For much of the 20th century, if a Western philosopher wanted to seriously engage with the intellectual history of China, their journey almost inevitably began with one monumental work: Fung Yu-lan's A History of Chinese Philosophy. First published in Chinese in the 1930s, this two-volume work was revolutionary. Fung (1895–1990), a philosopher trained at Peking University and Columbia, applied a Western-style historical and analytical method to his own tradition, organizing its sprawling schools and thinkers into a logical, chronological progression. The result is a work of immense clarity and power, a true philosophical history rather than a mere collection of doctrines.
Let's trace the grand arc of this history as Fung presents it, moving from the foundational arguments of the ancient masters to the complex syntheses of the later imperial age.
Fung's first volume covers the golden age of Chinese philosophy, an era of unparalleled intellectual creativity known as the time of the "Hundred Schools of Thought." This philosophical explosion was ignited by crisis. During the late Zhou Dynasty, specifically the Spring and Autumn (771–476 B.C.E.) and Warring States (475–221 B.C.E.) periods, the old feudal order crumbled. Central authority vanished, and China devolved into a collection of rival states locked in near-constant warfare. In this crucible of violence and uncertainty, thinkers emerged to diagnose society's ills and prescribe a cure.
Fung presents Confucius not as a religious prophet, but as China's first private teacher and a "transmitter, not a maker." His radical idea was that the way out of the current chaos was to look back—to restore the ethical and social harmony of the early Zhou dynasty. His program was fundamentally humanistic. He sought to create the Junzi (君子), the "noble person" or "gentleman," not through birth but through moral cultivation. The core concepts of his teaching were:
Ren (仁): Often translated as "benevolence" or "human-heartedness," Ren is the supreme virtue of being fully human. It is the inner moral compass, a cultivated empathy and integrity.
Li (禮): Ritual propriety. Li refers to the entire network of social conventions, from grand state ceremonies to simple etiquette. For Confucius, Li was not empty formalism; it was the external social grammar through which one's inner Ren could be expressed and disciplined.
Almost immediately, a powerful opposition arose. Mozi, a craftsman or warrior, found the Confucian program elitist and impractical. He and his followers, the Mohists, were disciplined pragmatists who judged all ideas and actions by a simple standard: do they benefit the country and the people? Their philosophy was built on:
Jian Ai (兼愛): Impartial Caring or Universal Love. In direct opposition to the Confucian emphasis on family and social hierarchy, Mozi argued that one should care for all people equally. This was not a sentimental appeal, but a utilitarian calculation: a society based on partiality leads to conflict, while one based on impartiality leads to harmony.
A Critique of Confucianism: The Mohists attacked the Confucians for wasting resources on elaborate funerals and musical performances and for promoting a belief in Fate (Ming), which they saw as encouraging passivity.
While Confucians and Mohists debated how to fix society, another group of thinkers argued that the entire project of civilization was the problem.
Laozi and the Daodejing (text likely compiled c. 4th Century B.C.E.): The legendary "Old Master" is the purported author of this seminal text. It introduces the concept of the Dao (道), the ineffable, spontaneous, and natural "Way" of the universe. The key to wisdom is not to build a better society, but to unlearn society's conventions and return to the Dao through Wu Wei (無為)—effortless, non-interfering action. It is a philosophy that champions the feminine, the weak, and the simple "uncarved block" over the masculine, the strong, and the artificially complex.
Zhuangzi (c. 369–286 B.C.E.): His work is a collection of brilliant parables, witty dialogues, and surreal allegories. He takes Laozi's ideas to their logical extreme, arguing for a radical skepticism about all human distinctions. Are we sure we are not just butterflies dreaming we are human? He champions a joyful, mystical acceptance of life's constant transformations, urging us to free ourselves from the prison of our own minds.
As the Warring States period intensified, Confucianism itself fractured over a fundamental question: what is the raw material of human nature?
Mencius (Mengzi, c. 372–289 B.C.E.): The idealist. Mencius famously argued that human nature is innately good. He claimed that anyone seeing a child about to fall into a well would feel an immediate flash of alarm and compassion—not out of calculation, but from instinct. This proves, he said, that we all possess the "four sprouts" of virtue: compassion, shame, courtesy, and a sense of right and wrong. Education is simply a matter of nurturing these sprouts, like a good farmer tending his crops.
