EP took what he wanted from Confucianism, and he took what suited
him from the Mussolini regime--using blinders against the larger
contexts that failed to interest him or might have undermined the
details he clung to.  It is a standing critical question to this
day whether a poet's distortions of history--in support of his
own points of view--weaken the value of the total work.
 
==Dan
 
At 07:47 AM 8/27/99 -0500, you wrote:
>Perhaps I should remind you that Confucianism underwrote both human
oppression, and an entire set of exclusionary principles in China for many
a year. The Confucians prescribed the forms in which a painter could paint.
There were to be no other forms than those prescribed. The Confucians
prescribed the sort of clothes that were to be worn by people of different
occupations. The Confucians outlined a society in which a person, like a
word, could only have one meaning or relation at a time. To use Chad
Hansen's example, here is how something so noble as the Confucian belief in
the need to maintain terms played out:
>     As Confucius notes, a minister in relation to his prince is always a
minister; in relation to his son, he is always a father. Consequence?  if a
man is identified as a thief, then he cannot at the same time be identified
as a human being. Thus to kill a thief is not to kill a human being.
>   jen?
>
 
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