Xunzi, also known as Qing, was a native of Zhao at the end of the Warring States Period. His date of birth and death is unknown, about one hundred years later than Mencius. When Xunzi was fifty years old, he began to study in Qi. During the reign of King Xiang of Qi, he drank three sacrifices, but was slandered by Qi people and went to Qi. Chu Xiangchun named him Lanling (now Lanling Town, southwest of Cangshan Mountain, Shandong Province). After Chun was killed, he abandoned Lanling. In his later years, he "died of thousands of words" (Biography of Historical Records Mencius and Xun Qing). Li Si and Han Fei are both students of Xunzi.
Xunzi is another master of Confucianism after Confucius and Mencius, who is proficient in poetry, etiquette, Yi, Spring and Autumn Period. Xunzi's thought is the product of the development of the times. At the end of the Warring States period, the feudal relations of production were basically established. After a long-term annexation war, it has become the requirement of the times to end the vassal regime and establish a unified centralized country. At this time, academic thoughts also tend to absorb and integrate from the contention of a hundred schools of thought. Xunzi adapted to the requirements of the times, critically absorbed the strengths of various schools and accepted the ideas of Confucianism, Taoism, Mohism and Law, and became a comprehensive thinker at the end of the Warring States Period. Looking at Xunzi, his thoughts are profound and rich, covering nature, society, philosophy, politics, economy, military affairs, literature and other aspects. It is a monument in the history of China's thoughts.
Xunzi is an outstanding progressive thinker, which is prominently manifested in his views on the nature of the universe. In the philosophy of the pre-Qin era, Confucianism believed that "heaven" was the master of all things in the universe with will and spirit, and man's fate was decided by heaven. Both Confucius and Mencius believe that "there is life and death, and wealth is in the sky." On the basis of sharply criticizing this idealistic theory of heaven and man, Xunzi absorbed the Taoist view of heaven and man, but abandoned the passive inaction of Laozi and Zhuangzi and boldly put forward the materialistic view of nature of "tomorrow's difference between people" (heaven theory). He believes that "the sky will always be there, not for Yaocun, not for Wu Jie." Governance should be good, chaos should be fierce "(ibid.). Heaven is a nature without will and purpose. It has its own operating rules, regardless of individual will. Social chaos and the rise and fall of a country are all caused by politics and have nothing to do with heaven. Therefore, Xunzi put forward the slogan of "controlling the destiny and using it", arguing that as long as people exert their subjective initiative and understand and master the laws of nature, they can transform and utilize nature. He said, "Think about it in the sky, which one is made of things and animals? It is better to praise it from the sky than to control fate and use it? Look forward to it and make it in time? " (ditto) Xunzi's brilliant proposition that "man can conquer nature" is undoubtedly of epoch-making revolutionary significance in the history of China's thought.
Xunzi's view of nature is reflected in the theory of human nature, forming his "theory of evil nature", which is an important cornerstone of Xunzi's philosophical thought. Xunzi criticized the "theory of goodness of human nature" of Mencius' innate moral view, and put forward the "distinction between nature and falsehood" on the basis of "the distinction between heaven and man". He believes that human nature is "solid and rough" ("evil nature"), which is not what Mencius said, but evil and full of desire for material desires. People's good behavior is the result of human efforts. "human nature is evil, and good people are false" (ibid.). Although human nature cannot be changed, it can be changed. Xunzi advocated "turning nature into falsehood". He said: "People who are also human beings can't do anything, but they can change" (Confucian effect), which requires people to constantly learn and practice to change their evil human nature and realize "false nature" (Book of Rites). Based on this, Xunzi put forward the famous "People who paint can be worried" ("Theory of Evil Nature"), thinking that people can become people like Yu as long as they keep "accumulating fakes". Xunzi's theory of evil nature demonstrates the problem of human nature from another angle, which is of positive and progressive significance. However, he divorced from human social attributes and only talked about human nature from the perspective of natural biology, which did not fundamentally solve the essential problem of human nature and was an abstract theory of human nature.
