《南華真經義海纂微》Vol. 24

If one pursues benevolence and righteousness as though they were one’s innate nature, then even someone as versed in them as Zeng Shen or Shi Qiu would not count as what I call good. If one devotes oneself to discriminating the five flavors, then even someone as skilled as Yu Er would not count as what I call good; if one fixates on distinguishing the five tones, then even someone as acute as Shi Kuang would not count as what I call truly perceptive; if one fixates on telling apart the five colors, then even someone as sharp-eyed as Li Zhu would not count as what I call truly clear-sighted.

What I call “good” is not the reputation of benevolence and righteousness, but the full preservation of one’s own inner virtue; it is not deliberately chasing benevolence and righteousness, but letting one’s inborn nature and the genuine feelings of life run their course. What I call perceptive is not hearing outward things, but being able to hear one’s own authentic self; what I call clear-sighted is not seeing outward things, but being able to see oneself.

To look only at external things instead of seeing from within oneself, and to seek only from external things instead of obtaining from oneself, is to treat what others have gained as one’s own gain, without ever truly possessing what belongs to oneself; it is to act in step with others’ ease while being unable to rest easy in one’s own situation. Whoever seeks only others’ comfort and cannot settle in their own place—whether Robber Zhi or Boyi—is alike in straying from the right path on this point.

I feel ashamed before the Dao of virtue, and therefore dare not treat benevolence and righteousness as a rigid code of conduct, and dare not indulge in licentious or deviant behavior.

Guo Xiang comments: When people treat benevolence and righteousness as their own nature, they often merely follow the labels of benevolence and righteousness. If one follows innate nature in tasting flavors, that could count as good; but if one does not start from oneself and instead attaches oneself to external things, then even someone as expert in flavor as Yu Er has already lost hold of oneself. When ear and eye each perform their function without being dominated by skills like those of Shi Kuang or Li Zhu, that is true cleverness and clarity.

Hence one who is good at “obtaining for oneself” forgets the names of benevolence and righteousness, and benevolence and righteousness then appear of themselves. If one takes benevolence and righteousness as goodness and pursues them deliberately, even harming oneself to conform to them, one violates the feelings of nature and life; if one cannot settle oneself, how can one help others? Only by following innate nature can one benefit others without wearing oneself out—that is true self-possession.

If one does not imitate Li Zhu or Shi Kuang, but simply lets one’s own eyes and ears see and hear, then the cleverness and capacities of everyone in the world can each be preserved in their own right. Not starting from oneself, but only looking at others and coveting what others have gained, is to abandon oneself to imitate others. When imitation goes far enough, oneself is lost. Though what each person loses and the path each takes differ, the loss of oneself is the same. Therefore the author says he is ashamed before the Dao of virtue, dares not cling to benevolence and righteousness, and dares not turn toward indulgence and deviance.

To uphold conduct and integrity without seeking fame or profit, to dwell at ease and remain unburdened by the dust of the world; to forget the self and not cling to others—nothing more than this.

Lü’s commentary says: When human nature leans on something and is ruled by it, one cannot be said to merge with all things without partiality. Zeng Shen and Shi Qiu clung to benevolence and righteousness (Ren and Yi); Nü Er was fixated on flavors; Shi Kuang and Li Zhu excelled respectively at hearing sounds and discerning colors—all of these count as partiality and being pulled by outer things, not what I call true “goodness.” True goodness is resting in the inherent De (Virtue/Power) of one’s own nature; it is not something achieved by meeting standards such as Ren and Yi. So long as one follows the nature and life-as-such of Heaven without imposing artificial rules, it cannot be pinned down by labels—that is genuine goodness.

The same holds for keen hearing and clear sight: not straining to listen outward, yet able to hear oneself; not straining to look outward, yet able to see oneself—this is true self-hearing and self-seeing. If hearing and seeing are tied to external things and not rooted in oneself, one takes another’s gain as one’s own and chases another’s ease, and has not yet truly tasted the nature and life-as-such of one’s own being. Seen this way, what difference is there between Robber Zhi and Bo Yi? Neither conformed to the moral nature-as-such. If one neither clings to lofty morality nor sinks into reckless excess, one can forget both extremes.

