Whether is human born good or bad? Whether a man is born good or bad is an issue debated by pilosophers in Eastern and Western for centuries . Mencius，a Chinese philosopher living about 2000 years ago , hold the opinion that everyone is born good ,for the fact that everyone has sympathy and commiseration ,which is shared by Adam Smith .We feel delighted when we see everyone around us is happy ,and we become sad by seeing others suffering .As Confucius and Mencius influenced China more than any other philosopher ,thus in the ancient ,Chinese government saw more value in “教化” ，which means teaching and instilling moral ideas to the public rather than clarifying the laws and cultivating their legal conception . The Buddhism ,spreads in China with constant change to be compatible with Confucianism .A principle held by Chan masters is known in China that is “佛无不可渡化之人”, which means every can realize the true meaning of life and then be saved through our saving .Jean-Jacques Rousseau thinks similarly with Lao-zi ,another Chinese philosopher ,that when human beings are still in primitive society ,everyone has nothing and they are born pure ,kind ,and born with freedom and consciousness. In the contrast ,the above opinion is accompanied by another opinion that is everyone is born bad .Xuncius ,who is a prentice of Mencius ,holds a totally different opinion from Mencius .He thinks human ,similar to animals ,is born to care his own benefit .If not limited ,human will behave badly by following their inherent idea .Han Fei ,one of Xuncius’s prentices ,then maintain that human’s behaviors should be limited by government through strict laws and heavy punishments ,which is adopted partly by later Chinese dynasties . In Christian ,people are born with sins ,and can only be saved through God’s forgiveness .And Tomas Hobbes ,an English political philosopher ,think human is like a beast ,which puts himself in the center of the world ,born with anti-society and destructive greed ,and the society should be a tool ,constraining the beast .These opinions are shared by Machiavelli , Schopenhauer and Hegel . In my opinion , human is not born good nor bad ,who has both the instinct to pursuit his interest by defeating the competitor and the tendency to cooperate with each other .So even the best man has defections and selfishness ,and the worst man may sometimes show his mercy and kindness .No man is an angel and no man is a devil ,he is just a man.