OF MINDS & MEN: On Universal History and the Creation of Aristocratic Men (Part III-VII)

By Quan Le

[Click here for part I-II]

There is an enlightening conversation between Confucius (551-479 BCE) and his close student Zigong (520-456 BCE) that has been recorded in the Ten Wings or Shi Yi 十 翼 (Shi2 Yi4), the indispensable philosophical appendix of the I Ching, the Book of Change.

Zigong 子 贡 (Zi3 Gong4) is the aristocratic name of Duanmu (family name) Ci (given name) : 端 木 赐 (Duan1Mu4  Ci4). He was a wealthy merchant and a prominent diplomat having resolved successfully many interstate entanglements during his time.

Zigong served as a high official in several states. He even saved the State of Lu 鲁 (Lu2), home state of Confucius, when the much more powerful neighboring State of Qi 齐 (Qi2) was to attack it. When Confucius died, most of his students remained near their Master’s grave, mourning for three years. Zigong prolonged his mourning for 3 more years.

The Book of Change 易 經 (Yi4 Jing1/I Ching) is essentially a theoretical & practical manual guiding people on their epistemological Journey to Justice : Valor : Humanity : Wisdom, meaning the four Cardinal Virtues, manifestations in Time of the Timeless Forms of Truth : Goodness : Beauty; it is not primarily a book on divination, as is commonly believed.

Before diving into the Timeless Conversation between Confucius and Zigong, I need to remind everyone on the stages of the epistemological growth symbolized by the Hexagram because the Idea will be used in the aforementioned conversation.

The Hexagram has 6 horizontal lines stacked vertically with a space between the three first ones, the bottom line being the first one (1-2-3) and the three last ones (4-5-6). Each of these six levels is composed by a broken line or a plain line. A broken line means ‘becoming, receptivity or passivity’ and a plain line signifies ‘being, activity or dynamism’. The archetypical illustration is the pair made of the Sun,BEING naturally & dynamically radiating light & heat and the Moon, passively receiving the light from the Sun and thus BECOMING luminous. Broken lines (Becoming) and plain lines (Being) present across the six levels of the epistemological growth powerfully symbolizes the absolute organic inter-penetration of Being & Becoming or of Timelessness & Time.

The Cosmic Mind in Timelessness & the Human Mind manifest in Time but deeply united to the Cosmic Mind.

As explained in the paragraph 2.4 of the Analects using SYMBOLIC AGES (The Upper Trigram : Lines 6-5-4 & The Lower Trigram : Lines 3-2-1) :

LINE 6 : At 70, I can act spontaneously without violating the Universal Laws : TRUTH
              With right self-cultivation, Timeless Truth is Wisdom manifesting in Time
LINE 5 : At 60, I hear the Will of Heaven without complaining : GOODNESS
              With right self-cultivation, Timeless Goodness is Valor & Humanity in Time
LINE 4 : At 50, I hear the Will of Heaven : BEAUTY
              With right self-cultivation, Timeless Beauty is Justice manifesting in Time

            A SPACE denoting a QUANTUM LEAP from TIME to TIMELESSNESS

LINE 3 : At 40, I’m no more confused :PSYCHE(being streetwise, with emotional insight)
LINE 2 : At 30, I take my stand : INTELLECT (wording, imaging, conceptualizing)
LINE 1 : At 15, I devote myself to learning : SENSES-PERCEPTIONS & CONFUSION

*** The Timeless Conversation manifesting in Time & recorded in the Ten Wings :

Zigong said : Does the Master believe in divination using the yarrow stick ?

Confucius : As for the Book of Change, I do indeed put its prayers and divinations last, ONLY OBSERVING THE TEACHINGS FOR ACHIEVING VIRTUE & JUSTICE.

Having intuition to make an Hexagram, and understanding the Hexagram for reaching virtue, is to embody true humanity. HAVING TRUE HUMANITY IS TO PUT YOUR TRUE UNDERSTANDING INTO RIGHT ACTION.

IF THE *HEXAGRAM* DOES NOT LEAD TO *RIGHT ACTION*, THEN ONE ACTS AS A MAGICIAN.

(A Magician is Confucius’ word for the fake timocratic man or the Sophist [level 3 of the Hexagram, the highest stage of the Animal Kingdom or the Lower Trigram] using Plato’s lexicon. I will address briefly later on about the shenanigans of a famous or maybe infamous Magician called Bertrand Russell 1872-1970).

IF THE *HEXAGRAM* DOES NOT LEAD TO *RIGHT ACTION*, THEN ONE ACTS AS A SCRIBE.

(A Scribe is Confucius’ word for the plutocratic man, having a powerful intellect [level 2 of the Hexagram] but utterly devoid of Beauty:Goodness:Truth; even devoid of the natural animal emotional intelligence as the Magician is capable of. I will try to understand a well known Scribe, John Dewey 1859-1952).

The divinations of the Scribes and the Magicians tend towards it but are not yet there, delight in it but are not correct.

