2. The Analects of Confucius: one of the Confucian classics, a collection of recorded essays of China in the Spring and Autumn Period, mainly recording the words and deeds of Confucius and his disciples. The Analects of Confucius reflects Confucius' thoughts and is compiled by Confucius' disciples and re-disciples. There are 20 books and 492 chapters in the book, which is the first "documentary". In the Southern Song Dynasty, Zhu called The Analects of Confucius, Mencius, Daxue and The Doctrine of the Mean the Four Books.