and highly educated man was the head of the Jesuit Missionaries. The Jesuits quickly realized that the best strategy for converting the Chinese was to work their way into the culture and teach them the Christian Gospel. The Jesuits at first had dressed like Buddhists in order to blend in, but Ricci quickly realized that Confucianism was the dominant value system of the time. "Ricci became persuaded that there was more compatibility between Christianity and Confucianism, particularly the early teachings of Confucius himself, with reverence for a supreme being and sublime moral exhortations" (Julia Ching, Confucianism and Christianity, p. 14). In the
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