Rising Together to the Ranks of Lords: Innate Equality and the Pre-Qin Vision of Self-Cultivation, Compared with Western Freedom and Equality
Starting from a brief episode in the Analects, in which the noble Wenzi of Wei promotes his own household steward, Zhuan, to stand alongside him among the lords, this essay reads that small event against the great declarations of freedom and equality since the Renaissance: the West places its ideal at the starting line, while the pre-Qin thinkers built the ideal into lived reality.
III. The Pre-Qin View of the Person: A Person Is Defined Not by Origin, but by Learning and Cultivation
3.1 "Human Nature Is Close; Habit Sets Us Apart" — A Modest Statement About the Starting Point
The Master said: "By nature people are close to one another; through practice they grow apart." (Analects, "Yang Huo") These eight characters are extraordinarily restrained. They do not claim that people are born as perfectly identical blank slates, nor that a person's endowment fixes his rank for life from the outset; they only acknowledge that people begin with roughly similar roots, and that the differences that later emerge are, for the most part, gradually opened up by what one practices, whom one associates with, and how one acts. A person's position therefore has both an origin and a subsequent unfolding; one can neither blame everything on the individual, nor blame everything on his origin.
"Nature is close" does not assert that everyone is equal in ability, physical strength, or opportunity. Infants are born into different families, and the community, the care, and the teachers and friends available to them already differ from the start. The Master does not erase these differences with a pretty phrase; instead, through the word "practice" (xi), he places the formation of a person back within time, relationships, and action. What is called practice includes not merely reciting texts, but also the customs one absorbs unconsciously, the skills one drills repeatedly, and the disposition that gradually takes shape as one makes choices. A person is not a piece of bronze already cast, but a vessel shaped, within concrete life, jointly by himself and by others.
This also explains why pre-Qin discussions of a person so often speak of "knowing" and "doing" together. To know a principle without acting on it cannot count as truly possessing it; a person in a low position who is willing to learn may, through accumulated effort over time, change himself. The Master also said: "Only the wisest and the most foolish do not change." (Analects, "Yang Huo") This line does not pronounce an unchangeable fate over most people — precisely because it restricts "unchanging" to the two extremes, it throws into relief the malleability of ordinary people. For most people, position is not a verdict settled once and for all, but a record continually rewritten between practicing and not practicing, learning and not learning.
This view carries a rare modesty: it neither exaggerates a person's innate endowment, nor allows anyone to blame failure entirely on circumstance. A society that speaks only of an equal starting point easily mistakes the gaps that later form for a natural fact; a society that speaks only of destiny fixed by origin robs learning of its meaning. The pre-Qin thinkers placed the question of the person on "how to practice, how to learn, how to cultivate oneself," and thereby both acknowledged the unevenness of reality and kept open a door upward. That Zhuan was able to rise together to the ranks of lords was not because the original difference of position had never existed, but because his labor of self-cultivation was, at last, seen by the public order.
3.2 Teaching Without Distinction: "From the one who brought a bundle of dried meat upward, I have never withheld instruction"
The Master's most forceful educational principle is often compressed into the phrase "in teaching, there is no distinction of kind" (Analects, "Wei Ling Gong"). These four characters do not mean that every person receives the same curriculum or achieves the same result — they mean that instruction sets no prior barrier based on lineage. If a person is willing to enter into the relationship of learning, he should not be turned away merely because of humble origin. The Master describes his own practice even more concretely: "From the one who brought so much as a bundle of dried meat upward, I have never withheld instruction." (Analects, "Shu Er")
The "bundle of dried meat" (shuxiu) was ten strips of dried meat — the modest gift a disciple would bring on his first visit. That the Master specifies this amounts to lowering the threshold of education to a level ordinary people could bear: no demand for great wealth, no demand for prior renown — one need only come with sincerity to learn, and the teacher would begin to teach. The equality here does not flatten the roles of teacher and student; rather, within the inequality of those roles, it recognizes that every seeker of learning has the possibility of becoming a better person. The teacher has knowledge and experience; the student has ability not yet unfolded. It is precisely because the two differ that teaching and learning can occur at all.
Teaching without distinction also means that education is not merely the transmission of a set of ready answers, but the process by which a person gains the power of independent judgment. The Master does not treat "whose child are you" as the end of the inquiry; what matters is whether this person can change himself through questioning, discernment, and practice. A poor youth may lack ample time; someone from a remote region may speak with a different accent — but neither can be grounds for shutting him out entirely. The true threshold is whether he is willing to entrust himself to long-term learning; the true test is whether the teacher can teach according to the student's capacity, rather than forcing everyone into the same mold.
