differences exist between Kant and Hegel to contribute to an internal tension of Mou Zongsan’s idea: accepting Kant’s moral metaphysics with autonomy of will the essence and being discontent in Kant’s critique of practical reason with wise discrimination drives him to Hegel’s “spirit and the embodiment,” but acknowledging

Mind and Ontology  27 Hegel’s proposition that “spirit is the entity and subject” means admitting that “spirit is necessarily a dialectical historical process,” while thought of the historical dialectics won’t be agreed upon by Mou Zongsan on the standpoint of Confucianism.46 So we can see that on the one hand, some of the criticisms of Mou Zongsan on Kant are rather similar to those of Hegel on Kant and on the other hand, he consciously stands in the position of Kant to criticize Hegel. As for the authentic Confucianism in him, we know that he pays special attention to the Philosophy of Mind faction of Neo Confucianism tradition which advocates both “nature being reason” and “mind being reason,” and traces the faction back to Confucius, Mencius, and other original ideas of Confucianism. However, if one is fully aware of the foundation significance of heavenly principle in Neo Confucianism, and considers that both the “nature being reason” or “mind being reason” are proposed from the concept of heavenly principle, he should be able to realize that Mou Zongsan’s “moral metaphysics” is actually difficult to really shield and sustain the Confucianism standpoint he hopes to maintain. In other words, discussing “nature being reason” and “mind being reason” in the context of the Song-​ Ming Neo Confucianism is totally different from the construction of “moral metaphysics” starting purely from the mind in modern context—​stopping talking heavenly principle or simply regarding the pure moral mind as heavenly principle. Heavenly principle is understood as the absolute spirit of “being at the same time activity,” and thus the principle is not contrary with nature being the objective manifestation, and mind the subjective manifestation, but what is noticeable is that the heavenly principle is the final and ultimate basis whose order is top-​down, which is what “heaven has conferred is called The Nature; an accordance with this nature is called The Path of Duty,” while the so-​called “he who has exhausted all his mental constitution knows his nature. Knowing his nature, he knows Heaven” by Mencius is the performance of efforts, so it is the bottom-​up order. In terms of the relationship between heavenly principle and mind, if the heavenly principle actually means “the end with itself the power,” mind mainly concerns the power disposition for the heavenly principle to realize itself but cannot merely be interpreted as power because the mind is the presentation of heavenly principle. At least from the metaphysical view, such an interpretation of the Song-​Ming Neo Confucianism has its legitimacy. However, when purely constructing “moral metaphysics” without regarding the heavenly principle a natural belief, it means that heavenly principle is blurred and even deposed, because here, fundamentally, the heavenly principle isn’t taken as the ultimate basis of mind, and then promotes it to heavenly principle. But, first of all, the moral consciousness is applied—​in Kant, this can be achieved through just common reason—​to understand the mind, and then raise it to heavenly principle, so that heavenly principle has actually become a hollow concept with the purpose to maintain the highest ethical authority of morality, or rather, that is actually a replacement of a moral mind for the heavenly principle.

28  The Arrogation of Conscience Heavenly principle is fundamentally not the moral reason found in Kantian formalism; the invalidity of the latter replacing the former can also be interpreted in this way: the original “the end with itself the power” has now been deprived of the objective factors and the power factors are left over.47 If we quote the thought of three powers of heaven, earth, and mankind in The Book of Changes, it must be clearer. In the context of the three powers, humanity’s significance has been described as “embracing heaven and earth for gestation,” where the earth and the heaven are objective, and are the ultimate foundation of humanity’s gestation. In this sense, the unity of the mind, nature, and heaven has its legitimacy. However, if the meaning of human gestation is understood with humanism based on the enlightenment sense ever since modern times, the Dao of the three powers is virtually impossible because this is not only an issue of the world being fragmented, it is rather an issue of the world being abandoned. At the other side of the heavenly principle, being replaced with pure moral mind, the earth is completely materialized, or simply put, the earth is dead. As a consequence, the “moral metaphysics” built up from the moral feeling due to the unity will inevitably lead to the nihilism “if Qian and Kun were taken away, there would be no means of seeing that system,” and the moralism conscience will arrogate the heavenly principle and earth while deposing the heavenly principle and killing the earth and turn to be the universal noumenon in the creation of the world. With this regard, Mou Zongsan ‘s “moral metaphysics” is not only the last radiance of the setting sun of Song-​Ming Neo Confucianism, but also the secret subversion of Song-​Ming Neo Confucianism.

Notes 1 See Deng Xiaomang: Three Levels of Kant’s Moral Philosophy, Journals of Yunnan University, 2004, 4. It is later collected in the Shi Works: Problems in Kant Philosophy, SDX Joint Publishing Company, 2006. 2 Kant once stated that metaphysics is “a congenital knowledge system out of pure concept”, that is to say, Kant’s metaphysics here is associated with the origin of a purely rational congenital knowledge! See the citation in Immanuel Kant, The Metaphysics of Moral, 6: 216, in Practical Philosophy, trans. & ed. Mary. Gregor, Cambridge University Press, 1996, p. 371. In Critique of Pure Reason, Kant repeatedly referred to his views of metaphysics, as seen in relevant narratives below. 3 Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, 4: 409, in Practical Philosophy, p. 64. 4 Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, 4: 411, in Practical Philosophy, p. 65. 5 Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, 4: 396, in Practical Philosophy, p. 52. In The Critique of Power of Judgement, such view of natural teleology is developed in a more in-​depth and detailed manner. 6 Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, 4: 412, in Practical Philosophy, p. 66.

Mind and Ontology  29 7 Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, 4: 414, in Practical Philosophy, p. 67. 8 Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, 4: 420, in Practical Philosophy, p.72. Kant makes a note here to expound the reason within: First of all, the practice of pure reason inevitably connects will and behavior, meaning that the moral imperative regulated by practice as pure reason is congenital; secondly, since man hasn’t got a perfect will, when will and behavior are connected via the practice of pure reason, a preexistent will won’t analytically deduce a behavioral willingness. Namely, the moral imperative regulated by the practice as pure reason is actually comprehensive. 9 Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, 4: 421, in Practical Philosophy, p. 73. 10 Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, 4: 421, in Practical Philosophy, p. 73. For the name of the formula and its variant, see Allen W. Wood, Kant’s Ethical Thought, Cambridge University Press, 1999, p. 78. 11 Immanuel Kant, Critique of Practical Reason, 5:67-​71, in Practical Philosophy, trans. &ed. Mary. J. Gregor, Cambridge University Press, 1996, p.194-​198.Mou Zongsan attaches much importance to the explanation under the title “pseudotype of pure practical judgment”, holding that the explanation is “extremely delicate and subtle”. And thus he writes down an interpretation at length. Meanwhile, he criticizes the explanation of Kant at his own standpoint. See Moral Philosophy of Kant, Trans. & Annotate, Mou Zongsan, Student Book Store, 1983, p. 229–​24. In addition, Mou Zongsan translates Kant’s “pseudotype” here as “Sign”, holding that it’s easy to contribute to misunderstanding when translating it into “Paradigm” or “Model”. His explanation is reasonable, but the phrase “Sign” is kind of secluded violation, so my suggestion is to translate it into “Mimicking”, getting the meaning similar to “Pattern”. 12 Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals.4: 428, in Practical Philosophy, p.79. 13 Immanuel Kant, Critique of Practical Reason, 5: 29–​30, in Practical Philosophy, p. 163. 14 Immanuel Kant, Critique of Practical Reason, 5: 4, in Practical Philosophy, p. 140. It is here that Kant made a very important and thus often cited note: when I entitle freedom as moral law conditions now, but in the subsequent writings I claim that the moral law is the condition by virtue of which we can initially realize the freedom, to make people not mistake it for an inconsistency, I just want to remind one that: freedom is for sure the reason of existence of the moral law, while moral law is the reason to know freedom. Because if the moral law is not clearly thought of in our reason in advance, we will not think that we have legitimate reasons to recognize something like freedom (although this is not a contradiction). However, if there is no freedom, the moral law will not be found in our mind. 15 Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, 4: 447, in Practical Philosophy, p. 95. In the introduction of Kant’s Three Levels of Moral Philosophy, Deng Xiaomang mistakenly believes that the “third” is the concept of freedom. In addition, Kant’s combining the subjective norm and objective principle into the thought of the moral law is corresponding to the first group (namely, the division of “scale”) in the freedom category in Critique of Practical Reason. While explaining the freedom category table, Kant stated:

30  The Arrogation of Conscience for example, from the table above and the first group, man will immediately know where to start up in practical considerations: start from the norm based on everyone’s inclination; start from certain norms effective to those rational beings with certain consistent inclination; finally start from the laws belonging to all rational beings, regardless of their inclinations. (5: 67) In Interpretation on the Free Category Table in Kant’s “Critique of Practical Reason”, Deng Xiaomang did excellent research on Kant’s freedom category, but there is still a very obvious mistake in corresponding understanding. Namely, he understands the second item “objective norms in accordance with the principles” as right or wisdom: This is the starting point considered by utilitarians and rational egoists. The category of freedom that they have established has been in “norm”, that is, “right”, which has already hinted certain moral meanings. However, in Kant’s view, this is not a pure morality, but just practical wisdom or “wisdom”. In fact, Kant’s “norm” refers to the practical principle which can be analyzed from free will. Deng Xiaomang’s mistake is due to his failure to correctly understand the sentence cited above: “start from certain norms effective to those rational beings with certain consistent inclination”. Here Kant just means that there is consistency for human in certain inclinations as the rational being as well as the perceptual being. The paper is cited from No. 9, 2009 of Philosophical Studies. 16 Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, 4: 414, in Practical Philosophy, p. 67, footnote. In a later footnote (4: 460), Kant also named practical interest and pathological interest respectively as the direct interest and indirect interest to behavior, or rational interest and experiential interest. 17 Immanuel Kant, Critique of Practical Reason, 5: 71–​72, in Practical Philosophy, p. 198. Here Kant also pointed out that moral law directly determining will also means that “God’s will shall never be given power” on this issue, which is actually opposing the doctrine of work of the Holy Spirit in Christianity. 18 Kant’s relating humility to moral emotion is self-​evidently due to his Christian cultural background, in which humility as a religious emotion or a virtue of faith refers to the fact that people correctly recognize their humility in the face of God. It’s significant since it directly correlates to belief, and its opposite, arrogance, is called the greatest evil, because as the origin of disbelief, it means great disrespect to God. In Moral Metaphysics, Kant defined humility as “a person’s humble consciousness and humble sense generated from the comparison between his moral value and the law”, and pointed out that in terms of its being moral humility, the relative term is moral arrogance, that is “subjective belief of the greatness of one’s moral value without comparison to the law”; compared with the true humility, the opposite is false humility, namely, “belittling one’s own moral value to gain the kindness of others”. See Immanuel Kant, The Metaphysics of Morals, 6: 435–​436, in Practical Philosophy, p. 558. 19 Immanuel Kant, Critique of Practical Reason, 5: 76, in Practical Philosophy, p. 201. 20 In Critique of Practical Reason, analytics is followed by dialectics and methodology, where the former deals with the possible antinomy while practical reason

Mind and Ontology  31 determines the concept of rounded goodness and the latter concerns how the practical reason enters into human mind, namely, the moral education issue. 21 Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, 4: 460, in Practical Philosophy, p. 105, Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, 4: 460, in Practical Philosophy, p. 105, in the corresponding body of the footnote, Kant equals “impossible to explain why man directly shows interest in moral law” to “freedom impossible to explain the will in the subjective aspect”. That is, the problem why man shows interest in moral and the problem how freedom is possible are of the same problem respectively in objective aspect and subjective aspect. 22 In Evolution and Reduction of Morality and The Appropriation of Autonomy, I analyzed the reason why the “ethics” concept in Confucian thoughts can’t be simplified as the “moral” concept in Kant’s philosophy, with the focus on the core ideology. In the forthcoming analysis here, I will emphasize the whole theory context. The two should be combined for analysis. 23 Kant doesn’t hold that “not to do to others as you would not wish done to yourself ” can be a universal law, but he admits that with some restrictions, the former can be deduced from the latter. See Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, 4: 430, in Practical Philosophy, p. 80, footnote. Therefore, if understanding is regarded as the basis of criticism, what’s important firstly is not to assert according to Kant’s reasons that the “not to do to others as you would not wish done to yourself ” in Confucianism’s classic text isn’t a universal law, but to understand its meaning in the overall context of Confucianism—​this actually means being within some restrictions. With regard to this, the way of Deng Xiaomang extracting the Confucian classics “not to do to others as you would not wish done to yourself ” from the overall train of thought and simply question whether one’s desire and one’s unwillingness is respectively others’ desire and others’ unwillingness, and more bizarrely relate it to the “hypocrite”, if not a deliberate misinterpretation, is at least a deliberate misinterpretation out of context. Meanwhile, this also reveals from one side how unrealistic the attempt is to abstract the “not to do to others as you would not wish done to yourself ” as a “gold rule” to construct the global ethics. Deng Xiaomang’s analysis and criticism on “not to do to others as you would not wish done to yourself ” are shown in multiple articles, such as Three Levels of Kant’s Moral Philosophy and Confucian Hypocrite Viewed in Kant’s Moral Philosophy collected in Problems in Kant Philosophy (SDX Joint Publishing Company, 2006), and Possibility of Global Ethics: Three Modes of “Golden Rules”, Jiangsu Social Sciences, Vol. 4, 2002. The “ethics” here gives the traditional connotation of “human relations”, and not the translation of “the ethical”, so it can be translated as “familial being”. 24 The word “Lunli” here takes the traditional meaning of “human morality” and does not take the meaning of “ethics” translated from the Western language “the ethical”, so it can be translated as “familial being” in English. 25 Kant divides obligation into “perfect obligation for self ”, “perfect obligation for others”, “imperfect obligation for self ” and “imperfect obligation for others”. The Confucian ethical human relations shall never inevitably be included in any of the obligation he divides. For the analysis and criticism on “moral saint” bred from Christian culture, see Susan Wolf, “Moral Saints,” in The Philosophy, Vol. 79, No. 8, Aug., 1982.

32  The Arrogation of Conscience 26 This also concerns the correct understanding of us on the “distinction between human and animals” by Mencius. As long as we observe the context for Mencius to talk about it, we can clearly know that the key of “distinction between human and animals” does not lie in the generally mentioned mind of moral—​Mou Zongsan understands it right this way, but in ethical human relations. That whereby man differs from the lower animals is but small. The mass of people cast it away, while superior men preserve it. Shun clearly understood the multitude of things, and closely observed the relations of humanity. He walked along the path of benevolence and righteousness; he did not need to pursue benevolence and righteousness. (Mencius · Li Lou II) 27 Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, 4:422, in Practical Philosophy, p.74. 28 Macintyre: After Virtue, Trans., Song Jijie, Yilin Press, 2003, p. 58. 29 Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, 4: 422, in Practical Philosophy, p. 74. 30 Macintyre: After Virtue, Trans., Song Jijie, p. 58. 31 Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, 4: 423, in Practical Philosophy, p. 75. 32 Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, 4:423, in Practical Philosophy, p.75. 33 Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, 4:424, in Practical Philosophy, p.75. 34 Kant accepted such view from works of Christian Wolff and Alexander Gottliel Baumgarten, while the view can earlier date back to Francisco Suarez, the scholastic philosopher in the late Middle Ages. 35 Immanuel Kant, Critique of Pure Reason (A246-​247/​B303), trans. Paul Guyer and Alien W. Wood, Cambridge University Press, 1998, p. 358–​359. The Chinese version “Immanuel Kant: A Critique of Pure Reason”, trans, Deng Xiaomang, collocation, Yang Zutao, People’s Publishing House, 2004, p. 223. For the word “Ontology”, Deng Xiaomang and Yang Zutao adopted the translated term “Ontology”, and this paper adopts “Ontology”. 36 Immanuel Kant, Critique of Pure Reason (A845/​ B873), p. 698. The Chinese version “Immanuel Kant: A Critique of Pure Reason”, trans. by Deng Xiaomang, collocation, Yang Zutao, p. 637–​638. 37 Immanuel Kant, Critique of Practical Reason, 5: 3-​4, in Practical Philosophy, p. 139. 38 Immanuel Kant, Critique of Pure Reason (A533–​534/​B561–​562), p. 533. The Chinese version “Immanuel Kant: A Critique of Pure Reason”, trans. by Deng Xiaomang, collocation, Yang Zutao, p. 433–​434. 39 Immanuel Kant, Critique of Practical Reason, 5: 142, in Practical Philosophy, p. 254. On the base of such understanding, I do believe that “postulate” shall be translated to “Reorganization” rather than “Referendum”, “Suspension” or “Standards”. For the differences between theoretical hypothesis and practical postulation, see Chapter 11 of Critique of Power of Judgment: “Ways to Regard It as Real from the Faith of Practice”. 40 Kant once stated clearly that God shall not be regarded as a theoretical hypothesis:

Mind and Ontology  33 Anything acting as a hypothesis to explain the possibility of a given object shall at least get its possibility totally affirmative. When making a hypothesis, I give up the knowledge corresponding to the reality, which is enough: I can’t give up more; the possibility of something I adopt acting as the basis of an explanation shall at least be free from any suspect, or the hollow illusion will be endless. However, if the possibility of an extrasensory being regulated in accordance with certain concepts is hypothesized, since here any condition required in a knowledge is not provided in accordance with something based on the intuition within, law of contradiction (it’s none other than a possibility of thought which cannot prove the possibility of the object itself mentioned) is the last to function as the standard of such possibility. Therefore, it will be a groundless presupposition. The quotation is seen in Immanuel Kant, Critique of Power of Judgment, 5: 466, trans. Paul Guyer and Eric Matthews, Cambridge University Press, 2000, p. 330. The Chinese version “Immanuel Kant: A Critique of Pure Reason”, trans, Deng Xiaomang, collocation, Yang Zutao, People’s Publishing House, 2002, p. 325. 41 Immanuel Kant, Critique of the Power of Judgment, 5: 471–​472, p. 30. The Chinese version is seen in “A Critique of Pure Reason”, trans.by Deng Xiaomang, collocation, Yang Zutao, p. 331–​332. 42 In a note in the preface to the Critique of Practical Reason, Kant mentioned that: the term of postulation of pure practical reason still most likely leads to misunderstanding if it is mixed with the meanings of those hypotheses of pure mathematics with apodictic determinacy. But what the assumption of pure mathematics set is the possibility of a certain action whose object can be congenitally predicted to be possible with complete certainty in theory. The postulation of pure practical reason just follows the inevitable practical law to set the possibility of a certain object (God and immortality of the soul), so it’s just for practical reason as the possibility of such a setting has no certainty in theory at all, which shall never have necessary certainty. That is to say, it’s not the necessity realized in terms of the object, but the necessary settings in terms of those objective but being the practical law, the subject abiding by the practical reason, which is therefore just an inevitable hypothesis. I can’t perceive a better way to express the subjective but true and unconditional rational necessity. In Theory of Rounded Goodness, Mou Zongsan quoted this sentence, and held that “this note is very important”, and clearly pointed out that the inevitability here is “not for understanding, but only for practice”. This shows that Mou Zongsan is clear of the distinction between theoretical assumptions and practical postulation of Kant. However, it is worth noting that Kant clearly depicted the differences between postulation of practice reason and hypothesis of pure mathematics, but he not only used “postulate” to refer to “hypothesis in pure mathematics”, but also applied “hypothesis” to refer to “the postulation of pure practical reason”. This invalid statement is likely to bring about a mixture in understanding. The paper cited from Kant is seen in Immanuel Kant, Critique of Practical Reason, 5: 11, note, in Practical Philosophy, p. 15. Mou Zongsan’s quotation of this material of Kant is seen in Mou Zongsan: Theory of Rounded Goodness, Student Book Store, 1985, p. 215, p. 237. 43 Mou Zongsan: Ontological Mind and Ontological Human Nature (I), p. 153.

34  The Arrogation of Conscience 44 Mou Zongsan: Ontological Mind and Ontological Human Nature (I), p. 108. 45 The citation by Mou Zongsan is under the title of “All Moral Principles Classification Based on Heteronomy Concept” of the second part of Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, see Ontological Mind and Ontological Human Nature (I), p. 107. 46 Like Hegel, Mou Zongsan also wrote Philosophy of History, and referred to his work, but in the basic position, they still show differences. For example, although he also used the word “dialectical”, his understanding of “dialectical” was totally different from that of Hegel’s. See the next section of the book “Historical Grafting”. 47 Kant mentioned his way to apply the causality category to understand freedom, and it is worth noting that the causality right belongs to the category of dynamics. See Immanuel Kant, Critique of Practical Reason, 5: 104, in Practical Philosophy, p. 223. In terms of Confucianism, whether the “I wish to be virtuous, and lo! Virtue is at hand.” by Confucius or “seek for the lost mind” by Mencius, they all concern about the motivation for ethical practice. However, this is only a part of its thought structure and is emphasized because of its urgency and criticality in practice.

3 Intellectual Intuition and Thing-​in-​Itself

“Moral metaphysics” originates from the commutative analogical interpretation and commutative explanation for the Confucianism and Kantianism of Mou Zongsan and becomes the theoretical basis for Mou Zongsan defining Confucianism and Kantianism. In his thinking, one important problem inspired by moral metaphysics is why Confucianism can achieve three levels at the most, while Kant can only reach the first level of practical reason, not to mention the second and the third levels. To explain this point, Mou Zongsan comes up with the question of whether human beings have intellectual intuition and discusses it on the level of the difference between the west and the east. The question about intellectual intuition proposed by Mou Zongsan still exists in the theoretical context of Kantianism. Firstly, in his opinion, although we have direct awareness of moral rules, free will as the existing foundation for moral rules is not an object we can deal with directly: We can call the awareness of the basic rule as a fact for reason. It is not because that we can suppose this rule from the awareness of freedom (because this awareness is not inborn), but because it is imposed on us as an inborn synthetic proposition independently. This proposition is not based on any perceptual intuition, neither pure intuition nor empirical intuition. If we presume the existence of the awareness of freedom, it will be analytical. However, as an active idea, this kind of awareness of freedom will need some kind of intelligent intuition which cannot be supposed by us. Nevertheless, to regard this rule as the given one accurately, we have to notice one point—​that it is not any empirical fact but the single fact of pure reason. Pure reason uses it to announce that it is the original legislation.1 In the book of Phenomenon and Thing-​in-​Itself, Mou Zongsan uses this paragraph with a relatively detailed explanation and pointed comment.2 In conclusion, he means now that Kant attributes the fact that the awareness of freedom cannot be presented directly to the fact the human beings do not have DOI: 10.4324/9781351242219-4

36  The Arrogation of Conscience intellectual intuition, the key for making the awareness of freedom a presentation not a standard is the transfer of the intellectual intuition.3 Secondly, in Kant’s opinion, compared with the sensible intuition, the intuition which relies on the existence of object and which exists only with the impetus by the object through the imagery ability of the subject, the intellectual intuition is described as an intuitive way that makes the existence of the intuitional object shown. Besides, in Kant’s opinion, because human beings only have perceptional intuition ability rather than intellectual intuition, the scope of human knowledge is confined to appearance instead of the thing-​in-​itself.4 As for the metaphysics of morals of Mou Zongsan, conscience as moral entity is the thing-​in-​itself with ontological significance. Therefore, the conscience must have the function of making the existence of the intuitional entity shown, which demands the recognition that the conscience as a kind of cognitive competence must be the intellectual intuition. In other words, the metaphysics of morals built in the commutative analogical interpretation and the commutative explanation demands the recognition that human beings have intellectual intuition on two levels, the level of moral philosophy and metaphysics. As has been mentioned previously, as for the difference between Confucianism and Kantianism, one important theoretical point of Mou Zongsan is the difference between thoughts about the relationship between heaven and man in Confucian tradition and the relationship between the God and the human in the Christian background. The difference is reflected in many aspects. However, in the opinion of Mou Zongsan, the most important one is the issue of treating the finiteness of human beings. That is to say, Kant thinks that the human is a finite existence while Confucianism holds the view that humans are finite but can reach an infinite level. To propose the issue of whether human beings have intellectual intuition is to settle down the details of the difference on the philosophical level. In the beginning part of Phenomenon and Thing-​in-​Itself, Mou Zongsan comes up with the following: Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason and all his philosophical systems imply two presuppositions. One is that the phenomenon and the thing-​in-​itself have transcendental difference and the other one is that the human is a finite existence (finiteness of human beings). The first presupposition implies the second presupposition which includes the first presupposition. Therefore, the second presupposition is the basic one.5 This statement is due to the empirical difference between the phenomenon and thing-​in-​itself, in subjectivism this relies on the distinction between the sensible intuition and the intellectual intuition. In other words, the knowledge of a phenomenon comes from sensible intuition while the knowledge of the thing-​in-​itself comes from intellectual intelligence. As long as Kant believes the human only has sensible intuition, he must make a difference between the phenomenon and the thing-​in-​itself so as to define the cognitive limits

Intellectual Intuition and Thing-in-Itself  37 of humans. Similarly, as the metaphysics of morals regards the current presentation and creativity of the conscience as the key point, the recognition of the intellectual intuition of humans must constitute the basis for the theory of the metaphysics of morals. Mou Zongsan himself knows very well about his thinking. He concludes that the point of the recognition of the intellectual intuition as the feature of the whole of Chinese philosophy: if the real human does not have intellectual intuition, the whole of Chinese philosophy shall break down and the results accumulated in the past several thousand years will become void and vain. This is a vital problem which we must face directly.6 From this statement, we can see the importance of intellectual intuition for Mou Zongsan. It is not only related to the theoretical basis of his philosophical system but also his core theme for both Chinese and western philosophies. As for Kant, intellectual intuition is not recognized in terms of the reality, while it cannot be denied in terms of possibility. More directly, although we do not have reasons for being certain humans have intellectual intelligence, it can be presumed that God has intellectual intelligence as natural theology does. The intuitional ability of human beings is connected with sensibility, which is called pure intuition in terms of its form, time, and space, or as empirical intuition in terms of detailed content. The feature of sensible intuition is its passive acceptance, in other words, the reliance on stimulus from the object. Contrary to this point, the intellectual intuition possessed by humans is the active spontaneity, that is, the active ability to put the object under the ideas for understanding and thinking. With the difference between sensibility and intelligence, both the intuitional intelligence and the intelligent intuition cannot be assumed. However, intelligent thinking ability can be conducted on the level of pure conception only with some rules, such as the law of non-​contradiction. If we connect understanding more with the ability of putting the intuition of the object under the idea, while connecting the ability for explaining the logical relationship among the ideas, the understanding of intellectuality can be divided into the narrow one and the broad one: the broad one includes the understanding ability and the thinking ability, which is referred as “intellektuell” by Kant (generally translated into “intelligence” or “reason”). The narrow intellectuality emphasizes the understanding ability for being connected with the empirical cognition, which is referred as “Verstand” (generally translated into “Intellectual”) by Kant. Intellectual intuition refers to the intuitional ability for intellectual objects. The rationalists before Kant held a view that human beings have intuitional ability for intellectual objects, such as knowledge about mathematics and geometry, which is included into the intellectual intuition. Kant rearranged the position of intuition and included intuition into the sensibility. However,

38  The Arrogation of Conscience his understanding of intellectual intuition still shares some similar ideas with the rationalists. Therefore, we can see that perceptual intuition and intellectual intuition still do not correspond to the phenomenon and thing-​in-​itself, but the phenomena and noumena: If we call the appearances of objects as phenomena while separate our perceiving ways and their natural characteristics, the indication is implied in our ideas. Either we put the objects (even we do not see them directly in their characteristics) according to the natural characteristics to the opposite aspect against the former objects and call them as the rationalistic objects or do the same thing for the objects which are not the objects of our sense but the possible objects which are reflected by the intellectuality as the target.7 This statement clearly shows that the distinction between perceptual intuition and intellectual intuition corresponds to the distinction between objects of sense and objects of rationalistic objects instead of the distinction between the phenomenon and the thing-​in-​itself. To be more specific, the objects of sense overlap the phenomenon while the scope for the rationalistic objects is larger than the thing-​in-​itself because “some other objects which are not the objects of our sense but the possible objects which are reflected by the intellectuality as the target” also belong to the rationalistic objects, but they do not belong to the category of thing-​in-​itself. The thing-​in-​itself is relative to the phenomenon and this kind of the relevance indicates that the concept of the thing-​in-​itself and the concept of the phenomenon are complementary. However, according to Kant, the difference between the thing-​in-​itself and the phenomenon is subjective: “the differentiation between the idea of thing-​in-​itself and the idea of phenomenon is not objective but subjective. The thing-​in-​itself is not another object but the presentation for another aspect of the same object.”8 That is to say, as the presentation for another aspect of the same object, the thing-​in-​itself is aiming at perceptible objects. Nevertheless, other intellectual objects which can think, such as free will, God and soul, do not have correspondents in the level of phenomenon. That is to say, those objects cannot be intuited by sensibility and they cannot become objects of perception as intellectual objects. In other words, although intellectual objects are relative to perceptual objects, the relevance here is different from the relevance between the thing-​in-​itself and the phenomenon: the idea of conceptual object and the idea of intellectual object are not interdependent. The division of conceptual objects and rationalistic objects by Kant means that he inherits the concept of intellectual intuition from the rationalists. The difference lies in that knowledge such as mathematics and geometry is referred to as intellectual intuition by the rationalists, while those knowledges referred to as the sensible intuition people possess and the intellectual intuition are related with conceptions that people can identify in practical areas

Intellectual Intuition and Thing-in-Itself  39 and can think about in theoretical areas but cannot have conceptual intuition of in terms of possibility.9 However, that does not indicate that objects of intellectual intuition are only the identification for the practical reason of free will, God, and souls apart from the thing-​in-​itself.10 In fact, the objects of the intellectual intuition may include all the concepts in practical areas, such as the concept of right discussed by Kant: Undoubtedly, the right concept used by complete intellectuality includes the same meaning which can be expanded from the subtlest thinking. However, people are not aware of the fact that there are so many presentations of different aspects of thinking in daily practical use. But people cannot say that this daily concept is sensible and includes a pure phenomenon […] Rightness cannot become the phenomenon. In contrast, its concept exists in intellectuality and shows the characteristics of the behaviors (morals). Those characteristics belong to the behaviors themselves.11 If the behavior is not a physical event in its essence, the concepts of the characteristics of the representation behaviors can only be thought about by people as rationalistic objects instead of sensible objects. However, intellectual intuition means rationalistic objects that people cannot have conceptual intuition about but can think about. In Kant’s opinion, we can envisage reasonably and only the original being; God can have this kind of intellectual intuition. Therefore, the intellectual intuition indicates that only God has cognitive competence in terms of its possibility. As for the reasons why we can envisage that intellectual intuition is the cognitive ability possessed reasonably only by God, Kant has a brief explanation: “because all the knowledge of God must be conceptual instead of the thought which has limitations at any time.”12 In other words, if there is a God who is envisaged by natural theology as the original being, we cannot presume the direct conceptive ability of God on the level of the sensible intuition of human beings nor presume the thinking ability on the level of the rationalistic thinking of human beings. Instead, we can only locate the cognitive ability of God which seems to double transcendental thinking on the level of the intellectual intuition or the intuitional intellectuality. Therefore, we can attribute the presupposition about God by Kant to his philosophical anthropology: envisage the infinity of the cognitive ability of God based on the finiteness of the cognitive ability of human beings. Moreover, although the finiteness in the cognitive ability of human beings is reflected directly on the empirical intuition, it must be based on the stimulus of objects so as to rely on the existence of the object. Then, people can envisage that the infinity of God’s cognitive ability lies in the fact that the intuitional knowledge of God does not rely on the existence of objects and can embody the existence of the objects. “Ability to embody the existence of the objects” is creativity and is identical to the idea in natural theology

40  The Arrogation of Conscience that God is the original creator. Therefore, for Kant, in the area of natural theology which can be envisaged reasonably, the cognitive process of God is actually the creation process of God. That is to say, the intellectual intuition becomes the creative intuition with the cosmological significance and the originality. Out of this sense, Kant calls the sensible intuition possessed by humans as the intuitus derivatives and calls the envisaged intellectual intuition possessed by God as the intuitusoriginarius.13 However, the idea that only God has this intellectual intuition is the result of following the thinking of natural theology and it does not mean that Kant himself has the same stand with natural theology. Actually, we know that Kant is against natural theology because he thinks that natural teleology is not enough for establishing a kind of theology and that the identification of practical reason establishes moral theology. It indicates that Kant does not affirm the idea that “only God has intellectual intuition” but he only thinks about its possibility without contradiction. The connection between intellectual intuition and the cognitive competence of God and the indication of the un-​deniability of the intellectual intuition in terms of possibility and the uncertainty in terms of reality mean that the existence of God is possible but uncertain in terms of the intellectual ability of human beings. Kant has pointed out clearly that the difference between possibility and reality is closely related with the characteristics of human beings: the intellectuality of human beings must be different in the possibility and reality of things. The evidence lies in the subject and nature of human cognitive abilities. Because if the implementation of those cognitive abilities does not require two kinds of elements of totally different nature, that is to say, require the intellectuality for idea and require the corresponding sensible intuition to the idea for the object, there will not be such kind of difference (between the possible thing and the real thing). If our intellectuality is intuitional, it will have no other objects apart from the real things […] Concepts (they are just the possibility aiming at one object) and the sensible intuition (it renders us something but it is not cognized as an object) will be canceled.14 Here it can be seen that the difference between possibility and reality is the limit of human beings, to be specific, the limit of human beings in their cognitive ability, because there is no difference between possibility and reality for God who can be envisaged reasonably and who has intellectual intuition. The difference between reality and value is similar to this. Also, the difference between the corresponding theoretical reason and practical reason is similar to this. In other words, the limit of human beings is not only reflected in cognitive ability but also reflected in practical ability, or, the field of practical reason:

Intellectual Intuition and Thing-in-Itself  41 similar to the fact that reason must be defined with certain inevitability without any condition of the natural original accordance in the investigation of the natural theoretical property, it presupposes its causal property without any condition, in other words, freedom, because it has been aware of the moral orders. However, here, as the obligation, the objective necessity of action is opposite to the certainty of this action in nature instead of freedom, while the absolutely certain action is seen as accidental in physics. Then it is clear that the following situation only originates from the subjective characters of our practical ability, in other words, moral rules must be presented as orders (the actions corresponding to those rules are presented as obligations) and the necessity of reason is not presented through being (occurrence) but through supposition. Under this situation, if reason is separated from sensibility (in other words, the subjective conditions for the reason being applied in the natural objects) and is regarded as the reason in the rationalistic world conforming to the moral rules according to the causal property, it will not happen. Here, between the doing and the supposed to do, between the practical rules which will be possible because of us and the theoretical rules which become reality […] It will have no difference.15 It is obvious that Kant regards the difference between possibility and reality in the theoretical reason field on the one hand and the difference between the supposition and being in the practical reason field on the other as opposite. The things becoming reality in the theoretical reason field are the things which the sensible intuition of human beings can be employed on, that is to say, things people can cognize. Things that can be ensured in the practical reason field and things that can only be possible but unrealistic in the theoretical reason field, that is to say, things which the sensible intuition of human beings cannot be employed on and which can order the actions of human beings without any condition because of the practical reason.16 The difference between being and supposition, in other words, the difference between the fact and values, is actually the difference between theoretical reason and practical reason, or the difference between knowledge and action. All of them are the reflection of a human limit. If we see here that we can imagine a God as a reference substance reasonably, then, there will not be the difference between being and supposition and the difference between knowledge and action in terms of God. The implementation of Kant for the anthropological proposition that the “human is a being of limited reason” is also reflected in the theoretical part which links up being and supposition, in other words, which links up knowledge and action. In the book Critique of the Power of Judgment, Chapter 77, Kant discusses “the intellectual characteristic which makes the idea of the natural goal possible for us.” The main points are shown as follows. Firstly, because the human intellectuality is a kind of intellectus archetypus compared

42  The Arrogation of Conscience to the intellectus ectypus. That is to say, it is a kind of inferential intellectuality, instead of natural intuitional intellectuality. Therefore, when the judgment includes special things in nature to the general concept of the intellectuality, the inevitable contingency occurs. To be specific, the needed intellectual general concept employing the judgment is necessary while the special material being included into the intellectual general concept is accidental. The contingency confronted by the judgment employment is a reflection of the human limit in judgment employment because the totally natural intuitional intellectuality, in other words, the archetype intellectuality, will not confront this kind of contingency. Actually, the difference between necessity and contingency in judgment employment is similar to the difference between possibility and reality in the field of theoretical reason and the difference between the subjective inevitability and objective contingency of moral rules in the field of practical reason. Secondly, because of this characteristic of judgment, the imitative intellectuality of human beings is not enough for the natural reflective employment of judgment and it must be based on archetype intellectuality.17 As for human beings, compared with the regulative judgment from general to special, the reflective judgment is from special to general. Then, the situation is that “one tangible entirety in nature can only be seen as the result of the impetus by the competition among the different parts.” Therefore, “the whole possibility can only be envisaged to be dependent on the various parts.” However, to “envisage the possibility of all parts (according to their characteristics and relationships) is to be dependent on the whole,” apart from resorting to spontaneous intuitional intellectuality. In other words, with the archetype intellectuality, there is no other way.18 To be more direct, the concept of natural teleology can only be understood within the relationship between intellectuality requiring images and the totally spontaneous intuitional intellectuality: as for the totally spontaneous intuitional intellectuality, it does not need or does not have natural teleology. However, only with human intellectuality and without the totally spontaneous intuitional intellectuality, the natural teleology will not come into being; in other words, the natural teleology that the whole includes the possible evidence connected within the parts can only be envisaged through the archetype intellectuality. For human beings with the imitative intellectuality, they can only envisage the natural teleology “that a whole image consists of the connected parts with the complete form and the possible evidence of the parts under the form.”19 Therefore, although the concept of natural teleology must be based on the archetype intellectuality, it is a “result of the special characteristics of our intellectuality.” Therefore, we do not have to prove such a kind of intellectus archetypus is possible but only have to prove that when we compare the deductive intellectus archetypus with the contingency of such characteristic, we are led to the intellectus archetypus without any contradictions.20

Intellectual Intuition and Thing-in-Itself  43 In conclusion, Kant regards the basis of the existence theory of natural teleology as the relationship between human beings (who have only the sensible intuitional ability absolutely in his view) and God (who can be envisaged to have the intellectual intuition reasonably). As for possibility, God is the root and human beings are the secondary part. As for reality, human beings are real and God is unreal. In the end, Kant discusses the reason why the explanation of natural teleology and the explanation of natural mechanism can both exist: at least it is possible to regard the material world as the pure phenomenon and think about the thing-​in-​itself (not phenomenon) as the basis while equipping the basis with the corresponding intellectual intuition (even though it is not our intuition), and then there will be a supersensible thing which we cannot understand that comes into being in nature, where we ourselves are included. Therefore we regard things that are necessary sensual objects in nature according to the mechanism while regarding things that are rational objects (even as the natural whole of the system), in other words, the consistency and unity which must be judged as the accidental special rules and the various forms according to the teleology. Meanwhile, we judge them according to two different principles, instead of the explanation of teleology to exclude the explanation of mechanism and conduct like that, they are contradictory.21 From this we can see that the principle of natural teleology is based on intellectual intuition but is connected to human intellectuality. Besides, just like that the difference between the phenomenon and the thing-​in-​itself is only subjective, and the difference between natural teleology and natural mechanism is also subjective. From the above analysis, it can be seen that if the intellectual intuition in the context against the sensible intuition only means a negative use of intellectual intuition, then the intellectual intuition when constructing natural teleology means the positive use of intellectual intuition. In other words, in his mind, the theoretical function of intellectual intuition is in the construction of natural teleology. Even though natural teleology is the same with the empirical knowledge and the practical order, reflecting the human limit. Relevantly, Kant did not confine the intellectual intuition within human beings, but admitted the possibility of the intellectual intuition being envisaged as the ability of God reasonably as the object which the human intellectuality can think about.22 As for the basic corresponding divisions between the phenomenon and the thing-​in-​itself, sensible objects and intellectual objects, sensible intuition and intellectual intuition, the cognitive ability of human beings (which can be envisaged reasonably) and the cognitive ability of God, the understanding of Mou Zongsan includes both the insight and the serious problems. The most important point lies in that Mou Zongsan controls the core goal for the

44  The Arrogation of Conscience divisions conducted by Kant: those divisions are made from different aspects but all of them belong to the same concept, the concept of human limit. What Mou Zongsan wants to do is to propose reasonable suspicion and include it into a more appropriate and more complete view about human beings based on the Chinese philosophical traditions he understood about the idea of Kant for the human limit, which in his view reflects the characteristics of western culture and western ideas. In this view, though Mou Zongsan holds the significant starting point of Kantianism and puts one important aspect of the difference between Chinese philosophy and western philosophy in the theoretical level, he has some prejudice for the problems and the theories about the significant aspects of the difference between China and the west so that he is unfair in evaluating Kant and cannot hold firmly the Confucian standpoint he endeavors to hold. The following is a brief analysis of this point. Firstly, the division of Kant between the phenomenon and the thing-​in-​ itself is so unique in western philosophical history that most thinkers before and after Kant do not agree with this division. However, Mou Zongsan not only accepts this division from Kant but also puts this division into the core understanding of Chinese philosophy. Reasonably, with the standpoint of “that which is antecedent to the material form exists, we say, as an ideal method, and that which is subsequent to the material form exists, we say, as a definite thing.” Or in other words, with the standpoint of “unity of body and soul” which was developed by Xiong Shili and inherited by Mou Zongsan, people shall not admit the division of phenomenon from thing-​in-​itself. However, Mou Zongsan said that the division between the phenomenon and the thing-​ in-​itself is necessary.23 Mou Zongsan accepts the division of Kant with his certain theoretical reason, accepting science with the root of the Chinese traditional ideas. To be more specific, through the new explanation for the Chinese traditional thoughts, he endeavors to create the ontological foundation for the science. In the preface of Intellectual Intuition and Chinese Philosophy, Mou Zongsan talks about the motivation to write the book. He reflects about his former and later research on Kantianism. Heidegger insists in the book Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics, the theme of Critique of Pure Reason is not an epistemology problem but a metaphysical problem. Under the influence of Heidegger, Mou Zongsan points out that his understanding of Kant in the Critique of Mental Consciousness ignores the intellectual “ontological reference” but just considers the intellectual “logical reference.” The so-​called intellectual ontological reference is the understanding for the intellectuality and the concepts of the relative phenomena on the ontological level and it constitutes the ontological basis for empirical knowledge and the relevant natural science. Therefore, the discussions of Kant in Critique of Pure Reason about the intuition, intellectuality and the corresponding knowledge of the phenomenon are very meaningful for Mou Zongsan. It can be included into the metaphysic system of Chinese philosophy, which is redefined. We know that Mou Zongsan regards it as one level of the two-​level topology so as to

