A Study On Tang Zhen’s Confucianism Thought

This study presents Confucianism thought of Tang Zhen,a great thinker of early Qing dynasty.The thesis is composed of six Chapters.Chapter one gives us a brief introduction of Tang Zhen’s life,his writings and the source of his thought.From Chapter two to Chapter six,the thesis discussed Tang Zhen’s thought on Dao,Mind and Human Nature,self-cultivation,education and moralization,management of the government.Tang’s theory on Dao inherits part of the traditional Confucianism’s philosophy of the mind and makes some innovation.He advocates that Dao is beyond the physical world,however,exists in everything it creates at the same time.Dao is in chaos however,it contains yin and yang and generates everything in the universe.According to Tang,Dao requires people to make achievements in the society.Besides,the most important characteristics is that Dao requires equality among the world.Tang’s theory on Mind and Human Nature also inherits the philosophy of the mind.Dao creates Mind and Human Nature.Human Nature is born with Ren(Benevolence),Yi(Righteousness),Li(Ritual),Zhi(Wisdom)four virtues.However,according to Tang,these four virtues should realize themselves in the practical life,otherwise,they are not genuine virtues.These virtues should be used in managing the government,improving living conditions of people etc.Among these four virtues,Zhi or Wisdom is the most important one,because only through wisdom,can people realize the other three virtues.Apart from that,Tang emphasizes that all these virtues should be realized in the practical daily life,which could be called that nature is fulfilled.As to Mind,Tang’s Mind has two layers of meaning.The first is metaphysical mind.By this meaning,Dao is Mind.Mind also needs to realize itself in the practical life,which means Mind needs to come down from metaphysical world to the physical one.However,when Mind becomes the physical one,it has desire which generates the evil.Thus in Tang’s theory,Minds has two layers of meaning.As the physical mind has the desire,people needs to do self-cultivation work to eradicate it.Confucianists of the history advocate various methods of doing self-cultivation.However,Tang proposes that people need not follow what is said on the classic books but try hard to find out the proper way of doing self-cultivation of their own,as different people has different desires.Tang also discusses his own way of doing self-cultivation: finding a pleasant way.Tang also develops Confucianism in the theory of education and moralization.On education,Tang promotes that a teacher should adopt different teaching methods according to the different abilities of the students.Tang also emphasizes parents’ model role in the family.On ethics,Tang criticizes the conventional five relationships,which are monarch-subject relationship,father-son relationship,brothers relationship,husband-wife relationship and friends relationship.He promotes new ethics relationships.He thinks that there should be an equality between monarch and subject,husband and wife.He also thinks that friends are much more important than people used to think.On management of the government,Tang thinks that the monarch of the country should hold the responsibility.So the monarch needs to do self-cultivating work all his life in order to be a monarch of high morality which is crucial to a country’s good management.Tang also appeals to a strict system on country’s civil officials.He promotes many ways to enhance people’s living standards and suggest that Sage’s books and words could serve as the laws of the country.Finally,he thinks that military theory should be included in Confucianists’ daily learning.In a word,within the framework of Confucianism,Tang Zhen attaches great importance to actual “use” of Confucian’s virtues.