SOURCE: “Chu Hsi's Ethics: Jen and Ch’eng,” in Journal of Chinese Philosophy, Vol. 14, No. 2, June, 1987, pp. 161-178.

[In the following essay, Borthrong contends that although Chu Hsi's views on ethics have been criticized as unoriginal and derivative, they display an ingenious approach based on the concept of humanity. Borthrong goes on to explore how Chu Hsi's conception of jenand ch’eng contribute to his views on the development of one's full humanity.]

INTRODUCTION

For over a decade Chu Hsi's thought has fascinated me—in a positive sense. I further think that Master Chu deserves to be considered second only to Master K’ung in the entire history of Chinese thought. Yet Chu remains remarkably unknown and understudied in the West—and even until recently relatively unstudied in modern China. That trend is now reversing itself slowly. It would, in itself, be a fascinating study to examine the historical causes for the comparative lack of interest in Chu in the 20th century, both in the East and in the West. The case of China is comparatively clear: Chu is often seen as reparesenting all the negative qualities of China's early modern past. In short, he is the paradigmatic feudal, conservative oppressor of creativity and freedom. Western reactions are perplexing and probably have more to do with the spotty development of Chinese studies in the West than with any intrinsic revulsion to Chu Hsi in particular and to the neo-Confucians in general. One only has to note the veritable renaissance of excellent studies of Wang Yang-ming (and other Ming thinkers) to prove that point. But intellectually no one can today deny the crying need to revisit and re-evaluate Chu Hsi and his monumental intellectual achievement.

Yet there are neglected puzzles within puzzles in the study of Chu Hsi. For instance, why has so little emphasis been placed or research devoted to what Chu himself would have considered the heart of his system: ethical reflection, conduct and its theoretical elaboration? Surely Chu Hsi was an ethicist first and foremost. He was also a subtle cosmologist, classical scholar and a talented bureaucrat. No one would deny these facts for a minute. Perhaps the reason for the undue neglect of Chu's ethical theories can be ascribed to the often heard comments that his ethics were unoriginal, derivitive, stereotyped, in a word, rather dull when compared to his theories of li^a and ch’i^b. On that reading what is interesting in Chu Hsi is not what he would have considered important. Rather Chu is interesting for his metaphysics and cosmology, not for his development of the Confucian ethical notions of jen^c and ch’eng^d.

I have difficulty with this line of reasoning for a number of reasons. The first major objection is actually rather mundane. Given the fact, and we will let it stand for a moment for the sake of argument, that there are no major modern studies of Chu Hsi's ethics, how then can we accept this common criticism that his ethics are derivitive or of secondary intellectual importance? And beyond the lack of studies of Chu Hsi's ethics, we know even less about his Sung predecessors. For instance, and it is another minor scandal, we do not yet have a decent monographic study of Shao Yung or Chang Tsai. And even the literature on Chou Tun-i and the Ch’eng brothers is hardly what one would call voluminous. How we can say Chu Hsi is derivitive when we do not know much about what he is purported to have borrowed? I for one would like to see the evidence prior to accepting the theory.

The second major objection is no doubt related to the first. Would it make one bit of difference if Chu Hsi derived all his ethical theories from earlier Sung thinkers? People have long recognized that Chu's genius in thought came from his re-arrangement and novel modification of previous Confucian conceptuality and sensibilities. His theory of ch’i^b, for instance, clearly owes a huge debt to Chang Tsai; yet the genius of Chu is what he did with an inherited intellectual vocabulary and sensibility. Novelty comes in many forms—not all of them related to the creation of novel intellectual vocabulary. And further, what else could we reasonably expect from a Confucian thinker, someone devoted to a profound veneration of the past? One ought to remember the Confucian burden was often to be creative transmitters rather than solipistic creators of culture. In short, it seems what we really have in Chu Hsi is a case of stunning ‘creative fidelity’ to the Confucian tradition in general and to the Sung era of that tradition in particular. And this ‘creative fidelity’ most certainly includes his ethical reflections as well as his cosmological speculation.