Intellectual Intuition and Thing-in-Itself  45 complete the theoretical mission of science and democracy which is also put by him under the category of intellectual thoughts. To some extent, Mou Zongsan admits that the theoretical motivation for the division of the phenomenon and the thing-​in-​itself conforms to the theoretical motivation for the division of the phenomenon and the thing-​in-​itself by Kant. Then why does Kant have to make a division between the phenomenon and the thing-​in-​itself ? Why was it Kant who divided the phenomenon and the thing-​in-​itself in the history of the western philosophy? To answer this question, we must reflect on the changes of the ideas on the matters over the history of the western philosophy from ancient times to modern times. We know that the idea of matter in classic times in the west can be represented by the physics of Aristotle. One of the most important points to believe is that all things have their nature and regard nature as the core idea to understand the thing. For example, in the understanding of movements, Aristotle connects clearly the movements of the matter with the nature of the matter. The leading idea presents as the matter moves according to its nature. To be more specific, “the movement methods and positions of matters are decided by their natures.” Therefore, the movement indicates the presentation of the nature of the matter and the position is understood to be the position where the nature of a matter belongs to. Thus, the idea that the matters of different natures are different because of their moving methods and the movement conforming to nature is different from the movement against nature come into being.24 The physics of Newton replaced Aristotle’s physics with a revolutionary power. In terms of Newton, the concept of the nature of matter for Aristotle and its function in physics disappear. That is to say, the movements of all things are not thought to be conforming to their nature. Rather, the law of motion becomes the basic rule for all the matters and all the matters are put under the law. Then, the movement is only seen as the situation change of the matter and the position is only seen as the external status of one matter. The division of the movement modes according to the different natures of the matters and the division of the movement modes according to conformity to nature and the defiance of nature are both eliminated. As for the revolutionary change of the view on the matter brought by Newtonian physics, Russell once commented, “the first thing deserving to be noticed is that nearly all the animatism is eliminated from the physical law.” To highlight its importance, he cited the epitaph written by Pope for Newton with the allusion to Genesis, “nature and nature’s laws lay hid in night; God said ‘Let Newton be’ and all was light.”25 From Aristotle’s physics to Newtonian physics, the change indicates that there is a revolutionary change of the concept of matter in western philosophical history. This revolutionary change can be described as that the mechanics standpoint replaces the ontological standpoints to become the fundamental understanding for nature. One important theoretical motivation of Kantianism is to reply to the revolutionary change brought by Newton’s

46  The Arrogation of Conscience physics. On the one hand, Kant admitted the core idea of Newtonian physics is to put all matters under the law of motions. On the other hand, Kant was unsatisfied with some views of Newton, such as the concept of absolute space and time and the view of regarding gravity as the first essential attribute of matter. He thinks that it is necessary to eliminate some mess and misunderstanding about matter and to provide the metaphysical basis for natural science. For this, Heidegger once pointed out, after the publication of Critique of Pure Reason for five years, also the year after 100 years of the publication of Newton’s Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica, Kant published his Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science (1786). It is based on the standpoint of Critique of Pure Reason and it is a conscious and complementary work to Newton’s work. In the end of the preface in this work, Kant discusses the works of Newton clearly.26 To be more specific, Kant himself thinks that the ideas about the sensible intuition and the intellectual category in Critique of Pure Reason have established a metaphysic system about nature so as to establish a basic standpoint for the metaphysical basis of natural science: it makes one general natural metaphysic system, especially a tangible natural metaphysic system close to a complete graph, which is the category. No more pure intellectual ideas can be concerned with the nature of the matter. In the four categories, that is to say, the amount, quality, relationship and modal, there must be a common definition of general matters and even all the regularities. Therefore, there must be a matter which can be reflected naturally by the category and which can be presented in the mathematical idea or which can be rendered as the certain empirical object in the experience.27 In the part talking about the category, Kant made a long note on the comment on his Critique of Pure Reason by an anonymous author and restated that: if we admit (1) “The category includes all the pure intellectual concepts and all the intellectual activity forms of judgment”; (2) “Because of the natural synthesis principle of intellectuality, it will put all the objects given to it under the above-​mentioned category and thus it must have the natural intuition which is the employment condition in the pure intellectual concept”; (3) This natural “pure intuition can only be the pure form of the phenomenon of the external or the internal senses (space and time) and thus can only be the object of the possible experience,” then it can be concluded that the pure reason can only aim at the empirical object at any time in terms of the employment of the intuition and the intellectuality. Besides, because there is nothing

Intellectual Intuition and Thing-in-Itself  47 empirical in the natural principles, those natural principles are the possible rules of the general experience.28 The reason why Kant replaced the arrogant ontology with the modest transcendental philosophy lies in aiming to confront the challenge of modern science, especially Newtonian physics to traditional ontology, which had become an outdated queen under the clash of modern science through the demarcation of reason. Thus he would establish a metaphysical basis for natural science through clarifying the natural principles on which the experience of knowledge is based to be possible. By doing so, the authority of science is confirmed and the dignity of metaphysics is protected. The division between the phenomenon and the thing-​in-​itself and the above-​mentioned corresponding division submit to such a theoretical context. It indicates another great theoretical goal of Kant, reconstructing and saving natural teleology with new theoretical modes when the classic natural teleology confronted the breakdown resulting from the challenges of modern science, especially Newton’s physics. In other words, Kant in modern times still wants to save the natural concept from classic times which is nature for matter with new theoretical modes. We can say that it is the endeavor of Kant to connect the past and the present. For this, as the matter under the ontological concepts, with the transcendental freedom of the cosmological concept and the natural freedom as the theological concepts, it constitutes the important theoretical measure taken by Kant to protect the natural concept in the classic meaning. From this we can see that the theoretical motivation of Mou Zongsan for admitting the division of phenomenon and the thing-​in-​itself is consistent with the theoretical motivation of Kant for making such kind of division, although Mou Zongsan does not have clear ideas about the theoretical motivation of Kant for connecting the past and the present. Kant submits to the critics of strict reason to make the division between the phenomenon and the thing-​in-​itself. Although he does not admit that human beings have intellectual intuition, he retains the concept of the thing-​in-​itself, actually understanding the intellectual intuition on the level of connecting the past and the present. However, Mou Zongsan turns an intellectual intuition problem into a problem of the difference between China and the west. In other words, the western philosophical tradition represented by Kant only admits that human beings have a sensible intuition so that the intellectual intuition can only be established on the basis of Chinese philosophical traditions. The theoretical motivation is to base modern science on Chinese classic philosophical traditions in a fundamental way.29 This theoretical motivation of Mou Zongsan also expresses his great theoretical goal: base on the cultural tradition and ideology of China, face the actual situation and historical problems since the modern times of China, connect the past and the present, and communicate the difference between the west and China from the view of furthering the situation and future of global history under the deeper communication of many cultures. Besides, under the special historical situation where the

48  The Arrogation of Conscience problem concerning the past and the present and the problem concerning the west and China and the former problem overwhelms the latter one, this theoretical goal of Mou Zongsan which can solve both problems is great. However, he was perplexed by the modern myth of the west to a large degree, just like other contemporary thinkers. Secondly, Mou Zongsan has a unique understanding of the concept of thing-​in-​itself of Kant. He thinks that the thing-​in-​itself proposed by Kant is a “concept with high value” instead of a real concept.30 Then how to evaluate this concept of Mou Zongsan? In my view, to understand the thing-​in-​itself as a concept with high value is a knowledgeable misunderstanding or an insight with errors. For Kant, the theoretical function born by thing-​in-​itself is to determine a proper limit for the empirical knowledge. That indicates that the thing-​in-​itself cannot be understood as a real concept because only the concept and the corresponding intuition of the concept can constitute the fact. However, as for the thing-​in-​itself, we can only think about its concept but cannot have a direct image.31 Therefore, when discussing the thing-​ in-​itself in the different areas of fact and values, the stricter question should be: is the thing-​in-​itself related to the fact problem or the value problem?32 Obviously, the thing-​in-​itself is related to the fact problem and the relationship is presented as drawing a dividing line from empirical knowledge. Then, is the thing-​in-​itself related to the value problem? As value for Mou Zongsan indicates moral value, this question can be presented as the relationship between the thing-​in-​itself and the moral values, in terms of the point that the thing-​in-​itself exists within itself. As for Kant, if he could have more thoughts about the concept that “thing-​ in-​itself exists within itself,” he was in the natural teleology. Therefore, to find the answer for the relationship between the thing-​in-​itself and the moral values, people have to look at the relationship between natural teleology and moral values. Kant has proposed natural teleology can play the role of the adjusting principles instead of the regulatory principles. However, he also pointed out that such kind of natural teleology is deficient in terms of its foundation. Because imitative intellectuality can become a concept of the natural teleology through getting close to the archetype intellectuality in the employment of reflecting judgment, there is no goal in nature which can be called the ultimate end of nature. The ultimate end of nature refers to the end “making all other natural things constitutes a goal system.”33 If the ultimate end of nature is wanting, there is an essential defect in the natural teleology. It is impossible to find out the ultimate end of nature in the internal nature and it means that people have to look for it outside nature. Kant proposed the concept of reflecting another goal to find the ultimate end of nature, in other words, the final end of the existence of a world, i.e. creation itself. The final end refers to “the end which does not need other things to be the condition of its possibility.”34 This is because in a natural teleology system, the things under the adjustment of the natural teleology remain interdependent and correlative. The end in the final level or the upper level in the end sequence, in

Intellectual Intuition and Thing-in-Itself  49 other words, the ultimate end of nature, must regard the free end which is impossible to be the measure of other ends, which do not need other things to be the condition for its possibility as the end. In other words, the ultimate end of nature can only aim at the achievement of the final end of the creation. Then what is the ultimate end of creation? In Kant’s opinion, human beings as moral beings and intellectual objects are the existents which exist in the form of set goals with the extrasensory free ability. For such a kind of existence, we cannot ask the question of reason for its existence. Then, only the human beings as the moral existent can be called as the ultimate end of creation so that the goal chain belonging to each other can be established: only among people, but within human beings as moral subjects, can people find the unconditional legislation above the goal. Therefore, only this kind of legislation can make people able to be the ultimate end and nature belongs to this ultimate goal in terms of teleology.35 For this point, Kant has argued for many times. He thinks that it is a “principle which the most common human reason cannot refuse to agree with” and discusses the value of the existing world or the value of the existing things: If there must be a reason in any place with the natural ultimate end, this end can only be people submitting to moral rules (in other words, the existent with reason in the world). Because (everyone judges so) if the world consists of lifeless existents, or the existents alive without reason, such kind of world has no meaning for existence value because there is no existence with the basic value concept. In contrast, even if there is the reasonable existent, if their reason can only establish the value of the existing things on the relationship between nature and themselves, there will be no (absolutely) ultimate end even with the (relative) end because the existence of the reasonable existence will be meaningless. However, the moral rules have a special characteristic. In other words, issuing it to the reason is just like the idea of the ultimate end as the end without any conditions. Therefore, only such kind of reasonable existence submitting to moral rules can be envisaged as the ultimate end of the existence of the world. On the contrary, if it is not so, there will be no end for the existing world or there will be no ultimate end for the ends providing the evidence.36 Now that the ultimate end of creation can only be the people as the moral existent, the final destination of nature can only be how to achieve the ultimate end. It is at this level that Kant once said, “Human beings themselves are the ultimate end of nature in terms of the vocation.”37 To be more direct, the ultimate end of nature can only be the cultivation of human beings, which Kant calls the culture of discipline, referring to the cultivation which aims to free the will from the autocracy of the desire and culture of the mind.38 From this we can see that Kant proposes moral teleology for the deficiency of the

50  The Arrogation of Conscience natural teleology and makes the moral teleology the basis of the natural one and comes up with his moral theology. Under this kind of moral theology based on moral teleology, the existence of the whole world or the existence of everything has a moral color. In other words, the existence of the world and everything has value for morals. Under this level, we can say that the understanding of Mou Zongsan for the thing-​in-​itself as the concept with the highest value is insightful. However, he did not go further into the act of Kant establishing the moral theology based on the moral teleology to complete the natural teleology or he did not know the deep meaning in the teleology thoughts of Kant. Actually, Mou Zongsan has definitely connected the concept of thing-​in-​itself with high value and the concept of end: when the free limitless mind presents, self is an end and the thing-​in-​itself is an end. The grass and the tree are also an end, which is their value. Therefore, the grass and trees cannot be only looked at as the limited existents but the revealed ones.39 Although Mou Zongsan here admitted that “the teleology kingdom of Kant has this meaning,” he ignored the natural teleology and moral teleology, although Kant “cannot prove the existence” of the statements of “the thing-​ in-​itself is an end” and “in terms of the God creation, it cannot hold water.” In fact, we can see that in the teleology thoughts of Kant, the creation of God is unreal and the final evidence of the teleology lies in the idea that human beings as the moral existents. As for Mou Zongsan’s criticism of Kant not admitting that human beings have the intellectual intuition so that they cannot control the division between the phenomenon and the thing-​in-​itself, it cannot hold water. Mou Zongsan explains the major reason for his criticism from two aspects. One aspect is from the perspective of the thing-​in-​itself. This aspect can be divided into two points, from the negative meaning and the active meaning of the thing-​ in-​itself. Firstly, Mou Zongsan believes that if we regard the thing-​in-​itself as the concept in the negative meaning like Kant, the thing-​in-​itself “like the opposite bank” cannot hold the transcendental division function for dividing the range of phenomena for its “shallow” and “meaningless and unreal meaning.” That is to say, Mou Zongsan thinks that this kind of concept of thing-​in-​itself cannot prevent “people from thinking the phenomenon they know as the thing-​in-​itself ” so that people cannot be sure that the division between the phenomenon and the thing-​in-​itself is the wished transcendental division of Kant. Instead, it is the logical division made by Leibnitz and Wolff for sensible representation and the intellectual concepts or the empirical division made by Locke for dividing the first quality and the second quality.40 Secondly, if we say Kant connecting the thing-​in-​itself and intellectual intuition which he thinks is only possible with God is possible to have means that the concept of thing-​in-​itself indicates that the concept of the thing-​in-​itself has some kind of certain positive meaning, because the creations by God are

Intellectual Intuition and Thing-in-Itself  51 the limited real existents, “we cannot know decisively that the limited real existents are the things-​in-​themselves instead of the phenomena.” That is to say, the concept of a thing-​in-​itself cannot be controlled and the concept of the phenomenon cannot be controlled.41 As for another aspect, it is from the perspective of the subject. Mou Zongsan holds the view that if we understand the cognition of human beings for things with the sensible intuition and intellectual intuition it creates a problem in the fact field; “we will have no clear standard to judge that what we know are only phenomena instead of the thing-​in-​itself.” In other words, unless we “further limit the values,” putting the thing-​in-​itself into a standard of the value, the transcendental division between the phenomenon and the thing-​in-​itself cannot hold water.42 The reason for criticizing Mou Zongsan lies in that if the explanation for thing-​in-​itself is confined to Kant, the meaning of this concept cannot be clear nor cannot hold water really. Therefore, Mou Zongsan wants to expand a more thorough thought, establishing the basis for the thing-​in-​itself and the phenomenon transcendentally through the new and different understanding and analysis for the subject mind ability. In other words, in Mou Zongsan’s view, only if the transcendental basis for the thing-​in-​itself is stable enough can the transcendental basis for the phenomenon be stable enough. The failure of this criticism lies in that Kant thinks the thing-​in-​itself is only the object for thoughts instead of the object for cognition in terms of the theoretical application for the pure reason. Similarly, God and intellectual intuition can only be the objects of thoughts instead of the object for cognition. As for the explanation for the positive meaning of the thing-​in-​itself, such as the statement that only God with the intellectual intuition can create the thing-​in-​itself, it is deduced according to the meaning of the concept without any contradiction. Either the thing-​in-​itself or God exists as possible things. Therefore, any attempts to prove the reality and necessity of the thing-​in-​ itself as the modal category in the general empirical thoughts through the cognitive ability of human beings are vain. In terms of the practical application of the pure reason, the regulation of the practical reason is presented as an order for human beings and the single fact of reason, freedom, aims at the phenomenon instead at the thing-​in-​itself when it is presented as the special causality. Therefore, any attempts to prove the reality and necessity of the thing-​in-​itself from the practical ability of human beings are impossible. To be specific, for Kant, the situation is just contrary to that for Mou Zongsan: only by confining the intuitional ability of human beings in the sensible level can people really control the division between the phenomenon and the thing-​in-​itself. The idea that human beings have intellectual intuition means that the division between sensible intuition and intellectual thoughts does not exist. Similarly, the division between possibility and reality, the division between necessity and contingency, and the division between theory and practice do not exist. Therefore, the division between the phenomenon and the thing-​in-​itself does not exist. Given to this point, as the final conclusion of his thoughts, the “double-​level ontology” of Mou Zongsan cannot control

52  The Arrogation of Conscience the relationship between the two levels because he insists that human beings have intellectual intuition and establish the basic level for the ontology on this basis. A conscience which can create everything naturally can be presented currently and it does not need any negation.43 As for the limitedness of human beings, Mou Zongsan criticized both Kant and Heidegger. The motivation behind writing of Intellectual Intuition and Chinese Philosophy is closely related with reading Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics and Introduction to Metaphysics. Mou Zongsan believes that “the act of Heidegger” is “cutting down the important parts but talking about the vain ontology within the time category.” It is because Heidegger uses the inappropriate method of phenomenology to discuss metaphysics, resulting in his misunderstanding about metaphysics: when I was reading his Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics, I see that he put his basic ontology within the scope of the immanent metaphysics, therefore I know the title of his work and his attention on time. However, according to the intention, the real metaphysics still lies in his so-​called Transcendental metaphysics. […] Currently, Heidegger abandons his free will and thing-​in-​itself, cuts down this area and puts the ontology in the scope covered by time, which is called the misplacement of metaphysics.44 The criticism of Mou Zongsan for Heidegger has many problems, but it is not meaningless. Firstly, it is important to understand that the concept used by Mou Zongsan for internal metaphysics and transcendent metaphysics is not right. The two concepts for him basically correspond to his double-​level ontology, in other words, the spatial ontology and the ontology exceeding time and space. However, that is not what Kant indicates. Kant has used the concepts of the internal one and the transcendent one for discussing metaphysics. In other words, the internal naturology and the transcendent naturology are special metaphysics. The former one refers to rational physics and psychology while the latter refers to rational cosmology and rational theology. It can be seen clearly that the concept of internal and transcendent for classifying the naturology used by Kant and the concept of internal and transcendent for classifying the metaphysics used by Mou Zongsan are very different. This is because Heidegger thinks the theme of Critique of Pure Reason is a metaphysical problem instead of an epistemology problem. Although Mou Zongsan admitted that he was under the influence of Heidegger both for his understanding of Kant and his own thoughts about the double-​level theory, he has a different opinion from that of Heidegger about Kant. Heidegger endeavors to prove that Kant has been aware that he must put the ontology within the horizon of time. However, he abandoned his standpoint quickly. Under the inspiration of Heidegger, Mou Zongsan has a consistent opinion for his double-​level ontology. He does not focus on the transcendent imagination for metaphysical problems like Kant; instead, he focuses on his so-​called “intellectual ontological reference.”

Intellectual Intuition and Thing-in-Itself  53 Secondly, Mou Zongsan did not pay enough attention and full understanding to Heidegger who put the ontology in the time horizon. As for Kant, there is no other intuition except for sensible intuition. Heidegger is sure about this point and thinks that Kant supports a kind of metaphysics of finitude. Actually, the so-​called metaphysics of finitude of Heidegger is similar to the standpoint of having as the basis of Confucianism, especially for the point that both parties are against nihilism. Besides, Heidegger once called the fundamental ontology in Being and Time as original ethics. As for the thinking, he shares some ideas with the moral metaphysics of Mou Zongsan: for Heidegger, it is through the present that the truth of ontology is reflected in time. For Mou Zongsan, it is through the mind that the truth appears in the universe. Mou Zongsan did not see this point mostly because he connects the space and time conditions with empirical knowledge like Kant even though Kant did not think that human beings have an intellectual intuition. Mou Zongsan was not aware that the establishment of empirical imagination must rely on a more original time concept. Actually, we know that German philosophy after Kant puts great attention on the intellectual intuition of human beings, especially phenomenology, which can be said to be established on the basis of intellectual intuition. In other words, criticizing Kant for denying the intellectual intuition of human beings is one of the most important thoughts of phenomenology. There is another point neglected by Mou Zongsan. Even though human beings have intellectual intuition, the intellectual intuition of human beings is different from that of God. That also means that the difference between the relationship between the universe and human beings on one hand and the relationship between humans and God is subconsciously exaggerated by Mou Zongsan. Therefore, his proposition is deviated instead of being loose. Nevertheless, from the standpoint of traditional Confucianism, Mou Zongsan’s criticism of Heidegger still has significance at that time. We know that at least since Cheng Hao and Cheng Yi or Zhang Zai, the discussion for having or not in metaphysics or Buddhism is understood as the problem of movement and motionlessness in Confucianism.45 Put in the concept of movement and motionlessness, the limited metaphysics or basic ontology of Heidegger cannot be enough even if they are recognized totally because its horizon indicates that Heidegger only talks about movement but not motionlessness.46 However, it is difficult to say that Mou Zongsan was aware of this point because it is difficult to say that he holds the traditional Confucian standpoint strictly and clearly in terms of his statements about intellectual intuition and Chinese philosophy. Mou Zongsan connects Kant’s opinion that human beings do not have intellectual intuition with the special background of western culture, at least including two relative points, the spirit of the analytical and complementary reason originating from Greece and the holy dichotomy originating from the Hebrew. Meanwhile, under the great spiritual pressure of western culture, which the undertaker of Chinese culture after the New Culture Movement went

54  The Arrogation of Conscience through, he transferred intellectual intuition from the problem concerning the past and the present to the problem concerning the west and China. In other words, he believes that only Chinese philosophy believes that human beings have intellectual intuition. Undoubtedly, the typical opinion that the statement that human beings do not have intellectual intuition represents western philosophy is totally wrong. Actually, the rationalists after Kant, the spiritualists after Kant, and the following phenomenologists all insist that human beings have intellectual intuition. Then how does Mou Zongsan discuss intellectual intuition in Chinese philosophy? We can see that the most significant point is that Mou Zongsan transferred the problem concerning the phenomenon and the thing-​in-​itself for Kant, or in other words, the basic corresponding problem concerning the sensible intuition and the intellectual intuition to the problem of having or not in Chinese philosophy. On that basis, Mou Zongsan proposes that Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism all insist that human beings have intellectual intuition. However, this type of transfer has serious problems. Therefore, when borrowing from Kant and explaining intellectual intuition in the three schools, he shows great difference in terms of the content and cannot justify his theories. About the basic implication of intellectual intuition, Mou Zongsan emphasizes three points. Firstly, he thinks that the intellectual intuition is a kind of “wisdom of not knowing”: “the intellectual intuition has no intuition or the cognition and that is the so-​called wisdom of not knowing.”47 Relatively, the thing-​in-​itself presented by the intellectual intuition is the “void”: “ ‘thing’ is the natural state of itself instead of the phenomenon. The natural state of the thing is void and it is presented stably in the universe with intellectuality.”48 Secondly, he quotes Kant’s idea that intellectual intuition is a creative intuition: “The intellectual intuition defines the existence of its object (the object does not have the corresponding meaning) and it is the creativity of the intellectual intuition.”49 Therefore, his definition for intuition is: Intuition, in terms of the conceptual idea, is a principle of concretion. In terms of the existence of things, if it is the sensible intuition, it is the principle of cognitive presentation and then it is accepted instead of created. It must have unified thoughts while the unity has to be based on the concepts; if it is the intellectual intuition, it is the principle of ontological creative actualization.50 In the end, he comes up with the fact that the intellectual intuition can impact itself while influencing the external world and that is the “inward experience”: “The intellectual intuition is the light of the intellectual apperception and the apperception itself is so clear that the intellectual intuition is no other thing but the intellectual apperception itself for us.”51 Of the three points, only the second point, the creation of intellectual intuition, conforms to Kant’s definition of intellectual intuition while the other two are rather different. As for Kant, although he emphasizes that the

Intellectual Intuition and Thing-in-Itself  55 intellectual intuition is the intuition for the existence of the object, this intuition still includes meaning for the essence of the object because it is intellectual. Besides, from the perspective of the meaning of the intellectual intuition in western philosophical history, the latter one is the major one. For example, Husserl uses the concepts of categorical intuition or essential intuition. For that point, intellectual intuition is defined as the wisdom of not knowing. At the same time, the definition for the thing-​in-​itself presented under the intellectual intuition as the “void” is wrong. As the inward experience of intellectual intuition, it is opposed clearly by Kant.52 The difference between the intellectual intuition of Mou Zongsan and Kant on the basic indication involves the translation issue. “Intellektuelle Anschauung” in German is translated as “intellectual intuition” but the German word “Anschauung” does not correspond with the English word of “intuition.” To be specific, the former one is more closely related with looking while the latter has the meaning of reflection. Therefore, if the latter one can be translated properly as “instinct,” the former should be translated as “intuition”; in other words, “Intellektuelle Anschauung” for Kant has a more appropriate translation as “intelligent intuition” or “intellectual intuition.” Furthermore, when Mou Zongsan translated the intellectual intuition as “intelligence,” the “intelligence” in his mind may not be intellectuality in the western philosophical tradition but the wisdom closely related to China and the oriental philosophical tradition. It actually indicates that the ideas in the three schools of Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism about wisdom play a vital role in the opinions of Mou Zongsan regarding intellectual intuition. Mou Zongsan thinks that there are ideas about intellectual intuition in the three schools of Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism. To be specific, Confucianism presents intellectual intuition as intellectual nature, Taoism the intellectual mystery, and Buddhism the intellectual void. For Confucianism, Mou Zongsan mainly explains through the division by Zhang Zai for “implementing the things people know by heart” and “knowledge got through the ears and eyes” or the division for the knowledge of virtue and knowledge of experience: the things people know by heart are not the sensible intuition or the intellectual intuition reflected by the limited concept. Instead, it is the knowledge about the things inspired by the common and limitless moral original intention. Here the meaning of things people know by heart is developed by the proper nature of the mind of Mencius. It is not the cognitive mind but the creative mind of morals. The creative mind is one theory which cannot be employed in far-​fetched things. Knowledge about things is another theory which can be employed in all things. The creative mind emphasizes the physical meaning while the knowledge about the things emphasizes the intuitional meaning. Both are discussed for the same true intention. Its creative mind is the one of the knowledge about the things and its knowledge about things is the knowledge about the creative mind. It is not the direct reflection or the comparison between the

56  The Arrogation of Conscience two parties. The reflected one is the one of the creative mind. The void one has its position while the tangible has no position and this is called “integration of the internal and the external.”53 The explanation of Zhang Zai for the division of the knowledge of virtue and the knowledge of experience originates from the division of Mencius for “mind” and “senses of hearing and seeing” and it is accepted by Confucianism after Zhang Zai. Therefore, Mou Zongsan concluded that the idea that human beings have intellectual intuition is the authoritative core thought in Confucianism: the above-​mentioned words of Hengqu such as “implementing the things people know by heart,” “sincere and intelligent knowledge,” “conscience of the natural virtues” and “knowledge from virtues” reflect that this knowledge is an intellectual intuition. Although it is expressed in the words of Hengqu, it can be expressed as Tao itself, nature, mind, benevolence, sincerity and divinity by people who understand The Analects of Confucius, Mengzi, The Doctrine of Mean, and The Book of Changes. In the book Almanac of Zhou Dunyi, sincerity, divinity, solitude and thinking can also show this meaning. The oneness of Cheng Mingdao, the true intention of Lu Xiangshan, the conscience of Wang Yangming, “knowledge is hidden in the meaning” of Liu Zongzhou, and “self-​ reflected mind accompanies nature” of Hu Wufeng can also express this meaning. Only the knowledge of virtue of Cheng Yi and Zhu Xi does not have this meaning. They analyze the two points of mind and truth. The nature of the mind cannot be united and the discussed mind is not the true intention.54 As for the intellectual intuition in the Taoism, Mou Zongsan mainly explains through the ideas of Laozi, Zhuangzi, Wang Bi, Xiang, and Guo in the metaphysics of the Wei and Jin Dynasties: “profound theory” is the name of the objective statement with the evidence of whether having the “the two parties originate from the same source while have the different names. The sameness is called as metaphysics and the metaphysics is called the entrance of all the metaphysics.” “Profound wisdom” is the name of the subjective statement with the essence of “aiming at the unreal pole and holding the quietness.” The profound wisdom is void but quiet. Inaction and persistence, the free mind can enlighten the knowledge about things (knowing the experience can be called as wisdom),” etc. Wang Bi, Xiang and Guo have developed this profound theory and wisdom but they are not the originators.55 Knowing and unknowing, the wisdom of unknowing is the intellectual intuition and the quietness and reflection of void and all is the essence.

Intellectual Intuition and Thing-in-Itself  57 Under the quietness and reflection of the Taoist heart, all lie in themselves. If it is a free matter, it will be achieved with each other.56 As for the intellectual intuition in Buddhism, Mou Zongsan mainly explains it according to the theories of Tiantai Sect such as “from nowhere, all laws are established,” “the principle of three thousand,” “life and death are nirvana and the troubles are bodhi”: the laws are void but the real and specific Hannya wisdom will not eliminate the laws. It investigates its real images in the laws so that “the void law is named according to ‘emptiness and cause’ and the void wisdom is named according to the persistence of Hannya wisdom.”57 On the basis of the explanation of intellectual intuition of the three schools of Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism, Mou Zongsan proposes an argumentation mode, which is the final conclusion of the thoughts of Mou Zongsan, the double-​level ontology. Its core concept is the free limitless mind: metaphysical wisdom, natural wisdom or void wisdom are the functions of the free limitless mind. The profound theory is the unreal theory and is about having or not. Wang Bi once said, “the profound is obscure, without the division for having or not.” In the mystery of having or not, there is no having or not. To be specific, having not is the quietness of mind and the expansion is the basis of everything. Having exists with the light and dust and lets everything come freely. Therefore metaphysical wisdom is the knowledge of things. Within this knowledge about things, the thing is the thing-​in-​itself. The void principles are about the laws without their own natures; the void wisdom is the real Hannya. They are so in all systems. In the real Hannya, the truth of laws is reflected. When the real appearance shows, the so-​called no appearance shows. That is the point as to why the law without its own nature lies in it. Nature is the evidence for surpassing the moral creation (the virtues are pure) and that is the nature which can be considered as the Taoist nature. The realistic ontology is the nature of everything and the reason for the existence of everything. The above-​ mentioned are objective statements. Nature is accompanied by the true intention of morals and is reflected by the true intention of morals. The true intention here has free rules, free directions and free laws. The truth can be called nature. The true intention, according to Wang Yangming, is called the intellectual apperception. The intellectual apperception knows the right and wrong (with its own direction and own rules) and it is the wisdom. The wisdom initiated by nature is the wisdom initiated by the intellectual apperception (even though the statement is initiated, the wisdom is from the intellectual apperception.) In the face of such nature, the thing, whether the behavior things or the existent thing are the things-​ in-​themselves, is called as complete things by Doctrine of the Mean.58 However, according to Mou Zongsan, this common argumentation mode is different from the past theory of “combination of three religions”; instead,

58  The Arrogation of Conscience it is “different but knowing the connection and knowing the type” and “the supposed integration and classification in this era” to “co-​exist well with each other.”59 Although Mou Zongsan believes that the three schools of Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism all support the view that human beings have intellectual intuition and his standpoint is the Confucian one, it is Buddhism instead of Confucianism that plays the vital role in his view on wisdom. When talking about the problem of how to develop intellectuality from the free limitless mind, Mou Zongsan stated clearly, “this work is to integrate the concept of persistence in Buddhism with the phenomenon level of Kant and to enrich the persistence with the deposing part of the critique of pure reason.”60 Meanwhile, the double-​level ontology of Mou Zongsan is established basically on the basis of persistence and non-​persistence, a typical Buddhist concept. He just emphasizes the meaning for the transferring process from persistence to the non-​persistence and attempts to prove the meaning of persistence with the functions of morals. It originates from the Confucian thoughts in Mou Zongsan’s view, but it can be seen in Buddhist thoughts. Therefore, when we see Mou Zongsan conclude one basic definition of the intellectual intuition as the wisdom for not knowing, we will not feel surprised. The wisdom of not knowing of the intellectual intuition means that the thoughts of Mou Zongsan about intellectual intuition still attribute the void to the metaphysical level instead of the level of having. In other words, his thought belongs to those of Buddhists or of Metaphysics, which are based on the void, instead of Confucianism which is based on having. This actually indicates that the views of Mou Zongsan on intellectual intuition and Chinese philosophy cannot withstand severe tests even without other problems, no matter in terms of the Confucianism which he agrees with greatly and spiritually or his recognition for the Taoism or Buddhism under the trigger of the problem concerning China and the west. As for Taoism and Buddhism, the explanation within the Metaphysical or Buddhist thoughts seems to be matching. However, there are great difficulties of the explanation for the other two basic definitions for intellectual intuition. Firstly, as for Metaphysical and Buddhist thoughts, it is difficult to talk about the creativity of intellectual intuition because it requires a creator, which is against the standpoint of Buddhism and the Metaphysics. Mou Zongsan is aware of this point clearly so he proposed that compared with the creative intellectual intuition in Confucianism, the intellectual intuition in Taoism is a static intellectual intuition and the intellectual intuition in Buddhism is an intellectual intuition with the attainment of Nirvana.61 In other words, he proposed that only the intellectual intuition in Confucianism is creative while the intellectual intuition in the Taoism and Buddhism is not creative enough or is not creative at all: we can only learn the profound wisdom, nature and void in the long term so that we can see the deficiency of Kant; however, only through

Intellectual Intuition and Thing-in-Itself  59 the words of Kant can we know the enlightening and creating implementer (Confucianism), enlightening implementer (Taoism), or revealer (Buddhism) for profound wisdom, nature and void.62 He contradicts himself when he explains the relevant thoughts in Buddhism and Metaphysics with the concepts of intellectual intuition. Secondly, as for the thoughts of Buddhism and Metaphysics, the inward experience of intellectual intuition cannot hold water. Particularly, in Buddhism, it is impossible to regard the free limitless mind of an entity as the basis of its argumentation. In other words, Mou Zongsan believes that the free limitless mind can prove the existence of the self through the inward experience is impossible to conform to the basic argumentation of Buddhism.63 As for Taoism, we can see the criticism of the successful mind and the emphasis on the Taoist mind, but it is difficult to see that there is a Taoist mind which can be regarded as the basis of the universe and which can reflect itself.64 As for Confucianism, Mou Zongsan emphasizes that his main thought is “showing the free limitless mind through the moral awareness” and points out “this part is to integrate the tradition of Confucianism with the moral philosophy of Kant. Because Kant did not analyze the concept of morals clearly or completely, we have to ‘keep the vagueness’.”65 However, the explanation in Confucianism and Neo Confucianism for the creation and inward experience of intellectual intuition is similar but it is difficult for the explanation of the wisdom of not knowing for the intellectual intuition.66 If we attribute it to the void in the metaphysical level instead of having, it is difficult to say that it conforms to the basic standpoint of Confucianism. In the explanation sequence of thinking history, this point involves one important problem in the development of Confucianism in the second stage: the division between Confucianism and Buddhism. In Chapter 2 of Substance of Mind and Substance of Nature, Mou Zongsan discussed the way that Mingdao divided the Confucianism and Buddhism according to the entity of the nature which is the rule for the moral creation, creation in the universe, and the definition for the real existence of everything. It is the basis for the existence of everything. Such propositions cannot agree with the void “emptiness and cause.” This is the essential difference which cannot be mixed. The rest are similar but it is all right.67 Here Mou Zongsan emphasizes that the entity is “the principle for defining the real existence of everything.” It seems that it is against the “emptiness and cause” of Buddhism and holds the Confucianism standpoint but it is not the truth. We know that Mou Zongsan believes that the most authoritative thought of Confucianism is to reflect the nature and entity as moving. Besides, when explaining the statement of moving exists, Mou Zongsan is talking about the moral movements; when talking about the existence of the objective principles, that is to say, the authentic existence, he endeavors to

60  The Arrogation of Conscience develop his moral metaphysics. For example, when explaining the statement of Cheng Hao of “stillness and the feelings are through,” Mou Zongsan said, God, sincerity and mind are moving and at the same time the principle, the existing. The principles are the sincerity, God, and mind with their own rules and own directions. Therefore, the moving principles are also called entities of principles. The principles make the moving sincerity, God, and mind become the objective and the thing moving and still. That is the existing. Therefore, the objective sincerity, God and mind are principles. The moving principles are the specific and real sincerity, body and minds. Therefore the so-​called moving principles are about the things moving and still. The entity is moving and existing, objective and subjective.68 It is obvious that Mou Zongsan’s interpretation is focusing on what he refers to as the rendering of the reality of the “entity of nature and substance,” rather than on principles. As a result, although the way of entity and nature is the entity of principles, in terms of analysis of natural-​principles, compared to nature and substance, it has become secondary: “the important point lies in the entity of substance, nature and life. ‘Principles’ is natural and is not necessary. The principles are not the key point of the argumentation system but reflection on the substance and nature.”69 In addition, since Mou Zongsan mentioned the famous poem line of “all things are complacent silently” by Cheng Hao many times when it comes to the intellectual intuition of Confucianism, and, as we already mentioned, in the Song Dynasty, there was a very important theory in action, that is understanding the problems of having or void as the problems concerning moving and motionlessness, thus blocking the possibility of regarding void as the basis and the having as the undesired. Then, as for Mou Zongsan talking about the wisdom of not knowing of the intellectual intuition in the context of Confucianism, it seems that there is a possible defense, that is, to understand the relationship between the sensible knowledge and the wisdom of not knowing in the thoughts of Mou Zongsan with the relationship between the moving and motionless in Song Confucianism. However, such an idea is also plausible. Both the problem of having or not and the problem concerning the dynamic and static are all metaphysical problems. The sensible knowledge that contrasts with the wisdom of not knowing is not metaphysical, unless its being is a limited metaphysics, strictly as Heidegger did for Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason. Mou Zongsan developed the theory of Tang Junyi as the opinion for explaining the existing principles and distinguished the existing principles of intellectual intuition from the structural principles of empirical knowledge or the generalized principles. Then, the relationship between the sensible knowledge and the wisdom of not knowing can correspond to the development of reason and the existence of the principle. However, the relationship between moving and motionlessness cannot correspond to the

Intellectual Intuition and Thing-in-Itself  61 relationship between the sensible knowledge and the wisdom of not knowing because that dynamic and static relationship exists only in terms of existence theory, not the formation principle and the relationship between the structural principles and the existence principles.70

Notes 1 Immanuel Kant, Critique of Practical Reason, 5: 31, in Practical Philosophy, p. 164. The Chinese version refers to the translation version of Deng Xiaomang and Yang Zutao, p. 41. As for Intellektuelle Anschauung (intellectual intuition for English), the translation of “intelligent intuition” is quite proper, especially for the difference with “perceptual intuition”. However, for the unity of the passage and convenience, I mainly use the translation of Mou Zongsan, “intelligent intuition” when discussing this problem. When introducing the relevant thinking of Kant, the phrase of “intuitive” still remains. 2 Mou Zongsan: Phenomenon and Thing-​in-​Itself, p 73. 3 Mou Zongsan: Phenomenon and Thing-​in-​Itself, p. 77. 4 The referred difference between sensible intuition and intellectual intuition can be seen in Immanuel Kant, Critique of Pure Reason (B72) p. 191. The Chinese version is seen in the translation version by Deng Xiaomang and Yang Zutao, p. 49. 5 Mou Zongsan: Phenomenon and Thing-​in-​Itself, p. 1. Please note that the word “beyond” is transcendental, which is usually translated as “priori” while the corresponding word “beyond” is usually translated as “transcendent”. Mou Zongsan sometimes mixes up the two ideas. 6 Mou Zongsan: Phenomenon and Thing-​in-​Itself, preface, p.3. 7 Immanuel Kant, Critique of Reason (B306), p. 360. As for the Chinese version, please refer to the book translated by Deng Xiaomang and Yang Zutao, p. 225. In the first version, the relevant statement of Kant is: If the phenomena are regarded as the objects according to the integrated unity, they are called conceptual objects. However, if I presume the things-​in-​ themselves are only the intellectual objects and still they are given some kind of perception as the objects but not the sensible intuition (as the objects for the intellectual intuition), then such kind of things are called the rationalistic objects. Please refer to Kant: Critique of Pure Reason (A249), translated by Deng Xiaomang and Yang Zutao, p. 227. As for phenomena and the noumena, their definitions are the perceptive objects and the rationalistic objects. Therefore, this paper will not use those misleading or confusing translations. 8 This statement, which comes from Opus Postumum by Kant, is used in the book of Kant and Problem of Metaphysics by Martin Heidegger. Mou Zongsan read the book and gave great attention to it. As for the quotation for Heidegger, please refer to Martin Heidegger, Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics, trans. Richard Taft, Indiana University Press, 1990, p. 23. As for the quotation by Mou Zongsan, please refer to the book of Intellectual Intuition and Chinese Philosophy, Taiwan, The Commercial Press, 1980, p. 37. 9 Here, if intuition is necessary for cognition, the difference between thinking and cognition corresponds with the difference between theoretical reason and practical

62  The Arrogation of Conscience reason. In the description of the difference between cognition and thinking by Kant, we can see the point clearly: to know an object, I have to prove its possibility (both according to real empirical evidence and natural reason). However, I can think about anything which I want to think about only if I do not contract myself. That is to say, if my concept is a possible concept, although I cannot ensure there will be a corresponding phenomenon with it among all the possibilities, it demands more to entitle the concept with the objective effectiveness (real possibility because the former possibility is only existing in logic). Nevertheless, people do not have to find more things in the origin of theoretical knowledge and they can also find them in the origin of practical knowledge. The quotation comes from Immanuel Kant, Critique of Pure Reason (BXX–​VI), p. 115, note. The Chinese version is translated by Deng Xiaomang and Yang Zutao, version 2, preface, p. 20, note 1. 10 As for the incomplete correspondence between the distinction between sensible object and rationalistic objects on one hand and the distinction between the phenomenon and thing-​in-​itself on the other, Mou Zongsan has not noticed it in Intellectual Intuition and Chinese Philosophy (first version in 1971). However, he discussed the rationalistic object clearly (he translated it as “intellect” or “self ”) in the Phenomenon and Thing-​in-​Itself (first version in 1975). However, he gives a too limited definition for rationalistic objects and thinks that the rationalistic objects only include the thing-​in-​itself, free will, the eternal soul, and God with reference to Mou Zongsan, Intellectual Intuition and Chinese Philosophy, p. 115 and Mou Zongsan, Phenomenon and Thing-​in-​Itself, p. 43. 11 Immanuel Kant, Critique of Pure Reason (A44/​B61), p. 168–​169. The Chinese version is translated by Deng Xiaomang and Yang Zutao, p. 43. Here, the word “right” has the German version of “recht” and the Chinese version by Deng Xiaoman as “just”. 12 Immanuel Kant, Critique of Pure Reason (B71), p. 191. The Chinese version is translated by Deng Xiaomang and Yang Zutao, p. 49. 13 Immanuel Kant, Critique of Pure Reason (B72), p. 191–​192. As for the Chinese version, please refer to the translation version by Deng Xiaomang and Yang Zutao, p. 50. 14 Immanuel Kant, Critique of the Power of Judgment, 5: 401–​402, trans. Paul Guyer and Eric Matthews, Cambridge University Press, 2000, p. 272. As for the Chinese version, please refer to the translation by Deng Xiaomang and Yang Zutao, People’s Publishing House, p. 254. 15 Immanuel Kant, Critique of the Power of Judgment, 5: 403–​404, p. 273. As for the Chinese version, please refer to the translation by Deng Xiaomang and Yang Zutao, p. 256–​257. 16 In the book of Critique of Pure Reason, Kant investigates the fields of the modals such as possibility, reality and certainty with the title of “postulation of the general empirical thinking” and indicates that they do not add the concept of the objects and the rules but only express the relation between the object and the cognitive ability. To be specific, the three concepts reflect the relations “between the object (including all the rules), and intellectuality, relation among the object, the empirical employment, and the empirical judgment, and the relation

Intellectual Intuition and Thing-in-Itself  63 between the object and the reason (when employed in experience)”: “things conforming to the empirical formal conditions are possible; things related to the empirical (sensual) material conditions are real; things regulated according to the empirical general conditions for the relation between the real things are certain (in terms of existent).” Immanuel Kant, Critique of Pure Reason (A218–​219/​B265–​ 267), p. 321–​322. As for the Chinese version, please refer to the translation by Deng Xiaomang and Yang Zutao, p. 197. 17 Immanuel Kant, Critique of the Power of Judgment, 5: 407–​408, p. 277. As for the Chinese version, please refer to the translation by Deng Xiaomang and Yang Zutao, p. 261. 18 Immanuel Kant, Critique of the Power of Judgment, 5: 407, p. 277. As for the Chinese version, please refer to the translation by Deng Xiaomang and Yang Zutao, p. 260–​261. 19 Immanuel Kant, Critique of the Power of Judgment, 5: 407–​408, p. 277. As for the Chinese version, please refer to the translation by Deng Xiaomang and Yang Zutao, p. 261. 20 Immanuel Kant, Critique of the Power of Judgment, 5: 408, p. 277. As for the Chinese version, please refer to the translation by Deng Xiaomang and Yang Zutao, p. 261. 21 Immanuel Kant, Critique of the Power of Judgment, 5: 409, p. 278. As for the Chinese version, please refer to the translation by Deng Xiaomang and Yang Zutao, p. 262. 22 Kant once said, “The research on teleology can only find a complete answer in theology”. The key lies in the intellectual intuition: because the intellectual intuition is envisaged as the ability possessed by God while the teleology must be based on the intellectual intuition, the research on teleology can only find a complete answer in theology. The reference is from Immanuel Kant, Critique of the Power of Judgment, 5: 399, p. 269. As for the Chinese version, please refer to the translation by Deng Xiaomang and Yang Xutao, p. 251. Ni Liangkang and Deng Xiaomang think that Kant supports the idea that human beings have an intellectual intuition. It is completely wrong or it is at most the external explanation for Kantianism on a certain standpoint not of Kant. Ni Liangkang said, Kant sometimes explains the intellectual intuition of the sense of intuition and originality as the imagination between the intuition and the reason, more strictly, the creative imagination. Because the basic definition of imagination lies in “the ability to present an object which does not exist at that time”, it is included into the intellectual intuition (at least in the version A of Critique of Pure Reason), which means the basic ability of the human soul to connect intellectual concept and sensible intuition. Kant has pointed out clearly that compared to the reproductive imagination, the productive imagination (Ni Liangkang translates them into “Recreative imagination” and “Creative imagination”) is used in the transcendental synthesis, which is the synthesis according to the category versus intuition. It is the function of intellectuality on intuition and the first employment of our possible intuitional objects (the basis of any other applications). This kind of synthesis as an image is different from the intellectual synthesis which is conducted without any imagination but the intellectuality.

