_IN CHINA:--CONFUCIANISM, TAOUISM, AND BUDDHISM._
The creeds in vogue amongst the Chinese may be regarded as
three:--_Confucianism_, the religion of the state; _Taouism_, the religion
of the philosophers; and _Buddhism_, the religion of the people.
It has been justly said that a religion which, like Confucianism, has
exercised for twenty-four centuries a potent influence over the Chinese
mind, though owing its name and origin to a simple citizen, must possess
in it something well worthy of consideration. There must be in it a spell
which strongly attracts the popular sympathies. This spell is said to be,
though possibly we ought to search deeper and farther for it, the purely
practical character of its tenets, and the harmony which exists between
those tenets and the patriarchal character of the government and the
institutions of the country. And in fact it is not so much a religion as
an ethical system,--something such as Christianity would be, if we took
out of it JESUS CHRIST. Or we may distinguish it as “a system of
ceremonies on a moral basis,” and, as such, admirably adapted to the
tastes and needs of so ceremonial-loving a people as the Chinese. To this
day the Ly-pou watch with jealous vigilance the maintenance of all the old
traditional rites, and rigidly enforce the observance of the traditional
details in the construction of the temples. Moreover such particulars as
the six kinds of sceptres, the five kinds of mats, and the five kinds of
stools are strictly insisted upon; and it is known that the innumerable
prescribed sacrifices offered to the various gods of the heaven and the
earth, to a man’s forefathers, to the hills and the rivers, the sea and
the central mount, the god of the south pole and the god of thunder, are
the same now as they have been for upwards of 2,000 years.
The founder of Confucianism, Kong-foo-tse, or Confucius, (as the Jesuits
latinised the name,) was born about 550 B.C. in the state Loo, within the
district now called Keo-fou Hien, lying to the eastward of the great
Imperial canal, in the province of Shang-tung.
Tradition asserts that his father was a descendant of the imperial family
of Hoang-ty, of the dynasty of Chang (2,000 B.C.), and the chief minister
of his native kingdom. At an early age, as is common with most who are
destined to rise to greatness, Confucius gave indisputable proof of no
ordinary mental capacity, and these budding powers were carefully
developed by the training and tuition of the ablest masters. He was still
young when he made himself acquainted with the literature of the period,
and especially with the canonical and classical books attributed to the
ancient legislators Yam Chun, and others. His amiability of temper is
warmly commended, and no shadow of reproach rests upon his moral
character; except in so far as he exposed himself to censure by divorcing
his wife, after she had borne him a son, in order, it is said, “that he
might devote himself the more absolutely to his studies.” It is some
excuse for him that, at this time, he was only twenty. In the same year he
was appointed “superintendent of cattle,”--not exactly the ideal office
for a philosophical student. However his assiduity and fidelity soon
secured the approbation of his superiors; he was promoted to a more
influential position; and there seemed every probability of his attaining
to the highest rank, when a sudden revolution in the state for a time
obscured his prospects.
The next eight years of his life he spent in travel, assuming the role of
a religious reformer, and everywhere gathering round him a crowd of ardent
disciples, whom he instructed in the rules and principles of his ethical
system. It is said that they numbered as many as 3,000, of whom
seventy-two were specially distinguished by their devotion to their
master and their rigid observance of his tenets. Returning to Loo, when he
was about forty-three years old, he was again called to the service of the
state, and from grade to grade rose to the post of Prime Minister, or
“governor of the people.” Invested with plenary power, he proceeded, with
the ardour of an enthusiast, to realise his ideas, and rapidly brought
about a vast improvement in both the moral and physical condition of the
country. The poor were the particular objects of his care: he provided
them with plentiful supplies of cheap and good food, and released them
from the thraldom in which the nobles had held them. His energy and wisdom
extended to every department of the state; and with extraordinary
fertility of resource, he initiated measures for the extension of
commerce, the improvement of the bridges and highways, the impartial
administration of justice, and the extirpation of the robber bands which
infested the mountains. But the neighbouring sovereigns regarded with
alarm the progress of his bold reforms. No doubt they talked about
communistic and socialistic doctrines, and the advancing flood of
democracy, as timid people do in our own day. At all events they contrived
to put such a pressure upon the King of Loo that he was compelled to part
with his great minister, who fled from his enemies northward, and found
refuge in the kingdom of Tsi, on the Gulf of Petchali. For twelve, or, as
some say, fourteen years he wandered from place to place, adding to the
number of his proselytes; until spent with fatigue, and bowed down with
years, he retired with a few favourite disciples to a quiet valley in his
native land, and devoted the remainder of his life to the task of revising
and improving the famous writings which for so many centuries have been
consecrated by the devout acceptance of the Chinese. He died at the age of
seventy-three, in 477 B.C.,[30] “on the eighteenth day of the second
moon,” after a seven days’ illness. Like many other great reformers,
though but indifferently treated in his lifetime, he became after death
the object of universal admiration, and to this day the Chinese pay homage
to the memory of the “Great Master,” the “Chief Doctor,” the “Wise King of
Literature,” the “Saint,” the “Instructor of Emperors and Kings.” His
descendants have been loaded with honours and privileges, and now
constitute the only hereditary nobility in the Chinese empire. Like the
princes of the blood, they are exempt from taxation. And in every city of
the first, second, and third rank, stands at least one temple dedicated to
Confucius, where the emperor himself and the mandarins are bound to
worship, with offerings of wine, fruit, and flowers,--with burning of
fragrant gums, frankincense, and tapers of sandal wood,--and with singing
of appropriate hymns. The eighteenth day of the second moon is kept sacred
by the Chinese as the anniversary of his death.
