Chapter 3 foreword

foreword Gentlemen, I am very glad to have this opportunity to give you a systematic speech.My speech will be divided into four topics four times in a row.To sum up, a general topic is tentatively named "Several General Topics in Chinese Thought". Let me briefly explain the meaning of the so-called "Chinese thought".When it comes to ideology, it refers to individuals, such as Confucian thought, Wang Yangming thought, etc.There are also common terms, such as Chinese thought, Indian thought, etc. The beginning of human thought is all common.For example, you want to eat when you are hungry, you want to drink when you are thirsty, and you want to wear clothes when you are cold.But later it gradually diverged, for example, rice food and wheat food were divided into two ways. Some people were thinking about how to bake bread, while others were thinking about how to cook rice.The same is true for drinking. Some people are thinking about how to make coffee, and some people are thinking about how to roast tea leaves.The same is true for clothing. Some people are thinking about how to raise silkworms and weave silk, while others are thinking about how to herd sheep and weave wool.

Human thoughts have evolved in such divergent ways. What we are talking about today is not about cooking rice or weaving silk, but what we talk about is abstract and still has commonality.The so-called Chinese thinkers are a small difference under the commonality of human thought.As far as Confucian thought and Yangming thought are concerned, the so-called Chinese thought still has a commonality. When talking about ideas, we must also pay attention to its coherence.In other words, thought must have its tradition.The thoughts of this era must have origins, clues, and order in the previous era.Therefore, every thought has its historicity.When we talk about thought, we must talk about the history of thought.

Human behavior must be guided by thought.Only when his thinking is traditional and orderly, human behavior can be followed one after another and have its continuity.The continuity of this behavior is what we call a historical spirit.The historical spirit also has its commonality, but still cannot but have its mutual divergence.Such differences have formed the individuality, that is, particularity, of the cultures of various nations in human history.Within each nation, there are characteristics of each era.See commonality in differences, and differences in commonality.The so-called Chinese thought is based on the differences in the thoughts of the Chinese nation in different ages, to show the commonality, so as to see the differences with other national thoughts.

In any nation, there must be a few common ideas, which have been carried through from ancient to modern times, transcended the times, and penetrated into the depths of everyone's hearts, and generally affected all aspects of society, becoming the general attention, common belief or belief of this society. The topic of general discussion has almost become a mantra.We may ignore or even lose the deep meaning of this mantra because we are accustomed to hearing and quoting it.But you should know that this is the crystallization of a common thought of a nation, and only this thought is alive and powerful.All differences of thought are staged from this.

Today we are in a great era, an era of ideological struggle.We should be able to create new ideas that our times so desperately need.But to create new ideas for our time, we should explore the traditional ideas in history, because they have been buried for a long time in the hearts of our multitudes, that is, in the hearts of each of us.It has evolved into our history, and it has become an important core of our lives.Most of our actions are performed unconsciously, so how can we not pay attention?We should grasp the traditional thoughts of history to create new ideas of our time and fulfill the new mission of our time.

The four lectures I have given are based on the above point of view to discuss some general topics in Chinese thought.This topic must be discussed by thinkers of every era throughout the past and present.This topic must penetrate deeply into the hearts of ordinary people in today's society.Therefore, talking about the history of thought is tantamount to talking about modern thought, because it has been buried in the heart of modern thought and has its deep life, so we have to pay attention to exploring and developing it, so as to adapt it to the current era needs, and become a new idea.Due to time constraints, I only talk about it four times, just to give examples.