Mencius is a collection of anecdotes and conversations of the Confucian thinker and philosopher Mencius. The work dates from the second half of the 4th century BC. It was ranked as a Confucian classic and its status was elevated in Song Dynasty. Zhu Xi, the scholar generally credited with the founding of Neo-Confucianism, included the Mengzi as one of the Four Books, and it became one of the canonical texts of Neo-Confucianism.