* * * * *
We have already said that the system of Confucius was ethical rather than
religious. It is absolutely free from any theological strain, and, indeed,
makes no mention of a Creator. “How should I know God,” he would say,
“when as yet I know not man?” “His system was essentially conservative; he
aimed at the correction of new vices which had crept into the body politic
by endeavouring to restore the old customs of the country; and hence the
high favour in which his system has ever been held by the rulers and
magnates of the empire. It inculcated the most perfect subordination, the
most servile obedience, and the most scrupulous adherence to ancient
usage; every social, civil, and political duty is set forth in it with the
greatest precision; but inasmuch as all the parts of the great machine of
empire are not absolutely deprived of volition, a rebellious cog-wheel or
insignificant pinion will sometimes disarrange and impede the entire
machinery.”
Confucius held that the universe had been generated by the union of two
material principles,--a heavenly and an earthly, Yang and Ya. He
represents man as having fallen by his own act from his original purity
and happiness, and asserts that by his own act he can recover that
condition. For this purpose he must lead a life of obedience to the law,
and he must not do unto others that which he would not have others do unto
him. He made the supremacy of parental authority the basis of his
political teaching, and strongly advocated that the son’s submission to
the father must be as complete as that of the servant to the master, of
the master to the magistrate, of the magistrate to the crown, and of the
crown to the law. Of course this implied that the reciprocal obligations
must be observed. This rigid application of the family ideal to the
administration of the government, and the consequent creation of a pure
despotism, has been the cause of all that is most perplexing to Europeans
in the Chinese civilisation, and explains why it has never advanced beyond
the standard or mark to which it had attained in the era of Confucius.
The Confucian doctrines are set forth in _Gze-Chou_, “The Four Books,” and
_King_, “The Five Canonical Works,” of which the following particulars may
interest the reader.
_The Ta-heo, or “Great Study.”_
The _Ta-heo_, or “School of Adults,” has been translated by Dr. Marshman,
in the “Clavis Sinica.” It is a treatise, in two chapters, on politics and
morals, rising gradually from the government of oneself to the government
of a family, thence to the government of a province, and finally to the
control of the affairs of an empire. Its leading principle is
self-improvement, self-culture. In one of the sections an eulogium is
bestowed upon the beauty of virtue as a means of self-enjoyment. And the
book closes with a fine exhortation to be just, and truthful, and honest,
to those whom fortune places at the head of the state.
_The Chung-Yung, or “The Invariable in the Mean,”_
Also translated as “the Safe Middle Course,” and “the Infallible Medium,”
describes the golden mean, the due medium by which a man should regulate
his conduct. He is not to be lifted up by prosperity, nor cast down by
adversity. Through thirty-three sections, in language sometimes clear and
strenuous, sometimes obscure, the subject is pursued, and the whole duty
of man inculcated. Here is a passage describing a kingly man which may be
compared with one in Seneca:--
“It is only the man supremely holy, who, by the faculty of knowing
thoroughly, and comprehending perfectly the primitive laws of living
beings, is worthy of possessing supreme authority, and governing men; who
by possessing a soul, grand, firm, constant, and imperturbable, is capable
of making justice and equity reign; who by his faculty of being always
honest, simple, upright, grave, and just, is able to attract respect and
veneration; who by his faculty of being clothed with the ornaments of the
mind, and the talents procured by assiduous study, and by the
enlightenment that springs from an exact investigation of the most hidden
things, and the most subtle principles, can with accuracy discern the true
from the false, and the good from the evil.”
_The Lun-Yu, or “Philosophical Conversation.”_
This is the Chinese _Phædo_, and contains a record of the conversations
held between Confucius and his disciples, but the author lacked the
eloquence and imagination of Plato. It is interesting however from its
anecdotes of the Great Teacher. In introducing his guests, it seems that
he kept his arms extended, like the wings of a bird; that he never ate
meat which had not been cut in a straight line; that he never used his
fingers to point to anything; and that he would not occupy the mat spread
for him as a seat unless it was regularly placed.
_The Meng-tze, or “Mencius,”_
Is a Commentary upon Confucius, written about a century after his death by
his disciple Meng-tze. The subjects treated in it are of various nature.