Frankly, as in so many aspects of Chu Hsi's thought, I feel that his ethics is interesting for its re-arrangement and refinement of traditional material. He surely did not invent jen^c and ch’eng^d. Yet his nuanced consideration of these terms is novel and stimulating. We should not let the antiquity of these terms obscure the careful elaboration of jen and ch’eng in his thought. Nor should we forget what Mou Tsung-san has taught us. The genius of Chu's thought depends on a careful analysis of what it means to be human and how to develop this full humanity in an ethical sense. It is indeed a moral cosmology. Mou's massive re-interpretation of the development of Chu's thought focuses our attention yet again on the ethical, moral core of his system. Other areas are important, and here again Mou has instructed a whole generation of scholars, but, to echo St. Paul, without jen^c and ch’eng^d the whole symphony would be empty, vain and dissonant.

The closely linked virtues of jen^c and ch’eng^d represent the apex of Chu Hsi's plan for self-cultivation, and, in a sense, are the twin foci of his whole philosophic enterprise. As symbols of a perfected life, jen and ch’eng represent the hoped-for outcome of life. Structurally, they are more difficult to place. It is clear that they are not specific parts of Chu Hsi's moral anthropology of mind, nature, and feeling or of his meta-system (which resembles most closely the Western notion of cosmology) of li^a, ch’i^b, t’ai-chi^e and ming^f. However, these ethical notions inform all parts of Chu Hsi's system. No notions better express the kind of inner life and outer behavior the Neo-Confucians sought to cultivate. Jen and ch’eng both express most forcefully Chu Hsi's organic vision of the world. Jen, as a supreme ethical goal, demands that a person live a life of deepened intersubjectivity: a person must learn to understand and empathize with his world. But a student on the road to sagehood must do even more, and for this reason, ch’eng is an important notion for Chu Hsi. A person must actively realize jen, which is one way of defining Chu Hsi's understanding of ch’eng.

But why does Chu Hsi seem to employ two terms for supreme exemplification? One is tempted to offer two suggestions. The first is that Chu Hsi was always interested in demonstrating the processive quality of life. By stating that ch’eng is the process by which jen is realized, jen is protected from being interpreted in a static, substantialistic manner. In his own way, Chu Hsi was quite worried about the problem of false reification or substantialization: jen is never a completed thing—it is always a subtly shifting response to the inexhaustible fecundity of tao^g as unceasing creativity. Second, and closely related to the first, was Chu Hsi's desire to highlight the relational traits of the universe. Jen might well be considered the principle of principles that links all the others together in an organic unity. It is a principle of spontaneous mutual empathy that reaches out of itself to another, and Chu Hsi seeks to capture this expansive quality of relationality through his exposition of ch’eng as self-actualization. A person who is fully cultivated realizes that the thrust of being, his or her very essence, is jen, which literally forces respect for others. The essence of self-actualization through self-cultivation issues in the virtue of shared humanity. Metaphorically at least, jen and ch’eng serve to mediate all the various elements of Chu Hsi's system. In doing so, they express his deepest conviction that the world is a process of creativity in which human beings are necessarily related through their common humanity: whether or not he was successful in articulating this vision, Chu Hsi evokes a sense of a moral metaphysics.

Jen and ch’eng can therefore provide a valuable bridge between Chu Hsi's moral anthropology and the other segments of his philosophy. When the student has undergone the arduous process of self-cultivation, from first choosing to establish reverence to the practice of ko-wu^h, certain virtues become manifest. For Chu Hsi, there are two cardinal virtues. We will first discuss jen and then conclude with a discussion of ch’eng.

JEN

Jen is the most famous of the Confucian and Neo-Confucian virtues. As with so many other key terms there have been numerous English translations of jen.¹ But as with the Christian term agape, there is no perfect English equivalent. The word “love” suffers from the problem that the Neo-Confucians were not anxious to identify their favorite ethical norm with the more emotional forms of love. Love is clearly a component of jen, as eros is of agape, but it is not all of what is meant in either case. The most promising translations have been those those that suggest the relationship of jen with humaneness, co-humanity, or humanity itself. These English translations illustrate the Neo-Confucian emphasis on the social nature of jen: virtue is always social and relates to how people choose to live together.²

