I. APPROACH TO LIFE
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In what follows I am presenting the Chinese point of view, because I cannot help myself. I am interested only in presenting a view of life and of things as the best and wisest Chinese minds have seen it and expressed it in their folk wisdom and their literature. It is an idle philosophy born of an idle life, evolved in a different age, I am quite aware. But I cannot help feeling that this view of life is essentially true, and since we are alike under the skin, what touches the human heart in one country touches all. I shall have to present a view of life as Chinese poets and scholars evaluated it with their common sense, their realism and their sense of poetry. I shall attempt to reveal some of the beauty of the pagan world, a sense of the pathos and beauty and terror and comedy of life, viewed by a people who have a strong feeling of the limitations of our existence, and yet somehow retain a sense of the dignity of human life.
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The Chinese philosopher is one who dreams with one eye open, who views life with love and sweet irony, who mixes his cynicism with a kindly tolerance, and who alternately wakes up from life s dream and then nods again, feeling more alive when he is dreaming than when he is awake, thereby investing his waking life with a dream-world quality. He sees with one eye closed and with one eye opened the futility of much that goes on around him and of his own endeavors, but barely retains enough sense of reality to determine to go through with it. He is seldom disillusioned because he has no illusions, and seldom disappointed because he never had extravagant hopes. In this way his spirit is emancipated.
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For, after surveying the field of Chinese literature and philosophy, I come to the conclusion that the highest ideal of Chinese culture has always been a man with a sense of detachment (takuan) toward life based on a sense of wise disenchantment. From this detachment comes high-mindedness (k'uanghuai), a high-mindedness which enables one to go through life with tolerant irony and escape the temptations of fame and wealth and achievement, and eventually makes him take what comes. And from this detachment arise also his sense of freedom, his love of vagabondage and his pride and nonchalance. It is only with this sense of freedom and nonchalance that one eventually arrives at the keen and intense joy of living.
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It is useless for me to say whether my philosophy is valid or not for the Westerner. To understand Western life, one would have to look at it as a Westerner born, with his own temperament, his bodily attitudes and his own set of nerves. I have no doubt that American nerves can stand a good many things that Chinese nerves cannot stand, and vice versa. It is good that it should be so --- that we should all be born different. And yet it is all a question of relativity. I am quite sure that amidst the hustle and bustle of American life, there is a great deal of wistfulness, of the divine desire to lie on a plot of grass under tall beautiful trees of an idle afternoon and just do nothing. The necessity for such common cries as "Wake up and live" is to me a good sign that a wise portion of American humanity prefer to dream the hours away. The American is after all not as bad as all that. It is only a question whether he will have more or less of that sort of thing, and how he will arrange to make it possible. Perhaps the American is merely ashamed of the word "loafing" in a world where everybody is doing something, but somehow, as sure as I know he is also an animal, he likes sometimes to have his muscles relaxed, to stretch on the sand, or to lie still with one leg comfortably curled up and one arm placed below his head as his pillow. If so, he cannot be very different from Yen Huei, who had exactly that virtue and whom Confucius desperately admired among all his disciples. The only thing I desire to see is that he be honest about it, and that he proclaim to the world that he likes it when he likes it, that it is not when he is working in the office but when he is lying idly on the sand that his soul utters, "Life is beautiful. "
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We are, therefore, about to see a philosophy and art of living as the mind of the Chinese people as a whole has understood it. I am inclined to think that, in a good or bad sense, there is nothing like it in the world. For here we come to an entirely new way of looking at life by an entirely different type of mind. It is a truism to say that the culture of any nation is the product of its mind. Consequently, where there is a national mind so racially different and historically isolated from the Western cultural world, we have the right to expect new answers to the problems of life, or what is better, new methods of approach, or, still better, a new posing of the problems themselves. We know some of the virtues and deficiencies of that mind, at least as revealed to us in the historical past. It has a glorious art and a contemptible science, a magnificent common sense and an infantile logic, a fine womanish chatter about life and no scholastic philosophy. It is generally known that the Chinese mind is an intensely practical, hard-headed one, and it is also known to some lovers of Chinese art that it is a profoundly sensitive mind; by a still smaller proportion of people, it is accepted as also a profoundly poetic and philosophical mind. At least the Chinese are noted for taking things philosophically, which is saying more than the statement that the Chinese have a great philosophy or have a few great philosophers. For a nation to have a few philosophers is not so unusual, but for a nation to take things philosophically is terrific. It is evident anyway that the Chinese as a nation are more philosophic than efficient, and that if it were otherwise, no nation could have survived the high blood pressure of an efficient life for four thousand years. Four thousand years of efficient living would ruin any nation. An important consequence is that, while in the West, the insane are so many that they are put in an asylum, in China the insane are so unusual that we worship them, as any body who has a knowledge of Chinese literature will testify. And that, after all, is what I am driving at. Yes, the Chinese have a light, an almost gay, philosophy, and the best proof of their philosophic temper is to be found in this wise and merry of living.
