Characteristics of the Translation of Caiyuan Dei in System der Ethik : Examining the Effects of Mao Tsu-Tung’s Comments

The main theme of this paper is to analyze the thought of young Mao Tsu-Tung. When he was young, he was greatly inspired by “System der Ethik”, written by Friedrich Paulsen, a German philosopher and educator. It was translated into Japanese by Yoshimaru Kanie in 1900. Cai Yuanpei translated the Japanese version into Chinese. Mao read the Chinese translation and annotated it applying its Western ideas to traditional Chinese thought. He wrote a lot of annotations on the edges of the Chinese translation. But his annotations have not been clarified until now. Therefore, to illuminate its influence on Mao’s thought, it is necessary to read not only the Chinese translation but also the original German text. However, in this paper, his annotations are mainly focused on the Chinese translation and their effects