Is the Ear Less Reliable than the Eye?
——About the Story of Jiao Wei Qin
Gu Junzheng

In the play CaiWenji, newly written by venerable Guo Moruo, reference is made to jiao wen qin,a zithern partly made of scorched wood by Cai Yong, father of Cai Wenji.Recently, after I saw the play on the stage, my mind naturally went to jiao wenqin and its story.

Cai Yong dislikedplaying up to bigwigs and, to avoid frame-ups, he went into exile in the South,wandering about for twelve years in Jiangsu and Zhejiang Provinces. It is saidthat one day during his stay in Suzhou when he heard the crackling of firewoodfrom his next-door neighbour at cooking time, he knew the familiar sound camefrom paulownia, a kind of choice wood best for making zitherns. Now, talking itover with his neighbour, he was given the piece of scorched wood, which hesubsequently made into a zithern. This musical instrument, when played, turnedout to be extremely pleasant to the ear. People called it jiao wei qin becausethe tail of its sound-board was made of scorched wood.

When I think ofthe story, I cannot help having doubts about the validity of the proverb,“Seeing is better than hearing.” Fact is, to know the material world, wesometimes use not the eye, but the ear. That Cai Yong could tell the quality ofwood by listening to its crackling sound while it was burning in the kitchenstove makes it crystal clear that “hearing” is not necessarily less reliablethat “seeing”. The above-mentioned proverb literally means that secondhandexperience is less reliable than firsthand experience, which is perfectly true.But, if we should take this saying at its face value and regard the ear asinvariably less reliable than the eye, we shall do the former a grossinjustice.

While we agreethat the eye is the main source of direct experience, we must admit that it isalso most misleading. Take a most common example. We all agree that the sun ismuch bigger in the early morning than at noon. But if we take a photo of it inthe early morning and at noon respectively, we shall find it of the same sizein both cases. Who would have thought that, when it comes to this commonphenomenon in our daily life, people the world over should have been fooled bytheir own eyes ever since time immemorial? The optical illusion has indeedlanded us in indescribable trouble. Not only were great ancient sages likeConfucius stumped by the question why the sun was seemingly bigger in the earlymorning than at noon, even scientists of today have failed to give a whollysatisfactory explanation. This is a keen satire on those having blind faith inthe eye.

Of course I do notmean to deny the role played by the eye. All I want to show is that althoughthe eye has an extremely wide scope of activities, it is, nevertheless, farfrom being faultless. We should, therefore, never over-trust the eye andunderestimate the usefulness of the ear.

Although the earhas a smaller scope of activities, its functions are not confined to listeningto conversation or music only. It has other specific functions of its own.Under certain circumstances, it is not only worthy of the saying, “Let the eardo duty for the eye,” it can even excel the eye.