Conventional Interpretations of Analects 8.9

In the above, I tentatively translated the passage from Analects 8.9, min ke shi you zhi bu ke shi zhi zhi 民可使由之, 不可使知之, as “common people can (or: are permitted to) be made to follow it and cannot (or: are not permitted to) be made to know it,” to reflect the major point of disagreement in interpreting this passage. The meaning of the word shi 使 is clear: “to make; to cause” (since the sentence is in passive voice, it means “to be made; to be caused”). There has not been much serious disagreement regarding the meaning of the two verbs you由 (to follow) and zhi 知 (to know) (although I shall argue that the most distinctive feature of Cheng's interpretation is his unique interpretation of the word zhi 知), and there seems to be a general consensus that the word zhi 之 (it), the object of the two verbs, refers to the Way. Perhaps somewhat more controversial isthe word min 民, here translated as “common people.” Some interpret the term as broadly as ren人, “human beings,” so that the passage means that any human individual can (or: is permitted to) be made to follow it but cannot (or: is not permitted to) be made to know it.Footnote ¹⁵ Others interpret min as narrowly as to refer to Confucius's students other than the seventy two who are proficient in the six arts.Footnote ¹⁶ Most commonly, min is understood to refer to those who are to be governed. The precise interpretation of min, however, is not crucial to understanding the passage. It is sufficient to understand the relationship between min and those who can (or are permitted to) make min follow the Way and yet cannot (or are not permitted) to make them know it. Although there will certainly be disagreements regarding the identity of the latter group as well, it suffices to say that they are those who not only follow but also know the Way, so that min, whoever they are, must be those who neither follow nor know it. Thus the major question remains why min can (or are permitted to) be made to follow the Way and yet cannot (or are not permitted to) be made to know it. The crucial issue here is whether the word ke 可 and its negation bu ke 不可 should be interpreted as “can” and “cannot,” respectively, or as “are permitted” and “are not permitted to,” respectively, as the term can have either meaning.

If the word ke means “be permitted to,” the passage can be read: “Common people are permitted to be made to follow the Way but are not permitted to be made to know it.” As noted above, many critics of Confucius and Confucianism accept this interpretation.Footnote ¹⁷ It is also, however, accepted by some more sympathetic commentators. For example, the Qing dynasty scholar Yan Xizhai 顏習齊 (1635–1704) not only defended this interpretation but also argued against the alternative interpretation of the word ke to mean neng 能 (can). In his view, if the Way is made known to people,

In his Lunyu zhu 論語注 (Annotations on the Analects), the Jin 晉 dynasty scholar Zhang Ping 張憑 related this interpretation to Confucius's distinction between government by virtue and government by punitive laws:

Slingerland follows this interpretation, saying that it “accords well with the sentiment of [Analects] 2.3, when Confucius declares that ruling by a publicized legal code merely inspires the common people to devise devious ways to get around the law.”Footnote ²⁰

This interpretation, however, is problematic in at least two respects. First, linguistically, it attributes two different referents to the word zhi 之, “it,” within the same passage. As the object of the verb you由 (to follow), zhi 之 refers to the Way or “virtue,” while as the object of the verb zhi 知 (to know), it refers to punitive laws. The original text, however, seems to intend a sharp contrast between what people can (or are permitted to) do and what they cannot (or are not permitted to) do: “to follow it” versus “to know it.” The word zhi 之, therefore, must have the same referent in both parts of the statement. Second, philosophically, such an interpretation amounts to saying that Confucius advocated a policy of keeping people in ignorance, which, as noted by Chen Daqi 陳大齊 (1887–1983), “is contrary to Confucius's thought. In two different places, [Analects] 9.19 and 14.28, Confucius says that the person who knows will not be deluded. On this principle, unless Confucius wished to keep people in delusion forever, he would not be unwilling to transform people from ignorance to knowledge.”Footnote ²¹ In other words, if we accept this interpretation, we have to conclude that Confucius or the Analects is not consistent.Footnote ²² In Chen's view, the word ke refers to ability and bu ke refers to the lack thereof, so the Analects passage really means that common people “can” be made to follow the Way but “cannot” be made to know it.Footnote ²³ This is the second common interpretation, which we shall now examine.

Most advocates of this second interpretation presume that common people cannot know the Way because they lack the intellectual capacity to do so. For example, in his Lunyu zhu 論語注 (Annotations on the Analect s), the Han 漢 dynasty scholar Zheng Xuan 鄭玄 (127–200) explains that “the word min 民 really means ming 冥 (the stupid), who are at a remove from the way of humanity.”Footnote ²⁴ The Qing Dynasty scholar Zhao You 趙佑, while not regarding min as at a remove from humanity, likewise states in his Sishu wengu lu 四書溫故錄 (Notes from Reading the Four Books) that common people are stupid: “The nature of all common people is good and so they can be made to follow the Way. The nature of common people is originally stupid and so they cannot be made to know it. So as to maintain order, rulers should discuss the Way among themselves and establish rules for people to follow. If so, everything will be in order.”Footnote ²⁵ Most contemporary scholars also hold this view. For example, D. C. Lau argues,

Although this is a popular interpretation, it is unlikely that it is indeed what Confucius meant. A famous passage in the Analects 15.39 states: “Education should be provided for all without distinction” (you jiao wu lei 有教無類), whether they are rich or poor, noble or lowly, with high or low intellectual abilities.Footnote ²⁷ If Confucius indeed thought that common people are too stupid to know the Way, then he would have instead said that education should be provided for all those who have high enough intellectual abilities. Not only did he not say this, but his own career in education proves the opposite. Although we do not have entirely reliable sources,Footnote ²⁸ we do learn from Shiji 史記 (Records of the [Grand] Historian), Lü shi chuqiu 呂氏春秋 (Mister Lü's Springs and Autumns), and other parts of the Analects that, among Confucius's students, Zilu 子路was originally “uncultivated” (ye ren 野人), Zigong 子貢 was engaged in commerce, Zhonggong's 仲弓 father was a “lowly person” (jianren賤人), Zizhang 子張 was from a family of low status in the state of Lu 魯, and Yan Zhuju 顏涿聚 was a robber.Footnote ²⁹ In fact, very few of Confucius's students were from rich or noble families. Far from proving a waste of Confucius's time, several of those mentioned here—Zilu, Zigong, and Zhonggong—were among his most accomplished students. Xu Fuguan 徐復觀 (1904–1982), an important contemporary Confucian, thus argues that one of Confucius's most important contributions to Chinese culture is that he “breaks free of all unreasonable distinctions among human beings and advocates that all humans are of one class and are equal.”Footnote ³⁰ In addition to Analects 15.39, Xu Fuguan cites a passage in Analects 18.6 to support his claim: “We cannot live together with birds and beasts. If I do not associate with humans, with whom shall I associate?” According to Xu's reading, Confucius here simply separates humans from beasts without making any further distinctions among humans.

