Preface
to the Great Learning by Chapter and Phrase
《大學章句序》by Zhu
Xi 朱熹
Zhu Xi
(1130–1200) was an influential Confucian scholar. Zhu Xi’s writings served as
the basis for Chinese governance. He devoted much of his life to educating
others and eventually founded his own academy. 朱熹（1130–1200）是一位很有影响力的儒家学者。 朱熹的著作是中国治国理念的基础。 他毕生致力于教育他人，并最终创立了自己的学院。
Primacy
Source:
The
Book of the Great Learning comprises the method by which people were taught
in the higher learning of antiquity. When Heaven gives birth to the
people, it gives each one, without exception, a nature of humaneness,
rightness, ritual decorum, and wisdom. They could not, however, be
equal in their physical endowments, and thus they do not all have the
capacity to know what that nature consists in or how to preserve it whole.
Once someone appears among them who is most intelligent and wise, and able
fully to develop his nature, Heaven is sure to commission him as ruler and
teacher of the myriad peoples, so that, being governed and instructed,
they may be able to recover their original nature. This is how Fu Xi, the
Divine Farmer, the Yellow Emperor, and [the sage kings] Yao and Shun
succeeded to [the work of] Heaven, establishing the norm [for all to follow],
and how they came to set up the post of Minister of Education and the office
of Director of Music.
In
the flourishing days of the Three Dynasties [Xia, Shang, and Zhou] their
institutions were steadily perfected until everyone, from the king’s court
and feudal capitals down to the smallest lane or alley, had schooling. At the
age of eight all children of the king and dukes, on down to the common
people, started their elementary learning, in which they were instructed in
the [social] disciplines of sprinkling and sweeping, responding to others,
and coming forward or withdrawing from [the presence of others] [as recorded
in Analects 19:12], and in the polite arts of ritual, music, archery, charioteering,
writing, and arithmetic. Then at the age of fifteen, starting with the heir
apparent and other princes, and down through the legitimate sons of the
dukes, chief ministers, grandees, and lower aristocracy to the talented sons
of the common people—all started their higher learning, in which they were
taught the way of self-cultivation and governance of men through the fathoming
of principle and rectifying of the mind. This is also how the distinction
was made in the gradations of elementary and higher instruction in schools.
Thus
widely were schools established, and thus precisely defined was the art of
instruction in the details of its sequence and itemized content! As to the
reasons for providing this instruction, they followed naturally from the
superabundance of the ruler’s personal attention to the practice of virtue
and did not need to go beyond the constant norms that govern the people’s
livelihood and everyday needs. This being the case, there was no one without
learning in those times, and as to the learning itself, no one would be without
an understanding of what was inherent in his individual nature or what
was proper to the performance of his individual duties so that each could
exert himself to the fullest extent of his energies. This is why, in the
great days of high antiquity, good government prevailed on high and beautiful
customs below, to a degree that later ages have not been able to attain.
With
the decline of the Zhou, sage and worthy rulers no longer appeared,
and the school system was not well maintained. The transformation of the
people through education became eclipsed and popular customs deteriorated.
At that time the sage Confucius appeared, but being unable to attain the
position of ruler-teacher by which to carry out government and education, he
could do no more than recite the ways of the sage kings and pass them along,
in order to make them known to later generations. Thus, for instance, there
were such pieces as the Ritual Matters (Quli); Lesser Ceremonials (Shaoyi);
Norms for the Household (Neize) [chapters of the Record of Rites] and Duties
of the Disciples (Dizi zhi) [from the Guanzi], which were only the remnants
and byways of the original elementary learning. There was, however, this
piece, the Great Learning, which followed up what had been accomplished in
elementary learning with a view to setting forth the lucid teaching
methods of the higher learning. Thus for outward emulation there would
be a model great enough to serve as the highest standard of perfection, and
for inner cultivation something detailed enough to spell out in full
its sequence and contents.
No
doubt, among the three thousand disciples of Confucius, none failed to
hear his teachings, but it was only Zengzi who got the essential message and
wrote this commentary to expound its meaning. Then, with the death of
Mencius, the transmission vanished. This work survived, but few understood
it. Thereafter came the vulgar Confucian scholarship [of later times],
stressing memorization and literary composition, which took double the
exertion of the elementary education but was of no real use, and the quietistic
and nihilistic teachings of the deviant doctrines [Buddhism
and Daoism], which were loftier even than the higher learning (Great
Learning) but lacked solid substance. Besides these there were the stratagems
of expediency and the tactics and calculations [of the so-called Strategists
and Realists], all the other theories aiming at worldly power and success, as
well as the teachings of the Hundred Schools and myriad splinter groups that
confused the world and misled the people, blocking the way to humaneness and
rightness. All these were mixed together in great confusion, so that
gentlemen [rulers], alas, could no longer hear the essential teachings of the
Great Way, and lesser men were no longer so fortunate as to enjoy the
beneficial effects of the ultimate in good government. There were obscuration
and obstruction; with the compounding of evils, everything became
incurably diseased, until the disorder and destruction reached its extreme in
the Five Dynasties [tenth century C.E.].
