4 Evils of Government
Confucius was asked by Zizhang, one of his younger disciples, what a man must be like to be suitable for a government post. It’s a good question with an appropriately Confucian emphasis: getting yourself right before attempting to rule others. Somewhat gnomically, Confucius replies that that the key is to respect the five ‘beautiful traits’ and to avoid the four ‘abhorrent ones’ (or the ‘four evils’). After a discussion of the beautiful traits, Zizhang asks for the bad ones.
7 Feelings of Cheng Yi
feelings of Cheng Yi 7 Feelings are problem for the Neo-Confucian, Cheng Yi. In his view, these seven feelings have the power to corrupt people’s original purity if allowed free rein. Even though human nature starts off pure, the social world that we inhabit corrupts it. The task we all face, therefore, is the endless struggle of protecting this tender shoot of goodness from the onslaught of life at large. This list of seven feelings is an interesting departure from notions more familiar to the Western reader, such as the Seven Deadly [...]
6 Schools of Sima Tan
Sima Tan (司馬談) 165-110 BC was a grand historiographer and astrologer of the Western Han dynasty, who classified the philosophy of his time into six main traditions. Of the six, Sima Tan favoured Daoism as the one school among them with the breadth of thought to encompass the others.
4 Books of Zhu Xi
Zhu Xi (1130-1200) was a Confucian scholar of the Southern Song (1127-1276). Incredibly learned and prolific, he ushered in a Neo-Confucian revival. His commentaries on the Four Books, which he singled out as the core classics of the Confucian canon, became prescribed reading for government officials.