In one part the virtues of individual life and of domestic relations are
discussed; in another, the order of affairs. Here are investigated the
duties of superiors, from the sovereign to the lowest magistrate, for the
attainment of good government. There are expounded the labours of
students, peasants, traders, artisans, while, in the course of the work,
the laws of the physical world, of the heavens and the earth, the
mountains and rivers, of birds, fishes, quadrupeds, insects, plants, and
trees, are occasionally described. The great number of affairs which
Mencius managed, in the course of his life, in his intercourse with men,
his occasional conversations with people of rank, his instructions to his
pupils, his expositions of books, ancient and modern,--all these details
are incorporated in this publication. It is a collection of historical
facts, and of the words of ancient ages, put together for the instruction
of mankind.
Mencius died when he was eighty-four years of age; his memory is revered
by the Chinese next to that of Confucius, and his descendants are treated
with a distinction inferior only to that which is accorded to those of
Confucius.
_King; or, The Five Canonical Works._
These, which were either written or compiled by Confucius, are the most
venerable existing monuments of Chinese literature, and embody the
fundamental principles of the earliest creeds and customs of China.
The first is the _Y-King_, or “Sacred Book of Changes,” which may be
termed a Chinese Cyclopædia, and contains a great variety of subjects,
morals, physics, and metaphysics. It is founded on the combinations of
sixty-four lines,--some entire, and some broken,--and called _Koua_; the
discovery of which has been attributed to Fo-hi, the traditional founder
of Chinese civilisation. He found them, it is said, on the shell of a
tortoise, and asserted that they were capable of explaining all things. It
does not seem easy, however, to explain _them_, and the commentaries upon
them are more numerous than even the commentaries upon Shakespeare. The
Imperial Library at Peking contains no fewer than 1450.
Second in order comes the _Shu-King_, or “Book of History,” which, despite
its imperfect and fragmentary condition, is full of interest. It contains
a concise narrative of Early Chinese history, down to the eighth century
before our era; including the speeches addressed by several emperors to
their high officers, and numerous valuable documents of great antiquity.
Reference is made in its pages to a great deluge, which some suppose to be
the Flood recorded in the book of Genesis, but others, with more
probability, identify with one of the early and extensive inundations of
the Hoang-Ho.
The third is the _Shi-King_, or “Book of Sacred Songs,” a collection of
311 poems, ancient, national, and official, the best of which every
well-educated Chinaman commits to memory. They range from the eighteenth
to the third century before our era, and are divided into four parts:
first, the Ku-fung, or songs of “the manners of different states;” second
and third, songs for state occasions; and fourth, Soong, a collection of
eulogies on the various emperors of the Chow dynasty. This book is
described as replete with very interesting and probably authentic
information on the ancient manners of China, and is frequently quoted by
both Confucius and Mencius, and by them recommended to the study of their
disciples.
Fourth comes the _Li-King_, or “Book of Rites and Ceremonies,” in which we
find a mass of fragments dating from the time of Confucius downwards, and
throwing a vivid light on the permanent characteristics of the Chinese
civilisation, and on the causes which made it what it is in all its iron
immutability. The ceremonial usages of China, as prescribed in this
ritual, number about 3000; and one of the six tribunals, the Ly-pou, is
specially charged with their custody and interpretation.
Fifth and last is the _Chun-tsien_, or _Tchuntsiou_, or “Book of Spring
and Autumn,” so called from the seasons in which it was respectively begun
and ended by Confucius. Here the Great Teacher has simply written down the
earlier history of his native land of Loo; with the view of recalling the
princes of his age to a conservative spirit of reverence for the customs
of the past by indicating the misfortunes that took place after they fell
into neglect.
* * * * *
Strictly speaking, Confucianism has no priests, no distinct sacerdotal
order; the emperor himself is the patriarch or head, and every magistrate,
within the sphere of his jurisdiction is a religious official or
hierophant. “Generally, all literary persons, and those who propose to
become such, in attaching themselves to it do not necessarily renounce
practices borrowed from other religions. But, in fact, faith does not seem
to have anything to do with the matter; and habit alone induces them to
conform to ceremonies which they themselves turn into ridicule--such as
divinations, horoscopes, and calculating lucky and unlucky days, all of
which superstitions are in great vogue throughout the empire.”
China possesses an enormous number of pagodas, or idol-temples; Peking
boasts of 10,000; every village has several, and they are distributed all
along the roads and all over the fields. Some are remarkable for their
splendour; but the majority do not differ in appearance, or very slightly,
from other buildings. Often they are nothing more than small chapels, in
which are niches containing idols and vases filled with burning perfumes,
or the ashes of gilt paper on which prayers have been printed, these
papers having been burnt, as a religious rite, by devotees. The
worshippers, if such they may be called, display the utmost indifference
of behaviour in these temples: they enter them to enjoy a rest or a sleep;
or they walk about with their hats on, whistling, smoking, laughing,
chattering. Round the sides are seated the vendors of the aforesaid gilt
paper prayers and pastiles; ever and anon they demand attention to their
wares by striking a gong; while the people incessantly burn paper models
of clothing, shoes, money, junks, and the like, to assist their deceased
friends on their long journey. For though the Chinese have no distinct
recognition of a future state, the worship of the dead is a prominent
element of their religion. Noble and peasant alike bring offerings, or
send them by proxy, and kneel before the shades of their ancestors: this
duty at least is always remembered, whatever other may be forgotten.