Xunzi put forward his own political theory based on the theory of evil nature. Xunzi's political ideal is to establish a centralized country that is "cosmopolitan" (Wang Zhi) and "one country in the world" (Wang Ba). "Long ceremony" and "attaching importance to law" are the core contents of his political theory. Xunzi believes that etiquette can restrain people's lust and consciously restrain people's behavior. It is not only an ethical hierarchy that makes "the rich and the poor are equal, the young and the old are different, and the rich and the poor are famous" (a rich country), but also the foundation and the highest political program of governing the country. "The ceremony is extremely distinguished, the foundation of a strong country, and the way of power." (on soldiers) "The people's destiny lies in heaven, and the country's destiny lies in ceremony" ("Power"). Ceremony is very important, which is related to the survival of the country. Only a long ceremony can govern the country. Etiquette is the foundation of governing the country and the people, and law is an indispensable means. Xunzi advocated paying equal attention to etiquette and law to govern the country, allowing virtuous people to do whatever they want, and rewarding them with heavy penalties. In the method of governing the country, Xunzi did not attach importance to kingliness, meanness and hegemony like Mencius, but attached equal importance to Wang Ba, thinking that the two were just different levels. At the same time, Xunzi criticized Mencius' retro thought that "law precedes king" and words must be called "three kings", and clearly put forward that "law should be king after all", "Wang Zhidao should be king after all" ("meticulous") and "law should be king after all" ("Confucian effect"), emphasizing that we should examine the past history from real life instead of blindly worshiping the past. Economically, Xunzi advocated the idea of "taking agriculture as the foundation, increasing revenue and reducing expenditure, saving money and enriching the people, and getting rich from top to bottom".
Xunzi's epistemology is based on the progressive view of nature and occupies an important position in the history of philosophy. He opposed Mencius' thoughts of "conscience", "virtue" and "everything is ready" and inherited Confucius' epistemological thought of "learning and knowing". Xunzi first affirmed that people have the ability to know things, and objective things can be known. "Anyone who knows is a human being; You can know the reason of things "("Revealing the Secret "). He believes that people can acquire rich knowledge through continuous hard study and practice and relying on external objective conditions. So how do people know things? Xunzi believes that the process of human cognition has to go through two stages: the celestial officials' understanding of things and the mind's seeking knowledge (rectification), that is, the various sensory organs of human beings (celestial officials) first make extensive contact with external things, and then seek knowledge from the mind, that is, analyze and synthesize the various phenomena obtained, so as to get a comprehensive understanding. He warned people to prevent all kinds of one-sidedness in the process of understanding, and to overcome "one song covers all, Dali is black" ("uncovering the cover"). Xunzi paid special attention to the role of "behavior", emphasizing that it is not enough for people to know only "knowledge", and "behavior" is the destination and end point of knowledge. Xunzi's view of the unity of knowledge and action is of far-reaching significance in the history of philosophy.
Related to Xunzi's epistemology is his logical thought of rectifying the name. At the end of the Warring States period, there was a trend of thought in the society, and all factions joined in this big discussion, and Xunzi also actively participated in this debate. In view of the situation that "there is no sage, but the name is slow, and the name is confused by strange words" (Correcting the name) and "being good at correcting the name" (ibid.), Xunzi put forward his own thought of correcting the name on the basis of Confucius' theory of "the name is not correct but the word is not smooth": "Therefore, the name of the king should be restrained, the name should be distinguished and the Tao should be consistent. He thinks that the ruler can unify the people's thoughts and make them obey the laws by being worthy of the name. Xunzi mainly analyzed from three aspects: the reason for naming is "naming to refer to the reality", "the upper level names clearly, and the lower level distinguishes differences" (ibid.), and naming is a major event related to the country's chaos control, "becoming famous in one fell swoop" (ibid.); Synonyms are formulated on the basis of "predestined officials", and predestined officials must contact with their respective objects, and then prove with heart that "this predestination is also based on similarities and differences" (ibid.); The naming of the name is "established by convention", but it should be "decided by facts" and "the fulcrum of this system is also very important" (ibid.). A set of logic theories founded by Xunzi made great contributions to the development of China's ancient logic thought.