Perhaps it will be because of the Book of Change that gentlemen of later generations will doubt me. I SEEK ITS TEACHINGS TO ACHIEVE TRUE HUMANITY AND NOTHING MORE.

I AM ON THE SAME ROAD AS THE SCRIBES AND THE MAGICIANS BUT END UP DIFFERENTLY.

THE RIGHT BEHAVIOR COMING FROM THE GENTLEMAN’S TRUE HUMANITY IS TO SEEK BLESSINGS FOR ALL. That’s why he sacrifices, but little.

THE JUSTICE COMING FROM HIS TRUE HUMANITY IS TO SEEK FAVORABLE CONFIGURATION FOR HIS ACTION. That is why he divines, but rarely.

I would like to adumbrate the Platonic Cosmogenic Cycle relevant here as correlated with Classical Architecture.

Imagine The Divine Cosmos (Cosmos means Harmony in Greek, so The Divine Plan) as a Circle. Within that Circle are inscribed vertically three smaller circles perfectly fit in the big Circle : the three smaller circles are the hypostases of the One Divine Plan, co-existent and co-manifest. The three small circles are aligned along the axis of their respective diameters. The three circles share common areas as in a Venn diagram. The Divine Cosmos is the Whole, the Totality in Holomovement, using the word coined by the physicist David Bohm (1917-1992).

Nicholas of Cusa (1401-1464) explained perfectly that the Reality of the Circle, the true Cause of the Circle is not the series of imaginary concatenated points but the dynamic action continuously generating the Circle.

The dynamic action soaring on the Eternal Forms or Timeless Principles of Truth-Goodness-Beauty is Being or more precisely Dynamic Eternal Being Booming In Entelechy (D.E.B.B.I.E) and the Circle manifest in Time is Becoming.

The realm of The Timeless Forms (Eidos ::: Aleitheia : Kagathos : Kallos / Truth : Goodness : Beauty) is the Cosmic Mind (“nous” in Greek, hence the noosphere or noetic sphere in English); it is the highest of the three small inscribed circles. Architecturally manifest in Time, the epistemologically Journey is symbolized first by returning to Kallos (Beauty) corresponding to the Corinthian Order, proceeding in Kagathos (Goodness) corresponding to the Doric Order and stabilizing in Aleitheia (Truth) corresponding to the Ionic Order. Correlating with the Hexagram, it’s about the Lines 6-5-4, the Upper Trigram.

Same in the Great Learning 大 学 (Da4 Xue3) 3 Principles or Guiding Lines from the Cosmic Mind: •• Make your inner Virtue bright •• Renew People •• Abide in the highest Good.

Next is the extended psyche. The bridge between the Realm of Reality, of the Timeless Forms and the Realm of the Phenomena symbolized as a space in the Hexagram, is the second inscribed circle in the Platonic Cosmogenic Cycle.

Last is the third inscribed circle, the Realm of the Shadows, of the Phenomena or Lines 3-2-1 of the Hexagram corresponding to the faculties of senses-perceptions, intellect and psyche, the Lower Trigram.

There is a natural hierarchy between the 3 inscribed circles but all 3 are within the Divine Cosmos, all 3 participate to the Divine and for those willing of making an effort, there is nothing occult or occulted to them because the Arcanes of Reality are open to all those willing to start their epistemological Journey. That is precisely the meaning of ‘arcanes’, open secrets for those willing to learn.

OF MINDS & MEN (IV)
ON UNIVERSAL HISTORY & THE CREATION OF ARISTOCRATIC MEN

The Tetractys is a powerful universal symbol for the unveiling of the Arcanes, the desire for true learning & self-knowledge. The Tetractys is an equilateral triangle made by 10 dots arranged on 4 ascending layers. Let’s take the Idea of Beauty.

The bottom layer is made by 4 dots on the same horizontal plane representing the element Earth and bodily Beauty. It‘s the first epistemological stage coming from the senses-perceptions.

The second layer is made by 3 dots on the next higher plane and denoting the element Water and the Beauty of ideas. It’s the second epistemological stage from the intellect (wording, imaging, conceptualizing).

The third layer is made by 2 dots on the next higher plane and expressing the Element Air and the Beauty of virtue. It‘s the third epistemological stage coming from the psyche (emotional intelligence, friendly attitude with everyone and capacity for mutually satisfactory consensus because of mind openness). Let’s not forget that even if the psyche is still in the Animal Kingdom, it’s the highest mental stage in the Animal Kingdom, it’s an inchoate Soul, so the psyche is capable of appreciating the Beauty of virtue notwithstanding not always having the fortitude of truly embodying virtuous conduct in specific difficult existential situations.

The highest and fourth layer is the one dot symbolizing the One shining blazingly in Timelessness, the Eternal Form of Beauty.

From the TETRACTYS to GU HONGMING 辜 鸿 铭 Gu1 Hong2Ming2 (1857-1928 ).

The Tetractys unveiled the Arcane of Beauty in the example above.

