 An important Neo-Confucian contribution to the philosophical consciousness of early-modern Japan was its metaphysical account of the world of ordinary experience as fully real. Early in the Tokugawa period, Hayashi Razan was among the leaders of those Japanese theorists who reiterated, with some distinctive variations, the metaphysical accounts synthesized by Zhu Xi during late-Song China. Essentially, this metaphysics explained reality in terms of two components, ri (“principle” or “pattern”) and ki (“generative force”). Ri referred to the rational and moral order of things generally, as well as that of each and every thing in terms of their particulars. In Razan’s view, there is a ri for each aspect of existence, making all particulars what they are in actuality. At the same time, there is an essential universal element in ri that defined a larger realm of commonality in terms of what things can potentially be. Thus, for example, the human nature that defines all people as people is referred to as ri, indicating that the rational order integral to humanity is shared in common. But more importantly, there is a normative, moral side of ri which makes it as much an ethical aspect of existence as it is a rational one. In the case of humanity, as well as virtually all of the ten-thousand things of the cosmos, ri is defined as morally good. This affirmation means, in the case of humanity, that human nature is good. Viewed in the perspective of all things existing between heaven and earth, the goodness of ri means that the world as such is also ethically good by nature and in terms of what it is to become as well. No doubt evil enters in, but that is not the original state, nor should it be the ultimate fate of things.