Confucius, Mencius, Xun's "Gentleman" S Research

The ‘gentleman’is one of the ideal personality of the Confucianism, and has aprofound influence on generations of Chinese people.How does it come up? What thehistorical evolution of it goes through?What is the foundation of metaphysics of it?Thispaper choses the pre-qin Confucian master Confucius, Mencius and Xunzi as theresearch object on the basis of discussing these problems to illustrate the social andcultural background of their ‘gentleman’theory, the main theoretical connotation of the‘gentleman’ theory, and the cultivation methods of the ‘gentleman’.It summarizes thesame and differences of ‘gentleman’ theory of the three people at the same time andbelieves that their political demands, moral support, moral accomplishment methodhaving some common points of view, but the attitude of destiny and the emphases aredifferent, and the Confucius attaches importance to benevolence, Mencius attachesimportance to righteousness, and Xunzi emphasizes the unity of the ritual and law incomparison.This article also discusses the historical influence, timelimitation,contemporary value and so on of the ‘gentleman’theory of Confucius,Mencius and Xunzi.