Beauty is the inner sense of Justice in everyday life, inter alia. The Eternal Form of Beauty has been dazzlingly embodied by Gu Hongming (1857-1928), philosopher, statesman, polymath, polemist, lecturer, polyglot (he was fluent in English, Mandarin Chinese, Hokkien, German, Russian, and French. He understood Italian, Ancient Greek, Latin, Japanese and Malay), one of the most original Chinese Scholars notwithstanding having received first a Western education : M.A. in English Literature at 20 years old (University of Edinburgh,1873-1877), he earned a diploma in Civil Engineering at the University of Leipzig and studied Law in Paris. Living at the end of the Chinese Empire and having unwaveringly kept unsullied his heartfelt confidence in the eternity and the glory of the Chinese civilization in the midst of the Century of Humiliation (1839-1949).

” Gu Hongming was born in Penang, Malaya. His family has its roots in the town of Tongan 同 安, Fujian Province, China. Gu was probably the first Chinese to receive a comprehensive European education. In 1885 (at 28 years old), in recognition of his linguistic capacities and knowledge of Western culture, Zhang Zhidong 张 之 洞 (1837-1909), viceroy and leading Confucian scholar-official, employed Gu as his secretary in charge of foreign documents and affairs. Under Zhang’s guidance, along with the influence of a number of leading Confucian scholar-official at Zhang’s office, Gu progressed steadily with his study of Chinese language and the Confucian Classics. By the turn of the century, Gu had not only acquired a respectable expertise in Confucian learning, but also established himself as a major spokesman for Chinese culture in the Western world. “

The paragraph just above is a quotation from Professor Huaiyu Wang, Georgia College.

I will now quote 3 long passages on Gu Hongming insights from an excellent article called “The Lost Confucian Philosopher : Gu Hongming and THE CHINESE RELIGION OF GOOD CITIZENSHIP” by Professor Huaiyu Wang (Department of Philosophy, Religion, and Liberal Studies, Georgia College and State University). His article has been published by the University of Hawai’i Press : Philosophy East and West, volume 71, Number 1, January 2021,pp. 217-240.

Professor Huaiyu Wang on the polymath Gu Hongming, first quotation :

” Drawing upon classical Confucian teachings and the aesthetic ideals of modern Romantic thinkers, Gu proposed that the ultimate solution to the major problems of modernity, such as decaying social and international solidarity, destructive materialism and commercialism, and abusive racial and nationalistic prejudices, must be a moral and cultural solution. In essence, Gu held that truth, understood in its deepest and broadest sense as THE SENSE OF HONOR AND TRUTHFULNESS IN ONE’S ENGAGEMENT WITH PERSONS AND THINGS, is of universal and eternal appeal among all humankind. AS A LIVING TRADITION, the value of the traditional Confucian social order consists in its continuous PERSONIFICATION OF THE LAW OF THE GENTLEMAN, which inspires ordinary persons to realize this sense of honor and truthfulness by fulfilling their individual roles and responsibilities.

The Confucian ideal of civilization is not “infinite happiness” or “self-indulgence” for everybody, but the complete and perfect realization of true moral being -the sense of obligation- and moral order in Mankind so that the Universe shall become a Cosmos and all things can attain their full growth and development. Remarkably, many scholars today, including leading Confucian scholars like Henry Rosemont, have regarded it necessary to stay away altogether from the ideas of truth, the universal, and the absolute in order to remedy the hegemonic dimensions of modern Western colonialism, imperialism, and enlightenment universalism. In light of Gu’s insights, however, the true crisis of modernity is not what Rosemont has pinned down as the belief in “the one true morality” that has to be established with the greatest number of machine guns. As everyone with a basic moral sense can see, to advocate “the one true morality” with machine guns would have implicated a fundamental inconsistency  with the basic principles of this morality already, such as Kant’s notion of the autonomous self who must treat the humanity in oneself and others as an end in itself. To all appearances, what accounts for the modern crisis of morality is not the utter falsity or irrelevancy of “the one true morality.”

It is rather THE LACK OF A GENUINE BELIEF IN HUMANITY, which brings about AN ATMOSPHERE OF HYPOCRISY THROUGHOUT”. It is what Gu described as THE MORAL BANKRUPTCY OF THE CAPITALISTIC POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC SYSTEM.

