The Sage of Confucianism and Taoism

Chapter 2569 Morality and Law

Fang Yun seemed not to notice the Legalist scholar's reaction and continued to speak.

"We don't care about the law, we only look at the original rules. If we think about it further, where do the original rules come from?"

"From survival? There are many rules that don't actually affect survival."

"Due to quelling fights? When we look at primitive societies, we will find that people in primitive societies are more equal. They don't even have the concept of private goods. Everything is collective, and there are actually very few fights."

"Given by God?" Fang Yun's expression suddenly became serious, "Our human race has gone through countless hardships, and countless sages have paved the road to progress with their corpses, allowing us to develop to this day and gain countless achievements and merits. If we shamelessly claim This is a gift from God, which is to tarnish the sages of past generations, which is tantamount to crushing their bones and raising them to ashes, which is tantamount to denying our bloodline. , Denying our wisdom, denying the reason for the existence of our human race! Since everything is a gift from God, what have we done? Such people are worse than insects, even worse than ants! So, I don’t! I hope the human race has such a voice. Those who say that are the products of the failure of human race’s progress and should be nailed to the pillar of shame in history!”

The scholars in the audience nodded in agreement, approving Fang Yun's words.

"Getting back to the subject, if we study carefully, we will find that our ancient ancestors will definitely take into account many factors when formulating the rules. Among these factors, there is indeed survival and struggle, but because there are many factors, all of them are Cannot be the source of original rules . Then, we continue to infer, why do the ancestors who set the rules have to consider so many factors? Some people may think that it is okay to set the rules casually, and if someone is unlucky, they will do bad things, and children will be bullied. It doesn’t matter, it doesn’t matter if the old man is killed..."

Fang Yun deliberately paused for a few breaths, and then continued: "When you hear me say this, you will naturally have some resistance in your hearts and think these are not good. You see, this is the point. We are actually following a potential standard to judge, Especially when you are judging these things, I am afraid that most people will not consider whether it is legal, but think it is bad, unreasonable and unreasonable. So, we naturally conclude that this standard is moral. "

"Our ancestors formulated primitive rules based on our morality, and the primitive rules have influenced today's laws. Therefore, the origin of law is morality."

There was silence in the venue. Some people thought deeply, some agreed, and some showed doubts.

Fang Yun smiled slightly and said: "I said that I am not conclusive about the origin of law. I am just talking about my personal opinions. At least so far, no one can deny that morality is the most important factor that affects the rules of primitive society. one."

"I have seen that many people in the audience are unconvinced. After all, in everyone's perception, Confucianism attaches the most importance to morality, and the Hall of Rites also attaches great importance to virtue and virtue. Moreover, there are currently some Legalists who want to completely separate the law from etiquette and completely cut it off. relationship with morality. But in fact, everyone is affected by morality, even immorality.”

"Let me give you the simplest example. If we do not consider morality and only look at murder from the content of words without emotional color, then one person kills another person and the victim dies. Because there is no morality as a standard, we give up. Emotions, abandoning reason, and just looking at it from a purely neutral perspective, our sentences and all sentencing of all murderers should be consistent, because the process is murder and the result is death. "

"However, the actual situation is that we have emotions and we have morals, so the sentencing is different for manslaughter, self-defense killing, or cruel and harsh means. If the law does not consider emotions and morality, Judging solely by the law itself is untenable.”

"So, if we really enact a law that doesn't take into account morality and reason, it will be the end of mankind."

"At this time, we want to talk about sentencing. At present, most legalists support 'retributive sentencing'. This does not need to be explained too much. Just from the literal meaning, it can be seen that the sentencing of this kind of law is based on the criminal behavior. , is the punishment for criminals. If the crime is severe, the punishment will be severe. Obviously, punishing people who do bad things comes from human morality."

"However, there are still a very small number of legal experts who believe that morality should not be considered in sentencing. The law is not for punishment, but to prevent and deter crime. But if we think about it carefully, we will come to some absurd conclusions. For example, a person If he kills someone, then in order to prevent him from committing another crime, he should be sentenced to ten years of exile. So, if a person says he wants to kill someone, or is likely to kill someone, shouldn’t the crime be the same?”

"If the sentence is to prevent a person from committing another crime, then it cannot be determined how many years the sentence will be, because who can determine 'when the murderer will no longer commit crimes'? Is it the murderer himself, the minister of Dali Temple, or the saints? I can't doubt it Said, all the saints can't do it, then they must slap the murderer to death, and then say, from now on, they will ensure that the murderer will not commit any crime again!"

"Of course, there are also peacemakers who want to make a compromise and believe that sentencing should take into account both punishment and prevention. Then, everything should return to before. The law ultimately relies on morality. The law that determines justice through morality is the law, not the law. A just law is when a few people use the law to protect their own interests, just like a slave owner stipulates what slaves should and should not do. "

Hearing this, the non-legal people all felt that Fang Yun's words were easy to understand and explained the relevant things very clearly.

However, the emotions of many legal people fluctuated significantly, because they vaguely sensed Fang Yun's purpose. Unlike the previous opposition and questioning, this time many legal people actually had a faint expectation.

Fang Yun continued: "We have talked about the source of law and what influences law. So, now we should consider who can make laws and for whom the laws are made!"

Amid the expectations of everyone, Fang Yun suddenly changed the subject and said: "Before talking about making laws, I quoted a sentence from Han Feizi Han Sheng in "Five Vermin", "Then those who now praise the ways of Yao, Shun, Tang, Wu, and Yu in the world today will surely be laughed at by the new saints. Therefore, the saints do not expect to restore the ancients, and they are always allowed to break the law. When discussing worldly affairs, they are prepared for it.'"

"The previous text of this sentence says that Han Feizi believed that in the primitive period, Youchao taught people to build houses on trees, and Suiren taught people to drill wood to make fire, so people respected and loved them. However, if it came to Xia In the Shang and Zhou dynasties, if there were still people who used the ancient method to build houses and drill wood to make fire, they would definitely be laughed at by Dayu. If there were still people who believed that the first priority of governing a country was to control floods in the Shang and Zhou dynasties, they would definitely be laughed at by Shang Tang and King Wu of Zhou. So, back to this sentence, if there are still people who admire the way of governing a country by Yao, Shun, Tang, Wu, Yu and others, they will definitely be laughed at by the current saints. A true saint will not expect to solve everything by copying the ancient methods, and will not completely follow the old conventions and bad habits, but should formulate corresponding laws for governing a country based on the current actual situation. "

"Then, I want to ask you, what is Han Sheng talking about?"

No one answered, and everyone stared at Fang Yun with bright eyes, wanting to get an answer.

"Natural disasters are not to be feared!"

"Ancestors are not to be followed!"

"People's words are not to be pitied!"

Fang Yun's sonorous and powerful voice rang out in the venue, straight up to the sky!