Mencius was a great thinker, politician and writer in the Warring States Period. One of the main representatives of Confucianism is the Confucian School.
The highest category of Mencius' philosophical thought is heaven. Mencius inherited Confucius' thought of destiny, removed the residual meaning of personality god, and imagined heaven as a spiritual entity with moral attributes. He said: "Honest people, heaven is also." Mencius defined the moral concept of honesty as the essential attribute of heaven, and believed that heaven was the origin of the inherent moral concept of human nature. Mencius' ideological system, including his political thoughts and ethical thoughts, takes heaven as the category.
Based on the experience of the Warring States period, Mencius summed up the laws governing the rise and fall of chaos in various countries and put forward a famous proposition rich in the essence of democracy: "The people are the most important, the country is the second, and the monarch is the light." People think that how to treat people is extremely important to the rise and fall of a country. Mencius attached great importance to the opposition between people's hearts, and repeatedly expounded through a large number of historical examples that this is a key issue related to winning or losing in the world.
"The people are precious, the country is second, and the monarch is light." It means the people first, the country second, and the monarch last. Mencius believed that the monarch should take care of the people first, and politicians should protect the rights of the people. Mencius agreed that the monarch has no way and the people have the right to overthrow the regime. For this reason, Hanshu and Yiwenzhi only regard Mencius as a sub-book, without giving it its due status. In the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms of Houshu, Meng Changjun, the master of Houshu, ordered people to carve stones in eleven classics such as Mencius, which may be the beginning of Mencius' being included in the classics. By the time of filial piety in the Southern Song Dynasty, Zhu called Mencius, the Analects of Confucius, the University and the Doctrine of the Mean as the "Four Books" and became one of the "Thirteen Classics", and Mencius' position was pushed to the peak. Legend has it that Zhu Yuanzhang, the founding emperor of the Ming Dynasty, was dissatisfied with Mencius' people-oriented thought and ordered people to abridge the relevant contents in Mencius. Mencius inherited and developed Confucius' thought of ruling by virtue, and developed it into the theory of benevolent governance, which became the core of his political thought. Mencius' political theory is king with benevolent governance as its content, and its essence is to serve the feudal ruling class. He applied the principles of "pro" and "long" to politics, eased class contradictions and safeguarded the long-term interests of the feudal ruling class.
On the one hand, Mencius strictly distinguished the class status of the ruler and the ruled, and thought that "those who do things rule their people, and those who do things rule their people", and imitated the Zhou system to draw up a hierarchy from emperor to ruler; On the other hand, the relationship between the ruler and the ruled is compared to the relationship between parents and children, and it is advocated that the ruler should care about the sufferings of the people like parents, and the people should be close to and serve the ruler like parents.
Mencius believes that this is the most ideal politics, and the rulers can win the heartfelt support of the people if they implement benevolent policies; On the other hand, if people's lives are ignored, they will lose people's hearts, become solitary thieves and be overthrown by the people. The specific content of benevolent government is very extensive, including economy, politics, education and ways to unify the world, among which there is a clue of people-oriented thought. This thought developed from the idea of valuing the people over the gods in the Spring and Autumn Period.
Mencius said: "Benevolence must go through first". The so-called "well boundary" means dividing and sorting out the field boundary and implementing the well field system. The well-field system conceived by Mencius is a feudal natural economy, which is based on small farmers of one household and takes the form of exploiting labor force for rent. Every farmer has a five-acre house and a hundred-acre field and is self-sufficient. Mencius believes that "people are the way, those who have constant production have perseverance, and those who have no constant production have no perseverance." Only when people have "permanent property" and settle down on the land can they not violate the criminal law and do evil. Mencius believes that when people's material life is guaranteed, rulers can re-establish schools, educate them on the principle of filial piety and guide them to be kind, which can create a good moral trend of "kissing" and "growing up", that is, "everyone kisses and grows up, and the world is peaceful." Mencius believed that the benevolent government of the ruler could win the heartfelt support of the people all over the world, thus being invincible. Mencius' benevolent policy should be based on the ruler's "unbearable heart". Mencius said: "The former king had an unbearable heart and Sri Lanka had an unbearable policy." "Unable to bear the heart of others" is a kind of pity and kindness. But this kind of sympathy and kindness is different from Mozi's "universal love", but comes from the feelings of blood. Mencius advocated that "Kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss kiss is the political embodiment of this unbearable heart.