Ch’en Ch’un, one of Chu Hsi's foremost disciples, in his Pei-hsi tzu-i provides us with an overview of Chu Hsi's understanding of jen. Ch’en's discussion of jen is part of his larger section on the virtues of iⁱ(“justice”), li^j (“ritual”), chih^k (“wisdom”), and hsin^l (“faithfulness”). He is emphatic in stating that these five constants (wu-ch’ang^m) infuse the creative process of the universe and give it ultimate meaning. Each of the virtues corresponds to one of the five phases (wu-hsingⁿ). Among these, jen is the spirit or essense of wood and comes first on Ch’en's list.³ From the point of view of principle, “Jen is the principle of love”.⁴ But this love must be manifested externally, and this is the function of jen. It is the virtue that holds the other four virtues together.⁵ The means by which the human mind sets forth all the heavenly principles is jen. These heavenly principles are always active, constantly productive without cessation, and when we give them a collective title we call them jen. All the other virtues are contained in this “one thread” of jen. If there is a single selfish thought, the heavenly principles are hopelessly separated. Only acting in a jen manner is sufficient to hold all these virtues together.⁶

Ch’en Ch’un points out that, because of its essence as unceasing concern for others, jen must issue forth from the heart in compassionate action. When these seeds of concern are carefully nurtured, they become an expression of the completion of love. Jen is the root of love and compassion is the seed of this root: love in its totality is the exuberant completion of this seed of compassion.⁷ This principle of creativity is lifted up as the one prime characteristic of jen: “Jen is the complete virtue of the mind.”⁸ If the person is not jen, then none of the other virtues will have any meaning. Jen is the principle of constant and unceasing creativity in the mind, which, if it ceased for a moment, would mean the end of true humanity.⁹

Ch’en Ch’un states that one of the great teachings of the Confucian school is to seek jen (ch’iu-jen^o), and that jen encompasses all the good of the world. A person who acts in a jen fashion has jen within him or her. This clear teaching, Ch’en showed, had been lost after Mencius and had not been revived until the two Ch’eng brothers. But even with the teaching of the Ch’engs, the possibility for error was still great, as was graphically illustrated by the mistaken understanding of jen propounded by the students of the Ch’engs. Hsieh Liang-tso (d. c. 1121), for example, spoke of jen in terms of consciousness and fell into the Buddhist interpretation of human nature as pure consciousness. Likewise, Yang Shih's (1053-1135) suggestion that the unity of the myriad things in oneself is the essence of jen was rejected by Ch’en. For Ch’en jen, is prior even to the mystic sense of unity with the world and represents the creativity of the cosmos, not pure non-differentiation.¹⁰

An examination of Chu Hsi's comments on jen in chuan 6 of the dialogues only serves to strengthen the interpretation of jen set forth in Ch’en's treatise.¹¹ Chu Hsi also makes the point that jen is a mediating concept that involves both a normative standard of judgment and the spontaneity of creativity. He says, “Jen has two sides: an aspect of determined action and an aspect of spontaneity.”¹² Any analysis of jen must be predicated on the union or fusion of these two aspects. All natural events and things are shot through and through with patterns that imply ethical judgments. All things have their own standpoints on the world, and hence fit into the larger cosmic pattern which we call the universe.¹³

On balance, Chu Hsi prefers to talk of jen as the unforced aspect of the principle of love. It lacks the element of conscious choice that we would find in shu^p (“reciprocity”).¹⁴ But since all things have their proper correlates, if we have jen we must also have iⁱ (justice). This keeps jen from becoming too subjective, a merely private emotion.¹⁵ Chu Hsi states that k’o-chi fu-li^q (“to discipline the self and return to ritual”) is jen: to like the good and hate the bad is just action.¹⁶ In terms of self-cultivation, jen must be achieved in conjunction with action and self-conscious deliberation.¹⁷Jen is the quality of being well-versed or totally immersed in the effort of self-cultivation.¹⁸ It is the fusion of experiential activity and knowledge. Chu Hsi often uses the term t’i-jen^r (“experiential knowledge”) to express the depth and profundity of the process of jen.¹⁹