Yet
Heaven’s cycle goes on turning, and nothing goes forth without returning [for
a new start]. The virtuous power of the Song Dynasty rose up, and both
government and education shone with great luster, whereupon the two
Cheng masters of He’nan appeared and connected up with the tradition from Mencius
[that had been long broken off]. The first truly to recognize and believe in
this work, they expounded it to the world and further rearranged the
fragmented text so as to bring out its essential message. With that, the
method whereby the ancients taught men through the Great Learning with the
guidance of the classic text of the Sage [Confucius] and the commentary of
the Worthy [Zengzi], was once again made brilliantly clear to the world.
Although
I am not very clever, it was my good fortune through indirect association
[with a teacher among the followers of the Cheng brothers] to hear about
this. Considering that the work still suffers some damage and loss, I
overlooked my own unworthiness and ineptitude, and went ahead to
gather up the fragments, rearrange them, and insert my own ideas here and
there to fill in for what was missing and then await the judgment of later
gentlemen. Realizing full well how presumptuous this is of me, I know there
is no way to escape the blame [for what I have done], but I thought it might
not be without some small benefit to our country in educating people and
improving customs, and also to scholars as a method of “self-cultivation for
the governance of men.”
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《大学》这部书，是古代大学教学的法则。自从上天降生人类以来，就没有不赋予每一个人以仁、义、礼、智的本性的。然而人的禀赋气质存在差别，所以不能够全知道并保有天所给予人的全部本性。如果有聪明智慧并能把最初本性发挥到极致的人，出于人民中间，则天必命他为广大人民的君主、师长，使其治理和教育人民，以恢复人民最初的善良本性。这就是伏羲、神农、黄帝、尧、舜之所以承受天命为人民的君师和榜样的缘由，也是教育人民的司徒、典乐等官职之所以设立的理由。
在夏、商、周三代兴隆时，学校设施及教学方法渐渐完备，王宫、国都和闾巷都有学校。人到了八岁，从王公以下至于老百姓的子弟，都进入小学学习。小学教学的内容是：洒水扫地，应答对话，待人接物的礼节、各种礼仪和音乐舞蹈，射箭和驾车，文字书写和算术等文化知识。待长到十五岁，从可继承君位的太子、君主其他儿子，以及公侯、卿相、大臣、官员之正妻所生的儿子，与老百姓中的优秀子弟，都进入大学。而教学内容则是使受教者懂得探寻身心的道理，掌握正心、修己、治人之道。这样的学校教育，大学、小学的教学内容和目的是划分得清楚明白的。
学校的设立，内容是如此的广泛，教学的次序和内容是如此详细分明，而其为教的内容，都是人君亲身经历的经验和心得，不追求人民日常生活和伦理知识之外的奇思妙想。这样，当世之人没有不学习的。这些学习的人，没有不知道人的本性所固有的，也没有不明白自己的职分所当为的，这样个人就会努力去尽自己的力量。这就是古代兴盛时，政治修明于上，风俗美善于下，而后世赶不上的原因。
