Quote by Xunzi: “The nature of man is evil; his goodness is acquired.”

Xunzi directly challenged Mencius by arguing that humans are not born good — we are born with impulses toward conflict and self-interest. Virtue, he believed, is something constructed through education, ritual, and social discipline. It is a more demanding and perhaps more honest view of how character is actually built.

Xunzi wrote during the Warring States period, just before the Qin dynasty violently unified China in 221 BCE. The question of human nature was not merely philosophical — it had direct political implications for how rulers should govern and what social institutions were necessary to prevent chaos.

Chinese Confucian philosopher who lived approximately 312–230 BCE and argued against Mencius that human nature is inherently self-interested and must be shaped by education and ritual. His thought influenced the Legalist school that guided the Qin dynasty's unification of China. His collected essays are a major text of Chinese classical philosophy.