The following may be given as an example of the prayers used upon such
occasions:--
“I, Lea Kwang, second son of the third generation, presume to come before
the grave of my ancestors. Revolving years have brought again the season
of Spring; I sweep your tomb with reverence, and, prostrate, beg you to be
spiritually present, and grant that your posterity may be illustrious. At
this season I desire to recompense the root of my existence, and
reverently, therefore, before your holy spirit present the five-fold
offering of pork, fowl, duck, goose, and fish; with five fruits and the
drink _samshu_;[31] entreating that you will condescend to inspect them.
This announcement is presented on high.”
Such offerings as are not accepted by the priests are generally taken home
again to furnish full the worshipper’s own table.
* * * * *
The Ritual State Worship, which concerns the Emperor and his court, but
affects not the great body of the people, we must glance at very briefly.
It may be defined as the ceremonial of a philosophical pantheism,
unconnected with any theological doctrine. Three classes of natural
objects are distinguished, to which the “Great,” the “Medium,” and the
“Lesser” Sacrifices are offered. The first class, the _Ta-sze_, includes
the Heaven and the Earth, and along with and equal to these, the great
Temple of Imperial Ancestors. Among the _Chung-sze_, or “Medium
Sacrifices,” are the Genii, the Great Light and the Evening Light (that
is, the Sun and the Moon), the Gods of Land and Grain, the God of Letters,
and the Inventors of Agriculture, Manufactures, and the Useful Arts. To
the “Lesser Sacrifices,” or _Scaou-sze_, belong the Founder of the Art of
Healing, as well as the spirits of statesmen, scholars, and persons of
eminent virtue. They are offered also to various natural phenomena, such
as the clouds, the rain, the wind, the thunder. The God of War, and Lung
Wang, the dragon-king, who represents the rivers and streams, have their
worshippers; nor is Tien-How, the Queen of Heaven, forgotten. There are,
besides, a host of household deities, like the Lares and Penates of the
ancients, who are propitiated by domestic sacrifices at the new year, when
they are supposed to pay a brief visit to the Other World, and report, as
it were, the doings and misdoings of the families over which they preside.
The chief sacrificial seasons are these: the winter solstice for all
offered to heaven, the summer season for all offered to earth. The others
have their appointed dates. Then, in the course of the year, numerous
festivals of a more or less religious character are held. First among them
is the Imperial Ploughing of the Sacred Field, which takes place towards
the end of March. The Emperor, attended by some of the princes of the
blood and his chief ministers, then proceeds to a field on one side of the
central street in Peking, where fitting preparations have, of course, been
made. After certain sacrifices, consisting chiefly of grain preserved from
the produce of the same field, the Emperor takes the plough, and drives a
few furrows. His example is followed by the princes and ministers in
succession: a red tablet indicating the space allotted to each
distinguished amateur. The “five sorts of grain” are then sown; and when
the Emperor has seen the work completed by the attendant husbandmen, the
field is committed to the charge of an officer whose business it is to
collect and store the produce with a view to future sacrifices to the Gods
of the Harvest.
* * * * *
Of the _Shae-tung_, or Feast of Lanterns, every traveller has spoken.
There are also the _Too-te-tan_, or birthdays of the familiar gods of the
city; the _Tsing-ming-tsee_, or Feast of Tombs; the festivals of all and
sundry deities; and the birthdays of the living Emperor and Empress, as
well as the anniversaries of the deaths of their predecessors, which,
however, are observed only by the mandarins. So numerous are the festivals
that were they celebrated everywhere by everybody there would be neither
“time” nor “hands” for the works of agriculture or commerce, trade,
science, or the arts.
* * * * *
We pass on to a brief account of
TAOUISM.
The founder of Taouism, the doctrine of Tao, or Reason, was a celebrated
philosopher named Lao-tsze, who was born in the third year of the Emperor
Ting-wang, of the Chow dynasty (B.C. 604) in the state of Tseu, now known
as Hoo-pih and Hoo-nan. He preceded Confucius by half a century. His
family name was _Le_, or Plum, and his youthful name, _Urh_, or Ear, in
allusion to the exceptional size of his “auricular appendages.” The events
of his career are so obscured in an atmosphere of legend and fable,
created by admiring disciples, that it is difficult to get at any
authentic particulars; but he seems to have been an assiduous student, and
the historian or chronologist of a king of the Chow dynasty. Visiting,
about B.C. 600, the western parts of China, he gained there a knowledge of
the system of Fo, or Buddha, and soon afterwards began to develope his own
religious teaching. So great was his fame that Confucius went to see him;
but the interview was hardly of the character that might have been
expected when two religious philosophers met. Lao-tsze reproached the
younger sage with pride and ostentation and vanity, affirming that
philosophers loved retirement and seclusion, and made no boast of virtue
and knowledge. It speaks well for the good nature of Confucius that he
replied to this tirade by highly commending Lao-tsze to his followers, and
describing him as a dragon soaring to the clouds of Heaven, unsurpassed
and unsurpassable.
