Encyclopedia of India–China Cultural Contacts v1.c7.s7.t6.1

v1.c7.s7.t6.1

During the late Eastern Han Dynasty, three kingdoms period and Eastern and Western Jin Dynasties, “idle talk” (qing-tan or pure conversation) was popular. The fans and followers of “idle talk” (pure talk) lived a dissipated life, boasted of showing off an attitude of the Daoist natural inaction. Their thoughts and statements were referred to as “Metaphysics of the Wei and Jin Dynasties” by the people of later generations. The system of “metaphysics” of Wei and Jin Dynasties contain theory of moralisation and theory of character and talent. The theory of moralisation included debate over existence and non-existence of the fundamental and incidental, debate on statements (sayings) and their connotations and debate on moralisation and the nature and so on which is represented by Wang Bi, He Yan, Xiang Xiu and Guo Xiang. The theory on character and talent focused on appreciation of talent, which originated in “*Records on Figures (personnel)*” authored by Liu Shao and was subsequently, introduced in another work titled “*Theory of Four Fundamentals*” authored by Zhong Hui. All the ideas of metaphysics of this period, with spirit of Taoism as its main theme, was combined with Confucian theories and a new system of thought thus emerged based on the convergence of different ideas.