Xunzi (c. 310–235 B.C.E.): The realist. Xunzi looked at the chaos of his time and came to the opposite conclusion: human nature is inherently selfish and unruly (xing e, 性惡). Left to itself, it leads only to conflict. Morality, therefore, is not natural; it is an artificial creation. Goodness is achieved only through intense effort, rigorous education, and the civilizing constraints of Li (ritual). For Xunzi, Li is what straightens the crooked wood of human nature.
The Legalists were the terrifyingly logical endpoint of Xunzi's realism. Thinkers like Han Feizi (c. 280–233 B.C.E.), a student of Xunzi, stripped their master's philosophy of its moral core. They argued that the state should not rely on the virtue of its ruler (a la Confucius) or the goodness of its people (a la Mencius). The only reliable tools for governance were:
Fa (法): A system of rigid, publicly known, and harshly enforced laws.
Shu (術): Secret administrative "methods" for the ruler to control his ministers.
Shi (勢): Positional power or authority, independent of the ruler's personal qualities.
It was this ruthless and unsentimental philosophy that the state of Qin adopted, enabling it to conquer its rivals and unify China for the first time in 221 B.C.E.
After the brief and brutal Qin dynasty, the Han Dynasty (206 B.C.E. – 220 C.E.) established a lasting empire. The intellectual climate changed dramatically. The era of founding new schools was over; the age of scholasticism, commentary, and synthesis had begun.
The Han court eventually adopted Confucianism as its official state ideology, but it was a Confucianism very different from the master's original teachings. The key architect of this new orthodoxy was Dong Zhongshu (c. 179–104 B.C.E.). He created a grand, syncretic cosmology by weaving Confucian ethics together with the theories of the Yin-Yang and Five Phases (Elements) schools. In his system, the human world, the natural world, and the heavens were all interconnected in a single, responsive organism. The emperor, as the "Son of Heaven," was the crucial link, and his misrule could cause disruptions in the natural order, such as earthquakes and floods.
When the Han Dynasty collapsed in 220 C.E., China entered another long period of disunity. The failure of the Confucian state model led many intellectuals to turn away from society and politics. This period saw two major developments:
Xuanxue (玄學), or "Dark Learning": This was a revival of Taoism, often called Neo-Taoism. Thinkers like Wang Bi (226–249) wrote brilliant philosophical commentaries on the Daodejing and Zhuangzi, engaging in "pure conversation" (qingtan) about metaphysical questions.
Buddhism: Arriving from India via the Silk Road around the 1st century C.E., Buddhism offered a sophisticated spiritual and metaphysical system that filled the void left by the collapse of the Han worldview. Over centuries, it was gradually adapted and transformed, leading to the creation of uniquely Chinese schools like Chan (Zen) Buddhism, which blended Indian concepts with Taoist naturalism.
By the Song Dynasty (960–1279), Buddhism had become the dominant intellectual force in China. In response, a new generation of Confucian scholars sought to revive their tradition by creating a metaphysical framework that could rival Buddhism's sophistication. This movement, known as Neo-Confucianism, became the defining intellectual current for the next 800 years.
The School of Principle (Lixue 理學): The orthodox school, whose ideas were systematized by the great Zhu Xi (1130–1200). He posited a metaphysical dualism of Li (理), the universal, rational Principle or pattern, and Qi (氣), the vital force or matter-energy that constitutes all physical things. Every blade of grass and every human being has its own Li, which is a manifestation of the one Great Ultimate (Taiji). The goal of self-cultivation was the "investigation of things" to apprehend the Li within.
The School of Mind (Xinxue 心學): The main rival school, championed by Wang Yangming (1472–1529) during the Ming Dynasty. Wang rejected Zhu Xi's dualism, arguing for a monistic idealism: Mind is Principle (xin ji li). Ultimate reality is not external; it is to be found within one's own mind. This led him to emphasize the "innate knowledge of the good" (liangzhi) that everyone possesses and the "unity of knowledge and action" (zhixing heyi).
Fung's history concludes with the "calamitous" encounter with the West in the 19th and early 20th centuries. The overwhelming power of Western military technology and science shattered China's traditional worldview and threw its intellectuals into a profound crisis. Fung's own life's work can be seen as a response to this crisis - an attempt to use the analytical tools of Western philosophy to re-examine, re-evaluate, and ultimately reconstruct Chinese philosophy for the modern age.