Lao-tsze inquired of Confucius if he had discovered the _Taou_, the “path”
or “reason” by which Heaven acts, and was informed that the philosopher
had searched for it unsuccessfully. Lao-tsze replied that the wealthy
dismissed their friends with presents, and sages theirs with good counsel;
and that for himself, he humbly claimed to be thought a sage--an indirect
way of advising Confucius to continue his quest of the _Taou_. Retiring to
Han-kwan, he wrote there his _Taou-tih-king_, or Book of Reason and
Virtue. He died, or as his followers say, ascended to Heaven on a black
buffalo, in the twenty-first year of the reign of King-wang of the Chow or
Cheu dynasty, or B.C. 523, having attained the age of 119 years.[32]
The contrast between the system of Lao-tsze and that of Confucius may be
indicated in a word: the former was _speculative_, the latter _practical_,
and it is no wonder, therefore that the latter, addressing itself to man’s
actual necessities and daily duties, prevailed over the former. But, in an
abstract sense, Lao’s, as originally defined by himself, was the purer and
more elevated; for it aimed at securing the immortality of man through the
contemplation of GOD, the subjugation of the passions, and the absolute
tranquillity of the soul. He taught that Silence and the Void generated
the Taou, the “Logos” or reason by which movement was produced; and that
all beings containing in themselves the duality of male and female sprang
from them.
Man, he said, was composed of two principles, the material and the
spiritual: from the latter he emanated, and to it he ought to return, by
throwing off the fetters and snares of the world, crushing out the
material passions, the desires of the soul, and the pleasures of the body,
and abandoning riches, honours, and the ties of life.
Before Lao-tsze’s time, the Chinese seem to have worshipped the
_Shang-te_, or Supreme Ruler, and the _Tien_, or Heaven: but Lao-tsze
preached in their place the _Taou_, or “reason” of the Kosmos. Of a
Supreme Creative and Eternal Power he had no conception. There was as
little theology in his system as in that of Confucius; but its morality
was not less admirable; it insisted on the practice of those virtues which
form the moral code of all the higher religions,--charity, benevolence,
chastity, and the free-will, moral agency, and responsibility of man. But
there was an obscurity about Lao-tsze’s teaching, which enabled his
followers successfully to pervert it, and it gradually assumed a form
which the Teacher himself would undoubtedly have been the first to
repudiate. The Taossi, as they were called, professed to have discovered
the drink of immortality, and practised divination, alchemy, the
invocation of spirits, and other superstitious rites. These follies were
gravely ridiculed by the Joo-Keaou, or sect of Confucius, and gradually
were abandoned by all but the most illiterate.
Among the host of deities worshipped by this sect we may instance the
_San-tsing_, or “Three Pure Ones,” the three-fold ruler of the assembled
gods in heaven, the sun, the moon, and the stars, who delivers his name
and benevolent commands to be promulgated amongst mankind, that all who
see and recite that name may be delivered from all evil, and obtain
infinite happiness. “It is impossible to doubt,” says a writer, “that we
see here traces of a Divine revelation, corrupted though it has now
become. China has her Trinity in Taouism as well as in Buddhism; as other
Pagan nations have had theirs in the Orphic mythology, where there were
‘counsel, and light, and life;’ in the Platonic theology, which had its
‘good, and mind, and the soul of the world,’ as in the Egyptian mysteries
there were ‘On, and Isis, and Neith;’ and in that of Fo, ‘Brahma, Vishnu,
and Seeva.’”
The Taossi, Tien-sze, or “Celestial Doctors,”--the priests of
Taouism,--are outwardly distinguished amongst the Chinese by the manner in
which they dress their hair. They shave the sides of the head, and coil
the remaining hair in a tuft on the crown. Moreover, they wear
slate-coloured robes. There are two orders; one, the keepers of the
temples, vowed to celibacy; the others, who are free to marry, live in
their own houses, or wander about the country selling charms and medical
nostrums. In the feast of one of their deities, the “High Emperor of all
the Sombre Heavens,” they assemble before his temple, and having kindled a
huge fire, about fifteen or twenty feet in diameter, go over it barefoot,
carrying the gods in their arms. “They firmly assert,” says Williams,
“that if they possess a sincere mind they will not be injured by the fire;
but both priests and people get miserably burnt on these occasions.”
Escayrac de Lauture says that they leap, dance, and whirl round the fire,
striking at the devils with a straight Roman-like sword, and sometimes
wounding themselves as the priests of Baal and Moloch were wont to do.
* * * * *
Some interesting particulars of the Buddhist temples of China are supplied
by Mr. Fortune. He speaks of the temple of Tien-tung as a congeries of
temples, a collection of spacious structures, which occupy the site of
former buildings. All of these are crowded with idols, or images of the
favourite gods, such as the “Three precious Buddhas,” “the Queen of
Heaven,” represented as sitting on the celebrated lotus or nelumbium--“the
God of War,” and many other deified kings and great men of former days.
Many of these images are from thirty to forty feet in height, and have a
striking appearance as they stand arranged in the spacious lofty halls.
