Look within.
Find yourself in everyday affairs.
XINXUE.AI is a free reading room for the classical Chinese texts of the School of Mind (xinxue 心学): Wang Yangming's Chuanxi lu, the recorded sayings of Lu Xiangshan and Huang Zongxi's Records of Ming Scholars. Every passage keeps its source and a stable number, and a dictionary of 332 entries explains the people, ideas and books.
知是行之始，
行是知之成。Editorial translationKnowing is the beginning of acting; acting is the completion of knowing.
What you will find here
The original texts
37 texts in classical Chinese, from the Chuanxi lu to the Records of Ming Scholars — 3886 numbered passages, each with its source.
Open the library →A dictionary of the School of Mind
332 entries on people, events, concepts, books, schools and places, each linked back to the passages where they appear. In Chinese.
Open the dictionary ↗Clear editorial principles
Original text, editors' notes and AI explanations are always labelled separately. Where there is no textual support, we say so.
About the site →Three ideas to start with
All 13 concepts →The mind is principle
Wang Yangming's starting point: moral principle (li) is not to be sought outside the mind, in things. When the mind is free of selfish desire, it is itself principle.
Read on the concepts page →知行合一 · zhī xíng hé yīKnowing and acting are one (unity of knowledge and action)
True knowing already contains acting; knowing that is never acted on is not yet knowing. Wang's example: seeing a lovely colour and loving it happen at once.
Read on the concepts page →致良知 · zhì liángzhīExtending innate knowing
The core of Wang's later teaching: carry this innate knowing into every affair, so that what one knows to be right is actually done.
Read on the concepts page →Short editorial summaries, not quotations. Each card opens its entry on the concepts page.