Hello everyone, here is a small broadcast reading, today we began to share "Liezi Yang Zhu", which is also the last article of Liezi, a brief introduction to Yang Zhu, he is the founder of the Taoist Yang Zhu school, is a famous thinker in the Warring States period, his ideas are recorded in "Liezi", "Zhuangzi", "Mencius", Yang Zhu's thought in the Warring States period is still very widely influential, in the Warring States period, even with Confucianism and Mojia, there is "the world's words, not return to Yang then return to the phenomenon of ink."
Yang Zhu is a representative of ancient realism, and the famous idea is: for me, noble self, noble life. In today's view, many of Yang Zhu's ideas are very selfish and very realistic. The famous idiom "no dime" is to say Yang Zhu," which says: "Yang Zi takes it for me, plucks a dime and benefits the world, not for it." Mencius said that Yang Zhu practiced 'for me', that is, he did not do anything that was beneficial to the world for his own sake and uprooting his hair. This story is said in "Liezi". One day, Yang Zhu said: The ancient sage Boyi was unwilling to pluck a hair from his body to help all things, so he was willing to give up the throne and live a life of seclusion. Legend has it that Boyi once had merit in controlling water, and Dayu intended to pass the throne to Boyi, but Boyi felt that he would hurt himself and refused. However, Dayu was unwilling to seek benefits for himself, so he worked hard all his life, and finally fell into a half-paralyzed body.
But in fact, we may partially misunderstand Yang Zhu's meaning, Yang Zhu said: "The ancient people lost a millimeter of profit and the world did not have a relationship, and the world did not take it." Everyone does not lose a single cent, everyone is not good for the world, the world is ruled", the ancient man plucked out a hair on his body, and it was beneficial to all things under the world, but he was not willing to give; let the whole world to feed him alone, he was not willing. If everyone does not pluck out a single hair on their own body, and everyone does not deliberately do things that are beneficial to the world, then the world will be too peaceful.
Therefore, Yang Zhu is not selfish for selfishness, but a more rational idea, just like Adam Smith, the father of modern economics, famously said in "The Wealth of Nations": Our dinner does not come from the benevolence of butchers, winemakers or bakers, but from their self-interested hearts. Modern economics is to establish that human nature is selfish and selfish, or is based on rationality, not on the basis of feelings that want to benefit each other, in fact, it is similar to Yang Zhu's thought, Yang Zhu believes that we do not need to deliberately give favors to people, just need to pay attention to ourselves to make the world peaceful, this kind of thinking is actually to some extent, in fact, it is still more advanced. So how did Yang Zhu argue his ideas?
One day, Bird Slipper [lí] asked Yang Zhu, if you let you pluck a hair from your body to save the people of the world, would you be willing? Yang Zhu said that this world is not something that I can do without a hair. Bird Slipper said, what if it could? Would you like to? Yang Zhu did not answer. Poultry Slipper left Yang Zhu and met Meng Sunyang on the road, Bird Slipper told Meng Sunyang about the matter, Meng Sunyang said, you still do not understand Mr. Meng's good intentions.
Meng Sunyang said: If someone damages your skin a little, but gives you ten thousand pounds of gold, are you willing? ”
Bird Slipper replied, "I do." ”
Meng Sunyang then asked, "If someone intercepts a limb of yours, but gives you a country, will you be willing?" ”
The bird slip listened and was silent.
Yang Zhu believes that the peace of a country cannot rely solely on the small favors of everyone, or cannot be based on a certain moral emotion, but should be based on reason. It is not to say that "pulling out a dime and benefiting the world" is not possible, from a realistic point of view, this is also impossible, it is impossible to pull out a dime to benefit the world. Therefore, Yang Zhu is also a rare realist in ancient times. This is the connotation of Yang Zhu's "for me, noble self, noble life".