Indeed, when neither the social and political leaders nor the masses take any truth or moral principles of right and wrong as an absolute with binding power underall circumstances, ‘the one true morality’ can easily be manipulated by individuals or nations to sanction their selfish interests through ‘legitimate’ violence and dominance. In Gu’s view, the answer to the modern crisis of morality consists in the Confucian Religion of Good Citizenship, in the aesthetic appeal of the gentleman, who may inspire ordinary people in a society to fulfill the law of their being and enable them to become what Walt Whitman envisioned as ‘ a law, and series of laws, unto himself, surrounding and providing for, not only his own personal control, but all his relations to other individuals, and to the State’. In my view, the Confucian Religion of Good Citizenship synthesizes what Henry Rosemont and Roger Ames call role-based contextual ethics and Kant’s deontological ethics. As I will show, Gu’s theses on a universal truth of humanity predicated on a poetic temperament and the aesthetic appeal of the gentleman may bring new insights to current Confucian and comparative moral and political studies and the relation between ethics and society. They promise a new vision to move beyond moral universalism and relativism, a key problem of cross-cultural discourse against the backdrop of the ‘clash of civilization.’ “

Second quotation from Professor Huaiyu Wang’s long article on Gu Hongming :

” However, while most modern Chinese have taken Gu to be ‘behind the Times, I believe Gu’s visions and ideas, which were inspired by both classical Confucian teachings and the aesthetic ideals of the modern Romantic period, were really ahead of his time. THEY MAY EVEN BE TIMELESS.”

OF MINDS & MEN (V)
ON UNIVERSAL HISTORY & THE CREATION OF ARISTOCRATIC MEN

Professor Huaiyu Wang continues…

“Not only are Gu’s interpretations of Confucianism still relevant to current Confucian and comparative studies, but many of Gu’s theses and arguments, with timely modification and expansion, would prove valuable and constructive in solving a range of difficult social and political problems today. One of Gu’s greatest insights was his critical understanding of and cultivated response to the then prevalent racist, colonial, and imperialistic ideologies, as he envisioned a way beyond the Scylla of a false universalism and the Charybdis of parochial nationalism (relativism). In Gu’s view, THE REAL CAUSE of the Revolution was the intense feeling of humiliation and resentment toward the racist attitudes of foreigners who ‘think we are only Chinese and look down upon us.’ The Chinese Revolution was not a revolt against a corrupt or tyrannical government; it was a revolution against the weakness of that government ‘for allowing foreigners to treat us like that.’

In other words, THE REAL CAUSE OF THE REVOLUTION WAS A FAKE UNIVERSALISM (which takes every European standard as universal) COMBINED WITH FANATIC NATIONALISM. Just as ‘the Boxer outbreak in 1900 was a fanatical explosion of hurt national pride, so the present revolution is a fanatical outburst of national vanity.’ Remarkably, precisely because the Revolution stemmed from a world of pathos entangled with a false universalism and fanatic nationalism, it was doomed to fail. In Gu’s view, the racial prejudice of the Europeans would not and could not be changed just because the Chinese decided TO IMITATE the Europeans by cutting off their queues and putting on European clothes. Instead, the only way to win true respect was to show ‘WHAT WE CHINESE TRULY ARE, a people with a somewhat different civilization but as wonderful a civilization as theirs and not a whit inferior.’ Hence,

The one reform which China needs above all others, is not queue-cutting or constitution-making but … to send our good people, the best of the Chinese, to show the people of Europe and America what we are. In short, IT IS BY JOINING THE BEST WITH BEST THAT WE CAN EVER HOPE TO BREAK DOWN THE DIVIDING LINE OF EAST AND WEST. “

Before going to the third quotation from Professor Wang’s article, I would like to make a clarification.

Gu Hongming decided to translate 君 子 之 道 (Jun1 Zi3 Zhi1 Dao4) as ‘The Chinese Religion of Good Citizenship’. However, the direct translation is: “The Gentleman’s Way”.

A “gentleman”, 君 子 (Jun1 Zi3) according to the Confucian epistemological symbol called the Hexagram, is the man having achieved the fifth stage of the Journey to the Arcanes, the open secrets of God’s Plan for those truly willing to learn.

At the fifth stage of the epistemological growth, a man is living for justice, honor, glory, discovery, inventiveness, creativity and his life is utterly filled with playful exploration.

The ‘gentleman’ was called by Plato (427-347 BCE) the ‘aristocratic man’.

So the 君 子 之 道, “The Gentleman’s Way”, is the Way to activate what is from within : THE TIMELESS FORMS of Beauty, Goodness and Truth precisely CREATING THE GENTLEMAN ONCE KINDLED. Once again, the word ‘education’ comes from the Latin word ‘educare’ meaning ‘to bring forth what is from within’, bringing forth Beauty, Goodness, Truth. Or the Gentleman’s Way is the eternal epistemological Journey, ASCENDING THE DIFFERENT DEGREES OF LEARNING, reaching to the Timeless Forms and THAT JOURNEY TO THE TIMELESS FORMS IS CALLED TRUE LEARNING.

Interestingly, the word ‘mathematics’ comes from the Greek word ‘mathematica’, itself from ‘manthanein’ which has a very general meaning and precisely is at the center of our present discussion : LEARNING. Not so uncannily, the basic mathematical forms are at the lowest of the fourth epistemological stage, where the explorer has his/her feet in the Upper Trigram– which is in the antechamber of the Domain of the 9 Muses, the Domain of Beauty, the first Timeless Form. Arithmetics & geometry are at the entrance. The Numbers through time is Music under the aegis of Euterpe. The Numbers in space-time are orchestrated by Urania as the Music of the Spheres or Astronomia. Numbers manifested as human rhythms, meaning dances supervised by Terpsichore.

