Q0482

“In the realm with a self, one views things through the self,…” — Wang Guowei (Remarks on Lyrics in the Human…)

Verified English quotation. Primary source: Remarks on Lyrics in the Human World. Theme: beauty.

English

In the realm with a self, one views things through the self, so things take on one’s coloring. In the realm without a self, one views things through things, and no longer knows which is self and which is thing.
Thinker Wang Guowei
School Modern Chinese Thought
Source Remarks on Lyrics in the Human World
Theme Beauty
Another quotation More from this thinker

Source and attribution

The archive attributes this English wording to Remarks on Lyrics in the Human World and files it under Modern Chinese Thought. That locator distinguishes the passage from loose internet attributions: readers can return to the named work or section to check translation, surrounding argument, and edition-specific wording.

About Wang Guowei

Wang Guowei (1877–1927) was a late Qing–Republican scholar who joined classical Chinese learning with Western aesthetics and philosophy. He wrote on tragedy, ci poetry, oracle bones, and the history of Song–Yuan drama.

How to read this passage

Aesthetics asks what beauty is, how taste is educated, and how art discloses truth or shapes moral perception. This passage enters that discussion through beauty, self.

Concepts in this quote

Beauty
Beauty raises questions about judgment, form, pleasure, and whether aesthetic value is subjective or shares standards.
Self
Philosophy quotes about self explore identity, responsibility, and the examined life—from Socrates’ unexamined life to modern phenomenology and existential authenticity.

How to cite this quotation

APA: Wang Guowei. (n.d.). In the realm with a self, one views things through the self, so things take on one’s coloring. In the realm without a self, one views things through things, and no longer knows which is self and which is thing. In Philosophy Blind Box. https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0482

MLA: Wang Guowei. “In the realm with a self, one views….” Philosophy Blind Box, https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0482.

Chicago: Wang Guowei. “In the realm with a self, one views….” Philosophy Blind Box. Accessed 2026. https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0482.

Frequently asked questions

What is the source of the quotation “In the realm with a self, one views…”?

The passage is attributed to Wang Guowei, Remarks on Lyrics in the Human World. The archive attributes this English wording to Remarks on Lyrics in the Human World and files it under Modern Chinese Thought. That locator distinguishes the passage from loose internet attributions: readers can return to the named work or section to check translation, surrounding argument, and edition-specific wording.

What does Wang Guowei mean by beauty?

Aesthetics asks what beauty is, how taste is educated, and how art discloses truth or shapes moral perception. This passage enters that discussion through beauty, self.

Same thinker

More from Wang Guowei

  1. Those who in ancient or modern times achieved great enterprises and profound learning must pass through three realms: first, standing alone atop a high tower after the west wind withers the green trees, gazing to the end of the road at heaven's edge; second, the belt growing looser without regret, wasting away for the beloved; third, searching a thousand times in the crowd, then suddenly turning — and finding that person standing where the lanterns grow sparse.
  2. Ci poetry takes jingjie — the aesthetic realm — as its highest: with jingjie it naturally attains a lofty style and famous lines of its own.
  3. Jingjie is not a matter of scenery alone: joy, anger, sorrow, and happiness are also realms of the human heart. Whoever can write true scenery and true feeling may be said to have jingjie.

All quotations by Wang Guowei

Same theme

More on beauty

  1. It is through wonder that people both now begin and first began to philosophize.
  2. A person's character is their destiny.
  3. What is opposed brings together; from what differs comes the finest harmony.
  4. Death is nothing to us: for what has been dissolved has no sensation, and what has no sensation is nothing to us.
  5. Pleasure is the beginning and end of the happy life — not the pleasures of profligates, but freedom from pain in the body and from disturbance in the soul.

Browse the beauty theme