‘Sobriety’ in the Chinese Intellectual Tradition✴

Gong Huanan

Abstract: In the Chinese intellectual world, “intoxication” is understood as the foundation and presupposition for “sobriety.” In the state of intoxication, people appear oblivious of their physical existence, absent from their ego, perception, desires, and action.In the state of sobriety, conversely, they are aware of their physical existence, present with their ego,perception, desires, and action.Intoxication brings one into a harmonious relationship with others and a unity with things.In the wake of sobriety, one falls into depression and walks away from unity, isolating oneself again from or even standing in hostility toward others and the world.When intoxicated, one is free from worry about lack of proper judgment;when sober, one is often overcome by repentance about what has been done.Corresponding with the pursuit of sobriety, thinkers are likely to associate sobriety with human nature, or to take it as a method of thinking and to apply it to spiritual cultivation.The connotation and scope of sobriety keep expanding and becoming thematic in the Chinese intellectual tradition.From the antithetical relations of intoxication and sobriety, to the founding of sobriety on intoxication, to the idea that sobriety is the dreamland of intoxication, the two states constitute an axiological ideal for people to opt for or go beyond.

Keywords: sobriety, intoxication, awakening, Chinese intellectual tradition

As generally assumed, the process of going from the intoxicated (zui醉) to the sober (xing醒) is that of going from the muddleheaded to the clear-headed, as well as that from the wrong to the right.This view has put “intoxication” and “sobriety” at odds, implying a basic judgment on them: intoxication is wrong while sobriety is right.Nevertheless, this is not really the case.

Intoxication runs its course from the dispersal of wine all over the body to break apart life’s forms and delimitations.The wine leaps out of the limited organism and particular identity to break through the boundary of self and then the boundaries between the self and the others, things and the self, Heaven and humans, as well as the numinous and the sentient being, fi nally ending up in boundless and shapeless chaos.Sobriety is the breakingapart of intoxication, as well as the extension of intoxication.Sobriety is embodied by the reemergence of life from out of its hiding place.The rich and novel experiences in intoxication afford brand-new materials for this renewed consciousness, by which a whole life starts afresh from form to substance.In contrast, after sobering up, what greets your eyes is the distancing of the human person from the myriad things, the falling-apart of the unity and the recurrence of hostility.In this view, one who has entered into the realm of unity with the myriad things prefers permanent intoxication over sobriety.

Connotations of Intoxication and Sobriety

[Refer to page 39 for Chinese.Similarly hereinafter]

Both of the Chinese characterszui醉 andxing醒 include the signifieryou酉as their radical.The 酉 originally referred to a drinking utensil and later became a metonymic name for alcohol.Explaining Graphs and Interpreting of Chinese Characters[说文解字] glossedzuiandxingas follows: “Zuimeans ending (zu卒).To restrain the amount of drinking before the ending is intended to avoid resulting in disorder and chaos”; “xingis the relief from beingzui.”1Xu Shen 许慎, Explaining Graphs and Interpreting of Chinese Characters [说文解字], vol.14, part II, ed.Xu Xuan 徐铉(Beijing: Zhonghua Book Company, 2013), 314.Intoxication refers to a state beyond the drinker’s capacity; sobriety is a post-intoxication state out of the grip of alcohol, a realm where consciousness has impeded transcendence and breakthrough, and returned to tranquility.Intoxication facilitates the attainment of sobriety as well as providing the theoretical presupposition for understanding it.Said in another way, sobriety is preceded by intoxication; without intoxication, neither sobriety nor insobriety makes sense.

The procession from intoxication to sobriety is one way in which human cognition unfolds.Nevertheless, intoxication is not ignorance; instead, it is a repository of cognition.Only after being obsessed with and deeply embedded in the world can one have a fresh experience of it.Intoxication is not a mistake, while sobriety is not the same as correctness either.Sobriety not only guarantees the understanding of objects but also an enlightened insight into them.

