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xv Introduction The imperial beginnings of China tell a story not just of concrete changes in state structure, policy, and military power but also of important developments in ideology. Well before the First Emperor of the Qin proclaimed sovereignty over a unified empire in 221 BCE, the concept that all should be united under a single great cosmic authority had clearly begun to take root in religious and intellectual circles as well as in political discourse.1 Alongside this focus on a unified authority that extends beyond and helps shape individual behaviors, a widespread debate on universal human nature (xing 性) began to locate cosmic authority and power in all humans from birth, helping usher in movements that viewed the individual body as a key source of empowerment.2 This book introduces the development of early Chinese beliefs that link universal, cosmic authority to the individual in new and interesting ways, indeed in ways that might sometimes be referred to as individualistic. In addition, this book also illustrates how such ideological and religious beliefs developed alongside and potentially helped contribute to larger sociopolitical changes of the time, such as the centralization of political authority and the growth in social mobility of the shi (士 educated elite) class. Much twentieth-century scholarship on early Chinese thought and religions focuses on single authors—the “great men” of ancient China— and on certain aspects of their philosophies. While the writings I examine are most certainly worthy of deep philosophical analysis, it is important to approach them not just as philosophical texts but as historical artifacts as well. Indeed, I hope to show that these texts can provide us with valuable insights into the changing religious, philosophical, and sociopolitical discourses of the period. This is possible, especially since “religion,” “philosophy ,” and “politics” were not separate categories of intellectual inquiry in ancient China. The intellectuals who composed and compiled such texts would have been deeply involved for their livelihoods in seeking (or rejecting) official appointment through their ability to discuss and provide xvi Introduction solutions to certain religious and philosophical problems, as well as political conditions and state affairs. I therefore aim to move beyond what we can know about a single author and his “philosophical” work to a discussion of how the ideas and political-religious beliefs represented in various authors’ works changed from period to period and fit into the general political and social climate of the times.3 The ancient sources to be examined in this book are representations of specific modes of culture and systems of knowledge embedded within contemporary social institutions and political agendas. By asking how certain ideas connect groups of authors from roughly the same epoch to each other, I abandon a singular focus on the transmission of ideas strictly according to distinct “schools” of thought and focus instead on thematic continuities and discontinuities during certain increments of time.4 This approach allows me to illustrate how diverse intellectual lineages influenced each other, shared or did not share certain basic orientations, and were similarly implicated in the broader intellectual, religious, social, and political world of a particular era: the Warring States (453–221 BCE) and early imperial periods (221– ~100 BCE).5 Starting with the writings of the early Mohists (fourth century BCE), I analyze many of the major writings through the early second century BCE such as those of Laozi, Zhuangzi, Xunzi, and Han Feizi, as well as anonymous authors of both received and excavated texts. I show how changing notions of human agency affected prevailing attitudes toward the self as individual. In particular, I demonstrate the onset of ideals that stress the power and authority of the individual, either as a conformist agent in relationship to a larger, cosmic whole, or as an individualistic agent endowed with inalienable cosmic powers and authorities. I then go on to show how distinctly internal (individualistic), external (institutionalized), or mixed (syncretic) approaches to self-cultivation and state control emerged in response to such ideals. As I explore the nature of early Chinese individualism and the various theories for and against it, I also reveal the ways in which authors innovatively adapted new theories on individual power to the needs of the burgeoning imperial state at the end of the Warring States and in the Qin and early Han empires. Approaches to the Study of Individualism in China In past studies that examine the role of the individual in China, scholars have framed questions and established values in such a way that China...

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