64  The Arrogation of Conscience From this we can see that, in Kant’s view, the productive imagination, though spontaneous, is still based on the difference between the sensible intuition and the intellectual intuition, in other words, is based on the limit of the cognition. Therefore, this kind of productive imagination which is used in the transcendental synthesis is not the intellectual intuition discussed by Kant. Besides, the better translation for the definition of imagination of Kant is in the version of Deng Xiaomang and Yang Zutao: “Imagination is the ability to visualize an object intuitively even when it is not present.” The translation of Ni Liangkang that “object that does not exist right now” actually is an object without its presence. His translation is misleading in that the definition for the imagination of Kant is similar to or even is same with the definition for intellectual intuition. Similarly, his translation of productive imagination as “creative imagination” is prone to make people think about the creativity of the intellectual intuition. Here the reference of Ni Liangkang is from Basic Definition of the Idea of Intellectual Intuition by Kant, Philosophical Study, 10, 2001; the reference is from Immanuel Kant, Critique of Pure Reason (B151–​152), p. 256–​257. As for the Chinese version, please refer to the translation by Deng Xiaomang and Yang Zutao, p. 101. Deng Xiaomang misunderstands that Kant thinks that human beings have an intellectual intuition because he misunderstands Chapter 77 of the Critique of the Power of Judgment. He thinks that the imitative intellectuality is a kind of learning or imitative intellectual intuition and further he believed that Kant regards the false learning or imitative intellectual intuition as the basis of the natural teleology and has a wrong conclusion that Kant insists that human beings have a learning or imitative intellectual intuition when attributing the intellectual intuition as the archetype intuition to God. Actually, according to the above analysis, we know that imitative intellectuality refers to human intellectuality, that is to say, the human intellectuality which cannot be separated from the difference between the sensible intuition and intellectual thoughts. Besides, the basis of natural teleology is not the learning or imitative intellectual intuition but the archetype intellectuality which is envisaged to be possessed by God only in terms of the possibility. In other words, the intellectual intuition, the imitative intellectuality possessed by human beings in terms of the reality, and the judgment related directly to the sensible intuition and the difference between the sensible intuition and the intellectual thoughts. The ideas of Deng Xiaomang can be seen in Brief Discussion of Intellectual Intuition of Kant, Journal of Literature, History and Philosophy, 1, 2006, included into the book Problems of Kantianism, SDX Joint Publishing Company, 2006. 23 Mou Zongsan, Phenomenon and Thing-​in-​Itself, p. 11. 24 Heidegger depicts the profound difference between the natural experience in ancient Greece and the modern natural experience through comparing the physics of Aristotle and the physics of Newton. The understanding of this paper is based on his opinion. Please refer to Heidegger, Modern Science, Metaphysics, and Mathematics, which is translated by Sun Zhouxing and included into the Selected Works of Heidegger (II), Shanghai, SDX Joint Publishing House, 1996, p. 860. 25 Russell: The History of Western Philosophy (II), translated by Ma Yuande, the Commercial Press, 1976, p. 56 and p. 58. 26 Heidegger: Modern Science, Metaphysics, and Mathematics, translated by Sun Zhouxing and included in Selected Works of Heidegger (II), p. 857. 27 Kant: Metaphysical Foundation of Natural Science, translated by Deng Xiaomang, Shanghai, People’s Publishing House, 2003, p. 13.

Intellectual Intuition and Thing-in-Itself  65 28 Kant: Metaphysical Foundation of Natural Science, translated by Deng Xiaomang, p. 15. Note. 29 A related point is that Wang Yangming thinks that the grass, trees, and stones all have a conscience while Mou Zongsan who supports the science disagrees with him. When talking about the conscious appearance of human nature and natural principles (Mou Zongsan calls them as the “principle of existence” and “principle of achievement”), Mou Zongsan said, even animals such as dogs, horses, monkeys and ants have a few appearances; it is instinctive, not the conscious appearance like human beings. As for the grass, trees, stones can never have any appearance. Therefore the nature of reason can only be described as the existential reason of an individual. Please refer to Mou Zongsan: Substance of Mind and Substance of Nature (I), p. 86. Similarly, when talking about the thoughts of “no emotion but with nature”, Mou Zongsan said, “’no emotion but with nature’ does not deserve to be worried about” because people cannot think that “grass, trees, and stones have the Buddhist nature”. Please refer to Mou Zongsan: Intellectual Intuition and Chinese Philosophy, Taiwan, Commercial Press, 1980, p. 319. 30 Mou Zongsan: Phenomena and Thing-​in-​Itself, Student Book Store, 1984, p. 8. 31 In the concept of the pure reason, freedom is the only concept to be treated as fact because freedom proves its reality through its special causality in the real activities and experience. Please refer to Immanuel Kant, Critique of the Power of Judgment, 5: 468, p. 332–​333. As for the Chinese version, please refer to the translation by Deng Xiaomang and Yang Zutao, p. 328. 32 At first, when coming up with the question, the statement of Mou Zongsan is strict: “the key of the problem seems to lie in the question whether the thing-​in-​ itself is the concept of a fact problem or the concept of a value problem?” Please refer to Mou Zongsan, Phenomenon and Thing-​in-​Itself, p. 3. 33 Immanuel Kant, Critique of the Power of Judgment, 5: 429, p. 297. As for the Chinese version, please refer to the translation by Deng Xiaomang and Yang Zutao, p. 285. 34 Immanuel Kant, Critique of the Power of Judgment, 5: 434, p. 301. As for the Chinese version, please refer to the translation by Deng Xiaomang and Yang Zutao, p. 290. 35 Immanuel Kant, Critique of the Power of Judgment, 5: 434–​436, p. 302–​303. As for the Chinese version, please refer to the translation by Deng Xiaomang and Yang Zutao, p. 291–​292. 36 Immanuel Kant, Critique of the Power of Judgment, 5: 448–​450, p. 314–​315. As for the Chinese version, please refer to the translation by Deng Xiaomang and Yang Zutao, p. 305–​307. 37 Immanuel Kant, Critique of the Power of Judgment, 5: 431, p. 298. As for the Chinese version, please refer to the translation by Deng Xiaomang and Yang Zutao, p. 286. 38 Immanuel Kant, Critique of the Power of Judgment, 5: 432, p. 299. As for the Chinese version, please refer to the translation by Deng Xiaomang and Yang Zutao, p. 287. 39 Mou Zongsan, Phenomenon and Thing-​in-​Itself, p. 18. 40 Mou Zongsan: Phenomenon and Thing-​in-​Itself, p. 9.

66  The Arrogation of Conscience 41 Mou Zongsan: Phenomenon and Thing-​in-​Itself, p. 10 42 Mou Zongsan: Phenomenon and Thing-​in-​Itself, p. 11–​12. 43 In Chapter 4 of Phenomenon and Thing-​in-​Itself, Mou Zongsan discusses the problem of “initiating the intellectuality through knowing the embodiment and apperception”. He thinks that it is necessary and calls it the “dialectic embodiment”, comparing it with the dialectics of Hegel. Meanwhile, he uses the metaphor of Lu Jiuyuan that “a small mound must start from a piece of flat land” for explanation. The problem lies in that the dialectic process can only be a process from the specific to the common, from the limited to the limitless, from the lower to the higher for Hegel. That is to say, it can only develop from the ascending direction instead of the descending direction; however, for Mou Zongsan, the dialectic process develops from the descending direction instead of the ascending direction. The necessity of the reverse dialectic cannot be justified from the philosophical view: either resorting to the moral function of intellectuality or turning the problem into having or not and movement and stillness in Chinese philosophy is useless. In the Intellectual Intuition and Chinese Philosophy, Mou Zongsan attributes the necessity of this kind of reverse dialectics to the morals: we cannot depend on the intellectual intuition and know everything in the world intuitively because it is equal to knowing nothing about the complexity of existence. If it is, the mind and nature of benevolence cannot be turned into the logic itself. With sensible intuition, people can have some knowledge about the profound existence and the right understanding for the phenomenon. On the basis of this knowledge, people say that the structural self consists of the mind and the nature of benevolence instead of saying that the logical self is an illusion. The problem lies in that, if the conscience is the source of the universe and is presented currently, the conscience itself can become everything and the negation is still redundant. The quotation is from Mou Zongsan, Intellectual Intuition and Chinese Philosophy, Taiwan, the Commercial Press, 1980, p. 201–​202. Actually, this point shows that Mou Zongsan must start from the opinion that the universe and human beings are separated and connected if he wants to prove his conscience negation theory. 44 Mou Zongsan, Intellectual Intuition and Chinese Philosophy, preface, p. 4. In the original book, the book titles are added with quotation marks and the quotations are added with the book title marks; the referred Being and Time is the basis for the core opinions for Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics. 45 Cheng Hao once said, talking about having or not, there will be many words; talking about having not, there will be no words. Having or not is similar to movement and motionlessness. For example, before the winter solstice, the universe is closed and quiet; the sun, moon, and stars are operating without stop, and can we call them motionless? It is people not knowing its motion. Left Works of Family Cheng in Henan (11). Please refer to the Selected Works of Cheng Hao and Cheng Yi edited by Wang Xiaoyu, Zhonghua Book Company, 2004, p. 121. In Correction of the Errors (Chapter Taihe), Zhang Zai proposes his understanding for having or not with the core proposition of “void is the Qi”. He

Intellectual Intuition and Thing-in-Itself  67 distinguishes the view on this problem from the Buddhist and Taoist views clearly through the explanation of the having or not by the meeting and parting of Qi: Void is the Qi. The having or not, visibility and invisibility, the subliming and the reducing, the nature and the destiny are the same. Given this knowledge, the meeting and dispersing, the introvert and the extravert, the image and the intangible can be deduced for their origins. People who know this truth are those who are adroit in Yi learning. If we see the void gives birth to the Qi, the void is limitless while the Qi is limited. This statement is totally different from my theory. It is a wrong natural theory that “having comes from the void” of Taoism. People holding this view do not understand my statement that the having or not are mixed forever; if we say everything is the phantom in the void, the things and the void cannot complement each other. The tangible is always tangible and its nature will never change. The shape and nature, and the universe and human beings have existed since the beginning. That is the statement after feeling there are some problems in the Buddhist opinion that the whole universe is the feeling of human beings. According to the recordings in Selected Works in Song and Yuan Dynasties, it is certain that this opinion of Zhan Zai was under the influence of Cheng Hao and Cheng Yi. Huang Zongxi said that Zhang Zai had studied about Buddhism and Taoism in the early years and “changed his thoughts totally” after discussing Cheng Hao and Cheng Yi. The original words of Huang Baijia are: “studying about Buddhism and Taoism for several years and discussing with Cheng Hao and Cheng Yi. After that, he returned to the authoritative study of Neo-​ Confucianism.” Now that the opinion about having or not is concerned with the essential difference between Buddhism and Taoism, it can be seen that the influence of Cheng Hao and Cheng Yi on Zhang Zai is expressed on the opinions for having or not. The quotations of Zhang Zai, Huang Zongxi, and Huang Baijia are in Selected Works in Song and Yuan Dynasties, edited by Liang Yunhua and Chen Jinsheng, Zhonghua Book Company, 1986 (1), p. 670, 663, 664. 46 As for the thoughts of Heidegger and his western context, if the discussion about the problem of having or not in the time horizon only and the presentation of existence rely on current times, the ontology must be connected with the historicism even if it is not of Heidegger. Therefore, the dominant one in ontology remain the historical instead of the natural concepts. From the classic perspective, it means that the basis of everything is totality. In terms of this point, in the reflection of Heidegger on the natural concept and the related reflections concerning it, the latter one at least includes reflection about the freedom problem (mainly including the ontology of Aristotle, the reflection on the transcendent freedom of Kant and the reflection on the freedom concepts of Schelling with the Christian theology in classic times) and the reflection on the techniques (mainly including the reflection on the technique age and the artistic metaphysics) are an important turning point in his thought. The criticizing of the representative historicism for Heidegger, such as Leo Strauss, is only effective for Heidegger in the earlier stage. 47 Mou Zongsan, Phenomenon and Thing-​in-​Itself, p. 100. 48 Mou Zongsan, Phenomenon and Thing-​in-​Itself, p. 99–​100. 49 Mou Zongsan, Intellectual Intuition and Chinese Philosophy, p. 199. 50 Mou Zongsan, Intellectual Intuition and Chinese Philosophy, p. 184.

68  The Arrogation of Conscience 51 Mou Zongsan, Phenomenon and Thing-​in-​Itself, p. 102. 52 Mou Zongsan stated about and discussed the issue of recognizing the self in the transcendental aesthetics of Kant. The difference finally contributes to the issue of whether supporting the opinion that human beings have intellectual intuition. Please refer to Mou Zongsan, Phenomenon and Thing-​in-​Itself, p. 102. 53 Mou Zongsan, Intellectual Intuition and Chinese Philosophy, p. 186. 54 Mou Zongsan, Intellectual Intuition and Chinese Philosophy, p. 189–​190. 55 Mou Zongsan, Phenomenon and Thing-​in-​Itself, preface, p. 10. 56 Mou Zongsan, Intellectual Intuition and Chinese Philosophy, p. 204. 57 Mou Zongsan, Phenomenon and Thing-​in-​Itself, preface, p. 13. 58 Mou Zongsan, Phenomenon and Thing-​in-​Itself, preface, p. 14–​15. 59 Mou Zongsan, Phenomenon and Thing-​in-​Itself, preface, p. 17 60 Mou Zongsan, Phenomenon and Thing-​in-​Itself, preface, p. 7 61 Mou Zongsan, Intellectual Intuition and Chinese Philosophy, p. 211–​214. 62 MouTsung-​san, Phenomenon and Thing-​in-​Itself, preface, p. 15. 63 This problem is controversial within Buddhism. For example, it may involve the problem of whether there are internal difficulties in the thought system and the relevant criticism of the consciousness-​only and madhyamaka for the thought system. However, a metaphysical entity which can prove its existence with the inward experience is contrary to Buddhism with the basic argumentation of emptiness and cause. 64 Mou Zongsan has attempted to explain the inward experience of the intellectual intuition in Taoism but his theory is too far-​fetched. Please refer to Mou Zongsan, Intellectual Intuition and Chinese Philosophy, p. 210. 65 Mou Zongsan, Phenomenon and Thing-​in-​Itself, preface, p. 6. 66 According to the above analysis, we can know that Mou Zongsan has the wrong explanation for the two concepts. His ideas are too far even without the consideration for the existing essential problems in its argumentation structure. 67 Mou Zongsan, Substance of Mind and Substance of Nature (I), p. 66–​67. 68 Mou Zongsan, Substance of Mind and Substance of Nature (I), p. 57. 69 Mou Zongsan, Substance of Mind and Substance of Nature (I), p. 63–​64. 70 Mou Zongsan very rightly points out, for that matter, Cheng, Zhu Xi had said they are also in existence theory, rather than a form of constitutive theory. Mou Zongsan: see the heart body and sex body (top), p. 77.

4 Supreme Good and Perfection Religion

One of the criticisms of Mou Zongsan about Kant is his concept of God. Under the double background of Christian culture and the Enlightenment, Kant refuted natural theology with his powerful reason and proposed moral theology. Mou Zongsan agrees with this point of Kant for refuting natural theology. However, Mou Zongsan is unsatisfied with the moral theology established by Kant, believing that the moral theology indicates that Kant has not implemented reason fully. Mou Zongsan conducts his criticism from many aspects. Firstly, he starts from the perspective of the relationship between morals and metaphysics. He believed that only the understanding that the subjective basis (mind), objective basis (nature) and ultimate basis (heaven) of morals is a thing-​in-​itself, with both the ethical meaning and the metaphysical meaning, which can be called “a totally rational decision.” However, Kant still illustrates the close relationship between morals and metaphysics through practical reason. From this point, we can say that Kantianism indicates the metaphysical practical turn. Nevertheless, leaving space and distance between morals and metaphysics, so as to establish moral theology, implies that he is lacking the “pure wisdom” reflected in Chinese philosophy, especially the Confucian traditions. That is to say, although Mou Zongsan seeks the implementation of reason, he refuses to accept the deed of Kant of retaining God on the basis of rational critique or refute the metaphysical method, starting from reason. Instead, he criticizes Kant for keeping God and not implementing the rational stance with enough attention on the metaphysical meaning. For that point, Mou Zongsan upgrades morals to the metaphysical level rather than endows the metaphysical thing-​in-​itself with the moral quality, so that morals can have a metaphysical sense. Secondly, Mou Zongsan expressed his core theories in a proposition similar to the philosophical anthropology one: human beings are finite but can also be infinite. The more specific meaning of this proposition is: as the existent with the perceptual intuition, human beings can have intellectual intuition. The statement of “can have” implies that the intellectual intuition is more understood as the result of cultivation. In other words, for Mou Zongsan, intellectual intuition is the ability after cultivation rather than an innate ability (such as perceptual intuition).1 Secondly, because Kant establishes his moral theology by coming DOI: 10.4324/9781351242219-5

70  The Arrogation of Conscience up with and solving the problem of the Supreme Good, his theory of the Supreme Good becomes one focus of criticism. We know that Mou Zongsan proposes the concept of perfection religion on this basis. However, that does not mean that Mou Zongsan proposes the concept of perfection religion out of concern for the concept of the Supreme Good. As has been stated before, the major concern of Mou Zongsan is the problem concerning the west and China, in other words, the problem of the difference between China and the west. The problem for him is specified as the difference between the wisdom of the Chinese cultural traditions represented in Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism and the wisdom of the western cultural traditions with the representation of Christian thoughts. The proposition of the problem of the perfection religion is out of the concern for the problem concerning China and the west, while the problem of the Supreme Good is the most appropriate theoretical topic for proposing the concept of perfection religion. So we can see clearly that the thought and opinion of Mou Zongsan is that the problem of the Supreme Good can be solved truly under the argumentation mode of the perfection religion. In other words, Mou Zongsan connects the fundamental difference between western and Chinese culture with the relationship between human beings and heaven. Meanwhile, he thinks that in terms of the Supreme Good, the fundamental difference between Chinese and western culture is presented most clearly. To illustrate the concept of Supreme Good, Kant first distinguishes two different meanings of “highest”: one refers to supremum and, correspondingly, “highest good” refers to supreme good, in other words, the pure and unconditional good; the other one refers to consummatum and, correspondingly, “highest good” refers to consummative good, in other words, the complete and perfect good. In the analysis of pure practical reason, Kant indicates that virtue can be called the supreme good for its unconditional quality. However, virtue cannot be called the consummative good because happiness is the target for the finite rational existent with the perceptual intuition.2 Therefore, the consummative good for human beings must be the integrity of the virtues and happiness with the condition of virtue and complement of happiness: the Supreme Good refers to the whole and the complete good. The virtue is always the consummative good as a condition because it cannot have any other conditions surpassing that. Nevertheless, although happiness can bring pleasure for the owner, it is not good at all times in every sense but regards the behavior conforming to the moral rules as the presupposition.3 The discussed topic of Kant in the dialectic discussion in the pure practical reason is the problem of the Supreme Good concerning the unity of virtue and happiness.4 According to the logical rules of conceptual conjunction, Kant points out two possible ways for the unity of virtue and happiness: one is connecting

Supreme Good and Perfection Religion  71 virtue and happiness according to the law of identity and the relationship between the two parties is analytic under this situation. The second is connecting two parties according to the law of causation and the relationship between the two parties is comprehensive: the connection between virtue and happiness can be understood in this way: the hard work contributing to the virtue and the reasonable pursuit for happiness are not different, but the identical behavior because the former one does not have to use the different rules from that of the latter one. Otherwise, that kind of connection is put into such a relationship, that is to say, virtue leads to happiness as a thing different from virtue, just like reason leads to result.5 Kant points out that the Epicureans and Stoics use the former way when seeking the unity of virtue and happiness, although their directions were opposite. The Epicureans believe that being aware of the rules making people happy is virtue while the Stoics believe that being aware of their virtues is happiness. However, since it has been proved in the analysis of the pure practical reason that the virtues and happiness “have totally different qualities in their highest practical principles,” and they can only be connected in the way of conceptual synthesis as “two totally different elements of the Supreme Good.” Given this point, neither the Epicurean theory of “happiness first and virtue second” or the Stoic theory of “virtue first and happiness second” acknowledged the independence of virtue and happiness in their practical theory or the theoretical theory.6 Therefore, the only right way to solve the problem of how the Supreme Good can be possible in practice is to use the conceptual synthesis according to the law of causation under the presupposition of the theoretical independence of virtue and happiness. However, Kant points out that this kind of practice may lead to the antinomy of practical reason because on the one hand we cannot hold the view that the pursuit for happiness is the motivation for rules of virtue on the stance of reason. On the other hand, from the empirical perspective, we cannot say that the rules of virtue are the effective reasons for happiness. The antinomy of practical reason and the third antinomy of the pure reason, in other words, the antinomy between the natural necessity and the freedom are similar: just like the latter fails to understand the relationship between freedom and nature from the perspective of the relationship between the intellectual world and the perceptual world, the former fails to understand the relationship between virtue and happiness from the perspective of the relationship between the sensible world and the conceptual world. Therefore, to eliminate the antinomy of practical reason reasonably, there is only one way: affirming the intention of virtues will definitely lead to happiness while the causation here—​virtues as the reason and the happiness as the result—​is not the causation in the conceptual world but that transcending the intellectual world and the conceptual world:

72  The Arrogation of Conscience because I am not only entitled to regard my existing thinking as the intellectual target in an intellectual world but also have a pure sensible decision-​making basis for my causation in moral rules, with the help of an intellectual natural creator, there may be a direct or indirect necessary connection between the virtues as the cause and the happiness as the result in the sensible world. However, in nature as the sensible target, the causation between virtues and happiness can only be occasional and cannot reach the height of Supreme Good.7 The only possible way to achieve the Supreme Good in practice requires that the pure practical reason must have priority when connecting with speculative reason and thus Kant proposes two affirmations of pure practical reason. Firstly, as for the first element of Supreme Good, intention and moral rules must be totally consistent in practice. Since the complete consistency between intention and moral rules can only be achieved in an envisaged indefinite process for human beings as the perceptual and intuitive rational existent, while “this kind of infinite process can only be possible under the presupposition of indefinite existent and personality (we call it the immortality of the soul),” the Supreme Good must affirm the immortality of the soul.8 In other words, to ensure the continuing advancement of virtues, the infinite existing body of virtues must be affirmed first. Secondly, in terms of the necessary connection between virtues and happiness in the lexical order of Supreme Good, there must be an intellectual creator above nature, so the Supreme Good must affirm the existence of God if it wants to be possible in practice. Kant states in a detailed illustration: this supreme reason should not only include the basis for the consistency between nature and the rules of the wills of sensible existence, but also includes the basis for the consistency of the presentation of this rule, in terms of the basis for them making it the supreme decision of their wills. Therefore, it should not only include the basis for the consistency between moral virtues naturally and formally but also nature and virtues as the basis for their decision-​making will, i.e., their moral intention. Thus, only with certain supreme natural reason in accordance with the moral intention, the Supreme Good can be possible in the world. Currently, an existent who acts according to the presentation of rules is a sensible one (an existent with reason) while the reason for such a kind of existence is his will. Therefore, for the Supreme Good, there must be a natural supreme reason, in other words God, the existent becoming reason through intellectuality and wills.9 The key point here is that pure practical reason must affirm the existence of God so as to make sure that happiness can be shared according to the

Supreme Good and Perfection Religion  73 percentage of virtues, and God must be envisaged as a sensible and intellectual existent, in other words, a God with personhood. To make the Supreme Good possible in practice, the practical reason must affirm a God with personhood. This practical inference of Kant for the existence of God is apparently related closely to his Christian background. Here we see clearly the full affirmation. On the one hand, Kant believes that the schools of ancient Greece, mainly referring to the Epicureans and the Stoics, fail to solve the possibility of the Supreme Good in practice because they are lacking in the faith that there is a God with personhood in the Christian meaning. On the other hand, with the special didactic explanation of “moral rules lead to religion,” Kant thinks the moral rules of Christianity—​here referring to the Protestantism—​are not of heteronomy but autonomy: the moral rules of Christianity are not theological (therefore they are not of heteronomy) but autonomy of the pure practical reason because such a kind of ethics does not regard the knowledge or the wills of God as the basis of moral rules but regards them as the basis for achieving the Supreme Good under the condition of following moral rules. It even puts the fundamental motivation of following rules into the presentation of the obligations instead of putting them into the expected results. Meanwhile, getting the qualification for the expected results lies in the strict following of the obligations.10 In conclusion, for Kant, pure practical reason ensures the possibility of the Supreme Good in practice through affirming the immortality of the soul and the existence of God. For this point, Mou Zongsan, however, inherits the problem of Kant but does not agree with the answer proposed by Kant. In other words, although he thinks that the problem of how the Supreme Good can be possible in practice exists and it is very important and even thinks that it is the highest problem in western philosophy and Chinese philosophy, he does not think that the immortality of soul and the existence of God must be affirmed to make sure the possibility of the Supreme Good in practice. Actually, we know that Mou Zongsan believes that the practice of Kant for ensuring the possibility of the Supreme Good in practice through affirming the immortality of soul and existence of God though pure practical reason is the proof of his weakness in argumentation. Surely, this opinion of Mou Zongsan is based on his understanding of Chinese philosophy and moralizing traditions. To be more specific, he thinks that Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism in Chinese philosophy all acknowledge that human beings have intellectual intuition, in other words, the infinite intellectual mind, which is the basis for the possible Supreme Good and consequently the real solution of the problem concerning the Supreme Good. The concept of perception, religion, and relative concepts all come from

74  The Arrogation of Conscience Buddhism, especially the Tiantai Sect and Huayan Sect in Chinese Buddhism which are developed by Mou Zongsan. What the sages say is the teaching. Generally, the practice which can inspire reason and make people use reason in moral practice or relieving practice, or the practice of purifying or blessing, the practice in life to the highest level, is teaching.11 This is a simple explanation of the concept of “teaching” by Mou Zongsan. To understand this simple explanation, we have to note the following three points. Firstly, this explanation aims at the cultural and religious traditions of China and the west, which refers to “what the sages say is the teaching.” Therefore we see that Mou Zongsan refers to Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism in China and the Christianity of the west when talking about real “teaching.” It implies that both the teachings of Confucius, Mencius, Laozi, and Zhuangzi and the teaching of Buddha and Jesus can be referred to as “the teaching of sages.” Corresponding to this point, it is the discussion covering the moral practice, relieving practice, and the practice of purifying life. Secondly, this explanation emphasizes the importance of people’s reason. For this point, the “teaching” in the mind of Mou Zongsan refers to the “religion within the pure reason” explained by Kant. However, in Kant’s thoughts, such a kind of religion within pure reason can only be the moral religion theoretically or the enlightened Christianity in practice. Mou Zongsan expands the concept of the sensible religion to the understanding of the moralizing traditions of China. Therefore we see that the thinking of Kant on the one hand is the basic resource for Mou Zongsan constructing the sensible religion. On the other hand, it is thought to be related to the special background of the Christian culture in terms of the key problems, even certain philosophical explanations of Christian thought.12 In the end, this explanation puts the meaning of “teaching” on the problem of practice. That is to say, the ultimate end of “teaching” lies in making people achieve the highest ideal level. Under such a concept which is based on the practice, there is surely a problem concerning the perfection religion because it is a must to envisage an ultimate perfection level in different levels of practice according to the difference of morals and the levels of mindset for any religion. Perfection religion is the Perfection Religion. The perfection refers to no imperfection. The perfection religion refers to religion as telling the truth and what it says has evidence. Therefore, the perfection religion is also called sound religion. The ones which have not reached such kind of situation are for the convenience of explanation. In other words, they just say something partially or in a limited way instead of telling the truth.13 This is the simple explanation of Mou Zongsan for the concept of the perfection of religion. From this explanation we can see that the concept of Mou

Supreme Good and Perfection Religion  75 Zongsan about perfection religion refers to the different levels of practice and the statement about the levels. Therefore, perfection religion refers to the perfection situation or sound situation contrary to the imperfect situation in the practice level and the positive knowledge contrary to the convenient ones in the theoretical level. To make sure what the perfect religion is, there must be some judgment for sects. In the Buddhist traditions, the judgment mainly refers to the judgment for the thoughts of different sects within Buddhism, just as Mou Zongsan saying “differentiating the different thoughts so as to judge the levels and the values.”14 Mou Zongsan also develops it into an expansive concept for sect judgment aiming at the thoughts of the various moralizing traditions. As for the internal sect judgment, people must judge the levels of the thoughts of different sects according to the basic argumentation of that sect. If we use the pair of concepts of thing-​in-​itself and practice in the Confucianism of the Song Dynasty, the internal judgment mainly focuses on the judgment of practice. That is to say, the presupposition is that the sects have the same view in terms of the issue of the thing-​in-​itself while the judgment for the levels is only about the difference in practice or the difference reflected on the basis of difference in practice. For example, the judgment of Buddhism aims at the thoughts of the Buddhist sects instead of thoughts being included as foreign thoughts. According to this, we can say that external judgment is not only reflected in the judgment of practice but also in the judgment for thing-​in-​itself.15 Therefore, the problem is that if the internal judgment is based on the basic argumentation of a certain sect, what is the standard for the judgment of the teachings of all sects for the external judgment? Mou Zongsan does not explain this problem clearly, but we know that this standard is the basic argumentation concerning the moral religion or the sensible religion based on the philosophical statements, or, the basic argumentation concerning metaphysical morals. When explaining the three meanings of practical reason, Mou Zongsan once proposed a “round circle theory.” Actually, his judgment theory has become true in this round circle theory: my meaning is that if practical reason develops and completes moral metaphysics (in China, it is Confucianism while in the west it is German idealism), a sound wise argumentation itself is a round circle and a central point, and it is the so-​called pivot. It is described as a round circle because people who cannot hold to the end under the circle will turn to a point to be still or opposite: up and down, inside and outside, positive and negative can be switching. In the next, Mou Zongsan explains the integration between Kant and Christianity with the switching of round circle up and down, the integration between Whitehead and Heidegger with the switching of round circle inside

76  The Arrogation of Conscience and outside and the integration between Taoism and Buddhism with the switching of round circle positively and negatively.16 Besides, for Mou Zongsan, judgment can be divided into a subjective one and an objective one. Such a kind of difference should resort to reason: without the subjective difference, there must be the objective judgment. Buddhism has been the most detailed religion in China. The disciples of Buddhism in China hold different views concerning the subjective and the objective. However, as for the teaching of Buddha, they can also take an objective attitude and arrange the teachings’ initial approaches to become a Buddhist believer and various methods (continuous, intermittent, secret or uncertain) reasonably and it is called judgment.17 Here it should be noted that Mou Zongsan actually thinks that the internal judgment is not always the subjective judgment and the external judgment is not always the objective judgment; in other words, for Mou Zongsan, resorting to reason, the internal judgment and the external judgment can both be an objective judgment. The difference lies in that the former one resorts to reason for the judgment of practice while the latter needs to resort to reason for the judgment of the thing-​in-​itself. In short, Mou Zongsan puts the judgment basis on his constructed moral metaphysical argumentation while confining the judgment within the problem about how the Supreme Good could be possible in practice. As for the meaning of judgment, Mou Zongsan points out that the judgment is the trend and the historical mission and therefore a theoretical work requiring wisdom. Given the special time when his thoughts came into being and the overall structure of his thoughts, we can surely say that Mou Zongsan actually wants to solve the problem concerning the west and China in the method of judgment. That is the best starting point for understanding the meaning of his judgment theory in intellectual history.18 Since the concept of the perfection religion is directly related to the problem of the practice level, the judgment for the perfection religion focuses on the issue of becoming a saint and Buddha. However, under the influence of the internal requirements of the ideological system and Buddhist thoughts, Mou Zongsan focuses the issue of becoming saints and Buddha on the awareness, or, to say it in a more related way, he focuses on the relationship between awareness and natural presence. This point indicates that, compared with the issue concerning the Supreme Good proposed in the thoughts of Kant, Mou Zongsan transferred the problem of the Supreme Good into the discussion of the perfection of religion. In conclusion, the judgment of Mou Zongsan follows the following order: firstly, arrange and employ the traditional judgment thoughts in Buddhism, so as to have a basic framework for judgment and conduct the judgment within Buddhism; secondly, conduct the judgment within Taoism and Confucianism; finally, conduct the judgment within Confucianism, Taoism, Buddhism, and Christianity, and finally

Supreme Good and Perfection Religion  77 return to Confucianism. Judgment in Christianity is conducted through understanding the theory of Kant about the Supreme Good, which holds the view that there cannot be a theory of perfection religion in the theories because both parties regard God with personhood as the target of confession. In comparison, the three religions of Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism all have the theory of the perfection religion because the three religions insist that human beings have an infinite intellectual mind and do not need God in the problem of Supreme Good. This point indicates the ultimate solution of Mou Zongsan to the problem concerning the west and China. In traditional Buddhist thinking, it is the Huayan sect and Tiantai sect that have achieved most in the judgment of perfection religion. With his unique analysis, Mou Zongsan believes that the teachings of the Tiantai sect are “the supreme truth and therefore the absolute perfection.” The teachings of the Huayan sect are considered by itself as “thoughts of a unique perfection religion,” they still have some weaknesses so that their teaching cannot be called absolute sound religion. The main reason for Mou Zongsan making this statement is his thoughts about the Supreme Good. We know that the issue of the Supreme Good concerns the problem of the unity between virtues and happiness while Mou Zongsan is unsatisfied with the projects for solving the problem of the Supreme Good: the Epicureans and Stoics solve the problem concerning the Supreme Good: Epicureans and Stoics use the law of identity to solve the problem in an analytic way which cannot ensure the independence of virtue and happiness; Kant uses the law of causation to solve the problem of Supreme Good in a comprehensive way which has to affirm that the immortality of the soul and the existence of God cannot achieve real soundness. Besides, in his view, the two projects in western philosophy for solving the problem of Supreme Good are different, although they have some common points, in other words, the decomposing characteristics, or the respective characteristics.19 Mou Zongsan believes that the teachings of the Huayan sect cannot be called absolute sound religion because he thinks that the solution of the Huayan sect for the Supreme Good belongs to the respective way or the way of respective or comprehensive analysis: “Dharmakaya is colorless” is the statement for decomposing and it is not sound religion under the three Tao or three virtues. Therefore “virtue” and “existence” is different and is a full circle. Since it is different, virtue and happiness cannot be consistent, or that there is virtue and no happiness, or that virtue is happiness (this “is” the analytic one and the happiness has no independent meaning) and happiness is not needless, or it needs happiness for existence through the God spirit. If it needs the divine spirit to show it, the Buddha itself is not the mark (no trace). Mark is made from the divine spirit and it is the comprehensive relationship between virtue and happiness. The sense disappears and the divine spirit also disappears. Thus there is only virtue but no happiness. There is no

78  The Arrogation of Conscience definite relationship between virtue and happiness—​the necessary consistency so that the existence of the laws has no necessity and the mind has no necessary quality.20 Therefore, the outstanding Tiantai teachings and Huayan teachings are considered to be absolute sound religion because they regard the meaning of the strange interbeing. The strange interbeing is the opposite of the decomposing interbeing: according to the Tiantai sect, the basic rule for establishing the perfection religion is the indication of being. If we say bodhi, we must say that the worry is bodhi and that is a sound statement. If we say nirvana, we must say that life and death are nirvana and that is a sound statement. If we explain it according to the original meaning of the word, explaining “proving bodhi through explaining trouble” or “puzzle is trouble and the comprehension is bodhi” or “there is nothing troubled but the bodhi” and all of those are not sound statements.21 “The strange interbeing” thus becomes the fundamental basis for the judgment of the perfection of religion. We know that for Kant, the relationship between the concepts can be the didactic as well as the analytic and the comprehensive one. For example, the possible antinomy when solving the problem of the Supreme Good of the pure practical reason indicates that virtue and happiness cannot be unified actually in a didactic relationship. We know that Hegel transfers the didactic concept in the negative sense for Kant to the didactic concept in the positive sense and understands the didactic as the basic way to achieve itself in an objective historical process. Then, does the “strange interbeing” proposed by Mou Zongsan under the presupposition of solving the problem of Supreme Good when opposing the analytic and comprehensive way indicate the solution to the problem of Supreme Good in a didactic way? Maybe we can say so, but actually Mou Zongsan himself has this intention—​when discussing how the Huayan perfection religion is not sound enough, he uses the statement of didactic development: “The Huayan perfection religion is the isolated perfection religion so that it is not sound enough, such as the rising sun will shed the sunshine on the high mountain but not the valley. The development without didactic is like that.”22 Even so, the didactic concept is different from the didactic concept of Kant and the didactic concept of Hegel. For Mou Zongsan, both the philosophical structure of Kant and Hegel belong to the respective way. Mou Zongsan uses the “starting system” and “specific system” to describe the difference between the Huayan sect and the Tiantai sect. He also indicates that “strange interbeing” is absolute present interbeing and “cannot be obliterated even for a second” while the “interbeing” is strange, indicating that both parties of “interbeing” still keep their independence.

