After the feudal lord of Ch’i, supported by the wealth and power of his feudal state, became dictator, he had to struggle not only against other feudal lords, but also many times against risings among the most various parts of the population, and especially against the nomad tribes in the southern part of the present province of Shansi.  In the seventh century not only Ch’i but the other feudal states had expanded.  The regions in which the nomad tribes were able to move had grown steadily smaller, and the feudal lords now set to work to bring the nomads of their country under their direct rule.  The greatest conflict of this period was the attack in 660 B.C. against the feudal state of Wei, in northern Honan.  The nomad tribes seem this time to have been proto-Mongols; they made a direct attack on the garrison town and actually conquered it.  The remnant of the urban population, no more than 730 in number, had to flee southward.  It is clear from this incident that nomads were still living in the middle of China, within the territory of the feudal states, and that they were still decidedly strong, though no longer in a position to get rid entirely of the feudal lords of the Chou.

The period of the dictators came to an end after about a century, because it was found that none of the feudal states was any longer strong enough to exercise control over all the others.  These others formed alliances against which the dictator was powerless.  Thus this period passed into the next, which the Chinese call the period of the Contending States.

6 Confucius

After this survey of the political history we must consider the intellectual history of this period, for between 550 and 280 B.C. the enduring fundamental influences in the Chinese social order and in the whole intellectual life of China had their original.  We saw how the priests of the earlier dynasty of the Shang developed into the group of so-called “scholars”.  When the Chou ruler, after the move to the second capital, had lost virtually all but his religious authority, these “scholars” gained increased influence.  They were the specialists in traditional morals, in sacrifices, and in the organization of festivals.  The continually increasing ritualism at the court of the Chou called for more and more of these men.  The various feudal lords also attracted these scholars to their side, employed them as tutors for their children, and entrusted them with the conduct of sacrifices and festivals.

China’s best-known philosopher, Confucius (Chinese:  K’ung Tz[)u], was one of these scholars.  He was born in 551 B.C. in the feudal state Lu in the present province of Shantung.  In Lu and its neighbouring state Sung, institutions of the Shang had remained strong; both states regarded themselves as legitimate heirs of Shang culture, and many traces of Shang culture can be seen in Confucius’s political and ethical ideas.  He acquired the knowledge which a scholar had to possess, and then