In this connection, it is worthwhile to take a look at Analects7.7, which is normally understood to mean that Confucius never refused to teach anyone who came with a small present for tuition. According to Huang Kan 皇侃 (488–545) and several other commentators, the phrase shu xiu 束脩 in this passage refers to a bundle of ten strips of dried meat (with xiu referring to dried meat and shu meaning ten). In his Sishu shengyan 四書賸言 (Additional Comments on the Four Books), the Qing dynasty scholar Mao Qiling 毛奇齡 (1623–1716) tells us that shu xiu is a small present that literati and officials (shidafu士大夫) carried with them when they went abroad.Footnote ³¹ If this is the case, then critics of Confucius may be correct in claiming that Confucius did not intend to provide education for all: although ten strips of dried meat might be deemed a small present for shidafu, it would certainly not have been “small” for poor people of his time (or even for some poor people in some remote areas of China today).Footnote ³² If Confucius did, in fact, refuse to teach people who could not provide this gift, this would contradict his statement in Analects 15.39. There are, however, alternative interpretations of shu xiu. For example, in his Lunyu ouji 論語偶記 (Occasional Notes on the Analects), the Qing dynasty scholar Fang Guanxu 方觀旭 quotes Zheng Xuan's 鄭玄 interpretation of shu xiu to mean “the age of 15” and cites uses of the term in this sense in Yantielun 鹽鐵論 (Discourses on Salt and Iron; Western Han dynasty), Liu Xiang's 劉向 (ca.77–76 b.c.e.) Lien ü zhuan 烈女傳 (Biographies of Notable Women), and Hou Hanshu 後漢書 (History of the Later Han).Footnote ³³ This interpretation was also accepted by the Qing dynasty scholar Huang Shisan 黃式三 (1789–1862) in his Lunyu hou ' an 論語後案 (Later Notes on the Analects).Footnote ³⁴ According to this interpretation, Confucius is not erecting a barrier to education based on property, but rather saying that he never refuses to teach anyone who is fifteen years old or above. Among contemporary scholars, Li Zehou 李澤厚 is one of the few to adopt this interpretation. Li notes that it is consistent with Analects 2.4, in which Confucius says that he sets the goal on learning at the age of fifteen.Footnote ³⁵

Since neither of the two conventional interpretations of Analects 8.9—which focus on the two different meanings of the word ke and its negation—seems consistent with Confucius's general philosophy, other scholars have attempted to produce a less problematic text by punctuating the passage differently. According to the traditional punctuation, on which the above two conventional interpretations are based, this passage is divided into two parallel and contrasting parts: min ke shi you zhi 民可使由之, bu ke shi zhi zhi 不可使知之. In his Lunyu ji 論語稽 (Examination of the Analects), the Qing dynasty scholar Huan Maoyong 宦懋庸 suggests that the passage should rather be read, min ke 民可, shi you zhi 使由之; bu ke不可, shi zhi zhi 使知之, meaning, “if people approve of it/them (rules proposed by government), then make people follow it/them; if people do not approve of it/them, then make them know it/them.” This interpretation makes some sense, but as Yang Bojun 楊伯峻 has noted, Huan's punctuation renders the sentence ungrammatical, as the object of the verb shi 使, presumably “people,” is missing from both clauses. If Huan's interpretation were correct, the passage should have read, min ke 民可, shi zhi you zhi 使之由之; bu ke 不可, shi zhi zhi zhi 使之知之.Footnote ³⁶

Changing the punctuation of this passage has become a popular procedure among contemporary Chinese scholars. Here are a few more representative exam-ples: 1) min ke shi 民可使, you zhi 由之; bu ke shi 不可使, zhi zhi 知之, meaning, “If common people follow the virtuous ruler, leave them alone; if common people do not follow the virtuous ruler, let them know”;Footnote ³⁷ 2) min 民, ke shi you zhi 可使由之, bu ke shi zhi zhi 不可使知之, meaning, “for common people, (rulers) should use (virtue) to guide them and not use it to force them”;Footnote ³⁸ 3) min ke shi 民可使, you zhi bu ke 由之不可, shi zhi zhi 使知之, meaning, “common people can be forced, but cannot be allowed to act according to their will. They should be made to know the Way”;Footnote ³⁹ 4) min ke shi you zhi 民可使由之? Bu 不. Ke shi zhi zhi 可使知之, meaning, “Can common people be left alone? No. They should be made to know.”Footnote ⁴⁰ It should be noted that all these recent interpretations based on alternative punctuations of the sentence in the Analects have been proposed in the context of contemporary China, where many Confucian scholars have been trying to recover the true Confucian spirit and to promote a positive image of Confucius in the shadow of the anti-Confucius campaign during the Cultural Revolution. Thus, they all try to provide favorable readings of this difficult passage. However, the weakness of these interpretations is also clear from their proponents' criticisms of one another, which reveal them all to be forced and implausible. It is in this context that we can best appreciate the significance of the philosophical interpretation of the same passage by Cheng Yi, who likewise aimed to promote Confucianism in a society profoundly influenced by Buddhism.