Yang Zhu attaches great importance to himself, especially his own life, he believes that everyone should cherish their own life, which is the premise of all possibilities, Yang Zhu said: "A person's life expectancy can only live to a hundred years old, more than a hundred years old people are very few, it is estimated that only one thousandth." Even if a man could live to be a hundred years old, subtracting his infancy and old age, he would have almost fifty years. Subtracting the time spent sleeping at night, the time delayed during the day took half of fifty years. Subtract the time spent being sick, the time of suffering, the time of worrying about death, and this takes up nearly half of the rest of the time. In this way, there are only a few decades left in life, but I am afraid that there will not be a day to live a comfortable and self-sufficient life without any worries.
It can be seen that Yang Zhu's thinking is actually very pragmatic, Yang Zhu for example, the ancient sages Xia Yu, Confucius, Yu Shun, and Zhou Gong were all very famous saints, but their lives were very miserable, Yang Zhu said, Confucius ruled the country and the world very well, and was reused by the monarch at that time, but he was framed when he was in the Song Kingdom, and had to flee into the wilderness. Later, in Weiguo, he was repeatedly attacked by rumors from others, and finally he could only disappear. In the Shang Zhou region, he was imprisoned, trapped in the wilderness between Chen Guo and Cai Guo, almost starved to death, and later suffered from Ji's blows and Yang Hu's humiliation, and kept walking on thin ice, until he finally died, he was the most miserable person in the whole world.
Yang Zhu believes that these saints are not even happy when they are alive, only after death, the so-called reputation is something outside of life, although we praise the saints, but the saints do not know under the Yellow Spring, what is the difference between this and tree stumps and wooden blocks?
There are four main reasons why a person cannot live a good life and is troubled all day:
One is to want to live longer
The second is to get a good reputation
The third is to obtain a distinguished status
The fourth is to seek more wealth.
In order to fulfill these four wishes, they are afraid of the visit of ghosts, the persecution of people, the persecution of the powerful, and the punishment of punishment. Such living people can be said to be contrary to natural nature, and their lives are also dominated by themselves, but they are completely limited by external objects. And those who truly respect life, know how to conform to the Mandate of Heaven, do not pursue longevity, do not attach themselves to power, status and wealth, this kind of person is a person who truly obeys the Mandate of Heaven. The life of such people is completely dominated by themselves, they are the strongest in life, they occupy the initiative of life.
This is Yang Zhu's attitude towards life, in short, life is short, why not let yourself live happily? In fact, Yang Zhu's thought is very similar to the "hedonism" pursued by the ancient Greek philosopher Epicurus, Yang Zhu believes that the pursuit of things outside of life is the main reason for our pain and confusion, and Epicurus also believes that there are three main reasons that plague our hearts, including the fear of natural disasters, the fear of death and the trouble of interpersonal relationships. Therefore, Epicurus advocated staying away from the distractions of the world and living a simple and happy life.
In 306 BC, he bought a garden in Athens and founded a school, which led to the Epicurean school also known as the "Garden School". Epicurus's schools, which had men and women, as well as slaves, were known for their friendship, and Epicurus also saw "friendship" as the first principle for attaining happiness. Of all the efforts to ensure lifelong happiness, he said, the most important thing is to meet friends. Wisdom is provided to all happiness throughout life, and the attainment of friendship is the most important.
In fact, Epicurus and Yang Zhu are almost contemporaries, both lived around the 4th century BC, their attitude to life is also very similar, Yang Zhu proposed "for me, noble self, noble life", cherish life, live a simple happy life far from the world, Yang Zhu said: Fame is an appendage of life, many people pursue fame, so sad, consume their own lives to gain fame, this is not worth it, but also against nature, the pursuit of happy and comfortable life is human nature, Do you agree with Yang Zhu's thoughts?
Well, today's content is these, the whole content of the book "Liezi" is introduced here, the next issue of content, we will briefly summarize the essence of the Taoist thought of Liezi, if you like my article, please pay attention to the small broadcast reading, we will see the next article.