Like Confucius, Mengzi was concerned to defend a certain conception of the good
life for human beings. Call this conception of the good life "the Confucian way,"
or "the Confucian Dao." According to the Confucian way, possessing virtues like
benevolence, righteousness, propriety, and wisdom are central to a life well-lived.
When Mengzi says that human nature is good, Mengzi's thought is that human beings
have innate potentials, or predispositions, toward such virtues. We naturally tend
toward these virtues. As Mengzi says, benevolence, righteousness, propriety, and
wisdom are not welded to us externally. We inherently have them.
In presenting this view, Mengzi uses an agricultural metaphor. He describes these
potentials and predispositions as sprouts of virtue. Mengzi's thought is that if we
fully cultivate our sprouts, if we tend to our predispositions toward virtue and
become fully virtuous, then we will bring our human nature to full fruition. But
what evidence does Mengzi adduce for the view that human nature is good?
2A6. "child and the well case."
There's the well, there's little Ria toddling along, getting closer. According to
Mengzi, anyone who saw little Ria about to toddle into that well would have an
immediate, non-reflective gut reaction. As Mengzi says in 2A6, anyone would feel a
surge of alarm and compassion.
Okay, so what should we conclude from Mengzi's child and the well thought
experiment? According to Mengzi, our non-reflective gut reaction to little Ria's
looming danger shows that we have innate predispositions toward benevolence. On
Mengzi's view, our response to little Ria's potential disaster is hard-wired. Human
beings, by nature, are simply predisposed to respond with alarm and compassion when
they see defenseless innocents about to face harm. And our alarm and compassion,
Mengzi insists, reveals the sprout of benevolence in human nature. To be sure, it
doesn't show that we possess the fully-developed virtue of benevolence. But Mengzi
thinks that it reveals the germ or bud of benevolence, the kind of proto-version of
benevolence that can be cultivated to maturity.
Mengzi recognizes, however, that one might offer different accounts of our
reactions. According to one alternative proposal, perhaps one's response to little
Ria's danger is instrumentally motivated. Mengzi, however, rejects this
instrumental account. Hearing about little Ria, Mengzi says, one would feel alarm
and compassion not because one sought to get in good with the child's parents, not
because one wanted fame among their neighbors and friends, and not because one
would dislike the sound of the child's cries. What's important, Mengzi thinks, is
that our alarmed and compassionate response is spontaneous and unthinking. That
shows that our response emerges without calculation.
Still, Mengzi's view of human nature faces another challenge. It seems demonstrably
false that human nature is good. If human nature is good, then vice should be rare.
We shouldn't often see brutishness, plunder, banality, selfishness, petty tyranny,
and other nasty traits. But vice isn't rare. Hence, it might seem Mengzi's view is
wrong. Contrary to Mengzi, it might seem human nature is bad.
When faced with this kind of challenge, Mengzi's strategy is to get human nature
off the hook. If human beings are bad, Mengzi argues, it's not because their nature
is bad. Mengzi puts the point this way: "As for their essence, human beings can
become good. "This is what I mean by calling their nature's 'good.' "As for their
becoming not good, "this is not the fault of their potential." Or, as Mengzi puts
the point elsewhere, it is not the case that only the worthy person has this heart,
that is, the heart or sprout of courage. All human beings have it. The worthy
person simply never loses it. In other words, Mengzi is fully aware that the world
is full of bad human beings. But Mengzi suggests, don't blame human nature for such
badness. Instead, blame the stunting of human nature for such badness. Human nature
does have predispositions toward virtue, but these predispositions can be
corrupted.
To spell out this response, Mengzi offers a parable, the Parable of Ox Mountain,
which appears in Mengzi 6A8. Here's Ox Mountain. By nature, it's verdant, and
woody, and it's soil is rich. But if hatchets and axes and grazing oxen and sheep
have their day at the vegetation on Ox Mountain, you shouldn't be surprised if the
mountain becomes barren. Here, Mengzi holds, there's no reason to think that Ox
Mountain is naturally barren. Likewise, Mengzi insists, human beings, by nature,
have predispositions toward benevolence, righteousness, propriety, and wisdom. But
if one grows up in a chaotic environment, neglected by narcissistic parents,
surrounded by too much money, and free to run wild with impunity, then don't be
surprised if one's own good nature similarly loses its capacity to blossom. Yet, as
with Ox Mountain, Mengzi believes, there's no reason to think that human beings are
naturally bad. For Mengzi, cultivating virtue does not constitute a mutilation or
radical transformation of one's human nature. Cultivating benevolence and
righteousness is not like making a willow tree into cups and bowls. In other words,
ethical education is not a kind of maiming. On the contrary, Mengzi thinks that
ethical education is like good gardening. It constitutes a tending that enables
innate tendencies to reach fruition. So, to return to the point about the willow
tree, ethical education is more like caring for and nurturing the willow tree so
that it reaches its full growth.