CH’ENG

The second important ethical concept expressing perfection for Chu Hsi is ch’eng.^d This is not surprising given the fact that the Chung-yung, which Chu Hsi accepted as the most profound of the Four Books, stresses ch’eng as one of its central messages.²⁰Ch’eng had been a favorite theme of Chu Hsi's Northern Sung predecessors, the most important in this respect being Chang Tsai and Chou Tun-i.²¹ Chu Hsi preserves the old meaning of ch’eng as “sincerity”, but adds new meanings to this important Neo-Confucian concept. For this reason, which will be defended in detail in a moment, ch’eng will usually be translated as “self-realization”.²²

As noted above, the interpretion of ch’eng has a long history in Confucian philosophy, and is found in many texts of the pre-Han period. One text, the Chung-yung, provides Chu Hsi with the beginning point for his reflections on ch’eng. Chu Hsi thought that the Chung-yung was the most important cosmological text of the Confucian canon, and it was on the basis of this text that he developed his mature definition of ch’eng.²³ Not only does the Chung-yung emphasize ch’eng, but it does so in a fashion that situates ch’eng precisely where it would be most useful for Chu Hsi in his complicated system.

Chu Hsi's own commentary on the Chung-yung devotes a great deal of time and space to ch’eng. His discussion of ch’eng is even more intense in his huo-wen^u (“subcommentary”) and in the first six chüan of the dialogues. Furthermore, even though a great deal of his ch’eng theory is connected with his work on the Chung-yung, the concept appears in many other places, too.²⁴

Generally speaking, Chu Hsi defines ch’eng in two ways. The importance of these definitions reverses their historical origins. Chu Hsi concedes that the old meaning of ch’eng as “sincere” is still valid, even though he is more interested in the Neo-Confucian understanding of ch’eng as “self-realization”. The first and older meaning of ch’eng is more specifically ethical: the sincere, the genuine, the true. In short, just the kinds of meanings which would justify the traditional translation of ch’eng as “sincerity”. Chu Hsi holds that this meaning of “sincere” (ch’eng-ch’üeh^v) is a perfectly good one.²⁵ He alludes to the fact that from Han times on the meaning of “sincere” was uppermost in the minds of scholars. While this is a perfectly good meaning in some cases, it hides the real import of ch’eng for the Confucian scholar.

The new emphasis on ch’eng as the realization of the unity of being in perfection is attributed to Ch’eng I. If the post-Han scholars adhered too closely to the old interpretation of ch’eng as “sincere”, there was a danger of over-reacting to this in the Sung. Chu Hsi claimed that ch’eng carries the dual meaning of “sincere” and “self-realization” equally well. According to him, neither is a completely accurate rendering of ch’eng in all cases.²⁶ There can be no self-realization without sincerity, and vice versa.

But there seems to be little doubt that for Chu Hsi the most important meaning of ch’eng has to do with its mediating role in the process of self-cultivation. In his first section on ch’eng in chüan 6 of the dialogues he affirms, “Ch’eng is that which really has principle.”²⁷ Or, as the next section has it, “Ch’eng is solid and real.”²⁸ Or finally, “Ch’eng is principle”.²⁹ The comment on being “solid” or “real” is particularly interesting. As A. C. Graham points out, when Chu Hsi uses this kind of language, he is saying that “solid” subjects are substances or essential parts of an event, while “empty” subjects are the contrasting functional terms. What Chu Hsi is driving at is that in its most essential mode ch’eng provides us with a criterion for knowing when we are in a state of proper ethical harmony.

How can we distinguish ch’eng as a virtue from li as principle? Chu Hsi answers by pointing to the difference between ch’eng and hsing^t (“nature”), which he identifies with principle. Reversing his first definition, he points out that ch’eng is empty or void.

“Nature is real while ch’eng is void. Nature refers to principle; ch’eng refers to perfection. If nature is like this fan, then ch’eng may be compared to this fan being well made.”³⁰

He later maintains that ch’eng is the concept of complete perfection without a flaw.³¹ Chu Hsi is willing to say that the solid is empty and vice versa if the situation demands. This is analogous to his point that jen has both an essential and a functional aspect. Much the same can be said about ch’eng, even though the terminology is different in both cases. If jen is the core of Chu Hsi's ethical thinking, ch’eng is the element which gives it a certain solidity and depth of meaning.

