Programs for the Present, 1058-1067

By the end of the 1050s Ssu-ma Kuang and Wang An-shih were ready to announce programs. Wang's "Ten-thousand Word Memorial" of 1058 was presented on his appointment as supervisor of funds in the Finance Commission (tu-chih p'an-kuan ), a post he held until his promotion to special drafting official (chih chih-kao ) in 1061. In 1063 Wang left to mourn his mother's death, declining appointments until late in 1067 when it became

[46] SMK 59.707.

[47] SMK 67.833.

[48] In this letter Ssu-ma argues that one can be sure he is on the right track in understanding the Way if he can "base it in heaven-and-earth, check it against the Former Kings, support it with Confucius, and verify it in the present." Ssu-ma may claim that his own ideas satisfy these four tests, but he does not appeal to them consistently (particularly not the first until the 1080s). Nor does a historical account of his thought suggest that he sought understanding from these sources in this manner. Nevertheless, the four tests indicate the standards that claims to universality at the time were expected to meet. On the rejection of the ancient style, see also SMK 59.712-13, letter to P'ang Chi. Ssu-ma's growing antipathy toward the idea that wen hsueh could function as a method of both understanding the Way and choosing officials is evident in SMK 60.718-19.

[49] The dating of his decision to write a history relies on Liu Shu's recollection; see Wang Te-i, "Ssu-ma Kuang te shih-hsueh," in Chi-nien Ssu-ma Kuang Wang An-shih , p. 32-33.

clear that the new emperor, Shen-tsung, actually wanted his advice. Ssu-ma Kuang began to spell out his program on his appointment as coadministrator of the Bureau of Policy Criticism (t'ung-chih chien-yuan ) in 1061. He served as a policy critic or censor until his appointment as a Hanlin academician in 1067.

Ssu-ma Kuang's Program

Ssu-ma had an unusually long tenure as a policy critic; he said he preferred a position that allowed him to "define right and wrong" to one that merely required literary skill.^[50] On taking up this post in 1061 he presented his program for ensuring the survival of political unity. He did this, first, through a series of memorials addressed to the emperor on political principles and specific policies and, second, by writing the Chronological Charts , his first major historical work, the forerunner of his Comprehensive Mirror .

"Five Guidelines," one of his first submissions, sets out a broad historical vision and the conclusions he draws from it. He begins with a review of the rise and fall of dynasties and concludes that dynastic houses have succeeded in maintaining the unity of the "world under heaven" for only five hundred out of the past seventeen hundred years because of the adventurism and negligence of rulers.^[51] Whether the Chinese world (Ssu-ma does not include the surrounding barbarians) remains unified depends on whether the "state" (kuo ) that unifies it survives. There is nothing natural about the rise and fall of states. The state is a man-made structure; it is possible to preserve it forever. Ssu-ma's analogy for the state is a building. The people are its foundation, rules and rituals its pillars, the high ministers its beams, the rest of officialdom its roof, the generals its walls, and the soldiers its latch. Rulers who "continue the structure and maintain the finished models of their ancestors" can pass it on to their descendants. But to do so they must keep this building in good repair. They must see to timely preparations against foreign invasion and natural disasters by selecting military and civil officials well, training the soldiers, storing up grain, and ensuring effective local administration. Selecting officials well requires noticing faults of character before they have a political effect. Finally, they must take measures to ensure that the functions of government are accomplished in substance, not merely in appearance.^[52]

Order exists, and the state as an integrated structure of functions sur-

[50] See Ssu-ma's nine refusals of his appointment as special drafting official in 1062, SMK 24.339-46. I have cited the sixth. See also his explanation for this behavior in his letter to P'ang Chi, SMK 59.712-13. For an account of why he accepted and tried to decline positions through his career to 1070, see SMK 43.555-56.

[51] SMK 21.307-14; 27.307-9.

[52] SMK 21:309-14.

vives, in this view, when all the groups that constitute the state are kept in their proper relation and fulfill their partial roles in the whole. The historical task of the ruler is to maintain the structure once it has been put together by the founder of the dynasty. That founder is the king with "heaven's decree," that is the one whose intelligence and strength outlast those of his rivals.^[53] Rulers may be seen as "owners" of the building, but Ssu-ma treats them more as caretakers responsible for its upkeep. If they have done their job poorly in the past, it is because they have lacked the judgment necessary to make political decisions and choices, as another memorial explains:

I observe that there are but three great virtues for the ruler: benevolence, knowledge, and militancy. Benevolence does not mean genial indulgence. Establish transformation through education. Improve administration. Nurture the folk. Benefit all things. This is the benevolence of the ruler. Knowledge does not mean petty spying. Understand the principles of the Way. Recognize security and danger. Distinguish the wise from the foolish. Discriminate between right and wrong. This is the knowledge of the ruler. Militancy does not mean violent ferocity. Choose that which agrees with the Way and do not doubt. Slander cannot confuse him. Flattery cannot move him. This is the militancy of the ruler. To be benevolent yet not know is like having good fields without ploughing them. To know yet not be militant is like finding the weeds around the shoots but not pulling them. To be militant yet not benevolent is like knowing how to harvest but not to plant. If these are all complete together, the state will be ordered and strong. If one is lacking, it will decline. If two are lacking, it will be in danger. And if none of the three is present, it will be lost. Ever since there were people this has never changed.^[54]

Ssu-ma repeated this to every ruler he served. Within the context of these general values of rulership, Ssu-ma identifies three essential tasks that the ruler must carry out to ensure that the parts of the structure fulfill their assigned functions. This Ssu-ma repeated to all his emperors as well.^[55]

I have heard that the way of achieving order depends on but three things: first, the assignment of offices; second, reliable rewards; and third, necessary punishments.^[56]

[53] SMK 21:307.

[54] Ssu-ma kept repeating these prescriptions for rulers throughout his career, with later memorials often citing earlier memorials. The memorial cited here is SMK 20.296, "Ch'en san te shang-tien cha-tzu" (1061). Others are SMK 24.346, "shang-tien hsieh kuan cha-tsu" (1062); 27.275, "Shang huang t'ai-hou shu" (1063); 27.383, "Shang huang-ti shu" (1063); 28.381, "Ch'i chien-sheng hsi-wu" (1063); 31.417, "Yen wei chih so hsien shang-tien cha-tzu" (1064); 32.427, "Ch'en chih yao shang-tien cha-tzu" (1064); 38.493, "Ch'u ch'i chung-ch'eng shang-tien cha-tzu" (1067); 46.568, "Chin hsiu-hsin chih-kuo chih yao cha-tzu" (1085).

[55] See the memorials listed in note 54.

[56] SMK 20.297-98.

The ruler's function is to see to it that all those responsible for the working of government fulfill their functions. This does not happen, however. Assignments and promotions are determined by mere longevity, and officials are shifted between offices before they learn their jobs, or when the difficulties their initiatives cause are still being felt but the good results are not yet apparent. Those who try are punished, while those who avoid problems are rewarded. The state cannot count on all officials to motivate themselves to fulfill their functions; few are able to be "concerned with the public and forget the private" irrespective of the situation.^[57] To make government effective requires institutional improvements: longer tenures, assignments by ability, and promotions by real merit. The first concern of policy is the effective administration of government.

When Ssu-ma wrote this he was fully aware that Sung was facing serious military and fiscal problems.^[58] We might well expect him to give priority to these pressing tasks of government. Why does he insist instead upon the importance of correct administration? The answer, I think, is evident in his analogy between the state and a building. The state is a structure of groups with different kinds of power and responsibility. (Note that the "people" are the foundation upon which the rest of the building-state rises.) Maintaining these groups in proper relation is the same as maintaining the state. The parts of the whole most subject to collapse are those with the most power; they are also fewest. If one part gets too much power, or gets the wrong kind, or fails to meet its responsibility, it will affect the work of the other parts. Thus, Ssu-ma concludes, make sure that the men assigned to each role can do the job, and use rewards and punishments to see that they continue to do so. The process of government, rather than the actual work of government, holds Ssu-ma's interest. This explains, I suspect, why Ssu-ma has a limited interest in the lower end of officialdom, in local government, where he supposes that if men are given the chance to develop competence and are rewarded for it, the tasks of government will be carried out. He is primarily interested in leaders of state as men directly responsible for making the government function.

Behind all this lies an assumption that men are generally guided by partiality and self-interest. Ssu-ma appeals even to the ruler's own partial interest: if he desires to keep the state for his descendants, he must have a total commitment to the "public." Institutions can be reformed, but whether officials do their duty depends upon the rewards and punishments that remind them where their own interests lie. This is not ideal, but, Ssu-ma points out, political authority must take the realities of "custom" (i.e., social values) into account. He does argue, at considerable length, that the

[57] SMK 21.312.