Benevolence, according to Mencius' explanation, is "human heart" What is benevolence? According to Mencius, it can be summarized as follows: First, be close to the people. Mencius advocated that rulers should "share with the people" and "have fun with the people". Second, use virtuous people. "Those who win the world are called benevolence." ("On Teng Wengong") "Respect the sages and enable them, and Jie Jun is in office." ("Gong Sunchou") "When a saint is in office, an able person is in office; Ming's political punishment. " Third, respect human rights. Mencius publicly preached the slogan of "people value the monarch but despise him", and advocated reconciling the relationship between rulers and working people within a certain range. Fourth, compassion. The rulers are required to adopt the method of "old people and old people, young people and young people" to govern the people. I believe that this will be welcomed and supported by the people, so as to achieve "invincible in the world." Fifth, killing people who have no choice is also benevolence, which is the greatest benevolence. Mencius called for a solemn condemnation of all tyrants and corrupt officials who were arrogant by the disabled people, and tried to develop the real society into a political track of "protecting the people as kings".
Mencius established an ideal economic plan based on "minefield" with "benevolent government" as the fundamental starting point. Advocate the idea of "saving punishment, collecting thin taxes" and "not violating the farming season" It is required that feudal countries should attach importance to and develop production while collecting taxes, so as to make the people rich, so as to have sufficient sources of fiscal revenue. This kind of thinking should be affirmed. As a thinker of the new landlord class, Mencius also put forward the theory of emphasizing agriculture but not restraining commerce, which improved the traditional concept of "emphasizing agriculture and restraining commerce", which was progressive at that time. Mencius' ideal of "well-field system" has far-reaching influence and guiding significance for later generations to establish a theory of governing the country to limit land annexation and ease class contradictions.
Mencius' educational thought is also the inheritance and development of Confucius' educational thought of "teaching without class" (The Analects of Wei Linggong). They all regard education for all as the means and purpose of benevolent governance. On the one hand, it advocates "setting up a school to teach it in an emergency" (in Teng Wengong's chapter) to strengthen school education; On the other hand, those in power need to set an example. "Ren Jun, ruthless; Junyi, all righteousness; Jun Zheng, Zheng Mo. " Educate the people with the power of example. The purpose of enlightenment is to make people "understand human relations", so as to establish an ideal society with harmonious and orderly human relations, in which "human relations are above, and villains are below" (Teng Wengong chapter). Mencius has always regarded himself as the orthodox successor of Confucius, and his educational contribution is unparalleled. He not only taught and educated people, but also trained outstanding students such as Le Zhengzi, Gong Sunchou and Zhang Wan. He also wrote seven books with his disciples for future generations. Like a continuous spring rain, it falls in the long river of history and culture.
For the improvement of educational methods, Mencius highly praised the traditional educational method of "teaching by changing children". When his favorite pupil, Gong Sunchou, asked why some gentlemen didn't personally educate their sons, Mencius replied, "Impossible. Teachers must be honest; Whether you are doing it right or not is followed by being angry. If you continue to be angry, you will be defeated. ..... The ancients changed to teach it, and the father and son did not blame goodness. If you complain about goodness, you will leave, and if you leave, it will be ominous. " Because of the deep affection between father and son, the father's education for his son is often lax, and some mistakes and faults of his son are indulgent and arrogant, which makes the correct education unsustainable. Therefore, "father and son don't complain about others", Ziyi let others educate them, which can be strict and maintain the intimate relationship between father and son without hurting feelings.
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