 One of the great texts of Song dynasty Confucianism is Zhang Zai’s (1020–1070) “Western Inscription” (Ximing). In its opening lines, Zhang states that he views heaven as his father, earth as his mother, and the ten thousand things of the world as his brothers and sisters. All that fills the space between heaven and earth he considers as his body. Elsewhere Zhang spoke more metaphysically, describing that which fills all between heaven and earth as qi, or the generative force (J: ki) that is the creative substantial being and energy of becoming in all things. Zhang also explained qi in terms of the great vacuity, a notion that sounds Buddhistic but was meant to capture the openness of all becoming to change and transformation. Yet in the end, qi was the rock bottom of Confucian realism, metaphysically speaking, and was in large part the ontological dimension of things that prompted Confucians throughout East Asia to take the world seriously not as a site of delusion and ignorance, but instead as a both the crucible of their being and an extension of themselves in becoming. Reportedly, Zhang’s sense of oneness and kinship with everything between heaven and earth left him unable to cut the grass and bushes outside his window. Other Song Confucians offered their own vision of oneness with reality by declaring that the humane person forms one body with the ten thousand things of existence. These visions of oneness and kinship prompted Confucians to paint landscape (shanshui) paintings, literally paintings of mountains (shan) and water (shui), compose poetry alluding to the interrelatedness of things, and to direct public works projects meant to maintain the harmony and balance of heaven, earth, and humanity.