CHU-HI, elnizilW (1l30-1.200). The motlerr apostle of Confucianism in its philosophical form, whose writings are the recognized standard of orthodoxy and the creed of educated men in Ch ina. lie has been officially approved by sue cessive imperial dynasties, and even canonized. His father was a Government officer. and he Was born in Fukien. Precocious from ehildhood, he took his second degree before he was 20 years obi. Ile devoted his leisure time when in °thee to Buddhism and Taoism, but throwing these aside atter a few years, he became an iii thusiastie student of the writings of the school men of the Sung Dynasty (A.u. 960-I 12(1). Confu cianism. under the analysis and exposition of the scholars Chow Tun-I and the brothers Cheng, had received a new statement, emerging as something like a philosophical system. instead of the an cient simple ethics and ritual. Chu-Ili, ex panding and expounding the doctrines thus set forth a century before his day, won fame all over the empire. and was summoned by the Em peror to the Court for consultation in regard to things literary and political. the elucidated the doctrines of Confucius and more especially with reference to the nature of man, the origin of good and evil, and the principles of creation. In I150. as governor of a city iu Kiang-si, he applied his principles and greatly improved public morals. Ills study room was the White Deer (grotto, on the hills near Lake Po-yang. NOt (•11t1•111, With ;111HO:01111y. he Sinn In Oiled around him famous scholars., who were his pupils and worked over the great historical annaP; of Sze-Ala Kwang, and thus furnished the standard history of China ; for Chu-lli's work, having been many times since reprinted with commentary and continuation, has been widely read in all Chinese Asia. Nearly all the histories and biographies (apart from an nals) written since his time in China. Korea, Japan. etc.. have been powerfully influenced by Chu-lli's model—that is. on the plan of philos ophy and edification, tieing less consecutive nar ratives of events than appraisals of men and their actions as righteous and unrighteous. ac cording to Chu-111's standards.
Chn-lli extended his labors in every direction of metaphysical :peculation. and his commen taries on the ancient writings of the sages have held the intellect of learned men of China and surrounding countries almost without challenge or criticism, until about the beginning of the second half of the Seventeenth Century. when
they began to be vigorously assailed in China, and later in Korea and Japan. In .Japan, Chu Ili's system is called Tei-shu, which is the Japanese pronunciation of the names of the Cheng brother- and of Chu-(11i). it was offi cially encouraged by lyeyasu and his successors very much as a State Church, and to oppose it openly was at first politically dangerous. Its most famous Japanese expounders were Kyuso, and And liakuseki, the opponents of this (..rthodox •ehool and the critics of Chulli being Sorai. Togai, and others. The latter, forming the Kogalm school, was noted for its doubt of the truth of the teachings of Chu-111's philosophy in Japan. as well as in China. profoundly intlueneed the form and spirit of literature. both scholastic and popular; hut in Japan. the Chinese tea•liings, becoming amal gamated in a common cause with Shinto. served powerfully to stimulate the national sentiment and feeling which overthrew the Shogun and Yedo (;overnment and restored the :Mikado to supreme power. E•peeially in the Province of Mito was this union of Chinese philosophy and Shinto teaching successfully carried out, power fully influencing the minds of the gentry and scholar: in bringing about the great revolution of 1868. Thus one of the strati in history was witnessed in ..Eit the rule of the Tokugawa family (1604-1SOS first shaken and then overthrown by the very doctrine "which generations of able shoffuns and their ministers had earnestlt encouraged and protected." In China. Chu-Ill's philosophy held its own until near the close of the \ling Dynasty (134;S If3-14), whenpl. r. b1.•:111 to feel that system was too narrow to hold all the truth. As a result of the profound thinking stimulated by the Manchu conquest, a school of criticism and opposition arose whose demand was for a study of the ancient text: in their purity. By continuation and expansion of philo sophical labor. and especially by coming into con tact with Occidental seionce ;Ind sin ciliation, modern reformers have come into view, whose activity and aims have been so obscured to \Vd•stern minds by the Boxer uprising (1900) and the foreign invasion.