Cheng Yi's Interpretation of Analects 8.9

One of Cheng Yi's students asked him about Analects 8.9: “Common people can (or: are permitted to) be made to follow it but cannot (or: are not permitted to) be made to know it.' Is this because sages do not want to make people know it or because people themselves are unable to know it?” The student is asking Cheng Yi to choose between the two conventional interpretations discussed above: either people are not permitted to know it or people are unable to know it. Cheng Yi replied: “It is not that sages do not want people to know it. The reason that sages establish their teaching is to let everyone know about it so that everyone can become worthy. Sages, however, can only make people follow it. How can they make them fully understand it (jin zhi zhi 盡知之)? This is because sages cannot do it.”Footnote ⁴¹ It seems that Cheng Yi is simply siding with those who interpret the word ke as “can.”Footnote ⁴² This is what Cheng Yi is generally thought to believe, because this view was popularized largely through Zhu Xi's 朱熹 (1130–1200) Lunyu jizhu 論語集注 (Collected Annotations of the Analects), in which a similar passage of Cheng Yi's is quoted from his annotation of Analects8.9. Zhu Xi prefaces this quotation with his own interpretation: “What people can be made to do is an 'ought' (dangran 當然), while what people cannot be made to know is a 'why' (suoyiran 所以然).”Footnote ⁴³Suoyiran is much more difficult to know than dangran; common people lack the ability to know it.Footnote ⁴⁴

In his reply to the student's question, however, Cheng Yi does not simply choose one of the two alternatives provided: either that sages do not want to make people know the Way, or that people cannot know it. Instead, he says that it is because “sages are unable to do it.” This is most interesting. We have noted that bu ke can either mean “not be permitted to” or “cannot.” There is no doubt that Cheng Yi understands it in the latter sense. So far, however, we have not taken note of the fact that when a negative sentence is cast in the passive voice, as in the sentence “A cannot be made to do x (by B),” the reason for the “cannot” can either be that A lacks the ability to do x or that B lacks the ability to make A to do x. So the reason that people cannot be made (presumably by sages) to know the Way can be due either to the people's lack of ability to know the Way or to the sages' lack of ability to make people know it. Perhaps because it seems derogatory to suggest that sages might lack some ability, almost all commentators who choose to interpret bu ke as “cannot” assume that it is the people who lack the ability. Yet, in the above quoted passage, Cheng Yi makes it unmistakably clear that it is because of the sages' lack of ability that people cannot be made to know the Way. If so, can we say, following Pang Pu 龐樸, that rather than regarding common people as ignorant (minyu 民愚), Cheng Yi regards sages as ignorant (shengren zi yu 聖人自愚)?Footnote ⁴⁵

In order to answer this question, we must understand why Cheng Yi believes that it is sages who lack the ability to make people know the Way; and in order to understand this, we must appreciate Cheng's distinction between knowledge (attained) by hearing and seeing (wenjian zhi zhi 聞見之知) and knowledge of/as virtue (dexing zhi zhi 德性之知). In Cheng's view, the significant distinction between these two types of knowledge is that knowledge by hearing and seeing is superficial in the sense that it does not incline us to act accordingly, while knowledge of/as virtue is profound in the sense that it inclines us to act accordingly. Thus, he states: “When knowledge is profound, action will be thorough. No one ever knows without being able to act. If one knows without being able to act, the knowledge is superficial. Because they know the danger, people do not eat poisonous herbs when hungry and do not tread on water and fire. People do evil things simply because they lack knowledge.”Footnote ⁴⁶ It is a contradiction, in his view, to claim that one knows and yet is unable to act: “So if one knows what is immoral and still does it, this is not genuine knowledge. If it is genuine knowledge, one will certainly not act immorally.”Footnote ⁴⁷ Clearly, then, in Cheng Yi's view, what sages are unable to give people is not knowledge gained by hearing and seeing—people can be instructed in this type of knowledge—but knowledge of/as virtue, the knowledge that will incline people to act appropriately.

Why are sages unable to give people knowledge of/as virtue? Cheng Yi tells us: “Knowledge from seeing and hearing is not knowledge of/as virtue. It results from contact between one thing and another thing and therefore is not internal. The knowledge of those erudite and skillful persons belongs to this (category). Knowledge of/as virtue does not rely upon hearing and seeing.”Footnote ⁴⁸ According to this distinction, while knowledge by seeing and hearing is external, knowledge of/as virtue is internal and comes from one's inner experience. Thus, Cheng claims that “learning, generally speaking, cannot be obtained through knowledge by hearing. One can obtain it only by silently apprehending it in one's own heart/mind (mo shi xin tong 默識心通).”Footnote ⁴⁹ In Cheng Yi's view, mo shi xin tong is not easy: “It is easy to learn but difficult to know; it is easy to know, but it is difficult to know by personal experience (ti er de zhi 體而得之).”Footnote ⁵⁰ Here the word ti 體, referring to that by which one can personally attain knowledge of/as virtue, is extremely important toCheng in particular and to Confucianism in general.Footnote ⁵¹ As Tu Weiming 杜維明 correctly warns us, knowledge attained by ti does not come from one's body. The word ti here functions as both noun and verb. As a noun, it refers to xin 心, the heart/mind, which Mencius calls dati 大體 (literally, “the great body”) in contrast to the physical body, which he calls xiaoti 小體 (literally, “the small body”).Footnote ⁵² This is why Cheng states in the previously quoted passage that “one can obtain it only by apprehending it in one's own heart/mind (xin 心).” For example, Confucius praises Yanzi 顏子for being able to be ren 仁 for a few months at a time. Cheng Yi argues that the distinction between Yanzi and others is that the latter “have only knowledge of hearing and seeing and not knowledge from their own heart/mind, while Yanzi can grasp ren firmly without losing it because he gets it from his own heart/mind.”Footnote ⁵³ As a verb, ti refers to the activity of the heart/mind. Here it is vital to understand the “heart” function of the xin in its role in obtaining knowledge of/as virtue. Knowledge gained by seeing and hearing does not come merely from one's sensory organs. It is also the result of the “mind” function of the xin, as it is something that one must understand, justify, and prove. Nevertheless, it is only when knowledge is grasped also by the “heart” function of the xin that it can become knowledge of/as virtue, the knowledge that inclines one to act. Thus, Cheng states that “if one gets the Way from one's heart/mind, one can manifest it in one's body.”Footnote ⁵⁴

With this distinction between the two types of knowledge,Footnote ⁵⁵ we are in a better position to understand why sages lack the ability to make people know the Way. Knowledge of the Way belongs to what Cheng Yi calls “knowledge of/as virtue.” Unlike knowledge attained through hearing and seeing, knowledge of/as virtue must not only be understood by one's mind but also experienced in one's heart, although mind and heart are simply two different functions of the same xin. So while sages certainly can teach people about the Way and people may also understand the teaching in their minds, until people experience it within their own hearts so that they are willing to act accordingly, the sages' teachings will remain merely knowledge from seeing and hearing to them. By its very nature, knowledge of/as virtue cannot be taught but has to be obtained by oneself (zide 自得). Thus, zide becomes one of Cheng Yi's most important ideas. In his view, “nothing is more important than attaining it on one's own through learning. To attain it on one's own is not to attain it from outside.”Footnote ⁵⁶ To say that one must attain it on one's own, of course, does not mean that one does not need to be taught by others. The point is that if one does not personally experience what is taught by others, it remains merely a piece of information, which one may fully understand and yet not be ready to act upon. In order for knowledge to be one's own, so that one not only understands but also firmly believes and is prepared to act on it, one must attain it on one's own. Thus, since the classics contain the sages' teachings, Cheng Yi states, “to study classics is the best way to learn. If, however, one does not attain it [the Way] on one's own, then even if one goes through the Five Classics thoroughly, there is nothing but empty words.”Footnote ⁵⁷ When asked how learners can zide, Cheng Yi replies: “If learners take time internally in appreciating and experiencing the sage's teaching, then they will attain it themselves. Learners should search deeply in the Analects, regarding the questions of Confucius's students as their own questions and regarding the sage's replies as if they were hearing them today. If they do so, they will naturally attain it.”Footnote ⁵⁸

