1001Philosophers

Mencius vs Xunzi

Mencius and Xunzi are the two most influential developers of early Confucianism after Confucius himself, and their dispute over human nature is the most important debate within the early Confucian tradition.

At a glance

MenciusXunzi
Dates372 BC – 289 BC310 BC – 235 BC
NationalityChineseChinese
EraAncientAncient
Movements Confucianism Confucianism
Profile Mencius → Xunzi →

Where they agree

Both held that human beings can be morally cultivated through study, ritual, and the example of the sages, both held that proper government aims at the moral cultivation of the people, and both worked within the Confucian framework of ritual propriety, humanness, and the rectification of names. Both took the Analects as the authoritative starting point.

Where they disagree

Mencius held that human nature is good: the four sprouts of moral feeling are innate, and cultivation consists in their nurture and growth. Xunzi held the opposite: human nature is bad, and what is good in human beings is the work of conscious effort against natural inclination. Mencius's cultivation is the watering of an inner seed; Xunzi's is the bending of crooked wood through ritual constraint. The dispute shaped the subsequent Confucian tradition, with the Mencian view becoming dominant in Neo-Confucianism and the Xunzian view marginalized but never lost.

Representative quotes

Mencius

  • “The great man is he who does not lose his child's-heart.”

    大人者，不失其赤子之心者也

  • “He who exerts his mind to the utmost knows his nature.”

    7A:1, as translated by Wing-tsit Chan in A Source Book in Chinese Philosophy (1963), p. 62

  • “The feeling of compassion is the beginning of benevolence; the feeling of shame is the beginning of righteousness; the feeling of deference is the beginning of propriety; the feeling of right and wrong is the beginning of wisdom.”

    2A:6, as translated by Wing-tsit Chan in A Source Book in Chinese Philosophy (1963), p. 65 | Variant translation: The sense of compassion is the beginning of benevolence; the sense of shame the beginning of righteousness; the sense of modesty the beginning of decorum; the sense of right and wrong the beginning of wisdom. Man possesses these four beginnings just as he possesses four limbs. Anyone p

Xunzi

  • “The person attempting to travel two roads at once will get nowhere.”

    Quoted in: Errick A. Ford (2010) Iron Sharpens Iron: Wisdom of the Ages, p. 48

  • “Quoted in: Errick A. Ford (2010) Iron Sharpens Iron: Wisdom of the Ages, p. 48”

    The person attempting to travel two roads at once will get nowhere.

  • “In order to properly understand the big picture, everyone should fear becoming mentally clouded and obsessed with one small section of truth.”

    Quoted in: Joan Klostermann-Ketels (2011) HumaniTrees, p. 96

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