Freedom to Act—A Brief Introduction to the Proposition of Being Watchful Over the Solitude in Daxue and Zhongyong

Baruch de Spinoza (1632-1677) once said, “The one who lives by dictates of reason is the free man.” This echoes the Western tradition of logo-centricism that has been prevalent since ancient years. However, from the perspectives of ancient Chinese philosophers, they would definitely propose “the one who lies by dictates of morality is the free man”. Changing the keyword from reason to morality makes a huge difference here.

Freedom to act implies the internalization of morality, leading to the formation of one’s moral life manifested with one’s capacity of self-discipline. This state of self-discipline is not driven by external regulations, but one’s own will that is deep-rooted in our own mind. This helps us to overcome the animalistic instinct and other external challenges to morality so that we can freely follow our will to act morally in our own pace in a cultivated manner. This is what we regard as the freedom to act. In Liji (Book of Rites, 禮記), the proposition of Being Watchful Over the Solitude (慎其獨, meaning being watchful when one is alone 慎其獨居, in particular when one is at home) appears in chapters on Daxue (Greater learning, 大學) and Zhongyong (Doctrine of the Golden Mean, 中庸). Being in solitude is a big test to self-discipline, as the freedom to act only manifests itself when one could implement the autonomy of one’s will to exert morality in self. In Daxue, there are three guiding principles with eight themes. The three guiding principles are to illustrate illustrious virtues (明明德); to renovate the people; and to rest in the highest excellence. The eight themes are investigating things (格物), acquiring knowledge (致知), sincerity (誠意), righteousness (正心), self-cultivation (修身), managing the family (齊家), governing the state (治國), as well as bringing happiness and peace across countries (平天下). Sincerity, which is listed after investigating things and acquiring knowledge, requires cultivated nobles (Junzi, 君子) to achieve under the state of being watchful over solitude. Here we will investigate the relationship between the idea of being watchful over solitude (which is emphasized in Daxue and Zhongyong), and its relationship with freedom to act. We will illustrate with two different perspectives as follows:

1. Monitoring morality and Self-consciousness of Being Watchful

Why is being watchful over solitude so important? This is an important question that we must ask. In Chinese philosophy, self-discipline is valued over being regulated by external forces. Self-consciousness to morality is the prerequisite of self-discipline. This implies that we should be watchful over our thinking and acts in our daily life, as well as staying vigilant to threats to morality. Consciousness to moral threats gives rise to conscience of Do’s and Don’ts in our moral self. In Zhongyong, the proposition of being watchful over solitude is illustrated by the consciousness to moral threats. As ascribed in the text, “Cultivated nobles are vigilant and watchful to what should not be seen, fear what should not be heard. When there are invisible threats, they don’t look at it. When there are minor signs of violation to morality, they don’t let it manifest (君子戒慎乎其所不睹，恐懼乎其所不聞。莫見乎隱，莫顯乎微).” Being vigilant, watchful and fear are demonstrating high level of self-discipline and awareness, that one keeps on monitoring with high moral standards in scrutinizing thinking and behavior. In this way, cultivated nobles can find out hidden dangers and signs of possible problems. Therefore, Zhongyong extends the description of the proposition of being watchful over solitude in Daxue by adding the discussion on consciousness to possible threats. Daxue cited a saying by Zeng Shen (曾參, 505-435 BC), “Be serious with your eyesight just like you have ten eyes! Be careful with your touch just like you have ten hands! Take it seriously!” (十目所視，十手所指，其嚴乎！), which aims at activating students’ sense of guilt and shame. Comparing with Being vigilant, watchful and fear, sense of guilt and shame is a sense related to prohibition. This means one sets an absolute bottom line over the object leading to one’s guilt and shame. Collectively, being vigilant and watchful, fear, as well as sense of guilt and shame are three signs that mark the beginning of freedom to act.

