New Probe Into Wei Yuan's Lao Zi Original Meaning

Wei yuan lived in the late qing dynasty.Witnessing the internal and external troubles of the empire,he was eager to find effective methods to rescue the social crisis.Under such academic purpose,wei yuan start to interpret Lao Zi.He distinguished Lao Zi from Buddhism and Zhuang Zi,and believes that Lao Zi is the"salvation book" which can save social chaos.During the process of interpretation of Lao Zi,wei yuan was trying to meet the Confucian benevolence,righteousness,courtesy and mercy,modesty,and retreat,and at the same time reflecting on defects of Loo Zi in practical application.Wei yuan thought that the "Tao"of Lao Zi is a way of "true and true," and everything is naturally occurring from the Tao."Tao" is the mother of the world,so it has a dominant role in the world.Because everything is created by the "Tao”,so they all have "Tao" within.Wei yuan used the "nameless simple" refer to "Tao",and during "simple" falling into "the machine",and "the gift,the music,the politics,the punishment" and other specific statecraft would naturally occur.If the " king" can"keep the simple",he will be able to control everything and achieve the political effect of the world peace.Before that,the king must achieve the state of "no desire"."No desire" requires the ruler,from the personal cultivation aspect,to look inside himself and purify the selfish thoughts,and from the aspect of governing the country,to stop the competition in the society and create a simple social atmosphere.But in the course of ruling the world,the throne can not control the "apparatus",especially the one that governs the world.The word "artifact" means "destiny" and"human heart".The dominant social status of the ruler,based on popular acceptance of the people.Therefore,in the aspect of social governance,the ruler should obey god' s will and carry out moderate politics,instead of replacing the people's will with his own will.The idea of the equality of wei yuan,is the combination of the dialectical thought of Lao Zi and the thought of Confucianism,which reflect that Wei explained Lao zi by using ConfucianismIn Loo Zi Origincal Meaning,wei yuan introduced the concept of Qi.He used"blood gas" to explain people's natural contention and desire.He advocated that in personal cultivation,the soft air should be filled with people's inner heart,so as to achieve the state of blending with their own nature.In addition,he used gasification to explain the changes of social history.He believed that without the governance of the throne social conditions would be declining.Therefore,he though we should use the simple "Tao" to bring the society back to the ideal state.After that,wei yuan was influenced by gong-yang school and deepened his understanding of social development.He believes that in different stages of social development,the specific measures of "undoing" should be different from the social situation.All in all,wei yuan's Lao Zi Original Meaning,not only absorbed the idea of "no desire" of Zhuang Zi,"inaction" and "your" of LaoZi,but also reflected the Confucian political participation consciousness and benevolence policy.In addition,influenced by song,wei yuan emphasized the importance of personal cultivation to governance.Influenced by the study of RAMS,the focus of wei yuan's thinking gradually turns tothe development of social history,emphasizing that "Tao" has its special function in different historical periods.Therefor,In the study of Lao Zi original meaning,it is important to focus on the change of the context,and the course of the change in the idea of wei.At the same time,wei yuan's research on Lao Zi enriched the contents of Laoism.Therefore,Lao Zi Original Meaning has special value,which reflects the influence of the change of academic atmosphere in late qing dynasty on Laoism.