Xunzi Quotes on Knowledge
Xunzi (c. 313 – c. 238 BC), the third great figure of the early Confucian tradition after Confucius and Mencius, defended in the long thirty-two-chapter Xunzi the doctrine that human nature is crooked and selfish (xing e) — directly against Mencius's doctrine of innate good sprouts — and that the moral and cognitive cultivation of the gentleman is therefore the patient straightening of an unfinished material through the long discipline of ritual, study, and the imitation of the sage-kings. Knowledge for Xunzi is acquired by sustained learning from authoritative models rather than being recovered from inner resources, and the famous chapter "An Exhortation to Learning" gives the canonical statement of this position.
Quotes
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Attributed to Xunzi:
“Learning should never cease.”
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Attributed to Xunzi:
“If you do not climb a high mountain, you will not comprehend the highness of the heavens.”
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“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 -
“Not having heard of it is not as good as having heard of it. Having heard of it is not as good as having seen it. Having seen it is not as good as knowing it. Knowing it is not as good as putting it into practice. Learning arrives at putting it into practice and then stops.”
As translated by Eric L. Hutton in Xunzi: The Complete Text (2024), Ch. 8 :The Achievements of the Ru | Variant translations: | Not having learned it is not as good as having learned it; having learned it is not as good as having seen it carried out; having seen it is not as good as understanding it; understanding it is not as good as doing it. The development of scholarship is to the extreme of d -
“As translated by Eric L. Hutton in Xunzi: The Complete Text (2024), Ch. 8 :The Achievements of the Ru”
Not having heard of it is not as good as having heard of it. Having heard of it is not as good as having seen it. Having seen it is not as good as knowing it. Knowing it is not as good as putting it into practice. Learning arrives at putting it into practice and then stops. -
“See also derivatives at "Quote Origin: Tell Me and I Forget; Teach Me and I May Remember; Involve Me and I Learn" at the Quote Investigator”
Not having heard of it is not as good as having heard of it. Having heard of it is not as good as having seen it. Having seen it is not as good as knowing it. Knowing it is not as good as putting it into practice. Learning arrives at putting it into practice and then stops. -
“Learning proceeds until death and only then does it stop. ... Its purpose cannot be given up for even a moment. To pursue it is to be human, to give it up to be a beast.”
An Exhortation to Learning | Readings in Classical Chinese Philosophy (2001), p. 258