Supreme Good and Perfection Religion  79 For the thoughts of the perfection religion within Taoism, Mou Zongsan tends to use the concept of Wang Bi and Guo Xiang and implements the meaning of “sedimentation perfection”: while the concept of sedimentation originates from the notes of Xiang and Guo. The first thought is Wang Bi’s concept of “the sage embodies nothingness.” The sages have emotions but they will not be hindered by the emotions… Under the inspiration of Wang Bi and Guo Xiang, the Taoist perfection is clear and cannot be misunderstood… Under such a kind of perfection situation, all change with the virtues lie in the infinite mind (wisdom). The infinite mind has the specific expression so as to have the virtues and that is one aspect of “virtue” in the Supreme Good (virtues in the Taoist sense). However, all existence (sedimentation) changes with the virtues and is smooth without any troubles. That constitutes one aspect of “happiness” in the Supreme Good. Therefore, for the subjective “body and void” of life, it is called “virtue.” For the objective “body and void” of life, it is called “happiness.” That is the Supreme Good of “unity of virtue and happiness.” Here the “unity” is not only the necessary relationship between the virtues and happiness externally but also the meaning that the virtues are the happiness internally and essentially. This can only have the real possibility in the perfection, situation of the sediment.23 “The trace perfection” is also called “trace interbeing” because he thinks that it is the “strange interbeing” in the Taoist sense. Regarding the statements of Mou Zongsan about the thoughts of the Taoist perfection religion, there are three points needing to be noted. Firstly, just as his discussion on the perfection thoughts of Buddhism, Mou Zongsan still uses the twin important concepts about virtue and happiness for Kantian moral philosophy. However, he has transferred the problem concerning the Supreme Good to the relationship between awareness and existence. In other words, his act indicates that his actual viewpoint is that the problem of the Supreme Good presents as the relationship between awareness and existence in the context of Chinese philosophy, especially the context of Taoism and Buddhism. Secondly, he thinks that the perfection of trace is the “common rule of three religions.” Besides, the judgment of the Tiantai sect is actually under the influence of the trace theory of the metaphysics in the Wei and Jin Dynasties: During the Chen State and Sui Dynasty, the Tiantai sect was popular and the perfection religion was also overwhelming. Under the inspiration of the trace theory of Wang Bi and Guo Xiang, it uses the highest rule of Buddhism. The judgment of Tiantai focuses on the argumentation of Buddhism while the principle and the basis of trace originate from Wang Bi and Guo Xiang instead of Buddhism. The fact cannot be denied.24

80  The Arrogation of Conscience I am not sure the degree to which this statement influences the resorted “fact.” However, from the statement of Mou Zongsan, we can sense that one important life-​time subject is the quality of Chinese philosophy. This subject is closely related to his attention to the problem concerning the west and China. In short, his aim is to answer the question of “what is China” in comparison and communication with others. In the end, Mou Zongsan says that to explain trace perfection and the problem of having and not in Taoist thought: “this void is the functional void instead of the existential void.”25 Besides, he indicates that although the trace perfection is the common rule of three religions, the perfection of Taoism and Buddhism is “only the perfection of the situation perfection instead of the actual perfection” because neither religion “has the ontological fundamental explanation for all existences” such as Confucianism from the perspective of moral awareness.26 From this point, we can know the difference and sameness to the degree Mou Zongsan endeavors to do so. Mou Zongsan attributes his preferred Confucian perfection religion to the acts of the sages from the stage of virtues: according to the direction of Confucian wisdom, the Confucian judgment starts from the scholar to the sage. These scholars favor the will and people who are unique are called scholars. “The desire is named as kindness (it is the argumentation), the richness is named as beauty, and the richness and brightness are named as greatness.” These three meanings start from the scholar to the savant and thus it can be called the savant religion. “The great and the void one (without the void and shape) is called a sage” and this starts from the savant to the sage. It is called the sage religion. It is combined into one with heaven, land and everything so that “combining the virtues of heaven and soil and combining the brightness with the sun and the moon” is referred to as the sage religion. “The sage and the unknown are called divine” and it is sage and divine (the god of divine awareness) and it can also be called as divine religion (four-​void religion). “The existing men of honor are referred to as God and the exceeding men are called the creator. The up and down are the same with heaven and the earth. Could it mean a small change?” Such a statement is the four voids of the sage and divine. If so, from the scholar to the men of honor, from the men of honor to the sage, from the sage to the divine, the four elements are integrated. The performance of human practice has the levels of difference with the different reasons and the different limits of the special situations. However, the sages establish the religion from the beginning to the end. Until the divine stage, the perfection of religion is done. Then the Supreme Good is achieved. The sage reflects that the Supreme Good is for the whole world. That is the ultimate situation of human beings and the philosophical reflection should end there.27 Here Mou Zongsan thinks that Confucian perfection religion must be established according to the universality and creativity of moral entities from

Supreme Good and Perfection Religion  81 the starting point of moral awareness and cannot be indicated through the “strange interbeing” directly. For the development of the argumentation mode of the Confucian perfection religion in history, Mou Zongsan starts from the knowledge of the heavens through the practice of Confucius, goes to the devoted knowing the mind and knowing the heaven of Mencius, the “restraining in privacy” and “integrity,” “respect for the heaven” of Book of Changes, “moved by the external world and thus have the thoughts” of Zhou Dunyi, “where the sages are, people around will be influenced” of Zhang Zai, “implement the thoughts in the practice” of Cheng Hao, “undertaking the thoughts of Mencius for establishing the statements” of Lu Jiuyuan, “extension of innate knowledge” of Wang Yangming, and finally the “four-​void school” of Wang Ji.28 It is obvious that this school has the same understanding as Mou Zongsan with Taoist traditions and he also mentions Cheng Yi and Zhu Xi who, he thinks, start the school in his statement about it. The most notable point is that he regards the ultimate end for the Confucian perfection religion. To make this point clear, he analyzes the “four-​word school” of Wang Yangming comparatively and the “four-​void school” based on the theory of Wang Ji. In the “four-​word school” of Wang Yangming, the mind, the awareness, the knowledge and the matter are connected: “the matter without kindness or the evil mind, the act with kindness and the evil mind, the knowledge about kindness and evilness are the consciousness, and the kindness without the evilness is studying the physical nature.” For this, the clarifying point of Mou Zongsan regards the transcending level with the mind and knowledge and the empirical level with the awareness and matter: “With the differentiation between mind and knowledge in the transcending level and the awareness and matter in the empirical level, and the practice can be initiated.”29 However, in the “four-​void school” of Wang Ji, mind, awareness, knowledge and matter are concluded into one: body, use, shape and the minute are only one chance and mind, awareness, knowledge and matter are only one thing. If mind is the one without kindness or evilness, awareness is the one without kindness and evilness, knowledge is the one without kindness or evilness, and matter is the one without kindness and evilness. Therefore, mind without mind should hide the secret, awareness without awareness should be perfect, knowledge without knowledge should be silent, and matter without matter must use the spirit. The nature of destiny should be the kindest and the divine and the divine responding. The chance cannot be tolerant and there is no kindness. The evilness is not and the kindness can be got. (Tianquan Enlightenment) Mou Zongsan thinks that the understanding for “mind, awareness, knowledge and matter” in the “four-​void school” should have the presupposition of the difference between the transcending level and the empirical level:

82  The Arrogation of Conscience They must have the difference between the two levels and then one can start to understand the meaning of “mind without mind.” The mind is the one without the mind and the awareness is the one without the awareness. The awareness is presented as the method of the “phase without awareness.” In other words, the method of “no other intention” (any thought without the sense); and the “act of awareness” at this time is the act without the acting phase; in other words, the act without acting. Therefore, there is no phase with the awareness. The meaning is purely the popular meaning of the divine spirit without any knowledge of its intention and therefore it is the intention without the phase. That refers to “changing the awareness into the mind” of Liu Jishan. The knowledge is the knowledge without the knowledge indicates that it is the knowledge of the phase without any knowledge … In the chaos, “the knowledge is the knowledge without knowledge” only indicates that the meaning is above the non-​empirical level of the consciousness to be compared with the matter. However, the knowledge phase without the knowledge is popular just as “decomposing it” to the smaller ones so that the big thing has no big phase. The knowledge is so and the matter is likely. In the chaos, there is still the matter. However, the matter is only the matter without the matter and the matter is without the phase of matter. Wang Yangming also says “the sense with apperception should be the matter” and the matter is the matter without the matter. The matter without the phase of matter means that this matter does not have the phase of the conscience or the right or wrong phase of the kindness and the evilness. “The meaning lies in the matter” and the matter is the matter on the empirical level, “the sense of the apperception should be the matter” on the transcending level. In the words of Kant, the former is the matter in the practice and it is corresponding to the one with kindness and evilness and the latter is the matter of thing-​in-​itself in practice and it is corresponding to the one with the apperception.30 With the thought framework of the so-​called double-​level ontology, it is troublesome to explain the “four-​word religion” of Wang Yangming or to explain the “four-​void religion” of Wang Ji. For Wang Yangming, the difference between the mind and the awareness lies in the problem of contacting the objective things instead of the difference between the transcending level and the empirical level. For that reason, the function of conscience is contacting objective things. Therefore, people can know kindness and evilness, and studying the physical nature of things can be understood as “eliminating evilness for the kindness.” Here the explanation of Mou Zongsan is too far-​fetched and simple. Especially since he has noted that the natural law of Zhu Xi is still the existential law instead of the formal law, he should not understand the “awareness” and “matter” of Wang Yangming as things at the empirical level.

Supreme Good and Perfection Religion  83 It is the same with the “four-​ void religion” of Wang Ji. The biggest problem lies in: if it is explained with the difference between the transcending level and empirical level, more specifically speaking, if people think the latter “mind,” “awareness,” “knowledge,” and “matter” belong to the transcending level while the former “mind,” “awareness,” “knowledge,” and “matter” belong to the empirical level in the statement about the mind without mind, the awareness without awareness, the knowledge without knowledge and the matter without matter, the meaning of “coexistence of the knowledge and matter” is impossible. Such a kind of the explanation about the mind without mind, the awareness without awareness, the knowledge without knowledge and the matter without matter actually indicates that the matter can appear at the transcending level on the basis of overcoming the limit of the empirical level and the obstacles so that the relationship between the transcending level and the empirical level cannot be a kind of “strange interbeing.” From the thoughts of Wang Ji and Wang Yangming, their problems in the metaphysical level are reduced to problems in the empirical level in Kant’s sense. In short, the explanation for the relationship between having and not in the Chinese ancient philosophy in the so-​called double-​level ontological thought framework indicates the reduction of “having” so that it cannot understand the relationship between having and instead separating the relationship between having and not. Regarding the differences between having and not, Mou Zongsan attributes the Confucian perfection religion to the “four-​ void religion” of Wang Ji and thinks the four-​word religion of Wang Yangming, which is called the “four-​have religion” by Mou Zongsan, does not achieve the ultimate perfection for the presented situation: the four-​word religion of Wang Yangming is not the ultimate perfection religion but the pre-​stage of the perfection religion. The ultimate perfection religion lies in the “four-​void” proposed by Wang Longxi and the four-​word religion is the “four-​have.” In terms of the four-​void, the mind, awareness, knowledge and matter are not the things-​in-​themselves. Instead, they are the presentations of the void in the chaotic heavenly land. In this kind of formless presentation, the four have no corresponding kindness and evilness.31 For the “void” in the “four-​void religion,” Mou Zongsan has one important differentiation in terms of the “mind without mind,” the void is the one in the presentation of the mind instead of the existential sense. It means that there must be a mind on the existential level but the presenting function of mind is presented in the form of “mindless.” In other words, it is not presented on purpose. Therefore, this “void” is like the void in the statement of “has done neither good nor evil.” It is similar to the void in the statement of

84  The Arrogation of Conscience Cheng Ming Dao’s Definite Nature that the heaven and the land tend to influence all things without any mind and the sages tend to relieve all things without any emotion. “With the mind” indicates that there must be a mind in the existential level and “influencing all things without mind” indicates that it is common in all things because it is made so on purpose but it influences people in a mindless way. “Sages tend to relieve all things without emotion” is similar to this statement. “With the emotion” means having a mind of emotion while “without emotion” means having no mind of emotion. “Void can be good and void can also be evil” is similar to the statement. There must be the good and evil but people should create the good or the evil on purpose. It is similar to the statement of Buddhism that “the mind of the Buddha and the mindless is Tao.” “The mind is the Buddha” affirms the existence of mind and Buddha. “The mindless is the Tao” reflects that the mind contributes to the Buddha in the way of “mindless in the mind and Buddha,” in other words, the wise use of the Prajna wisdom. Wang Yangming also says “the mind is the real and the mindless is the fake” and it is the having or not on the existential level. In the ontological level, the mind of the conscience exists. Things with conscience are real, otherwise they are fake. That is also the statement in the Doctrine of the Mean that “the real things exist to the end and the fake are formless.” However, Wang Yangming says “the mindless is the real and the mind is the fake.” That is the having or not in the functional level of “reflecting the conscience.” On the function of reflecting the conscience, it must be presented in the form of mindlessness. Thus all are natural. Both the practice and the body are real; if not, all are fake. Both the practice and the body are tortured into the image.32 This differentiation is important because the differentiation between the having and not involves the fundamental difference between Confucianism and Buddhism. In other words, if the “void” of “four-​void religion” in the words of Mou Zongsan is not or at least is not only the void in the presenting function but also the void in the existential level, the “four-​void religion” is difficult to hold the Confucian stance but reduces to the Buddhist thoughts of nihilism. Therefore, it seems that through affirming the “void” of “four-​ void religion” is the void in the presenting function and thinking that the “four-​void religion” regards the “having” as the sin, Mou Zongsan protects the Confucian stance of Wang Ji. However, it is not so simple. Firstly, on the stance of the Early Confucianism, the understanding for sages on the sense of the theory of state or the theory of awareness is not reasonable and it is a kind of internalized explanation for the sages while ignoring the importance of the thing. For example, in The Analects of Confucius, we read the dialogue between Zigong and Confucius: “Zigong said: ‘If there is a man who can give many benefits to the people and help people, can he be called as the

Supreme Good and Perfection Religion  85 benevolent one?’ Confucius said: ‘He is not only the benevolent one but also the sage! Just like Yao and Shun in ancient China!’ ” (Yong Ye, The Analects of Confucius). In terms of the Great Learning, the sages regard the cultivation of their moral character as the basis and it can be called enlightenment for the virtues. However, it also emphasizes that they enlighten the virtues in the attention to harmony among the body, family, nation, and the world while the ultimate end is that the ones who want to enlighten the whole world do not only focus on the internal awareness. For this point, from the perspective of Mou Zongsan, one possible argument is that the sages are the sages firstly because of the awareness of their state. However, they can have the merits and virtues matched with the sages only after their internal awareness has reached the state of the sage, just as “internal sage and external kind” is understood by others. The problem lies in admitting the importance of the matter for the sage; it is impossible to think that the “four-​void religion” of Wang Ji is more perfect than the “four-​word religion” of Wang Yangming because the latter at least emphasizes that the “study for the physical nature” of “eliminating the evilness for the kindness” is one important part. Or in the statement of Mou Zongsan, actually, the theory concerning sages “regarding the having as the body and the void as the practice” cannot reflect the “active meaning of creation” of the sages to eulogize heaven and the land.33 The troublesome point lies in attributing having to the mind (mind as the body) while attributing the void to the knowledge (knowledge without knowledge) cannot deny the criticism of nihilism. It seems strange that Mou Zongsan disagrees with Kant regarding his opinion that human beings have no intellectual intuition. It seems that he is opposed to the agnosticism of Kant. However, after his assertion that human beings have intellectual intuition, he says that the intellectual intuition of human beings for everything is a kind of knowledge without knowledge and he seems to return to the agnostic stance of Kant. Since the intellectual intuition for everything is a kind of essential intuition but the result is a kind of knowledge without knowledge, the concept of the nature of things and the laws of things cannot hold water. That is against the fundamental stance of the Early Confucianism and the spiritual pursuit and the theory concerning the sense of the Neo Confucianism of the Song and Ming Dynasty. We know that the Early Confucianism discusses “nature” both on the sense of the ethics and the sense of the cosmology (the so-​called “the things given by the heaven is the nature, doing things according to the nature is called the Tao, and the way to achieve Tao is teaching”). One core thought proposed is “changes of the natural laws make the lives valuable.” However, in the following days, because of Mencius, the concept of the nature is used to refer to “virtues” in the ethical sense. As an integral concept in the cosmological sense, the natural laws cannot express the meaning of the nature of things clearly and it is easy to be confused with nihilism in the ontological sense. Given this point, the Confucianism of the Song Dynasty regards the “natural laws” as their basis. That is to say, if the concept of natural law puzzles people because of the metaphysical thoughts of Confucianism and

86  The Arrogation of Conscience nihilism in a certain sense, the concept of natural sense eliminates the possibility for confusion. Under this kind of thought background, the thoughts in the Great Learning and the Doctrine of Mean, especially the degree for attaining the virtues of investigation, inquisition, sincerity, honesty, cultivation, family harmony, country management, and world peace and “mean” which is explained as “definite rule of the world” by Cheng Yi can show the qualities of Confucian thought. In other words, with the “natural law” which is called as “exposed by them” by Cheng Yi, the Confucianism in the Song Dynasty can divide the natural law assisted by Confucianism with the nihilism for any ontology. The thought of Mou Zongsan that regards the free and infinite mind as the body and the intellectual intuition of this mind for everything is a kind of knowledge without knowledge not only indicates that “making the life valuable” assisted by the Early Confucianism is useless and the whole endeavor for supporting the natural laws by the Confucianism in Song and Ming Dynasty is in vain. To say the least, since the theoretical basis of Mou Zongsan for attributing the sacred ground and the perfection situation of Confucianism to the intellectual intuition “having sense but no knowledge,” the result of his thoughts will be mysticism. Actually, it can represent the fundamental stance of Mou Zongsan in ontology: the theory of all ontology is a mystic corpus, in other words, the infinite mystery. “The heaven is soundless and flavorless so that it is the infinite mystery.” With nature, heaven and land can exist and nature is also the mystery of heaven, land, and spirits (Hu Wufeng). All of these make up the infinite mysteries. However, the sages do not measure and talk about the mystic corpus through the thinking and reasoning nor gain the knowledge from talking. Therefore “it cannot be gained and sensed.” The school holding this view expresses that Confucius does not talk much about or use thinking and reasoning to speculate because this kind of thing cannot be talked about emptily. “Is virtue a remote thing? I wish to be virtuous, and lo! Virtue is at hand.” The practice of virtues is a thing which can be controlled by one. Mencius says “When we get by our seeking and lose by our neglecting –​in that case seeking is of use to getting, and the things sought for are those which are in ourselves.” “The superior man does not murmur against Heaven, nor grudge against men. Knowing the things in the world and getting inspiration from heaven, am I known by heaven?” That heaven knows me indicates that I know about heaven. Knowing that it knows me is equal to knowing heaven and such a kind of knowledge is the rapport for connecting with heaven into one unity. “Heaven, Earth, and I were produced together, and all things and I are one” is said by Zhuangzi but it is also shared by all the sages. The practice of virtues can help to know heaven so that men and heaven must have common features, that is to say, the creation of the whole world and the completion of the whole world. The principle (mystic corpus) of the

Supreme Good and Perfection Religion  87 ontology of nature and natural law needs not the deep investigation to know (the demonstration through thinking and reasoning is deep investigation) but the practice of virtues can become mysticism.34 From the perspective of understanding with sympathy, we can say that mysticism is the final destination of the thoughts of Mou Zongsan.35 For attributing Confucianism in terms of the conception, the judgment of Mou Zongsan for the religions can be divided into two steps. Firstly, Mou Zongsan judges Taoism, Buddhism, and Confucianism from the difference between the metaphysical situation to the metaphysical reality with Taoism and Buddhism as the supplement and Confucianism as the main body. The key lies in creativity: there must be identification. In other words, for the situation that the mind knows matter is an event, it is not explained vertically but horizontally so that it is no different from Buddhism. Actually, it is still vertical but it is only not clear for perfection. Because this awareness is still the awareness of all the created things and it has the basis of “the superior man, (thus represented), by his self-​reverence maintains the inward (correctness).” It is neither the metaphysical wisdom of “inaction and no obsession” nor the Buddhist wisdom of “immaculate and knowing the mind.” The latter two are about the infinite wise mind without creativity. Therefore, it can only be purified in all existences (having no or like it) and subsequently it can only be stored and achieved without creativity. Therefore, for the unity of virtues and happiness in the two systems, the virtues are not the virtues in the moral sense. For Taoism, it is only the metaphysical virtues and for Buddhism, it is only the quiet virtues. They are only the negative virtues but not the virtues of the moral creation in the active sense of correcting things, smoothing things and creating things. Therefore, it is not the perfection religion which holds the moral practice and it is only the perfection religion of freedom. Mr. Xiong is unsatisfied with Buddhism and therefore argues with the monks. What he says tends to express this meaning and what he argues lies in creativity.36 According to this opinion of Mou Zongsan, we can say surely that Christianity and Kant have similar thoughts with Confucianism because both Christianity and Kant admit the existence of a creative God. However, the second step of Mou Zongsan for religious judgment is judging Kant and Christianity, which belong to western culture, and Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism, which belong to Chinese culture in terms of the difference of God between the infinite intuition and personhood. As has been mentioned before, this step of Mou Zongsan is that he proposed and solves the problem concerning the west and China in his unique philosophical thinking way.

88  The Arrogation of Conscience Stating his core thought is that the solution of the problem of perfection does not need a God with personhood like Kant or a God with personhood out of the “emotional function” like Christianity. Besides, the proposition of a God with personhood cannot achieve the perfection of religion. Furthermore, only the proposition of infinite intuition can achieve the real and final solution to the problem of the Supreme Good. Therefore, we can see that Mou Zongsan attributes the possibility of perfection to the Chinese tradition and judges Christianity as a peculiar religion. Besides, he thinks that Kantianism, coming from the cultural background of Christianity, “can only be said to be the original religion or the peculiar religion of the practical reason.”37 This understanding of Mou Zongsan of the difference between the west and China has been described as the difference between internal transcendence and external transcendence.38 That is, the final conclusion for solving the problem concerning the west and China. For this point, according to the above-​mentioned analysis, we can say that the thoughts appearing in the special situation of modern China have gone too far in the problem concerning the west and China because of the huge comparative tension. Therefore, while reviewing the gain and loss of Mou Zongsan on this problem, the most important point in the next step is how to properly propose the problem concerning the west and China.

Notes 1 Logically, Mou Zongsan still needs to acknowledge that there is an inborn basis for human beings boasting intellectual intuition in the human endowment. 2 For Kant, if virtue means keeping to the unconditional order of the pure reason and reflects that human beings as the rational existent have the necessary requirements for themselves, happiness is “the sum of the satisfaction of human beings as the rational existent”. In the sense that the sense is higher than the sensibility and regulates the sensibility, Kant defines happiness: “happiness is the situation where the rational existent does everything according to the wishes and will in the whole existing process and thus it relies on the accordance of the deciding basis for the nature, the whole target, and the nature of the will”. Please refer to Immanuel Kant, Critique of Practical Reason, 5: 124, in Practical Philosophy, trans. & ed. Mary. J. Gregor, Cambridge University Press, 1996, p. 240. 3 Immanuel Kant, Critique of Practical Reason, 5: 111, in Practical Philosophy, p. 229. 4 For that sense, there is some sense for Mou Zongsan translating “highest good” as “supreme good”, which is reasonable even though the connection between highest good and perfection religion is established by Mou Zongsan according to his own understanding of Chinese philosophy. 5 Immanuel Kant, Critique of Practical Reason, 5: 111, in Practical Philosophy, p 229. 6 Of course, the evaluation of Kant for Stoics is better than that for Epicureans in that in his view, although both make the mistake of reductionism in the issue of highest good, the Stoics start from the reason for constructing moral rules while the Epicureans start from the sensibility.

Supreme Good and Perfection Religion  89 7 Immanuel Kant, Critique of Practical Reason, 5: 114–​115, in Practical Philosophy, p. 232. 8 Immanuel Kant, Critique of Practical Reason, 5: 122, in Practical Philosophy, p. 238. 9 Immanuel Kant, Critique of Practical Reason, 5: 125, in Practical Philosophy, p. 240–​241. 10 Immanuel Kant, Critique of Practical Reason, 5: 129, in Practical Philosophy, p. 243. Mou Zongsan does not give any evaluation when translating this paragraph but he disagrees with Kant. He thinks that the morals of Christianity are not about self-​cultivation but its institution. Kant defends Christianity as the moral religion when discussing the affirmation of pure practical reason. His points can be generalized into two. The first is, “moral rules must still be considered as the order of the highest existent”. That is to say, the absolute order of the practical reason must be considered as the order of God; secondly, the pure moral motivation does not come from the Holy Spirit, whose function only lies in “leading to the devout and firm determination and the ever-​lasting awareness in the moral process”. Please refer to Immanuel Kant, Critique of Practical Reason, 5: 129; 5: 123, in Practical Philosophy, p. 244; p, 239, note. 11 Mou Zongsan, On the Highest Good, p. 267. 12 Therefore, it is understandable that the criticism of Kant for Christianity is the important resource for Mou Zongsan criticizing Christianity on the one hand, and the criticism of Mou Zongsan for Kant reflects his criticism for Christianity on the other hand. 13 Mou Zongsan, On the Highest Good, p. 267. 14 Mou Zongsan, On the Highest Good, p. 266. 15 Obviously, the thought of “thing-​in-​itself is practice and practice is thing-​in-​itself ” will make the judgment, especially the external and objective judgment very subtle. The biggest danger results from that the sects emphasize on the relation between thing-​in-​itself and practice in terms of similarity while ignoring the essential difference in terms of the ontology of all sects. 16 Mou Zongsan, Substance of Mind and Substance of Nature (I), p. 160–​161. 17 Mou Zongsan, On the Highest Good, p. 266. 18 The best friend of Mou Zongsan, Tang Junyi, also takes the same way of thinking, even though they have quite different views on details. 19 In the appendix of Nature of Buddha and Prajna, Mou Zongsan discussed the question of “respective and irrespective analysis”. 20 Mou Zongsan, On the Highest Good, p. 279. Besides, in another part (p. 272), Mou Zongsan has explained the statement of “no difference between the mind and the body” as the “decomposing comprehensive proposition”. However, when talking about the difference between Huayan perfection religion and the Tiantai perfection religion, Mou Zongsan once said that the teachings of the Huayan sect are only “analytic”. Please refer to Nature of Buddha and Prajna, Student Book, 1984, p. 557. 21 Mou Zongsan, On the Highest Good, p. 273. 22 Mou Zongsan, On the Highest Good, p. 272. 23 Mou Zongsan, On the Highest Good, p. 94. 24 Mou Zongsan, On the Highest Good, p. 302. 25 Mou Zongsan, On the Highest Good, p. 281. 26 Mou Zongsan, On the Highest Good, p. 302.

90  The Arrogation of Conscience 27 Mou Zongsan, On the Highest Good, p. 333–​334. 28 Under the influence of modern intellectual history, Mou Zongsan thinks that the finishing age of The Doctrine of Mean and The Book of Change is later than Mencius. However, he does not choose to analyse the intellectual history of Zhu Xi for Confucius, Zengzi, Zisi and Mencius for The Analects of Confucius, The Great Learning, The Doctrine of Mean and Mencius. 29 Mou Zongsan, On the Highest Good, p. 314. 30 Mou Zongsan, On the Highest Good, p. 317–​318. 31 Mou Zongsan, On the Highest Good, p. 316. In the same part of the book (p. 324), Mou Zongsan says if we judge according to the method “the principle of three thousand, no end and three Tao refers to the three virtues”, the four-​have sentence is the peculiar religion while the four-​void sentence is the perfection religion of the peculiar religion. The real perfection religion (the so-​called perfection religion of the universal religion is similar to the mode “the natural law and the human desires come from the same thing but have the different functions and they have the same source but different situation” of Hu Wufeng. 32 Mou Zongsan, On the Highest Good, p. 317. 33 For this point, the theory of Mou Zongsan concerning the sages is close to the stance of the Metaphysics instead of the Confucian stance. In the preface of Talent and Metaphysics (third edition), Mou Zongsan talks about the major problem of the metaphysic in Wei and Jin Dynasty with the core of the Wang Bi, Xiang Xiu, and Guo Xiang is “extracting the wisdom of ‘void’ with the accordance to the theory ‘eliminating daily to achieve the Tao’ and refining the wisdom of ‘wisdom’ ” and affirming the “void” in such kind of practice is unavoidable in the life of any important religion and the sages. He also talks about in a specific way that the wisdom of “void” on the subjective practice is the common rule of Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism. Although each religion “originates from the same origin” and “has different meaning under the teaching”, it is “the same in the essence in the form of using the expression”. As for the statement that the wisdom of “void” on the subjective practice is the common rule of the three religions, the explanation of Mou Zongsan is: the teaching of the religion is the decomposition so as to establish the theory so that the perfection comes to the specific one. The wisdom of “void” is that perfection comes to be specific. Is there any life of the sages that is not perfect or coming to be specific? The decomposition for establishing the teaching has a difference while there is no difference for the perfection coming to be specific and that is the common rule. In particular, when talking about Confucianism, he says: Confucius cannot violate the wisdom of “void” on this subjective practice and he is beyond this because he pursues benevolence also. However, is the reflection of benevolence is the mind? Although he does not talk much, he tends to believe this point. This point has been known by Zhou Haimen. Therefore, since the Mind Studies of Lu Xiangshan, till the statement “body without kindness or the evilness” of Wang Yangming, even the “four-​void” of Wang Longxi, they cannot avoid the state of “mindless is the Tao”, in other

Supreme Good and Perfection Religion  91 words, the state of talking about “void” on the subjective practice. That does not come from the Buddha but the independent thought. That is the reason why the life of the sages is common. If people cannot understand this point, they will say that the school of Wang Yangming and Lu Jiuyuanis Buddhism and the secret of Buddhism can never be achieved. However, the debate on the statement “no kindness or evilness” cannot be settled forever and it is not a good thing for Confucianism.

34 35

36 37 38

If we say that the key for the school of Lu Jiuyuan and Wang Yangming can be different from the Buddhism lies in that they emphasize the function of “mind” like the Buddhism and attribute “mind” to the “reason” supported by the Confucianism in the Song and Ming Dynasty. In the thoughts of Mou Zongsan, there is no important part of defending the natural laws. Therefore, although the three religions all talk about the highest state of the cultivation, there is some essential differences between the Confucian perfection and the Buddhist perfection: take the teaching “do what you want without breaking the rules” of Confucius for example, if it does not affirm the significance of “rule” on the height of natural law while focusing on the statement of “perfection for the specific”, it cannot hold the Confucian stance. Mou Zongsan expects that “the secrets can be exposed while the natural qualities of the religions will be eliminated”. However, according to his explanation, there is a problem with the self-​nature of Confucianism but no problem for Buddhism. In conclusion, on the level of thought, the interbeing relation between thing-​in-​itself and practice decides that the use of void with the presupposition that the having is the body cannot be the symbol of the sage level unless equaling the sage and the heaven. The above-​mentioned citation can be seen in Mou Zongsan, Talent and Metaphysics, Guangxi Normal University Press, 2006, preface, p. 1–​2. Mou Zongsan, On the Highest Good, p. 308–​309. About the mysticism in the Confucian traditions, readers can refer to two articles by Chen Lai: “The Metaphysical Problem in the Traditions of Mind Studies”, which is published in Realm of Existence-​Spirits in the Philosophy of Wang Yangming, appendix, Renmin’s Publishing House, 1991; and “Mysticism in the Philosophy of Feng Youlan”, which is published in Pursuit of the Modern Chinese Philosophy, Renmin’s Publishing House, 2001. It is notable that firstly, metaphysics is not the leading tradition of Confucianism. The introduction of Confucianism under the influence of Buddhism and Taoism is always seen in the school of Mind Studies in Song and Ming Dynasty while Neo Confucianism criticizes it a lot for “playing the world”; secondly, Feng Youlan has noticed the mysticism in Chinese philosophy and gives more attention to it. He proposes the theory that knowing metaphysically is the knowledge without knowing. Firstly, the discussion of the school of Mind Studies and Neo Confucianism in the Song and Ming Dynasty is confined to the discussion on practice and both are against the nihilism ontologically; secondly, Feng Youlan who emphasizes the logical analysis and arranges the thoughts of Neo Confucianism also gives enough attention to the mysticism. He explains that logical analysis is deficient for understanding traditional Confucianism and shows the awkward fate of traditional metaphysics for reducing into the mysticism in the “scientific and wise” modern life. Mou Zongsan, On the Highest Good, p. 327. Mou Zongsan, On the Highest Good, p. 332. Mou Zongsan, On the Highest Good, p. 294.

Part II

The Graftage of History

5 Moral Metaphysics and Historical Philosophy under the Concern for Chinese Problems

In the Neo Confucian ideological system of Mou Zongsan, historical philosophy is a significant constituent but it is a very special one. On the one hand, the moral metaphysics established by Mou Zongsan does not need a world historical concept internally, although he endeavors to establish a world historical concept from the stance of the moral metaphysics. On the other hand, a world historical concept connecting ancient times and the present is nearly a necessary theoretical requirement for Mou Zongsan because it is vital for him to have the solution to the “Chinese problem” under the theory of universalism. Here firstly is a brief introduction to the Chinese problem. The Chinese problem refers to the “biggest change in the past three thousand years” confronted by China. The different discourses of “China–​west” and “ancient and present” represent the two different kinds of descriptions of the Chinese problem. The problem concerning the west and China refers to the problem concerning self-​identification and the pursuit for recognition during the association between China and the west. It involves the comprehensive reflection on lifestyle with the important reference system of the west and the problem of how to achieve self-​identification, reestablish height and achieve active freedom in communication where western culture is rather strong and developed through globalization. The problem concerning the ancient and the present refers to the problem concerning traditions and modern lifestyle. It used to be called the problem concerning the old and the new and then it is called the modernization problem of China and the modernity problem of China. It mainly involves the understanding and reflection of China on modernity problems resulting from modern concepts formed since the Enlightenment in the actual historical and cultural situation on the one hand and the understanding and reflection on the historical and cultural traditions of China. As for the different expressions of the Chinese problem, both the problem concerning the west and China and the problem concerning the ancient and the present focus on their difference, while the former focuses more on cultural qualities and the latter on the change of time. Because modernization originates from the west and comes powerfully to China, the problem concerning the west and China has been connected with DOI: 10.4324/9781351242219-7

96  The Graftage of History each other since the beginning, within the actual historical context. In the oppression of the situation featured by a strong west and weak China, the problem concerning the west and China has been simplified into the problem concerning the ancient and the present. The New Culture Movement is an important dividing line and it has been implied so for a long time. The kind of situation of “the problem concerning the ancient and the present overwhelming the problem concerning the west and China” is a presentation of the strong west. The most important point is that present China is described as the east image of the past west (the pre-​modern west) which is abandoned by the present west (surely the modern west). Given to this point, for the people who admit the modern concepts of the west and the traditional culture of China, the criticism for the Chinese traditional culture can be solved through the explanation of the change of time so that the accusations on the traditional Chinese culture can be eliminated. This kind of thought of “saving culture from history” is significant for understanding the cultural conservatives who are not conservative in modern China. Actually, history salvation theory is the mainstream theory proposed to solve the Chinese problem since recent times. The liberalists, the communists, and the cultural conservatives resort to the grand historic concept which is present but not ancient. In other words, with the problem concerning the west and China being simplified into the problem concerning the ancient and the present, the Chinese problem is completely, not partially, described as a problem about historic philosophy. Therefore, the establishment of a kind of historic philosophy is the most important theoretical act for solving the Chinese problem. Different historical philosophies have emerged in the Chinese thought circle since modern times. However, they have one common theoretical basis: historical evolutionism. Although the liberalists did not use the theory of “termination of history” at that time, they have affirmed that freedom and democracy as the highest moral principle of human beings. This opinion is close to the view that freedom and democracy are the ultimate destination of human historic evolution. The most important theoretical weapon of the communists is historical materialism which plays a significant role in contemporary Chinese history. As is well known, historical materialism is actually the Marxist version of historical evolutionism and the materialist version of the theory of history termination. The communist ideal is thought to be the ultimate destination of human historical evolution. Most cultural conservatives do not show the strict image of the conservatives because they use the faith of historical revolution to understand the change from the tradition to the modern times. However, what is interesting is that the cultural resources of China have played a great pre-​understanding influence during the acceptance of historical revolutionism and have led to some innovative explanations in the integration of the field of vision. The most influential one is the three-​phase theory of the Gongyang School. The three-​phase theory of the Gongyang School comes from the revelation and generalization for The Commentary of Gongyang and Spring and Autumn Annals, i.e., the unconformity of the

Metaphysics and Philosophy under the Concern for Chinese Problems  97 scene, the unconformity of the head, and the unconformity of the story. After the explanation by Dong Zhongshu and He Xiu, it became an important concept for dividing and explaining the history in the Spring and Autumn Period. Strictly speaking, it is not a theoretical historical philosophical concept but only plays the function of the historical philosophy as the explanation for the Spring and Autumn Annals. However, for Kang Youwei, the three-​phase theory has been more abstract and theoretical and has become the most influential historical philosophical concept since modern China with the Great Harmony and Well-​off in The Classics of Rite·Li Yun and historical evolutionism.1 Therefore, historical evolutionism has been endowed with the appearance of the Confucian classic studies and presented as the moral idealism which regards the inspiration of the sages as the basis and the moral virtues of the savants as the aim.2 Secondly, it is the theory of nature in the Yi learning. The Theory of Natural Selection of Yan Fu had great influence on the thought circle. The core content in the article is the metaphysical historical philosophical framework. When translating the Evolution and Ethics of Huxley into the Theory of Natural Selection, Yan Fu used many thoughts in the traditional Yi learning about the natural laws and explained the historical evolutionism with the theory of the natural laws in Yi learning so that Theory of Natural Selection was still classified as the book of Yi learning in the document classification of Qian Jibo in the 1930s. The biggest difficulty to illustrate historical evolutionism with the natural laws in Yi learning lies in that the former insists on the concept that everything is cyclic, different from the theory of historical evolutionism. However, in the explanation of Yan Fu, whether it is the cycle or the development for the history is not important. Instead, it is a kind of historical concept which tries to explain history through a metaphysical concept about natural laws so as to include and digest evolutionism. Besides, it emphasizes the function of human power in historical evolution so that it is nearly a restatement for the idea that “heaven, in its motion, gives the idea of strength. The superior man, in accordance with this, nerves himself to ceaseless activity.”3 Another point is the Buddhist theory of consciousness-​only. The representative work is the Two-​Way Evolution of Zhang Taiyan. The two-​way evolution based on the Buddhist theory of consciousness only thinks that kindness, evilness, happiness, and misery are in one. It seems to be thinking in the way of historical evolutionism but it is actually sublimation for historical evolutionism. It surely includes the deep suspicion of historical evolutionism but it is not done in direct refuting. Furthermore, the historical evolution against evolutionism also has a more special theoretical fruit. When Liang Shuming investigated western and Chinese culture at the height of world history, he was under the great influence and inspiration of the two-​way evolutionism of Zhang Taiyan. He regards culture as the basis of history and the desires of human beings as the basis of culture. Therefore, he regards history as the process of developing towards the Buddhist truth and the whole historical

98  The Graftage of History process is presented as the “Buddhist trick.” It still has the theoretical vestige of historical evolutionism but essentially it transcends historical evolutionism and the direction of human desire is understood as the basis for the understanding of world history.4 The above analysis shows that the Chinese thought circle in modern times has two distinctive features for the acceptance of historical evolutionism and the relevant historical philosophical thinking in the integration in the field of vision in western and Chinese culture: firstly, it interprets the problematized historical concept with the concept of the natural laws in classic thought in China since the eastward transmission of western science, so that thought about historical philosophy nearly reach a metaphysical height. Secondly, in the establishment and the explanation of the historical concepts, it emphasizes the power of culture so that thought about historical philosophy can present a clear humanistic color. This kind of idea of understanding historical development with the main method for combining heaven and human beings is rooted in Chinese traditional thought. For example, in the famous saying of Sima Qian “investigate the relationship between heaven and human beings, know the development from ancient time to the present and create a philosophy of one’s own,” it is obvious that “investigating the relationship between heaven and human beings” is the condition for “knowing the development from ancient time to the present” and “creating a philosophy of one’s own.” This point has an obvious implied function, so that we can notice that the Chinese problem since modern times is the problem concerning the west and China and the problem concerning the ancient and the present in terms of the appearance of the discourse and the problem concerning heaven and human beings in terms of deep thought. In other words, while admitting the importance of historical philosophy for solving the Chinese problem, we must make sure that the problem concerning heaven and human beings is the fundamental problem of historical philosophy and the answer to the problem concerning the west and China, and the ancient and present must return to the problem concerning heaven and human beings. Mou Zongsan actually thinks an this metaphysical height consciously. His moral metaphysical system established with all his energy is the endeavor of “investigating the relationship between heaven and human beings.” Besides, he thinks about the problem concerning the west and China and the problem concerning the ancient and the present at the level of the problem concerning heaven and human beings consciously. Therefore, historical philosophy becomes one important constituent of his moral metaphysical system and the important theoretical attempt to investigate the relationship between heaven and human beings, know the difference between the west and China and know the difference between the ancient and the present with attention on the practice of the Chinese problem. As is well known, the basic thinking of Mou Zongsan to establish historical philosophy is “a learning both sound in theory and practice” for studies in China, that is to say, develop the new school and political school from the innate Confucian orthodoxy. In other words, it is

Metaphysics and Philosophy under the Concern for Chinese Problems  99 based on the humanistic spirit of Chinese traditions and aims at its core values such as science and democracy in the western Enlightenment. The academic circle has many discussions about the plan of “inner cultivation leading to the exterior action” proposed by Mou Zongsan to solve the Chinese problem, but they have two kinds of preferences. Firstly, very few of them arrange the plan of Mou Zongsan from the perspective of historical philosophy, so that they ignore one of the most important theoretical dimensions of this plan.5 Secondly, they put most of the attention on the question of whether inner cultivation can lead to the exterior action and focus on the exterior action, lacking the necessary reflection for the understanding of Mou Zongsan about the Confucian traditions. In my view, the historical philosophical establishment of Mou Zongsan actually violates the Confucian traditions on certain essential points; the key for his failure to connect Confucian culture and spirit with western modern political theories through an historical concept lies here.

Notes 1 The Book of Great Harmony based on the three-​phase theory had great influence on the Kuominists led by Sun Yat-​sen and the communists led by Mao Zedong. Sun Yat-​sen and Chiang Kai-​shek cite the core concepts of the three-​phase theory of Kang Youwei in the speeches about the Three People’s Principles, though they have important differences with Kang Youwei for the specific understanding; Mao Zedong is surely a supporter of historical evolutionism and explains communism through the ideal of great harmony. The relevant analysis can refer to the article by Tang Wenming, “Difference between the Yi and Xia and Legitimacy Problem in the Establishment of the Contemporary Country”, included in the book of Recent Worry: Cultural Politics and the Future of China, East China Normal University Press, 2010. 2 Here the word “virtue” does not equal to the concept of the English word “morality” but refers to the combination of the natural rules and the human virtues. 3 As for the analysis for the intertextuality in Theory of Natural Selection, please refer to Tang Wenming, Appointments of Heaven and Perfect Virtue: Traditional Spirits of the Confucian Morals and Moral Problems, Hebei University Press, 2002. 4 As for the explanation and analysis for the world historical concept in the thoughts of Liang Shuming, please refer to Tang Wenming, “Essential Wisdom” and “Subsequent Wisdom”-​Grand Historical Concepts in the Thoughts of Liang Shuming, included in the book edited by Wan Junren, Tsinghua Philosophical Almanac, 2002, Hebei University Press, 2003. 5 In Philosophy and Works of Mr. Mou Zongsan (Studentbook, 1978) edited by his disciples and students to celebrate the seventieth birthday of Mou Zongsan, there are two articles about the historical philosophy of Mou Zongsan: the first one is “Moral Reason and Historical Culture of Zhou Qi Zhen” and the second one is “Life Form of the Chinese Nation-​Inspirations of Masters (Historical Philosophy) of Zhu Weihuan”, both of which are narratives. The researching articles include: “Jiang Nianfeng, Experience of Taiwan in the Post-​War Period and Hegel in the Thoughts of Tang Junyi and Mou Zongsan”, included in Development Experience of Taiwan after Recovery, Research Center of Human Society and Science, Academia Sinica

100  The Graftage of History (27), 1991, and it is later included in Text and Practice, Guiguan Book Company, 2000; Qiu Huanghai: “Display of Criticizing ‘Historical Concept’ of Mou Zongsan”, published in Legein Monthly, 5th, 1999; Li Rongtian: “Viewing the New Directions of Confucianism from the Hegel Historical Philosophy”, included in the Proceedings of 1st International Academic Conference on Contemporary Neo Confucianism, Exterior action, 1991; Lai Gongou, “Core of ‘Culture Life’ in the Historical Philosophy of Mou Zongsan”, included in Jiangxi Social Science, 11th, 2003; Li Hanji, “Political Concept of Mou Zongsan and Reflection on the Historical History of Hegel”, included in Contemporary Confucianism and Western Culture: Philosophy, Research Institution for Literature and Philosophy, Academia Sinica, 2004.