Let’s go deeper into the estate of the Muses but only after the last quotation from Professor Wang.

Third & last quotation from Professor Huaiyu Wang’s piece on Gu Hongming :

” The Aesthetic Appeal of the Gentleman and the Universal Order of Civilization.
Gu’s vision to bridge the divide between East and West ‘by joining the best with best’ stems from his deep familiarity with both classical Confucian teachings and modern Romantic ideas. As Gu sees it, ‘there is very little difference between the East of Confucius and the West of Shakespeare and Goethe’. Accordingly, ‘those who well know both, know that the best in China and in the West are in perfect harmony.

Let the best of the two civilizations unite and nothing but good will follow.’ Gotelind Müller affirms that Gu’s Confucianism is ‘the royal road to true civilization of the whole human race, which had been threatened to break into smithereens between the Scylla of A FALSE LIBERALISM and the Charybdis of MATERIALISM’. Hence, ‘when dialogue is often asked for as an antidote against a clash of civilizations’, Gu’s thesis on the correspondence between the best thinkers in the East and West may well ‘provide more solid foundation for a fruitful intercultural dialogue than today’s fairly common academic value-indifferent forms of postmodern, radically-relativistic anti-essentialism criticism’. In my view, Gu was far ahead of his time when he realized, as many cultural relativists do today, that a global order centered on the ‘signifier Civilization’ of the modern Western Powers and their self-promoting values and interests was doomed to miscarry. However, in contrast with those relativists who went to the other extreme and rejected all universal standards and principles in order to reinstall the ‘unique’ self-serving values of each culture, Gu maintained that a universal order was not only possible but also necessary although we have no guarantee as to when humankind can accomplish this. Remarkably, the universal order that Gu envisioned was not ‘a hybrid system of both worlds’ as suggested by some scholars.

As a matter of fact, IN AN ARTICLE FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES IN 1921, Gu made it very clear that the attempts to amalgamate Eastern and Western civilizations, such as proposed by the then Japanese prime minister, Hara Takashi, reflected an ignorance of what civilization is. For a civilization ‘is either a true civilization or a false or, as the Japanese say, a magai make-believe civilization : there is no East or West’. But how should we understand this universal order were it to involve neither such universal principles as promulgated by the modern Western Powers nor a hybrid of Eastern and Western values ? Here, it is worthwhile to recollect Gu’s main ideas on civilization as presented in the 1921 article : ‘Uncivilized United States’. As Gu made clear, the object of his article was not to ‘abuse the American people’s as it’s title ‘Uncivilized United States’ might have suggested. IT WAS RATHER TO SHOW THE TRUE MEANING OF CIVILIZATION. Because in order to ‘save civilization … the first thing you must do … is to know what civilization is.’ For Gu, THE ESSENCE OF A CIVILIZATION is not its economic and technological advancement as measured by the ‘standard of living’.

It consists not even in the arts, sciences, and institutions, but in ITS ENDURING SPIRITUAL ACHIEVEMENT. Here, Gu cited Analects 17.11 where Confucius (551-479 BCE) took issue with the then prevalent tendency to take Li 礼 (Li3) & Yue 乐 (Yue4) …

OF MINDS & MEN (VI)
ON UNIVERSAL HISTORY & THE CREATION OF ARISTOCRATIC MEN

In Analects 17.11, Confucius (551-479 BCE) took issue with the then prevalent tendency to take Li 礼 (Li3) & Yue 乐 (Yue4) (ritual, ceremony, forms of courtesy, and music)–the essential expressions of Chinese religion and civilization–to be a matter of ‘carrying fine jades’, ‘wearing silk dresses’ and playing musical instruments like bells and drums. Questioning the Japanese prime minister’s desire to amalgamate civilizations, Gu Hongming said that it was a gross mistake to take ‘wearing high collars, cutting the queue, building European houses, riding in motor cars and erecting statues such as one sees in the streets of Tokyo’ as ‘the whole of civilization or even civilization at all’.

In Gu’s view, the true meaning of civilization in classical Confucian teachings was precisely THE ‘MAKING OF THE CIVIL PERSON.’ The spirit of civilization consisted in the ideal types of personalities who were able to realize the universal truth of humanity.

Resorting to Matthew Arnold (1822-1888) and the Chinese poet Su Dongpo’s (1037-1101) interpretations, Gu stated that both Christianity and Confucianism were, first and foremost, ‘A TEMPER, A DISPOSITION.’ Likewise, ‘civilization is also, first and above all, A STATE OF MIND AND HEART : A SPIRITUAL LIFE.’ The essence of civilization ‘is not dress, house, furniture, machine, ship or gun, but GENTLENESS OF MIND AND HEART.’ The ‘chief and one aim of civilization’, therefore, is not ‘to make and teach men to be strong, but to make and teach men to be gentle.’

