理學家往往批駁王安石為「不知道」。本文分作三方面，論證事實上在盛行論「道」的北宋儒學界中，安石的「道」論有其不容忽視的價值。首先，就基本思想而言，安石主張「道一」。雖然基於其務實性格，他將道與器、天道與人道劃分開來，且將其理論重點放在器之製作與人道之實踐，然而其最終理想仍為道與器、天道與人道之整全。例如他成功地轉化《老子》的「無為」為積極有為之後的「從容無為」之道術說，十分精彩;而這同時亦展現出王氏擅長整合、轉化儒學以外的其他學派思想的學術特色。其次，安石感嘆「道之不一」，主張建立一個「道一」的社會。他分別提出兩個通向建立「道一」社會的途徑，一是由政府接興學制以統一士人價值觀，杜絕「人自為義」的紛亂現象；一是呼籲士人勿拘限於窮讀儒家經典，而能藉由廣泛的閱讀以及現實經驗認識，以求得「道」的再次整全。這顯示出安石在要求統一價值觀的保守理念中同時充滿積極開放的思想性格。其三，安石提出「道一」論，顯然是有意抗衡韓愈以來頗為儒者關注的「傳道」論，故他認為世衰道徽的原因是「道的分裂」而不是「道的失傳」，所以他不注重傳道統緒，而主張博究百家、兼容佛老思想。作為新學之理論基礎的安石道論，與同時代二程的道論，旨趣迴異。程頤努力宣揚傳道說的原因之一，正是意圖藉此將二程之學樹立為儒學正統，以取代安石新學在當時的首要地位。俟後理學大盛，安石「道一」說遂無聞焉。

Although Neo - Confucians often criticized Wang An - Shih, saying that he "did not know the Dao," in this paper I present three ways in which we can see that Wang had his own highly developed concept of the Dao. First, in terms of his fundamental thought, Wang advocated "unifying the Dao". Due to his own highly practical character, even though he recognized both the Dao of Heaven and the Dao of Man, he emphasized the Dao of Man. But his final ideal was to completely unify the Dao of Heaven and the Dao of Man, as well as unifying Dao and Chi ( 器 ). For example, he transformed Lao-Tsu's concept of "inaction" ( 無為 ) into a Dao -shu ( 道術 ) theory of "composed inaction", which could arise after willful action. This example also shows Wang's strength at combining and transforming schools other than Confucianism. Secondly, Wang considered that "the Dao is now not unified," and he advocated setting up a society based on "unified Dao", proposing two ways of setting it up. One way was that the government should develop an educational system to unify literati values to eradicate the disorder of people's individual values. The other was by calling upon literati to study not only the Confucian classics, but to unify the Dao through widespread study of other schools and grasping experiential reality. This shows that Wang's conservative notion of "unified values" also had a positive and open character. Thirdly, Wang's theory of "unified Dao" was apparently to compete with the theory of "transmited Dao," which had become increasingly popular since its promulgation by Han - Yu. Wang believed that "Dao had been divided" and not that "Dao had been lost in its transmission". Thus, he did not stress the lineage of "transmission of the Dao" but advocated broad study of all schools, including Buddhism and Daoism. As a basic theory of hsin hsueh ( 新學 ), the aim of Wang's discourse of Dao is totally different from the Ch'eng Brothers' discourse on Dao. In fact, one of the reasons that Ch'eng Yi advocated the theory of "transmission of the Dao" was to establish the Ch'eng brothers thought as orthodox Confucianism, displacing the hsin hsueh of Wang from its preeminent position. Subsequently, with the flourishing of Neo -Confucianism, Wang An-shih's theory of "unifying the Dao" was neglected.