2. Practices that lead to internalization of morality

Generally speaking, sincerity is the consequence of internalization of morality. Daxue describes sincerity as “Never deceive yourself (毋自欺)!” The Chinese character Wu (毋) indicates an imperative on prohibition. Here it emphasizes that one should prohibit self-deception and maintain one’s truthfulness and sincerity in one’s good nature. Then, we would follow-up by asking: what is the motivation behind such prohibition? “Never deceive yourself” in Daxue is illustrated with two similes: “Just like we hate disgusting odours (如惡惡臭)” and “Just like we are attracted to beauties (如好好色)”. The goal of not deceiving oneself is realized by the direct and automatic physiological responses. If hating disgusting odours and being attracted to beauties are natural physiological responses, we will follow up by asking: what is the relationship between such physiological responses and our cultivation in moral acts? The answer lies on the following phrase, “the evil men, when idly staying at home, will do evil things, without any limits. However, when they meet cultivated nobles, they will hide up their evil nature and persuade others that they are men of virtue (小人閑居為不善，無所不至，見君子而後厭然，掩其不善，而著其善).” The main idea of these phrases is to remind cultivated nobles to get away from the problems that often found among evil men: lack of morality and self-centredness.

Upon meeting cultivated nobles, evil men immediately pretend to be good people, who keep buffing about their virtues and try all means to cover up their wrongdoings. Nonetheless, when one trick is repeated for too many times, people will eventually discover the truth, just like the case in Western Children’s story The Emperor's New Clothes. In Human Nature is Inscribed in our Lives (性自命出), one of the texts found in Bamboo manuscripts of Chu Kingdom excavated in Guodian town (郭店楚簡校譯), we could find texts that cross-reference with above-mentioned texts: “One could not pretend forever. One would know that. If one pretends for ten times or less, their real intension will soon be revealed. Is it so easy to be noticed that we won’t fail to detect (人之不能以偽也，可知也。不過十舉，其心必在焉，察其見者，情安失哉？)¹ ?” From this, we know that the imperative of “Never deceiving oneself!” is directed to the acts that are hypocritical and self-deceiving. Let’s continue the discussion on the imperative of “Never deceive oneself!” and the two illustrations with physiological responses.

In Economics, there is a theory of Path Dependence, which implies that our behavior is based on previous experience, and our future behavior would also be adopted from current acts. Adopting this theory for the context of cultivation in morality. In the moment that the first sign of bad habits appears, it will soon become a rigid behavioral pattern that is difficult to be rectified.Therefore, by encouraging cultivated nobles to be watchful over the solitude, they are able to prepare and purify themselves from the start. Therefore, “Never deceive oneself” emphasizes the need for self-reflection and self-monitoring in pursuit of pure thinking and behavior. When one’s mind is purified, one’s explicit behavior would subsequently be internalized into one’s moral life. Soon, one would find that every act and speech of this person reflect the sense of genuineness.  This is as natural as innate physiological phenomena like “hating disgusting odours” and “being attracted by beauties” that one has no way of denying. Hence, Daxue concluded with the following, “with inner sincerity cultivated, our expression would manifest itself to the outer”. (誠於中，形於外). To deceive is the negation of inner sincerity. One’s behavior, which lacks the impact rooted from inner morality, does not reflect the inner vital force. In such case, one’s behavior could not cover one’s lies, one’s speech is never truthful, and one could never freely express oneself and could never be genuine and sincere. Therefore, in order to achieve freedom to act, one must activate one’s sensitivity to what is good and what is evil based on morality. Therefore, the early stage of of being watchful over the solitude involves the three elements of Being vigilant and watchful, Fear, as well as Sense of guilt and shame. When developed fully, being watchful over the solitude allows one to cultivate the morality of sense of what is good and what is evil. Upon this stage one could achieve freedom to act.

Finally, one might ask: why must we achieve the freedom to act? In Daxue, there are three extra remarks on sincerity: “wealth can nourish our household, virtue can nourish our body, thus achieving peace of mind and developing good physique (富潤屋，德潤身，心廣體胖).” Therefore, one could achieve better mental and physical health with the cultivation of morality. While not everybody wants to have good physique in terms of gaining weight, but everybody is in pursue of reaching peace of mind by having good appetite, good sleep, feeling no guilt and shame, and feeling blissful. From this, we could find that freedom to act is also a way to free our mind and spirit.

Footnotes

1.  引文採用劉釗釋文。見劉釗:《郭店楚簡校釋》（福州市：福建人民出版社，2003年），頁100。