Page "The Religion of China: Confucianism and Taoism" Paragraph 10

According to Confucianism, the worship of great deities was the affair of the state, ancestral worship is required of all, and a multitude of popular cults are tolerable.

Confucianism tolerated magic and mysticism as long as they were useful tools for controlling the masses ; it denounced them as heresy and suppressed them when they threatened the established order ( hence the opposition to Buddhism ).

Another notable quality was the avoidance or both irrational ecstasy and excitement, as well as mystic contemplation and metaphysical speculation.