This is clear again when Chu Hsi distinguishes ch’eng from reverence. The distinction is made during a discussion of the point with a group of his disciples. The disciples respond to his question about the difference between ch’eng and reverence by quoting Ch’eng I's statement that ch’eng means to will one thing without error or improper deviation. Chu agrees, but goes on to say that reverence means not being disrepectful, while ch’eng is the action of not disregarding one's conscience.³² Even later, he paraphrases Ch’eng I to the effect that to be firmly established in a unitary fashion is reverence while “the unity itself is ch’eng.”³³ Here, Chu Hsi obviously means to equate reverence systematically with kung^w (“respectfulness”) and ch’eng with the normative state of being a sage. Ch’eng represents not just the manifestation of virtue, but also symbolizes the principle informing perfected ethical action.

When the sage is surely an exemplary person, the model is one that we can all theoretically realize. The distinction is made clear when Chu Hsi discusses the difference between ch’eng and hsin^l (“faithfulness”). Ch’eng is the self-determinate realization of jen in perfection, while hsin is the realization of virtue in a partial manner. By this Chu means that hsin is the activity that makes complete the effort of self-cultivation in jen.³⁴

He further states that ch’eng is the way of Heaven and hence the sage's true faithfulness towards the creative mind of Heaven. In the sage, hsin becomes ch’eng. The sage is therefore the actual connective link between Heaven and Earth. The faithfulness of common men and women can only be called hsin in a partial sense, and cannot be univocally equated with ch’eng in the full sense of jen as an all-encompassing sagely virtue.³⁵

This sense of ch’eng as a full or complete state is emphasized by Chu Hsi's comment on its relation to chung (“steadfastness”). He says that “Ch’eng refers to the complete essence of the mind, while chung refers to its responding to events and coming into contact with things.”³⁶ Chu Hsi indicates that ch’eng points to a fullness or perfection of the process of self-determination. The natural and spontaneous achievement of ch’eng is the preserve of the profound person. But there is an effort that can lead ordinary people to ch’eng. Chu Hsi holds that those who do not innately realize the perfection of the sage must select the good in order to comprehend the perfection of li^a. This is the concerned effort of ch’eng which is possible for the normal person seeking sagehood.³⁷

Ch’en Ch’un's treatise adds a few points to Chu Hsi's view. Ch’eng as an ethical term most closely resembles chung^x and hsin^l.³⁸ But the special characteristic of ch’eng is that it points to its own self-determinate realization. Ch’eng is securely part of the fundamental activity of the way of Heaven. Ch’en notes that Chu Hsi makes an important addition to one of Ch’eng I's definitions of ch’eng. While Ch’eng defined ch’eng as the “non-false”, Chu Hsi added the following phrase: “The true and the non-false is what is called ch’eng.”³⁹ What is true is ethically good and what is non-false will not mislead us in our dealings with other people. The content of what we discover in wisdom reflects back on the method of discovery and the actions we take in light of this self-consciousness.

Ch’en Ch’un goes on to emphasize another aspect of ch’eng which had not yet been adequately covered. How does ch’eng relate to the becoming or growth of any object or event? Ch’en writes that while ch’eng is part of the normative side of Chu Hsi's system, it also carries a dynamic quality. Ch’eng is the decree of the Way.⁴⁰ It is a mandate to action as well as a description of that action.

Ch’en Ch’un does not forget, however, the purely ethical dimension of ch’eng. Ch’eng manifests itself in a person through activity seeking the good as its goal.⁴¹ He concludes the last part of his discussion of ch’eng by quoting the term ch’eng-chih^y (“to have the disposition to Ch’eng”) in the Chung-yung. Ch’eng-chih is the effort men make to live according to moral principle. “The myriad principles all achieve their complete genuineness without one iota of vacuous deceit. Only that can they deserve [to be called ch’eng].”⁴²

The last set of meanings for ch’eng deals with it as the beginning and end of a thing, a metaphor taken from section 25 of the Chung-yung.⁴³ The self-creation of humanity is like the organic unity of a tree. The perfection of the whole is related to the interaction of the various limbs, branches, roots, and leaves. Just as in a tree there is an organic unity, a human being is also a whole, a living unity of the various senses and bodily limbs.