The priests themselves reside in a range of low buildings, erected at
right angles with the different temples and courts that divide them. Each
has a little temple under his own roof; a family altar crowded with petty
images, where he is often engaged in private devotion.
Mr. Fortune, after inspecting the various temples and the belfry, which
contains a noble bronze bell of large dimensions, was conducted to the
house of the principal priest, where dinner was already spread upon the
table. The Buddhist priests are not permitted to eat animal food at any of
their meals. The dinner, therefore, consisted entirely of vegetables,
served _à la Chinoise_, in numerous small round basins, the contents of
each--soups excepted--being cut up into small square bits, to be eaten
with chopsticks. The Buddhist priests contrive to procure a quantity of
vegetables of different kinds, which, by a peculiar mode of preparation,
are rendered very savoury. “In fact,” says Mr. Fortune,[33] “so nearly do
they resemble animal food in taste and in appearance, that at first we
were deceived, imagining that the little bits we were able to get hold of
with our chopsticks were really pieces of fowl or beef. Such, however, was
not the case, as our good host was consistent on this day at least, and
had nothing but vegetable productions at his table. Several other priests
sat with us at table, and a large number of others of inferior rank with
servants, crowded around the doors and windows outside.”
During dinner, Mr. Fortune learned that about a hundred priests were
connected with the monastery, but that many were always about on missions
to various parts of the country. A considerable portion of land in the
vicinity belonged to the temple, and supplied its revenue: large sums were
raised every year from the sale of bamboos, which are here very excellent,
and of the branches of trees and brushwood, which are made up in bundles
for firewood. Many rice and tea farms also belong to the priests and are
cultivated by them. In addition to the sums thus raised, a considerable
revenue must accrue from the contributions of the devotees who frequent
the temple, as well as from the alms and donations collected by the
mendicant priests of the order, who are sent out on begging excursions at
stated periods of the year. There are, of course, all grades of priests;
some being merely the servants of the others, both domestic and
agricultural.
The temple forms the centre of a fine landscape. It stands at the head of
a fertile valley, with green hills all around it; this valley echoes with
the music of several bright mountain streams, and yields abundant crops of
rice. On the lower slopes of the more fertile hills grow masses of tea
shrubs, with dark green leaves, lending a fine background to the picture.
A long avenue of Chinese pine trees leads up to the temple. At first it is
straight, but near the temple it winds picturesquely round the edges of
the artificial lakes, to end at a flight of stone steps. Behind, and on
each side, the mountains rise in irregular ridges, from 1,000 to 2,000
feet above the sea level; not bare and desolate like the mountains of the
south, but clothed to their tops with a dense tropical-looking growth of
brushwood, shrubs, and trees. Some of the finest bamboos of China flourish
in the ravines, and the sombre-coloured pine attains to a large size on
the acclivities.
A quaint account of the origin of the monastery was given by one of the
head priests:--
“Many hundred years ago a pious old man retired from the world, and came
to dwell in these mountains, giving himself up entirely to the performance
of religious duties. So earnest was he in his devotions that he neglected
everything relating to his temporal wants, even to his daily food.
Providence, however, would not suffer so good a man to starve. Some boys
were sent in a miraculous manner, who daily supplied him with food. In the
course of time the fame of the sage extended all over the adjacent
country, and disciples flocked to him from all quarters. A small range of
temples was built, and thus commenced the extensive buildings which now
bear the name of ‘Tien-tung,’ or the ‘Temple of the Heavenly Boys;’ _Tien_
signifying heaven, and _tung_, a boy. At last the old man died, but his
disciples supplied his place. The fame of the temple spread far and wide,
and votaries came from the most distant parts of the empire--one of the
Chinese kings being amongst the number--to worship and leave their
offerings at its altars. Larger temples were built in front of the
original ones, and these again in their turn gave way to those spacious
buildings which form the principal part of the structure of the present
day.”
Mr. Fortune remarks that a large number of Buddhist temples are scattered
over all this part of the country. Their architects have shown as keen a
sympathy with nature as the Cistercian founders in Europe, always building
them in the most lovely and picturesque situations, amongst the green
hills, and in the shelter of spreading woods--the leafy enclosures that in
England indicate the presence of an old manor house, or “ancestral hall.”
_Poo-to_, or the Worshipping Island, as foreigners call it, is one of the
eastern islands in the Chusan Archipelago, and seems to be one of the
great Buddhist centres. The principal group of temples is situated in a
fine romantic glen, and from the high ground above it, seems like a town
of considerable size. As the traveller approaches nearer, he finds the
view of great interest. In front extends a large artificial pond, filled
with the broad green leaves and noble red and white flowers of the
nelumbium speciosum,--a plant in high favour with the Chinese. Access to
the monastery is obtained by a very ornamental bridge thrown across this
piece of water.
The temples or halls containing the idols are extremely spacious; many of
the idols are thirty or forty feet high, generally made of wood or clay,
and then richly gilt. In a temple of far less pretentious character than
any of the others Mr. Fortune met with some exquisite bronze statues, of
undoubted value.