Nor does this principle promise that learning will necessarily be exchanged for an equal office. Some, once their studies are complete, go on to govern a region; some keep their household in order and raise their children well; some, amid a chaotic age, use their words to set friends right. Their uses differ, yet the value of self-cultivation does not vanish according to the size of the office attained. To misread "teaching without distinction" as a promise of equal outcomes would place unrealistic demands on education; understood instead as a refusal to turn away a person's aspiration to rise, one can see how it echoes "rising together to the ranks of lords": first let a person enter the gate of learning, and then let his studies and virtue determine how much public responsibility he can bear.
3.3 Master Meng (Mencius): "Every Person Can Become a Yao or a Shun"
Master Meng (Mencius) states the Master's educational conviction even more boldly: "Every person can become a Yao or a Shun." (Mencius, "Gaozi II") This does not treat everyone's present conduct as already the conduct of a sage, nor does it treat the names and standing of Yao and Shun as medals to be claimed out of thin air. What it expresses is a universality of capacity: so long as a person, within the realities of his life, exhausts his heart and carries out what is right, even an ordinary person can attain the highest virtue. The sage is not some miraculous species apart — he is one who has carried the seeds of goodness, judgment, and responsibility already present in human nature to their utmost fulfillment.
Master Meng often uses the story of Shun to make this point. Shun's origins were not exalted, and his family relationships were extremely difficult, yet he tempered himself step by step in the ordinary places of life — being close to kin, serving his elders, and taking on tasks. Master Meng says: "Who was Shun$11 Who am I$12 One who acts accomplishes the same." (Mencius, "Teng Wen Gong I") The weight of this line falls on the two words "who acts": it is not a matter of idly imagining oneself equal to the sage, but of putting in effort at every point where action is possible. Seen in this light, human dignity does not lie in some certificate, but in one's capacity to set right the action of this very moment.
"Every person can become a Yao or a Shun" also preserves a clear-eyed awareness of the difficulties of reality. That one can become a sage does not mean one already has become one; that the road is open does not mean the road is smooth. A person may be held back by poverty, illness, violence, or bad habit, and if the public order gives him no basic support, it cannot rebuke him with the single line "you too can become a sage." The "capacity to act" that Master Meng speaks of requires concrete sustenance, education, and companionship; it requires someone to hold him up when he stumbles, and it requires that he himself not abandon repeated practice. The higher the ideal, the more it needs the daily labor that upholds it.
In this way, Master Meng detaches a person's worth from his origin, without detaching a person's worth from his responsibility. Since every person has the possibility of becoming a Yao or a Shun, no one may hand himself over to be pushed about by circumstance, nor may anyone forever lock another person into a lowly position. Those in high position have a duty to open the way for others; those in low position have a duty to strive ceaselessly to strengthen themselves. Only when these two duties are joined together does "every person can" turn from a merely inspiring phrase into a visible ascent within society. The story of Zhuan moves us precisely because it gives "the capacity to become" a public result, rather than letting it remain mere consolation for the soul.
3.4 Master Xun (Xunzi): "The Person on the Road Can Become a Yu," and "Exhortation to Learning"
Where Master Meng emphasizes the seeds of goodness within human nature, Master Xun speaks in sturdier terms of effort, accumulation, and institution. Discussing the person, he says bluntly: "The person on the road can become a Yu." (Xunzi, "Human Nature Is Bad") "The person on the road" is simply an ordinary person walking along the way — with no sacred bloodline and no illustrious starting point. Master Xun immediately explains that what made Yu into Yu was his ability to carry out benevolence, rightness, and correct law — and none of these are some mysterious thing that cannot be known, learned, or practiced. The height of the sage is therefore a height built up by long practice.
The "Exhortation to Learning" chapter of the Xunzi renders this practice as a continuous image: "Blue is taken from the indigo plant, yet it is bluer than the indigo; ice is formed from water, yet it is colder than water." Blue is drawn out of the indigo plant, yet surpasses it in depth of color; ice congeals from water, yet surpasses it in coldness. Learning does not preserve the raw material unchanged — it is through repeated working that a person acquires a new nature. Master Xun also says: "The noble person studies broadly and examines himself daily, so that his understanding becomes clear and his conduct free of fault." Learning must be broad, and self-examination must occur daily; only then can it finally take root in clear discernment and right action. Without daily accumulated self-examination, however much one understands in words remains only borrowed light.
Master Xun's "capacity to become" is thus closer to reality than momentary enthusiasm. For a person to change, he needs teachers and models, ritual and rightness, friends, and repeated training; for an organization to employ people well, it needs examination, trial appointment, and accountable procedures. To say merely that everyone has potential, while arranging no time for learning, no method of instruction, and no standard of examination, leaves potential stranded in mere praise. What the pre-Qin thinkers called self-cultivation was never a matter of leaping to the heights by sheer will — it was like timber straightened by the carpenter's inked line, or a wheel gradually wearing smooth against the road, slowly forming a stable habit.
