V. The fifth epoch, beginning with the Sung Dynasty (from A.D. 960 to 1333) and lasting to our own time, was ushered in by a period of intense mental energy.  Strange to say (and most interesting is the fact to Americans of this generation), the immediate occasion of the recension and expansion of the old Confucianism was a Populist movement.[4] During the Tang era of national prosperity, Chinese socialists questioned the foundations of society and of government, and there grew up a new school of interpreters as well as of politicians.  In the tenth century the contest between the old Confucianism and the new notions, broke out with a violence that threatened anarchy to the whole empire.

One set of politicians, led by Wang (1021-1086), urged an extension of administrative functions, including agricultural loans, while the brothers Cheng (1032-1085, 1033-1107) reaffirmed, with fresh intellectual power, the old orthodoxy.

The school of writers and party agitators, led by Szma Kwaug (1009-1086)[5] the historian, contended that the ancient principles of the sages should be put in force.  Others, the Populists of that age and land, demanded the entire overthrow of existing institutions.

In the bitter contest which ensued, the Radicals and Reformers temporarily won the day and held power.  For a decade the experiment of innovation was tried.  Men turned things social and political upside down to see how they looked in that position.  So these stood or oscillated for thirteen years, when the people demanded the old order again.  The Conservatives rose to power.  There was no civil war, but the Radicals were banished beyond the frontier, and the country returned to normal government.

This controversy raised a landmark in the intellectual history of China.[6] The thoughts of men were turned toward deep and acute inquiry into the nature and use of things in general.  This thinking resulted in a literature which to-day is the basis of the opinions of the educated men in all Chinese Asia.  Instead of a sapling we now have a mighty tree.  The chief of the Chinese writers, the Calvin of Asiatic orthodoxy, who may be said to have wrought Confucianism into a developed philosophy, and who may be called the greatest teacher of the mind, of modern China, Korea and Japan, is Chu Hi, who reverently adopted the criticisms on the Chinese classics of the brothers Cheng.[7] It is evident that in Chu Hi’s system, we have a body of thought which may be called the result of Chinese reflection during a millennium and a half.  It is the ethics of Confucius transfused with the mystical elements of Taoism and the speculations of Buddhism.  As the common people of China made an amalgam of the three religions and consider them one, so the philosophers have out of these three systems made one, calling that one Confucianism.  The dominant philosophy in Japan to-day is based upon the writings of Chu Hi (in Japanese, Shu Shi) and called the system of Tei-Shu, which is the Japanese pronunciation of the names of the Cheng brothers and of Chu (Hi).  It is a medley which the ancient sage could no more recognize than would Jesus know much of the Christianity that casts out devils in his name.