This book, The Metaphysics of Chinese Moral Principles, would not be possible without the education I received from my parents, teachers, and peers from the primary school all the way to my graduate study in China. I’m indebted to my parents for not only their staunch upholding of the moral principles detailed in this book but also their persistence in inculcating them into their children. My deep gratitude also goes to all my teachers in China, especially my middle school Chinese teacher Tang Bingrong, my high school history teacher Yu Yuantao, and my graduate supervisors the late Professor Luo Changyan and Professor Zhang Boran at the Nanjing University, all of whom are highly respected educators and scholars who taught with their own exemplary models. I have had the pleasure and honor to share this education with such admirable classmates and friends as Zhang Shuwen, Sun Xuhua, Li Xiaohan, Du Lingling, and Jiang Shuxiang, to name just a few. This book is a tribute to all these laudable figures who allowed me to witness and benefit from the most conscientious, exalted, and inspiring realization of the moral principles outlined in this project.
I’m no less thankful to my PhD supervisors and mentors: Professor Elizabeth D. Harvey, Professor Mary Nyquist, Professor David Galbraith, and Professor Lynne Magnusson in the English Department at the University of Toronto, as well as Professor David Porter in the English Department at the University of Michigan. It is the critical and analytical skills of reading English literature I learned from these highly renowned scholars that allow me to interpret and introduce Chinese philosophy to the West.
I want to take this opportunity to express my thanks to my editors Elizabeth You and Qin Higley for their dedicated commitment to this book, and to my series editor John Makeham and the anonymous reviewer for their insightful feedback.
My heartfelt thanks are, as ever, reserved to my husband and two sons, for their unyielding support of my passion for literature and philosophy.