On the basis of inheriting predecessors, Han Yu and Liu Zongyuan put forward a more clear and realistic theory of ancient Chinese prose. Generally speaking, Han and Liu's ancient prose theory has the following aspects: First, "for writing". Second, while advocating "writing with Ming Dow", we should also fully realize the role of "writing" and learn from predecessors' heritage, so as to write good articles. Han Yu mentioned many times: "The goal of healing lies in the ancient road, and words must be carried out." (Answer to Chen Shengshu) "Immerse yourself in training, repeat sentences, sharpen your career, and work hard on articles." Liu Zongyuan also said: "Words without words are mud, but writers are indispensable!" (Answering Wu Wuling's question about non-Mandarin books) This attitude of having both ability and political integrity is obviously different from that of China ancient writers before them. From this point of view, they further advocate extensive study of various cultural classics other than Confucian classics, "those who have never heard of white books, such as Zhuang, Sao, Historical Records, Ziyun and Xiang Ru Fu, but have not read them" (Han Yu's Answer to Hou). And take this opportunity to "push the traffic and think about it" (Liu Zongyuan's "Answer to Wei Zhongli's Book Teacher's Road"). Although they criticized the parallel prose of "Li, Jin Xin Xiu Kou" (Liu Zongyuan's Qiao Qiwen) many times, they did not completely deny it, but paid attention to absorbing its beneficial components. This view of literature has undoubtedly made great progress compared with the extreme attitude of ancient writers in China who rejected the literature after Qu and Song Dynasties. Third, for Wen Yi, "self-building, not following the crowd" means innovation. Han Yu believes that the study of ancient Chinese should "learn its meaning, not its words", and that "if all people rise and fall with the world and do not stand on their own feet, they will not be blamed at that time, nor will they be handed down to future generations" (answer to Liu Zhixin). In the style of the article, he advocated writing "ancient prose", but in the specific writing, he resolutely opposed imitation, pointing out: "Only ancient prose will be published, not thieves." (Epitaph of Nanyang Fan Shaoshu) When answering Li Yishu, Han Yu summed up three stages of his pursuit of innovation: when he began to learn from the ancients, although he tried to "keep his word", he felt quite difficult; Then I gradually gained some experience and took some ancient books. "When you keep them in mind and in your hand, they will suddenly come"; If we persist in this way, we will "stay away from the ancients and wait and see" and finally reach a free and easy realm. It can be considered that it is a key for Han Yu's ancient prose theory to surpass its predecessors to advocate retro, trend to the past, oppose tradition and strive for innovation. Although Liu Zongyuan's advocacy of innovation is not as strong as Han Yu's, his repeated opposition to "fishing and hunting, killing thieves" (Talking with friends as documents) just shows that his thoughts are consistent with Han Yu's. Fourthly, Han Yu's thesis attaches great importance to the writer's moral cultivation and the emotional strength of the article, which is considered to be the key to writing a good article. He has repeatedly pointed out: "A husband's so-called writer must be among them, so a gentleman should be cautious." ("Answer to Wei Chisheng's Book") "Raise its roots and be practical, add its cream and hope for its glory; The roots are lush, but the cream is brilliant. A kind and upright person keeps his word. ..... Morality will return one day. What about the outside world? " (Answer to Li Yishu) "Everything is in it" and "repairing its roots" all refer to moral cultivation. With good moral cultivation, the article can be enriched and prosperous. On this basis, Han Yu also developed Mencius' theory of nourishing qi and Liang Su's theory of Wen Qi, and put forward the general principle of writing: "If the qi is sufficient, the length of the speech should be better than that of the speaker." "Qi" is the result of self-cultivation, which includes moral factors such as "the way of benevolence and righteousness" and "the source of poetry and calligraphy", as well as spiritual temperament and emotional strength derived from personality and social practice, and the latter is more important than others to some extent. When this kind of "qi" is extremely full, when generate comes out, the article will be well written and have moving power. Based on this, Han Yu further emphasized the voice of injustice (Preface to Farewell to Meng Dongye) and advocated that the feelings of anger, embarrassment, sadness, resentment, drunkenness and annoyance (Preface to Master Gao Xian's Farewell) could be freely vented. Like Han, Liu Zongyuan also advocates that people's temperament should be "full of sincerity" and their emotions should be "full of pleasure" (book), and thinks: "A gentleman who suffers from the world sighs and learns from the world. ..... so I feel angry and angry, and I am eager to make my ambition serve the present world. It must be shaped in words and extended in singing. " The "resentment" here has internal identity with Han Yu's "grievances are heard". As a theoretical proposition that attaches great importance to personal feelings, both of them are of great value and significance.

The core of the theory advocated by Han and Liu is the theory of "writing style", and the style reform they advocated is also based on this slogan. Judging from the practical character of this proposition closely related to real politics, it is undoubtedly of positive significance; But as far as the connotation of this proposition is concerned, especially Han Yu's "Ming Dow" theory, it does not provide more things than its predecessors; Moreover, once divorced from the specific environment in which it came into being, as a general theory, it will become a bondage and a theoretical basis for propagating feudal ethics, which often makes the article lack true feelings and full of Taoist colors.

Although Han and Liu stipulate that writing for the sake of writing is only a means, the essence of their ancient prose theory lies in their exposition of "writing", that is, their exposition of "Tao" only involves what to write, while their exposition of "writing" focuses on how to write and how to write well. In contrast, the latter undoubtedly condensed their more efforts. Later, some Taoists were greatly dissatisfied with Han Yu, accusing him that "the first meaning is learning literary talent, and the second meaning is poor learning truth" (The Analects of Zhuzi 137), which proved that Han Yu attached great importance to "literature". From the perspective of the history of literary development, we will find that the reason why Han and Liu's ancient prose theories pay equal attention to "Tao" and "Wen", and sometimes even "Wen" is more important than "Tao", is indeed influenced by the concept of miscellaneous literature that has gradually returned since the Tang Dynasty, and it is also a concentrated expression of the concept of miscellaneous literature in a specific period.