After Yangming's death, Wang Ji tended associate himself with the nascent members of the Taizhou school, rather than the quietist and orthodox interpretations of his master's thought.
[2] Longxi assumed that if, according to Wang Yangming, the mind is without good or evil, then all thoughts, volition, and intuitive knowing should be likewise.
Intuitive knowing is to be distinguished, according to Longxi, from the volitional ideas and passing thoughts which make up one's ordinary perception of the universe.
In this way, one may abolish all ordinary consciousness in the intuitive knowing beyond all transient thoughts, ideas, good, and evil.
In the emptiness of liangzhi, expressions of good may arise, but they will inevitably pass like an echo, leaving only the void of intuitive knowing.
[6] For Wang Longxi, the apprehension of Nothingness and intuitive knowing occurs by means of "the mind of the absolute present" (見在心, jianzaixin), saying that "When the mind is in the absolute present it will be free from the departing of the past and the coming of the future, and will be unified."
Criticizing the faults of postcosmic teachings, Longxi noted that their students would become inevitably attached to them, despite their provisionality.
[10] Wang Yangming considered Wang Ji's ideas on intuitive knowing beyond good or evil to be those of the student of keen intelligence, while the views of other students who emphasized the moral character of passing thoughts were to instruct those of lesser knowing.
"[4] In general, the schools of Wang Ji and the Taizhou school of Wang Gen were the only traditions of Yangmingist thought which adapted themselves to the romantic, emotional, and sensual mood of the late Ming dynasty, which was represented by such works as the novel the Golden Lotus (among many other vernacular dramas and novels centered around passion and emotion), the poetry of Yuan Hongdao, the painting of Xu Wei, and the calligraphy of Dong Qichang.