[58] SMK 20.298.

government must try to influence social values in its own interest. That is, it should make men "accustomed" once again to "the roles of superior and inferior." "Be Careful about Habits" recognizes that a willingness to accept hierarchy is a state of mind and that men must believe in its importance or come to accept it as a given.^[59] Ssu-ma recognizes, of course, that it is not a given; it is necessary to help contain the problem of partial and selfish interests. However, once those with authority understand this, they can act so as to "make the people accustomed to the roles of superior and inferior."^[60]

The argument of this memorial, developed through a historical review of political change, is essentially this: the survival of a state is a function of its success in getting men accustomed to hierarchical relations of authority. This "custom" is the safety net of the polity, for the human resistance to change (which Ssu-ma takes as a given) entails a willingness to follow established authority as long as it does not itself involve costly change. In antiquity this habit was sustained by ritual, but with the decline of the Chou it gradually disappeared until only the powerless Chou king survived to testify to its value. During the Han and T'ang not only was ritual not restored, but men became accustomed to challenging superiors. By the end of T'ang men no longer spoke of "the ranking of honored and humble or the principles of right and wrong," and the ephemeral states of the Five Dynasties period were the result. The Sung founders "understood that all misfortune arises from an absence of ritual" and took measures to establish the authority of the ruler and reduce that of the provincial governors. They unified the hierarchy of authority so that it extended from the court to fiscal intendants (Ssu-ma's modern equivalent for the feudal lords of Chou) and thence to local officials and the people; "thus the ranking of superior and inferior was correct and rules and principles were established."^[61]

As Ssu-ma would later assert in the Comprehensive Mirror , a hierarchy of authority and clearly defined levels and areas of functional responsibility were basic to order and unity. These concerns dominate Ssu-ma's memorials as a policy critic. We find typical examples in his opposition to the regular granting of amnesties, on the grounds that they make rewards and punishments ineffective; his call for changes in the examination system, on the grounds that exams that "value literary writing highly" promote only one kind of talent; his proposal for a reform of the promotion system, to be undertaken to guarantee that only the competent rise; and his criticism of particular cases of rewards for men he finds lacking true merit.^[62]

[59] SMK 24.347-51.

[60] SMK 24.349.

[61] SMK 24:348-49.

[62] These examples are taken only from 1061 but are representative of the 1061-1065 memorials in SMK , ch. 20-36. On amnesties, see SMK 20:300; on exams, 20:302; on the promotion system, 21:314; for an example of a particular case, see his attack on Chang Fang-p'ing, 23:325.

When Ssu-ma does turn to national defense and state finances, he again argues for bureaucratic and administrative solutions. Writing during a period of increasing tensions with the Tangut's state of Hsia, he argues against all attempts to increase the size of the military, conscript northern farmers, and establish a more aggressive posture on the borders. His aim is to keep the two parties, Sung and Hsia, in a stable relationship, one in which neither will disturb the other. But he also notes that a large military depletes the treasury, thus making the military itself a threat to the state. His advice is relatively simple. Better training and better selection of the officer corps will make it possible to return the military to its proper size; and he cites the achievements of the Sung founder, who had far fewer troops.^[63]

"On Wealth and Profit," his most extensive memorial on fiscal affairs from this period, takes a similar view. He opposes "literati of literary talent" whom he sees dominating the Finance Commission and proposing reforms aimed at increasing the state's share of the national wealth. The restoration of fiscal stability is to be achieved by three kinds of measures. First, improve the financial administration: fill financial posts with specialists in financial affairs and create a special career path of financial offices, separate from the career path of "literary talent." Second, bring the common people back to farming, their proper role, and thereby restore production and revenue. He advocates reducing farmers' taxes by tapping urban wealth and hiring ya-ch'ien servicemen. But since he sees poor administration as the main problem, he pays most attention to bureaucratic reforms that will ensure competence in local government. Third, he calls for a reduction in expenses. The stipends of the imperial clan and gifts to officialdom can be reduced. But the real problem is that the numbers in civil and military service are growing while "the production of heaven-and-earth is constant." Thus instead of discussing ways of increasing production and revenues to cover costs, Ssu-ma concludes that the state must manage its revenue better to make ends meet while reducing expenses. He calls for the unification of financial controls in a single organ under the chief councillor, with the responsibility of matching expenses with revenue, finding the causes of deficits and possible savings, and evaluating the financial bureaucracy.^[64]

Ssu-ma was well aware that his policy advice was not being taken.

[63] Ssu-ma's discussions of military policy became more specific as tensions with the Tan-guts increased during the 1060s; see SMK 20:298; 34:449-59; 35:461; 35:464.

[64] SMK 25:356; 25:361; 35:353-62. Note that Ssu-ma would bring the Privy Purse into this unified fiscal system as well.