So, according to Cheng Yi, Analects 8.9 does not mean that people are not permitted to know the Way but that people cannot be made to know it; people cannot be made to know the Way not because they lack the ability to know it, but because sages lack the ability to make people know it; and sages lack the ability to make people know it not because they are deficient, lacking in power or knowledge that they should have, but because the type of knowledge relevant here is knowledge of/as virtue, which, by its very nature, has to be attained on one's own. Thus, in Cheng's view, to ask sages to make people know the Way is to ask them to do something logically impossible: to provide people with something that, by its very nature, people can only attain on their own. This interpretation certainly makes sense. Before we conclude our discussion of Cheng Yi's interpretation of this Analects passage, however, it would be worthwhile to say a few words regarding possible objections to it. A common criticism of Cheng Yi's interpretations of Confucian classics is that he imposes general philosophical ideas on the texts rather than engaging in careful textual analysis. In this particular case, for example, it might be argued that the central concepts that Cheng Yi invokes, such as “knowledge of/as virtue” and “attaining it on one's own,” are absent from Confucius's Analects. Admittedly, Confucius does not make the distinction between knowledge of/as virtue and knowledge by hearing and seeing. I do not, however, think it unreasonable to suppose that Confucius's “knowledge of the Way” is not merely intellectual but also something that inclines one to act. This can be seen from the close connection between zhi 知 (knowledge), on the one hand, and ren 仁 (humanity) and yi 義 (rightness), on the other. When asked about knowledge, Confucius replied, “A person who does his best to work for the rightness due to people . . . can be regarded as having knowledge.”Footnote ⁵⁹ Here, in Confucius's view, knowledge has to be related to the moral action of yi. On the one hand, he argues that a person who has knowledge must choose ren. Thus, he argues that we cannot “consider people as having knowledge if they do not choose to settle in ren 仁,”Footnote ⁶⁰ and that “the person who has knowledge seeks ren.”Footnote ⁶¹ On the other hand, he argues that a person of ren must have knowledge: “Without knowledge, how can one be ren?”Footnote ⁶² When Confucius laments that “there are few people who know virtue,”Footnote ⁶³ what he has in mind is clearly not people who have heard about virtue (knowledge by hearing and seeing) but people who are inclined to act by their knowledge of virtue. In this sense, it can be argued that Cheng Yi's idea of knowledge of/as virtue (dexing zhi zhi) has its origin in the Analects.Footnote ⁶⁴

Now, let us look at Cheng Yi's idea of attaining knowledge on one's own. In order to have knowledge of/as virtue, Cheng Yi argues that we cannot rely upon hearing and seeing but only upon mo shi xin tong 默識心通. Here, mo shi xin tong is derived from mo er shi zhi 默而識之, “to silently gain knowledge from inside,” which Confucius identifies as one of his own traits in Analects 7.2. In his commentary on this Analects passage, Cheng Yi explains that by mo shi, Confucius means “to gain knowledge within oneself” (you zhu ji 有諸己).Footnote ⁶⁵ This idea of mo shi xin tong or mo er shi zhi is closely related to Cheng Yi's important concept of attaining (knowledge) on one's own (zide), an idea that he adopts from the Mencius: “Superior persons deeply pursue the Way in order to attain it on their own (zide).When they attain it on their own, they will be at ease in it; when they are at ease in it, they can draw deeply on it; when they draw deeply on it, they can make use of it wherever they turn. That is why superior persons want to attain it on their own.”Footnote ⁶⁶ It is true that we do not find this idea of attaining it on one's own in Confucius's Analects, but in Cheng Yi's view, the idea is implicit there. When commenting on Analects7.8 in his Lunyu jie 論語解 (Interpretation of the Analects), he further states: “Do not teach people who are not eager to learn or anxious to explain themselves.' This means to teach only when students are sincere. 'When I have pointed out one corner of a square to people and they do not come back with the other three, I will not point it out to them a second time.' This means to wait for the students to attain it on their own (zide) after they are taught.”Footnote ⁶⁷ In another comment on the same passage, Cheng Yi emphasizes the idea of si 思, normally translated as “thinking”: “When Confucius teaches people, he 'does not teach people who are not eager to learn or not anxious to express themselves' [Analects 7.8]. For knowledge will not be solid when taught to people who are not eager to learn and do not express themselves. When they are eager to learn and express themselves, they will be energetic. Learners need deep si.”Footnote ⁶⁸ Learners need deep si because si is crucial to attaining knowledge on one's own. When asked how people can attain knowledge on their own, Cheng Yi simply replies: “si.”Footnote ⁶⁹ In Cheng's view, it is for this reason that Confucius says that “to learn without si will be bewildering, and to si without learning will put one in peril.”Footnote ⁷⁰ We have to understand that si for Cheng Yi does not merely refer to intellectual thinking but also to inner reflective experience. Although he sometimes invokes them together, he draws a distinction between si and lü 慮. In his view, it is through si that one can attain knowledge on one's own, and “to act after attaining it on one's own is different from acting after lü. Once one is able to attain it on one's own, everything becomes as natural as using one's hands to lift things. Through lü, however, one cannot reach zide and one will feel some unnaturalness, just like using a stick to lift things.” Footnote ⁷¹

The Conventional Interpretation of Analects 17.3

We have argued that Analects 8.9 does not mean that people are too stupid to know the Way or that sages are too deficient to make people know the Way, but that knowledge of the Way, by its very nature, has to be attained by learners themselves. If so, the question arises as to whether everyone has the ability to attain knowledge of the Way by him- or herself. Confucius seems to deny this in Analects 17.3: “Only the wise above and the stupid below do not change.” It is therefore important to discuss Cheng Yi's interpretation of this Analects passage along with Analects 8.9. In order to appreciate the uniqueness of Cheng's interpretation, it will be helpful to begin with the conventional interpretation of this passage and its drawbacks.

