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In both Confucius' Analects and The Republic , both philosophers discuss the importance of good governance and the qualities a ruler must possess to rule the people. Confucius mentioned governance many times in his work The Analects and was asked by his students on multiple occasions what his thoughts were on governing and ruling. Once Confucius' student Ji Kangzi asked him about government. Confucius replied, "To govern is to correct. If you lead the people with correctness, who would not be corrected?" This is an example of a virtue that Confucius sees is important to ruling and why. The virtue of correctness and the actions that follow will lead the people to be correct and correct themselves. Confucius emphasizes how important having these virtues are in ruling when speaking to Ji Kangzi again. The verse reads "Ji Kangzi was troubled by the thieves in his state. He asked Confucius what he should do about it. Confucius replied, "If you weren't so greedy, your people wouldn't steal, even if you offered them a reward for doing it." This quote helps build a picture of what Confucius thought on Governance and ruling. To rule meant to exemplifying certain virtues while eschewing vices. We will look at quotes like these and build a succinct picture of Confucius' views on governance to compare to Plato. Plato dedicated two chapters of his book The Republic to the question of that a philosopher is and what his use is in the world. Plato concluded that there are certain virtues that distinguish a philosopher from the common people. These virtues lead the philosopher to be of use in ruling the people. Plato saw that true philosophers love truth and wisdom while also hating untruths and lies. Plato saw the best kind of ruler was one who loved truth as much as one could love a good sight or sound. In The Republic the character Socrates is written saying as much as he talks to the character Glaucon, he says "Therefore the man who is really a lover of learning must from youth on strive as intensely as possible every kind of for truth." This man he describes is the philosopher. He writes later on in the chapter on why the philosopher is best fit to lead the people and rule them. He writes, as he is describing the allegory of The Ship of State, that "They don't know that for the true pilot it is necessary to pay careful attention to year, seasons, heaven, stars, winds, and everything that's proper to the art, if he is really going to be skilled at ruling a ship." The allegory of The Ship of State is that the philosopher has virtues and skills that allow him to flourish at ruling correctly. Like a ship that needs a knowledgeable and educated captain, the state needs a knowledgeable and capable ruler. We will explore the Ship of State allegory and other quotes from Plato as to give a clear picture of his philosophy and compare it to Confucius. Our paper will focus on both these philosophers works and look for similarities and differences in their views on governance. We will be pulling our research from their respected works and show what each philosopher claimed was necessary to be considered a good ruler and what virtues were necessary to lead the people. The We will look at these quotes and more to compare the two philosophers and their ideals on ruling. We can already see that both see virtues as imperative to ruling. One must, for the peoples sake, carry with them the virtue of wisdom and ability to learn before they are truly capable to rule. Both Confucius and Plato emphasize the importance of ruling for the people instead of for the power. Both write on how important this ruler is to keeping the country and society moral and orderly. We will look to see where these ideas align and where they do not. Both of these philosophers did have incompatible ideas that do not match up in their writings. We will explore these differences and show how each school of thought came to difference conclusions with the same goal in mind, imagining the criteria for good ruling.