Moreover, he saw that rulers, in particular Ying-tsung, did not really believe that "to order the self nothing is prior to filial piety; to order the state nothing is prior to impartiality (kung )."^[65] To demonstrate the necessity of his views Ssu-ma turned to scholarship.

Learning from History . Long "fond of historical learning (shih hsueh )," Ssu-ma in the 1060s turned to historical writing in earnest. In 1064 he submitted to Ying-tsung the Chronological Charts (Li-nien t'u ), a chronology of events from 403 B.C. to A.D. 959, which was to be incorporated in a longer work, Record of Examinations into the Past (Chi ku lu ), in the 1080s.^[66] And in 1066 he submitted an eight-chapter work entitled Comprehensive Treatise , covering the years 403 to 207 B.C. The Charts appears to have become the outline for the Comprehensive Mirror ; the Treatise became its first eight chapters.

In the Mirror Ssu-ma would claim that learning from history was the "single starting point" (i tuan ) for knowing the Way to achieve order through government.

The Changes says, "The superior man acquaints himself with many sayings of antiquity and many deeds of the past in order to increase his virtue." Confucius said, "It is enough that the language one uses gets the point across." Thus history is the single starting point for Ju, wen is a superfluous affair for Ju. As for Lao and Chuang, their "void" and "nothingness" certainly are not that with which we give instruction. Learning is that by which we seek the Way. There are not two Ways in the world. How could there be four learnings!^[67]

Ssu-ma was sure that history revealed the principles or rules (Ssu-ma uses such terms as kang-yao and chi-kang ) necessary for establishing and maintaining the state. As he asserted in the Chronological Charts , "From when the people first came into being to the end of heaven and earth, those who have had states, in spite of myriad sorts of change and transformation, have not gone beyond [the rules set forth here]."^[68] Ssu-ma freely admitted that

[65] SMK 31:417. For an example of Ssu-ma's view of Ying-tsung, see 36:471-75.

[66] For an account of this work, which briefly covers the period before 403 and Sung through 1066, see Wang Ching-chih, "Chi ku lu chien t'an," Chung-hua wen shih lun-ts'ung , vol. 14 (Shanghai: Shanghai ku-chi, 1980), pp. 121-31. I have followed the text of the Charts Ssu-ma reproduced in his Chi ku lu of 1086 (Hsueh chin t'ai yuan ed.), 1 l:58b-16:79b.

[67] Quoted in Lin Jui-han, "Ssu-ma Kuang ti shih-hsueh yü cheng-shu," reprinted in Sung shih yen-chiu chi , vol. 8 (Taipei, 1974), pp. 59-60. The passage is found in Ssu-ma's Tzu-chih t'ung-chien (Peking: Ku-chi ch'u-pan-she, 1956) 123:3868. Ssu-ma is here commenting on a passage relating the simultaneous establishment of "schools" of Neo-Taoism (hsuan-hsueh ), Ju, History, and Wen under the Liu Sung dynasty in the fifth century. Ssu-ma cites the I Ching , Ta-ch'u hexagram, trans. Wilhelm and Baynes, 516, modified, and the Analects , 15:41, trans. Lau, p. 137.

[68] Chi ku lu 16:78a.

he had chosen those events that he saw as essential to tracing the rise and fall of states. But he held that the principles he derived from these were valid for the present because they could account for both the success and the failure of past political leaders to establish and maintain order. A single set of rules made history consistent and coherent: "The Way of order and chaos is on a single thread in past and present."^[69] Thus his history becomes a record of political conduct rather than of cumulative institutional or cultural change. He is after timeless principles, valid whether or not rulers followed them consciously. But they were principles that men should obviously try to follow.

What then is the content of these principles? The view that Ssu-ma was a monarchical absolutist and defender of autocracy, although still current, has been effectively challenged by Anthony Sariti, who argues that for Ssu-ma, "the emperor was confined in his own stratum, namely the bureaucracy," that Ssu-ma believed in the necessity of remonstrance, and that the ruler was to subordinate himself to "Confucian principles." While it is certainly true that Ssu-ma limits the ruler, demanding that he adhere to the lessons of history, Ssu-ma also makes the ruler bear full responsibility for the survival of the state. Precisely because government functions through a hierarchy of authority, the conduct of the ruler, more than that of any other position, affects the working of the entire government. Ssu-ma defines the functioning of the ruler according to principles that apply to the administration as a whole. No doubt these principles are more Confucian than Taoist, but we should not assume that there was a given set of clearly defined and well-established Confucian principles to which Ssu-ma and other officials could appeal. One of the purposes of Ssu-ma's historiography was to define what the principles of the Ju were.

