「人に忍びざるの政」を目指して : 横井小楠の政策論と『孟子』引用

概要

論文の詳細を見る
Yokoi Shonan, a Confucian scholar and samurai who was active in the late Tokugawa Period, often quoted passages from the Chinese classic Mencius in his letters and writings. Some scholars have pointed out some of these quotations and made claims concerning the influence of Mencius on Yokoi. But we do not fully understand to what extent and degree this Chinese classic influenced his thinking. In this paper I have tried to examine the quotations of Mencius in Yokoi's writings and its influence on him. My analysis of these passages, taken with the facts of his life and activities, shows he was deeply influenced by the classical Chinese conception of "compassionate government" founded on the "sensitive heart" for the suffering of others. Yokoi explains these notions as being the moral principle in the context of the ancient Yao and Shun period of China, and the continuation of these concepts through the Three Dynasties of the Hsia, the Yin and the Chou periods. Based on this conception of benevolence, Yokoi criticized the policies of the Higo domain (Kumamoto Prefecture) and the Tokugawa shogunate, and proposed new reform policies for the people of Higo, which later were significant for the building of modern Japan.