Having examined these temples, our traveller made his way towards another
group of them, about two miles to the eastward, and close on the sea
shore. Entering the courts through a kind of triumphal arch, which looked
out upon the sapphire sea, he found that these temples were constructed on
the same plan.
On the following day he inspected various parts of the island. In addition
to the larger temples just noticed, about sixty or seventy smaller ones
are built on all the hill sides, each containing three or four priests,
who are all under the abbot, or superior, residing near one of the large
temples. “Even on the top of the highest hill,” he says, “probably 1,500
or 1,800 feet above the level of the sea, we found a temple of
considerable size and in excellent repair. There are winding stone steps
from the sea-beach all the way up to this temple, and a small
resting-place about half-way up the hill, where the weary devotee may
rest and drink of the refreshing stream which flows down the sides of the
mountain, and in the little temple close at hand, which is also crowded
with idols, he can supplicate Buddha for strength to enable him to reach
the end of his journey. We were surprised to find a Buddhist temple in
such excellent order as the one on the summit of the hill proved to be in.
It is a striking fact, that almost all these places are crumbling fast
into ruins. There are a few exceptions, in cases where they happen to get
a good name amongst the people from the supposed kindness of the gods; but
the great mass are in a state of decay.”
The island of Poo-to is nothing but a residence for Buddhist priests, and
no other persons are allowed to live there but their servants and
attendants. No women are admitted, as the principles of Buddhism insist
upon sacerdotal celibacy. There are about 2,000 priests, many of whom are
constantly absent on begging expeditions for the maintenance of their
religion. On certain high days, at different periods of the year, many
thousands of both sexes, but more particularly females, visit these
temples, clothed in their gayest attire, to pay their vows and engage in
the other practices of heathen worship. In the temples or at the doorways
stand little stalls, for the sale of incense, candles, paper made up to
resemble ingots of Sycee-silver, and other holy things, which are regarded
as acceptable offerings to the gods, and are either consumed in the
temples or carried home to bring, it is supposed, a blessing upon the
homes and families of their purchasers. The profits of these sales go, of
course, to the maintenance of the establishment. Whatever we may think of
the superstitious character of Buddhism, it is impossible to doubt the
sincerity of its disciples, when we find them sometimes travelling a
distance of several hundred miles to worship in their temples.
“I was once staying,” says Fortune,[34] “in the temple of Tien-tung when
it was visited for three days by devotees from all parts of the country.
As they lined the roads on their way to the temple, clad in the graceful
and flowing costumes of the East, the mind was naturally led back to
those days of Scripture History when Jerusalem was in its glory, and the
Jews, the chosen people of God, came from afar to worship in its temple.”
Mr. Gutzlaff, the missionary, is of opinion that the priests and devotees
of Buddhism entertain no sincere conviction of the truth of their creed.
Describing a visit to Poo-to, he says: “We were present at the vespers of
the priests, which they chanted in the Pali language, not unlike the Latin
service of the Romish Church. They held rosaries in their hands, which
rested folded upon their breasts. One of them had a small bell, by the
tinkling of which their service was regulated; and they occasionally beat
the drum and large bell to rouse Buddha’s attention to their prayers. The
same words were a hundred times repeated. None of the officiating persons
showed any interest in the ceremony, for some were looking round laughing
and joking, while others muttered their prayers. The few people who were
present, not to attend the worship, but to gaze at us, did not seem, in
the least degree, to feel the solemnity of the service.” But to condemn
the whole Buddhist sect from this solitary instance would be as reasonable
as to pronounce all Protestants insincere because a West-end congregation
in London may have shown signs of frivolity and indifference! Mr. Fortune,
on the contrary, declares that he was much impressed by the solemnity with
which the devotional exercises of the Buddhists were generally conducted.
“I have often walked,” he says, “into Chinese temples when the priests
were engaged in prayer, and although there would have been some apology
for them had their attention been diverted, they went on in the most
solemn manner until the conclusion of the service, as if no foreigner were
present. They then came politely up to me, examining my dress and
everything about me with the most earnest curiosity. Nor does this apply
to priests only; the laity, and particularly the female sex, seem equally
sincere when they engage in their public devotions. Whether they are what
they appear to be, or how often they are in this pious frame of mind, are
questions which I cannot answer. Before judging harshly of the Chinese,
let the reader consider what effect would be produced upon the members of
a Christian church by the unexpected entrance of a small-footed Chinese
lady, or a Mandarin, with the gold button and peacock feather mounted on
his hat, and his long tail dangling over his shoulders. I am far from
being an admirer of the Buddhist priesthood; they are generally an
imbecile race, and shamefully ignorant of everything but the simple forms
of their religion, but nevertheless there are many traits in their
character not unworthy of imitation.”
The superstitious credulity of the Chinese is demonstrated by the nature
of their various religious ceremonies. In all the southern towns every
house has its temple or altar, both within and without. In the interior
the altar generally occupies the end of the principal hall or shop, as the
case may be; is raised a few feet from the ground, and adorned with an
effigy of the household god, enveloped in gaudy tinsel paper. By the way,
of what we call “taste,” the Chinese do not seem to know even the
rudiments; nor do they appear to have any feeling for harmony of colour or
proportion. On the first day of the Chinese month, and other festivals,
candles and incense flare and smoke on the table in front of it. The altar
outside the door is like to a small furnace, and here the same ceremonies
are regularly performed.