In literature and art, Xunzi has also made great achievements. Xunzi is an excellent essayist at first. He advocated that the article should be literary, pay attention to the tempering of language, "language and the like, Mu Mu and Huang Huang" (Outline), pay attention to the combination of literature and quality, and "combine arts and sciences to match their appearance" (Book of Rites). Xunzi emphasized that "words must be reasonable" (the influence of Confucianism), and the language and characters must conform to the etiquette and justice, which created the literary criticism of "taking Ming Dow as the text" in later generations. Xunzi's prose not only inherited the characteristics of strong logic and tight structure of Mozi's prose, but also made new explorations in system and skills, and developed the quotations from Confucius and Mencius' prose into independent long monographs, which made important contributions to the development of pre-Qin philosophers' prose. Xunzi's prose is clear in context, good at argumentation, rigorous in argumentation, magnificent in momentum, good in metaphor and beautiful in writing. Being good at comparison is one of the most striking features of his prose. For example, in the article Encouraging Learning, five metaphors are used at the beginning to demonstrate the importance of acquired learning, which is vivid and logical. Later, it discusses the importance of concentration and consistency in learning, using eight metaphors and combining comparison, repeatedly demonstrating from two sides and analyzing layer by layer, which is very infectious. Such analogy, analogy and introductory link are everywhere in Xunwen. In addition, Xunzi often uses rhetorical devices such as parallelism and antithesis to make his articles magnificent, full of rhythm and beauty. Regarding the characteristics of Xunzi's articles, Guo Moruo made a high evaluation: "Xunzi's articles are quite rich ... He is a thinker who is good at literature and art. Among the pre-Qin philosophers, Monk and Zhuang Zhou can rank third, and Han Fei, who is said to be his disciple, can also be called four pillars. The sharpness of Mongolian, the arrogance of Wen Zhuang, the profundity of Xunwen and the rigor of Korean are really worlds apart. " ("Ten Criticism Books, Criticism of Xunzi")
Xunzi is also an excellent lyricist. His Xiang Xiang and Fu are pure literary works in a strict sense, which have an important position in the history of literature. Xiangcheng is a rhyme expressing Xunzi's political thoughts in the form of folk popular literature, and a political lyric poem expressing his inner resentment. The so-called "sound" refers to an ancient percussion instrument, and "sound" is a literary style of singing while playing. Its sentence patterns are neat and diverse, mainly composed of three sentences, four sentences and seven sentences, each of which rhymes and is catchy to read. Some people think that it is the ancestor of Tanci (called Lu). The article Xiangcheng directly influenced the appearance of seven-character poems in later generations, and its long and short sentence patterns also had an important impact on the development of prose in later generations. Xunzi's Fu is the earliest article named Fu, which occupies an important position in the development history of Fu. The full text expresses Xunzi's political ideal and social dissatisfaction in the form of five poems, one poem and one ditty, such as Li, Zhi, Yun, Silkworm and Zhen. These five compositions are all in the form of questions and answers. The first part is the description of things, similar to riddles, and the second part is the sentence pattern of rhetorical parallelism, stating the efficacy and reasons of such things, and finally revealing the mystery. Fu's language is simple, plain and elegant, and its description is vivid, which is the first time for future generations to praise things and small fu. His writing style of expressing ambition with things and satirizing the world with things has great inspiration for later generations.
As an outstanding philosopher, Xunzi's thought had a far-reaching influence on later progressive thinkers. For example, in the Eastern Han Dynasty, Wang Chong's thought of "harmony between heaven and earth" and "on nature", in the Tang Dynasty, Liu Zongyuan's thought of "those who make contributions should make contributions, and those who suffer disasters should make their own contributions" (Tian Shuo), Liu Yuxi's thought of "harmony between heaven and man" (theory of heaven), and Wang Fuzhi's thought of "sage's ambition is better than heaven" in the early Qing Dynasty. In addition, a large number of writers in later generations also drew rich nutrition from Xunzi's prose. The political essays of Jia Yi and Chao Cuo in the early Han Dynasty were obviously influenced by Xun Wen, and the essays of Liu Zongyuan, Liu Yuxi and Wang Anshi in the Tang Dynasty also had the style of Xun Zi's prose.
However, Xunzi is a controversial figure in history. Originally, Xunzi stood at the height of the times and criticized and summarized the views of various factions. His thoughts have distinct characteristics of the times. Although Confucianism is a Sect, he has developed and reformed Confucianism with the characteristics of the times and has obvious progress. However, at that time, Xunzi was "famous far and wide, his disciples were unprofessional and brilliant" (Wen Yao language), which was not valued by people. His criticism of Meng Si School and his theory of evil nature also aroused the dissatisfaction of post-Confucianism, and some even classified him as a Legalist. Therefore, although Xunzi and Mencius are both great scholars, they are far from being treated as Mencius, and later generations have different opinions on him.