All proceed from the natural self-determination of that particular object, the actualization of its own nature. Here again, the spontaneous order of the universe is involved along with the normative pattern of human relations that this pattern implies. Tzu-jan^z (“the spontaneous”) and tang-jan^aa (“the normative”) find their essential unity in ch’eng.⁴⁴

But ch’eng is not just a term for the unitary state of self-realization, it is also one element in the process of selection. It is the explanation of why there is a certain particularity to any object or event. As Chu Hsi puts it: “When a man is alive, he embodies this principle, and at the time of death, this principle is scattered.”⁴⁵ Using Mencius at this point, he shows how the way of Heaven and the way of Man are related in ch’eng.

Ch’eng is the way of Heaven. Ch’eng is principle which is self-determination without being falsely ordered. How to realize ch’eng is the way of Man. It is to carry out this real principle and therefore to make an effort to realize it. Mencius said: ‘All things are complete in us’—this is ch’eng. [There is no greater delight] than to be conscious of ch’eng upon self-examination’—this is how to realize ch’eng. Self-examination is merely to seek in oneself. Ch’eng refers to the fact that all things are complete.⁴⁶

A certain triadic structure is clear. There is the way of Heaven, the way of humanity and their mediation through the process of ch’eng ending in jen. As in so many other cases, Chu Hsi frames his philosophy in a triadic structure.

Fan Shou-k’ang, in his study of Chu Hsi's philosophy, points out that a person is modeled on the creative order of the Way as expressed ideally by ch’eng. The essence of the Way includes the principle of jen.⁴⁷ As Chu Hsi says in his commentary on Chou Tun-i's Diagram of the Supreme Ultimate: “Ch’eng is the foundation of the profound person, the beginning and end of things, and the Way of the Decree.”⁴⁸ As with all of Chu Hsi's key concepts, none can be understood without reference to their context with the whole of his thought. Ch’eng, as the last quotation indicates, directs our attention to the profound person in action, the things of the world, and to the normative order that decrees these interrelated components to be the way they are. Chu Hsi never varies his triadic formulation of his key principles. The actual manifestation of virtue in the sage is no exception to the general rule.

CONCLUSION

In the necessarily broad ambit of comparative ethics, what can we say about Chu Hsi's contribution? I would suggest three short, and yet hopefully, proleptic comments. First, it seems that Chu Hsi clearly stands firmly within the Confucian mainline. Both his ideas and lifestyle indicate a location more towards the conservative than the radical end of the spectrum. For instance, Chu is certainly more ‘conservative’ than Ho Hsin-yin or Li Chih, just to mention two ‘radical’ late Ming thinkers. He is also less daring than Wang Yang-ming. But we should also keep in mind that the relative lack of an exciting personal life does not mean a concomitant lack of intellectual creativity. The term ‘creative fidelity’ probably quite accurately describes Chu Hsi's life and thought. Balance and integrity are other tags which easily also come to mind. Chu was no martyr but he likewise was no coward either.

Second, in that perennial pan-Asian debate between the ‘gradual’ and the ‘sudden,’ Chu Hsi is definitely identified with the ‘gradual’ approach to ethics. Nor is this at all surprising given his preference for the Confucian image of sagehood as a human ideal of conduct. Other religious sensibilities suggest other models, for instance that of the saint, who might well be inclined toward a more dramatic, ‘sudden’ vision of the culmination of life. Be that as it may, Chu himself opted for achieving the arduous, difficult and lengthy process of Confucian sagehood. His Tao^g was, whatever else, long and strenuous, but not impossible. Chu's ‘gradual’ ethics are positive and directed towards the evocation of a harmonious, balanced and ultimately sagely pattern (li^a) of human life.

Third, and this is probably the most difficult characterization, Chu Hsi, in a global context, represents axiological and ‘processive’ sensibilities. His thought is resolutely axiological because all of its aspects are based on a profound concern for values—normative, harmonious and demanding. The decree of heaven (t’ien-ming^ab) both commands us to be something definite and also leaves open the future for our own choice as how to achieve some definite form of the tao^g. Chu's vision is ‘processive’ in that it is open ended, never static, never completed. History taught Chu that there are always new questions to be answered. The Confucian cumulative tradition provides resources and guidelines for approaching these questions, yet the person must creatively respond to the process in order to achieve the human good.