At one time, intoxication is manifested by insanity and irritability; at another, it is trapped in tranquility.Irritability and tranquility fall into uniformity, with no differentiation or order.All the way through the beginning phase of imbibing to the state of drunkenness, drinkers physically and mentally come into a continuous contact with the alcohol, keep crossing a variety of boundaries, and fi nd their way into a novel realm.The gustatory sense dominates,while the visual and the auditory senses gradually blur until they fi nally become ineffective and imperceptive to anything visual and auditory.The tactile sense also fi nds itself at a loss about the objects to be perceived and ends up with nothing to feel due to the diminution and loss of the sense of distance.The traits that individuate things have been exterminated and the things themselves have also been forgotten.The taste of the alcohol and human nature intermingle while the “significant taste” (yiwei意味) is incessantly generated.Arguably speaking, intoxication is a movement that is “metaphysical” or, more exactly, “above form.”Here, “above” not only refers to location, but also to what is worthy of respect.Inversely, the process from the intoxicated to the sober is a movement that is “physical,” that is, “within form,” where the form or shape is being gradually retrieved and becomes dominant.

The alcohol-warmed body and soul indulge themselves in freedom.The aura of harmony and joy when drinking expands and heightens the soul, while the past is recollected.Threaded through passion and imagination, the self is further propelled to crystallizationand breakthrough.The closed self is being thawed and transcended.The given self—other relations and the familiar world present themselves in a new light.The co-drinkers, who have been renewed by the alcohol, and their harmonious and joyful interpersonal relationship,fashion a new world.The fl oating and deformed self, that is, the drifting self, concerns the self with the others, itself, and the new world, and then new cognition and enlightenment arise.The drunken people have lost their own consciousness and the normal capability to behave themselves.Moreover, they have also lost the ability to individuate the world around them and end up in oneness with the world.Then they feel quite self-satisfi ed and oblivious of their physical existence and ego, only to fi nd themselves absent of cognition, desires, and action.

The depth and intensity of sobriety depend on the depth and intensity of intoxication.The intoxicated experience is imprinted onto the physical and mental memory, except that the post-hangover recollection only accounts for a part of the realm explored by intoxication.The majority of the experiences that have sunk deep into or intuitively impacted the world alternate between appearance and disappearance merely as a blurry background.Most of the novel experiences and realms cannot bring themselves up to the surface of language and thus fail to be converted into new knowledge.Obviously, in terms of understanding, intoxication is more profound, mysterious, and expansive than sobriety.Sobriety is the restoration of the physical and mental orders, and also the residue of richly experienced intoxication.It is manifested as a novel cognition of and an insight into the drifting self, inter-personal relations, and the world.

Repentance comes with sobriety after intoxication.It owes itself to the antithesis between the intoxicated and the sober state of being and notion of value.Getting intoxicated,one is oblivious and absent from ego; on sobering up, one retrieves the awareness and existence of the ego.When coming around from intoxication, one will fi nd the fragmented forms restore themselves and the forgotten identity and the surrounding order reappear.The soul in the wake of intoxication has been enriched and re-saturated in cognitive experience, but feels guilty before the clear-headed moral self.The bodily organism in intoxication manifests itself in exaltation, inappropriate speech, and perverted conduct.One does things that one would not do when sober, and one says things that one would not normally say.With the dispersal of the heat, the post-insobriety body has exhausted its functions.The heartfelt things one said while drunk are now revealed to lack polish and seem inappropriate.Then one falls into depression and repentance arises with the clarity of sober refl ection.

In a difficult world and a life filled with suffering, to get intoxicated by drinking is an important way to seek joy.Under the effect of intoxication, joy spikes to ecstasy.The intoxicated person empathizes and communicates with others through joy.Even rivals reconcile in a shared intoxication.This deep joy expands the thickness of the intoxicated person’s life.In this situation, the intoxicated person will not repent, refuse, or even twist the interpersonal relationships, or relationships between humans and things, initiated by intoxication.Instead, one will plausibly pass them on and deepen them.Sobriety is the natural continuation of intoxication.However, intoxication brings joy but sobriety cannot.Having returned from intoxication, their respective realistic situations return, and pains,worries, anxieties, responsibilities, and duties in the real life come successively.The bodily limits and the given identity suspended by intoxication renew their oppositions against other people, events, and things, again plaguing the sober person and infl icting pain on the self.