到周朝衰落后，贤圣之君不再出现，上述学校的体制不再推行，教化随世事而零落，风俗也颓废败坏。当时即使有孔子这样的圣人，也得不到君师的地位，来推行他的政治教化学说。于是他就开设私人学校，仿效先王之法，招收弟子习读《诗》、《书》和历史文献，把先王之道传授弟子，再由弟子传教后人。像《曲礼》、《少仪》、《内则》、《弟子职》等篇，都是小学的内容遗留。而这一篇《大学》，是在小学学成的基础上，讲明大学教学内容和方法，既展现儒家学说、理论体系的规模框架之大，而内容又条理分明、节次详细。
孔子的三千多学生，都听过孔子的讲说，只有曾子明白其中的真义，于是写成传文，以阐明孔子本意。到孟子死后，《大学》的传统消失了，《大学》这部书虽然存在，但知其真义者太少了。从这以后，出现了普通学者诵读记忆词句、习作文章的风习，所下的工夫数倍于小学但没有用；异端所讲求的虚无寂灭之教，其理论高过于大学而无实；其他权谋术数，一切以功名利禄为目的的说教，以及百家众技之流，这些蛊惑人心、阻塞仁义的东西，又纷然杂出并流行于世，使在上位的人不幸而不得闻大道的要旨，使平民百姓不幸而不得政治修明的恩泽，昏暗不明，政教不行，痼疾反复积累，到五代十国衰败之时，坏乱到了极点。
天运循环，无往不复。宋德隆盛，治教修明。于是出了河南程氏两位先生，能够继承孟子的传统。他们开始尊信和表彰此篇，又将传下来的古书文字重新编次，挖掘其真义，然后古代大学教人之法，圣经贤传之宗旨，粲然复明于世。
虽然我不够聪明敏捷，但也有幸从我老师那里听说了程氏两先生的学说。只是程氏两先生的书不少已经流失，于是不顾我自己的浅陋，将程书重新钩稽，章句之中也附入了我自己的一些见解，还补其阙失省略的地方，这些都等待以后的学者纠正。自知超越等级和失礼，没有办法逃脱罪责，但于国家化民成俗之意，学者修己治人之方，则未必没有小小的帮助。
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Citation:
Zhu Xi, “Preface to the Great Learning by Chapter and Phrase” in
Sources of Chinese Tradition, ed. Wm. Theodore de Bary and Irene Bloom,
2nd ed., vol. 1, (New York: Columbia University Press, 1999), 722–725.
《大學章句序》by Zhu
Xi 朱熹 in Classical Chinese 文言文
大學之書，古之大學所以教人之法也。蓋自天降生民，則既莫不與之以仁義禮智之性矣。然其氣質之稟或不能齊，是以不能皆有以知其性之所有而全之也。一有聰明睿智能盡其性者出於其閒，則天必命之以為億兆之君師，使之治而教之，以復其性。此伏羲、神農、黃帝、堯、舜，所以繼天立極，而司徒之職、典樂之官所由設也。
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三代之隆，其法寖備，然後王宮、國都以及閭巷，莫不有學。人生八歲，則自王公以下，至於庶人之子弟，皆入小學，而教之以灑掃、應對、進退之節，禮樂、射御、書數之文；及其十有五年，則自天子之元子、眾子，以至公、卿、大夫、元士之適子，與凡民之俊秀，皆入大學，而教之以窮理、正心、修己、治人之道。此又學校之教、大小之節所以分也。
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夫以學校之設，其廣如此，教之之術，其次第節目之詳又如此，而其所以為教，則又皆本之人君躬行心得之餘，不待求之民生日用彝倫之外，是以當世之人無不學。其學焉者，無不有以知其性分之所固有，職分之所當為，而各俛焉以盡其力。此古昔盛時所以治隆於上，俗美於下，而非後世之所能及也！
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及周之衰，賢聖之君不作，學校之政不修，教化陵夷，風俗頹敗，時則有若孔子之聖，而不得君師之位以行其政教，於是獨取先王之法，誦而傳之以詔後世。若曲禮、少儀、內則、弟子職諸篇，固小學之支流餘裔，而此篇者，則因小學之成功，以著大學之明法，外有以極其規模之大，而內有以盡其節目之詳者也。三千之徒，蓋莫不聞其說，而曾氏之傳獨得其宗，於是作為傳義，以發其意。及孟子沒而其傳泯焉，則其書雖存，而知者鮮矣！
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自是以來，俗儒記誦詞章之習，其功倍於小學而無用；異端虛無寂滅之教，其高過於大學而無實。其他權謀術數，一切以就功名之說，與夫百家眾技之流，所以惑世誣民、充塞仁義者，又紛然雜出乎其閒。使其君子不幸而不得聞大道之要，其小人不幸而不得蒙至治之澤，晦盲否塞，反覆沈痼，以及五季之衰，而壞亂極矣！
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天運循環，無往不復。宋德隆盛，治教休明。於是河南程氏兩夫子出，而有以接乎孟氏之傳。實始尊信此篇而表章之，既又為之次其簡編，發其歸趣，然後古者大學教人之法、聖經賢傳之指，粲然復明於世。雖以熹之不敏，亦幸私淑而與有聞焉。顧其為書猶頗放失，是以忘其固陋，采而輯之，閒亦竊附己意，補其闕略，以俟後之君子。極知僭踰，無所逃罪，然於國家化民成俗之意、學者修己治人之方，則未必無小補云。
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淳熙己酉春二月申子，新安朱熹序
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