Bo Yi was a sage—how could he lack his own insight and ease and still count as a sage? It is only that he deliberately upheld integrity, hoping to make the greedy honest and the timid resolute, and so could not avoid leaving traces of intentional effort. When Zhuangzi speaks of the nature and life-as-such of Heaven and urges forgetting fame and gain, he pairs Bo Yi with Robber Zhi and treats both as straying from the natural. Yet when he discusses conduct lofty enough to correct the age’s manners and actions that defy vulgar custom, the integrity of Bo Yi and Shu Qi is listed alongside Xu You, Shan Juan, Confucius, and Yan He in the “Kings Who Yielded the Throne” (Rang Wang) chapter.

Yidu’s commentary says: “Being attached” means nature is caught by something and cannot open to all things without selfishness. Hence Zeng Shen, Shi Qiu, Nü Er, Shi Kuang, and Li Zhu were respectively ruled by Ren and Yi, flavors, sounds, and colors—they could not avoid pursuit; this is not the “goodness” I mean. True good De is following the nature and life-as-such of Heaven; what is meant here by nature and life-as-such is the proper disposition, flavor, color, and sound that things originally possess. Those men strained and sought deliberately; they did not act from self-contentment. Only by following nature can one keep nature from being mastered by outer things; then tasting flavor, hearing sound, and seeing color will arise naturally.

Gather in sharp hearing and one turns to inner listening; gather in clear sight and one turns to inner vision. Inner listening hears the Dao (the Way); inner vision sees the Dao. Having attained the Dao, nature finds its rest. Those who do not look from within the self but only at outer things…

When people lose themselves and chase after external things instead, they cannot rest in their own being; they treat what they gain from outside as real gain—yet that is precisely abandoning one’s nature to go after something else.

The Dao may appear differently between Bo Yi and Dao Zhi, but in clinging to bias and losing balance they are the same. From this we see that if benevolence and righteousness (ren and yi) become deliberate objects of pursuit, they too can lead one away from the Dao.

Whatever causes one to lose the Dao, act in a skewed way, or disturb one’s De is what Zhuangzi does not approve.

Xiangdao commentary: There is sound, and there is the source from which sound arises; there is form and color, and there is the source from which form and color appear; there is flavor, and there is the source from which flavor comes. The noise that sound makes can be heard, but the source that makes sound “sound” does not show itself. Form and color can be seen, but the source that makes form and color what they are does not reveal itself. Flavor can be tasted, but the source that produces flavor does not present itself.

Human ears and eyes are by nature close to empty stillness and unknowing (“xiyi” is the Daoist way of saying the Dao cannot be seen or heard). When sound and form and color are right before us, our true nature is often veiled by wandering thoughts; the mouth’s relation to flavor is the same. Laozi said: “The five colors blind the eye, the five tones deafen the ear, the five flavors spoil the palate.” How much more so when countless side matters are piled on and the nature is dragged down!

Bixu commentary: Zeng Shen, Shi Qiu, Yu Er, Shi Kuang, and Li Zhu each excelled in one kind of skill; ruled by that ability and fixated on externals, they lost innate genuineness—how could they count as truly good? Those who store De within take ease in self-content as goodness; they follow the spontaneous tendencies of nature and fate and simply hear naturally and look naturally. To take another’s gains as one’s own gains and another’s comfort as one’s own comfort is to lose the self for the sake of external things.

Therefore Zhuangzi neither makes a show of ren and yi nor indulges himself in skewed conduct. That is truly nurturing upright nature and life.

Yanzhai commentary: “Following the spontaneous tendencies of nature and fate” means following what is natural. The phrase “simply hear naturally and look naturally” is precisely Zhuangzi’s distinctive insight, hard for others to match. The teaching of the entire Buddhist canon amounts to no more than this: self-content, self-ease—seeing the Dao and awakening for oneself.

Broadly speaking, to distinguish mind from externals: anyone who cannot hold the mind and instead runs after outer things is skewed. Neither deliberately wielding ren and yi nor indulging in skewed acts is “doing good without courting reputation, doing ill without incurring punishment.” Dao and De are naturally so; once one chases reputation or invites punishment, one is no longer in accord with nature.

Reading Zhuangzi’s words, is he not rectifying the mind and cultivating the person? His criticisms of Yao, Shun, Confucius, Zeng Shen, Shi Qiu, and Bo Yi are not final verdicts; they use the flow of the text to stir debate.