Intoxication diversifi es with individuals.For example, the motives for getting drunk differ in one way or another.For the worldly, they yearn for lust, fame, or profi t; for those of integrity,they pursue harmony and joy or spiritual transcendence.Intoxication brings profundity,secrecy, and generosity, adding new colors to the real world.The intoxicated person is fl awed by their lack of power to exert themselves despite their rich unbound imagination, optimistic attitude, and active thinking.Their post-intoxication acts are deformed, impacting and undermining the symbolic rites, and are labeled as abnormal.Being intoxicated without sobering up indicates an escape from, denial of, and departure from reality.

The Conditions for Sobriety [41]

In Chinese history, the occasional recurrences of prohibiting alcohol failed to hold people back from their passion and hunger for it.The two characters,zuiandxingfor intoxication and sobriety, have been enriched semantically over the course of history.Originally,intoxication referred to the loss of the ability to discriminate and the fulfillment of the human—thing unity under the impact of alcohol.Later on, the indulgence in a particular object, the loss of the independent self and the ability to judge and discern on one’s own, the physical and mental immersion in an object, and the stoppage and oblivion of refl ection, all fell into the semantic repository of “intoxication.” Correspondingly, sobriety originally referred to the emancipation from the bondage of alcohol and the resuming of the ability to think and act.Afterward, the escape from dependence on an object and the achievement of self-independence by independent judgment and discrimination fell under the scope of “sobriety.” The post-intoxication mind and soul has been enriched and fulfi lled cognitively.So, people describe cognitive illumination and enlightenment in terms of sobriety or awakening.In a particular context, this universalized “sobriety” takes on specifi c connotations as the enlightened awareness of a specifi c object, theme, and substance.

Sobriety needs to isolate itself from intoxication in content or object.In this way, the distance between human and object obtains, engendering an emotional isolation, and a departure from the world of unifying the self and things.The recovery of sobriety starts with the reinstatement of discernment and then the restoration of cognitive competence ensues.The prominent trait of sobriety is to remove the disturbance and delusion exerted by alcohol on cognition and perception, restoring what has been forgotten in intoxication.“Being sober to something” implies the suspension of being deluded and dominated, the shiftfrom unconditional conformity to rational refl ection and autonomous judgment, and even the initiative endeavor to cope and reform.Those who spare no efforts to remain in permanent sobriety are always prepared to take action; those who awaken others are those who encourage others to take action in the current context.

The logic of sobriety is the logic of the real world: to bring oneself into an encounter vis-à-vis the real world and to address the issues in it.For Qu Yuan 屈原 (ca.340—278 BCE),sobriety is oriented toward the consciousness of morality and political ideals, that is, being clear about moral and political measures and taking action according to these measures.Intoxication is being obscure about moral and political ideals, or being fragile in one’s will to take action according to the ideals.On this ground, Qu Yuan argued that the majority did not drink as if in sobriety, but actually were in the state of insobriety.He then versifi ed as follows: “The whole world is turbid but I am pure; most of the sentient beings are drunk but I am clear-headed” (Songs of Chu[楚辞], “Fisherman” [渔父]).Intoxication refers not only to being literally drunk, but also to being oblivious of the status quo.Correspondingly,sobriety refers not only to the departure from the muddled and chaotic state of being intoxicated, but also to being knowledgeable and discerning about the status quo and taking charge of addressing the current issues by changing and streamlining the unbearable status quo.This is the goal inevitably pursued by the ideal-equipped people.Nevertheless, thatsobriety rids itself of intoxication does not necessarily mean abstaining from alcohol.On the contrary, drinking alcoholic beverages is one of the important appeals in the real world.Qu Yuan was defi nite about the pursuit for sobriety.One can drink and get drunk, but the quality of freeing oneself from intoxication and keeping clear-headed matters more.

Sobriety presupposes intoxication.Some people awaken from intoxication earlier, some later, and some remain in unconsciousness.Those who are incapable of sobriety are either trapped by stereotypes or short on the ability to refl ect on themselves or the status quo.Both need to be awakened by others.Those who have the ability but are reluctant to refl ect are those unwilling to sober up.However, if sobriety and intoxication have been universalized as specifi c states of the mind, it is hard to make a distinction between them.What Confucians think of as intoxication is likely to be sobriety in the eyes of the Daoists.What Buddhists think of intoxication is likely to be sobriety in the eyes of the Confucians.However, for Confucianism and Buddhism, ordinary people will be regarded as drunk.This suggests that,with respect to going beyond utilitarian pursuits and yearning for spiritual transcendence,the rival notions of sobriety and intoxication are also commensurable in one way or another.