The introduction to the Chronological Charts gives the essential rules that determine order and chaos, placing the ruler at the center:

The Way of order and chaos is on a single thread in past and present. The duration [of a state] is a matter of virtue alone. I am ignorant and of shallow learning, incapable of understanding the larger form of the state. But whenever I have divined it with the traces of previous ages as carried in the records I have boldly dared pronounce upon it. Now whether the state is in order or chaos depends entirely upon the ruler of men. The Way of the ruler of men is one. His virtues are three. His talents are five.^[70]

[69] Chi ku lu 16:75b, written in 1064. Compare, in 1066: "The sources of order and chaos have the same necessary form in past and present" (ku chin t'ung ti ): SMK 17:254-55.

[70] Chi ku lu 16:75a-75b. The Chronological Charts begins in 403 B.C. , as does the Comprehensive Mirror , because the division of Chin into three states shows that "the rules of ritual were exhausted." See Chi ku lu 11:58b. This judgment is explained and elaborated in the introductory comment in the Comprehensive Mirror ; see Tzu-chih t'ung-chien 1:2-6. Both works end in 959 A.D. with the demise of Later Chou, which Ssu-ma treats as having provided the foundation without which Sung could not have unified the world. The point here, I take it, is that Sung cannot truly distance itself from immediate pre-Sung history and simply return to antiquity. See Chi ku lu 15:74, Tzu-chih t'ung-chien 294:9599-9600. The twenty-five charts are now lost, but the year-by-year record of events has survived together with thirty-six comments interjected by Ssu-ma. In contrast to the comments found in the Mirror , Ssu-ma's comments here are largely devoted to evaluating rulers through history. For example, in the evaluations of Eastern and Western Han (12:87b-88b, 13B:103a-104a) and T'ang (15:61b-65b), every ruler is discussed, while ministers are introduced only in relation to the rulers' conduct of affairs. Although he wrote the work for Ying-tsung, it gained a broader readership with the publication of an unauthorized edition. This edition appeared under the title The Line of Emperors (Ti t'ung ), a title that Ssu-ma claimed "was not my intent." See SMK 71:877, "Chi Li-nien t'u hou," on the format of the original work and the problems with the unauthorized edition. The introduction presents the rules in general terms, while the various comments explain how particular rulers variously succeeded or failed to realize those principles.

The one Way is the correct way to employ men; the three virtues, as before, are benevolence, knowledge, and militance; and the five talents are styles of rulership. In elaborating on the one Way Ssu-ma repeats much of what he has said before but also makes the new claim that it is the shih that the ruler must employ. They exist in every state as the men of either great wisdom or ability. They must be employed because the people follow them, as the leaves and branches follow the "root." To gain the support of the people the ruler must gain the support of the shih . Once he has them he must choose among them, assign them functions according to their real · talent and achievements, and give them full authority to carry out their tasks. He gives them rank and salary, encourages them with rewards, and punishes those who stray. In this view the shih , the elite, exist already in society. They are not created by the state, but they are essential to the state, which, Ssu-ma appears to imply, must make those members of the elite in government do its bidding yet not go so far as to threaten the leading position of the elite among the people.

The three virtues concern how the ruler employs men. The first two need no further explanation; the third, militance, concerns the ruler's ability to stand behind those he has chosen. The five talents are indicative of the ruler's success. There are founders, able to unify the world, and four classes of successors: those who keep the system in good repair, reforming those received institutions that have developed faults; those who do not pay attention to the historical situation; those who do and so "restore" the state; and those who are so utterly unconcerned that the state is lost. The point here is constant attention to the direction of events and an ability to see that a deterioration in the structure of relations presages trouble. The Way, virtues, and talents hold through all historical change, Ssu-ma concludes, yet an ordered world has been a rare achievement. The first two Sung rulers were true founders. Implicitly, readers are invited to ask what kind of successor the current ruler will choose to be.

Thus by the end of Ying-tsung's reign Ssu-ma had articulated a body of principles and a general program. When Shen-tsung came to the throne in 1067, Ssu-ma was ready to provide advice. Instead, the emperor turned to Wang An-shih and proceeded to contravene the rules of government Ssu-ma had defined for him.

Wang An-shih's Program

Wang An-shih set forth his program for achieving political-social integration in his famous "Ten-thousand Word Memorial" of 1058, repeating its essential points in 1060 and 1061.^[71] The distance between Wang and Ssu-ma is clear. All that Wang requires of the ruler is that he support the program. Nor, for him, are the shih already present in society and waiting only to be correctly employed: Wang focuses on forming the kind of shih that will be suitable for carrying out his program.