6 The Conception and Implication of the Philosophy of History

In the preface of the second edition of Historical Philosophy, Mou Zongsan says that he has planned to write a “relatively long and complete introduction to put ahead of the passage” for the book, but he has written another kind of writing, Moral Idealism and Political Doctrine and Governance Doctrine. The two books include the content of what is intended to be written in the introduction. Therefore, there is no need to repeat it. People who read this book should read both books so as to have the complete meaning. The three books are actually a series. The core idea in short is intending to solve the problem of exterior action through the studies of innate cultivation in China.1 Therefore, as for the investigation into the historical philosophy of Mou Zongsan, people should put the three books of Historical Philosophy, Moral Idealism and Political Doctrine and Governance Doctrine, which are called “three new books for exterior actions” by Neo Confucianism disciples into a comprehensive view; on the contrary, the comprehensive view which integrates the three books can only be provided by the historical philosophy. As for the intellectual background and the writing motivation, we can get a brief understanding from the preface of the first edition of Historical Philosophy. In the preface, Mou Zongsan states four points for that book involving four important persons and works respectively. Let’s look at the first two points. The first point states that the narration of the big historical events of China “mainly comes from the Outline History of Mr. Qian Mu”. The second point proposes that people should “find the ideology and cultural consciousness which guide the development of China” from the “status of the ancient official historians in the political utilization” and states that his opinion “comes from The Essence of the History of China of Mr. Liu Yizheng.”2 The reference to the two contemporary historians is a way of saying that the writing sources seem to keep to academic regulations simply but have a deeper meaning. It actually indicates that, on the one hand, Mou Zongsan emphasizes Qian Mu and Liu Yizheng’s writing of national history. On the other hand, he is unsatisfied with their writings because their writing DOI: 10.4324/9781351242219-8

102  The Graftage of History has a theme different to that of Mou Zongsan and therefore there is the need for the writing of historical philosophy.3 The concept of “national history” is similar to the concept of “studies of Chinese ancient civilization,” expressing the practical attention of intellectuals for national construction since modern times, and it is the discourse action belonging to national construction. In particular, after the Japanese invasion, the problem of national construction had become an urgent job in the minds of many intellectuals. Both books by Qian Mu and Liu Yizheng were written during the Second Sino-​Japanese War and were used as textbooks in universities. Although one is the history outline and the other one focuses on historic meaning with a different focus, their common practical aim is the same. More importantly, both of them emphasize the importance of cultural spirit in historical understanding and have discussions under the concept of “historical knowledge”. Qian Mu says the needed new national history at present should have two qualities. Firstly, it can show people the evolution of the nationality and culture of China and provide wisdom and knowledge for people who want to know about its political, social, cultural, and intellectual evolution. Both should reflect the difficult problems in history and provide the necessary reference for the changes. The former actively seeks to understand the fountain for everlasting life of a country and a nationality and serves as the dependence of the promoting spirits of all history; the latter points out the evidence for the recent sickness of the country and nationality and is the basis for improving the current plan.4 That requires that “the person who writes national history must clearly know the personality of the national cultural development and know the special situation and cause so as to write its special spirit and appearance.”5 In other words, the historical knowledge is different from the historical material because “material increases with time while the knowledge becomes new with time”; the historical knowledge is “changing with time and should have close connection with the various problems at present” and “can understand everlasting situations as it sends to ancient history”.6 Liu Yizheng says the knowledge for history writing is not the theory used for writing a common book. It should conform to people-​oriented principles. The people-​ oriented principles from history are referred to as historical philosophy by modern people. Our country does not have an historical philosophy, but it has the basic rules to speculate about its principles. The writing of Chinese history should use the people-​oriented principles proposed by the ancient sages in China to pursue the justice of historical facts.7

The Conception and Implication of Philosophy of History  103 Here “historical philosophy” refers to the pursuit of philosophy in history, that is, the “people-​oriented principles” inspired by both the sages and in classic works. Mou Zongsan agrees with understanding history and the writing of national history according to the principle of “the development of personality of the national culture” of Qian Mu or the “people-​oriented principles”. Historical Philosophy was planned to be called “Analysis for the Spiritual Development of National History” and the first chapter in the book is titled “The Formation of the Concepts and the Clan Society in the Development of National History”. Both are apparent evidence.8 The practical attention of viewpoints of spiritual history and the writing of natural history is the basic common faith of Mou Zongsan, Qian Mu, and Liu Yizheng. The key difference lies in the problem of how to add understanding of the whole nation’s cultural spirits through philosophical wisdom to the writing of national history. Mou Zongsan is unsatisfied with the writing of Qian Mu and Liu Yizheng regarding national history mainly because he thinks Qian Mu focuses on the specifics and fails to have an overview, while Liu Yizheng has an overview but fails to notice the specific details. His writing of national history should analyze the internal development sequence of the national spirits while giving enough attention to the spiritual entity in the national history because it is the only way it can be referred to as “historical philosophy”. It should be noted that Mou Zongsan’s understanding of the concept of “historical philosophy” is greatly influenced by Hegel. Hegel differentiates three different modes for historical writing: original history, reflective history, and philosophical history.9 Original history can be represented as the history writing of Herodotus and Thucydides who “have first-​hand testimony and experience of their described acts, event and situation and have the same feelings for those events and the expressed spirits in those events”10 If we say original history has the quality of dynastic history, reflective history “actually is regarded as the whole past”.11 For reflective history, the most important thing is the method for treating the historical material and for the writer to get close to the material with his own spirits instead of the spirits of the targets. Therefore, everything depends on the rules, concepts and principles used in the narrative forms and contents.12 Reflective history can be divided into four categories: general history, pragmatic history, critical history, and specialized history. For general history, “the aim of the researchers is to have an overview for the whole history of a nationality, a country or the whole world”.13 Pragmatic history has a pragmatic purpose and is presented as some pragmatic reflections, in other words, “reflecting the present life to the past records and recovering the past records”.14 Mou Zongsan adds a note “it is like History as a Mirror,” when introducing the pragmatic history.15 This kind of statement seems right but it

104  The Graftage of History does not stand up to deeper thought. Historical traditions in ancient China emphasize “knowing the change from the past to the present” and the importance to know the present with the knowledge of the past, or, in other words, learning lessons from the past to know the future. “History as a Mirror” is not an exception but it is different from “knowing the past from the present” and “knowing the past from the future” though both have the pragmatic use of “knowing the past for the present” and “knowing the past for the future”. Particularly, under the situation of historical rupture, the contents of both parties are different. Critical history “does not constitute history itself but rather the history of history, evaluating the historical narration and checking its reality and reliability”.16 For this point, Mou Zongsan adds a note, “it is the historical evidence”17 and has no mistakes. Specialized history has a special meaning that “provides an historical transition point through philosophy for a common field of view”.18 Philosophical history indicates the investigation from a philosophical perspective and it is the task of historical philosophy. In conclusion, “historical philosophy is the history of applying thought to history” because history is the history of human beings while the difference between human beings and animals lies in the fact that human beings are creatures able to think. Given this point, all historical researches will not ignore the meaning of the thought because there is thinking in human emotion, knowledge, and comprehension and it is included in the consideration and scope of historical research. However, Hegel points out that “resorting to this kind of method to discuss the participation of thought in human activity is not enough” because it only sees thought as the auxiliary parts of existence. Philosophy values thoughts which come from pure thought, exceed the objective reality, and are independent. Considering history in such a way means that philosophy “needs to control history with some temperance and force history to conform to presupposed concepts of philosophy so as to establish a transcendental history”.19 What Hegel emphasizes here is actually the difference between intellectual thought and reasonable thought. The feature of intellectual thought is decomposing and understanding of the matter in abstract concepts and its corresponding formal logic. As for history writing at this level, events are more essential than thoughts. The aim of thought is regulated to find the underlying reason and causes. The reasonable thought is different. It has the comprehensive feature, resorting to the internal activity or the concept instead of the controlling of the non-​formal concept for the external material. In other words, reasonable thought aims at the development of the concept itself. The form and the material is nothing but concept because concept has become tangible and therefore the logic must be dialectical. In history writing at this level, thought achieves the more fundamental status than the events and the understanding and explanation for these events must conform to the internal development and self-​achievement of the transcendental principles presupposed by the thoughts on history. In other words, it is not only the

The Conception and Implication of Philosophy of History  105 reason for Kant to set rules for history but also the unity between reason and history.20 The difference between intellectual thought and reasonable thought corresponds to the difference between science and philosophy and comes across in the historical field as the difference between the science of history and the philosophy of history. Original history and reflective history are the results of utilizing intellectual thoughts so that they belong to historical science. Philosophical history is the result of using reasonable thoughts so that they are historical philosophy. Philosophical history has another important difference from original history and reflective history, which lies in the fact that philosophical history has a common spiritual view which can surpass the special spiritual concern and the obvious pragmatic features in original history and reflective history. The writer has similar thoughts with those of the people from the past (original history) and the writer who is close to the material with the spirits in his own time (reflective history) are viewed with special spiritual concern. Philosophical history surpasses this kind of specialty fundamentally because its starting point is a common spiritual concern. This point helps us to understand why Hegel regards specialized history as the transition point from reflective history to philosophical history. Specialized history examines the history of different kinds of national spiritual life, but the history of each category must be presented in from a common viewpoint after integration. In specialized history, the closest one is intellectual history, which can be understood as the real transition point from reflective history to philosophical history. Therefore, given the influence of Hegel, we can affirm that Mou Zongsan will classify Outline History of Qian Mu and Essence of the History of China of Liu Yizheng as historical science, which is the so-​called reflective history of Hegel. To put it in a more specific way, for the comparison between general history and specialized history, both focus on the writing of general history; as for the comparison between pragmatic history and critical history, Outline History can be included into pragmatic history and the Essence of the History of China can be classified as critical history. Of course, Mou Zongsan will not be satisfied by the national history writing of Qian Mu and Liu Yizheng even though their works have shown the “sympathetic understanding” for the Chinese cultural spirits because he wants to write historical philosophy different from the history of science and promote the practice and concern of national history writing at a theoretical level. However, Mou Zongsan mainly criticizes the tendency of using experience and scientific methods to write history in national history writing since the “new history” proposed by Liang Qichao; for this point, he agrees with Qian Mu and Liu Yizheng. In Mou Zongsan’s view, this kind of tendency in history writing does not admit that the spirit is the main body of history and detracts the meaning of the spirit in history to a different degree. The extreme theoretical form is shown to hold a materialistic view for history in the fundamental stance. In the preface of the first edition of Historical Philosophy, he criticizes the disadvantages of

106  The Graftage of History history writing since the New Culture Movement to explain his principles for writing Historical Philosophy: Since the New Culture Movement, the scholars of history writing have been focusing on the investigation of the details but could not see the overview clearly and get the truth of the history and culture. The history of China can develop to the present with some reasons. If we ignore those reasons, the life of our nation and our culture will diminish into an endless situation with the passing of time. Therefore, the connection of the life of nation and culture to guide the recovering China is the only and necessary way and the urgent task now.21 In the preface of Historical Philosophy, the 3rd edition, 1974, Mou Zongsan discussed the “three possible key views for the historical philosophy” which refer to three differences. The first difference is that the understanding of reasons is different from the innate laws of things, so to criticize the understanding method that views history entirely by experience and scientific methods theoretically. Reason deals with spiritual events, while the innate laws of things aim at natural events. To put it in the terms of Kant, reason and the innate laws of things can both be put in the causal category for understanding, but the former involves free causality and the latter involves natural causality. As the practical activities of human beings, historical events should be understood as spiritual events instead of natural events, and therefore understanding of historical events should be through reason instead of the innate laws of things. Thus, the importance of historical philosophy can be explained fully: history is the activity process of group life. The activities of group life must be controlled by one concept no matter if it is consciousness or not. The concept is the direction of their activities. Therefore, the understanding of history should be achieved through the “concept”. However, currently, people writing history materialize historical reason so that they cannot understand the meaning or don’t know that it has reason, or even say that it has no reason. Therefore, they are against and even look down upon historical philosophy, while it is their self-​denial and self-​destruction.22 For Mou Zongsan, the last two statements concerning Wang Fuzhi and Hegel in the preface of the first edition of Historical Philosophy are more important than the former two statements concerning Qian Mu and Liu Yizheng. In the third statement, Mou Zongsan firstly highly praises Comment about History as a Mirror and Comment on the Song Dynasty and thinks

The Conception and Implication of Philosophy of History  107 that both books are “the best in the past history books”; then he uses the explanation about “comment” in the final volume of Comment about History as a Mirror and the statement “the Tao has no clear rules but it has rules for displacing the things. The Tao has no physical appearance but it has the appearance for achieving the things” is the brightest point. In the end, he concludes and states: from the book of Wang Fuzhi, to solve the difficult problems about historical facts and show “the entity of spirits”. He explains the whole history and eliminates the dirty details with his merciful heart. If people want to understand history from the historical facts and know the “spiritual entity” of history, Wang Fuzhi’s book is a must for historians. Based on this book, I do not go against the past sages.23 In the fourth statement, Mou Zongsan says: I do not go against the past sages and develop their theories, and the “spiritual entities” are presented as various forms. I would like to explain the reason why there is no science, democracy and religion in the cultural life of China, what they are, and how to change the cultural life so that there will be science and democracy in China and complete the comprehensive form of religion. That develops from the argumentation of the past sages and bases on Historical Philosophy of Hegel.24 The concept of Mou Zongsan about historical philosophy is under the influence of Hegel in many aspects and the most important point is emphasizing the significance of spirit in history, in other words, regarding the spirit as the entity of historical change. That is the reason why he can “know the spiritual entity of history” from the book of Wang Fuzhi. Obviously, in his view, the past sages including Wang Fuzhi emphasized the significance of spirit in history. In other words, they may agree with the basic opinion about historical philosophy that “history is the presentation of the spiritual entity”. For the statements of Mou Zongsan that “do not go against the past sages,” Tang Junyi had a detailed explanation. Tang Junyi reflected about the innate academic tradition “talk about the reason according to different things” in China and pointed out that the key point lied in that “the judgment for facts accompanies the judgment for value”. The writing style of Spring and Autumn Annals for judgment is the starting point for emphasizing the value judgment in history writing and it can be called as “the ancestor for Chinese historical philosophy”. The statement of “the gentleman says” after the narration of Comment of Zuo and the words of praise in Historical Records express the value judgment clearly. Besides, nearly all the following people writing the history put their value judgment for history into the writing and the comments for history so that there

108  The Graftage of History can be the two books of Wang Fuzhi, whose works can state the reason clearly and help the practice. The reason can be seen in the facts and developed from the facts and it can be called historical philosophy.25 It should be noted that the historical philosophical traditions in China talked about by Tang Junyi are almost the same as the statement of Liu Yizheng, emphasizing the significance of spirit in history and therefore the significance of the value judgment in history writing. Generally speaking, this point can be regarded as the common point of the innate Chinese historical philosophical traditions and the Hegel historical philosophy. However, in a deeper sense, there still are great differences between both parties. Using the concept of “spiritual entity” of Hegel to explain the “Tao” or “reason” in the classical thoughts in China and its legitimacy must originate from the unique understanding of Mou Zongsan and Tang Junyi for Chinese classical thoughts. Without this point, the greater difference lies in that the innate Chinese historical philosophical traditions emphasize the significance of spirits in history and therefore lay more emphasis on the significance of the value judgment in the historical writing. As a result, they mainly understand history as spiritual objective reason while ignoring the question of whether there is an innate development process in this spiritual objective reason. Hegel is different. He not only regards history as spiritual objective reason but also emphasizes that history is the internal development of spirit. In other words, if we say that innate Chinese historical philosophical traditions regard history as a process with reason and force, the reason is basically the constant reason, i.e., the “common reason” and the force is connected with the changing situation and is classified into Qi in the philosophical sense. However, the cause of change lies in Qi instead of reason. In other words, historical changes come from the interaction between the stable reason and the changing Qi. In the historical philosophy of Hegel, the spirit is used by different nations to achieve their goals. In other words, as historical entity, the spirit itself has an innate change and development process and that is the reason why history becomes history. In other words, the innate historical philosophy of Liu Yunyi and Liu Yizheng aims to reveal constant reason as the destiny of the group life with the reflection for the existing experience of the group, or, putting it in another way, aims to see through and reflect the existing experience of the group with constant reason with the destiny of the group life as standard. The historical philosophy of Hegel aims to present how the spiritual entity shows its internal developmental line in the past experience of groups. Seeing China from the perspective of Hegel, people may think that there is no historical concept in the world of Chinese people, that is to say, there is no development because there is a lack of a spiritual concept about internal development and this is a famous opinion of Hegel. In return, seeing Hegel from the perspective of the innate historical philosophy of China, people may think that Hegel’s historicism may well be nihilism because Hegel understands the process of

The Conception and Implication of Philosophy of History  109 diminishing natural law as the process of historical development. These two opinions seem to be alarming, but both have deep insight. As for the great difference between the innate Chinese historical philosophy represented by Wang Fuzhi and Hegel’s historical philosophy, Mou Zongsan has deficient knowledge and attention. We can say that his basic stance is similar to Hegel because both he and Hegel have clear and strong teleological faith about historical development. Given that point, he agrees with the opinion of Hegel about Chinese history and tries to apply the teleological faith of historical development in a way similar to that of Hegel to the innate Chinese historical philosophy represented by Wang Fuzhi. However, the understanding of Mou Zongsan about historical development can be said to be against Hegel’s in a certain sense because he attributes the power of historical development to kindness instead of selfish desires like Hegel does. This difference leads to his criticism of Hegel’s historical philosophy. He thinks that he “does not go against the past sages and develops from them” so that he can contribute to the new exterior action based on the studies of the inner cultivation. Actually, we can imagine that he must think that he is not against Hegel while developing from him. However, this point is presented because he uses the spiritual resources of the innate Chinese historical philosophical traditions represented by Wang Fuzhi to criticize and improve Hegel’s opinion under the influence of the basic structure of Kant’s philosophy. It has been mentioned that Mou Zongsan discusses “the three key concepts which make historical philosophy possible” in the preface of the third edition of Historical Philosophy and analyzes the first concept. With the second and the third key concept—​the former aims to explain the difference between the specific comprehension and the abstract comprehension and the latter aims to explain the difference between the historical judgment and the moral judgment—​he seems to think according to Hegel’s discourse but they show that Mou Zongsan is distinctive from Hegel in terms of the understanding of historical philosophy. Abstract comprehension is “the common and scientific way,” or “use the concepts to classify matters” or “procedures of classification, definition, analysis, generalization, deduction and conclusion”.26 Specific comprehension is “understanding its function or significance for showing the concept for the reasonable matter”. In other words, the specific comprehension is “reflecting the possibility of concept according to the reasonable matter dialectically”.27 Seen this kind of comparative explanation, the difference between abstract comprehension and specific comprehension named by Mou Zongsan seems to be the difference between intellectual thought and reasonable thought, to which Hegel gives enough attention. However, this is not correct. Firstly, Mou Zongsan makes abstract comprehension and specific comprehension of the innate laws of things and reason strictly differentiated in the first key concept. However, for Hegel, it is obvious that the difference between intellectual thought and reasonable thought is the difference between scientific thought and philosophical thought. That means that both can be used

110  The Graftage of History to understand natural events and spiritual events. To put it in a specific way, intellectual thought used in the natural field and the historical field is natural science and the historical science and reasonable thought used in the natural field and the historical field is natural philosophy and historical philosophy. In other words, the difference between intellectual thought and reasonable thought is the difference in the level of thought, while not corresponding to the difference in the field of the thought object. Secondly, Mou Zongsan renders the specific comprehension with the meaning Hegel does not have. Hegel regards philosophical thought as the specific thought to differentiate with the scientific abstract thought. Hegel use the word “Begriff” to show the specific thought of philosophy, which means that the content of the thought does not come from the external world but from the thought itself.28 In the preface of the third edition of Historical Philosophy, Mou Zongsan refers to specific comprehension as “dialectic intuition” and regards it as “the reasonable specific wisdom”. Therefore, “reason is objective proof for historical philosophy while the specific comprehension of the dialectic intuition is subjective proof for possibility.”29 If it is still unclear from this statement, the explanation for the specific comprehension in the article, About the Historical Philosophy-​in Recognition for Mr. Tang Junyi (published in Democratic Review, Feb. 1956, volume 7, 04), written by Mou Zongsan to thank Tang Junyi (Reflection of the Philosophy of Chinese History) for writing the review after publication of the first edition of Historical Philosophy. Mou Zongsan firstly uses the existentialist proposition of “subjectivity is the truth” to explain the difference among comprehension, enlightenment, and full understating: there has been the theory concerning comprehension, enlightenment and full understanding in the past. I think that the comprehension is non-​ “existentialist” while the enlightenment and full understanding do exist. Enlightenment connects the two sides: one is the tough side according to my brother and the other is the supported side in the hardships. Both must be experienced in the “existentialist practice”. That can be called “existentialist inspiration,” that is to say, the so-​called “enlightenment”. Full understanding is the sublimation of the mature perfection which can be called as deification and the existentialist deification. Comprehension is a clever and reasonable function and can be developed according to reason. The thought developed according to reason becomes the abstract speculation without personality or existence.30 After that, he regards specific comprehension and existentialist enlightenment as the same and uses the terms and thoughts of Hegel to say: “the specific comprehension controls the specific universality: this is practical and dynamic; it does not need the classification but only the existentialist enlightenment for control in the cognition of spiritual development.”31 That is to say, for Hegel, as a kind of reasonable intuition, specific comprehension is still an

The Conception and Implication of Philosophy of History  111 objective cognition, in other words, intellectuality. For Mou Zongsan, specific comprehension refers to “physical intuition” or “realization,” emphasizing the subjective cognition, the body cognition. Using the principle in spiritual philosophy that “the subject is identical to the entity,” reasonable intuition is the physical intuition and the intellectuality is the body cognition. The difference lies in that the former emphasizes objectivity while the latter the subjectivity. It still cannot eliminate the essential difference between Mou Zongsan and Hegel for the understanding of the specific comprehension. Reasonable intuition resorts to philosophical understanding and the physical intuition the spiritual experience. The reasonable intuition relies on the internal reasonable awareness and the physical intuition the present unity of mind and reason. In the end, because Mou Zongsan understands “specific comprehension” as “existentialist enlightenment,” although he uses the word “dialectic” as Hegel when talking about “specific comprehension,” his dialectic concept is totally different from Hegel. About this point, he explained clearly in the speech titled “Transcendental Decomposition and Dialectic Integration” in 1993. The most important point lies in that he emphasizes the understanding of “dialectic” under the differentiation between the practice and the body of the Chinese traditions so that there is the concept of “practical dialectic”: according to Chinese tradition, the “dialectic” presupposes the difference between “practice” and “body”. The practice presents the body and the practice is combined with the body so that it is the “dialectic integration”. According to this concept, the problem is the problem concerning the practice instead of the body.32 The practice concept in Chinese tradition is the concept concerning culture, and enlightenment is indispensable. Therefore, corresponding to the understanding “specific comprehension” as the “existentialist enlightenment,” Mou Zongsan understands the “dialectic,” the so-​called “practical dialectic” as the enlightenment process in the practical culture. On this stance, Mou Zongsan thinks “the dialectic integration presupposes the critical decomposition of Kant” and criticizes Hegel on this point: only practice can give rise to the “reasonable strange” and “dialectic integration” named by Hegel. The existence itself is not strange or dialectic. The greatest mistake made by Hegel is the confusion here. Western philosophers are unsatisfied with it. For example, Russell criticizes Hegel for equating the thinking process and with the existent process and including God into the dialectic. The Logic Theory of Hegel starts from the void of absolute existence, God, and fulfills it through the dialectic process so as to achieve it. By doing so, the dialectic process is the existentialist process and that is the worst and the most dangerous thought to disturb the whole world. God

112  The Graftage of History is the most stable object for prayer and the body of practical comprehension. Disintegrate it and mix it into the practical dialectic so that the world is in conflict and confusion. This kind of thought becomes the source of chaos and that is referred to as “When words are evasive, I know how the mind is at its wit’s end. These evils growing in the mind, do injury to government, and, displayed in the government, are hurtful to the conduct of affairs.”33 From another perspective, Mou Zongsan actually is unsatisfied with the dialectic of Hegel though he emphasizes the dialectic element of Hegel’s historical philosophy, such as his evaluation of the First Emperor of Qin for abandoning the old rules and establishing the counties. We know that Wang Fuzhi recognizes the historical feats of the First Emperor of Qin for abandoning the old rules and establishing the counties and points out that “abandoning the ancient noble titles and establishing the county governors” are out of the “heart of holding the whole nation as his own” but only indicates that “the act of the First Emperor of Qin is used by the heaven to conduct the justice secretly”. This opinion of Wang Fuzhi is quite similar to the idea of Hegel that regards history as the “reasonable trick” (which is translated by Mou Zongsan as “reasonably strange”) and He Lin explains this point in the article Historical Philosophy of Wang Fuzhi.34 Mou Zongsan knows it clearly and evaluates this historical event on different levels, but he cannot understand it through the reasonable trick with his special emphasis essentially on the moral evaluation. In the third chapter, “Development of Qin Dynasty and Shen Buhai and Hanfei” of volume 2 of Historical Philosophy, we can see that Mou Zongsan does not acknowledge the Qin Dynasty and regards the First Emperor of Qin as the “spirit of the quantity of the things” and “the person twists the development in the last stage”.35 It can represent the basic evaluation of Mou Zongsan for the Qin Dynasty. In Political Doctrine and Governance Doctrine, Mou Zongsan twice mentioned the abandoning of the ancient rules and establishing the counties of the First Emperor of Qin. The first one is in the notes for the discussion on the “Qin Dynasty” in Ancient Ceremony, Huang Book of Wang Fuzhi. As for the significance of abandoning the ancient rules, he holds the ideas of Wang Fuzhi and recognizes them on the development of the political formation while denying in terms of the cultural consciousness: abandoning the ancient rules has no benefit for the emperor and the whole country. The disadvantages for the emperor lie in that there are no vassal states to hold the king. The disadvantages for the whole country lie in that there is no vassal states to hold the heart. With the cultural consciousness as the main body, the focus is on the latter one. That is the truth told by Wang Fuzhi. However, in terms of the politics and the development of the political formation, the abandoning of the ancient rules originates from the selfish king but it also has public reason, saving

The Conception and Implication of Philosophy of History  113 the whole country from the ownership of the nobles. That is the public action.36 At another time, he regards the statement “human history is the process for the human beings conducting practice” as the starting point so that he only recognizes the meaning for “upgrading and transferring value,” which is called “the trash being transferred has values”.37 In the article Transcendental Decomposition and Dialectic Integration, Mou Zongsan mentions his evaluation of the First Emperor of Qin for abandoning the ancient rules and establishing the countries when explaining his idea of “practical dialectic” and he thinks the evaluation of Wang Fuzhi that “the act of the First Emperor of Qin is used by the heaven to conduct the justice secretly” is the “most proper explanation” for the “reasonable trick” called by Hegel and it is a universal truth. However, he then emphasizes: “only practice can lead to the ‘reasonable strange’ and ‘dialectic integration’ named by Hegel”. It shows that Mou Zongsan still understands “reasonable trick” in the sense of his unique “practical dialectic” but does not care about the dialectic in the sense of Hegel although dialectics is the basic skeleton of Hegel’s historical philosophy.38 Correspondingly, the third key concept proposed by Mou Zongsan to explain how historical philosophy is possible—​differentiating the difference between the historical judgment and moral judgment—​has some errors. For Mou Zongsan, “moral judgment is initiated through asking the act of one person in accordance with ‘absolute reason’. In other words, discovering the motivation of the act to see whether it is initiated according to the ‘unconditional order’ while the unconditional order comes from free will (or conscience)”.39 The first point needing to be noted is that the concept of “moral judgment” is different from the concept of “moral judgment” in the standard moral terms but similar to the idea of “moral evaluation”. In the standard moral terms, the moral judgment refers to that the agent judges whether he should do the matter according to certain moral concepts and it becomes one internal part of the action for being directly related to the choice of will; moral evaluation is the evaluation of acts done according to certain moral concepts and it cannot be included into the internal part of the act because it occurs after the matter. Generally speaking, moral evaluation has motive theory and the effect theory for the different moral concepts. Mou Zongsan assists the deontology of Kant so that he can hold the motive theory clearly in terms of the question of moral evaluation, the so-​called “moral judgment” and expands this point to his understanding of historical judgment. Then, what is the so-​called historical judgment of Mou Zongsan? “The historical judge understands the matter within the dialectic reason according to the specific comprehension of the dialectic intuition to show the function or significance of the concept dialectically with the dialectic identification.”40 Because the “specific comprehension of the dialectic intuition” is the “existentialist proof ” in the sense of “practical dialectic,” the historical judgment for Mou Zongsan cannot leave moral evaluation in the sense of the motive theory,

114  The Graftage of History the so-​called moral judgment. Besides, “dialectic” is not the dialectic process of the concept but the dialectic of the function or significance of the concept. Actually, it is the possible difficulties confronted when the theory is implemented in the objective world and the historical spirit of Mou Zongsan refers to the difficulties in the process.41 Therefore, the so-​called historical judgment is only moral evaluation in the sense of motive theory with the consideration of the historical situation. In other words, only he proposes the difference between historical judgment and moral judgment according to his terms and thinks that only through the historical judgment can “history be introduced” and therefore there is the possibility for historical philosophy. However, his historical judgment belongs to his so-​called moral judgment but emphasizes the historical situation. Take the evaluation of the First Emperor of Qin as an example, as Mou Zongsan understands the historical judgment in the sense of the moral evaluation of the motive theory, he can never recognize the acts of the First Emperor of Qin for “abandoning the ancient rules and establishing the counties”. Similarly, as for Zhu Xi and Chen Liang’s different evaluations on the Han and Tang Dynasties, which is the emphasis for discussion when Mou Zongsan explains the difference between historical judgment and moral judgment in the preface of the third edition of Historical Philosophy, and develops the discussion in the tenth chapter of Political Doctrine and Governance Doctrine, Mou Zongsan thinks that Zhu Xi looks down upon “conforming to the moral judgment and therefore is unable to introduce the history” of the Han and Tang Dynasties while Chen Liang “respects the Han and Tang Dynasties according to the heroism and therefore is unable to express the historical judgment.”42 In conclusion, as for the concept and significance of historical philosophy, Mou Zongsan is unsatisfied with the writing of the national history on the historical and scientific level of Qian Mu and Liu Yizheng (though both emphasize the function of reason in the spiritual or the philosophical sense in the history, i.e., the importance of the value judgment in the historical understanding advocated by Tang Junyi) and emphasizes the writing of the national history on the level of the historical philosophy. At the level of historical philosophy, Mou Zongsan agrees with Hegel in the basic stance, but he is unsatisfied with Hegel and different from Hegel. Therefore, he uses the spiritual resources in the innate Chinese historical philosophy to criticize Hegel. Tang Junyi has a clear and complete generalization for the writing motivation of Mou Zongsan in the review for Historical Philosophy: in the past China had historical philosophy but it is mixed with the studies of the classics. The ancient sages in China do not know much about historical philosophy. However, for thousands of years, China has its constant cultural system and the meaning is known by nearly all people so that it does not need detailed explanation. However, now times have changed and the Chinese people are confronted with different western cultural systems. Therefore, the common thoughts which do not

The Conception and Implication of Philosophy of History  115 need detailed explanation must be studied again for exposure and development. There must be people inheriting the unfulfilled wish of Wang Fuzhi to face the challenge posed by the academic culture of the west, arrange the road and the reason of the history and culture in China and explain the history and culture in China in a philosophical way so that theories replacing the theories of the western historical philosophy can develop. That is what Mou Zongsan does with this book.43

Notes 1 Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy, Guangxi Normal University Press, 2007, preface 2, p. 1. 2 Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy, former preface, p. 1. 3 Actually, Mou Zongsan evaluated Qian Mu and Liu Yizheng in a letter to Tang Junyi. He Criticized Qian Mu for having “deficient understanding” of the historical spirits so that “he only has a brief review of history without any interest, so he has no clear thoughts”; he also thinks that Liu Yizheng “has common sense and is very good”. Please refer to Li Hanji, The Political Concepts of Mou Zongsan and Reflection on the Hegel Historical Philosophy, published in Contemporary Confucianism and Western Culture: Philosophy, Research Institution for Literature and Philosophy, Academia Sinica, 2004, p. 176–​177. 4 Qian Mu, Outline History: Introduction, (Taiwan) National Institute for Compilation and Translation, 1956, p. 7. 5 Qian Mu, Outline History: Introduction, p. 8. 6 Qian Mu, Outline History: Introduction, p. 1. 7 Liu Yizheng: The Essence of the History of China: Sixth Historical Knowledge, Zhonghua Book Company, 1984, p. 127. 8 In the article of “Active Spirits of Self-​Salvation of Human Beings”, Mou Zongsan says in the beginning “I overestimate myself and write a book about history which is named Analysis of the Spiritual Development in the National History (which has been changed into the name of Historical Philosophy and published in 1944)”. The article was included into Studies of Life, San Min Book Co., LTD, 1970, p. 195. 9 Here the translation of “philosophical history” as “speculative history” instead of “philosophical history” like Wang Zaoshi is to avoid confusion with the concept of “history of philosophy”. For Hegel, philosophical activity is presented as pure thought and the translation for “philosophical history” as “philosophical history” is proper. 10 G. W. F. Hegel, Lectures on the Philosophy of World History, translated from the German edition of Johanners Hoffineister by H. B. Nisbet, Cambridge University Press, 1975, p. 12. 11 G. W. F. Hegel, Lectures on the Philosophy of World History, p. 16; also see p. 228, note 21. 12 G. W. F. Hegel, Lectures on the Philosophy of World History, p. 16 13 G. W. F. Hegel, Lectures on the Philosophy of World History, p. 16. Here Mou Zongsan cites his translation in the Historical Philosophy of Hegel; see Collected Works of Mr. Mou Zongsan, volume 17, Linking Publish Co., LTD, 2003, p. 282. The article is included in Xie Youwei, Philosophical Papers of Hegel, volume 2, China Cultural Publishing Committee, 1956; the content focuses on the translation

116  The Graftage of History and introduction for the introduction part in the Historical Philosophy of Hegel while Mou Zongsan also adds his explanation and notes. 14 G.W. F. Hegel, Lectures on the Philosophy of World History, p. 20. 15 Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy of Hegel, see Collected Works of Mr. Mou Zongsan, volume 17, p. 282. 16 G. W. F. Hegel, Lectures on the Philosophy of World History, translated from the German edition of Johanners, p. 22. 17 Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy of Hegel, see Collected Works of Mr. Mou Zongsan, volume 17, p. 282. 18 G. W. F. Hegel, Lectures on the Philosophy of World History, p. 23. 19 G. W. F. Hegel, Lectures on the Philosophy of World History, p. 25. 20 G. W. F. Hegel, Lectures on the Philosophy of World History, p. 26. 21 Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy, former preface, p. 1. 22 Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy, former preface third edition, p. 4. 23 Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy, former preface first edition, p. 2. 24 Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy, former preface first edition, p. 2. 25 Tang Junyi, Reflection on the Philosophy of Chinese History, included in Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy, Guangxi Normal University Press, 2007, appendix one, p. 351. 26 Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy, former preface third edition, p. 5. 27 Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy, former preface third edition, p. 5–​6. 28 Please refer to the preface of the translator, T. M. Knox in the English version in Hegel’s Philosophy of Right, Oxford University Press, 1967, viii, for the explanation for “begriff ”. “Begriff ” is a key word for understanding the thought of Hegel and it can be translated as “concept” or “notion”. It is translated as “sense” with the meaning of conscious reason; Correspondingly, “idee” (English translation as “Idea”) is suggested to be translated as “scripture”. He Lin translates “begriff ” as “begreifen”, emphasizing the difference between the common “concepts”. Please refer to the preface of the translator of He Lin for the Chinese version of The Shorter Logic of Hegel (SDX Joint Publishing House, 1954). 29 Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy, former preface third edition, p. 6. 30 Mou Zongsan, About Historical Philosophy-​in Recognition for Mr. Tang Junyi, included in Historical Philosophy, Guangxi Normal University Press, 2007, appendix two, p. 364. 31 Mou Zongsan, About Historical Philosophy-​in Recognition for Mr. Tang Junyi, included in Historical Philosophy, Guangxi Normal University Press, 2007, appendix two, p. 369. About the difference between the specific comprehension and the abstract comprehension, please refer to the speech called Specific Comprehension and Abstract Comprehension in Humanistic Recordings, included in Collected Works of Mr. Mou Zongsan, volume 28, Linking Publish Company, 2003, p. 53–​59. 32 Mou Zongsan, Transcendental Decomposition and Dialectic Integration, included in Collected Works of Mr. Mou Zongsan, volume 27, Linking Publish Company, 2003, p. 460, 462. 33 Mou Zongsan, Transcendental Decomposition and Dialectic Integration, included in Collected Works of Mr. Mou Zongsan, volume 27, p. 460, 463. 34 This article is firstly published in the Philosophical Review, volume 10, 01 in the October of 1946, and then included in Culture and Life, the Commercial Press, 1947.

The Conception and Implication of Philosophy of History  117 35 Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy, p. 120. 36 Mou Zongsan, Political Doctrine and Governance Doctrine, included in Collected Works of Mr. Mou Zongsan, volume 10, Linking Publish Company, 2003, p. 207. 37 Mou Zongsan, Political Doctrine and Governance Doctrine, included in Collected Works of Mr. Mou Zongsan, volume 10, p. 277. 38 Mou Zongsan, Transcendental Decomposition and Dialectic Integration, included in Collected Works of Mr. Mou Zongsan, volume 27, p. 463. 39 Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy, former preface third edition, p. 6. 40 Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy, former preface third edition, p. 6. 41 Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy, p. 4. 42 Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy, former preface third edition, p. 6. 43 Tang Junyi, Reflection on the Philosophy of the Chinese History, included in Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy, Guangxi Normal University Press, 2007, appendix one, p. 352.

7 Conscience, History, and Perfection

The moral metaphysics of Mou Zongsan borrows a lot from Kant. Comparatively, his historical philosophy is mixed with the thoughts of Hegel. Mou Zongsan speaks highly of the historical philosophy of Hegel, and Mou Zongsan himself is under his deep influence when establishing his own historical philosophy although he has significant differences in some key points. In the article of Hegel and Wang Fuzhi, he evaluates Hegel: “there are few people who have greater mind than his and even we can say that he exceeds all the past philosophers.”1 Here Mou Zongsan emphasizes the spiritual philosophy of Hegel instead of the whole system of Hegel’s philosophy, i.e., “his philosophy about history, country, laws, and art and the philosophy about the whole humanistic and cultural world,” especially the historical philosophy of Hegel and the legal jurisdiction philosophy which is closely related to the historical philosophy and which is about the idea of a rational country. He thinks that Hegel “has enduring contribution in this aspect” and “has greater understanding and wisdom than all the past philosophers in this aspect.”2 For this point, Mou Zongsan explains that western philosophical traditions are good at developing the abstract comprehension ability of human beings for emphasizing metaphysics and epistemology, while Hegel “has strong specific comprehension ability so that he can understand history in a detailed way and even the whole cultural world.”3 As for the “pure philosophy” of Hegel, in other words, the logic, Mou Zongsan has some different opinions and thinks that it is “deceitful”: “the reader reading the books about his pure philosophy thinks that the statements are continuously rolling snowballs of chaos without reason or strange materials and it can only be homogeneous.”4 Given this point, Mou Zongsan asserts that Hegel is not “as good a philosopher” as Wang Fuzhi but he is a “good historical philosopher.” We need to know that in the Hegelian philosophical system, as the “pure philosophy,” logic plays a basic role and constitutes the thought basis for natural philosophy and spiritual philosophy. Hegel names it as the logic, but this kind of thinking is different from formal logic as the instrument of logic in the sense of Aristotle and different from the transcendental logic which clears the basis for knowledge in the sense of Kant. Instead, it tries to deal with the ontological problem in general philosophical classification from the DOI: 10.4324/9781351242219-9

Conscience, History, and Perfection  119 viewpoint of time-​history within the main feature of the dialectics. This kind of different understanding by Mou Zongsan of Hegel’s philosophy shows that although Mou Zongsan points out that the feature and advantage of Hegelian philosophy lie in the “dialectic integration” and emphasize the special importance of the “dialectic integration” for understanding history and cultural world, he does not care much about the Hegel dialectics. For Mou Zongsan, he regards the spirits as the most important thing, like Hegel, but he does not understand dialectics in the sense of Hegel as the internal rule of the spiritual development. Therefore, this kind of dialectic in the sense of Hegel is neither important for Mou Zongsan in terms of ontology nor important in historical philosophy. Hegel thinks that the most important point of historical philosophy is regulating history with the philosophical views, and the specific rule is setting a transcendental principle for history according to the philosophy. Mou Zongsan accepts this idea of Hegel, though his transcendental principles established for history according to his own philosophy are quite different from that of Hegel. The theoretical starting point for establishing the historical philosophy is the moral idealism which is developed through the new explanation for the Confucian traditional thoughts. When talking about the core ideas in Moral Idealism, Mou Zongsan says: What is the core concept? It is the “benevolence” which is the cultural life of Confucius and Mencius and the wise life. Proving benevolence through attributing the present people to the body is the source of value and the source of idealism. Given to this point, it is called moral idealism.5 In this book, “benevolence” is also called “conscience with pity” and is the conscience of mind, nature, or benevolence referred to by Mou Zongsan in different contexts. We know that as a concept of moral metaphysics, the so-​ called conscience of Mou Zongsan is actually the basis for the metaphysics.6 Therefore, very directly, the conscience as the body becomes the absolute starting point for a possible historical concept. In other words, since conscience is the body, history can only be the history of conscience. For Hegel, the entity of history is spirit, and history presents the development process of the spirit and freedom as the essential feature of spirit and the destiny of history. For Mou Zongsan, the entity of history is the conscience and history presents it to be the achievement process of the conscience, while the destiny of history is moral perfection, or the ideal of Great Harmony. In terms of the comparison between the status of spirit in Hegel’s philosophy and the status of conscience in the philosophy of Mou Zongsan, the two transcendental principles about historical philosophy have some equivalence. It naturally shows that Mou Zongsan has thorough understanding of his conscience in his Neo Confucianist system and the spirit in the Hegel philosophical system.7 However, Neo Confucianism with thorough communication between the west and China can have the actual significance sometimes

120  The Graftage of History and the formal significance sometimes. The actual significance of the transcendental philosophical principles established by Mou Zongsan for history presents a huge difference from that of Hegel. For Hegel, the essential quality is freedom and it is “shown by speculative philosophy”: Spirit “is dynamic in its essence and the activity is its essence; it is its product, its beginning and its end.” In other words, the spirit “relies on itself for existence and that is the freedom.” Besides, for this reason, the spiritual freedom is not seen in static matters but the continuous denial of the matters which threaten to destroy the freedom. The most important goal of spirit is to produce itself and make itself as its object so as to get the knowledge about itself. In this way, it exists for itself.8 That means that history is the process of the self-​development of spirit and therefore the self-​identification of spirit in terms of the expression of spirit. As for freedom as the destiny of history, acquiring freedom must go through continuous dialectical negation. By contrast, for Mou Zongsan, the essential quality of conscience is the pure Supreme Good, which refers to the essential quality to which Kant renders the good will, in other words, the unconditional good or the free good. That is to say, although Mou Zongsan understands the conscience as spiritual life, he cannot understand the essential quality of conscience as freedom like that in the spiritual philosophy of Hegel. The pure Supreme Good of conscience is a formal name and the full implementation is its ultimate end; spiritual freedom has actual significance. It is the aim itself and its implementation is only the tool for self-​development and self-​understanding of the spirit. The ultimate end of spirit lies in the freedom which has to get rid of any actual forms to achieve it. Besides, spiritual freedom means the continuous negation and destruction of finite things while the completion of the conscience in the implementation indicates the continuous acknowledgement and settlement for the finite things. Although the negation of negation is affirmation and the destruction is to achieve the higher settlement, the difference between both parties is apparent here. Specifically, the completion process in the implementation of the conscience relies on study and cultivation as well as the moral development. That is the so-​called “accomplished great study.” However, spiritual development must rely on the reasonable trick. Moreover, seen from the conscience concepts of Mou Zongsan, the spirit of Hegel is not essentially moral. The reasonable trick has not only the aspect of subjectively using private gain for public good objectively and subjectively using evil for objectively achieving the purpose of the good, but also the aspect of subjectively appraising the personal desires and evil on the one hand and objectively suppressing the public good and the goodness on the other hand. In other words, Hegel has the implication “heartless world, to all things as straw dogs; the heartless sages, to all people as the straw dogs” while Mou Zongsan has the implication “It shows to be benevolent and hide it in practice. It promotes

Conscience, History, and Perfection  121 everything in the world and shares the troubles of the sages.” In conclusion, if we say the basic thought of Hegelian historical philosophy is that the spirit sets rules for history, the thought of Mou Zongsan is that morals set rules for history; besides, although “morals” and “spirit” can be connected to some degree, their difference is neglectable. After affirming that conscience is the historical entity, the next step is to illustrate the power against the conscience for Mou Zongsan so as to explain that the achievement of the conscience is surely an historical process: the conscience is the absolute moral rule and the power against the conscience is the absolute trend objectively. In other words, conscience cannot only constitute an historical concept because the pure conscience of the Supreme Good is irrelevant to history and it can only exist as the eternal entity. Only when the presentation of the conscience confronts the obstruction of certain opposing powers, and the presentation of the conscience is a process, can it have the historical concept so that the history can possibly be the fight between the conscience and the opposing power which obstructs the conscience presentation and ends with the victory of conscience. Then, for Mou Zongsan, what is the opposing power obstructing the presentation of conscience? To answer this question, we must turn to the theory of human nature based on moral metaphysics or moral idealism. In the article of Moral Idealism and Theory of Human Nature, Mou Zongsan says in the beginning that “the reason why human beings are human beings” equals to “the reason why human beings are different from animals” according to Mencius lies in that human beings have the “sympathetic heart.” In other words, the conscience; that is to say, the pride of being human beings and the difference between the human beings and animals lies in the conscience. Therefore, human nature “from this point”: “the sense of conscience and the sympathetic heart are the features of human beings and therefore it is human nature.”9 Therefore, as the metaphysical objective existence, the conscience is the existentialist basis of human beings and is presented through the awareness and practice of human beings. That basically generalizes the existentialist method of the conscience as the spiritual entity. The understanding of the moral metaphysics of human nature can be said to be the most important principle of moral idealism supported by Mou Zongsan so that “the guiding principles of the practice in human society” is the moral standard for the practical judgment: “ ‘the sympathetic heart’ or ‘sense of conscience’ is the practical, personal, social and all the possible, general and necessary condition for all practice.”10 From this point, the moral standard of the historical judgment can be speculated: any practice of human beings cannot get rid of the influence of the general condition of “sympathetic heart.” Without the general practice, the practice is not the practice but the animal act and will have no valuable or ideal meaning in human society. Surely, in political or social practice, there is more than this general condition and it cannot be shown purely with some mixture.11