Fung Yu-lan's history is more than a catalogue; it is an argument. It argues for a tradition that is rational, humanistic, and deeply concerned with the practical problem of how to live a good life, both as an individual and as a member of a community.
Fund Yu-lan's philosophical system is a fascinating and ambitious attempt to build a bridge between traditional Chinese thought and modern Western philosophy. It is known as the New Rational Philosophy or Xin Lixue (新理學). The name itself is a deliberate echo of the Song Dynasty's Lixue (理學), or Neo-Confucianism. This was no accident; Fung saw his project as a direct continuation and reconstruction of the great rationalist tradition of thinkers like Zhu Xi, but fortified with the tools of 20th-century Western logical analysis. Here's an overview of its core ideas.
Fung was acutely aware that traditional Chinese metaphysics, with its talk of Li (Principle) and Qi (vital force), sounded vague and unscientific to the modern ear, especially to those trained in Western logical positivism. His goal was not to abandon this rich heritage but to give it a new, logically sound foundation.
He believed the original Neo-Confucians had made a crucial error: they talked about metaphysical principles (Li) as if they were actual things that exist in the same way tables and chairs exist. This, Fung argued, made their philosophy vulnerable to empirical critique. His solution was to introduce a sharp distinction, borrowed from Western philosophy, between two kinds of concepts.
This distinction is the absolute heart of Fung's system. Understanding it is key to understanding his entire project.
The Actual World: This is the concrete, physical world of space and time that we experience. It is the realm of "what is." Everything in this world is describable, changeable, and subject to scientific investigation. This is the realm of Qi (氣).
The Formal World: This is a purely logical, abstract, and "silent" realm of truth. It contains concepts like Principle (Li, 理) and the Great Ultimate (Taiji, 太極). These concepts are not things that exist; rather, they are the underlying principles and patterns that make the actual world intelligible.
Think of it this way: the mathematical concept of a perfect circle is a formal concept. It's a pure, unchanging truth. The circles you draw on paper are actual things. They are imperfect, they exist in space, and you can erase them. Fung argued that the original Neo-Confucians mistakenly treated Li (the perfect circle) as if it were just another, albeit very important, actual thing (a drawn circle).
By defining Li as a purely formal concept, Fung protected it from scientific critique. You cannot empirically disprove a logical truth. Science can study the actual world of Qi, but philosophy's job is to understand the formal world of Li.
If these formal concepts like Li and the Dao are silent and do not "exist" in the actual world, how can we possibly talk about them? Fung's answer is what he calls the "negative method" (fufangfa, 負方法).
This method asserts that we cannot say what these ultimate principles are, because any positive description would limit them and place them within the actual world. We can only approach them by saying what they are not.
For example:
"The Dao has no name."
"Principle is not a thing."
"The Great Ultimate is without form."
This is a method of stripping away all concrete descriptions to lead the mind beyond the limits of the actual world to a kind of intuitive, silent contemplation of the purely formal reality. It's a logically rigorous path to what has traditionally been described as a mystical insight.
For Fung, this abstract metaphysics was not an end in itself. Its ultimate purpose was to provide a foundation for a fully realized human life. He outlines four distinct levels, or spheres, of human existence.
The Innocent Sphere (自然境界): This is the unreflective state of living according to one's natural instincts and social customs. A person in this sphere is not yet fully self-aware and does what they do without knowing why.
The Utilitarian Sphere (功利境界): In this sphere, a person acts consciously for their own self-interest and material gain. They are aware of themselves as an "I" seeking benefit. Fung believed that most people operate primarily in this sphere.
The Moral Sphere (道德境界): Here, a person transcends their own ego and acts for the good of the social whole—the family, the community, the nation. They understand their duties and act according to moral principles. This is the realm of the traditional Confucian sage.
The Transcendent Sphere (天地境界): This is the highest sphere of living. A person in this sphere acts for the good of society, like someone in the moral sphere, but they do so with a philosophical understanding of the universe as a whole. They have an intuitive grasp of the formal reality of Li and the Dao. Their identification expands from the social to the cosmic. They see themselves as part of the entire universe and understand their place within it.
In essence, Fung's New Rational Philosophy is the intellectual key to unlocking this final, transcendent sphere. It provides the rational understanding that elevates a moral life into a truly philosophical and enlightened one. It is his grand attempt to show how one can be a sage in the modern world.