One controversial issue in interpreting this passage is what Confucius means by “wise” and “stupid”: Do these terms refer to intellectual ability or to moral quality? In his essay, “Lun xing pian 論性篇” (On Nature), Qing Scholar Ruan Yuan 阮元 (1764–1849) argues that “wise” and “stupid” here do not refer to moral good and evil, but to intellectual abilities: “The stupid are not evil. The wise are good, but the stupid are also good.”Footnote ⁷² In connection with Analects 16.9, in which Confucius contrasts people who are born with knowledge, people who know as a result of learning, people who learn after being vexed with difficulties, and people who do not learn even after being vexed with difficulties, Chen Daqi argues that Confucius's main purpose is to show that “there are different levels of inborn intellectual ability. . .. Those who are born with knowledge have the highest intellectual ability, those who know by learning have lower intellectual ability, and those who learn after being vexed with difficulty and those who do not learn even after being vexed with difficulty . . . have very low intellectual ability.”Footnote ⁷³Tu Weiming holds the same view. Commenting on this Analects passage, he claims,

I think that this understanding of “wise” and the “stupid” as purely intellectual traits is not correct. Zhi 知 is an important idea in the Analects. Confucius's interest, however, is in moral knowledge. Moral knowledge, of course, also depends on intellectual ability, but everyone possesses the intellectual ability needed to be good. In this sense, on the one hand, it is easier to gain moral knowledge of/as virtue than to attain scientific knowledge (for example), because everyone is born with the ability to attain the former, but not the latter; on the other hand, it is more difficult to gain moral knowledge of/as virtue than to obtain scientific knowledge, as moral knowledge requires xin to perform both the function of mind and that of heart.Footnote ⁷⁵ I therefore think it more fitting to understand the terms “wise” and “stupid” here in their moral rather than intellectual senses. Most commentators share this view. Han scholars Jia Yi 賈誼 (200–168 b.c.e.) and Wang Chong 王充 (29–97 c.e.), for example, argue that “the wise” refers to good people, while “the stupid” refers to evil people. In his Sishu fanshen lu 四書反身錄 (Reflections upon the Four Books), Qing Scholar Li Zhongfu 李中孚 (1627–1705) expounds on this view in some detail:

With such a moral rather than intellectual understanding of “the wise above” and “the stupid below,” most commentators interpret this Analects passage in connection with two other related passages. One is Analects 16.9, mentioned above: “Those who are born with knowledge are above; next are those who know by learning; next again are those who learn after being vexed by difficulties; and those who do not learn even after being vexed by difficulties are common people below.” For example, in Wen zi tang ji 問字堂集 (Collection of Essays from the Hall of Inquiry into Characters) the Qing scholar Sun Xingyan 孫星衍 (1753–1818) argues that the wise above and the stupid below in Analects 17.3 refer, respectively, to those who are born with knowledge and those who do not learn even after being vexed with difficulties. Those who know by learning and those who learn after being vexed by difficulties are those between the wise above and the stupid below, the people in the middle (zhongren中人) mentioned in the other related passage: “You can talk about higher learning with people above the middle but not with people below the middle.”Footnote ⁷⁷ Commentators then apply these three categories—the wise above, the stupid below, and average people in the middle—to the immediately preceding passage: “People are alike by their inborn nature but become different from each other by practice.”Footnote ⁷⁸ It is clear that there is a connection between these two passages, and some commentators even claim that 17.2 and 17.3 were originally a single chapter. The question is how to understand this connection. According to the conventional interpretation, 17.2 refers to the majority people in the middle who can become good or bad depending upon their personal actions, while 17.3 refers to exceptional people at the two extremes, the wise above (often translated “the wisest”) and the stupid below (often translated “the stupidest”): the former will never become bad and the latter will never become good. According to this interpretation, 17.2 provides a general principle that people can become good or evil depending upon how they act, and 17.3 qualifies this principle with two exceptional cases of people whose nature cannot be altered regardless of their actions.

In order to make sense of such an interpretation, it is understandable (although somewhat surprising) for commentators to portray Confucius's conception of human nature as neither good (an idea more fully developed by Mencius) nor evil (an idea more fully developed by Xunzi), nor as a combination of good and evil (an idea more fully developed by Gongsun Ni 公孫尼), but rather as existing in three gradations (xing sanpin shuo 性三品說): some humans' nature is good, some humans' nature is evil, and some humans' nature is a combination of good and evil (an idea more fully developed by Dong Zhongshu 董仲舒 [197–104 b.c.e.] and Han Yu 韓愈 [768–825 c.e .]). For example, in his Lunyu hou ' an, Huang Shisan states,

Thus, he further claims that, together with Analects 17.2, Confucius conveys the belief that “there are people above whose nature cannot be changed into evil, people in the middle whose original good nature may be changed into evil, and stupid people below whose nature cannot be changed into good.”Footnote ⁸⁰Wang Chong 王充 also argues that

In Lunyu yishu, Huang Kan further explains how these three grades of human nature originated. In his view, humans, when born, are endowed with qi氣:

Although this interpretation seems to make some sense, it is based on the highly problematic assumption that Confucius adopts the three-grades theory of human nature rather than either of the two definitely more influential theories, Mencius's theory of human nature as good and Xunzi's theory of human nature as evil. As is well known, unlike later Confucians, Confucius himself does not clearly state whether human nature is good or evil or a combination of good and evil. There are only two references to human nature in the Analects, and 17.2, which states that “humans are alike by their inborn nature,” is the only definite assertion about it. (The other reference to human nature is 5.13, where Confucius's student Zigong complains that one cannot hear Confucius's view on human nature or the Way of heaven).Footnote ⁸⁴ This does not mean, however, that Confucius did not have a theory of human nature. Analects 17.2 is key to understanding this theory. Here, Confucius does not say that “some humans” or “most humans” are alike by nature, but that “humans (in general) are alike.” This shows that the three-grades theory of human nature, at least, cannot be correct, as humans of these three different natures cannot be regarded as “alike.” It does not, however, indicate in what sense humans are alike. For this information, we must look to the general ideas of the Analects. I agree with Xu Fuguan 徐复觀, who argues that Confucius holds the view that human nature is good, because “Confucius believes that ren 仁 is inherent in every human life. It is for this reason that he can say, 'Is ren far away? It is here as soon as I desire it' [7.30] and 'to practice ren depends upon oneself [12.1]. . .. Since Confucius believes that ren is inherent in every human life, although he does not explicitly say that ren is human nature . . . he actually believes that human nature is good.”Footnote ⁸⁵ Confucius is even reported to have said that “ren仁 is ren 人.”Footnote ⁸⁶ This statement implies that ren is a defining feature of human beings. I therefore agree that Mencius's theory that human nature is good represents Confucius's own view better than any other theories of human nature.Footnote ⁸⁷