Wang's memorial follows directly from his concerns in the 1040s. We can read it as an answer to one of his own examination questions:

There were root and branch in the sages' ordering of the age. There were what came first and what came last in their applying [of root and branch]. Today the problems of the world have been left uncorrected for a long time, and teaching and policy have not yet been put in accord with the intentions of the sages. We have lost sight of the root, seeking it in the branch; we have taken what should come last and put it first. Thus the world careens toward disorder. Now if it is so that the world will not be ordered except through the means the sages used to achieve order, then to be considered a true shih one must attend to how the sages achieved order. I want you gentlemen to relate in full the root and branch of how the sages achieved order and what they put first and last.^[72]

The memorial also responds to two objections, raised by the historically minded, to a policy of returning to antiquity. First, the policies of the sages addressed their times; times have changed and so must policy. Second, if there was an integrated order in antiquity and sages governed, then men seeking to cope with an age of decline clearly should not adopt policies suited only for an age of perfect order.

Wang begins the memorial by attributing contemporary problems (domestic and foreign, moral and financial) to a failure "to understand institutions" (fa tu ). By this he means understanding that to secure order institutions must "agree with the policies of the Former Kings." But more precisely: "imitating the policies of the Former Kings means we should only

[71] LCC 39:410-23. For Wang's restatements, see LCC 41:438 and 39.423. The memorial is fully translated in H. R. Williamson, Wang An-shih: A Chinese Statesman and Educationalist of the Sung Dynasty (London: Probsthain, 1935), vol. 1, pp. 48-84.

[72] LCC 70.747, third question.

imitate their intentions." Moreover, these intentions, which ground a systematic program of action, stood the test of historical change in antiquity.

The two emperors [Yao and Shun] and the three kings [Yü, T'ang, and Wen] were removed from each other by over a thousand years. Order and chaos followed one upon the other and periods of splendor and decline were fully present. The changes they encountered and the situations they faced differed, and the measures they adopted varied as well. But their intentions in making society and state (wei t'ien-hsia kuo-chia chih i ), the root and branch and the first and last, were always the same. I therefore say: we ought simply to imitate their intentions. If we imitate their intentions, then whatever changes and reforms we make will not shock people or cause complaint, yet will surely be in agreement with the policies of the Former Kings.^[73]

In short, policies that accord with the intentions of the sages, and are systematically organized to correspond to—not to replicate—the sages' program of action, can be put into effect without fear of the consequences.

But, Wang continues, "to fit the intentions of the Former Kings to the changed situation of the present" is not possible as long as "human talent in society (t'ien-hsia ) is inadequate." Talent is the "root" of an integrated order; the government must set about "completing it by molding and casting it." The government creates the talent it needs through a sequence of measures founded in the model of antiquity.

The first requirement is "Instruction" through government schools, established to train all those capable of being of use in realizing the program. Schooling should immerse men in the integrated systems of antiquity. They will learn "the affairs of rites and music, punishment and policy" by living in an environment where all that they see and practice are the "model sayings, moral conduct, and intentions for ordering society of the Former Kings." Second is "Nurturing." The government nurtures all the people by providing economic support, establishing rituals of passage and of daily life appropriate to their economic stations, and finally by controlling them with penal law, thus to "unify social customs and bring about order." Third, through "Selection," the schools recommend the most wise and able to the leaders who may, on examining their speech and conduct, assign them probationary employment and titles. Finally, in "Employment," those selected and proven are assigned ranks and responsibilities commensurate with their talents. Such officials are to be given long tenures and left unfettered by regulations so that they can develop and complete projects and do what ought to be done.

Wang goes on to compare the present with the model. "Instruction" is incomplete, for it deals only with the civil and literary and ignores the military. Salaries are too low to "nurture" honesty among officials, while rites

[73] LCC 39.410-11.

fail to restrain men, and the law does not punish basic faults. "Selection" is based on literary skill and memorization; it fails to garner men of real use. "Employment" is determined by a seniority system that assigns men to positions outside their competence. Wang concludes that the first step now is to devise policies to form talent under present conditions but in a manner in line with the intentions of the Former Kings. To accomplish this there is a necessary sequence: first think out broad strategies, then make precise calculations, then gradually put them into effect, and finally bring them to fruition. Offer rewards to those who further the cause and punish those who hinder it. Let the ruler take the intentions of the sage kings as his guide.

