Abstract: Challenging the interpretation of “Chinese world order”as the “tribute system” represented by J. K. Fairbank, J. L. Hevia recently claimed that it was the Qing Guest Ritual which embodied not only the principles and methods of the Qing court in its foreign relations, but also its broader concept of integrating world order. Moreover, Hevia emphasizes that “the Qing imagining of empire”lies in the notion that“the world was made up of a multitude of lords over whom Manchu emperors sought to position themselves as overlord.”This essay argues that, for the Manchu, the so-called system of multitude of lords and the Qing Guest Ritual were very different. Although they were connected to certain degree in the eighteenth century, the significant dissonance between them made the integration of the two as one world order unlikely.