Cheng Yi's interpretation of Analects 17.3

Cheng Yi likewise understands the terms “wise” and “stupid” in this Analects passage in their moral rather than intellectual senses. In other words, the “wise” are morally good people, whereas the “stupid” are morally bad people. Whether or not a person is morally good is not related to his or her intellectual ability. On the one hand, the morally wise person is not necessarily highly intelligent: “Even those who are extremely unintelligent can also gradually make moral progress.”Footnote ⁸⁸ On the other hand, the morally stupid person is not necessarily a person of lesser intelligence. Of morally stupid people, Cheng Yi argues, “not all are intellectually deficient; many of them, such as Shang Xin 商辛 [the last King of the Shang Dynasty, named Zhou 紂], have superior intellectual abilities that ordinary people do not have.”Footnote ⁸⁹ While acknowledging that there are morally good people and morally bad people, Cheng Yi claims that the difference between them has nothing to do with their inner nature. He therefore argues against the three-grades theory of human nature. In his view, “the nature of all humans is the same.”Footnote ⁹⁰ Moreover, Cheng advocates the Mencian view that “the nature of all humans is good.”Footnote ⁹¹ According to him, “Mencius overshadows all other Confucians because he sheds light on human nature. No human's nature is not good. . .. Human nature is the same as principle (li 理) and principle is the same from Yao and Shun to common people.”Footnote ⁹² In his view, the distinction between the wise above and the stupid below in Analects 17.3 does not pertain to human nature, in which they are alike, as Confucius affirms in 17.2. There is no difference between the wise above and the stupid below at birth in this respect: “From childhood, the sagely quality is already complete in everybody.”Footnote ⁹³ Since the nature of the stupid below, like that of the wise above, is originally good, “it is not their nature to be stupid below. They are stupid because they have not made full use of their cai 才 (natural endowment).”Footnote ⁹⁴

Here Cheng Yi is referring to Mencius 6A6, where Mencius states that there are people who are not as good as others because they fail to make best use of their natural endowments. In Cheng's view, Mencius's “four beginnings [humaneness, rightness, propriety, and wisdom] are the natural endowment (cai) for one to be good. There are people who are not good, because they do not make full use of the natural endowments of the four beginnings.”Footnote ⁹⁵ So the distinction between the wise above and the stupid below is a result of their efforts, or lack thereof, to exercise their cai. The wise above are wise because they exercise their cai; the stupid below are stupid because they do not exercise their cai. A new understanding of the relationship between Analects17.2 and 17.3 thus emerges. According to the conventional understanding, the distinction between the wise above and the stupid below in Analects 17.3 qualifies Analects 17.2, where the general principle that humans are alike by nature is stipulated. Thus the nature of the wise and the nature of the stupid are not only unlike each other but also unlike that of common people, whose nature is discussed in 17.2. According to this new understanding, however, 17.3 does not qualify but rather further explains how humans, who are alike by nature, grow apart through practice, with the result that there is a distinction between the wise above and the stupid below. In other words, “the wise above” and “the stupid below” in 17.3 are not exceptions to, but rather, among the “humans” in 17.2.

Here Cheng Yi interprets Confucius's “the stupid below” as people who lack self-confidence (zibao自暴) and give up on themselves (ziqi 自棄). In his commentary on the Book of Change, when asked why there are people who cannot be transformed, Cheng Yi replies:

So in Cheng's view, zibao and ziqi are the two greatest enemies of moral cultivation. As long as people think that they cannot become wise and do not try to become wise, they can never become wise. Thus, in Cheng's view, “no failure in action is greater than evil, but it can be remedied; no failure in administration is worse than disorder, but it can be rectified. Only those who lack self-confidence and give up on themselves cannot become superior persons.”Footnote ⁹⁷ Here the people to whom Cheng Yi refers as being zibao and ziqi are the very people to whom Confucius refers as being unwilling to learn even after being vexed by difficulties (kun er bu xue). Commentators have failed to note, however, that although according to some conventional interpretations the stupid below also include those who do not learn even after being vexed with difficulties, Confucius here does not say that these people are too stupid to learn but that that they do not learn. So he does not say that these people cannot be changed if they start to learn.

In contrast, the wise above, in Cheng Yi's view, are those who have gained knowledge, knowledge of/as virtue in contrast to knowledge by hearing and seeing, whether innate (sheng er zhi zhi 生而知之) or learned; and, in the latter case, whether they learned it before (xue er zhi zhi 學而知之) or after (kun er zhi zhi 困而知之) they were vexed by difficulties. It is important to note that, for Cheng Yi, the wise above are not merely those who are born with knowledge. On the one hand, this is because, in his view, what is important is to acquire the needed knowledge; it does not matter how it is acquired. Thus, he repeatedly states: “Whether you get the knowledge by learning or through birth, its function is the same.”Footnote ⁹⁸ On the other hand, although Cheng Yi does not deny the existence of people with inborn moral knowledge, his emphasis is on the importance of learning. Thus, while acknowledging that Confucius was born with knowledge, he asks, even so, “what harm does learning cause to him?”Footnote ⁹⁹ At times, Cheng emphasizes knowledge by learning so much that he virtually ignores innate knowledge. For example, he states that “those who are born with knowledge of course do not need to learn, but sages must learn.”Footnote ¹⁰⁰ If sages still need to learn, then who are those born with knowledge who do not need to learn? It appears that Cheng's objective here is to define innate knowledge rather than to affirm its existence, just as we may define the term “unicorn” without affirming that unicorns exist.Footnote ¹⁰¹ This attitude of Cheng Yi's toward people born with knowledge is quite similar to that of Confucius. Cheng Yi and other later Confucians regarded Confucius as a sage born with knowledge, but Confucius himself denied it. As noted by Cai Shangsi: “Confucius himself does not really believe that there are indeed 'people who are born with knowledge,' for he not only laments that he has never seen a 'sage,' and not only denies that he himself is a sage by birth, but also clearly denies that he himself is 'one born with knowledge.”Footnote ¹⁰²