The "Ten-thousand Word Memorial" as I read it, is about the idea of a perfect, self-contained, and self-perpetuating system. The forming of talents is not separable from policies to provide for the livelihood, morality, and discipline of society. Producing men devoted to the system requires establishing the system at the same time. However, when the memorial turns to actual measures appropriate to the present, its aims are more limited. Rather than proposing a school system for all the people so that officials can be chosen from among them, Wang asks only that, as an initial step, the government restructure its relationship with the shih . In effect, Wang calls for integrating the shih with the government, rather than allowing the shih to exist independently of the government and its purpose. But we may also say, and perhaps just as accurately, that Wang is asking that the government be made one with the shih and with their aspirations as Wang presents them. In either case Wang's program demands the unification of politics and morality, of government and society. This is clear in his claim that education must "unify all who learn" to prevent disagreement among literati about what is to be done. It is clear too in his view of the economy: he holds it essential that the government "manage wealth" in order to keep private wealth from increasing to the point that people become beholden to private interests. That would irreversibly divide authority and so hinder the uniform implementation of policy.^[74]

For Wang political leadership belongs to those who have truly "learned," men committed to realizing the intentions of the Former Kings. "Even the son of heaven, facing north [thus acknowledging such men as teachers], will inquire of them and take turns acting as host and guest with them." In letters to followers in the 1060s, Wang insists that achieving an integrated system can arise only when men who have truly learned gain authority. Such men will be able to direct all the parts to fulfill their proper roles as pieces of a larger whole; "We cause others to take what is correct

[74] LCC 82.860-61; 82.862-63. Other accounts of the ideal school include 82.858 and 83.870.

from us so that they are able to be correct." Once they have the knowledge in them, all they need is the political authority to put it into effect.^[75]

Learning from the Sages . Wang An-shih's essays show that he sought to justify his claim that literati ought to take the sages as their guide to political action. The model for the present must be the "completed model" (ch'eng-fa ) developed by the sages when they took over what heaven-and-earth had begun, "completing" the things nature had brought into being. (Contrast this with Ssu-ma Kuang's view that the truly relevant models are those of the dynasty's founders.) "Thus in the past, when the sages were in power and took all things as their responsibility, they necessarily instituted the four methods. The four methods are ritual, music, punishment, and policy; these are the means for completing things."

The sages' completed model, which was free of any onesidedness and partiality, was established over time in a cumulative manner. Later sages did not imitate the "traces" of former sages, Wang explains, because sages responded "according to changes in the times" (ch'üan shih chih pien ). Nevertheless, there was a basic uniformity to their intentions. Confucius, the last sage and completer of the system, responded to changed times according to the "intent of ritual"; he did not stick to "the forms of ritual [already] instituted." This meant, in the case of ritual, anchoring it in the communal feeling of man as it was at that moment while incorporating the sages' own tradition. Wang extends this to all institutions. A system must be built from the common desires of those affected, and it must be instituted in a way that allows the "average man" (chung jen ) to meet its requirements. Imitating the forms and imitating the intentions are not mutually exclusive, however. Those who successfully thought out and established integrated systems inferred intentions from the forms of the past. Thus they were better able to accommodate change and maintain an integrated system than were mere imitators of past forms. The latter, trying to preserve forms, were increasingly unable to incorporate new developments. True sages were able to create new systems on the basis of past intentions. Their willingness to make changes in forms to realize the same idea was a sign of their sincere desire to benefit all. Imitators of forms lacked that self-confidence; they copied the past to impress others but did not know the intentions on which past models were based. This accounts for the decline of Chou: men started imitating forms and forgot how to act as sages.^[76] Having the intent as opposed to imitating the form was what made kings and hegemons fun-

[75] LCC 82.858; 72.766-768. See also LCC 75.790-91: "In regard to learning, the superior man's intention is surely directed to society, but first to ourselves and then to our fellows. If we ourselves are in order, then whether others are in order or not depends on whether we realize our intention or not."

[76] LCC 69.730; 67.713; 66.701; 67.717; 67.714.

damentally different. Ssu-ma Kuang did not share this Mencian view. Ssu-ma saw only a difference of degree, since political order under any circumstances depended upon the same principles: if order was achieved by hegemons, they must have been following the same principles as kings.^[77]

For Wang antiquity has authority in three ways. On the first level, he can justify the creation of institutions on the grounds that they formed part of the "completed model" provided by the ancients. Here it is a matter of "imitating the traces." On a second level, antiquity provides a set of ideas for organizing society and state into a single system. These ideas were constant, even though the institutional structure grew and changed. Third, antiquity provides, in the sages, a model for carrying out the reorganization of society and state. One who shares the intentions known from the forms of the past can do what is necessary to reestablish a coherent, unified system. Antiquity thus has authority as a source of models, purposes, and methods. These three aspects join in the term fa (model, rule, method, law, and to imitate). Knowing the fa of the sages is more important than historical knowledge, for their fa were effective in achieving true order. In what might well be seen as a response to Ssu-ma Kuang, Wang writes, "I hold that one who understands order and chaos ought to discuss the methods [the sages] used to transform men."^[78] Clearly Wang and Ssu-ma had different ideas about how the sages had civilized men.

