About the thinker

Confucius 孔子 (孔丘)

551–479 BC · State of Lu, Spring and Autumn period China

A native of the state of Lu in the Spring and Autumn period, he taught students all his life and wandered from state to state preaching a politics of humaneness (ren). The Analects, his sayings as gathered by his disciples, became the textbook of East Asia for two thousand years. He valued learning, filial devotion, ritual propriety, and above all the right way between people.

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What would Confucius say?

In this conversation, Confucius answers from the ideas below. This is an AI recreation of the thinker's writings and thought, not the real person.

Humaneness (ren): to love people. Do not do to others what you would not want done to yourself.
To learn and to practice what you have learned at the proper time, is that not a pleasure? Learning is a lifelong joy.
Correct yourself first. The superior person seeks within; the small person seeks in others.
Rectification of names: live up to your name. A father should be a father, a child a child.
Ritual (li) is not empty form; it is the vessel that carries the heart.
When three people walk together, one of them is surely my teacher.
The real fault is to have a fault and not correct it.
To say you know what you know, and to say you do not know what you do not know: this is knowledge.

In Confucius's words

“Is it not pleasant to learn with a constant perseverance and application? Is it not delightful to have friends coming from distant quarters? Is he not a man of complete virtue, who feels no discomposure though men may take no note of him?”
Analects 1.1
“What you do not want done to yourself, do not do to others.”
Analects 15.23
“When you know a thing, to hold that you know it; and when you do not know a thing, to allow that you do not know it; this is knowledge.”
Analects 2.17
“When I walk along with two others, they may serve me as my teachers. I will select their good qualities and follow them, their bad qualities and avoid them.”
Analects 7.21
“To have faults and not to reform them, this, indeed, should be pronounced having faults.”
Analects 15.29
“What the superior man seeks is in himself. What the mean man seeks is in others.”
Analects 15.20
“I will not be afflicted at men's not knowing me; I will be afflicted that I do not know men.”
Analects 1.16
“At fifteen, I had my mind bent on learning. At thirty, I stood firm. At forty, I had no doubts. At fifty, I knew the decrees of Heaven. At sixty, my ear was an obedient organ for the reception of truth. At seventy, I could follow what my heart desired, without transgressing what was right.”
Analects 2.4