122  The Graftage of History Here it is obvious that the complexity and mixture of history are closely related to the “animal act.” The difference between human beings and animals is not only the standing point for looking at human nature in the stance of moral idealism but also a key for Mou Zongsan to establish an historical concept based on moral idealism. If we say generally history is the mixture of brightness and darkness, for Mou Zongsan, the brightness in history should attribute to the presentation of human nature and the darkness in the history should attribute to the animal act. In the first part and first chapter, of the first volume of Historical Philosophy, Mou Zongsan has a clearer explanation: the reason why the historical spirit is a compounding word is because the actual development is meandering while the primary cause is the animal nature of human beings. The reason for the meandering actual development is the animal nature of human beings. … Therefore, although human beings have the positive moral heart to express idealism (it is his divinity) but you have to know that he has animal nature. With the desire for positive development, the animal act, mixture and even the strange habits are only the results of human nature. Human nature combined with the aspect of “animal act and the inability of human nature” become the historical spirits in real development.12 History is a process during which human nature and the animal nature fight each other and overwhelm each other, representing the different powers of good and evil, and it is the key step for Mou Zongsan to establish historical philosophy with the starting point of moral idealism. On this basis, Mou Zongsan understands the special expressions of human nature with the introduction of the concept of nation as in Hegel: in the group practice of national life, the concepts from the moral heart expressing its ideals are different in all the nations. For the present, the cultural systems of the west and the east are different. The reason lies in this: as for the heart which expresses the ideals, the content and the aspect are rather rich and it is creative. However, human beings are confined to the animal nature (generally speaking, the restriction of the material or the temperance called by the ancient people) so that it cannot be shown at one time. Since it cannot be shown at one time, it has different directions. As for the questions concerning in which aspect it appears and what form it has, there is no logic and absolute reason except historical reason in group practice.13 Although conscience has been endowed to everyone as the universal human nature, in the group practice in which human beings exist through the form of a nation, the expression of human nature is unique and this kind of specialty is uncertain logically. Then, the problem lies in how the

Conscience, History, and Perfection  123 nation develops from its specialty to the universality. The other way to put this question is: how does one reach universal human nature from the unique nationality? Mou Zongsan’s answer for this problem is that the nations become perfect through learning. In other words, world history is a process in which nations learn from each other, perfect each other and develop each other. In the preface of the first edition of Historical Philosophy, Mou Zongsan generalizes: the appearance of the various forms and various principles of the spiritual expressions must be different for different nations in terms of the order and preference. The method for appearance has its difference in terms of the comprehensiveness and the disintegration. Therefore, the spiritual expression of the nations of human beings must be polished and perfected in the development systematically so as to achieve spiritual communication. Therefore, the spiritual expression of history is pursuing the completion of the philosophical system in the development process.14 Generally speaking, the opinions of Mou Zongsan on the relationship between nationality and human nature have three points. Firstly, nationality is the special expression of universal human nature. Secondly, the reason that the nationality shown to be the specialty is limited is because of the limitations of animal nature from the negative aspect and the variety and creativity of human nature from the active aspect. Thirdly, the different nations use different methods, in other words, the special methods to show universal human nature but the specialty is uncertain logically so that the reason can only be historical. Mou Zongsan introduces the concept of nation in historical philosophy because of the actual situation of China confronting the west since modern times. Therefore, although nation is an expansive and abstract concept, it mainly refers to the west and China for Mou Zongsan. Besides, according to the concept of nation, the west is surely not a nation. However, Mou Zongsan has no disagreement with this point, indicating that his concept of nation for establishing the historical philosophy is actually rather general and is a division concept in the cultural typology. It is similar to the division of Chinese culture, western culture and Indian culture by Liang Shuming in The Eastern and Western Culture and Philosophy. It should be pointed out that he hides the pursuit for national equality behind his concept of nation in the sense of cultural typology. If we compare it with Wang Fuzhi and Hegel, supported strongly by Mou Zongsan in terms of historical philosophy, it will be clearer. For Wang Fuzhi who regards himself as the surviving adherent of the Ming Dynasty, the problem of nation is most important, so that the Yuan and Qing Dynasty and popular Buddhism in terms of culture are considered, described, and regulated through being included into the differentiation between the Yi and Xia as the basic spirit in China. However, in Wang Fuzhi’s historical and philosophical framework, dominated by the relationship between reason and situation, the concept

124  The Graftage of History of nation has no theoretical importance. Wang Fuzhi, as is said by Mou Zongsan, understands history on the philosophical level like Hegel and both of them have clear stances. From the external critical perspective, the former is expressed as sinocentrism and the latter as European centrism and even German centrism. However, different from Wang Fuzhi, for Hegel, because he has to inherit and digest the “expressionism” which is represented by Held, one important source of Romanticism and the core view with the cultural pluralism. Thus, the nation is described as the basic unit for world history developing itself: the spirit is essentially the individual but we do not care about the special ones, we do not need to confine ourselves within the individual case or reflect the things behind them in world history. The spirit in history is an individual both with the common nature and special nature, in other words, the common nation. That is to say, the spirit concerning here is the national spirit.15 Here, the difference between Mou Zongsan and Wang Fuzhi lies in that Mou Zongsan faces the new situation and regards the group practice of nationality as a basic unit to control world history and the important pursuit for national equality. He once discussed this point with the basic spirit of “recovering a lost country and continuing the broken dynasty.” Related to this point, the concept of nation in the historical philosophy of Mou Zongsan has similarities and differences with that in the historical philosophy of Hegel. As for the similarities, although Mou Zongsan emphasizes that the specialty of nation can only be attributed to historical reason instead of the logical reason in terms of the reason for its specialty, because the nationality is the reflection of human nature, his nationality still “has the universal nature and the special quality” like Hegel. In his statement, the specialty of nationality is “metaphysical and certain.” As for the difference, because one important focus of Mou Zongsan lies in emphasizing that every nation can achieve the moral perfection through the endeavoring and the continuous learning, i.e., the total completion of conscience (this point is related to the pursuit to the national equality), the importance of the concept of nation in his historical philosophy to some degree is greater than that in the historical philosophy of Hegel. From the last point, it can be seen that the hidden pursuit for national equality of Mou Zongsan actually refers to the fact that the different nations endowed with a common human nature pursue equality in terms of moral advancement and the underlying theoretical source is the concept of the universal human nature of Mencius that “ordinary people can also be Yao and Shun.” Therefore, Mou Zongsan establishes a theory of historical perfection which regards the conscience as the body, the difference between human beings and animals as the main line and the nation as the unit, and this is communicated variously with the starting point of moral idealism. The process that human beings walk toward moral advancement until they reach

Conscience, History, and Perfection  125 moral perfection is the achievement process of the conscience. The two most important points are emphasizing conquering animal nature with human nature and achieving universal human nature from the special nationality. It is such an historical philosophy framework of the theory of moral perfection constitutes the theoretical context for Mou Zongsan to understand and describe the different culture features between China and the west, even concerning Chinese problems. Because moral idealism as the starting point of his theory is developed through his inheritance and explanation of Mencius, in his view, as for the point that the Chinese culture has regarded Confucianism as the guidelines, world history has the direct expression in the group practice of the Chinese nation. The understanding and judgment for the nationality of the Chinese nation serve as the key for the description of Mou Zongsan for Chinese problems in the historical philosophical context. As is well known, he regards the comprehensive rationale for the spirit to do and the integrated Qi to do the spirit to describe the features of Chinese culture, in other words, the nationality of the Chinese nation and compare it with the disintegrating rationale for the spirit in the western culture. Moreover, he thinks that China has the former but does not have the latter while the west has the latter but not the former. Dividing the different spirits of the Chinese and Western cultures comprehensively and disintegrating has clear origins but also has some shortcomings. Firstly, connected to the division of Kant for the will power of human beings, the determination of “disintegration” can be corresponding to intellectuality. On this basis, the word “comprehensiveness” opposite to “disintegration” is corresponding to the reason. Therefore, we can generally say that the best rationale for decomposition of spirit and the best rationale for composition of spirit are different in that the former expresses reason in an intellectual way while the latter expresses itself in a direct way. In Kantianism, this difference is corresponding to the difference between theoretical reason and practical reason, while surely we know that Mou Zongsan once criticized Kant for “having no practical reason to fulfill it.” The above has mentioned that it is the science and the concept and thought related to the necessary logical speculation of science for Hegel’s most direct expression form of the best rationale for decomposition of spirit. Of course, this point in the Kantian philosophical framework means recognition of the phenomenon circle. Then, compared with the science as the direct expression form as the best rationale for decomposition of spirit, what is the direct expression form of the best rationale for composition of spirit? The answer is surely the present conscience (generally speaking, the morals) and the intellectual intuition directly related to the present conscience (generally speaking the intuition). We know that for Kant, matter is divided into the phenomenon matter and thing-​in-​ itself according to the possibility for the recognition of matter. Human intellectuality can only recognize matter as a phenomenon while the sense of God, in other words, intellectual intuition, can recognize the thing-​in-​itself. Mou Zongsan thinks that Chinese philosophy, including Confucianism, Taoism,

126  The Graftage of History and Buddhism recognize that human beings have intellectual intuition, so they admit that human beings have the ability to understand the thing-​in-​itself. Therefore, it is very clear that the division of Mou Zongsan between western culture and Chinese culture with the best rationale for decomposition of spirit and the best rationale for composition of spirit is established on the basis of the Kantian-​style division between the phenomenon and thing-​in-​itself, then with his understanding of the spirits and wisdom in the Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism in the Chinese traditions, especially the Confucian conscience and the investigation and understanding of the reason why China does not have western science. The problem lies in that the division between the phenomenon and the thing-​in-​itself is the unique content in Kantianism, and it is unique in the whole western philosophical history, and how can it be expanded to understand the features of the whole western culture and spirit? Actually, after Kant, Fichte began to cancel the concept of thing-​in-​itself. With the spiritual phenomenology created by Hegel and the Phenomenology Movement, the intellectual intuition has become clearer and so does the best rationale for composition of spirit. That is to say, “disintegration” and “comprehensiveness” serve as a pair of concepts in the internal western philosophy. That indicates this is the best rationale for decomposition of spirit and the best rationale for composition of spirit in the internal western culture. Similarly, Mou Zongsan uses the division between “common wisdom” and “wonderful wisdom” to express the division for the best rationale for decomposition of spirit and the best rationale for composition of spirit to show that this is both the best rationale for decomposition of spirit and the best rationale for composition of spirit in the internal Chinese culture.16 Secondly, apart from the division between western culture and Chinese culture with the best rationale for decomposition of spirit and the best rationale for composition of spirit, Mou Zongsan uses the best Qi for composition of spirit and he thinks that it is a special feature of Chinese culture, different to anything in western culture. “Rule” and “Qi” are a pair of significant concepts in Confucianism of the Song Dynasty and the “Qi to do the spirit” designed by Mou Zongsan apparently is comparative to the “rationale to do the spirit.” However, in the statement of “the best Qi for composition of spirit,” even though the word “composition” is not abundant, it is not the word corresponding to the word “decomposition” but can just be understood as “direct.” If we still regard the division of Kant for the will power of human beings as the reference, the best Qi for composition of spirit can be corresponding to the aesthetic judgment which cannot leave the free game of imagination. The problem lies in that no matter whether the west or China has its artistic spirit, which does not need to be pointed out, why do we say the best Qi for composition of spirit is a special quality of Chinese culture different from the western culture? For example, “talent” is an important idea for Kant to explain aesthetic judgment while “hero” or “world historical figure” is an important idea of Hegel’s historical philosophy.

Conscience, History, and Perfection  127 Focusing on the specific content of the best rationale for decomposition of spirit and the best rationale for composition of spirit, we can see that Mou Zongsan mainly generalizes three differences between western culture and Chinese culture: science, democracy, and religion in the west (Mou Zongsan thinks that its feature is peculiar so that it is called as peculiar religion), Studies on Mind (as mentioned before, Mou Zongsan talks about the three religions of Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism, while he mainly refers to Confucianism here), mechanism of sages and perfection religion (compared with the peculiar religion) in China. So, how are these three differences unified into the difference between disintegration and comprehensiveness? It is not a problem to say that the difference between science and the Studies of Mind corresponds to the difference between the disintegration and the comprehensiveness. However, the difference between the democracy and the mechanism of sages, which is shown by Mou Zongsan in the book Political Doctrine and Governance Doctrine as the difference between reasonable structure presentation and reasonable utilization presentation, which can be correspond to the difference between the science and Studies of Mind to some degree. Therefore, it is not a problem to conclude the difference between the disintegration and comprehensiveness in the semantic sense. However, the difference between the peculiar religion and the perfection religion cannot correspond to the difference between science and the Studies of Mind directly, so here the difference between the disintegration and the comprehensiveness can only have proper understanding only when it is transferred into the difference between the peculiar religion and the perfection religion.17 It actually means that the conclusion of the difference between western culture and Chinese culture in the essential spirit with the difference between the disintegration and the comprehensiveness relies on the transfer of the pair of ideas of disintegration and comprehensiveness in the way of semantic conversion. Based on the order of Mou Zongsan’s narration of the spiritual difference between western and Chinese culture, we can see that he firstly talks about the best rationale for composition of spirit and the best Qi for composition of spirit of China and then talks about the best rationale for decomposition of spirit in the west. However, we can actually see that he looks at Chinese culture with the basic reference of the spiritual features of the western culture in his understanding, though he emphasizes that the perfection spirits in Chinese culture have greater value compared to the isolated and peculiar form of western culture. This point shows especially his great attention to science and democracy. Here it should be noted that the understanding of Mou Zongsan of the spiritual difference between western and Chinese culture is related to the New Culture Movement. Although nationalism is the direct engine of the New Culture Movement, the statements concerning the nature of citizens, more specifically, the statements concerning the deep-​ rooted nature of citizens are one of the most important contents in the New Culture Movement and the prescript is just the slogan of science and democracy. Mou Zongsan takes different attitudes to the New Culture Movement: he advocates

128  The Graftage of History the scientific and democratic spirits proposed by the New Culture Movement, while he hates the conduct of denying the value of Chinese culture. Therefore, Mou Zongsan does not propose complete westernization like the leaders of the New Culture Movement; instead, he puts the spiritual differences between Chinese and western culture into the statement of historical philosophy such that “nationality is the specific expression of universal human nature” through a kind of relatively proper reflection in his view. Compared with the universality of human nature, the specialty of nationality always means finite affirmation. That is to say, it has both advantages and disadvantages. Besides, in his finite affirmation, the affirmation is the major one and the finite can be said to be the limit on the one hand and the guarantee of specialty on the other. In other words, the only way for the Chinese nation to reach universal human nature from the national limit is facing the shortages and proposing requirements for the future under the condition of supporting and inheriting the advantages, acquiring the best rationale for decomposition of spirit, which was not possessed through learning from the west. Similarly, because the nationality of “western nationalities” is also the special expression of general human nature, the “western nationalities” should learn from China. Specifically, they should learn the perfection spirits in Chinese culture to reach the complete achievement of universal human nature, in other words, moral perfection. In the article About the Historical Philosophy-​in Recognition to Mr. Tang Junyi, Mou Zongsan discusses the “specialty and the universality problem of historical culture” in a rather general way. We can conclude the basic principles of the historical philosophy of Mou Zongsan, including the following 12 statements: first, “the beginning of the cultural history of a nation is different from the beginning of the ideological form.” Second, “the ideological form is the reflection of the moral mind to show the ideals.” Third, “the content of the moral mind is the infinity of the moral mind.” Fourth, “the human being is the finite existence so that the content of the moral mind cannot be shown at one time but achieved in the development with the developing conscious. That is the reason why there is the history” and the reason “why there must be differences between the history and culture of all nationalities.” Fifth, the specialty of the history and culture of all nationalities is “metaphysically certain” though there is no “logical reason” in terms of the special forms of expressions but only the “historical reason in the actual world” and “the reason on the national temperance.” Sixth, “therefore the practice of all nationalities achieves their nature and their history and culture so that they have a value to be affirmed and therefore they are metaphysically certain.” Seventh, “so that subjugation (by itself or by others) is a great evilness while ‘recovering a lost country and continuing the broken dynasty’ is a great good and great moral.” Eighth, the infinite moral mind develops and expands in the historical development and therefore it is also the basis for the universality of the history

Conscience, History, and Perfection  129 and culture of all nationalities and the universality of history and culture is expounded: it is also certain in the practical and the spiritual development. Ninth, “this universality or changeability is the explanation of the thoughts in the spiritual development shown in the practice. This thought and its rules are the same in various development lines.” Tenth, “the various forms and various fruits of spiritual values must be completed fully in the development and it must be integrated with the thought of development internally. In other words, they must develop with the help of each other.” Eleventh, “the various forms and various fruits of spiritual values” will not hinder each other in the same “development thought” and instead they are helping each other. If it has value, it will be achieved and if they will not hinder each other, they should and can be integrated with each other; instant stagnation is irrelevant with the stubbornness. That is the “changeability” of the history and culture of all nations; twelfth, “but the universality cannot leave the specialty because it cannot be of ‘pure form’ with what kind of universality.”18 From this point, we can see clearly that the historical philosophy of Mou Zongsan is under the influence of the basic principles but also opposite to Hegel in some key aspects. Specifically, his first statement is basically the same as Hegel’s and his second statement is same as Hegel’s in the form but different in the essence—​the moral mind is the same with the spirit in the form but it has the essential quality of pure good, different from the freedom as the essential quality of spirit. Therefore, from the third statement to the twelfth statement, except from that the fifth one is similar to Hegel in the form respectively, others are quite different from Hegel. From the stance of Hegel, the basic principle of the historical philosophy of Mou Zongsan has the suspicion of “bad infinity.” It is shown in particular that he thinks “the content of the moral mind is infinite and limitless” and emphasizes that “all values should and can be achieved.” Mou Zongsan tries to understand the spiritual development in the national group practice as a “dialectic” process (for example, the theory of conscience negation which is dedicated to the national group practice of China and which regards the “dialectic” meaning as its aim) and emphasizes that “the various forms and various fruits of the spiritual values” are “together with each other internally” in the “development thought.” He tries hard to avoid this possible criticism, but because he cannot explain the dialectic idea of Hegel, his dialectic concept is not Hegel’s but the concept of “practical dialectics” explained by him. Therefore, to what degree his endeavor avoids this possible criticism becomes a problem. Based on his basic principles of the historical philosophy explained by him, Mou Zongsan proposed two limits to Hegel’s historical philosophy. The first one is whether spiritual perfection will stop in the nation. Hegel thinks that “spiritual perfection reflects the presumed form of nation” but Mou Zongsan has a different view for this and thinks that “there must be a level

130  The Graftage of History of ‘great harmony’ above the nation.” In case “the subjective wish of benevolence extends to other nations of human beings,” all nations can achieve their nature through making it their own or through giving consideration to themselves and others in a transcending and external way. If so, we can make them become objective laws under the mutual reflection and mutual confinement of the subjective spirits. That is the “organization of great harmony.” If so, the reason should not only focus on the nation so as to become a country but also focus on the relationship among the nations to become the “organization of great harmony” exceeding both the nation and country. Within this organization, the various nations and countries are obliged and endowed with the right: the rights and obligations become the unity of the higher level. That is the statement that “the sacred concepts exist on the Earth completely” and the achievement of “harmony of the whole world.” If so, the countries are not in the ‘natural state’ and the external activity of a country does not consider the subjective private interests as the highest principle.19 The second is “whether the circulation and survival of history and culture,” in other words, “the way to achieve the long history and culture.” Mou Zongsan thinks that people conforming to “the principle of ‘achieving the rule with Qi’ can be eliminated while people supporting the principle of ‘generating the rule with Qi’ can last for a long time.”20 It is implied that Hegelian historical philosophy conforms to the principle of “achieving the rule with Qi” so that he does not find the method to achieve the long history and culture; while his historical philosophy conforms to the principle of “generating the rule with Qi” so that he can avoid the possibility of a broken history and culture.21 The explanation by Mou Zongsan of the basic theories make people remind of the relative statements in The Doctrine of Mean and The Book of Change: all things are bred without harm and the ways are parallel but not contrary; the small moral integrity is like the running waters and the great moral integrity is like the honest and firm root; that is the reason why the universe is great. There are many different methods and considerations but they can all achieve the same effects; there are many considerations but they can all achieve the final goal. We can say that Mou Zongsan explains the relative statements in the two books as an historical concept. However, the problem lies in whether the historical philosophy of Mou Zongsan is coherent with his internal Confucian spirits? This must be considered from the treatment methods and solutions of Chinese problems.

Conscience, History, and Perfection  131

Notes 1 Mou Zongsan, Hegel and Wang Fuzhi, Studies of Life, San Min Book, 1970, p. 174. 2 Mou Zongsan, Hegel and Wang Fuzhi, Studies of Life, p. 174. 3 Mou Zongsan, Hegel and Wang Fuzhi, Studies of Life, p. 176. 4 Mou Zongsan, Hegel and Wang Fuzhi, Studies of Life, p. 172. As for the natural philosophy of Hegel, Mou Zongsan does not mention it. 5 Mou Zongsan, Moral Idealism, Student book, 1978, third edition, preface, p. 5. 6 This thought may be similar to the act of Levinas that regards the ethics as the first philosophy exceeding the ontology, but it is only similar in terms of the form. 7 Although the question to what degree it is proper to emphasize the significance of this kind of communication is not a simple question, it should be noted that this kind of communication is not alone in the thought of Mou Zongsan, for example, it can be seen also in the thoughts of He Lin and Tang Junyi. Besides, the attention to this kind of communication is significant for the Neo Confucian thoughts in the comparative context since Xiong Shili, and its trend of thought even becomes one important signal for this thinking group to achieve their identities. For example, in the criticizing of Mou Zongsan for his understanding of the Chinese philosophy of Hu Shi and Feng Youlan it is essential. Besides, understanding the difference between He Lin and Mou Zongsan on the one hand and Hu Shi and Feng Youlan on the other hand in terms of the explanation for the thinking trend of the Chinese philosophy as the difference between the European Continental philosophy and the Anglo-​Saxon philosophy shown in the modern Chinese philosophy, it is still rather shallow. 8 G. W. F. Hegel. Lecture on the Philosophy of World History, translated from the German edition of Johannes Hoffmeister by H. B. Nisbet, Cambridge University Press, 1975, p. 48. 9 Mou Zongsan, Moral Idealism, p. 25. 10 Mou Zongsan, Moral Idealism, p. 34–​35. 11 Mou Zongsan, Moral Idealism, p. 24. 12 Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy, p. 4–​5. 13 Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy, p. 5. 14 Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy, original preface I, p. 2. 15 G. W. F. Hegel, Lectures on the Philosophy of World History, p. 51. About the relation between Hegel and Romanticism on the one hand and the thought origin on the other, please refer to Hegel and Modern Society by Charles Taylor, translated by Xu Wenrui, Taipei: Linking Publish Company, 1990, under p. 1. Expressivism is the word used by Taylor. However, the occurrence of this word is under the direct influence of the understanding of Isaiah Berlin for Held. Please refer to the note of the translator for this word in p. 1. Taylor points out that, with comparison to the broken opinion which is formed to regard human beings as the “objective analytic entity and object of science” since the Enlightenment, “Held has developed a set of different concepts with other people. Their major images regard human beings as a kind of expression. The life of human beings is seen to have a uniformity which is similar to that of artistic works. Each part or aspect can only be meaningful in relation to other parts.” However, “human beings are shown to be the existence of expressionism because they belong to a kind of culture while the culture is sustained, developed and inherited within a common group”. Such a

132  The Graftage of History common group is the “nation” of “the carrier of a certain culture” called by Held. Besides, more importantly, “each nation has its unique central theme or method in expression and it cannot be replaced or removed. Moreover, any attempt to imitate the expression of other nations purely, for example, many cultivated Germans imitate the French Enlightenment philosophers, cannot replace it.” Please refer to p. 2–​4 of that book. 16 Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy, Guangxi Normal University Press, 2007, p. 154. 17 Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy, p. 155. Although in the narration of Mou Zongsan, the intellectual intuition corresponding to the scientific thought is the key for understanding the difference between the peculiar religion and the perfection religion, the difference between the peculiar religion and the perfection religion cannot be understood as the presentation on the religion (in a wide sense) problems of two different thoughts. 18 Mou Zongsan, About Historical Philosophy-​in Recognition for Mr. Tang Junyi, included in Historical Philosophy, appendix 2, p. 369–​371. 19 Mou Zongsan, About Historical Philosophy-​in Recognition of Mr. Tang Junyi, included in Historical Philosophy, appendix, p. 372–​373. 20 Mou Zongsan, About Historical Philosophy-​in Recognition of Mr. Tang Junyi, included in Historical Philosophy, appendix, p. 374. 21 Besides, concerning the two above-​mentioned limits, the concern of Mou Zongsan for “recovering a lost nation and continuing the broken dynasty” in the sixth and seventh statements aims at the historical philosophy of Hegel. This point is connected to the opinion of Mou Zongsan for war and peace. Interestingly, although Mou Zongsan attributes spiritual perfection to the achievement of great harmony, he says that “ ‘the eternal peace’ seems impossible”. This apparent theoretical contradiction actually shows the spiritual pain in the mind of Mou Zongsan. He is both an optimist ideally and pessimist practically. Especially, when he regards the ideal of great harmony as the destiny of world history, he feels that “the mind of human beings are expansive and wonderful” and he has the double feelings of “infinite, serious and pitiful”. The citation can be seen in Mou Zongsan, About Historical Philosophy-​in Recognition of Mr. Tang Junyi, included in Historical Philosophy, appendix, p. 373–​374.

8 The Third Period of Confucian Development and the Theory of Self-​Negation of Conscience

The understanding and generalization of the differences between western culture and Chinese culture in terms of their ultimate spirit constitute the theoretical basis for Mou Zongsan to propose the solution to solve the Chinese problem—​this solution can be reasonably called “the third development of Confucianism” according to the understanding of Mou Zongsan.1 The intensive analysis by Mou Zongsan of the third development of Confucianism is conducted in the following three articles: Origin and Rules of Ehu Academy of Qianshan, Jiangxi, Development and Mission of the Confucian Learning, and On the Modern Significance of Chinese Culture from the Current Mission of Confucianism. The latter two articles are more systematic. The first article is written following the invitation from Cheng Zhaoxiong to recover the Ehu Academy. In the introduction to that article, Mou Zongsan comes up with the three developments of Confucianism for the first time, but it is not detailed. Development and Mission of the Confucian Learning was published on September 1, 1949, issue 6, volume 1 of Democratic Review, and was included in the book of Moral Idealism as the first article. Mou Zongsan explains the three developments of Confucianism in that article and the statement of the first half is almost the same as that of the introduction in the Origin and Rules of Ehu Academy of Qianshan, Jiangxi. On the Modern Significance of Chinese Culture from the Current Mission of Confucianism is a speech in the “Conference on Chinese Culture” at Tunghai University in July of 1979, it was included in the book Political Doctrine and Governance Doctrine as the “preface to the new edition” in 1980, and included in the book Time and Experience in 1984. In that article, Mou Zongsan explains the theory of the three developments of Confucianism in more detail. Besides, in the beginning of the speech in Tunghai University, Mou Zongsan mentioned that the former name of the speech was “Development and Mission of the Confucian Learning,” which is the same as the title of his paper he published in 1949. About the specific contents of the third development of Confucianism, Mou Zongsan concludes the preface of Moral Idealism with the “theory of three unifications”: DOI: 10.4324/9781351242219-10

134  The Graftage of History First, the affirmation of moral unification, which recognizes the value of moral religion and protects the source of human beings and the universe developed by Confucius and Mencius. Second, the development of academic unification, this develops the “intellectual entity” to integrate Greek traditions and develops academic independence. Third, the continuation of political unification, this recognizes the democratic politics as necessary through understanding the development of the regime.2 “The theory of three unifications” is the major portion of the discussion by Mou Zongsan about the third development of Confucianism and it is his consistent proposition both in the article of 1949 and the speech in 1979. However, with more attentive reading, we can find that there are subtle and not unimportant differences between the article in 1949 and the speech in 1979 which explains the theory of the three developments of Confucianism both in expression and thought. Firstly, as for the expression of the historical destiny of the third development of Confucianism, in the article of 1949, apart from the democratic and scientific thesis known by us, there is a specific statement of “being responsible for creating the rules and nation” according to the transcendent spirits of Confucianism. In other words, the establishment of the national country based on spiritual life: First, past Confucianism was expressed in a purely moral way when it had to be expressed in the national form. … Secondly, the moral forms conform to the universal concepts in the past while there needs a form to conform to the national concept at present.3 If connected to Historical Philosophy, as has been mentioned, the introduction of the concept of nation and nationality to describe the diverse objective fact in the world context is an important precondition for Mou Zongsan to establish the concept of world history. Then, the concept of nation in the cultural sense and the concept of nation in the political sense will be connected through the “demands of the spirits”: “the nation which cannot establish the country is the nation which cannot have its own qualities.”4 For the whole Chinese nation, this problem lies in the fact that ancient China was not a country but a “general cultural and religious system.” There was the structure of a whole empire before, so we can say that it has the basis of “general spiritual life.” However, we need to know that this great empire was not in the form of “nation” before, and all the orders and rules belonging to this “great entity” were not the western or modern laws. Therefore, people always say that China is not a national unit but a cultural unit. The organization of the great empire is not a “nation” but a “world.”5

Third Period of Confucian Development and Theory of Self-Negation  135 Therefore, the establishment of a political nation in the modern sense based on the “general spiritual life” is a must for the Chinese nation to achieve its nationality, and it is also the historical mission of the third development of Confucianism. There is no doubt that his opinion to establish a nation based on cultural life conforms to democratic and scientific opinion based on moral unification. However, despite his own understanding, as for the meaning of those two propositions, there might be an important difference between the two parties, especially when we suspect that there is a Confucian spirit in democracy and science, in other words, the spirits as moral unification as cultural life. Secondly, comparing the 1949 article and the 1979 speech, we find that Mou Zongsan has a different attention to democracy and science. In the article of 1949, Mou Zongsan says that the third development of Confucianism depends on the deficient quality of western culture to make up for the absorption and integration in terms of the disadvantages at present. That has two important meanings today. First, mathematics runs through academic studies. Our contemporaries lack the highest and lowest media which are the advantages of people in the west. Confucianism had a high status in the past but there was no thorough implementation because mathematics was not popular. Therefore, it can ascend but cannot descend, and it can match heaven but cannot match people. The one that matches heaven cannot be rooted in the land because of its wandering and distance. Therefore, the one that can only ascend cannot exist for a long time because it belongs to the morals. It thus can enrich mathematics to become knowledge. Knowledge is not established and life is in danger so that it floats and wanders. Knowledge is not expansive and there is no firm basis or the frames of structures so that it cannot reach high. Therefore, the mathematics and the sciences developing from it must be integrated into the culture of the current people to enrich this wisdom without any gap or difficulties. It needs the establishment and development of the philosophical system. Second, in the actual history and society, the establishment of the national regime is compared to the status and function of mathematics. That is also the disadvantage of China and the advantage of the west. The national regime cannot be established and the wise Tao cannot be achieved actually in history. The wise Tao is only expressed as the moral form such as the general religion boasting the individual spirits and the absolute spirits. People can communicate with the spirits of the world but they cannot have the objective spirit of the group and organization. Therefore, the individual spirits must stop at the objective while the spirits of the world shall become void. Human spirits cannot have active and rich light. Therefore, it is the rich and complete individual spirits that enriches and supports the absolute spirits. The people without national politics (such as Jews) either have void spirits or

136  The Graftage of History miserable destinies. Behind the truth, there is no real hot power or spirits rooted in the world. The difference between the highest form and the lowest form lies in whether there is the expression of the objective spirit and the affirmation of national politics. Therefore, the establishment of the national regime must be integrated into the highest wisdom of the culture of current people to enrich its wisdom without any gap. It waits to be modified by great historical philosophy and cultural philosophy.6 From here we can see that Mou Zongsan can emphasize science more than democracy in terms of their theoretical status. He thinks that the establishment of the national regime, in other words, democratic politics, is the expression of objective spirits under the absolute spirits and the “frames of structures” developed by transforming the moral forms to the political forms with the intellectual thoughts which are connected to mathematics or science. In other words, democratic politics is actually “political science” which is based on the moral spirits and is the fruit of the utilization of moral spirits in national politics, though he says that the status and function of both can “be compared” when talking about the relationship between the two. However, in the speech of 1979, the narrative order by Mou Zongsan of democracy and science has important and obvious changes. He thinks that democratic politics is the most important meaning of “new exterior action” and the formal significance and the formal condition of the new exterior action on which the achievement of things depend. It is real idealism. However, democratic politics is contained by rationalism; practice under the democratic politics is the just presentation of rationalism. It is the idealism which is shown by Confucianism internally, the rational idealism. However, science is the material condition of new exterior action, that is to say, the material and content of new exterior action. The scientific spirits are practical spirits and science has no distinction for high or low status. Science is also the presentation of rationalism corresponding to the practical spirit. Science is also the requirement of the internal goal of Confucianism and Confucianism does not protest against knowledge. In the former society, that old knowledge would be enough. However, the current society advances forward and the demand for the new knowledge is the supposed requirement. The internal goal of Confucianism requires science and this demand is the intrinsic goal. Why? Talking about conscience and morality focuses on the goodness of mind and motivation. However, with only a good motivation, this good motivation morally cannot be expressed without the knowledge. Therefore, the motivation of conscience and morality demand knowledge as a tool for essential communication.

Third Period of Confucian Development and Theory of Self-Negation  137 Besides, Mou Zongsan further emphasizes that scientific knowledge is only a material condition of new exterior action and it can only be achieved fully under democratic politics. Otherwise, talking about neutral science alone without the formal condition of democratic politics cannot be called real modernization. The general public understands modernization from the level of science and technology but they do not know that the key for modernization is not science but democratic politics; the freedom, equality and human rights movement contained in democratic politics are the essential meaning of modernization.7 The division of science and democracy as the formal condition and material condition of “new exterior action” is similar to the division of science and democracy as the functional form and direct form of the intellectuality and the difference is obvious: for the former one, democracy and science are divided and the relationship between the two in “new exterior action” is comprehensive and the value of democracy is higher; for the latter, science and democracy are unified in the intellectual utilization as the disintegrating expression of rationale and both are united in this kind of intellectual utilization in “new exterior action.” Because science is directly connected to intellectual utilization, the scientific significance in practical speculation is the most essential one. Seeing the difference between the 1949 article and the 1979 speech under the same theme of “the third development of Confucianism” from the perspective of intellectual history, we must understand his critical attitude for materialism and his political stance against Communism. In the 1949 article, confronting the Communist Party holding the materialist stance and the political actuality that it was growing stronger, Mou Zongsan emphasizes his view of establishing the national country based on the cultural life with consideration to the various opinions on the establishment of the new country since modern times. There is no doubt that as the heritage of the New Culture Movement, science and democracy are the major content of his theory of establishing a country based on cultural life. Besides, they conform to the required logical conformity of the theoretical construction for the philosophical system. Science and democracy are united in the intellectual utilization, in other words, the rational spirits which have been explained in detail in Historical Philosophy. In the 1979 speech, Mou Zongsan pointed out that democratic politics is the essential meaning of modernization and the value of democracy is higher than science. A direct touch lies in that the “Communist Party also pursues science.” In other words, science and democracy have their own independence and one does not necessarily accompany the other one. Therefore, there is the view that regards democratic politics and science as the formal condition and material condition of the new exterior action and puts science under democratic politics. However, for Mou Zongsan, the

138  The Graftage of History internal structural change of the new exterior action, involving the different understanding for democracy and science and the different connections of the two in the new exterior action, does not influence the core theoretical opinion that science and democracy are controlled by morality, which has been explained before. In his view, the moral values of democracy and science can be justified through two forms of independent moral reasoning. Therefore, we can see that he reiterated this in the speech of 1979: “If Confucianism wants to develop further and take its responsibility in this world; the focus is its internal goal which requires the occurrence of science, democratic politics and modernization. That is the real modernization.”8 As for the stage problem of Confucianism’s development, from the modern times to the present, there are many different voices in academic circles and most are reasonable. However, the theory of stages which can reflect the self-​consciousness of a culture is the theory of three-​stage development which is proposed by Mou Zongsan with both spiritual and institutional consideration.9 Mou Zongsan divides Confucianism’s development into three stages: Confucianism in Pre-​Qin and Han Dynasties is the first stage, Confucianism in the Song and Ming Dynasties is the second stage and Confucianism after the Republic of China is the third stage. Here it should be noted that the theory of Confucianism’s development by Mou Zongsan is a theory concerning the historical development of Confucianism, but it is different from his views of moral unification. The apparent point is that in his views of moral unification, people like Xunzi and Dong Zhongshu are not included but Xunzi, Dong Zhongshu, and even the whole of Han Confucianism have a significant status in this theory.10 For this point, the criticism for this theory by Li Zehou and the practical concern behind those criticisms are important, but his biggest misunderstanding is that he mixes the theory of Neo Confucianism represented by Mou Zongsan and their views of moral unification.11 The greatest difference between the theory of the three stages of Confucianism’s development by Mou Zongsan and his views on moral unification lies in the fact that the proposition of the former includes spiritual and institutional considerations while the latter includes heritage and development (the so-​called traditions of Neo Confucianism) on the spiritual level. In the beginning part of the Development and Mission of Confucian Learning, Mou Zongsan says: in the past history of more than 2,000 years, Confucianism is its cultural backbone. Confucianism is different from Christianity and Buddhism. It is different because its profound thoughts and metaphysical principles are not only thoughts or principles but also can be presented as the organizational development of political society. The theory of six arts is the code for organizing society. Therefore Confucianism regards history and culture as its theoretical basis since Confucius and Mencius. Its thoughts and statements have influence on history and culture. The historical records

Third Period of Confucian Development and Theory of Self-Negation  139 emphasize the inner cultivation and exterior action and a real significance can be seen.12 In the article, he writes repeatedly that the Tao is not void and it must be achieved. If it cannot be achieved, it is not Tao. The achievement must be based on the objective existence of family and country and the difficulty of history and culture. The history, culture, and family and country or national country thus have their acknowledged value or objective value because of the basis of the achievement of Tao. Confucius says: “After the death of King Wen, was not the cause of truth lodged here in me?” Here the so-​called “cause of truth” is the reason because human nature is connected to divine nature and it is the comprehensive name for the achievement in the historical and cultural national country. Confucius develops the meaning according to the development of the conventions in the historical and cultural sense and regards “the cause of truth” as his final goal. The system of truth is the truth system. Confucius talks about “Confucian orthodoxy system” with “truth system.” It does not say that Christianity is only for religion, Buddha is only for the void and Socrates is only for philosophy.13 Specifically, Mou Zongsan puts Confucianism in Pre-​ Qin and Han Dynasties in the first stage of the development of Confucianism because of the spiritual and institutional considerations: “the Confucianism is presented to be the academic and cultural power from the late Zhou Dynasty to the great unity in the Qin and Han Dynasties and constitutes the political society of the Han Dynasty.”14 This point can be seen from his view that the development of Chinese history “has basic scale” in the Han Dynasty, especially after “the suggestions of Dong Zhongshu and the reform of Emperor Wu of Han.”15 In the discussion by Mou Zongsan on the second development of Confucianism, there seems to be no apparent concern for institutional problems, which shows his deficiency and preference in terms of understanding the history of Mou Zongsan as a philosopher on one hand. On the other hand, the focus of the second development of Confucianism is recovering the Confucian traditions to deal with the challenge of Buddhism and Taoism, especially Buddhism, and the spiritual problem is more outstanding.16 Besides, the discussion of Mou Zongsan on the third development of Confucianism is conducted with the spiritual and institutional considerations: the current problems are more difficult than those in the past. The traditions and customs are broken and Confucianism fades. Therefore people lose their faith and the country is lost in terms of direction. The phase that the current people have to come to is the phase where people have to create everything. The country should be established

140  The Graftage of History and the regime created, the social economy enriched and the customs reestablished.17 However, the misunderstanding of Li Zehou has some reasons. The unique thought that endeavors to reach the new exterior action with inner cultivation makes Neo Confucianism talk too much in terms of spiritual problems or the nature of mind but talk too little in terms of political problems and customs. Du Weiming inherits the theory of three developments of Confucianism and develops it. As for the time division of Confucianism’s development, Du Weiming has the same view as Mou Zongsan. However, compared with Mou Zongsan, Du Weiming has two new points for the explanation of the theory. Firstly, for Mou Zongsan, the theory of Confucianism’s development is based on China while Du Weiming focuses on the whole world and understands the significance of the theory in a general and universal view. Given this point, for Du Weiming, the three developments of Confucianism are indicated as follows: the first development is that Confucianism expands into the cultural life of the whole of China from local knowledge through the Zhou, Qin, and Han Dynasties. The second development is that Confucianism developed into the cultural traditions of the whole East Asia from the local knowledge of China between the eleventh century and seventeenth century. Therefore, facing profound and extensive globalization, the historical destiny of the third development of Confucianism is to make local knowledge in East Asia become the universal global wisdom. Secondly, compared with the theory of the three developments of Confucianism under the spiritual and institutional considerations, Du Weiming emphasizes the religion and spiritual sense of Confucianism. Given this point, for Du Weiming, if Confucianism wants to become the really universal global wisdom based on the local knowledge of East Asia, it must highlight the “religious sentiment” of Confucianism and face the fact of the diversity of global civilization. Cultural discourse must become the important subject of the third development of Confucianism, both at the theoretical and practical level.18 Emphasizing the spiritual importance of Confucianism, introducing a universal global view and advocating cultural communication have important guiding significance for the future development of Confucianism. Therefore, we can say that Du Weiming makes important theoretical developments for the theory of three developments of Confucianism proposed by Mou Zongsan. However, the most important task for Confucianism’s development is the treatment of Chinese problems and the implementation of the natural laws and benevolent government proposed by Confucianism in China in a systematic way. In other words, if Confucianism cannot solve Chinese problems, the global view will only be a joke. In my view, that is the meaning of the theory of the third development of Confucianism based on the actualities of China, especially his theory on establishing a country with cultural life in the current period. However, the problem of Mou Zongsan lies in the fact that because he develops democracy and science on the self-​negation of conscience, he fails the historical task

