130 SOCIA L REFORMgained easier access to the highest level of the educational system and high office
in the bureaucracy. Yet within the school system individual students were treated
as equal units and ranked at each level by age only and promoted on the basis
of scholastic accomplishment and moral worth, guaranteeing some new blood
in the social elite in every generation. The students in the schools constituted
the lowest rung of the social stepladder in a stratified, feudal society. and stu-
dent status was the only way out of commoner status, but the position of com-
moner students was precarious since they were under threat of expUlsion and
permanent relegation to commoner status.
Learning and Age as Criteria of Rank
The significance of scholarly merit and age as criteria of rank in Yu's writing is
demonstrated by the importance he attached to the local wine-drinking rite, which
he copied out from the Book of Etiquette and Ceremonial (I-Ii) and Book of Rites.^30
These two texts described the way that local officials (hyang-daebu) honored
eminent local scholars by affording them special treatment as guests in the wine
ritual. The main importance for Yu was the exaltation of learning and ethical
behavior as more important criteria for status than the possession of official rank.
Age was also the basis for ranking the assembled minor guests and visitors at
the rite. Ranking men by learning and age assumed special importance if the
existing society happened to be dominated by a hereditary elite, which was the
case in both Chou times and contemporary Korea)'
Major Features of the Classical Model
To summarize the essential features of the ancient model, a system of official
or public schools performed the functions of both education and recruitment for
office. The king was obliged to show respect for both educational officials and
schools. The goal of education in the schools was knowledge of virtue, culti-
vation of moral behavior, and the study of the arts. Knowledge was directly con-
nected to moral action and behavior. and thc arts included elements like ritual
and archery, which were also designed to inculcate attitudes conducive to moral
behavior.
Candidates for promotion within the school system and appointment to office
were recommended by those best able to judge their overall behavior over the
long term, not just their knowledge of objective fact or skill in useful tasks. The
base of the system of education and recommendation was located in the local
community where peers. elders, and teachers were best able to observe children
and young men. Recommendation was also used outside the schools for obtain-
ing men for office, and a quota system was used for recommendation of men
by the feudal lords to the king according to the size of the demesne.
Appointments of officials were shared betwecn the king and the feudal lords,
so that direct central control was extremely limited. Once in office officials were