Because Wang is sure that there are models, intentions, and methods, he can make claims about how sages in antiquity must have operated, even when evidence is lacking. This is illustrated in "The Duke of Chou," where he defends the idea of a state school system to form shih against those who think (like Hsun Tzu in this essay, or Ssu-ma Kuang) that the sages relied on a system of personal connections and recommendations to find shih . He appeals first to the "system of the Three Eras," a time when "fa was truly perfected," which is said to have included schools. But then he argues that this manner of forming shih is necessary for fa to be good. "If the Duke of Chou knew how to govern, then by rights he would have established the fa of schools under heaven."^[79]

This suggests that for Wang the real test of whether he is right is the ability of his own mind to envision integrated systems. To deal with the present he must, of course, fit in developments since antiquity.^[80] Essays

[77] SMK 73.896. For a discussion of Sung literati debates on this issue, see Hoyt Cleveland Tillman, Utilitarian Confucianism: Ch'en Liang's Challenge to Chu Hsi (Cambridge: Council on East Asian Studies, Harvard University, 1982), pp. 46-53.

[78] LCC 69.731.

[79] LCC 64.677-78.

[80] He admits this when he writes that in learning men must "comprehend past and present, acquaint [themselves] with rites and rules, the patterns of heaven and the affairs of man, and the changes in policy and instruction." See LCC 69.734.

such as "On Ritual and Music," where ritual and music are presented as models for true "learning," and "On Attaining and Using Unity," which defines the process of "learning," suggest that the process of mentally envisioning how various parts can be formed into a coherently integrated system is basic to Wang's view of learning. These are very difficult essays, in part because we find Wang trying to unite internal and external, human nature and sentiment, man and heaven-and-earth, sages and common men. If they are not persuasive as philosophical treatises, they still indicate what Wang was trying to accomplish. He begins the second essay with the statement "All things have their perfect patterns (li ). If one can grasp the essential of the patterns, one is a sage. The way to grasp the essential of the patterns lies simply in attaining [and using] their unity." This is applied to human affairs in the first essay when Wang concludes that all enduring creations "have been established by sages who attained [and used] the essential and loved learning." For Wang attaining and using the essential or unity enables one to hold all dualities together and create things that harmonize and synthesize diverse interests and traditions. By contrasting this with merely "maintaining completed models" he argues that this kind of learning can and must be a basis for reorganizing modern society.^[81]

There is a dialectic between Wang's attempt to achieve a coherent, unified understanding of the Classics and the sages and his efforts to envision a system that can incorporate all aspects of the world. We can see a similar dialectic, in Ssu-ma Kuang's thinking, between the effort to define the constant principles of political process and the attempt to make history coherent. To a greater degree than Ssu-ma, I think, Wang appeals to the coherence of his conclusions to justify their validity. He will later write his cousin Tseng Kung:

For long the world has not seen the complete Classics. If one were only to read the Classics, this would not be enough to [let one] know the Classics. I thus read everything, from the hundred schools and various masters to [such medical texts as] the Nan ching and Su wen , the pharmacopeia, and various minor theories, and I inquire of everyone, down to the farmer and the crafts-woman. Only then am I able to know the great system (ta t'i ) of the Classics and to be free of doubt. The later ages in which we learn are different from the time of the Former Kings. We must do this if we are fully to know the sages.^[82]

[81] LCC 66.707; 66.702-6; quoting from 66.706. Winston Lo, in "Wang An-shih and the Confucian Ideal of Inner Sageliness," and K'o Ch'ang-i, in his account of Wang's philosophical thought (pp. 194-96), both treat "On Attaining and Using Unity" as a statement of Wang's basic philosophy. I suspect that this essay and "On Ritual and Music" are late writings because they are concerned with the internal and the cosmological. Hsia Chang-pu has argued that after 1068 Wang changed his view of human nature to argue that good values were innate; see "Wang An-shih ssu-hsiang yü Meng-tzu," p. 315.

[82] LCC 73.779.

Knowing the sages and the Classics means envisioning a perfect system that comprehends and integrates everything. Wang's claim, I think, is that if he has envisioned that system he knows the sages and he can act.