The approaches to the interpreting and defi ning of intoxication and sobriety depend on the positing of the conditions for sobriety.In the eyes of Qu Yuan, those who drink succumb to intoxication; those who do not drink also succumb to “intoxication.” People in the Han dynasty (206 BCE—220 CE) advocated drinking in the manner of a ritual, indulging in drinking around the clock without ever succumbing to intoxication, indicating the sustaining of order (ritual) and well-organized action.Of course, “sobriety” in their discussions is not confi ned to the sobriety after intoxication.For instance, as “Attaining Sobriety First” [先醒],an essay by Jia Yi 贾谊 (200—168 BCE), read, “Without learning the principles, one will be obsessed with gains and losses and ignorant of the rationale for governing and surviving.”This description bears resemblance to intoxication.In the essay, people who awaken from intoxication earlier are defined as those who “know the Way (dao道),” while those who awaken from intoxication later “do not realize the importance of safeguarding their country until they become refugees.” And those who remain in unconsciousness “have become refugees but are still unaware of why they have lost their country.”2Jia Yi 贾谊, “ Attaining Sobriety First” [先醒], in vol.7 of The Proofreading and Annotation of New Books [新书校注],eds.Yan Zhenyi 阎振益 and Zhong Xia 钟夏 (Beijing: Zhonghua Book Company, 2000), 261—263.Sobriety connotes discernment about gain and loss, respect for the talented and the competent, suppression of the evils and the securing of integrity, and the cultivation of oneself into virtuous personhood.It is discernible that Jia Yi’s championing of sobriety is consonant with Qu Yuan’s.Those who can awaken are able to embrace the world and enhance themselves with virtues and morals, something that can be only lived up to by those of noble bloodlines.

To some extent, Cheng Hao 程颢 (1032—1085), Cheng Yi 程颐 (1033—1107), and Zhu Xi朱熹 (1130—1200) restore the attitudes of fear, terror, and alertness toward intoxication as can be traced back to the Western Zhou (1046—771 BCE).They also restored the Han Confucian pursuit for sobriety.“One who does not know the Way is like a man in intoxication: when drunk, there is nothing he will not do; when coming around, he is ashamed and repentant.”3Cheng Hao 程颢 and Cheng Yi 程颐, Surviving Works of the Two Chengs of Henan [河南程氏遗书], vol.18, in Collected Works of the Two Chengs [二程集], ed.Wang Xiaoyu 王孝鱼 (Beijing: Zhonghua Book Company, 2004), 221.In the eyes of Cheng Yi, the state of being intoxicated manifests and accounts for the deviation from the Great Way.Nevertheless, the sober are not necessarily kings, dukes, generals, or ministers.Ordinary civilians can also cultivate themselves into the state of being sober.

The later Confucians mostly resonate with the Cheng brothers and Zhu Xi.The bright consciousness of the mind as substance unfolds things into clarity.Drinking will graduallybring about the loss of clarity.Intoxication brings obscurity and oblivion.In this view,alcohol is the enemy of the original mind as well as the original nature.Xu Jie 徐阶 (1503—1583) further identifi es muddled oblivion with alcohol:

Before drinking, everything is clear; when in intoxication, everything falls into oblivion;when in sobriety, clear-headedness returns.Thus, muddled oblivion is caused by the alcohol and clarity is what the heart-mind originally is.If one cannot defi le his original mind by lucrative desires, he will not risk being exposed to the muddled oblivion in handling daily affairs.The restraint of the self is the method for coming around from intoxication.4Huang Zongxi 黄宗羲, Records of Ming Confucian Scholars [明儒学案] (Beijing: Zhonghua Book Company, 1986), 619.

Alcohol is generally accused of causing muddled chaos, and then sobriety, the counterpart of intoxication, takes on more enriched connotations.In summary, sobriety is of profound ethical and ontological implications.Considered this way, a sober person in the genuine sense is hard to fi nd.

An Obsession with Permanent Sobriety Free from Intoxication [44]

Confucianism admits the reality of the world and seeks for the optimization of it.Confucians try to well-intentionally reform the cosmos and the myriad things, which also means opposing the natural world.Understandably, most of the Confucians endorse drinking with propriety and prioritize sobriety for fear of the disorder in intoxication.