Accordingly, the only right and effective way to govern an empire, the Japanese shogun Tokugawa Ieyasu (1543-1616) remarked, is expressed in the Chinese word Ci 慈 (Ci2), or ‘to have a gentle and tender heart’. The Latin ‘alma’ as in ‘alma mater, the extreme gentle tenderness of a mother.

For Gu, the development of an ideal type of humanity grounded in gentleness of mind and heart is the foundation of all true social orders. IT IS THIS SENSUS COMMUNIS OF THE HEART AS INSPIRED BY THE *SUBLIME* MORAL AND POETICAL TEMPERAMENT THAT IS TRULY UNIVERSAL. As Gu elaborated, the ‘essence and power’s of all great systems of religious teachings such as Christianity and Confucianism ‘does not lie in any particular precept such as even the golden rule, much less in the collection of theories, rule of conduct and discipline.’ Rather, ‘IT LIES IN THE PERFECT STATE OF TEMPER, SPIRIT AND MIND’.

In fact, when this gentle and tender heart is absent, even the golden rule may lose its universal appeal and find itself enforced autocratically by whoever has the greatest number of machine guns. On the other hand, when this gentleness of mind and heart is achieved, even those with opposing values and opinions will tolerate, respect, and even learn from each other or at least agree to disagree, if disagreement is unavoidable.

Thus, by shifting the priority from external laws and institutions to *** THE INTERNAL LAW OF THE GENTLEMAN ***, GU IDENTIFIED A NEW IDEA OF THE UNIVERSAL AS THE COMMON SENSE OF RIGHT AND WRONG. PREDICATED ON OUR REFINED TEMPERAMENT AND CULTIVATED PERSONALITIES, THIS IDEA OF THE UNIVERSAL IS UNFETTERED BY THE DOGMATIC INSISTENCE ON ANY TRANSCENDENT PRINCIPLES OR HAPHAZARD MIXTURE OF EASTERN AND WESTERN VALUES.

As I see it, Gu’s idea about the truth of humanity and the universal order of civilization comprise two interconnected philosophical theses. First, moral truth or rightness of moral conduct does not come from PARTIAL or MECHANICAL conformity of one’s body or intellect to some pre-established moral rules outside one’s being. Rather, it consists in THE ENACTMENT OF ONE’S WHOLE NATURE AND BEING WHEN IT IS ‘FULLY DEVELOPED, PROPERLY BALANCED, AND IN A WELL-ORDERED HARMONIOUS CONDITION.’

Gu elaborates in Appendix B to his translation of the Zhongyong 中 庸, The Doctrine of the Mean:

“In order to think aright and find out what is morally right and true, we must first of all, put and keep the state of OUR WHOLE NATURE AND BEING in a proper and well-ordered condition. The more fully our whole nature and being is developed and the more perfectly it is kept in proper, well ordered and well balanced condition the more exact, just and true will be the product of our thought; i.e. the nearer the idea in our mind or the product of our thought approaches that which the thing we think  about really is, AS IT EXISTS BY THE LAW OF ITS NATURE; and in this way brings the action which we take nearer to that which is in unison with the universal order and system of things in the Universe; in fact, what we think then is true and what we do is just.” (Gu, 1906).

NOW, THIS STATE OF THE PROPER ORDER AND BALANCE OF OUR WHOLE NATURE AND BEING IS THE VITAL STATE OF ZHONG HE 中 和 (Zhong1 He2). Here, Gu takes the Chinese word ‘zhong’ to mean OUR CENTRAL INNER SELF, and thus OUR TRUE SELF. It corresponds nicely to what Arnold calls ‘the central clue in our moral being which unites us to the universal order (Arnold 1892).

Gu rendered the word ‘he’ 和, which is usually translated ‘harmony’, as ‘moral order.’ This translation makes good sense here in reference to THE APPROPRIATE EXPRESSION OF OUR EMOTIONS IN ACCORD WITH THE RITUAL AND SOCIAL DECORUM. Thus, when our whole nature and being are attuned to a well-ordered and balanced condition, when our “true moral being and moral order are realized, the universe then becomes a cosmos and all things attain their full growth and development” (Gu 1906).

Second, THE KEY TO ALL MORAL ACTION IS THE MORAL SENSE THAT INSPIRES A PERSON TO FULFILL HIS OR HER MORAL OBLIGATION AS *A FREE AGENT*, ASIDE FROM ULTERIOR MOTIVES OF PROFIT AND FEAR OF PUNISHMENT. GU IDENTIFIES THIS MORAL SENSE, THIS *** SENSE OF HONOR AND TRUTHFULNESS***, AS THE HEART OF THE CHINESE RELIGION OF GOOD CITIZENSHIP. IT IS ESSENTIAL TO REALIZE OUR TRUE BEING. IT IS ALSO THE UNIVERSAL FOUNDATION OF ALL TRUE SOCIAL ORDERS.

No society, no human organization or institution, can truly function without this sense of honor and duty.