This also lets Master Xun complement the Master and Master Meng. The Master tells people not to abandon themselves on account of their origin; Master Meng tells people that within them lies a seed of goodness with the capacity to become; and Master Xun reminds us that this seed and this capacity, unless trained, cannot bear the weight of public affairs. That Zhuan was able to rise together to the ranks of lords was surely not merely because Wenzi happened to take a liking to him — more likely, it was because he had demonstrated reliable ability through long service, learning, and the handling of affairs. Mobility of rank must be grounded in labor; otherwise ascent will only send a person to a place he is not yet prepared for.
3.5 The Ladder of the Great Learning: "From the Son of Heaven Down to the Common People, All Alike Take Self-Cultivation as the Root"
The "Great Learning" (Daxue) chapter of the Book of Rites (Liji) links personal cultivation and public order into a single ladder: "Those in antiquity who wished to make bright virtue shine throughout the world first governed their states well; wishing to govern their states well, they first brought order to their families; wishing to bring order to their families, they first cultivated themselves; wishing to cultivate themselves, they first rectified their hearts; wishing to rectify their hearts, they first made their intentions sincere; wishing to make their intentions sincere, they first extended their knowledge to the utmost; and the extension of knowledge lies in the investigation of things." This passage is often read as a string of grand goals, but it is really more like a construction plan: each level must be supported by the level beneath it — one cannot skip the intervening bricks and simply write "peace under Heaven" on a banner.
The chapter therefore concludes: "From the Son of Heaven down to the common people, all alike take self-cultivation as the root." (Book of Rites, "Great Learning") The Son of Heaven and the common person do not, of course, occupy the same office, and the affairs each bears are far from equal — but on this point of "root," there is no exception. If a superior's intentions are impure and his heart insincere, the greater his power, the wider the damage he causes; if a subordinate regards self-cultivation as mere ornament belonging to those in high position, his own work, too, will lose its measure. Self-cultivation is not the privilege of any one class — it is the shared starting point of every position.
The ladder of the Great Learning also shows that the ideal is never left hanging in mid-air. Rectifying the heart must take root in the handling of household affairs; ordering the family must take root in the governing of the state; and governing the state must in turn take root in letting all under Heaven each find its proper place. Each step widens its influence beyond the step before it, yet none can depart from the genuine labor of the step before. A person who cannot even treat those around him well, yet suddenly declares he will bring peace to the whole world, is painting a tower on sand; a person who keeps faith in a small office and remains fair in every detail, though he has not yet reached a high position, is already preparing himself for greater responsibility.
This ladder also gives "ascent" a clear meaning. Ascent is not leaping from one identity into another — it is the simultaneous expansion of ability, virtue, and the scope of responsibility. If only rank and title are added, while self-discipline and the capacity to bear responsibility are not, then the position has arrived before the person has. Conversely, once a person has repeatedly proven himself in small matters, the public order has reason to entrust him with a greater task. The reason the pre-Qin ideal can connect with reality is precisely that it lays out, for every person, a step that can be taken right now: sincerity of intention, rectification of the heart, cultivation of the self, and from there, achievement proven within relationships and affairs.
3.6 The Daoist Undertone: "Seen from the Way, No Thing Is Noble or Base" ("Autumn Floods")
Where the Confucians emphasize cultivating oneself within one's allotted position, the Daoists remind us from another side not to mistake the name of a position for the truth of Heaven and Earth. The "Autumn Floods" chapter of the Zhuangzi says: "Seen from the Way, no thing is noble or base; seen from things themselves, each thing exalts itself and disdains the rest; seen from convention, nobility and baseness do not lie in oneself." In the eye of the Way, the myriad things each follow their own nature, rather than lining up along a single spectrum of noble and base; if a person views the world only from his own interest and custom, he will exalt whatever is useful to him and disdain whatever is not.
This does not mean that the duties of actual life can be dissolved. When crossing a river, someone must hold the rudder; when treating illness, one must heed the physician; in the army, there must be commands. The Daoist insight is that the person who carries out such duties should not, on that account, imagine himself the center of the universe. Office is a temporary form within a relationship; a person's life does not gain or lose its entire worth according to the height of his office. A person sweeping the ground outside the gate may see more clearly than an honored guest seated within the hall; a person occupying a high place, if he becomes lost in his title, may likewise have his vision blocked by his own pride.
Placing the words of "Autumn Floods" back beside "rising together to the ranks of lords" reveals another kind of balance: rank may differ, but one's vision need not be enslaved to rank. Had Wenzi viewed things only by convention, his steward would forever have remained only a steward; that he was able to see Zhuan's talent and virtue means that, within a concrete relationship, he broke through a blindness produced by custom. The Daoists free people from superstition about title and rank; the Confucians keep people from evading responsibility. To loosen one's attachment to noble and base on one side, while carrying out one's proper duties in earnest on the other — this, together, is the complete undertone of the pre-Qin view of the person.