This third characterization is truly difficult. We are just beginning to develop a golobal vocabulary for discussing adequately comparative issues. Given Chu Hsi's pre-eminent place in the Chinese and entire East Asian tradition he certainly merits our careful attention in this new and vital undertaking. And finally we would be remiss if Chu's ethics were omitted from our broader comparative efforts.

Notes

1. For a historical study of jen see Wing-tsit Chan. ‘The Evolution of the Confucian Concept of Jen,” Philosophy East and West (January 1955): 295-319.

2. One of the more interesting treatments of the religious nature of the Confucian tradition has been suggested by Herbert Fingarette. For his interpretation of jen see Herbert Fingarette, Confucius: The Secular as Sacred (New York: Harper & Row, Publishers, 1972), pp. 37-56.

3. PHTI 1:22a.

4. PHTI 1:22b.

5. Hsinl (“faithfulness”) also has a synthetic quality for Chu Hsi. CTYLTC 1:351 (6:5a).

6. PHTI 1:22b-23a.

7. PHTI 1:23b.

8. PHTI 1:26B.

9. Of course Ch’en also draws all sorts of analogies between jen and the other virtues and to various-phenomena and to the process of yin and yang. Jan and i are equated with the spring and summer months, and by extension, to the yang powers of those seasons. PHTI 1:26a-27A.

10. PHTI 1:31a-32a.

11. CTYLTC 1:356-93 (6:7b-26a).

12. CTYLTC 1:372 (6:15b).

13. CTYLTC 1:372-73 (6:15b-16a).

14. CTYLTC 1:379 (6:19a).

15. CTYLTC 1:390-91 (6:24b-25a).

16. CTYLTC 1:388 (6:23b).

17. CTYLTC 1:379 (6:19a).

18. CTYLTC 1:376 (5:17b).

19. CTYLTC 1:376-77 (6:17b-18a). Mou Tsung-san devotes the whole central section of volume 3 of Mind and Nature to the problem of jen in Chu Hsi's Jen-shuo (Treatise on Jen), HTHT 3:229-447. The text of the Jen-shuo is on pages 234-246. As Tu Wei-ming has pointed out, Mou provides us with a character by character reading of this crucial text. According to Mou, this text represents Chu Hsi's thought and debates with the Hu Hung school sometime during his forty-third year (3:229). From age forty to forty-three Chu Hsi was struggling with the problem of chung-ho^s and moving on to a critique of the Hu school's concept of jen. Mou outlines this position on pages 231-232, and goes on to demonstrate that Chu Hsi followed Ch’eng I in all important details.

    Mou hammers away at his main contention that Chu Hsi really does not have a Mencian theory of the morally transcendent mind, but merely relies on the cognitive powers of the mind to define it (p. 243). After defining Chu Hsi's usages, (pp. 244-245), Mou goes on to prove that whereas Chu Hsi may use language similar to the Mencian mainline, he actually has a different set of values in mind (pp. 245ff). On page 270 he assents that jen for Chu Hsi is just principle which he takes to be an abstraction, and not a mode of determination of true being. On page 277 he argues that Chu Hsi was, by implication, an epistemologist and not a moral metaphysician in the orthodox sense of Ch’eng Ming-tao and Hu Hung. By page 279, after defining in English what he takes to be sound Confucian doctrine, he points out that Chu Hsi had an external view of reality that effectively blocked him from the ontological transcendent powers of the mind. All kinds of evils spring form these initial errors. On page 322, Mou shows that Chu Hsi has a passive concept of knowledge and consciousness befitting his reliance on the external world for principle (see also page 352). The objective viewpoint is ontological while the subjective makes for a defintion of t’ai-chi^e (“the Supreme Ultimate”) which lacks any reference to true “active reason.” While this is not the end of the critique, on pages 383-384 Mou even points out the similarities of Chu Hsi's position with that of Hsun-tzu. This is truly a case of guilt by association.

    Suffice it to say that one can agree with Mou that Chu Hsi was trying to do certain things which indicate an interest in epistemology, but it is another thing entirely to then say that this interest keeps Chu Hsi from developing a sound moral metaphysics.

