-310 – -235
Xunzi (c. 310–235 BCE) was a major Confucian philosopher of the Warring States period whose systematic writings represent the most analytically rigorous strand of classical Chinese thought. He is best known for his doctrine that human nature is inherently flawed (xing e), directly contesting Mencius's view of innate moral goodness, and for his insistence that virtue must be cultivated through ritual propriety, education, and sustained moral effort. His collected work, the Xunzi, spans ethics, epistemology, philosophy of language, and political philosophy.
Formulated the doctrine that human nature is inherently evil, requiring ritual and education to achieve goodness
Developed a systematic account of ritual propriety (li) as the foundation of ethical and social order
Advanced a naturalistic cosmology separating Heaven (tian) from moral or supernatural agency
Articulated a theory of rectification of names (zhengming) linking language to political and moral order
Taught Han Fei and Li Si, whose Legalist synthesis shaped Qin imperial unification