However, Confucius who earnestly safeguarded the rites of the Zhou dynasty (1046—256 BCE) was permissive of drinking.What he opposed is the chaos in intoxication.“Only in the case of wine did he not set himself a rigid limit.He simply never drank to the point of becoming confused.”5Analects 10:8.The English translation of the Analects is based on D.C.Lau’s 刘殿爵 version, with some alterations.“Miscellaneous Records, Part II” [杂记下] in theBook of Ritesrecords that when Confucius talked about the “intoxicated ecstasy” with Zigong 子贡 (520—456 BCE),he interpreted it as the necessary release of the natural life.This is based on knowledge about human nature: human nature itself has limits.Sobriety itself has the tensions of life: it contains the oppositions and tensions within external things, the restraints and disciplines exercised over natural life, and the internal demands for one’s own mind and nature.This has pushed life to a state of extreme tension.For a fi nite being, an appropriate release is quite necessary.This suggests that the permanent sobriety free from intoxication has no basis in human nature.

Daoism values intoxication with no mention of sobriety.In the Daoist notion, the importance of intoxication does not lie in the release of life, but in the convalescence and integration of life.

When a drunken man falls from a cart, he may be hurt but he will not be killed.His bones and joints are no different from those of other men, but the degree of harm done by the fall differs radically, for the spiritual in him forms one intact whole.Having been unaware that he was riding, he is now unaware that he is falling.The frights and shocks of life and death have no way to enter his breast, so he is unfl inching no matter how things clash with him.6Zhuangzi, chap.19.The English translation of the Zhuangzi is based on Brook Ziporyn’s version.

Intoxication enables the disintegrated body and mind to re-integrate and the intoxicated to roam within the ultimate harmony (taihe太和).Accordingly, awakening from intoxication means an “incomplete state of spirit.” That is, being aware of cognition with the frights and shocks of life and death in the mind implies a departure from the ultimate harmony and the ultimate communication.

For the common people in the Wei and Jin periods (220—420), life and death were out of their control.In their minds, intoxication and sobriety were again endowed with distinctconnotations.In the eyes of the sober, the world is ridden with misery and helplessness.Despite the awareness of the differences between sobriety and intoxication and the possession of the ability to awaken, they cringed away from awakening for fear of being unable to change the status quo.Sobriety or awakening would put them at odds with the surrounding world.Conversely, intoxication could help them to conceal and shy away from the hostile world and lend them the eyes to see the prospect of coming to terms with it.Ruan Ji 阮籍(210—263) once fell into a drunk coma for sixty days; Tao Yuanming 陶渊明 (Tao Qian陶潜, ca.365—427) would drink as long as there was wine within his reach and inevitably get drunk at each bout.Sobriety succumbs to worldliness while intoxication brings about transcendence.Following the guidelines of Tao Yuanming, to eulogize drunkenness and to belittle sobriety gradually became theZeigeistof his time.

In the Tang dynasty, Bai Juyi 白居易 (618—907) was also captivated by the experience of being intoxicated and aspired to the dreamland of intoxication, holding that sobriety was a torture.“The sober is stricken with bitter intention; / the drunk gives way to joy.”7Bai Juyi 白居易, “The Thirteenth of ‘Sixteen Poems Emulating Tao Qian’s Form’” [效陶潜体诗十六首], in vol.5 of Collected Annotations of the Poetry by Bai Juyi [白居易诗集校注], ed.Xie Siwei 谢思炜 (Beijing: Zhonghua Book Company, 2006), 513.“The drunk mind prevails over the sober mind.”8Bai, “The Wine of the Qiu Family” [仇家酒], in vol.15 of Collected Annotations of the Poetry by Bai Juyi, 1179.As can be shown by these poetic lines, he was more willing to be liberated by intoxication.