20. This point is amply documented in Wu I, Chung-yung ch’eng tzu te yen-chiu [The Concept of Ch’eng in the Chung-yung] (Taipei: n.p., 1972), pp. 27-39. For further support of this interpretation see Tu Wei-ming, Centrality and Commonality: An Essay On Chung-yung (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1976), pp. 106-141.

21. For a study of Chou Tun-i's use of ch’eng see Chow Yih-ching, La Philosophie Morale dans le Néo-confucianisme (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1954), pp. 104-126. See also T’ang Chun-i, Chung-kuo che-hsueh yuan lun: Yuan Chiao P’ien [Fundamental exposition of Chinese Philosophy: Education] (Knowloon, Hong Kong: New Asia Research Institute, 1968), pp. 70-75, where he points out the importance of ch’eng in the philosophy of Chang Tsai.

22. See infra p. 139, n. 3.

23. Mou Tsung-san, Chung-kuo che-hsueh te t’e-chih [Special Characteristios of Chinese Philosophy] (Taipei: Student Book Co, 1974), p. 52, states that the Chung-yung, along with the I-Ching, represents the cosmological approach in early Confucian philosophy. Mou argues that the Chung-yung uses the concept of ch’eng to define hsing^t (“human nature”). Ch’eng is the nature as the “flowing decree of Heaven,” which is the creative principle of the way (p. 53). See also HTHT 1:19-42.

24. CTYLTC 1:353 (6:6a).

25. CTYLTC 1:350 (6:4b).

26. CTYLTC 1:350 (6:4b).

27. CTYLTC 1:349 (6:4b).

28. CTYLTC 1:349 (6:4b).

29. CTYLTC 1:350 (6:4b).

30. CTYLTC 1:350 (6:4b); A.C. Graham, Two Chinese Philosophers: Ch’eng Ming-tao and Ch’eng Yi-ch’uan (London: Lond Humphries, 1958), p. 67, points out that the “solid” words often indicate substances while “empty” words indicate qualities or states of being.

31. CTYLTC 4:3311 (64:17a); CTHHA 2:414.

32. CTYLTC 1:350 (6:4b).

33. CTYLTC 1:352 (6:5a).

34. Cf Tu Wei-ming, “Confucian Perception of Adulthood,” Daedalus (Spring 1976), pp. 109-123.

35. CTYLTC 1:351 (6:5a).

36. CTYLTC 1:352 (6:5b).

37. CTHHA 2:410 CTYLTC 4:3288-89 (64:5b-6a).

38. PHTI 1:34b.

39. PHTI 1:40b.

40. PHTI 1:41a-b.

41. PHTI 1:41b-42a.

42. PHTI 1:42b.

43. Chung-yung, p. 17b. SPPY ed.

44. CTYLTC 4:3313 (64:18a).

45. CTYLTC 4:3315 (64:19a).

46. CTYLTC 4:3287-88 (64:5a-b); James Legge, trans., The Chinese Classics, 5 vols. (Hong Kong University Press, 1970), 2:450-451.

47. Fan Shou-K’ang, Chu-tzu chi ch’i che-hsueh [Chu Hsi and His Philosophy] (Taiwan: K’ai-min shu-chu, 1964), p. 128.

48. Chow, La Philosophic Morale, pp. 155, 210.

Abbreviations

CTHHA Ch’ien Mu. Chu-tzu hsin hsueh-an [A New Study of Chu Hsi]. 5 vols. Taiwan: San Min Shu-chu, 1971.

CTYLTC Li Ching-te (Fl.1263), ed. Chu-tzu yu-lei ta-ch’uan [The Dialogues of Chu Hsi]. 8 vols. Tokyo: n.p., 1973.

HTHT Mou Tsung-San. Hsin-t’i yu hsing-t’i [Mind and Nature]. 3 vols. Taiwan: Chen-Chung Shu-Chu, 1968-1969.

PHTI Ch’en Ch’un (1159-1227). Pei-hsi tzu-i [Pei-hsi's Glossary]. Hsi Yin Hsuan Ts’ung-shu ed., 1840.

SPPY ed. Su-pu pei-yao ed.