The Criticism Of Han Fei To The Thought Of Virtue Ruling In Confucianism And Its Contemporary Enlightenments

The most obvious trait of"Yellow Civilization"or the civilization of Yellow River valley is the thought of virtue ruling which was raised by Confucians in the pre-Qin days. The thought of virtue ruling was initiated by Confucius during the Spring and Autumn and Warring States Period. During this period, it had been developed by Mencius and concluded by Xunzi as an ideological system which focuses on"benevolence"and formed with"etiquettes". It is a comprehensive and systematic ideology. Generally speaking, its principles include as follows: First of all, it requires"correct designation"and"return to etiquettes"in the political orders. Secondly, the thought of virtue ruling insists that the ruler should select those intelligent and capable elites into the administrative system and the individual moral qualities should be greatly emphasized. Thirdly, it requires the ruler to cultivate his moral characters and keep himself as a good example to others. According to the process which ranges from inner world to outside world, from oneself to others to achieve the moral state which emphasizes individual cultivation, family arrangement, country administration and world suppression and finally to achieve a state of inner saint and outer king. At last, on citizens administering, it pays great attention to richen the people then educate them and first educate the people then punish if they are outlaw, and it pursues a condition of advocating morality and cautiously punishing. This kind of thought of virtue ruling is based on six microcosmic logic points: First, the thought of restoring ancient ways of the former ruler; second, the humanity premise of Good-nature theory; third, the key viewpoint of administering the country with moralities; forth, the ruling target which focuses on the sovereign; fifth, the same class stand in common interest; sixth, the ideal social model with social position and estate system. In short, the thought of virtue ruling of Confucianism in pre-Qin days is an ideological system which focuses on benevolence, formed by etiquettes, and aims at benevolence policy through etiquettes and benevolence.However, with the similar background yet differ on country administering, Han Fei, who synthesized all the previous teachings of Legalist thinkers, strongly criticized the Confucian thought of virtue ruling. By and large, the criticism to the virtue ruling thought by Han Fei concentrates on non-morality-inclined and law-inclined policy in Han Fei Zi·Xian Xue. It is the focus, core and center both of the criticism to the virtue ruling thought and his law ruling proposition. Han Fei waged a tit for tat criticism against the thought of virtue ruling and its microcosmic logic points. First, he rectified the Confucian thought of restoring ancient ways to today; second, he challenged the Confucian humanity premise with Bad-nature theory; third, refuted the benevolent ruling with law ruling; forth, narrowed the Confucian ruling target range by eliminating the sovereign; fifth, opposed the view of common interests with contrary interest; at last, he negated the social position and estate privilege with law equal principle.On the intrinsic logics of different views of human nature and ruling tactics, the Confucians took an optimistic attitude on human nature. This attitude deeply influenced its ruling tactics which emphasized on internal causes—to look for the necessity and perseverance of the philosophic basis on human beings. That is to say, as the human nature is good, then goodness equals to morality, therefore, the subject of humanity, human, must be moral and trustworthy. So the Confucian ruling tactic finally rests on the concept of man-ruling, insists on man-ruling and lays great emphasis on the morality construction. In the contrary, this theoretical conclusion deepens the understanding of good human nature. In other words, in Confucianism, it is an interactive course between the humanity issue and the ruling tactics, which are interplaying and interacting. Its logic reference of internal cause is as the following chart: Good→Man is trustworthy→Man administrating→Man has morality and virtue↗↘ The viewpoint of humanity Rule a country with virtue↖↙ Good←Man must be trustworthy←Man administrating←Morality is the human's moralityContrary to Confucianism, the representative of Legalists, Han Fei, thought that humanity tends to go after profit while avoid damage, with evil in humanity, thus he held a pessimistic attitude toward human nature. In Han Fei's opinion, looking for the ruling tactics on man is useless and the answer of ruling a country should be found on external cause which doesn't rest on man. Exactly because of the pessimistic judgment of human evil, Han Fei was urged to be disappointed of the internal cause—man and consisted in resorting to external world for ruling tactics perseveringly. As a result, the evil humanity is served as the philosophical basis of the tactic of law ruling. In Han Fei, the evil of humanity can only be efficiently restrained by law, with law to control evil, thus punishing evil is ruling man; ruling man is ruling country. Finally, he drew a conclusion that administering a country should resort to law and took it as the ruling strategy. In the contrary, this theoretical conclusion also deepens his further understanding of the evil of humanity. As with the Confucianism, there is an interactive course between them which contain the following external logical reference:Evil→Man is unreliable→Look for external cause→The law which is outside of man↗↘ The viewpoint of humanity Rule a country with law↖↙ Evil←Look for internal cause←Man mustn't be trusted←Law is outside of manThe criticism of Han Fei to the Confucian thought of virtue ruling reflects a lot of theoretical faults, which include, first, the deviation on judging the relationship between history and reality, tradition and invention; second, common theoretical mistakes on the humanity issue; third, deviation on the contradiction of law ruling and virtue ruling; forth, the fatal weakness of law ruling target in Legalists; fifth, the lack in value seeking in both ideologies. In short, though there are partial differences and opposition between the Confucian virtue ruling and the Legal law ruling, substantially they belong to the traditional man ruling. Between the two theories, without eliminating one side or replaying the other, they become two wings complementary to the traditional man ruling tactics. Even though, Han Fei's criticism to the Confucian virtue ruling influenced the following dynasties of China profoundly; moreover, it enlightened the administering strategy a lot in modern China. These enlightenments include the following aspects. Above of all, we must firmly insist on the policy of combining virtue ruling and law ruling; second, we must follow the correct scientific theories; third, we must establish the administering concept of human-orientation; last but not the least, we must constitute the ideal social model of harmonious society hardly.