With such an understanding of the wise above and the stupid below, we are ready to understand Cheng Yi's interpretation of the Analects passage, “Only the wise above and the stupid below do not change.” At first glance, Cheng Yi seems to simply deny what Confucius says. For example, when asked whether the stupid can be changed, he replies: “Yes. Confucius says that the wise above and the stupid below do not change, but there are reasons for them to change. . .. It is wrong to say that the stupid below cannot change. They share the same human nature with others, and so how can they not be changed?”Footnote ¹⁰³ In his comment on Analects 6.21, where Confucius distinguishes three kinds of people—above-average people, average people, and below-average people— Cheng Yi claims that this distinction relates to their cai rather than their nature. Then, when asked whether those who are below average have to remain so throughout their lives, Cheng Yi replies: “There is also a way for them to make moral progress.”Footnote ¹⁰⁴ For this reason, in his Sishu bianyi 四書辯疑 (On Doubts about the Four Books) the Yuan 元 scholar Chen Tianxiang 陳天祥 (1230–1316) argues against Cheng Yi: “Confucius says that the stupidest cannot be changed, while Cheng thinks that they can be changed. If Cheng Yi is correct, then Confucius must be wrong.”Footnote ¹⁰⁵

Cheng Yi, of course, does not think that he is arguing against Confucius. In his view, he is rather providing a correct interpretation of this Analects passage in light of the general principle that Confucius tries to convey. He argues that this passage “does not mean that people cannot be changed. It means that there is a principle that cannot be changed. Only two kinds of people cannot be changed: those who lack self-confidence and those who abandon themselves. They are unwilling to learn. If they are willing to learn, have confidence in themselves, and do not give up on themselves, how can they not change themselves?”Footnote ¹⁰⁶ According to Cheng Yi's interpretation, what Confucius means by “unchangeable” is this principle: If people give up on themselves and lack self-confidence, they cannot become wise. Conversely, if people continue to learn, they will necessarily become wise. So what Confucius means is that this principle governing the moral transformation of human beings will never change and not that the stupid cannot become wise.Footnote ¹⁰⁷

The key point here is that, for Cheng Yi, people do not have the necessary knowledge not because they are stupid by nature but because they do not want to learn. If they start to learn, they will become wise. This is because, in Cheng's view, first, the object of our knowledge, the Way or principle, is inherent in every one of us, although “you will never attain it if you do not exert effort”;Footnote ¹⁰⁸ second, the ability to attain it, which is different from the ability to perform scientific research or philosophical meditation or poetry writing, is also inherent in our xin 心, the distinguishing mark of being human. Thus, he states:

Superior persons and sages are so because they diligently develop that with which they are born, while inferior persons are so because they abandon their efforts to develop their innate moral tendencies. This is why, in the above passage, Cheng Yi concludes that development of the four beginnings is entirely up to oneself. This is consistent with Mencius, who says in the same paragraph, “for people possessing these four beginnings to deny their own potentialities is for them to cripple themselves.”Footnote ¹¹⁰

Thus, Cheng Yi emphasizes the importance of learning. He argues that “for superior persons, nothing is more important than to learn, nothing is more harmful than to stop, nothing is more sickening than to be self-content, and nothing is more sinful than to give up on oneself. To learn without stopping is how Tang and Wu become sages.”Footnote ¹¹¹ For him, “anyone can become a sage. The learning of a superior person must not stop until one becomes a sage. Those who stop before becoming sages all do so because they given up on themselves.”Footnote ¹¹² For this reason, Cheng Yi encourages people to set high goals for themselves. He states, “people in the world often question how they could become sages. This is because they do not have self-confidence (zixin 自信).”Footnote ¹¹³ In his view, with regard to such matters, it is not necessarily good to be modest. One should not be satisfied to be a second-class person while politely letting others become first-class people. Rather, “in learning, one ought to aim at the Way, and in being a person, one ought to aim at being a sage. To say that one is unable to do so is to cripple oneself, and to say that one's head [heart/mind] is unable to do so is to cripple one's head. . .. It is fine to have such humiliation as long as one still tries; it is not permissible to have such humiliation as an excuse for not trying.”Footnote ¹¹⁴

The Role of Sages: Education

We have examined Cheng Yi's interpretations of two controversial passages, Analects 8.9 and 17.3, and found them superior to some of the more conventional interpretations. For Cheng Yi, people cannot be made to know the Way because knowledge of the Way is knowledge of/as virtue (dexing zhi zhi), which must be attained on one's own (zide). Although people cannot be made to know the Way, they can still know the Way on their own as long as they have confidence in themselves and do not abandon their efforts. The stupid below who do not become wise are simply those who lack self-confidence and give up on themselves. If they are resolved to learn, they can also become wise. Here it is important to address a question likely to arise from our discussion thus far: Does this mean that people have to be entirely self-reliant in seeking the Way? This is indeed what Wang Yanlin 王彥霖, one of Cheng Yi's students, believed to be the case: “People can become good only when they are willing to become good by themselves. So they cannot be made to be good.” If so, what is the role of sages in moral cultivation? To this, Cheng replies: “What you say is indeed true. People themselves have to try to become good. This does not, however, mean that they should be left alone. This is the reason for education. 'Cultivating the Way is called education.' How can there be no education (jiao)?”Footnote ¹¹⁵

So, while emphasizing attaining the Way on one's own, Cheng Yi also stressed the importance of education:

In Mencius's terms, education means that those who already possess knowledge and awareness (xianzhi xianjue 先知先覺) should awaken those who have yet to acquire them (houzhi houjue 後知後覺): “Take an analogy. Suppose everyone is asleep. Others have not awakened, but I awake first. So I shake those who have not awakened so that they can awaken.”Footnote ¹¹⁷ In the context of education, however, Cheng Yi argues that the former (educators) did not take something from themselves and give it to the latter, for the latter also have what the former have; they simply have not been aware of it.Footnote ¹¹⁸Cheng Yi thus contrasts the Confucian and Daoist attitudes toward education: “The learning of the superior person is: 'Those who know first are obligated to awaken those who do not know yet; and those who awaken first are obligated to awaken those who have yet to awaken.' Laozi, however, advises: 'Do not seek to enlighten people but keep them ignorant.' This is to cripple one's own nature.”Footnote ¹¹⁹