In the Western Han Dynasty, Xunzi's influence was not as good as Mencius', but his position was comparable to Mencius'. On the whole, Xunzi and Mencius respected each other. Sima Qian combined Xunzi and Mencius into Mencius and Biographies of Xun Qing in Historical Records, believing that both of them inherited Confucius' career. Liu Xiangzai's new book "Xu Lu" said that Dong Zhongshu had "written beautiful books" and thought that only Xun and Meng respected Confucius among his contemporaries. Sima Qian and Liu Xiang played a positive role in promoting the development of Xunxue. In the Eastern Han Dynasty, Xunzi's position was not as good as Mencius'. Yang Xiong especially praised Mencius, but only downplayed Xunzi's "Alien Family" (Fa Yan Gentleman). Although not derogatory, his attitude towards Xunzi and Mencius is different. By the time Wang Chong wrote Lun Heng, Xunzi's position was lower than Mencius'. Xunzi has attracted the attention of the world since the Tang Dynasty. When Han Yu read Xunzi, he thought Xunzi was "full of alcohol but lacking in defects" and "different from Confucius". Although it is not as good as Mencius who is full of alcohol, he is basically sure of Xunzi. Yang Jian commented on Xunzi for the first time, thinking that it "incarnated the Six Classics and glorified Confucius" and gave a high evaluation. At the same time, Liu Zongyuan, Liu Yuxi, Du Mu and others all contributed to the popularization of Xunxue. During the Song and Ming Dynasties, because Xunzi's thought was incompatible with the theory of Neo-Confucianism, Neo-Confucianism rejected him greatly, thinking that he had lost his "great book" (Cheng Yi's words) and "all applied for North Korea" (Zhu's words), and Xunzi was put in the cold shoulder. In the middle and late Ming dynasty, with the liberation of thought, Xunzi was released from the cold palace and overturned his case. Gui Youguang, for example, fully affirmed Xunzi. He said: "When the Warring States was in full swing, hundred schools of thought wrote books and said that the world was in chaos. Xun Qing is the only one who knows the way of Zhongni and keeps pace with Mencius. Considering that it is a calligrapher's style, the text is rich, the primers are linked and there are many exaggerations, so it is impossible to be flawless. When it is fine, Mencius cannot be born. " ("Xunzi Xulu") Li Zhi, a master of thought, also praised Xunzi: "Xunzi and Mencius are the beauty of learning, and their writing style is more outstanding, so they are more accessible and not pedantic." (Biography of Xun Qing) Both of them thought that Xunzi's achievements were not inferior to Mencius', and even surpassed Mencius' in some places, and they spoke highly of him. With their efforts, Xunzi gradually attracted the attention of the world. In the Qing Dynasty, Neo-Confucianism declined, and Xunzi gradually attracted the attention of the world. Especially in Ganjia period, Xunzi made great achievements in collating and collating, and Xunzi entered a prosperous period as a toddler. At the end of the Qing Dynasty, due to political reasons, some people criticized Xunzi, and even said that "Xunzi studied for two thousand years and was homesick" (Tan Sitong's Benevolence), but Xunzi's research never stopped.
There is little controversy about the author of Xunzi. It is generally believed that most chapters of Xunzi were written by Xunzi, and only a few chapters were compiled by Xunzi's students or disciples. Liang Qichao and Guo Moruo believe that eight articles in Xunzi, such as Gentleman, Compendium, Zuo Zuo, Zi Dao, Fa Xing, Wen Yao and Zhong Ni, were not written by Xunzi, but by his disciples or descendants. As for the number of articles in Xunzi, there is no test today. During the Western Han Dynasty, Liu Xiang proofread 322 works by Sun Qing, which were named Sun Qingxin's Book. Tang Yang Xu divided the thirty-two articles into twenty volumes, slightly adjusted the order, and made notes for them, and named them Xun Qingzi. Since then, Yang's annotated version of Xunzi has been widely circulated around the world and has become the final version. There are many achievements in the study of Xunzi in Qing Dynasty, among which the most representative ones are Lu's Xunxue, Xun Zhu, Xun Tong Shuo, Xun Bu and Wang Niansun's Reading Xunzi Magazine. Wang Xianqian's Notes on Xunzi in the late Qing Dynasty is the most perfect and detailed annotation of Confucianism in the Qing Dynasty, which is a masterpiece of many schools. Liang Qixiong's Annotation of Xunzi, Zhang Shitong's Annotation of Xunzi and Zhang Jue's Annotation of Xunzi have their own characteristics, which are good notes for understanding Xunzi's thoughts.