say. One philosopher believes in repression of the passions, and another believes in
naturalistic abandon, but Tzussu counselled moderation in all things.
Take the question of sexual passion in particular. There are two opposite views of
sexual ethics, one represented by Buddhism and Calvinism, which regard sex as the
culmination of sin, the natural consequence of which is asceticism. The other extreme
is naturalism which glorifies virility, of which many a modern man is a secret follower.
The conflict between these points of view gives the modern man his so-called
restlessness of spirit. The man who tries to take a sane and healthy view of sex as a
normal human passion, like Havelock Ellis, inevitably veers toward the Greek view, which is the humanist view. The Confucian position with regard to sex is that it is a
perfectly normal function, and more than that, it is connected with the perpetuation of
the family and the race. The sanest view of sex I have encountered is that in Tehsao
Paoyen^ an outand-out Confucianist novel, which takes special delight in exposing
the libertinism of the monks, and whose hero, a Confucian superman, goes about
persuading his bachelor bandits and bandit girls to marry and bear children for the
glory of their ancestors. Unlike Chinp' inmei, which is devoted to libertinism, the men
and women in Tehsao Paqyen are decent people, who make ideal husbands and wives.
The only reason why this novel is considered obscene is that the author makes its men
and women go through extremely compromising situations. Yet the total effect is a
convincing argument for marriage and the home, and a glorification of motherhood.
This view of sex is but one manifestation of the entire Confucian theory about
passions, as stated by Tzussu, Confucius's grandson, in Chung Yung (The Golden
Mean), which emphasizes moderation with regard to all the seven passions.
That such an attitude is a difficult thing is well demonstrated by what an Oriental calls
the excesses of Western theories. It is all too easy for man to be enslaved by
nationalism, fascism, socialism or communism, which are all consequences of the
excesses of industrialism, and forget that the state exists for the individual and not the
individual for the state. A communist state in which the human individual is regarded
but as a member of a class or a state organism would at once lose its attractiveness by
the Confucian appeal to the true end of human life. Against all systems as such, the
human individual asserts his right to exist and seek happiness. For more important
than all the political rights is man's right to happiness. A fascist China would have a
hard time persuading the Chinese gentleman that the strength of the nation is more
important than the welfare of the individual. Close observers of the communist state
when it was set up in Kiangse offer as the greatest reason why Communism must fail
in China, in spite of its great superiority over the feudalism of other parts, the fact that
life was too systematized and too inhuman there.
An equally undesirable effect of the Chinese spirit of reasonableness and its
consequent hatred of logical extremes has been that the Chinese, as a race, are unable
to have any faith in a system. For a system, a machine, is always inhuman, and the
Chinese hate anything inhuman. The hatred of any mechanistic view of the law and
government is so great that it has made government by law impossible in China. A
rigorous, harshly legalistic regime, or a really impersonal administration of the law,
has always failed among us. It has failed because it was not liked by the people. The
conception of a government by law was propounded and developed by thinkers in the
third century B.C. It was tried by Shang Yang, a wonderfully efficient administrator,
who helped to build the power of the Gh' in state, but eventually Shang Yang had to
pay for his efficiency with his life. It had worked in Shang Yang's country,
Ch' in, a country with suspicious barbarian elements in Kansu, had enabled that
country to develop a devilishly efficient war machine and conquer the whole of China, and had then died out miserably in two decades when the same type of regime was
applied to the Chinese people en masse. The building of the Great Wall was so
efficient but so inhuman that it cost Ch' in Shih Huang his empire.
On the other hand, the Chinese humanists preached, and the Chinese people have
always been under, a personal government, according to which the deficiencies of a
system, the principle of eking, can always be remedied by "expediency," the principle
of cKuan. Instead of a government by law, they have always accepted a government
by "gentlemen," which is more personal, more flexible and more human. An
audacious idea this 梚 t assumes that there are enough gentlemen to go round ruling
the country! Just as audacious is the assumption of democracy that one can find out
truth by a mechanical count of an odd jumble of opinions of common unthinking men.
Both systems are admittedly imperfect, but the personal system seems always to have
better suited the Chinese humanist temper, Chinese individualism and the Chinese
love of freedom.
This trait, the lack of system, characterizes all our social organizations, our civil
service, our colleges, our clubs, our railways, our steamship companies 梕 verything
except the foreign-controlled Post Office and Maritime Customs 梐 nd the failure
invariably goes back to the intrusion of the personal element, like nepotism and
favouritism. For only an inhuman 'mind, ean unemotional iron face" can brush aside
personal considerations and maintain a rigid system, and such "iron faces" are not in
too great public favour in China, for they are all bad Confucianists. Thus has been
brought about the lack of social discipline, the most fatal of Chinese characteristics.
The Chinese err, therefore, rather on the side of being too human. For to be reasonable
is synonymous with making allowance for human nature. In English, to say to a man,
"Do be reasonable," is the same as making an appeal to human nature as such. When
Doolittle, the father of the flower-girl in Pygmalion^ wants to touch Professor Higgins
for a five-pound note, his appeal is, "Is this reasonable . . . ? The girl belongs to me.
