Individual Autonomy and Responsibility in Late Imperial China By ...

this less cruel than committing a violent crime in cold blood? […] Therefore, because of my theories on the “Preservation of Human Nature” and “Preservation of Learning,” I risk the same punishment suffered by Zhu Jiyou.¹⁵

We will now turn our attention to another case of persecution in a period of a relative loose ideological control when intolerance was not directly related to authoritarian despotism.¹⁶ In 1591 the famous, unconventional thinker Li Zhi 李贄 (Zhuowu 卓吾, 1527–1602) took a trip with his friend Yuan Hongdao 袁宏道 (1568–1610) to Wuchang’s Yellow Crane Pavilion, where he was attacked by an angry mob. The mob accused Li Zhi of “eccentric behavior and confusing people” and attempted to drive him out.¹⁷ The main reason for this was that Li Zhi had shaved his head like a Buddhist monk but still wore a traditional Confucian gown. In addition, he openly admitted he led a licentious life in the pleasure quarters.¹⁸ Making matters worse was a scandal which erupted when Li Zhi accepted as a disciple Mei Danran 梅澹然, the 20-year-old widowed daughter of the powerful Mei Guozhen 梅國楨.¹⁹ However, the moralistic and ideological intolerance of the local gentry can probably be traced back to Li Zhi’s work published the previous year: in 1590 his controversial A Book to Burn (Fenshu) had its first printing. The publication of this work highlighted the hard controversy between Li Zhi and Geng Dingxiang 耿定向 (1524–1596), and Li was well aware of the potentially dangerous consequences.

To understand the complex process at the origin of this persecution, we must go back ten years to 1581. After his withdrawal from government office, Li Zhi was introduced to Geng Dingxiang and his brothers and became active in their circle, taking part in philosophical debates, public speaking, and collective reading. Although Geng and Li were both followers of Wang Yangming, their attitudes and social positions were very different.²⁰ The growing corruption and social anomie gradually led Geng to turn away from Buddhism and Wang Yangming’s intuitionism and to focus instead on moral reinvigoration, as well as the values of social discipline and hierarchy. As Jin Jiang notes, “[f]or Dingxiang, the