道家早期阶段：杨朱

一、早期的道家与隐者

隐者，desired to maintain their personal purity. 

They were also, in a sense, defeatists who thought that the world was so bad that nothing could be done for it. 

Most of them living far away from other men in the world of nature.

由此可见，隐者持消极的世界观，离群索居。

The Taoists,  were men who, having gone into seclusion, attempted to work out a system of thought that would give meaning to their action. 

Among them, Yang Chu seems to have been the earliest prominent exponent. 

道家，是那些要为自己的行为赋予一定意义的思想体系的隐者。

二、杨朱的基本观点

Yang Chu's two fundamental ideas were: "Each one for himself, and the despising of things and valuing of life. 

即杨朱的基本观点为：

1、每个人都是为了自己；

2、轻物重生。

三、道家思想的发展阶段

The ideas attributed to Yang Chu represent the first. 

Those expressed in the greater part of the Lao-tzu represent the second. 

And those expressed in the greater part of the Chuang-tzu represent the third and last phase. 

三个阶段：杨朱、老子、庄子

1、杨朱：

The starting point of Taoist philosophy is the preservation of life and avoiding of injury. 

Yang Chu s method for so doing is "to escape". 

This is the method of the ordinary recluse who flees from society and hides himself in the mountains and forests. 

By doing this he thinks he can avoid the evils of the human world. 

Things in the human world, however, are so complicated that no matter how well one hides oneself, there are always evils that cannot be avoided. 

There are times, therefore, when the method of "escaping" does not work. 

2、老子

The ideas expressed in the greater part of the Lao-tzu represent an attempt to reveal the laws underlying the changes of things in the universe. 

Things change, but the laws underlying the changes remain unchanging. 

If one understands these laws and regulates one's actions in conformity with them, one can then turn everything to one's advantage. 

This is the second phase in the development of Taoism. 

Even so, however, there is no absolute guarantee. 

In the changes of things, both in the world of nature and of man, there are always unseen elements. 

So despite every care, the possibility remains that one will suffer injury.

3、庄子

These words of greater understanding are developed in much of the Chuang-tzu, in which occur the concepts of the equalization of life with death, and the identity of self with others. 

This means to see life and death, self and others, from a higher point of view. 

By seeing things from this higher point of view, one can transcend the existing world. 

This is also a form of escape; nol one, however, from society to mountains and forests, but rather from this world to another world. 

Here is the third and last phase of development in the Taoism of ancient times. 

Yet if a man cannot see things from a higher point of view, none of these methods can absolutely guarantee him from danger and harm. 

To see things from a higher point of view, however, means to abolish the self. 

We may say that the early Taoists were selfish. 

Yet in their later development this selfishness became reversed and destroyed itself.

道家思想发展到最终阶段，实现了由小我到大我的飞跃。