Mencius and Xun Zi

Mencius is an optimist. From his writing, we can see how he wants everyone to act good so that it benefits the other people around them or the people in the empire. He also believes that everyone should help each other for the benefit of the economy and empire. He also says, "The feeling of commiseration is the principle of benevolence. The feeling of shame and dislike is the principle of righteousness. The feeling of modesty and complaisance is the principle of propriety. The feeling of approving and disapproving is the principle of knowledge." those are some of the things he believes are associated to each other and things that people should feel and do.

Xun Zi is a pessimist and believes in strict rituals and swift punishments. He believes that desires cause disorder and destruction of a kingdom and he feels that everyone is over come with negative feelings such as grief, despair, and depression. He also believes that sages are the only people that can do the correct rituals and have the correct feelings. He thinks that: "They are born with fears and hatreds. If they follow them, they will become violent and tendencies toward good faith will dies." He means to say that people are generally born bad per se and when they give in to fears and hatreds, any of the good inside the person will die. Xun Zi likes to compare humans to a piece of wood meaning that if heat is applied, they can shape the wood however they want, but it take a lot of force and "torture" to do it.


I believe with Mencius's ways. I am an optimist, meaning I believe in the good in everyone. I believe in many of the things he believes in such as the ideas that will make people happy. One was how if the king employs talented men int he position that he deserves, then other scholars will love him and want to work for him too. I also believe people are filled mostly with good, endless something had happened to them to make them bad. I also believe about what he says about how most people can't bear to see other people suffer, it makes the good people sad for them and wanting to help. I feel the same way. I want to help people in any way I can, just like the example he uses in Book 2, Part 1, Chapter 6, Number 3, about how if a child was about to fall in a well, you'd feel distressed and go to try and help them and stop the child from falling in the well.