Abstract: Chinese culture has formed a tradition of pursuing sage as the ideal personality since ancient times.Based on the homogeneity of sages in innate personality,Mencius andXunzi emphasized that everyone can be "a righteous man or a sage" through "self-discipline and submitting to ritual" after birth,that is,"one can learn to be a sage".Guo Xiang absorbed the view of "innate personality" of Mencius and Xunzi;however,he emphasized the heterogeneity of innate personality between a sage and a mortal,and transformed their views into one that "a sages cannot be learned to be".On the one hand,Guo Xiang's view of sage emphasized the "distinction of a sage and a mortal" under the "heterogeneity of a sage and a mortal" in order to maintain the social order at that time,and on the other hand,he emphasized that a sage and a mortal can reveal their "distinction" through later "learning",so as to weaken the class distinction.This provided a theory for the reconstruction of social order and the settlement of an individual.Guo Xiang's view of sage inherited the moral ideal of "inner sage" taught by the Confucians in the pre-Qin period in the aspect of attaching importance to the cultivation of acquired personality.Guo Xiang had some similarities with Mencius and Xunzi in the aspects of recognition of subjectivity,weak attitude towards desire and emphasis on the understanding of inner spirit.However,in the specific path,he learned from the "full integration of mind and matter" of Taoism and the "equalizing things" and "free and unfettered" realm theory.On the whole,Guo Xiang learned from and developed Mencius and Xunzi's views of sage.The differences between them lie in that "a sage and a mortal are heterogeneous" and "a sage and a mortal are homogeneous",and also in that "one can learn to be a sage" and "a sages cannot be learned to be".Both emphasize the importance of acquired moral education or "practice" in the pursuit of moral life and the achievement of a harmonious and stable social order.

Key words: Guo Xiang, Mencius, Xunzi, view of sage, innate personality