The traveller, as he passes in the neighbourhood of small villages, or in
even more sequestered localities, comes upon little joss-houses or
temples, all glaringly decorated in the same style with paintings and
tinsel paper, and stuck round about with bits of candles and sticks of
incense. Shops for the sale of idols of all kinds and sizes, but of
unvarying ugliness, at prices varying from a few pence to many pounds, are
found in all the large towns. Some are evidently very ancient, and have
passed through the hands of a long succession of proprietors. It is a
capital custom--is it not?--when you are tired of your god, because he
does not fulfil your wishes, to purchase another and a more powerful at a
slight increase of price! A deity who would really gratify _all_ our
petitions would be worth--so far as this world is concerned--a heavy sum!
* * * * *
Nothing in China is more remarkable than the periodical offerings of a
Chinese family to its gods. The traveller already cited witnessed such a
ceremony in a house at Shanghai. The principal hall was duly set out at an
early hour in the morning; a large table was placed in the centre; and
shortly afterwards covered with small dishes filled with the various
articles commonly used as food by the Chinese. All these were of the very
best description which could be procured. After a certain time had elapsed
numerous candles were lighted, and from the burning incense rose columns
of fragrant smoke. The inmates of the house and their friends were all
clothed in their best attire, and came in turn to _ko-too_, or bow lowly
and repeatedly in front of the table and the altar. “The scene,” says our
authority, “although it was an idolatrous one, seemed to me to have
something very impressive about it, and whilst I pitied the delusion of
our host and his friends, I could not but admire their devotion. In a
short time after this ceremony was completed a large quantity of tinsel
paper, made up in the form and shape of the ingots of Sycee silver common
in China, was heaped on the floor in front of the tables, the burning
incense was then taken from the table and placed in the midst of it, and
the whole consumed together. By-and-by, when the gods were supposed to
have finished their repast, all the articles of food were removed from the
tables, cut up, and consumed by people connected with the family.”
On another occasion, Mr. Fortune, when at Ning-po, having been abroad all
day, did not return to the city until nightfall. The city gates were
closed, but, on knocking, he was admitted by the warder. Passing into the
widest and finest street in the city, he observed a blaze of light and a
general liveliness very unusual in any Chinese town after dark. The sounds
of music fell upon his ear, the monotonous beat of the drum and gong, and
the more pleasing and varied tones of several wind instruments. On
approaching nearer he discovered that a public offering was being made to
the gods, and it proved to be a more striking scene than he could have
anticipated. The table was spread in the open street, and all the
preparations were on a large and expensive scale. Instead of small dishes,
whole animals were sacrificed. On one side of the table was placed a pig,
on the other a sheep; the former, scraped clean in the usual fashion, the
latter skinned; of both the entrails had been removed, and on both were
placed flowers, an onion, and a knife. The other parts of the table
“groaned” with the delicacies in vogue among the more respectable Chinese,
such as fowls, ducks, numerous compound dishes, fruits, vegetables, and
rice. At one end of the table, when the gods were supposed to sit during
the meal, chairs were set; and chopsticks were laid in order by the side
of every dish. The whole place glared with light, and wreaths of incense
filled the air with sweet odours. At intervals, bands of musicians struck
up the favourite national airs, which are all of a plaintive cast, and
altogether the scene was a strange and curious revelation of human
superstition.[35]
* * * * *
Processions in honour of the gods are of frequent occurrence. Mr. Fortune
speaks of one which he saw at Shanghai as at least a mile in length. The
gods, or josses, arrayed in the finest silks, were carried about in
splendid sedan-chairs, in the centre of a long train of devotees, all
superbly dressed for the occasion, and all bearing their different
insignia of office. The dresses of the officials exactly resembled those
of some of the attendants who figure in the suite of the higher mandarins.
Some wore on the sides of their hats a broad fan, composed of
peacock-feathers; others strutted in gaudy theatrical costumes, with two
long black feathers stuck, like horns, in their low caps. The scowling
executioners carried long conical black hats on their heads, and whips in
their hands, for the prompt chastisement of the refractory. Bands of
music, in different parts of the procession, played at intervals as it
marched along.
On arriving at a temple in the suburbs, it came to a halt. The gods were
taken out of the sedan-chairs, and with a great exhibition of reverence,
replaced in the temple, from which they had been removed in the morning.
Then their worshippers bent low before their altars, burning incense, and
depositing their gifts. Numerous groups of well-dressed ladies and their
children were scattered over the ground in the neighbourhood of the
temple; all were kneeling, and apparently they conducted their devotions
with great earnestness. A large quantity of paper, in the shape of the
Sycee silver ingots, was piled up on the grass by the different devotees,
and when the ceremonies of the day were being brought to a conclusion, the
whole was burned in honour of, or as an offering to, the gods.