In views of the transcendent function of intoxication, many people in the Song dynasty(960—1279) were supportive of intoxication and opposed to sobriety.As a poem reads, “If only wine would overfl ow at each household, / I could get drunk forever with no awakening....The creator tries to restrain me with sobriety, / but no one knows that this old man would go mad in sobriety.”9Lu You 陆游, “A Sigh for No Wine” [无酒叹], in vol.5 of The Complete Works of Lu You [陆游全集校注], eds.Qian Zhonglian 钱仲联 and Ma Yazhong 马亚中 (Hangzhou: Hangzhou Education Press, 2011), 168.The traditional Confucianism generally holds that an intoxicated chaos would confuse the intoxicated person.In the eyes of Lu You 陆游 (1125—1210), it is nothing but sobriety that corners a person with restraint and bondage.Those who get trapped by intoxication can escape by way of getting drunk.Drunk and absent of cognition, their pains are limited.Those who are entangled by sobriety are at a loss about how to get disentangled or even are unwilling to make a change.Then they give way to more pains.This is the reason why many people keep themselves away from sobriety—if they are in sobriety,they are sober alone; if in intoxication, they share it with others.Those who are willing to get drunk are willing to integrate with things and reconcile with reality.Intoxication is an important way to resolve the confusion of sobriety, for the long-pent-up mind gets relieved in intoxication.Those who are willing to awake may be capable rulers, ministers, or worthy gentlemen.They are concerned about the world and oblige themselves to serve people.They do their uttermost no matter how hard it is for them to get disentangled.

Despite the fact that the people in the Wei and Jin periods and the Tang dynasty (618—907)generally regarded sobriety as an obsession, this could not hold back the Confucians from their yearning for sobriety.The Song dynasty Confucians linked up sobriety and reverence(jing敬) by ethicizing the former’s connotations and elevating it to a universally applicable intellectual method.Sobriety does not only enable one to understand the self but also to get enlightened about what one has done.It connotes the perception and identifi cation of ritual propriety, as well as the value assessment of one’s words and deeds, the mind, and innate nature.In sobriety one feels ashamed and repentant for one’s inappropriate behavior while intoxicated, which suggests that one knows the Way.Because knowledge of the Way is based on sobriety, Xie Liangzuo 谢良佐 (1050—1103) particularly associated Buddhist “beingconstantly clear-headed” (changxingxing常惺惺) with Confucian “reverence.”10Xie Liangzuo 谢良佐, Chen Mo 陈模, and Zeng Zao 曾慥, Quotations of Shangcai, Reference Book of Eastern Palace,Random Records of High Studio, and Elegant Lyrics Composed in Style of Music Bureau [上蔡语录 东宫备览 高斋漫录 乐府雅词] (Beijing: Commercial Press, 2019), 21.In this way,Xie distinguished the Confucian sobriety from the Daoist “fasting of the mind” (xinzhai心斋).

Zhu Xi glossed “being constantly clear-headed” as sobriety or awakening, referring to the non-benighted state of the original mind.He further articulated the differences between Confucians and Daoists about the notion of sobriety in terms of reverence and illuminating virtue (mingde明德), arguing as follows: “Daily effort (gongfu工夫) or committed work is usually intended for awakening, which is, in terms of Cheng Yi, ‘reverence as attaching one’s attention to one thing,’ and, in terms of Xie Liangzuo, ‘being constantly clear-headed.’”11Li Jingde 黎靖德, ed., Topically Arranged Discourses of Zhu Xi [朱子语类], vol.119 (Beijing: Zhonghua Book Company, 1986), 2875.Awakening is morally based on reverence, and the reverence of “attaching one’s attention to one thing” is intended to awaken the mind.The effort of reserving and collecting one’s mind are both understood as awakening.Sobriety is enlightenment and illumination, by which one stands far removed from intoxication.Distinct from Qu Yuan and Jia Yi, who interpreted sobriety as a psychological state of discernment and self-consciousness, Zhu Xi endowed sobriety with the connotations of effort and methodology, taking sobriety as the effort to cultivate oneself and thematizing it.This is undoubtedly a profound refl ection on and conscious response to the indulgence in wine during the Song dynasty.This reverencebased sobriety counteracted the intoxication that gradually succumbed to shallowness, and it curbed the unlimited expansion of intoxication.

