A Sight Into Chen Daqi's Study On Confucius, Mencius And Xunzi

Chen Daqi, a contemporary philosopher, who studied from psychology, Lize(logic) to Chinese philosophy, especially on the thought of Confucius, Mencius and Xunzi. The author mainly put her explorations on Chen Daqi's thinking of Yi(the Right) which he took as the"core of core"in Confucius's thought and which also is the constant principle throughout Confucius teaching and learning. The conclusion are drawn as the follows: firstly, there is something wrong in Chen Daqi's conclusion that Yi(the Right )is the"core of core"in Confucius'thought. Confucius's thought after all is mainly about Ren(the Good), which reigns in all his thought and commands Yi(the Right); Chen Daqi took Yi(the Right) as the supreme concept in Confucius's thought, that totally ignored the metaphysical origin of Confucian School. Secondly, Yi(the Right) is not the constant principle throughout Confucius's teaching and learning, this constant principle, which really is referring to Ren(the Good) and deeply implies the outlook on the Mandate of Heaven which Confucius had given great importance in his teaching and learning. This article also introduces the comparison between Confucius's theory of knowledge ("The common people can be made to follow the Principle; they cannot be made to understand it") to Sun Yat-sen's statement:"Knowledge is difficult, but action easy", made by Chen Daqi, and the conclusion he drew is that two of them are identical golden sayings.Referring to the study on Mencius and Xunzi, the author mainly uses Chen's thought as a quotation. Chen studied the different emphases of"Renyi"in Mencius and Xunzi, and made a comparison of Mencius and Xunzi's thought on human nature. On the study of Mencius and Xunzi's theories of notion and truth, Chen summarized the contributions made by Mencius are"Bu'zhiyi", which means"not holding one principle but meets different conditions"and"Chuai'ben", which means"making two sides in debating standing on the same ground". His study on Xunzi revolves around"bian"(distinguishing).