As Gu iterates in ‘The Spirit of the Chinese People‘ :

“A society without the sense of honor in men, and without morality on its politics, cannot … be held together, or at any rate, cannot last” (Gu 1922).

In Gu’s view, the true foundation of such social institutions as marriage is NOT the allegedly sacred social contract sanctioned by legal or divine authority. It is NOT even the passion of love between a man and a woman. It is rather the law of the gentleman and good manners, THE SENSE OF HONOR that inspires a man and woman to recognize and respect the duty and dignity of their BEING and BELONGING TOGETHER in the same family and community. This is why Confucius says the law of the gentleman, which is the essence of moral law, ‘takes it’s rise’ in the relation between husband and wife; “but in its outmost reaches it reigns supreme over heaven and earth’s” (Gu 1922).

Even for merchants and gamblers, unless all parties recognize and feel themselves bound by a BASIC MORAL SENSE TO HONOR THEIR CONTRACTS, no gambling or trade would be possible.

As an old Chinese saying puts it, ‘THERE MUST BE HONOR EVEN AMONG THIEVES’. Without a minimum sense of honor and trust, it is impossible even for gangsters to work together. Thus, with no, or no adequate, sense of honor and duty, there can be no true social order, for then a society can be held up only by the use of force and fraud. But a social order based on force (eg, the police or military) and fraud cannot really function, or at least not in any sustainable manner. Because it would implicate infinite snags of vicious circles : it would have to use greater and greater numbers of guns to put down other guns, and bigger and bigger lies to cover up the old lies. Such vicious circles, indeed, are characteristic of those individuals (or nations) caught in the mess of a deadlock by means means of some clever dodge, contrivance, or scheme of reform, which, instead of salvaging them, only …            

                

OF MINDS & MEN (VII)
ON UNIVERSAL HISTORY & THE CREATION OF ARISTOCRATIC MEN

… bring them ‘into a greater mess and deadlock’.

In light of Confucian teachings,there is ‘ONLY ONE TRUE WAY OF ESCAPE’ from such a circumstance : ‘ to get back the evenness of your temper and your calm judgment; TO GET BACK YOUR TRUE SELF, or in the words of Confucius, TO FIND THE CENTRAL CLUE AND BALANCE IN YOUR MORAL BEING.’

In other words, the ultimate solution to all social and political deadlock must be a moral solution. It consists in the moral reform of one’s own being and person, which ‘must precede all and every other reform.’ It is only when a person or a nation HAS RECOVERED AND GOT HOLD OF THE TRUTH OF THEIR BEING that they will be able to ‘SEE and UNDERSTAND the true and exact state of … affairs’ and to ‘see and DO WHAT IS MORALLY JUST AND RIGHT.’ It is only then that :

“NOT ONLY MEN AND THINGS, BUT THE WHOLE UNIVERSE, GOVERNED AS IT IS BY THE SAME MORAL ORDER, BY THE SAME ORDER AND SYSTEM OF THINGS, WILL RESPOND AND OBEY; AND WHATEVER THINGS ARE ABOUT AND AROUND SUCH A MAN WILL AT ONCE AGAIN ARRANGE THEMSELVES INTO A HARMONIOUS AND COSMIC ORDER. (Gu 1906) “

Here, at the end of the third and last quotation from Professor Huaiyu Wang, is the perfect place for returning to the Muses. I left them after having adumbrated EUTERPE, URANIA and TERPSICHORE.

Beyond arithmetics & geometry, the Divine Ladies rule Numbers by presiding respectively over Music, Astronomy and Dance.

I left them before going deeper into their Domain because it was a good metaphorical way to illustrate that Numbers are only the introductory layer of the Estate of Beauty and there is the mortal risk to be stuck there if we don’t advance further into the lessons offered graciously by the 9 Muses. Numbers are the right expressions for the divine HARMONIC PROPORTIONS and as such should be enthusiastically studied but there are higher types of Harmonies taught by the 9 Muses. POLYHYMNIA is deeply absorbed in the Timeless religious hymns. ERATO offers lyric poetry (enthusiasm, God within, in words) and erotic poetry, bodily love as the first step to higher loves; let’s not forget that the Greek language makes the distinction between eros, filios and agape. CALLIOPE is teaching eloquence, the epic (‘epos’ meaning good) poetry celebrating the heroes and the virtuous men,also Literature, Sciences & Arts. And at the center of their estate, MELPOMENE inspires authors writing tragedies, THALIA those writing comedies, idyllic poetry too and CLIO favoring with enthusiasm Justice as the end goal of Universal History notwithstanding History in real flesh & blood alternating regularly between tragedies and farces.

I promised at the beginning of my article to write about Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) and John Dewey (1859-1952). On a second thought, I prefer staying with the noble Philosophers and not wasting my time with them. Suffice it to know that Bertrand Russell promoted a true education for the upper class (at least what he was capable of imagining as a “true education” …) and only a training for being obedient, following adequately practical instructions, learning a trade and being contented for everyone else. John Dewey fancied that doing things manually and remembering the sequences of the various operations (simple and complex) without theoretical contemplation and without deeply going through the ascending stages of the epistemological Journey would be enough for reaching to true learning. I don’t feel any drive for exploring further their mental cesspool for now.