Third Period of Confucian Development and Theory of Self-Negation  141 of organizing political society with the essential spirits of Confucianism and leads his disciples to leave the great concern of establishing country with local culture, to achieve cultural dialogue and religious dialogue. As the specific content of the third development of Confucianism, the “theory of three unifications” has the theoretical form of self-​negation of conscience. It has been mentioned that the understanding of Mou Zongsan regarding the historical task of the third development of Confucianism is based on his understanding of the difference between the essential spirits of western and Chinese culture, with consideration of the unique experience of China and the west since modern times. In other words, that is the origin of the “three unifications.” Seeing the three comparative understandings of Mou Zongsan about Chinese and western cultural spirits, moral unification corresponds to the third item, in other words, affirming that the moral unification inherited from the Chinese sages is the perfect moral religion in comparison to western religions in isolation. That of course constitutes the basis for Mou Zongsan to consider the problem of science and democracy. There is no doubt that the affirmation of moral unification does not only indicate the simple restatement of Confucianism but also the complete reconstruction for facing the new situation. In the words of Mou Zongsan in the preface of the first edition of Historical Philosophy, it needs to “complete the comprehensive form of religions according to the cultural life.” In his opinion, the acknowledgement of moral unification as the perfection of religion is the supposed and required stance of Chinese cultural life, but also the point which should be learned by the western culture from Chinese culture. In conclusion, “it is a problem of the highest judgment.”19 In return, Chinese culture should learn science and democracy from western culture, which are a must to “complete the comprehensive form of religions.” Besides, in the mechanical level of “completing the comprehensive religions,” Mou Zongsan has some considerations. He once established a cultural club in the 1950s with one important goal—​to prepare for establishing the church in the future so as to recover Confucianism as a form of social teaching. In the first speech of the Basic Spirits and Wishes cultural club, he says clearly: “we insist that Confucianism become the cultural religion and establish the cultural church in the future to hold the country. We are not sure when the church can be established but we have hope.” When talking about the religious features of Confucianism, he regards Confucius as the leader: “in China, the natural law is achieved through Confucius so that Confucius is the leader.” When talking about the practical development of Confucianism, he points out the supposed adjustments in the modern situation and emphasizes the function of fellowship of the church: “there must be a church to govern society and it depends on the emperor, but clubs at the moment.”20 However, this thought of an established church is not developed by Mou Zongsan in a profound way theoretically and is not implemented in practice.21 The development of academic system and the continuation of political system are corresponding to the first item and second item of the three

142  The Graftage of History differences between western culture and Chinese culture and it is the key step of the plan proposed by Mou Zongsan to solve Chinese problems and the core concern for Mou Zongsan to construct his two-​level ontological philosophical system, including the judgment of Mou Zongsan for the Chinese culture based on the modern faith: the cultural life of China only develops upward, in other words, develops in the upward direction and shows the form of source but does not develop downward, in other words, develop in the downward direction to show the ultimate “intellectual form” and “objective practical form” of the national politics and laws. The cultural life of China is developing and all troubles and difficulties can be seen from it.22 As the study of conscience (or study of mind or morality), the moral unification actually means “develops in the essence.” However, if it stops here, it will be reduced to “deficient and not full.” Therefore, the perfecting conscience in implementation must present to be an historical process and the transformation from the best rationale for composition of spirits to the best rationale for decomposition of spirits is the necessary and internal need of the conscience in the process of implementation and perfection. Specifically, as the transcendental moral entity, the conscience can only remove the intellectual entity and the political entity containing science and democracy in the active sway of self-​negation. That is the infamous “theory of self-​negation on conscience” in modern Confucianism. As for the “theory of self-​ negation of conscience” (here the word “Blankness” refers to the dialectic meaning of “self-​denial” and the meaning of “practical dialectics” in the sense of Mou Zongsan), the most common criticism is usually expressed as “the old inner cultivation cannot be developed into the new exterior action.” In other words, it is the ability of the conscience that is suspected. The criticism here is directed at the conscience of the moral entity while ignoring the conscience as the spiritual entity in the ontological sense. If we admit that conscience is the spiritual entity in the ontological sense, which is the theoretical presupposition of “theory of self-​negation on conscience,” from the philosophical view, this kind of criticism is so simple that the supporter does not need to respond to it. In other words, the statement that the conscience is unable to develop the intellectual entity and the political entity is actually the same as the statement that an entity with infinite creation is lacking certain specific creation abilities. It is obviously ridiculous. As the believer, communicator, and critic of Kantianism, Mou Zongsan’s thought closely relates to German philosophy. For example, Fichte cancels the concept of thing-​in-​itself in the Kantian sense but adopts the thought of self-​setting the non-​ego. If we compare the ontological narration of Fichte that “self shows itself through setting the non-​ego” with the “practical dialectics” of Mou Zongsan, their idealist logics are very similar though both parties have

Third Period of Confucian Development and Theory of Self-Negation  143 great differences in the significance of free thoughts because the self-​setting non-​ego theory of Fichte is not setting other entities by one entity.23 For another example, for Hegel, the objective implementation of spirits means the self-​negation of spirits. Specifically, the understanding for the existentialist way of spirits must be done with logic, but also with the understanding of the objective implementing way of spirits must be done with natural philosophy, legal philosophy, and historical philosophy because the spirit is destined to be with nature, human society, and world history. This implementation of spirit can be said to be that the spirit negates itself to nature, human society, and world history, in other words, the expressionism concerning spiritual objectification referred to by Charles Taylor. If we compare the expressionism of spiritual objectification of Hegel and the theory of self-​negation of conscience of Mou Zongsan or the concept of “practical dialectics,” the similarity between the two parties is obvious though there are still many differences in many aspects. For example, most notably, Mou Zongsan does not construct a complete historical narration for “practical dialectics” like Hegel. Besides, there is a point that must be explained. The misunderstanding of the theory of self-​negation on conscience is closely related to the theoretical narration of Mou Zongsan and therefore exists both in some defenders and critics. According to the theory of self-​negation of conscience, science and democracy are developed through self-​negation of the conscience and therefore are put in two different levels which refer to the two-​level ontology of the final statement of the thoughts of Mou Zongsan. Because the conscience is thought to be the entity of moral values, the corresponding thing-​in-​itself is thought to be “a concept with the sense of value.” Thus, science and democracy after negation can only be instrumental in terms of the possessed moral values to differentiate with the intrinsic moral values possessed by conscience. Besides, because science and democracy have instrumental moral value, the conscience will be developed after self-​negation. That indicates that science and democracy are the moral techniques which are developed for the perfection and implementation of conscience. In the statement from Mencius, science and democracy are artifacts of benevolence if the conscience is “body of benevolence.” It seems to be a correct narration for the theory of self-​ negation on conscience. However, compared with the moral body or value reason of conscience, the understanding in the sense of moral techniques or instrumental reasons will reduce the importance of this theory and even make it meaningless, but a special misunderstanding of the theory of self-​negation on conscience. The reason for this is that the above-​mentioned narration about the theory of self-​negation on conscience is almost the narration of Mou Zongsan. Firstly, the feature of techniques lies in application. In other words, as is well known, the techniques can be transferred. Therefore, generally, taking the copinism—​the strengths of absorbing foreign things—​on a technical level is not wrong and the conscience does not need to invent an invented technique. For this point, the defenders may explain further that the theory of

144  The Graftage of History self-​negation of conscience is not a general explanation resulting from science and democracy as moral techniques but from the development of the cultural life of China. Therefore, the theory of self-​negation of conscience is meaningful from perspective of the development of the cultural life of China. However, the problem lies in that if science and democracy are only moral techniques implemented by the perfection of conscience, the development of science and democracy from conscience does not need the self-​negation: the invention of some moral techniques out of moral aims is natural and reasonable and it does not need the self-​negation which can be understood only in the ontological sense. It actually indicates that the ontological meaning possessed by the intellectual entity and the political entity does not allow us to understand science and democracy as moral techniques in the instrumental reasonable sense, which is the real content of the recognition of Mou Zongsan that science and democracy have relative independence. Therefore, he does not allow us to understand the theory of the self-​negation of conscience in the sense of aim and methods to be developing “artifice of benevolence” from “benevolent body.” Talking about the spiritual philosophy of Hegel, Charles Taylor thinks, there is a basic principle in the thought of Hegel that the entity and all its functions must be reflected no matter to what degree those functions have “spirit”: this reflection contains two dimensions with a close relationship: the first is the rational animal, that is to say, he is an animal able to think; the second is the expressionist existence, that is to say, his thoughts must be reflected in a medium. This principle might be called the principle of necessary embodiment and it is the core of the Hegelian spirits or the concept of universal spirits.24 Actually, although Mou Zongsan has no clear explanation for this aspect, the relationship between the conscience and science and democracy in his thought can only be understood in the sense of the principle of necessary embodiment instead of the simple sense of goal and methods. Science and democracy mean that the functions of the entity with certain spirits which are referred to as the intellectual function and political function of entities must be reflected in an objective world and therefore has ontological meaning. Actually, this is the key for understanding the two-​level ontology of Mou Zongsan. The problem with the theory of self-​negation of conscience is not whether the conscience as the moral entity can be developed into the intellectual and political entity through self-​negation. In other words, it is not whether the inner cultivation can lead to the new exterior action or not; but whether the relationship between conscience on the one hand and science and democracy on the other hand in the theory of self-​negation of conscience cannot be understood only in the sense of goal and methods. In other words, science and democracy have more meanings than techniques. The clarification of these

Third Period of Confucian Development and Theory of Self-Negation  145 two points can lead us away from the various useless discussions related to this problem and help us understand a new theoretical situation. In other words, the suspects that the theory of self-​negation of conscience may be oriented to the theoretical presupposition of the theory of self-​negation of conscience: is the conscience as the moral entity really the spiritual entity in the ontological sense? Whether it conforms to one certain unique explanation for Confucian traditions and the acknowledgement for the traditions or some certain practical or theoretical speculation? When attributing this problem to the personal or even the national spirits or faiths, the theoretical discussions will be meaningless and that is the most frequent phenomenon seen in the proponents and critics of the theory of self-​negation of conscience. However, even under the presupposition of the acknowledgement of the traditions, more specifically, under the presupposition of the acknowledgement of the Confucian traditions, especially the traditions of the studies of mind since the Song and Ming Dynasties, this problem still exists. The most essential and the most important proposition in the traditions of the studies of mind is “the mind is the reason.” However, in the moral metaphysics of Mou Zongsan, the conscience as the true intention stands firm while the natural law connected to the conscience of true intention is valuable and even deficient. If the concept of natural law in the view of some people is rather abstract, let’s analyze how Mou Zongsan establishes the relationship between the traditional cultural life and freedom on the one hand and the democracy based on freedom by pondering the past and turning over a new page. As for this problem, Mou Zongsan is influenced greatly by the opinions of Hegel on China, but he also has his own new views. As has been mentioned before, the overall understanding of Hegel for world history (his opinions of China are put in the overall understanding of world history) is based on the spiritual concepts in his philosophical system, while the essential feature of spirits is freedom. The so-​called “natural division for the world history” of Hegel is the core of spiritual freedom. As is well known, the famous opinion of Hegel is that world history as the development of free consciousness experiences the low level, the high level, the beginning, and the end, just like the four stages of the human life of childhood, teenage, adulthood, and old stage. Besides, these four stages are expressed in the eastern world, the Greek world, the Roman world, and the German world in actual history. More specifically, the eastern nations “only know that a man is free,” including China as a typical representative while the Greek and Roman “know that some people are free” but only the German people know that “all men are free.”25 When talking about China, Hegel says that the “outstanding features” of the nationality of Chinese people lie in the fact that “virtually all belonging to the spirits are void, including the non-​enforcing morality, mind, internal religion, science, and art.”26 To understand the opinions of Hegel regarding the nationality of the Chinese people, we have to point out his division for subjective freedom and substantial freedom. Actually, the comparative discussion between the eastern

146  The Graftage of History nations (as has been mentioned before, he regards China as the typical representative of the eastern nations) and the western nations is conducted on the basis of this division: substantial freedom refers to the fact that the abstract and undeveloped reason implied in the will power begins to develop in the nation. However, in the reasonable stage, there is no personal insight and will, i.e., the subjective freedom. The subjective freedom can only be achieved by the individual and constitutes the individual’s reflection in the conscience of the individual. Only in the places which have only substantial freedom, the orders and laws are considered as the stable and abstract ones which the subjects must conform to. Those laws do not need to conform to individual wishes and therefore the subjects are like children who listen to their parents blindly without any insight or will. However, when subjective freedom appears, the reflection of human beings on external existence transforms into the reflection of their souls. Therefore, the difference concerning the negation of reality resulting from the reflection appears. Returning from the actual world an antithesis comes into being. One part is absolute existence, i.e., God, and the other part is individual human beings. In the direct and non-​reflected awareness unique to eastern philosophy, the two parties are not that different. The actual world has some differences with individuals but the opposition produces a kind of gap between the absolute spirits and the subjective spirits.27 In other words, Hegel acknowledges that there is substantial freedom, and objective freedom or rational freedom but no subjective freedom in the living system of Chinese people. That is the real meaning of “all really belonging to spirits are deficient in China.” What is Mou Zongsan’s opinion for this statement of Hegel? Firstly, as for the point that Hegel thinks that the social political life of Chinese people reflects substantial freedom or rational freedom, Mou Zongsan has a more specific historical explanation for this agreement: this “rational freedom” has been achieved since the establishment of the Zhou Dynasty and the formation of a system of rites and music. The root of its affinity is the patriarchal society. The hereditary system and hierarchy are the most reasonable systems and constitute the system of rites and music of the great empire (all rites and plans in the great empire) and this is a rational system. The transcendental basis behind this system is the general moral entity, which can be called “general spiritual life.” This is an “absolute existence,” the divinity. This divinity is presented to be a “rational system” if the emperor has good morals.28 Secondly, Mou Zongsan expressed agreement to some degree with the view that there is no subjective freedom in the life of Chinese people:

Third Period of Confucian Development and Theory of Self-Negation  147 the general spirit and absolute existence are transferred into “rational freedom” through the emperor performing benevolent government. The freedom of the emperor (performing benevolent government is realizing freedom in fact, and the freedom of the emperor has a spiritual expression) is expressed as the system of rites and music and therefore is rational freedom. This kind of freedom is the direct expression of the general spiritual life and has not developed into the “subjective freedom” stage. Such development is only the development of a nation. From the perspective of the human entity, such a kind of development is real. From the perspective of the whole society, in other words, the individuals, it is false. Because this aspect is false, the “rational freedom” is only “substantial” and “objective freedom.” In other words, the abstract and undeveloped freedom implied in the abstract spirits.29 It seems that Mou Zongsan agrees with the previously mentioned statements of Hegel but it is not the truth. Generally speaking, the concept of subjective freedom in Hegel refers to the consciousness which is closely related to self-​consciousness and self-​identification. As for the historical development of Confucianism, if we say that the system of rites and music of Duke Zhou reflects rational freedom, the proposal of Confucius that “the practice of perfect virtue is from a man himself ” and the proposal of Mencius that “benevolence and virtue come from man” implicate the occurrence of the subjective freedom after the breaking-​down system of rites and music. Conscience becomes a core word boasting its outstanding status in the second development of Confucianism. Therefore, as for the opinion that there is no subjective freedom in Chinese cultural life with the spiritual core of Confucianism, people who have certain knowledge of Confucianism will not agree with it. For Mou Zongsan, who stands with Confucianism and speaks highly of the moral entity on the ontological level, it is never a problem. Mou Zongsan criticizes Hegel for knowing the Emperor Wen of Zhou Dynasty but not knowing Confucianism, so he “does not know the essential and comprehensive Chinese cultural life.” Through the explanation of “perfection” in Confucian thoughts, such as perfection of mind, perfection of nature, perfection of rites and perfection of system, Mou Zongsan affirms that there is subjective freedom in Chinese cultural life with the spiritual core of Confucianism: In this “perfection,” each individual has the reflective consciousness and reflects “subjective freedom” to be an “individual.” Subjective freedom reflects an “antithesis” in which the spirits as the entity come out on the one hand and nature as the “object” comes out and goes down. This “nature” does not have to be external nature and the “material element” of the matter can be called nature. If nature comes out, the “spiritual subject” is far away from the moral entity and the general spiritual life, or the absolute spirits. Comparatively, it can be verified. The distant comparison

148  The Graftage of History between the subjective spirits and the absolute spirits (the so-​called split for Hegel and the split resulting from the antithesis) comes from the antithesis between consciousnesses and “nature” and it was the complete whole just like the innocent heart of a child. As for the antithesis coming from the individual, nature, subjective spirits, and the absolute spirits can withstand the test; perfection can be finally achieved. That is one general principle of Chinese cultural life.30 Based on the two different quotations, as for the famous view of Hegel that “there is no subjective freedom in Chinese cultural life with the spiritual core of Confucianism,” Mou Zongsan shows agreement in one point but shows clear disagreement in another point. How to explain this possible contradiction? We can see that essentially Mou Zongsan does not agree with the view that “there is no subjective freedom in Chinese cultural life.” However, because he is highly concerned with political freedom and presupposes that the political in the sense of Hegel and the democracy based on this kind of political freedom is at the core of the third development of Confucianism, he recognizes the views of Hegel to some degree. The adjusting strategy made by Mou Zongsan is that he divides the subjective freedom named by Hegel according to his own views. One is the subjective freedom in the political aspect and the other is the subjective freedom in the moral and artistic freedom, corresponding to the division of the best rationale for decomposition of spirit and the comprehensive rationale and Qi to do the spirit which has been discussed before. Therefore, he made the final conclusion for this problem: “the understanding of Hegel is not totally irrational.” “It is subjective freedom in the aspect of national politics and laws that is deficient in China” and “it is the subjective freedom in the moral and artistic aspect that China has.”31 When viewed from Hegel’s philosophical stance, such division cannot withstand the test because subjective freedom is subjective freedom, which is acquired through the unique connection between the absolute one and the human as an individual. We can say that it is moral or religious freedom, or, in other words, the freedom of conscience. Although it can propose relative requirements in the political level to appear as political freedom, it is located in different areas to political freedom. However, considering the meaning of Mou Zongsan, his view is that there was subjective freedom in the life of the Chinese people, but he says it stays in the internal aspect and did not propose relative legal requirements at the political level. In the concept of Kant, China has internal freedom. In other words, moral freedom, but this kind of internal freedom does not develop into external freedom, i.e., political freedom. This point echoes the other opinion of Hegel, which has been recognized by Mou Zongsan: Chinese history is seen to have “no history” and it has been repeating itself for several thousand years. Therefore, the point needing explanation in the thinking situation which Mou Zongsan reaches under the guidance of Hegel is: in China, moral freedom at the subjective

Third Period of Confucian Development and Theory of Self-Negation  149 level has been presented by Confucius, but why is there no political freedom in the subjective level in the development of history? We know that Hegel thinks that China has not developed subjective freedom just like his description of the nationality of the Chinese people: China developed into the current situation a long time ago, but it has not changed because it is lacking of comparison between objective existence and subjective freedom in its internal development, replacing so-​called real history with a constant stability.32 Attributing this problem to historical contingency is imprudent and frivolous, but the direct answer is rather difficult because any answer will harm spiritual pride. However, the intractable nature of this question may prompt us to reconsider the questions that may be contained in the setting of the question itself: how to understand subjective freedom in the case of Hegel? Is it proper to describe thought in the Confucian traditions, such as “the practice of perfect virtue is from a man himself,” “the benevolence and the virtue come from the man” and the thought of conscience? Hegel is not afraid of talking about the cultural and religious source of the concept of spiritual freedom, especially the concept of subjective freedom which is thought to be the symbol of the mature state of free concepts. In part 482, which talks about the subjective spirits in the third part of Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Hegel points out clearly: in all continents, Africa and the east, there is no mature concept of freedom even now. The Greeks, Romans, Plato, Aristotle, and the Stoics did not have one either. On the contrary, they think that an individual can only achieve real freedom through birth (in other words, becoming a citizen of Athens or Sparta), virtue, education, and philosophy (a wise man is still free even if he is enslaved in jail). It is Christianity that brings this mature concept of freedom to the world. According to Christianity, as the object and goal of God’s love, the individual has an infinite value. The individual is defined as the spirit who has absolute connection with God and the Holy Spirit which lives inside, and therefore the highest freedom is endowed to the individual as their destiny.33 This point has been explained by Hegel that Christianity brings the “principles of subjectivity” to the world. Here it should be noted that “Christianity” here refers to Protestantism, which emphasizes the direct communication between man and God after the Reformation, instead of traditional Catholicism. After explaining the religious root of the philosophical principles of subjective freedom in the thought of Hegel, it will be easier to compare

150  The Graftage of History relative concepts from Chinese cultural traditions. As for the three religions of Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism, which have great influence on Chinese cultural history, we can find subjective freedom among them to some degree but there is a significant difference between concepts of subjective freedom illustrated in the philosophical method under the background of Christianity. Hegel once has a comparative illustration between Chinese religion and western religion and it helps us to illustrate this: the Chinese religion is not the so-​called religion which refers to the spirits that return to themselves and focus on the reflection of nature and internal existence. In this area, human beings draw out from the relationship between themselves and the nation and finally achieve freedom from the power of secular government in this seclusion. However, Chinese religion does not develop to this degree because only the isolated individual can have real faith for the individual who can exist for it without being influenced by external power. In China, the individual does not enjoy such a life or such independence: in any aspect, he is dependent, such as in religion and all other aspects.34 Here the “Chinese religion” referred to by Hegel mainly refers to Confucianism. Although we may disagree with him, his comparative description is rather correct. If we understand “the practice of perfect virtue is from a man himself ” of Confucius, “benevolence and virtue come from man” of Mencius and “conscience and nature” of Confucianism in Song and Ming Dynasties in the philosophical way as the subjective freedom of the same type, it is obvious that this subjective freedom is different from the subjective freedom described by Hegel under the background of Christianity. In short, subjective freedom in Confucianism has the dimension of complete reflection but it does not leave subjective existence; most importantly it does not leave human relationships. In other words, in this reflection, ultimate existence and objective existence have a double affirmation and both become the source for self-​affirmation (in a way that the former covers the latter. For example, human relationships are actually natural laws). Subjective freedom in Christianity must be based on the self-​negation of objective existence and be achieved through the complete recession from objective existence. In other words, there is a close relationship between the negation of objective existence and ultimate existence, and self-​affirmation must be achieved after the negation of objective existence and affirmation of ultimate existence. Mou Zongsan does not ignore this point, but he does not have consistent opinions and emphases in different stages. In the end of the article of Geometric Culture and Mathematical Culture published in Regeneration (54) on November 10, 1940, Mou Zongsan proposes and criticizes the opinion that Chinese people do not have conscious self-​awareness. He explains:

Third Period of Confucian Development and Theory of Self-Negation  151 Hegel says Chinese culture is a culture in childhood without consciousness or self but loves chaos, wholeness, and subjection instead of treatment. Such a statement is right if being confined to the surface or the phenomenon in a certain special time. However, it is wrong for the essential spirits of China. He does not know that it is a geometric way with coordinates and directions. We have self but the self must exist in the organization. We have self-​awareness but self-​awareness must exist in loyalty and forgiveness. It is not conforming to subjection but real relative harmony.35 If we say it emphasizes the subjective freedom in Confucianism, it must be understood in the objective existential level, in Substance of Mind and Substance of Nature, which is seen as the representative thought in his mature period: Confucianism says “nature” is the “quality” of having moral creation; if seen as the entity, it is the “creation entity” which can initiate moral creation. This is not the “same concept.” It has absolute generality, but it is rather obvious for human beings, so it is called human “nature.” As for the absolute generality, it is connected by natural laws into one unity. Therefore, as the body of things in the universe, the metaphysical entity is the “creative entity” which can initiate the universal life; as for the practical entity in the individual, it is called “nature” which can “create entity” for moral creation and can be proved through the moral practice of human beings. This is referred to by Mencius as that true intention is nature.36 Although the nature connected to ultimate existence can cover subjective existence for creating the entity, the discussion of subjective freedom only in the level of ultimate existence does not pay enough attention to the point that “people must discuss subjective freedom with subjective existence.” Therefore, the understanding of the concept of subjective freedom will be suspected to deviate from Confucianism’s traditions. It will lead thinking to a dead end when considering the management of a political system based on such a kind of concept as subjective freedom. Besides, confronting the actualities of Chinese history and culture, we will naturally notice that in the teachings of Taoism and Buddhism, we can see a spiritual tendency of recession from subjective existence, such as the so-​called “setting mind free from the secular world” or “jumping out of the three realms.” It is the point which has been criticized most by Confucianism because this spiritual tendency will lead to the destruction of human relationships from the stance of Confucianism. Therefore, just like the spiritual contradiction between Athens and Jerusalem in western history and culture, Confucianism and Taoism or Buddhism can constitute

152  The Graftage of History a spiritual contradiction in China.37 However, this kind of contradiction does not force western liberalism. On the one hand, Confucianism develops a set of matching social and political systems in subjective implementation and solves the challenge of Buddhism and Taoism under the double force of system and spirits. On the other hand, different from Christianity, in the teachings of Buddhism and Taoism, the self is considered to be a matter which should be disintegrated essentially and it is only a “concordance pseudo” which was false and created through piercing.38 Although Christianity emphasizes the importance of a unity with God, the self achieves a certain affirmation in front of God, which is a significant concept in the core doctrines of “justification by faith.” In other words, the freedom proposed by Taoism and Buddhism is the freedom without self while the freedom proposed by Christianity is the freedom with self. With consideration to the unique point that Confucianism is connected with human relationships, we can generalize the concept of freedom in Confucianism as ethical freedom—​the word “ethical” refers to the meaning of “reason of human relationships” which is the same with the concept used by Liang Shumin in the statement about China of “ethic as standard and occupation with division” in The Substance of Chinese Culture. Mencius says: “By the sages, human relationships are perfectly exhibited” (Lilou, I). Xunzi says: “By the sages, the human relationships are fully achieved” (Jilebi). We can say that the so-​called “full achievement of human relationships” of Mencius and Xunzi includes the meaning of moral freedom. Seen from this point, the understanding of the concept of subjective freedom which discusses freedom but not human relationships under Christianity is improper. It can be criticized as a slack or shallow explanation and rebelling against orthodoxy without consideration for kings and fathers in a severe sense. The implementation of such a stance requires political freedom be based on such a type of concept of moral freedom. In the words of Hegel, we should reach a right which must be a moral right on the basis of moral freedom. In other words, freedom can only become true and achieve specific freedom in moral right. In ancient Chinese society, “the monarch is the outline for his subjects” is actually an example of moral right, which is called patriarchy by Hegel. It not only constitutes the moral dimension of the “constitution” in ancient Chinese society but also indicates the ultimate dimension of the “constitution” in ancient Chinese society because of the ultimate protection for morality.39 If we are unsatisfied with the patriarchy because of the problems in the conduct and hope that there will be new reforms in the political systems, we should begin from the reflection on the patriarchy. However, if the reflection has gone beyond the supposed limit and finally the independent legal right replaces the natural legal right based on nature, it means the violation of the moral spirits of Confucianism and the loss of natural laws. In other words, the democratic politics which is developed into a western style based on the spirit of Confucianism and the concept of freedom under Christianity is actually total grafting.

Third Period of Confucian Development and Theory of Self-Negation  153 As to the issue of democracy, Mou Zongsan expounds clearly on this in his book Political Doctrine and Governance Doctrine. In his view, first, the political way and governmental way should be distinguished. Second, he asserts that there were democratic elements demonstrated in governmental ways in ancient Chinese society. What we lacked was democracy in a political way. Finally, he illustrates that democracy in a political way is essential and internalizes the needs of conscience itself during the process of implementing and improving. However, it also has independence. Therefore, conscience explores democracy in a political way through self-​negation, which is the continuity of political orthodoxy under the affirmation of Confucian orthodoxy. The distinction between regime and governance by Sun Yat-​sen forms the ideological basis of distinction between the political way and the governmental way by Mou Zongsan.40 To ensure people can effectively manage the government and vice versa, Sun Yat-​sen proposes the principle of regime and governance separation on the political system settings, that is the principle of separation of the people’s rights from governing capacity: Politics is the issue of everyone, the power assembling issue of everyone is regime; regime is the people’s power. Governance is to manage the issue of everyone, and the power of assembling for managing issues of everyone is governance. Governance is the government’s power. Therefore, in politics, there are two powers, regime and governance. Of these two powers, one is used to manage the government, and the other belongs to the government itself.41 The intention of Sun Yat-​sen in this proposal lies in enabling people who have governance to legally and effectively prevent and stop the government from abusing common powers. This is also relevant to his dissatisfaction of the European and American representative political systems. In his words, the separation of governance and regime can make up for the shortcomings of a representative system. We won’t make the same mistakes as them [European and American countries]. We want people to separate their attitudes to government on right and power. The main power of politics is separated into two, one of government, the other of people. In this separation, we take the government as a machine and people as its engineers. What attitude people hold towards the government is what engineers are to machines.42 To emphasize, the governance mentioned by Sun Yat-​sen is different from what we said on common experience; it is closer to the concept of “sovereignty.” His principle of regime and governance separation aims to thoroughly implement the ideology of sovereignty belonging to people under certain system arrangements.

154  The Graftage of History Mou Zongsan basically inherited the identification and distinction of regime and governance by Sun Yat-​sen and summarized the conception of a political way and a governmental way. As to regime and governance, he said: “People who hold a regime hold a national group and manage all public issues in the group. People who hold governance take measures to solve problems.”43 His explanation goes further in that the regime, as the common feature of national commodity, is real in form and common sense; but governance belongs to the regime and aims at being applied anytime in a changeable way. In this way, there are common unchangeable things maintaining their nature, and changeable things ready to be applied.44 On this basis, Mou Zongsan puts forward the concept of political and governmental ways. “People in a political way, due to the real form and common sense, manage the group in a sharing and total way.” “People in a governmental way, under the second system, take measures and apply the way.” The political way is a framework which maintains regime and the constitution path where governance generates, so it’s a commodity of sense. However, the governmental way is an application, so it’s wisdom.45 Attention, the description by Mou Zongsan here is not scrupulous because of the matter of emphasis. In fact, governmental way is included not only under the second system but also inside of it. Based on the concept of the political and governmental way he created, Mou Zongsan carries out the analysis and diagnosis on the political system and culture of ancient Chinese society. He points out from a historical perspective that the political formation of human society can be divided into three types: feudal aristocracy politics, autocratic monarchy politics, and constitutional democratic politics. No matter whether it is feudal aristocracy politics or autocratic monarchy politics, the regime belongs to a monarch. These two can be called by a joint name of the monarch system. So, the political way goes the monarchy way. How monarchs gain the regime, lies in morality and ability at the beginning and hereditary in the following. Therefore, the political way of the monarch system can be discussed from these two aspects.46 As to the first aspect, the political way of ancient Chinese society formed during the Zhou dynasty, which initiated respect for destiny, worship morality, and preserving people. These three elements constitute a cycle of illustration: from the ultimate dimension, the monarch’s legitimacy lies in morality worship; from the objective dimension, the monarch’s legitimacy lies in people preservation. In another word, respect of destiny is based on morality worship which depends on people preservation. This ideology in fact is directly related to the legitimacy of revolution: if a monarch can’t respect destiny, worship morality, and preserve people, the revolution is legitimate; in another word, revolution is for destiny and people. Therefore, “respect destiny, worship morality and preserve people” is the most direct demonstration of a political way. As to the second aspect, the political way of ancient Chinese society also formed in the Zhou dynasty, when the hereditary system came into being. The significance is, like what Wang Guowei said, that “the essence of the hereditary system is to appoint the next monarch who is the

Third Period of Confucian Development and Theory of Self-Negation  155 eldest but not the most competent.” Maybe we don’t have this wording at that time, but the meaning is similar. The greatest benefit to the world is nothing but peace, while the worst harm is nothing but conflict. One following destiny gets peace, one following humanity gets conflict. Therefore, the monarch chooses a successor under this rule, to pursue peace. Ancient people were also aware that a competent successor brings more benefits, but they didn’t change this rule because they wanted to protect the peace for people. After thorough consideration, they chose the way with less harm to set up the lineal primogeniture system and keep this rule for the following dynasties.47 Mou Zongsan presents his criticism on both aspects. For the first aspect, he summarized through analysis on revolution that the comment on revolution means the acquisition of a regime lies in morality and power, and it also depends on the morality and power of individuals or tribes. Once a regime depends on the morality and power of individuals or tribes, it is impossible to generate monarchs in an objective and legal way. On this occasion, when it comes to politics, there is no real way at the beginning except conflict. If there is a way, it must be only about how to store morality and power, whose purpose however is to obtain the regime still by fighting.48 As to the second aspect, Mou Zongsan also thinks that the hereditary system, as the main component of the monarch system, means there is a way of regime in the ancient Chinese dynasty. However, because the polity of the monarch system presents “oneness of regime and governance” but the successor usually is not competent in morality and power, the hereditary system is not a real political way, or we say, it is not enough to integrate the static realness of the regime.49 So, based on the analysis and criticism on both aspects, Mou Zongsan proposed his radical conclusion that there is no political way in ancient Chinese society.50 But it doesn’t mean Mou Zongsan holds a completely negative attitude to the monarch system polity of ancient Chinese society. In particular, he has no reason to deny political ideology such as “respect destiny, worship morality and preserve people.” All affirmations Mou Zongsan lay on the monarch system polity of ancient Chinese society have been placed or inclined on governmental way, which is an important consequence that he receives after explaining history based on the distinction between political and governmental way.51 As to the governmental way of ancient Chinese society, Mou Zongsan summarized three forms: governmental way of Confucianism, Taoists, and Legalists. Here we only discuss Confucianism. Briefly speaking, the governmental way of Confucianism aims in morality governance with virtue monarchs and sage courtiers as the core. The morality here, says Mou Zongsan, has more concrete illustration. The morality of Confucianism is stipulated as humanity, justice, propriety, and wisdom. It’s neither Taoists morality nor abstract obligation of western world. Therefore, the governmental way of Confucianism can be summarized into three items of intimate relatives, respect seniors, and adore talents.52 That is to say, all human life aspects in Confucius tradition are self, home, nation, world from the view of reality, or monarch and courtier, parent and child, couple, brother, friend

156  The Graftage of History from the view of humanity. All these spirits and thoughts are absorbed by Mou Zongsan into the range of governmental ways in political philosophy. The most important ideology is about monarchs. As we said before, the monarch is the owner of the regime, directly related to the governmental way. But monarchy also is a link of governance, the highest link in supremacy, therefore directly related to governmental ways as well. This unique position of monarch presented that under the polity of monarch system, regime, and governance are not separated. This non-​separation is revealed in the power of the monarch, also means what mentioned before “respect destiny, worship morality and preserve people” consists of both political and governmental ideology. Apparently, as for this ideology, Mou Zongsan doesn’t affirm the significance of political way, but only affirms that of governmental way. In the view of Mou Zongsan, non-​separation of regime and governance is the key to understanding the polity crux of the monarch system in ancient Chinese society. His thoughts mirror governmental way development of ancient Chinese dynasty as already quite complete and mature. However, due to the non-​separation of regime and governance, governance belongs to the regime, and the political way is presented as an unprincipled course where the performance of governmental way is restricted in a large sense. Take Confucianism as an example. Although they initiate respect for morality and insist on study, the governmental way of morality can make up for the shortage of the political way. But because of the restriction on the unavailability of the political way, they cannot obtain real morality. On this issue, Mou Zongsan thinks the previous Confucians had no way to solve it. The reason lies in that there is only a comprehensive spirit of sense but no separated one in Chinese culture.53 Therefore, Mou Zongsan proposed that we should accord with the wish of Wang Chuanshan to “build up a thousand years of humanity with ultimate kindheartedness and justice” and internalize it into national cultural life. This is to develop political way and regulate regime, to separate regime and governance and liberate governmental way and governance from the regime of no political way. Or else we could bring governmental way from the previous subjectivity into objectivity and build up a nation closer to moral dream. It would be easier to realize moral dreams in the political system. We can also see that, although Mou Zongsan’s distinction between political and governmental way is based on Sun Yat-​sen’s distinction of regime and governance, they are both involved in a concern for different matters. Sun Yat-​sen tries to implement the democracy of regime into an objective system in the inner layout of democratic politics to prevent the possible alienation and abuse of regime. Meanwhile, Mou Zongsan focuses on the theoretical construction of historical revolution from the monarch system to the democracy system in order to settle and liberate the regime of democracy. In the eyes of Mou Zongsan, the real political and governmental way fits into morality and sense must accord with democracy. If we say there is no political way in ancient Chinese society, it means there is no political way at the core of democracy in society. In like manner, to affirm the governmental

Third Period of Confucian Development and Theory of Self-Negation  157 way of ancient Chinese society, one of the most important standards is to affirm the existence of democracy. What Mou Zongsan means “democratic element in governmental way” here mainly focuses on the abundant fluency of imperial examinations in bureaucracy in ancient Chinese society and related widespread participation in all classes. What’s more, as earlier mentioned, the thoughts of democracy revealed in the monarch ideology of “respect destiny, worship morality and preserve people” in Confucianism are also affirmed by Mou Zongsan in the sense of governmental way. As for the connection between morality, governance spirit, and democracy in Confucianism, Mou Zongsan has summarized, this supreme rule in politics is definitely not today’s democratic political formation in the way of sense content performance. But we can’t say this is not democratic. At least the individual principle revealed in the sense content performance is not against that of today’s democratic polity. Furthermore, the individual principle of today’s democratic polity, from the aspect of content realization, just achieves the content performance under the saying of individual principles. But we may ask, where is the boundary of democracy? It’s not democratic in politics. The individual principle under democratic politics is the performance of sense extension. It is democratic in content. The individual principle under sense content performance is the content significance of democracy, but not extension.54 We can see that Mou Zongsan’s understanding of democracy contains two different levels: democracy on a political system level and morality dream level, i.e., democratic politics and dream. Democratic politics is just system arrangement under a reasonable frame with only instrumental values compared to the morality dream. The democratic dream is farther and higher, in relation to the lifestyle and moral spirit of dream and with more purposeful value compared to democratic politics. Meanwhile, Mou Zongsan’s affirmation of democracy is firstly the affirmation of the democratic dream. In his view, democratic politics is the best political measure to realize the moral dream in national cultural life. The cultural life nation-​construction theory based on the political orthodoxy developed from the Confucian orthodoxy, specifically speaking, is the democratic constitutionalism developed from the edified dream. Seen from the outside, this proposal by Mou Zongsan is to set up a contemporary Confucius country which is actually a Confucianism nation-​construction theory. But it’s not true. Mou Zongsan only takes advantage of terms in The Book of Changes. This is to create the unique concept of negation to present the existence of dialectical negative relationship between conscious and democratic polity and to mention the principle of separation of moralization from politics—​“politics is politics, moralization is moralization.” On the political level, we only need to emphasize concepts like freedom, equality,

158  The Graftage of History and human right, and we don’t need to mention the significance of moralization on life completeness.55 Another important related theoretical measure is his distinction between substantive rules in the social world and regulative rules in political world. Under this distinction, all Confucian humanity conceptions are classified into the former but not the latter.56 The principle of separation of religion from politics in the western world is closely related to the development and differentiation of Christianity from other religions in western society. From behind, it is the antagonism existing between the worlds of God and humanity. It is the tension between one and the other shore, it is the crack of surpass and inside. From the process of factual history, it is also closely related to the religious fight even war led by religious alienation. Mou Zongsan doesn’t notice the essence, and he regards the regional knowledge developed from the Christian world as common truth, and grafts Chinese traditional moralization together with this western democratic politics. This is quite unsuccessful, weak in practice, and a betrayal of Confucian spirits. First, seen from history, those fierce religious conflicts never happened in China. Second, those unique cracks of surpass inside of the Christian world never have shown up in Confucius thoughts. And last, but not least, Confucianism moralization values most the significance of human relationships. Human relationships can be common sense: no matter how one holds which belief, he exists as a human being in a relationship. Therefore, any political Confucius comment, no matter how much it takes conscious mentality like Neo Confucianism on the concrete path, cannot exclude the significance of human relationships out of the consideration of politics. Mou Zongsan gives up the political sense of human relationship but affirms it on the social moralization level, he classifies it into the practical rules of the social world but not on regulative rules of the political world. We can say he is quite influenced by western thought and doesn’t figure out the intention of rites and music. In this way and in relation to the previous concept of ethic freedom, the internalized Confucius constitution must be different from the constitution born in western Christian spirit edification. In like manner, the internalized Confucius modern country must be different from the country established in Western Christian spirit edification. Hegel has compared the constitution and country established based on the ideology of reasonable freedom developed from Christian world into a Gothic building.57 Comparatively, the constitution and country established based on the ideology of ethic freedom in Confucius moralization should be a Cosmological temple. The characteristic of Gothic building is, on one hand, with a high point representing the infinite freedom between humanity and God. In Hegel’s view, it parallels the rules of Jerusalem. On the other hand, it stands firmly on earth representing this freedom unwavering still on the shores of the world. In Hegel’s viewpoint, this parallels the rules of Athens. Therefore, the Gothic constitution and country in Hegel’s eyes stand for the reconciliation between Jerusalem and Athens. Meanwhile, a cosmological temple takes heaven, earth, and the three human elements as a basis, i.e., the changes in the book indicate that

Third Period of Confucian Development and Theory of Self-Negation  159 “the way of heaven is Yin and Yang, the way of earth is soft and strong, the way of humanity is kindheartedness and justice.” On the one hand, it emphasizes the unification of heaven and earth. On the other hand, it values the relationship between ancestors and descendants, i.e., the significance of human relationship is unlike what Hegel said. He only affirmed the rule of this shore which is not related to individuals and the other shore. It is, indeed, recognized in the unity of heaven and earth and is a reflection of the supreme channels and rules that cannot escape between heaven and earth. This point is inevitable to research.