Nature is like the great void: pursued to the end it seems to have nothing, yet it is nowhere absent. Once there is attachment and clinging to one side, one falls into partial stubbornness and is no longer on the upright path of Dao and De.

Zeng Shen, Shi Qiu, Shi Kuang, and others each received different natural endowments and excelled in their own particular strengths. From the perspective of the Great Dao, they were still liable to partiality. How much more so when people admire others’ strengths by relying on their own weaknesses? Surely many have tried to learn the people of Handan’s way of walking, only to forget their own natural gait. None of this is enough to be called true goodness.

True goodness lies in following the inherent nature of people’s life and destiny, so that words and actions proceed along the proper path of De. It does not force itself to grasp at things, nor cling to one-sided compliance. The ears, eyes, and mouth need not force themselves to understand sounds, colors, and flavors, nor deliberately suppress them. To let them be as they are, without adding private motives, is the most proper state under Heaven. What could disturb it?

When a person’s intelligence reaches the point of hearing and seeing for oneself—that is, knowing things through one’s own experience and observation—it differs from what the world calls intelligence. True goodness lies in finding joy within oneself and being at ease with one’s nature; it too differs from what the world calls goodness. Once human labels such as benevolence and righteousness have fallen away, one’s true nature can be wholly preserved in De. De has its source within a person; how could external things enter and disturb it? If one cannot find ease and contentment within oneself, but only follows others, that too is partiality and a departure from what is right. What distinction then remains between the worthy and the unworthy?

The True Classic of Southern Florescence (Nanhua Zhenjing) uses this to explain that the proper path of De lies in neither exalting oneself nor forcing oneself to act, but in resting in the natural condition of life and nature, and finding contentment within oneself.

The titles of the Inner Chapters of this classic are said to come from the lacquer garden, where Zhuangzi once served as an official; each carries a deeper meaning. The Outer Chapters and Miscellaneous Chapters were edited and abridged by Guo Xiang, who often titled them with words from their opening lines, though their general meaning was preserved. The Inner Chapters have already discussed the principles of De, nature, and life in detail. The Outer Chapters therefore begin by pointing out that what does not properly belong to one’s De is like an extra limb or a fleshy growth on the body. The idea may be traced back to the “leftover food and extra conduct” in the Dao De Jing, where it describes people who show themselves off and think themselves right as being far from the Great Dao.

Zhuangzi develops his argument at great length in order to explain it as fully as possible and dispel worldly delusions, so that people may return to nature and accord with the Dao. Human De is originally pure, like jade still hidden in its unworked stone, untouched by carving. Later, clever distinctions and divisions of benevolence and righteousness gradually encroached upon it. People came to seek goodness only in external things, and lost the simplicity and truth within themselves. The chapter therefore gives Zeng Shen, Shi Qiu, Shi Kuang, Yang Zhu, Mo Di, and others as examples, showing how each was inclined in a particular direction by nature and then, influenced by custom, strayed from the proper path. Though this way adds extra branches and departs from one’s nature, people throughout the world still compete to follow it.

When human nature and the truth of life turn away from the right path of Dao and De (Virtue), the world falls into disorder. Only by forgetting differences and seeing all things as one—like the wild duck’s short legs and the crane’s long legs, neither of which should be cut short or lengthened, each keeping its natural form—can one come close to the Dao.

Yet the world is confused by views of distinction; what can I do? The author tells the story of “Zang and Gu Lost the Sheep”: Zang and Gu were both hired shepherds, but each lost his flock because of what he pursued. This shows that Boyi and Daozhi are called gentleman and villain, and people rank them by what they pursue; yet whoever they are, harming life and injuring nature is the same.

If one can set aside outward conduct and reputation, stop clinging to any camp, return to the root, and taste the deepest Dao, one can roam freely in the state before things took shape. Then appendages like webbed toes or extra fingers, and even the body itself, can all be forgotten. Gentleman and villain can each rest in what they have and act according to their nature.

Therefore, following human nature and the truth of life is the highest reach; innate clarity and awareness are not lost by doing so. Without listening to others, one still knows oneself; without watching others, one still sees for oneself. This matches what Yan Hui said: “The benevolent love themselves; the wise know themselves.” When people are content in themselves and no longer look up to others, whether Boyi or Daozhi is the worthier will be clear to all.