After the 9 Muses, reminding everyone at this point Plato’s teachings using the metaphor of the Charioteer (explained in the Republic & The Phaedrus dialogues) as the general structure of the Mind is appropriate because it is primarily the absence of SUPERIOR EMOTIONS which explains why History in blood & flesh alternates so obstinately between tragedies and farces rather than racing resolutely toward the end goal of Universal History that the Chinese Classical Tradition calls 大 一 统 (Da4 Yi1 Tong3), meaning THE GREAT UNION. The Union of the Cosmological Order and the Human Order. The Union of the Upper Trigram & the Lower Trigram. The Union of Episteme & Doxa. **THE GREAT UNION IS THE UNION OF JUSTICE & POWER**, the dazzling end goal of Universal History.

THRASYMACHUS, the archetypical plutocratic man- a man living at second stage of the epistemological growth out of six, appearing in Plato’s Republic, said overbearingly that ‘Justice is the advantage of the powerful’; in three simple words : MIGHT IS RIGHT.

The Great Union means : MIGHT SERVES RIGHT.

In our time, President Xi Jinping of China contributed to the Timeless Idea with a notion dubbed: 大 一 统 (Da4 Yi1 Tong3/The Great Union) a contemporary equivalent expression : ‘The Human Community with a Shared Future’; 人 类 命 运 共 同 体 in Chinese characters and in pin-yin transliteration : Ren2 Lei4 Ming4 Yun4 Gong4 Tong2 Ti3.

Epistemologically speaking, the collective historical Journey from ‘MIGHT IS RIGHT’ to ‘MIGHT SERVES RIGHT’ is the Journey from the PLUTOCRATIC MIND which is motivated by profit, wealth and power for their own sake and not as mere tools of power for higher purposes to the ARISTOCRATIC MIND, motivated by justice, honor, glory, discovery, inventivity, creativity and playful exploration. Hence the title ‘OF MINDS & MEN : ON UNIVERSAL HISTORY & THE CREATION OF ARISTOCRATIC MEN.

When Lyndon Larouche Jr offered the idea that ‘Genius can be taught’, I say the same thing with the expression ‘The creation of aristocratic men’.

In Plato’s metaphor for the general structure of the Mind, the Chariot is the body & actions. The Black Horse embodies the elementary instincts including the primary impressions coming from the senses-perceptions and THE INFERIOR EMOTIONS (greed including lust, anger, impulsivity, envy, jealousy, anxiety, fear, cravenness, etc.), the White Horse incarnates THE SUPERIOR EMOTIONS (filial piety, piety toward the gods, loyalty, friendliness, gratitude, temperance, compassion, etc.). The responsibility not to allow the inferior emotions to be overwhelming and of nourishing the superior emotions belongs to the Charioteer.

The Charioteer is driving guided by Reason and by AXIOLOGICALLY being receptive to the Timeless Forms of *Beauty*, **Goodness** and ***Truth*** corresponding EPISTEMOLOGICALLY to *DIANOIA* (Dia/through & Noia/Ideas) meaning the Journey through the Domain of the 9 Muses, **DIALEKTIKON**, playful exploration and ***THEORIA***, pure contemplation of the Timeless Forms. POLITICALLY, this gives birth respectively to the *TRUE TIMOCRATIC MAN*, the **ARISTOCRATIC MAN**, the ***PHILOSOPHER-KING***. That’s what I mean when using the expression ‘The axio-epistemo-political Triangle’. TEMPUS : KAIROS : CHRONOS. Also BEING : OVERTURE : BECOMING.

Let’s not forget the fundamental parallel Plato made in one of the dialogues he wrote, the Republic, between the structure of a man’s Mind & the structure of a City. In Greek, the dialogue is named ‘Politeia’ and the exact meaning of ‘Politeia’ is ‘Constitution’. THE CONSTITUTION OF THE CITY is the direct image, the direct reflection of THE CONSTITUTION OF THE MINDS of its people, especially the constitution of the Minds of the members of its ruling class.

Plato proposed 6 basic types of Mind matching the 6 ascending stages of the epistemological growth. I want to mention a type of Mind which can be labeled as ‘0’ corresponding to the ochlocratic man. The Greek word ‘okhlos’ means the ‘crowd’, so “ochlocracy” is the power of the crowd- the mob rule. It also means the Mind completely fragmented, with no center, utterly disorganized. It’s not a surprise that Plato did not start his epistemological map with the ochlocratic ‘Mind’ because it is hopeless. With no mental center of gravity, it’s not possible to advance epistemologically.

Plato offered the same epistemological map, with other words, than Confucius’ Hexagram.

In the next segment of our exploration into Universal History and the Creation of Aristocratic Men, we will continue to examine Plato’s analysis of these fundamental types of mind.