The greatest political support of Liberalism was the Emperor Shih Huang, the founder of the Ch'in dynasty. His Prime Minister, Li Ssǔ, was the most untiring opponent of the Conservative School of his time or of any subsequent time. Both the Emperor and his Prime Minister were firm believers in the principles of the School of Doctrine or Tao. In personal conduct as well as in the establishment and administration of his government, Shih Huang reflected no honour upon the teachings of the School of Lao Tzǔ. He was a cruel tyrant, passionate in temper, intolerant of any form of opposition and entirely dominated by his own imperious self-will. He burned the books of the Conservatives and destroyed their ceremonial utensils in the hope of cutting himself off from the restrictions imposed by those who had gone before him, and of establishing a new order. His success was only partial, for though he established a bureaucratic form of government which continued in its general principles down to the Republican Revolution of 1911-12, it was controlled after his death not by the principles in which he believed, but by those of the Conservative School. The task of the Han dynasty, which succeeded the Ch'in established by Shih Huang, consisted in retaining the form of government established by Shih Huang and of bringing it under the domination of the philosophical ideas of the Conservative School. If Shih Huang had been a man of a higher type of personal character, the dynasty which he established might have had a good chance of survival. As it happened, his government survived in form, but came entirely under the control of an opposing set of principles.
During the Han dynasty, about 150 b.c., the sayings of Confucius were compiled by one of his descendants, K'ung An-kuo. This compilation, called Lun Yü Hsün Tz'ǔ, was based upon the comparison of two texts. One of these was found with other texts, pi chung shu, in a wall of the home of Confucius when it was being demolished by Kung Wang, son
