PART IV INTRODUCTION 393
necessarily new or modern, was he a force for liberation from the accumulated
restrictions and disabilities of the past? Finally, did he convey a legacy to the
next generation, or next century, that stimulated the reform efforts of that age,
or if not, can he be regarded as an unsung and tragic prophet ruefully ignored
by lesser men in positions of political power, an example of a tragic flaw in the
incapacity of a Confucian dynasty to appreciate one of its more astute institu-
tional thinkers?