You got her. Where do I come in?" Doolittle further typifies the Chinese humanist
spirit by asking for five pounds and refusing Professor Higgins's ten pounds, for too
much money would make him unhappy, and a true humanist wants money only to be
happy and buy a little drink. In other words, Doolittle was a Confucianist and knew
how to be happy and wanted only to be happy. Through this constant appeal to
reasonableness, the Chinese have developed a capacity for compromise, which is the
perfectly natural consequence of the Doctrine of the Golden Mean. When an English
father is unable to decide whether to send his son to Cambridge or Oxford, he may
end up by sending him to Birmingham. So when the son, starting out from London
and arriving at Bletchley, changes neither to the east for Cambridge, nor to the west
for Oxford, but goes straight north to Birmingham, he is merely carrying out the
Doctrine of the Golden Mean. That road to Birmingham has certain merits. By going
straight north he succeeds in offending neither Cambridge nor Oxford. If one
understands this application of the Doctrine of the Golden Mean, one can understand the whole game of Chinese politics in the last thirty years, and prophesy the outcome
of any Chinese declaration of policy blindfold. One ceases to be frightened by its
literary fireworks.
IV. TAOISM
But has Confucian humanism been sufficient for the Chinese people? It has and it has
not. If it had completely satisfied man's instincts, there would have been no room for
Taoism or Buddhism. The middle-class morality of Confucianism has worked
wonderfully for the common people, both those who wear official buttons and those
who kowtow to them.
But there are people who do not wear or kowtow to the official buttons. Man has a
deeper nature in him which Confucianism does not quite touch. Confucianism, in the
strict sense of the word, is too decorous, too reasonable, too correct. Man has a hidden
desire to go about with dishevelled hair, which Confucianism does not quite permit.
The man who enjoys slightly rebellious hair and bare feet goes to Taoism. It has been
pointed out that the Confucian outlook on life is positive, while the Taoistic outlook is
negative. Taoism is the Great Negation, as Confucianism is the Great Affirmation.
Confucianism, through its doctrine of propriety and social status, stands for human
culture and restraint, while Taoism, with its emphasis on going back to nature,
disbelieves in human restraint and culture.
Of the two cardinal Confucian virtues, benevolence and righteousness, Laotse
contemptuously said: "No character, then benevolence; no benevolence, then
righteousness." Confucianism is essentially an urban philosophy, while Taoism is
essentially rural. A modern Confucianist would take citylicensed pasteurized Grade A
milk, while a Taoist would take fresh milk from the milkman's pail in the country
fashion. For Laotse would have been sceptical of the city licence and pasteurization
and the so-called Grade A, which smells not of the natural cream flavour, but of the
city councillors* ledgers and bankbooks. And who, after tasting the peasant's milk,
can doubt that Laotse was perhaps right? For while your health officers can protect
your milk from typhoid germs, they cannot protect it from the rats of civilization.
There are other deficiencies in Confucianism also. It has too much realism and too
little room for fancy and imagination. And the Chinese are childishly imaginative.
Something of that youthful wonder which we call magic and superstition remains in
the Chinese breast. Confucianism provides for the existence of spirits, but takes care
to keep them at a distance. It recognizes the spirits of the mountains and the rivers,
and even symbolically those of human ancestors, but it has no heaven and hell, no
hierarchy of gods and no cosmogony, and its rationalism shows little interest in magic
and the pill of immortality. Even the realistic Chinese, apart from their rationalistic
scholars, always have a secret desire for immortality. Confucianism has no fairies, while Taoism has. In short, Taoism stands for the childish world of wonder and
mystery for which Confucianism fails to provide.
Taoism, therefore, accounts for a side of the Chinese character which Confucianism
cannot satisfy. There is a natural romanticism and a natural classicism in a nation, as
in an individual. Taoism is the romantic school of Chinese thought, as Confucianism
is the classic school. Actually, Taoism is romantic throughout. Firstly, it stands for the
return to nature and the romantic escape from the world, and revolts against the
artificiality and responsibilities of Confucian culture. Secondly, it stands for the rural
ideal of life, art and literature, and the worship of primitive simplicity. And thirdly, it
stands for the world of fancy and wonder, coupled with a childishly naive cosmogony.
The Chinese have been adjudged a matter-of-fact people. Yet there is a romantic side
to their character which is even deeper, and which shows itself in their intense
individuality, in their love of freedom and their happy-go- lucky view of life, which so
often completely mystifies the foreign observers. For myself, I think the Chinese
people are immeasurably greater for it. In every Chinese there is a hidden vagabond,
with his love of vagabondage. Life under the Confucian code of decorum would be
unbearable without this emotional relief. For Taoism is the playing mood of the
Chinese people, as Confucianism is their working mood. That accounts for the fact
that every Chinese is a Confiicianist when he is successful and a Taoist when he is a
failure. The naturalism of Taoism is the balm that soothes the wounded Chinese soul.
It is interesting to note how Taoism is more the creation of the Chinese people even
than Confucianism and to see how the naturalistic philosophy of Laotse became a llied,
through the working of the folk-mind, with the Chinese interpretation of the world of
spirits. Laotse himself had nothing to do with the pill of immortality or with Taoistic
magic. His was a philosophy of laissez faire in government and naturalism in ethics.
For he believed in a "government which does nothing" as the ideal government. What
man needed was to be let alone in his state of primitive freedom. Laotse regarded
civilization 35 the beginning of man's degeneration, and considered the sages of the
Confucian type as the worst corrupters of the people, as Nietzsche regarded Socrates
as the first corrupter of Europe. With his mordant wit, he said, "Sages no dead,
robbers ao end/'1 His great follower Ghuangtse followed up with brilliant satires
against Confucian hypocrisy and futility.
It was all so easy. For Confucianism, with its emphasis on ceremonialism and anxiety
over the distinctions of mourning periods and the thickness of coffin panels, and with
the intense desire of its followers to seek official positions and save the world, lent
