Beginning in the late Southern Sung one sect of Confucianism gradually came to dominate literati culture and, by the Ming dynasty, was canonized as state orthodoxy. This book is a historical and textual critique of the construction of an ideologically exclusionary conception of the Confucian tradition, and how claims to possession of the truth-the Tao-came to serve power.

The sacred landscape of imperial China was dotted with Buddhist monasteries, Daoist temples, shrines to local deities, and the altars of the mandarinate. Prominent among the official shrines were the temples in every capital throughout the empire devoted to the veneration of Confucius. Twice a year members of the educated elite and officials in each area gathered to offer sacrifices to Confucius, his disciples, and the major scholars of the Confucian tradition.

The worship of Confucius is one of the least understood aspects of Confucianism, even though the temple and the cult were highly visible signs of Confucianism's existence in imperial China. To many modern observers of traditional China, the temple cult is difficult to reconcile with the image of Confucianism as an ethical, humanistic, rational philosophy. The nine essays in this book are an attempt to recover the meaning and significance of the religious side of Confucianism. Among other subjects, the authors analyze the social, cultural, and political meaning attached to the cult; its history; the legends, images, and rituals associated with the worship of Confucius; the power of the descendants of Confucius, the main temple in the birthplace of Confucius; and the contemporary fate of temples to Confucius.

Congress enacted the Wilderness Act in 1964. It established a National Wilderness Preservation System of federal lands "where the earth and its community of life are untrammeled by man, where man himself is a visitor who does not remain". The act designated 54 wilderness areas containing 9.1 million acres of federal land within the national forests. It also reserved to Congress the authority to add areas to the system, although it also directed agencies to review the wilderness potential of certain lands. This book summarises the various statutory provisions and provisions on prohibited and permitted uses within wilderness areas.

This work uses the tradition of English school inspection as a mirror for reflecting the dilemmas in American school accountability. It aims to address the crises affecting American schools and should assist those implementing educational reform.