Notes 1 Mou Zongsan once used different expressions such as “the Third Development of the Confucian Tradition” and “the Development of the Confucian Learning in the Third Phase”. However, given the fact that he emphasizes development in any sense and even creation must be intrinsic to Confucian traditions, and that “development” can better show this kind of inheritance than “creation” in terms of the slight difference in the figures, I will use the expressions “the Third Development of the Confucian Tradition” and “the Development of the Confucian Learning in the Third Phase” when arranging and describing his relevant thoughts. 2 Mou Zongsan, Moral Idealism, preface, p. 6. 3 Mou Zongsan, Development and Mission of the Confucian Learning, published in Moral Idealism, p. 6. 4 Mou Zongsan, About Historical Philosophy—​in Recognition of Mr. Tang Junyi, appendix 2, Historical Philosophy, p. 367. 5 Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy, p. 65. 6 Mou Zongsan, Development and Destiny of Confucianism Teaching, included in Moral Idealism, p. 3–​4. 7 Mou Zongsan, On the Modern Significance of Chinese Culture from the Current Mission of Confucianism, included in volume 10 of Collected Works of Mr. Mou Zongsan, preface of the new edition of Political Doctrine and Governance Doctrine, Linking Publish Company, 2003, p. 18–​19. 8 Mou Zongsan, On the Modern Significance of Chinese Culture from the Current Mission of Confucianism, included in volume 10 of Collected Works of Mr. Mou Zongsan, preface of the new edition of Political Doctrine and Governance Doctrine, Linking Publish Company, 2003, p. 19. 9 As for the important significance of the differentiation between the Yi and Xia in the theory of stage development, please refer to Luo Yijun, Concept of Third Confucianism of Mr. Mou Zongsan, included in Journal of Yantai University, 2005 (2). 10 As for the concept of the moral unification of Mou Zongsan, please refer to Li Minghui, On the Moral Unification of Current Confucianism, included in Self Transformation of Current Confucianism, Institute of Culture and Philosophy, Academia Sinica. 11 Li Zehou, On Four Stages of Confucianism, included in Five Theories of Ji Mao, SDX Joint Publishing Company, 2003. 12 Mou Zongsan, Development and Mission of Confucian Learning, Moral Idealism, p. 1. The core thesis here is the point to which the modern historians with strong

160  The Graftage of History sense of responsibility for culture such as Wang Guowei and Chen Yinke give great attention. They all emphasize the institutional problem in Chinese history. 13 Mou Zongsan, Development and Mission of Confucian Learning, included in Moral Idealism, p. 6. 14 Mou Zongsan, Development and Mission of Confucian Learning, included in Moral Idealism, p. 1. 15 Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy, former preface first edition, p. 4. 16 In his new book, Peter K. Bol, Neo-​Confucianism in History, Harvard University Press, 2008, emphasizes that Confucianism in the Song and Ming Dynasties, including the Yuan Dynasty in his discussion, does not aim at dealing with the challenges of Buddhism but the problems brought by social change. Specifically, the practice of Confucianism in the Song and Ming Dynasties lies mainly in cultivating the local custom society with Confucianism. This kind of opinion has a certain correcting function for the opinion that stresses that Confucianism regards dealing with Buddhism as the main concern from pure thinking. However, the two are not distinct; instead, it can be seen as two aspects of the development of Confucianism in the Song and Ming Dynasties. 17 Mou Zongsan, Development and Mission of Confucian Learning, included in Moral Idealism, p. 2. In terms of the discourse of “inner cultivation and exterior action” preferred by Neo Confucianism, the traditions of moral unification on the spiritual level mainly concern inner cultivation while the implementation and establishment on the level of political institutions are included as the exterior action. Given this point, the third development of Confucianism of Mou Zongsan follows such a line: in the first stage of Confucian development, the inner cultivation and exterior action have basic scale. Specifically, the traditions of moral unification come from Confucius and the establishment of cultural and religion institutions attributed to Xia, Shang, and Zhou Dynasties and before (especially duke Zhou) while the basic scale of Confucian China results from Han Dynasty; in the second development of Confucianism, inner cultivation is perfected while the exterior action still lingers on the past void. Specifically, Confucianism in the Song and Ming Dynasties develops the studies of mind to the greatest extent but does nothing in terms of the innovation and development of political institutions. Therefore, the historical destiny of the third development of Confucianism is described to recognize and restate the studies of inner cultivation, which has become perfect in the second stage with the consistent mind, and develop the new exterior action, which is lacking in the second development, so that both the inner cultivation and the exterior action can become perfect. 18 The discussions about the three developments of Confucianism are included in his works and speeches, most of which are included in Collected Works of Du Weiming, Wuhan Publishing Press, 2002. 19 Mou Zongsan, On the Modern Significance of Chinese Culture from the Current Mission of Confucianism, included in Collected Works of Mr. Mou Zongsan, volume 10, Political Doctrine and Governance Doctrine, preface of new edition, p. 35. 20 Mou Zongsan, Cultural Records, included in Collected Works of Mr. Mou Zongsan, volume 28, Linking Publish Company, 2003, p. 3. 21 However, when explaining his school in Waiting for the Dawn: A Plan for the Prince, Mou Zongsan advocates that school instead of church be the basis for promoting Confucianism:

Third Period of Confucian Development and Theory of Self-Negation  161 therefore we must refine the “religious spirits” of Confucianism to replace the religion of other countries. Only the development of Confucian spirits can cultivate the celebrated scholars to hold the studies. The refinement and holding of Confucianism as the religion means not to set the church and base on the school. Political Doctrine and Governance Doctrine, included in Collected Works of Mr. Mou Zongsan, volume 10, p. 197. 22 Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy, p. 4 23 There is the communication point in it, but it has many difficulties. The most important point in this possible communication is that the set non-​ego can only be presented in the self in the set level, while this absolute idealist stance conforms to the idealist thought of Mou Zongsan in terms of forms. 24 Charles Taylor, Hegel and Modern Society, translated by Xu Wenrui, Linking Publish Company, 1990, p. 30. 25 G. W. F. Hegel. The Philosophy of History, translated by J. Sibree, Dover Publications, 1956, p. 19. Besides, the so-​called eastern nations for Hegel mainly include China, India, and Persia. Among the three nations, “China is particularly eastern, India can be compared to Greece and Persia Rome.” Please refer to the book, p. 113. 26 G. W. F. Hegel. The Philosophy of History, p. 138. 27 G. W. F. Hegel, The Philosophy of History, p. 104–​105. Mou Zongsan cites this statement when referring to the opinions of Hegel for China. He translated “subjective freedom” and “substantial freedom” as “body” and “substance” and translated “antithesis” as “对反”, please refer to Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy, p. 56–​57. 28 Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy, p. 61–​62. 29 Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy, p. 62. 30 Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy, p. 68. 31 Here the sited three propositions are the titles of the fourth, fifth, and sixth part of the third chapter of the first volume of Historical Philosophy. Please refer to Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy, p. 61, 64, 67. 32 G. W. F. Hegel, The Philosophy of History, p. 116. 33 G. W. F. Hegel, Hegel’s Philosophy of Mind, trans. From The Encyclopedia of the Philosophical Sciences, by William Wallace, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1897, p. 101. 34 G. W. F. Hegel, Hegel’s Philosophy of Mind, p. 131–​132. 35 Mou Zongsan, Early Collected Works of Mr. Mou Zongsan (I), Collected Works of Mr. Mou Zongsan, volume 25, Linking Publish Company, 2003, p. 566–​567. 36 Mou Zongsan, Substance of Mind and Substance of Nature (I), Shanghai Ancient Books Publishing House, 1991, p. 34–​35. 37 In the book of Records of Some Thoughts, there is one famous saying of Cheng Yi: “the harm of Yang and Mo is greater than Shen and Han; the harm of Buddhism and Taoism is greater than Yang and Mo.” Mou Zongsan is familiar with this opinion but he does not necessarily have real profound experience for this view from his various discussions: he criticizes greatly the Legalists and denies nearly all of them; however, he does not have deep thoughts for the harm of Buddhism and Taoism, so he proposes three religions and regards the Tiantai sect as representative of perfection. As for the reason, it may be that he can be smart in metaphysical thoughts but cannot think about specific ones.

162  The Graftage of History 38 The discussion here is rather simple. It would be rather complex to analyze the argumentations of Taoism and Buddhism of different sects in different periods in detail. In the end of the final chapter of Talent, Nature and Metaphysical Reason, Mou Zongsan uses the title of “Using Hegel for development” to point out that the freedom of Taoism is “a kind of immoral freedom beyond morality” and classifies the freedom of Taoism and Buddhism into one kind as the “freedom of lunar religion” and the freedom of Confucianism as the “freedom of solar religion”. He thinks that the freedom of the lunar religion of Buddhism and Taoism “do not count as real free entities” from the perspective of subjective freedom, requiring individual principles to conform to moral principles. Only the freedom of the solar religion of Confucianism establishes the real free entity in the regeneration through the endeavor of subjective freedom: Confucius talks about benevolence based on the endeavor of subjective freedom and that is the regeneration of morality. Here, the external rites and laws are not only the rootless external things but also the objectification which becomes internal morality and internalizes the “free subjectivity” of current people so that it has root. The key of this division is morality. In other words, Mou Zongsan believes that the concept of freedom of Buddhism and Taoism reflect individuality but not morality. That is to say, the individual principles and the moral principles in the concept of freedom in Buddhism and Taoism do not reach unity. As for the opinions of Mou Zongsan about the concept of freedom in Buddhism and Taoism, there are two problems needing consideration: first, to what degree is individuality affirmed in the argumentation of Buddhism and Taoism and how? Second, in what sense are nature and rites to be separated and how are they in Confucianism? For this point, ignoring the diversity and complexity in the internal thinking traditions of Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism, we can conclude that not only is understanding of the concept of freedom of Buddhism and Taoism rather improper with the individual principles generalized by Hegel in the Christian world, but also understanding the concept of nature of Confucianism with the moral principles generalized by Hegel from the Greek world, though he classifies it into Asia. The views of Mou Zongsan can be seen in Talent, Nature and Metaphysical Reason, Guangxi Normal University Press, 2006, p. 328–​329. 39 In one word, three cardinal guides are the constitution of ancient Chinese political society. 40 Mou Zongsan said the so-​called political and governmental way is relative to what Sun Yat-​sen said about regime and governance. Collected Works of Mr. Mou Zongsan, Political Way and Governmental Way, ­chapter 10, p. 3. 41 Sun Yat-​sen: The Three People’s Principle, see Sun Yat-​sen Collected Works, People’s Publishing House, 1981, p. 791. 42 Sun Yat-​sen: The Three People’s Principles, see Sun Yat-​sen Collected Works, p. 794. 43 Mou Zongsan, Political Doctrine and Governance Doctrine, see Collected Works of Mr. Mou Zongsan, ­chapter 10, p. 21, 24. 44 Mou Zongsan, Political Doctrine and Governance Doctrine, see Collected Works of Mr. Mou Zongsan, ­chapter 10, p. 24.

Third Period of Confucian Development and Theory of Self-Negation  163 45 Mou Zongsan, Political Doctrine and Governance Doctrine, see Collected Works of Mr. Mou Zongsan, ­chapter 10, p. 23, 26–​27. Here, the second system is comparative to the first system, which is established for the generation of regime, or we say constitution; the second system refers to system established for the implementation of regime, such as administration and judicature. 46 Mou Zongsan, Political Doctrine and Governance Doctrine, see Collected Works of Mr. Mou Zongsan, ­chapter 10, p. 2. 47 Wang Guowei, System Theory of Yin and Zhou Dynasty, see Posthumous Papers of Wang Guowei, Shanghai aAncient Books Publishing Company, 1983, book II, Collected Works of Guan-​tang, ­chapter 10, p. 5. 48 Mou Zongsan, Political Doctrine and Governance Doctrine, see Collected Works of Mr. Mou Zongsan, ­chapter 10, p. 4–​5. 49 Mou Zongsan, Political Doctrine and Governance Doctrine, see Collected Works of Mr. Mou Zongsan, ­chapter 10, p. 5–​7. 50 In Mou Zongsan’s view, “there is no political way in ancient Chinese society” is an evaluation but not a factual estimation. The significance lies in the political way of ancient Chinese society in fact indicates in the form of unprincipled course. In another word, Mou Zongsan applies the conception of political and governmental way sometimes in the theory of knowledge, and sometimes in the sense of teleology. 51 Or in specific, the purpose that Mou Zongsan distinguishes political and governmental way is to illustrate this possible consequence. Zhang Junli thinks, there is official management but no politics in ancient Chinese society. Mou Zongsan’s understanding on ancient Chinese social politics is influenced by Zhang Junli. Obviously, the opinion that there is governmental but no political way in ancient Chinese society is actually a political ethic explanation on “there is official management but no politics in ancient Chinese society.” 52 Mou Zongsan, Political Doctrine and Governance Doctrine, see Collected Works of Mr. Mou Zongsan, ­chapter 10, page 31. 53 Mou Zongsan, Political Doctrine and Governance Doctrine, see Collected Works of Mr. Mou Zongsan, ­chapter 10, page 21. Besides, except for this main comparative statement discussed in detail in Historical Philosophy, Mou Zongsan develops two new comparative statements in Political Doctrine and Governance Doctrine: the application and frame performance of sense, the inner content and extension performance of sense. That is, the application performance of governmental way and sense, the content performance of sense are accord with the comprehensive theoretical spirit; the frame performance of political way and sense, the extension performance of sense are accorded with the divided theoretical spirit. 54 Mou Zongsan, Political Doctrine and Governance Doctrine, see Collected Works of Mr. Mou Zongsan, ­chapter 10, p. 134–​135. 55 Mou Zongsan, Political Doctrine and Governance Doctrine, see Collected Works of Mr. Mou Zongsan, ­chapter 10, p. 137. 56 Mou Zongsan, Political Doctrine and Governance Doctrine, see Collected Works of Mr. Mou Zongsan, ­chapter 10, p. 179. 57 G. W. F. Hegel, Lectures on the Philosophy of World History, translated from the German edition of Johannes Horrmeister by H. B. Nisbet, Cambridge University, 1975, p. 121.

Acknowledgements

I wish to thank Du Weiming. Mr. Du helped me twice during my two visits in the Harvard-​Beijing study group. I had in-​depth communications with him and his enthusiasm on promoting Confucius research touched me greatly. Thanks are also due to the National Planning Office of Philosophy and Social Science. This book is the research result of the youth project of the National Planning Office of Philosophy and Social Science, which was identified an excellent project in the closing summary. Thank you to the five anonymous assessment experts, some of whose suggestions were accepted in the revision of this book. I wish to thank Chen Lai. Mr. Chen invited me to participate in the third Chinese Culture Forum in 2007. The thesis I submitted to the forum was the content of the second part of this book. I thank all my academic peers who put forward questions on my thesis in that conference, especially the criticism, suggestion, and encouragement from Mr. JinYaoji, Gan Yang. I would like to thank Mr. Guo Qiyong and Zhang Xianglong. Communication with these two gentlemen always brings me unexpected inspirations. I thank Mr. Wang Zhongjiang. The draft of the first part of this book has been fully published in New Philosophy, edited by Mr. Wang. I thank Mr. Wu Fei. The fourth part has been fully published in Philosophy Gate, edited by Mr. Wu. I thank my supervisor Mr. Wan Junren, whose support and encouragement were the main drive of my academic research. Thank you to all my friends, mentors, and peers who cared, helped, and gave me many worthwhile and critical suggestions. I thank my family. Tang Wenming Zhi Er Xun Study, Beijing, Summer 2011

Bibliography

Original Confucius Masterpieces and Works by Mou Zongsan Mou Zongsan, The Wisdom of Life, San Min Book, 1970. Mou Zongsan, Features of Chinese Philosophy, Shanghai Ancient Books, 1977. Mou Zongsan, Intellectual Intuition and Chinese Philosophy, Commercial Press (Taiwan), 1980. Mou Zongsan, Buddha Nature and Prajna, Student Book Store, 1984. Mou Zongsan, Phenomena and Thing-​in-​Itself, Student Book Store, 1984. Mou Zongsan, Treatise on the Summum Bonum, Student Book Store, 1985. Mou Zongsan, Moral Idealism, Student Book Store, 1992. Mou Zongsan, The Traits of Chinese Philosophy, Shanghai Ancient Books, 1997. Mou Zongsan, The Substance of Mind and the Substance of Nature, Shanghai Ancient Books, 1999. Mou Zongsan, Collected Works of Mou Zongsan, 33 vols, Linking Publishing, 2003. Mou Zongsan, “Geometric Culture and Mathematical Culture”, in Collected Works, vol. 25 . Mou Zongsan, “Historical Philosophy of Hegel”, in Collected Works, vol. 17. Mou Zongsan, “Political Doctrine and Governance Doctrine”, in Collected Works, vol. 10. Mou Zongsan, “Records of Cultural Lectures”, in Collected Works, vol. 28. Mou Zongsan, “Transcendental Decomposition and Dialectical Comprehensiveness”, in Collected Works, vol. 27 . Mou Zongsan, Nature, Talent and Metaphysical Reason, Guangxi Normal University Press, 2006. Mou Zongsan, Historical Philosophy, Guangxi Normal University Press, 2007.

Works by Kant and Hegel Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, trans. by Tang Yue, Commercial Press, 1959. Immanuel Kant, Critique of Practical Reason, trans. by Guan Wenyun, Commercial Press, 1960. Immanuel Kant, Kant’s Moral Philosophy, trans. and annotated by Mou Zongsan, Student Book Store, 1983. Immanuel Kant, Critique of Judgement, trans. by Werner Pluhar, Hackett, 1987.

166 Bibliography Immanuel Kant, Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, trans. by Miao Litian, Shanghai People’s Publishing House, 1986. Immanuel Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, trans. by Mou Zongsan, Student Book Store, 1992. Immanuel Kant, Critique of Judgement, trans. and annotated by Mou Zongsan, Student Book Store, 1993. Immanuel Kant, Practical Philosophy, trans. and ed. by Mary. J. Gregor, Cambridge University Press, 1996. Immanuel Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, trans. by Paul Guyer and Allen W. Wood, Cambridge University Press, 1998. Immanuel Kant, Critique of Practical Reason, trans. by Han Shuifa, Commercial Press, 1999. Immanuel Kant, Critique of the Power of Judgment, trans. by Paul Guyer and Eric Matthews, Cambridge University Press, 2000. Immanuel Kant, Critique of Judgement, trans. by Deng Xiaomang ed. by Yang Zutao, People’s Publishing House, 2002. Immanuel Kant, Critique of Practical Reason, trans. by Deng Xiaomang, rev. by Yang Zutao, People’s Publishing House, 2003. Immanuel Kant, Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science, trans. by Deng Xiaomang, Shanghai People’s Publishing House, 2003. Immanuel Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, trans. by Deng Xiaomang, ed. by Yang Zutao, People’s Publishing House, 2004. Immanuel Kant, “Moral Metaphysics”, trans. by Zhang Rong and Li Qiuling, in Kant’s Works, vol. 6, ed. by Li Qiuling, China Renmin University Press, 2007. Immanuel Kant, “Religion within the Bounds of Pure Reason”, trans. by Zhang Rong and Li Qiuling, in Kant’s Works, vol. 6. G. W. F. Hegel, Hegel’s Philosophy of Mind, trans. from The Encyclopedia of the Philosophical Sciences, trans. by William Wallace, Clarendon Press, 1892. G. W. F. Hegel, The Logic of Hegel, trans. by He Ling, SDX Joint Publishing, 1954. G. W. F. Hegel, The Philosophy of History, trans. by J. Sibree, Dover, 1956. G. W. F. Hegel, The Philosophy of Right, trans. by Fan Yang and Zhang Qitai, Commercial Press, 1961. G. W. F. Hegel, Hegel’s Philosophy of Right, trans. by T. M. Knox, Oxford University Press, 1967. G. W. F. Hegel, Lectures on the Philosophy of World History, trans. by H. B. Nisbet, Cambridge University Press, 1975. G. W. F. Hegel, Hegel’s Early Theological Writings, trans. by He Ling, Commercial Press, 1988. G. W. F. Hegel, Philosophy of History, trans. by Wang Zaoshi, Shanghai Bookstore, 1999.

Other Works in Chinese Henry Arison, Kant’s Theory on Freedom, trans. by Chen Huping, Liaoning Education, 2001. Ba Xinsheng, Ethical Form in West Zhou Dynasty, Tianjin Classics, 1997. Cai Renhou, Chronicle of Mou Zongsan’s Study and Thoughts, Student Book Store, 1996.

Bibliography 167 Chen Lai, Ancient Religion and Ethics: Root of Confucius Thoughts, SDX Joint Publishing, 1996. Chen Lai, “Problem of Mysticism in Tradition of the Studies of Mind”, in Realm of Having or Not: Spirit of Wang Yangmin Philosophy, People’s Publishing House, 1991. Chen Lai, “Mysticism in Feng Youlan Philosophy,” in Track for Modern Chinese Philosophy, People’s Publishing House, 2001. Chen Mengjia, “Comprehensive Statement on Oracle Inscriptions”, in Yin Xu, Zhonghua Book Company, 1988. Cheng Hao and Cheng Yi, Collected Works of Cheng Yi and Cheng Hao, ed. by Wang Xiaoyu, Zhonghua Book Company, 2004. Paul Delicy, Collected Works of Delicy, ed. by He Guanghu, Shanghai Joint Publishing, 1999. Deng Xiaomang, Several Issues of Kant’s Philosophy, SDX Joint Publishing, 2006. Deng Xiaomang, “Three Modules of Possible Gold Rules in Global Ethics”, Jiangsu Social Science, 2002 (4), p. 1–​6. Du Weiming, Collected Works of Du Weiming, Wuhan Publishing House, 2002. Duan Yucai, Etymological Dictionary of Characters with Notes, Shanghai Ancient Books, 1988. Micheal Funcl, “Nietzsche, Genealogy, History”, trans. by Su Li, in Liu Xiaofeng and Ni Weiguo (eds.), Nietzsche in Western, Shanghai Joint Publishing, 2002, p. 279–​305. Hans-​Georg Gadamer, Truth and Method, trans. by Gong Handing, Shanghai Translation, 1999. He Lin, Culture and Life, Commercial Press, 1988. Martin Heidegger, Selected Works of Martin Heidegger, ed. by Sun Zhouxing, Shanghai Joint Publishing, 1996. Martin Heidegger, Being and Time, trans. by Chen Jiaying and Wang Qingjie, ed. by Chen Jiaying, SDX Joint Publishing, 1999. Martin Heidegger, “A Letter on Humanism”, in Landmark, trans. by Sun Zhouxing, Commercial Press, 2000, p. 366–​429. Hou Wailu, General History of Chinese Thought, vol. 1, People’s Publishing House, 1957. Huang Zongxi and Quan Zuwang, Cases in Song and Yuan Dynasties, Zhonghua Book Company, 1986. Edmund Husserl, Ideas: General Introduction to Pure Phenomenology, trans. by Li Youzheng, Commercial Press, 1992. Jiang Nianfeng, “Taiwan’s Experience after War and Hegel in the Thought of Kang Junyi and Mou Zongsan”, in Text and Practice, Guiguan Book, 2000. Lai Gongou, “Core of Cultural Life of Mou Zongsan’s Historical Philosophy”, Jiangxi Social Sciences, 2003 (11), p. 29–​33. Li Hanji, “Mou Zongsan’s Political Idea and Introspection on Hegel’s Historical Philosophy,” in Contemporary Confucianism and Western Culture: Philosophy, Institute of Chinese Literature and Philosophy of Academia Sinica, 2004. Li Minghui, “On the So-​called ‘Confucianism Extensive Moralism’,” in Confucianism and Modern Sense, Wenjin, 1911. Li Minghui, Confucianism and Kant, Linking Publishing, 1990.

168 Bibliography Li Minghui, “Contemporary Neo-​Confucianism Orthodoxy,” in Self-​transformation of Contemporary Confucianism, Institute of Chinese Literature and Philosophy of Academia Sinica, 1994. Li Rongtian, “New Path of Confucianism from Hegel’s Historical Philosophy,” in Memoir of the First International Academic Conference of Contemporary Confucianism, 1991. Li Zehou, Five Sayings on Yi Mao, SDX Joint Publishing, 2003. Liang Shuming, The Substance of Chinese Culture, Xuelin Publishing House, 1987. Liang Tao, “Symposium on Guodian Inscribed bamboo-​slips and School of Zisi-​ Menciu”, Studies on Chinese Intellectual History, 2005 (4). Lin Huowang, On Knowledge and Behavior from Confucian Concern-​Consciousness, Zhengzhong Book Company, 1981. Liu Yizheng, Essence of the History of China, Zhonghua Book Company, 1948. Luo Yijun, “The Third Phrase Confucius Conception of Mou Zongsan and the Doctrine of Pay Equal Attention to Three Orthodoxies”, Yantai University Journal, 2005 (2). Alasdair MacIntyre, After Virtue, trans. by Song Jijie, Yilin Press, 2003. Memoir Editor Group of Mou Zongsan’s 70th Birthday Celebration, Philosophy and Masterpieces of Mou Zongsan, Student Book Store, 1978. Ni Liangkang, “Basic Implication of Kant’s Intellektuelle Anschauung Concept,” Philosophy Research, 2001 (10). Pei Xuehai, Collective Explanations on Empty Words of Ancient Texts, Zhonghua Book Company, 2004. Qian Mu, Outline History, National Translation and Compilation Center, 1956. Qiu Huanghai, “The Critical Demonstration of Mr. Mou Zongsan’s Conception of History”, E’Hu Magazine, 1999 (5). Matteo Ricci and Nicolas Trigault, De Christiana expeditione apud sinas [Matteo Ricci’s Chinese Commentary], trans. by He Gaoji, Wang Zunzhong, and Li Shenyi, Zhonghua Book Company, 1983. Jean-​Jaques Rousseau, The Social Contract, trans. by He Zhaowu, Commercial Press, 1980. Bertrand Russell, A History of Western Philosophy, trans. by Ma Yuande, Commercial Press, 1976. Max Scheler, Scheler Anthology, ed. by Liu Xiaofeng, Shanghai Joint Publishing, 1999. Max Scheler, The Formalism of Ethics and Material Value Ethics, trans. by Ni Liangkang, SDX Joint Publishing, 2004. Sun Yatsen, “The Three People’s Principles”, in Sun Yatsen Anthology, People’s Publishing House, 1981. Tang Junyi, On the Origin of Chinese Philosophy: Introduction, Xinya Academy Research Institute, 1974. Tang Junyi, “The Philosophical Interception of Chinese History,” Appendix 1 of Historical Philosophy, Guangxi Normal University Press, 2001. Tang Wenming, With Life, with Kernel: The Spirit and Modernity Problem of the Original Confucian Ethics, Hebei University Press, 2002. Tang Wenming, Recent Worry: Culture Politics and the Future of China, East China Normal University Press, 2010. Charles Taylor, Hegel and Modern Society, trans. by Xu Wenrui, Linking Publishing, 1990.

Bibliography 169 Paul Tillich, “Systematic Theology I (Reason and Revelation),” in Collected Works of Paul Tillich, vol. 2, trans. by He Guanghu, Shanghai Joint Publishing, 1999. Wan Junren, “Contrasting Confucian Virtue Ethics and MacIntyre’s Aristotelian Virture Theory”, Chinese Academic, 2001 (2). Wang Bo, “Early Confucianism’s Theory on Ren and Yi”, Peking University Journal of Philosophy, 2005 (11). Wang Depei, “Book Reading Notes of Truth Seeking (I)”, Journal of Tianjin Normal University, 1983 (4). Wang Depei, “Notes on Liji, vol. 1”, Journal of Tianjin Normal University, 1997 (4). Wang Guowei, Collected Essays of Wang Guowei, Zhonghua Book Company, 1959. Wang Guowei, Posthumous Papers of Wang Guowei, Shanghai Ancient Books, 1983. Wang Rongzu, Theories of Kang Youwei, Zhonghua Book Company, 2006. Wang Shenxing, “On the Essence of the Western Zhou Dynasty’s Filial Values”, Journal of Humanities, 1991 (2). Xu Fuguan, History of Human Nature in China: The Pre-​Qin Period, Shanghai Joint Publishing, 2001. Zhang Xianglong, Martin Heidegger’s Biography, Hebei People’s Press, 1998. Zhang Zai, Collected Works of Zhang Zai, Zhonghua Book Company, 1978. Zheng Kai, Between Virtue and Propriety: The History of Thought of the Pre-​Qin Period, SDX Joint Publishing, 2009. Zhu Bokun, “Concern-​Consciousness and the Ethnic Spirit of the Book of Changes”, Journal of Peking University, 1997 (1). Zhu Xi, The Collected Four Books, Zhonghua Book Company, 2012.

Other Works in English G. E. M. Anscombe, “Modern Moral Philosophy,” in Roger Crisp and Michael Slote (eds.), Virtue Ethics, Oxford University Press, 1997. Keith Ansell-​Pearson, “Nietzsche on Autonomy and Morality: The Challenge to Political Theory”, Political Studies, 1991 (39). Marcia W. Baron, “Kantian Ethics”, in Three Methods of Ethics: A Debate, Blackwell, 1997. Peter K. Bol, Neo-​Confucianism in History, Harvard University Press, 2008. Hans-​Georg Gadamer, Truth and Method, trans. by Joel Weinsheimer and Donald G. Marshall, 2nd rev. edn, Continuum, 2004. Martin Heidegger, Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics, trans. by Richard Taft, Indiana University Press, 1990. Martin Heidegger, Plato’s Sophist, trans. by Richard Rojcewicz and André Schuwer, Indiana University Press, 1997. Martin Heidegger, The Essence of Human Freedom: An Introduction to Philosophy, trans. by Ted Sadler, Continuum, 2002. Martin Heidegger, “Phenomenological Interpretations in Connection with Aristotle: An Indication of the Hermeneutical Situation”, in Supplements: From the Earliest Essays to Being and Time and Beyond, trans. by John van Buren, State University of New York Press, 2002. Kenneth Holloway, Guodian: The Newly Discovered Seeds of Chinese Religious and Political Philosophy, Oxford University Press, 2009. P. J. Ivanhoe and B. W. Van Norden (eds.), Readings in Classical Chinese Philosophy, Hackett Publishing, 2005.

170 Bibliography Ian Johnston (trans.), The Mozi: A Complete Translation, Columbia University Press, 2010. T. M. Knox, “Preface for English Version of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right”, in Hegel’s Philosophy of Right, trans. by T. M. Knox, Oxford University Press, 1967. James Legge (trans.), The Chinese Classics: With a Translation, Critical and Exegetical Notes, Prolegomena, and Copious Indexes—​Confucian Analects, the Great Learning, and the Doctrine of the Mean, 5 vols., Trübner, 1861–​1872. Emmanuel Levinas, “Freedom and Command”, in Collected Philosophical Papers, trans. by Alphonso Lingis, Duquesne University Press, 1987. Alasdair MacIntyre, “Incommensurability, Truth and the Conversation between Confucians and Aristotelians about the Virtues”, in E. Deutsch (ed.), Culture and Modernity, University of Hawaii Press, 1991. Alasdair MacIntyre, “Once More on Confucian and Aristotelian Conceptions of the Virtues: A Response to Professor Wan”, in Robin R. Wang (ed.), Chinese Philosophy in an Era of Globalization, State University of New York Press, 2004. Jean-​Luc Nancy, “Heidegger’s ‘Originary Ethics,’” in Francois Raffoul and David Pettigrew (eds.), Heidegger and Practical Philosophy, State University of New York Press, 2002. Friedrich Nietzsche, On the Genealogy of Morals and Ecce Homo, trans. by Walter Kaufmann and Reginald J. Hollingdale, Random House, 1967. Friedrich Nietzsche, The Gay Science, trans. by Walter Kaufmann, Random House, 1974. Martha Nussbaum, “Tragedy and Justice”, Boston Review, October/​November 2003. Jean-​Jacques Rousseau, The Social Contract and the First and Second Discourses, ed. by Susan Dunn, Yale University Press, 2002. J. B. Schneewind, The Invention of Autonomy: A History of Modern Moral Philosophy, Cambridge University Press, 1997. Michael Stocker, “The Schizophrenia of Modem Ethical Theories”, in Roger Crisp and Michael Slote (eds.), Virtue Ethics, Oxford University Press, 1997. Wan Junren, “Contrasting Confucian Virtue Ethics and MacIntyre’s Aristotelian Virture Theory”, trans. by Edward Slingerl, in Robin R. Wang (ed.), Chinese Philosophy in an Era of Globalization, State University of New York Press, 2004. Bernard Williams, Moral Luck, Cambridge University Press, 1981. Bernard Williams, Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy, Harvard University Press, 1985. Bernard Williams, Shame and Necessity, University of California Press, 1993. Susan Wolf, “Moral Saints”, Journal of Philosophy, 1982 (8). Allen W. Wood, Kant’s Ethical Thought, Cambridge University Press, 1999.

Index

About the Historical Philosophy-​in Recognition for Mr. Tang Junyi 110, 128 abstract versus specific comprehension 109–​111 Analects of Confucius, The 84–​85 Ancient Ceremony, Huang Book 112 Aristotle 45, 118 autonomy 10–​11 Being and Time 53 benevolence 119, 130, 143, 144 Book of Changes, The 28, 81, 130, 157 Book of Rites • Li Yun 16 Buddhism 3, 6, 87, 139; Doctrine of the Mean in 85; four-​void religion and 84; intellectual intuition in 55, 57–​59, 73; judgment in 75–​77; recession from subjective existence in 151–​152; Supreme Good and 73–​74, 76–​78; theory of consciousness-​only in 97–​98; on virtue and happiness 79 categorical imperative 9 Cheng Hao 4, 53, 60 Cheng Liang 114 Cheng Ming Dao 85 Cheng Yi 4, 53, 81, 86 Chinese problem and historical philosophy 95–​99, 125, 133 Christianity and God 3, 6, 158–​159; as cultural background of Kantianism 25, 69; freedom in 149–​150, 152; “golden rule” in 14–​15; intellectual intuition and 37–​42; personhood in 88; principles of subjectivity in 149; separation of religion from politics and 158; Supreme Good and 73–​74, 76–​77, 88; unity with God in 152

Classics of Rite • Li Yun, The 97 codes of conduct, moral 17–​19 Comment about History as a Mirror 106–​107 Commentary of Gongyang and Spring and Autumn Annals, The 96–​97, 107 Comment of Zuo 107 Comment on the Song Dynasty 106–​107 Communism 137–​138 Confucianism: familial being and unity in 15–​16; four-​void religion and 84–​85; freedom in 149–​151, 152; historical philosophy and 98–​99; intellectual intuition in 55–​59, 73; metaphysical reality in 87; moral awareness in 59; Mou Zongsan and practical reason at the maximum in 3–​6; natural law in 85–​86; pre-​Qin 4–​5; Qi in 126; recession from subjective existence in 151–​152; Song-​Ming Neo 4–​6, 20, 26–​28, 138; Supreme Good and 73–​74, 76–​77; third development of (See third development of Confucianism); three-​ stage theory of development of 5–​6 conscience 119–​120; decomposition of spirit and 125–​127; expression of universal human nature and 122–​123; historical perfection and 124–​125; as historical process 121; in human beings and not animals 121–​122; intellectual intuition and 125–​126; Supreme Good as essential quality of 120–​121; theory of self-​negation of 142–​145 critical history 103–​104 Critique of Practical Reason, The 9, 12, 20, 36, 46, 52, 60; on limits of human intellectuality 41–​42

172 Index decomposition of spirit 125–​127 Definite Nature 85 democracy: governance and 153–​157; science and 135–​138, 144 Development and Mission of the Confucian Learning 133 Doctrine of Mean, The 130 Dong Zhongshu 97, 138, 139 double-​level ontology 51–​52, 57, 82 Du Weiming 140 Eastern and Western Culture and Philosophy, The 123 Encyclopedia of Philosophy 149 Epicureans 71, 73, 77 Essence of the History of China, The 101, 105 Evolution and Ethics 97 existentialism 110–​111 faith 23 feeling of commiseration 15 Fichte 142–​143 four-​void school/​four-​void religion 81–​85 freedom 11, 13, 21–​24; cultural life versus democracy 145–​147; Hegel on 119–​120; intellectual intuition and 35–​36; moral 152; religious 149–​150; subjective 150–​151 general history 103–​104 Geometric Culture and Mathematical Culture 150 “golden rule” 14–​15 Gongyang School 96–​97 good will 7, 13–​14 governance and regime 153–​157 Great Harmony 119, 130 Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals 7–​8, 11, 17, 25 Guo Xiang 79 Han Dynasty 138–​139, 140 happiness and virtue 70–​73, 79 Heavenly principle 27–​28 Hegel, G. W. F. 26–​27, 78, 107–​112, 114, 129–​130; on intellectual thought versus reasonable thought 104–​105; on modes for historical writing 103; on moral freedom 152; philosophical system of 118–​121; on spirit and freedom 119–​120; third development of Confucianism and 146–​149

Hegel and Wang Fuzhi 118 Heidegger, M. 46, 52–​53, 60 Herodotus 103 He Xiu 97 historical culture 128–​129 historical philosophy 104–​109; Chinese problem and 95–​99, 125; Hegel’s 118–​119 Historical Philosophy 101–​106, 109, 114; on historical spirit 122; third development of Confucianism and 134, 137, 141 Historical Records 107 Huayan sect 78–​79 human nature 122–​123, 128 Hu Wufeng 4 intellectual intuition 35; conscience and 125–​126; creativity of 54; distinction between perceptual intuition and 38; distinction between sensible intuition and 36–​37; double-​level ontology of 51–​52, 57; freedom and 35–​36; Kant on God and 37–​41, 52–​53; limits of human 41–​42; Mou Zongsan on 37, 47–​48, 53–​61, 85–​86; natural teleology and 42–​43, 48–​50; Newtonian physics and 45–​47; rationalism and 38–​39 Intellectual Intuition and Chinese Philosophy 25 intellectual thought 104–​105 intellectus archetypus 42 judgment 75–​77; historical versus moral 113–​114 Kang Youwei 97 Kant and the Problem of Metaphysics 52 Kantianism 38–​39, 118–​119, 142–​143; on categorical imperative 9; decomposition of spirit and 125; on difference between reality and value 40–​41; on faith 23; on four codes of conduct 17–​19; on freedom 11, 21–​24, 35–​36; on good will 7, 13–​14; on heaven 27–​28; influence of Christianity on 25, 69; on intellectual intuition 37–​42, 52–​53; matter in 125; on moral emotion 24–​25; on moral interest 11–​12; on moral law 12–​13; on moral metaphysics 3–​4, 6, 8, 10–​11, 19–​21; on natural law 9–​10, 16–​17; on natural teleology 42–​43, 48–​50;

Index  173 on Newtonian physics 46; on pure intuition 46–​47; on rational beings 11–​13, 15; rationalism and 38–​39; on sensible intuition 40; on Supreme Good 70–​72; on ultimate end of creation 49–​50; on universal law 16–​18 Liang Shuming 97–​98, 123, 152 Liu Jishan 4 Liu Yizheng 102–​103, 105–​106, 108, 114 Li Zehou 138, 140 Lu Jiuyuan 81 Mencius 14–​15, 27, 56, 81, 121, 125, 143, 152 Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science 46 mind, awareness, knowledge and matter four-​void school 81–​82 moral emotion 24–​25 moral freedom 152 Moral Idealism 101, 119, 121, 133–​134 moral interest 11–​12 moral law 12–​13 moral metaphysics: Hegel’s 26–​27; historical philosophy and 95–​99; Kant’s 3–​4, 6, 8, 10–​11, 19–​22; Mou Zongsan’s 25–​27, 35, 52–​53, 87, 98–​99, 118; origins of 35 moral perfection 124–​125 moral philosophy 7–​8, 13 moral theology 49–​50, 69 Mou Zongsan: on abstract versus specific comprehension 109–​111; analysis of natural principles 60; on benevolence 119; on conscience 119–​130; on conscious self-​awareness 150–​151; criticisms of Kant 24, 69; on democracy and science 135–​138; on divisions between phenomenon and thing-​in-​itself 43–​48, 50–​51; double-​ level ontology 51–​52; existentialism and 110–​111; on four-​void religion 81–​84; historical philosophy and 95–​99 (see also Historical Philosophy); on historical versus moral judgment 113–​114; on human beings as different from animals 121–​122; influence of Hegel on 104–​112, 114, 118, 129–​130, 146–​149; influence of Kant on 3–​4, 6, 7, 13, 19–​22, 142–​143; on intellectual intuition 37, 47–​48, 53–​61, 85–​86; on judgment 76; moral metaphysics

of 25–​27, 35, 52–​53, 87, 98–​99, 118; on nationality 123–​124; on natural history writing 105–​108; on New Culture Movement 106, 127–​128; ontology stance of 86–​87; on practical dialectics 111–​114, 142–​143; practical reason and 3–​6, 22–​23; on Qi 127; on reflective history categories 103–​104; on regime and governance 153–​157; on spiritual difference between western and Chinese culture 127–​128; on subjectivity as truth 110; on Supreme Good and perfection religion 70, 73–​88; on theory of self-​negation of conscience 142–​145; theory of three-​stage development 138–​139; on third development of Confucianism 133–​159 nationality 123–​124, 128; general spiritual life and 134–​135 natural law 9–​10, 16–​17; Song Dynasty and 85–​86 natural teleology 42–​43, 48–​50 naturology 21 New Culture Movement 53–​54, 96, 106, 127–​128 Newtonian physics 45–​47 On the Modern Significance of Chinese Culture from the Current Mission of Confucianism 133 Ontological Mind and Ontological Human Nature 3, 23–​24 Origin and Rules of Ehu Academy of Qianshan, Jiangxi, Development and Mission of the Confucian Learning 133 Outline History 101, 105 patriarchy 152 perceptual intuition 38 perfection: conscience and 124–​125; human nature and 123; of religion 74–​79; sedimentation perfection in 79; strange interbeing and 78 Phenomena and Noumena 25 phenomenon and thing-​in-​itself 36–​38, 125–​126; difference between 38; four divisions of 43–​48; negative meaning and active meaning of 50–​51 Phenomenon and Thing-​in-​Itself 35, 36 Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica 46

174 Index philosophy of natural history: abstract versus specific comprehension of 109–​111; Historical Philosophy and 101–​102; historical versus moral judgment in 113–​114; intellectual thought versus reasonable thought in 104–​105; Mou Zongsan on understanding and writing 103; practical dialectic and 111–​114; reflective history categories and 103–​104; writers of 102–​103 Political Doctrine and Governance Doctrine 101, 114, 127, 133, 153 practical dialectics 111–​114, 142–​143 practical freedom 22 practical reason 3–​6, 10, 22–​23; difference between theoretical reason and 40–​41; freedom and 11, 13; Supreme Good and 71–​73 pragmatic history 103–​104 pre-​Qin Confucianism 4–​5, 138–​139 profound theory 56 pure intuition 46–​47 Qi 126 Qian Jibo 97 Qian Mu 102, 103, 105, 106, 114 Qin Dynasty 139, 140 rational beings 11–​13, 15 rational freedom 146 rationalism 38–​39 reality and value 40–​41 reasonable thought 104–​105 recession from subjective existence 151–​152 reflective history 103–​104, 105 Regeneration 150 regime and governance 153–​157 science and democracy 135–​138, 144 sedimentation perfection 79 self-​awareness 150–​151 self-​legislation 10 sensible intuition 36–​37, 40 sensible knowledge 60–​61 Sima Qian 98 Song-​Ming Neo Confucianism 4–​6, 20, 26–​28, 85–​86, 138 specialized history 103–​104 spirit: decomposition of 125–​127; freedom and 119–​120 Stoics 71, 73

strange interbeing 78, 81 Studies of Mind 127 subjective freedom 150–​151 Substance of Chinese Culture, The 152 Substance of Mind and Substance of Nature 59, 151 Sun Yat-​sen 153–​154 Supreme Good and perfection religion: Christianity and 73–​74, 88; four-​void religion and 81–​85; judgment and 75–​77; Kant on 70–​72; Mou Zongsan on 70, 73–​75; practical reason and 71–​73; sedimentation perfection and 79; strange interbeing and 78, 81 Tang Junyi 60, 107–​108, 110, 114 Taoism 6, 87, 139, 155; intellectual intuition in 55, 57–​59, 73; recession from subjective existence in 151–​152; strange interbeing in 79; Supreme Good and 74, 76–​77 Taylor, C. 143, 144 theoretical reason 40–​41 theory of consciousness-​only 97–​98 Theory of Natural Selection, The 97 theory of nature 97 Theory of Rounded Goodness 25 theory of self-​negation of conscience 142–​145 theory of three-​stage development 138–​139 theory of three unifications 133–​134, 141 third development of Confucianism: articles about 133–​134; Communism and 137–​138; conscious self-​awareness and 150–​151; cultural discourse in 140–​141; cultural freedom in 145–​147; democracy and science in 135–​138, 144; development of academic system and continuation of political system in 141–​142; regime and governance in 153–​157; theory of self-​negation of conscience in 142–​145; theory of three-​stage development in 138–​139; theory of three unifications and 133–​134, 141 Thucydides 103 Tiantai sect 78–​79 Time and Experience 133 trace interbeing 79 Transcendental Decomposition and Dialectic Integration 113 transcendental freedom 22

Index  175 transcendental logic 20 Two-​Way Evolution 97–​98

Wang Ji 81, 82, 83, 84 Wang Yangming 81, 82, 83, 85

ultimate end of creation 49–​50 universality problem of historical culture 128–​129 universal law 16–​18

Xunzi 138

virtue and happiness 70–​73, 79 Wang Bi 79 Wang Fuzhi 106–​107, 109, 112–​113, 118; on nationality 123–​124 Wang Guowei 154–​155

Yan Fu 97 Yi learning 97 “Yun-​men Three Teachings” 3 Zhang Taiyan 97–​98 Zhang Zai 4, 53, 56 Zhou Dunyi 4 Zhou Dynasty 139, 140 Zhu Xi 4, 81, 114