This work introduced Western philosophy. Ricci and the whole Jesuit order in China advocated allowing Chinese to continue the traditional practices of ancestor worship even after conversion to Roman Catholicism. But later, during the early Ching Dynasty, the pope, on the urging of other orders, ruled that continuing such ancestor worship was a form of syncretism--mixing religions--and banned it.
書中有系統地介紹中國的位置、面積、人口、物產、學術、政府、禮俗等，大大激起西方人對中國的嚮往，以及往中國傳教的興趣。