A Study Of The Idea About The Talented People By Some Famous Scholars In The Pre-Qin Dynasty

Talents problem concerns the ups and downs of a country. Even though duringthe Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods, this problem was quite intense.Obtaining a scholar would make a country prosperous, and losing one would make itend up a failure, this was a very vivid reflection of the historical condition at thattime. Different schools created different theories so that they established theframework and core content of Chinese traditional talents' notions, and influencedChina for more than two thousand years. The thoughts of the scholars in Pre-Qin canprovide source of ideas and knowledge for current reforms and economicconstruction. At the same time, they provide references for political reform andenterprise management, and play a significant role in realizing the exploitation ofintelligence, independence, development, progress of human beings. This paper tidiedup and studied the thoughts of the scholars in Pre-Qin according to some historicalmaterials. It contains seven sections as follows:Sectionâ… expounded the talents thoughts in Analects of Confucious. Confucioustouched on talents problem many times in the course of conversations with hisstudents although he never undertook special studies on it, he emphasized theimportance of talents and put forward the idea that selecting talents could firstlygovern a country very well and secondly prevent wrong people from worming in, andmake rulers fall in favor with people and enlighten evil people. What Confucioustalked about talents referred to those who combined good qualities in one. Whenselecting talents, a ruler had to pay attention to talents' intelligence and investigatetheir deeds and avoid demanding perfection, and he needed to be prone to receivingopinions of the masses. In order to train talents, the nurture of environment wasneeded; and to keep them stay, the strength of models had to be introduced. Histhoughts had an impact on both the arising of talented people in large numbers and thelatter thinkers.Sectionâ…¡related the thoughts of talents in Lao-Tzu. The definition of talents ofLao-Tzu differed in reality and ideality, his notion of talents was that of saints. Onlysaints could love their subject and manage their country in good order. They not only promoted what was beneficial and eliminated what was harmful, but also removedcurses for the whole world, and put their subject before themselves. In Lao-Tzu'sopinion, only those who cared about self-development should be necessarily selected,at the same time, people should concentrate on self-reliance. At the point of trainingtalents, he introduced the emphasis on basic training and creativity. Lao-Tzu for thefirst time raised talents thoughts to the level of philosophy.Sectionâ…¢expanded talents thoughts in Master Guan. Master Guan, at first, laidemphasis on the importance of talents toward countries. He pointed out that trainingtalents lasted much longer than growing trees, anybody who wanted to control thewhole world had to dominate human resources. In his understanding, talents referredto the ones which were not restricted by conventions but creative. Then, he putforward that talents who were awarded elsewhere could be awarded much morewithin my territory. To appoint someone, we had to investigate his abilities rather thananything else. On the process of growth of talents, Master Guan suggested talents betreated politely and protected well. He was the first person who advocated retirementsystem so that the retired ones could return to hometowns to cultivate new talents,consequently, a cycle of reproduction of talented people was formed, even today, thisidea was rather significant.Sectionâ…£discussed talents thought in Mencius. Mencius firstly put forwardrespecting capable persons, and asked them to be in power so as to make the countrybloom. He then gave negative examples to prove how harmful was it if talents wereignored. As for the standards of talents, Mencius considered all the good qualities ofYao and Shun as standards. On choosing talents, he confirmed a system of asking thesolons not the descendents of the kings to succeed, provided filial piety observationmethod, benefactions observation method, loving materials observation method,making friends observation method. On cultivating talents, he emphasized theimportance of school education. Solons were to be regarded as models, people had tolearn from each other strong points and raised the level together. This idea greatlyenriched the history of talents thoughts in Pre-Qin period, and furnished the lattertalents with immeasurable ideological nourishment. Sectionâ…¤argued about talents thoughts in Mo Zi. Mo Zi firstly discussed thattalented people concerned the ups and downs of a country. On the standards of talents,he pointed out good morality, eloquence ability, intensive Tao were necessary. As forchoosing talents, he thought it good not to grade people's status, people had to begiven appropriate positions and exploited their abilities fully. On training talents, headvised that talents be protected safely and promoted to higher political and economicstatus for the sake of cherishing them. From Mo Zi's thoughts, we found that histhoughts on talents was the most perfect and systematic ones among the HundredSchools of Thought, and they remained meaningfully to today's official systemconstruction.Sectionâ…¥talked about talents thoughts in Xu Zi. Xu Zi firstly expounded thatputting talents in important positions was in regard to poverty and riches of thecountry, all the political policies had to be executed by talents, the rise and fall of thecountry had close connection with the use of talents, so intelligent people ought to beappointed important positions. He also pointed out that rulers had six drawbacks, allthe six drawbacks were about taking advantage of talents. He advocated hierarchicaltheory on using talents by measuring their morality and capability. On developmentand cultivation of talents, he suggested that talents should be given noble titles and behighly awarded. In this way, rulers could easily rule the country, and rulers had toevaluate talents. In this respect, Xu Zi developed farther than Mo Zi, and he wasregarded as a solon with greatest achievement, leaving valuable heritages for thedescendents.Sectionâ…¦related talents thoughts in Han Fei-zi. Hart Fei-zi denied confuciousand Mo Zi to start with, and put forward the new ideas of using sorcerers, regardingthe people's obedience to rulers as good morality, this idea actually was in the bud ofMaster Guan's ideas, and till to the time of Han Fei-zi, it had already become the coreof ideological system. As for the standards of talented people, he thought that loyaltycame first, then intelligence. Talents had to take responsibilities of helping rulersmanage the country in good order with loyalty and wisdom. On selecting talents, headvocated evaluation of talents one by one, strongly opposed using the people who were just there to make up the number. He also thought the masses' responses had tobe noticed carefully, rather than the ruler' s impression. On using talents, he thought itvery important to use people with arts and skills. On training talents, he pointed outthat it was very easy to ruin and very hard to build them. And he warned rulers toprotect talented people for the sake of stopping treacherous officials to do bad deedsand he kept the idea of struggling with treacherous officials constantly without anystopping. Han Fei-zi worked so hard on the studies of treacherous officials that heplayed a major role in the training and development of talented people, this stillprovided valuable references for us today.