Since Cheng Yi believes that human nature is originally all good, education's foremost goal is to cultivate this original goodness to ensure that it will grow and not be lost. For this reason, he develops the idea of “cultivating correctness in childhood” (yang zheng yu meng 養正于蒙): “The unaroused state is called childhood (meng蒙). To cultivate correctness (zheng 正) in the pure and unaroused state of childhood is the art of sages. It becomes more difficult to prohibit incorrectness in the aroused state. To cultivate correctness in childhood is the utmost goodness of learning.”Footnote ¹²⁰ In other words, if original goodness is lost, then it is difficult to get it back. It is therefore best to take care of original goodness, so that when it is aroused, it will remain intact. Thus Cheng Yi argues that “the way to educate people is similar to training a young bull. To control it before it is able to harm people with its horns is the greatest good. . .. If people are not to be educated, then there is a need for instruments of punishment to control them. If, however, their hearts are guided by the Way, then no such instruments are needed, as they will be transformed by themselves.”Footnote ¹²¹ Even when there is already incorrectness in the aroused state, still “it is easy to stop human evil at its beginning. It is difficult to control it when it is fully developed.”Footnote ¹²²

While it is best to educate people when they are young, this does not mean that no moral education is needed for adults, especially those who have lost their original goodness. Cheng Yi argues that the best way to get such people back on the right track is not through the application of laws and punishments but through moral education. In his commentary on the Book of Change, he states that sages

In Cheng's view, there are two effective types of moral education. One is education by setting an example (shen jiao 身教), and the other is education by teaching about the Way (yanjiao言教). With regard to the former, commenting on Mencius's view that “when the ruler is humane (ren), everyone will be humane, and when the ruler is dutiful, everyone will be dutiful,”Footnote ¹²⁴Cheng Yi states that “the order or disorder of the world depends upon the humaneness or inhumaneness of the ruler.”Footnote ¹²⁵ For this reason, he develops the idea of “rectification of the incorrect heart/mind of the ruler (ge jun xin zhi fei 格君心之非)” as the root of sovereignty: “There are two ways to rule: through the root or through the branch. From the root, the only thing to do is to rectify the incorrect heart/mind of the ruler in order to rectify higher officials, and to rectify higher officials in order to rectify lower officials.”Footnote ¹²⁶ Of course, when the lower officials are rectified, common people will be rectified by themselves. Therefore, Cheng Yi claims that “if you want to govern others, you need to govern yourself first.”Footnote ¹²⁷ This view of Cheng Yi's on example-setting as a mode of education is, of course, a typically Confucian view. Confucius himself says, “if the ruler sets an example by being correct, who would dare to remain incorrect?”Footnote ¹²⁸ Likewise, “when the ruler loves propriety, no common people dare not love it; when the ruler loves rightness, no common people dare not love it; and when the ruler loves faithfulness, no common people dare not love it.”Footnote ¹²⁹ This is what Confucius calls “governing with virtue,” which can be compared to the pole star that does not move while all other stars revolve around it.Footnote ¹³⁰ For Confucius, the reason is that “the virtue of superior persons is like wind, while the virtue of inferior persons is like grass. When the wind blows over the grass, the grass is sure to bend.”Footnote ¹³¹

Cheng Yi has the Confucian classics in mind when he discusses education by spreading the sages' moral teachings (yan jiao 言教). In his view, “the sages had no choice but to write the Six Classics; just as there would be no way to maintain people's daily lives if there are no farm tools and pottery.”Footnote ¹³² In other words, while sages themselves have no use for the classics, they know that, just as tools and pottery are necessary for people's daily life, so too are the classics necessary for people's moral cultivation, because “the sages wrote the classics solely to illuminate the Way.”Footnote ¹³³ Of course, as we have seen, the knowledge that common people can receive from sages through the classics is merely knowledge from hearing and seeing and not knowledge of/as virtue, and it is the latter that really matters in moral education. Does this mean that the sages' teachings are useless? Although it is true that what matters here is knowledge of/as virtue, Cheng Yi argues that knowledge by hearing and seeing is also important as it can be developed into knowledge of/as virtue if, when reading classics, one tries to experience that which sages experience in one's own heart/mind so that it becomes one's own. For example, Cheng offers the following instructions: “Learners should go deep into the Analects, regarding the questions of Confucius's students as their own questions and applying the sage's answers to these questions as if addressed to their own situation. This way, they will necessarily attain it (knowledge of the Way).”Footnote ¹³⁴ For this reason, Cheng maintains that when those who already know and are aware of the Way (xianzhi xianjue) teach those who are yet to know and become aware of the Way (houzhi zhoujue), the former must ensure that the latter achieve understanding on their own. In his view, this is indeed how Confucius taught his students. Thus, commenting on Analects 7.8, Cheng Yi argues that when Confucius says, “do not enlighten those who are not eager to learn and do not bring new horizons to those who are not anxious to give an explanation,” he is “asking one not to teach a student until the student is sincere”; and when Confucius said, “Do not repeat if one cannot come back with three other corners after one corner is presented,” he means that, “after teaching students, one should wait until they achieve understanding on their own.”Footnote ¹³⁵Cheng Yi assures us that by studying the classics this way, we will be able to attain knowledge of the Way: “If we cannot get it [the Way] through learning, then why did the ancient sages teach people so diligently? Did they try to mislead later people?”Footnote ¹³⁶

So, in Cheng Yi's view, although one has to attain knowledge of the Way on one's own, moral education, whether in the form of setting an example or in the form of moral teachings, is still extremely important. It might, however, be asked, “Since both modes of education are effective only for those who are willing to learn, then what about those who think that they cannot learn or are unwilling to learn at all?” Cheng argues that there are such people in all ages, including the time of Yao and Shun. Sages, however, do not abandon even people such as these. For such people, they establish more or less coercive measures to prevent them from doing evil and force them to do good. Thus, Cheng Yi states,

In Cheng Yi's view, even for such people coercive measures are only cautionary and provisional. It is Cheng Yi's conviction that the threat of punishment will suffice to prevent people from doing evil things, so that punishment itself will remain unnecessary.Footnote ¹³⁸ Moreover, coercive measures are not to be used alone. Because these measures cannot make people understand the reasons for obeying rules and laws, they must immediately be followed by moral teachings.Footnote ¹³⁹