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1. 人生態度
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以下將要介紹的是中國人的觀點，畢竟我來自中國。但我感興趣的是介紹中國最傑出聰慧的思想者在他們的民間智慧和文學積澱中觀察到并表達出來的處世待物的觀念。我意識到這是一種閒適哲學，它源自慵懶的生活，又在一個不同的時代里演變。但我不禁在想：這種人生觀在本質上是正確的；既然人類性相近，則觸動某國國民心扉的也會打動其他國家。而我義不容辭要介紹的人生觀經過了中國詩人和學者們常識的揣摩，經驗的篩選和詩意的渲染。我也應該嘗試展現一些異教徒世界的美，他們深知此生有涯，但也盡力維護生命的尊嚴，他們的人身既有恐怖又有美麗，既有痛苦又有喜樂。
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中國哲學家睜著一隻眼睛做夢，既熱愛生活又嬉笑怒駡，既冷嘲熱諷又和善包容，時而警醒時而困頓，在夢中比清醒時更有活力，從而使清醒的人生摻雜了幻想。他用一隻眼睛看到周遭萬事皆徒勞，自己的掙扎也僅是枉然，而這也只不過是留存足夠的現實感來決心繼續下去。他從不幻想，因此無所謂醒悟；他從不奢望，所以無所謂失望。他的魂靈因此得救。
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探討了中國文學和哲學之後，我發現凡中國文化的最高典範都以一種達觀心境面對生活，這種達觀則來自于明智清醒。由達觀生髮曠懷，使人能容能諷，不為功名利祿所牽絆，坦然接受未來。這種達觀也孕育了人的自由意識，使他熱愛流浪，孤傲冷漠。只有擁有這種自由意識及冷漠態度，人才能真切地體會到生活的極大快樂。
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讓我證明我所說的這種人生觀是否適用於西方人並無裨益。要瞭解西方人的生活，就需要設身處地，以西方本土的視角，體會他們的性情，感受他們的身體態度和神經感受。毫無疑問的是，美國精神使得美國人能接受中國人所無法忍受的很多事物，反之亦然。我們生而不同，這理所應當，也是極好的。然而這不過是相對來說。我深信，在生活的喧囂忙碌之餘，美國人骨子裡一定也無比渴望躺在挺拔的樹下的青草地上，悠閒地度過一個自在的下午。如“醒來去生活”之類的大眾呼聲之所以存在，在我看來這足以證明有相當一部份美國人寧願在夢中度過一段時光。但是美國人終還不至於頹廢至此。問題只在於他頹廢的程度以及他如何使這種頹廢成為可能。也許美國人只是對于“混日子”一詞有些慚愧，這個世上沒有閒人；但莫名其妙的是，正如我很確定地知道他也是動物一樣，我知道他有時會想放鬆全身肌肉，在沙灘上伸伸懶腰，或是靜靜地躺著，枕著手臂，舒服地翹起一條腿來。如果這樣，他便與顔回有幾分相似了，顔回是孔子最為稱讚的門徒，他也擁有這種美德。我唯一希望看到的，就是他能夠開誠佈公，告訴世界心之所欲，承認他的心靈發出“人生真美”的呼喊時是他閒適地躺在沙灘上的時候，而不是在辦公室工作的時候。
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因此，我們將要看到的是整個中華民族心中的哲學觀和生活藝術。我傾向于認為，不論好壞，這種觀念在世界上都是獨一無二的。因為我們所看到的是一種從完全不同的思想中衍生的嶄新的人生觀念。不言而喻的是，任何一種民族文化都是該民族的思想結晶。所以，既然有這麼一種民族思想與西方文化世界迥然不同，且長期隔絕，我們就有權利期待從中發現應對人生困難的新思路，更貼切的說是新的方法論，或者這些困難的新姿態。我們知道這種思想的優勢與不足，至少過去的歷史告訴過我們。它的藝術光輝絢爛，科學不值一提，常識博大精深，邏輯粗鄙淺陋，閒談人生時極盡細膩溫柔，卻完全沒有達到學術高度。眾所周知中國人的思想非常實際而又精明，一部份中國藝術的愛好者會認為中國人的思想非常細膩，認為中國思想富有詩意和哲理的人則更少。至少中國人在以哲理的眼光觀察事物上是享有盛名的，這比說中國哲學深厚或有幾位大哲學家更有意義。對一個國家來說，擁有幾個大哲學家并不稀奇，但以哲理的眼光去觀察事物則難能可貴。無論如何，中華民族更重哲理而非實效，否則它無法在與追求效率的生活相伴的高血壓中綿延四千年。四千年的高效生活可以毀滅任何民族。一個重要的結果是：西方的狂人太多而只能住進瘋人院，中國狂人罕有而備受崇拜。這就是我要說明的。確實，中國人的哲學是輕鬆的，近乎快樂，而他們的哲思性情的最好例證便是他們智慧而快樂的人生態度。
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