Transmitting the Sage's "Heart" (I): Unsealing Moral Autonomy—Intellectual Intuition and Mou Zongsan's Reconstruction of the "Continuity of the Way" (Daotong)

"Moral autonomy" in Mou Zongsan's work coalesces with the Mencian "heart-mind" (xin 心). Humans are said to experience this alleged core of Confucianism as an intuitive consciousness of the value of their actions. This spontaneous moral awareness Mou calls by the Kantian term "intellectual intuition." Examining this crucial concept of Mou's thought, the present article argues that it conceals the purported content of Mou's philosophy. Escaping linguistic representation, it eventually frustrates explication. The validity of moral metaphysics hence rather than on its inexplicable content has to rely on the authority of its enunciator—the Confucian teacher. "Intellectual intuition" thus is essential to Mou's restoration of the daotong—the traditional view of a transmission of the Way from a master to his disciple.