Abstract: Yan family were both Confucian and Buddhists. Although the creation of YanShiJiaXun was based on Confucianism, the educational thoughts as reflected in the book are vastly different from that of Confucius in terms of subject selection, research methods, examples, and purpose of working hard. Using the method of word frequency statistics in library and information science and mapping knowledge representation, the paper analyses the texts of YanShiJiaXun and The Analects, and demonstrates their correlation and difference regarding education philosophies.

Key words: Confucius, Yan Zhitui, Education thoughts, Word frequency statistics, Comparative study