In addition, reverence is a moral consciousness, or in terms of the Song Confucians, an“awakening,” as a result of which benevolence (ren仁) as moral consciousness and wisdom(zhi智) as rationality are combined, deepening the implication of reverence to a large extent.However, when applied in a specifi c context, it gives rise to many problems.Sobriety on every occasion will put one in a hostile and taut state.The need for awakening itself indicates the finite nature of human beings.Zhu Xi once critiqued worldly people, busy learning from the Zen Buddhists, as not daring to fall asleep.12Li, Topically Arranged Discourses of Zhu Xi, vol.12, 220.Numerous Confucians shied away from sleep and more from intoxication in order to remain always awake and sober.They spared no effort to exhaust their mind and nature, ignorant of the need to alternate between tension and relief, and exerted themselves to the uttermost incessantly.If this requirement is set against other people, it is also exhausting to them.From this perspective,to take reverence—awakening as the presupposition for knowing the Way is theoretically difficult.The Way which is broached in terms of sobriety is also far from human beings.

Sobriety as the Dreamland of Intoxication [46]

The dreamland of intoxication, despite its appeals, stands far removed from the real world and even at odds with it and opposed to it.If people can realize their values in the real world as well as in the dreamland of intoxication, then sobriety and intoxication become one.As Chen Guan 陈瓘 (Chen Yingzhong 陈莹中, ca.1060—1124) asked rhetorically, “The world of the ultimate harmony appeals, where everyone drinks; / Who knows sobriety is the dreamland of intoxication?”13Chen Yingzhong 陈莹中, “Fourth Poem in the ‘Six Quatrains of Self-Admonishment’” [《了斋自警六绝》其四],quoted in Yang Shi 杨时, Collected Works of Yang Shi [杨时集] (Beijing: Zhonghua Book Company, 2018), 1037.When entering into the dreamland of intoxication entails no drinking, sobriety and intoxication are united rather than mutually opposed.Yang Shi 杨时(1053—1135) had a resonance with Chen Guan.He also wrote a poem commending Tao Yuanming by taking fi eld tilling as the dreamland of intoxication, betraying his intention to realize this connotation of intoxication.

Chen Xianzhang 陈献章 (1428—1500) set aside the premise of ultimate harmony, going straight to the topic of the fi nal convergence of sobriety and intoxication:

To drink with butchers and wine peddlers, the lowly people, and not to drink the wine brewed from the grains of the public fi elds in the Pengze County—this was the practice of those who indulged in wine since antiquity.Though they disharmonized with the sober loners, they both converged on the correct direction.Despite converging on the correct direction, their degree of difficulty differs.Sober people go straightforwardly against their intentions, while intoxicated people shine their light only on the inside.Thus it is more difficult for the intoxicated than for the sober.I fi nd nowadays drinkers different in that they do not indulge in drinking.Alas! How can I see those who have escaped to the dreamland of intoxication in antiquity and drink with them?14Chen Xianzhang 陈献章, “In the Wake of Writing a Poem to Resonate with Magistrate Lun” [书和伦知县诗后],in vol.1 of The Collected Works of Chen Xianzhang [陈献章集], ed.Sun Tonghai 孙通海 (Beijing: Zhonghua Book Company, 1987), 73.

For scholars, however, to remain sober is easier than to become intoxicated.The sober elevate themselves to a high level and live alone.It is sufficient to stick to their pursuit.The intoxicated mix themselves with the worldly people, requiring them to blunt their sharpness, and more than that, to be facilitated with flexibility in life.In this sense, the condition of intoxication is undoubtedly higher than sobriety.

Wang Yangming 王阳明 (Wang Shouren 王守仁, 1472—1529) defi ned sobriety in light of intuitive knowledge(liangzhi良知).He described himself as “asleep for more than forty years but still blurry-eyed though awakened.”15Wang Shouren 王守仁, “An Occasional Poem when Awakening from Sleep” [睡起偶成], in vol.20 of Complete Collection of Wang Shouren [王文成公全书], eds.Wang Xiaoxin 王晓昕 and Zhao Pinglue 赵平略 (Beijing:Zhonghua Book Company, 2015), 928.This suggests that he did not awaken until he advanced the idea of “extension of intuitive knowledge” (zhi liangzhi致良知).“When the intuitive knowledge alerts me, it feels like the sun coming into sight, while the ghosts and monsters all disappear by themselves.”16Wang, “Addressed to Huang Zongxian” [与黄宗贤], in vol.6 of Complete Collection of Wang Shouren, 266.Wang Yangming drank often and got drunk often.In his mind, intoxication did not mean the concealment of intuitive knowledge, but the natural manifestation of the integration of things and the self, or of humans and events.In this sense, intoxication by drinking is the specific form of sobriety.When intuitive knowledge presents itself, intoxication is sobriety.As one of his poems reads,

In real life, sobriety in daylight is like sleep;but in the mountain Laozi slept as if still awake.Neither of them or both of them are what they are;but clouds over stream driftin silence and water gurgles onward.17Wang, “The Fourth of ‘Four Poems of Lethargic Sleep in the Mountain’” [山中懒睡四首], in vol.20 of Complete Collection of Wang Shouren, 879.

