DEVELOPMENT OF THE CHINESE 85 



If nature at large be designated as the macrocosm, then human 

 nature is the microcosm, and for Wang human nature was the human 

 mind. He was taking recreation at Nanch'en, when one of his friends 

 pointed to the flowers and trees on a cliff and said, " You say that there 

 is nothing under Heaven outside the mind. What relation exists be- 

 tween my mind and those flowers and trees on the high mountain, 

 which blossom and drop of themselves ?" Wang replied : " When you 

 cease regarding these flowers, they become quiet with your mind. When 

 you see them, their colors at once become clear. From this you can 

 know that these flowers are not external to your mind." This is undis- 

 guised idealism, in which the microcosm creates as truly as does the mac- 

 rocosm. In the great all-pervading unity of nature the most differ- 

 entiated, highly specialized portion is the human mind. It manifests 

 the only creative ability that man can really know. Wang said again 

 and again that it is db initio law, that it is the embodiment of the prin- 

 ciples of Heaven. Thus its very essence is natural law ; but not in any 

 partial, superficial sense. There are no other principles operative any- 

 where, for the mind is so all-embracing that it has no internal and ex- 

 ternal. 



The influence of this point of view upon Wang's ethical theory and 

 practise was profound. He held that it is not necessary to go to the 

 classic literature to get a knowledge of fundamental ethical principles, 

 for the human mind has these principles within itself. Intuitive knowl- 

 edge of good is to be identified with moral principles. He who would 

 have accurate information regarding right and wrong can get it from the 

 intuitive faculty. The highest good consists in developing it to the ut- 

 most. It is to the details of right and wrong and to changing circum- 

 stances as compasses and squares are to squares and circles, and meas- 

 ure to length and breadth. 



The changes in circumstances relative to details can not be determined 

 beforehand, just as the size of the square or the circle, and length and breadth 

 can not be perfectly estimated. But when compasses and squares have been 

 set, there can be no deception about the size of the circle or the square, and when 

 the rule and measure have been fixed there can be no desception about length or 

 shortness. When the intuitive faculty has been completely developed, there can 

 be no deception regarding its application to changing details.is 



Wang is to-day read extensively by Chinese students, and will prob- 

 ably influence the Chinese as much as he has the Japenese. He has 

 the advantage over many other rationalizing and socializing forces of the 

 present day in that his point of view is a direct product of the Chinese 

 mind and therefore strikes a sympathetic chord in the mind of the 

 Chinese scholars. As a rationalizing and socializing factor in the de- 

 velopment of Chinese morals it exhibits the following doctrines-: 



13 Wang Yang-ming, ' ' Philosophy, ' ' Book III., p. 61 f . 



