How to Evaluate the Literary Color of Mencius

Mencius' humanistic spirit and its literary expression Abstract: Mencius' humanistic spirit is manifested in highlighting individual consciousness, enhancing people's dominant position and emphasizing people-oriented. This spirit acts on literary expression, and in literary thought, it advocates knowing people and discussing the world, and opposes will with will; In the debate, he is far-sighted, good at criticism and refutation, and uses parallelism and metaphor to make the article smooth and vivid. Key words: the word "humanity" of Mencius' humanistic thought and literary view was first seen in the Book of Changes: "Combining rigidity with softness, astronomy is also; Civilization stops, human nature also; Observing astronomy to observe time changes and observing human nature to transform the world. " The "astronomy" here refers to the literary talent of the sky, such as the sun, the moon and the stars, and the changes of yin and yang. "Humanity" refers to people's literary talent, such as articles and etiquette. Natural changes are presented through astronomical phenomena; The degree of human civilization can also be seen by means of objects and etiquette. Gambao said: "The change of the four seasons is related to the sun and the moon; The sage turned into an article. " Therefore, Yi Zhuan emphasizes the role of education, but ultimately it is to realize human value. It can be said that this is the same understanding in Confucianism, and this understanding shows different characteristics in different thinkers, thus making their literature show different styles. Mencius is more than one hundred years later than Confucius, and he is the successor of Confucius' theory. Confucius' exposition of human nature affirmed the existence of human nature, pointing out that acquired learning can change human nature: "The Analects of Confucius Yang Huo", but it did not define the good and evil of human nature. Mencius took Confucius's "similarity in sex" a step further, affirming that people are human because they all have the same essence-"goodness in nature": "the goodness of human nature is even better than water. There is nothing wrong with people and there is nothing wrong with water. " Mencius' definition of "goodness" of human nature mainly refers to benevolence: "People are also benevolent." ("Dedicated") "Benevolence, people's hearts are also; Righteousness, people are also on the road. " ("Gao Zishang") In Mencius' view, the four ends of "benevolence, righteousness, courtesy and wisdom" are born and rooted in people's hearts. "Compassion is the purpose of benevolence; The heart of shame and evil is also the end of righteousness. " (On Ugly Sun) Mencius explored the profound reason of "the benevolent loves others" from human psychological and emotional activities, which is also the development of Confucius' theory. Mencius' humanistic thought is rooted in the respect for human nature and the promotion of self-spirit. First of all, it is manifested in highlighting this kind of personality consciousness, mobilizing individual's subjective initiative, publicizing personality spirit and personality integrity, so as to enhance individual's dominant position. Mencius traveled around the world all his life and dealt with princes many times. In front of the monarch, Mencius showed his loyalty of sticking to righteousness and not fearing power. He faced the king face to face, dared to speak out, and never kowtowed to Nuo Nuo: "Be reserved about adults, but don't take adults as the highest." He exposed the dark situation and directed his criticism at the monarch: "Dogs eat people and don't know if they are hungry;" When people die, they say,' If it's not me, it's age.' "("Hui Liang Wang Shang ") makes you concede three points. "May he be taught in peace! He also asked the monarch face to face: "What if you don't die within four borders?" (Hui Liang Wang Xia) left the king speechless and could only "talk about him from left to right". Even to put it bluntly, empathy is unwise: "If it is too big, it will be admonished; Repeatedly, if you don't listen, you will be translocated "("Under Zhang Wan "), and even the monarch is" furious "! Confucius said, "I was ordered not to drive. "Mencius ("The Analects of Confucius and the hard-working townships ") claimed to be an uninvited minister. In Mencius' view, one should look at the essence of the king: "What can an inhuman person say? "