As issues addressed in the spiritual world, intoxication and sobriety are attached to intuitive knowledge.This lays the foundation for the free transformation of the originally opposed intoxication and sobriety.As long as they do not hinder intuitive knowledge, intoxication and sobriety are leftto themselves.In another respect, to discuss sobriety and intoxication with no reference to drinking would weaken the natural linkage between the two states and alcohol.18By analogy, intoxication and sobriety are the results not merely of drinking.The indulgence in lust and profi t can also lead to intoxication.It does not matter what causes intoxication.What matters is that intoxication is detrimental to order.Feng Menglong 冯梦龙 (1574—1646) thus has expanded the implications of intoxication and sobriety to the worldly situations beyond drinking and endowed them with relatively independent values, see Feng Menglong, preface to Stories to Awaken the World [醒世恒言], in vol.3 of A Complete Collection of Feng Menglong [冯梦龙全集], ed.Wei Tongxian 魏同贤(Nanjing: Phoenix Press, 2007), 1.Sobriety and intoxication are not only related with the mind’s clarity and turbidity, but also symbolize the well-being of body and mind as well as of interpersonal relationships.Being fundamentally confused in mind and inverting the performance of acts are the demonstration of intoxication, while being fundamentally bright in the mind, physio-spiritually harmonious, and reverent for others as well as for oneself are the preconditions for sobriety.

In light of what Yang Shi, Chen Xianzhang, and Wang Yangming have contended,being in sobriety is being in the dreamland of intoxication, while being intoxicated is contingent upon being sober.A life without the experience of intoxication is short of profundity; those who have never been intoxicated are oblivious to sobriety.Said in another way, the worldly people have neither got intoxicated nor come around, just like the transcendent is either intoxicated or sober and either sober or intoxicated.

Coda [47]

The sober person knows the Way to live through crises and survive ordeals, fi ll up the void of spirit with order, curb the urge to take action irrationally, and adhere to their intention and the Way without deviating from them.This is the correctness ofwen文 (ornament or polishing).The intoxicated person aspires, makes a breakthrough, and sets no limits to the self.This intoxicated person will expand the channels for communication and hide things deep within, releasing what is old and embracing what is new.This is the correctness ofzhi质 (the essence or substance).Intoxication enables one’s self to ascend, break through,and transcend.However, being intoxicated for its own sake will ultimately return one to a primitive state of chaos, losing control of human nature in the real world.When the intoxicated person comes around, they will come back to where they are supposed to be in place and time.Human nature arises in the alternation between intoxication and sobriety.

Consonant with the evolution of the concept of intoxication, that of sobriety has also been gradually thematized in the Chinese intellectual tradition.The connotations of sobriety,such as Qu Yuan’s pursuit of realistic judgment, the linking of sobriety and knowing the Way by Jia Yi, the Song Confucians’ understanding of sobriety as a daily cultivation, and the Ming Confucians’ defi ning it as a manifestation of intuitive knowledge, pile up in intellectual history.From the opposition of intoxication and sobriety, to the founding of sobriety on intoxication,and fi nally to the idea that sobriety is the dreamland of intoxication, sobriety and intoxication together constitute a value that people can choose or transcend.In the Chinese intellectual tradition, their connotations get entangled in their historical evolution, demonstrating the profundity and subtlety of Chinese philosophy.Nevertheless, from this time forward, to get intoxicated or to remain sober becomes a difficult question for every individual.

Bibliography of Cited Translations

Lau, D.C.刘殿爵, trans.The Analects(Chinese—English Edition) [论语：汉英对照].Beijing: Zhonghua Book Company, 2008.

Ziporyn, Brook, trans.Zhuangzi: The Essential Writings with Selections from Traditional Commentaries.Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company, 2009.✴ Liu Huawen is professor of translation studies in the School of Foreign Languages at Shanghai Jiao Tong University.