nauseous articles,[740] who spend more than they should upon wine, who
kidnap human beings for sale, who steal clothes and ornaments from
coffins, who break up dead men’s bones for medicine, who separate
people from their relatives, who sell the girl brought up in the house
to be their son’s wife, who allow their wives[741] to drown female
children, who stifle their illegitimate offspring, who unite to cheat
another in gambling, who act as tutors without being properly strict,
and thus wrong their pupils, who beat and injure their slaves without
estimating the punishment by the fault, who regard districts entrusted
to their charge in the light of so much spoil, who disobey their
elders, who talk at random and go back on their word, who stir up
others to quarrel and fight--all these shall, upon verification of
their sins, be taken from the great Gehenna and passed through the
proper wards, to be forwarded when their time has expired to the
Eighth Court, again to be tortured according to their deserts.
All things may not be used as drugs. It is bad enough to slay birds,
beasts, reptiles, and fishes, in order to prepare medicine for the
sick; but to use red lead and many of the filthy messes in vogue is
beyond all bounds of decency, and those who foul their mouths with
these nasty mixtures, no matter how virtuous they may otherwise be,
will not only derive no benefit from saying their prayers, but will be
punished for so doing without mercy.
Ye who hear these words make haste to repent! From to-day forbear to
take life, buy many birds and animals in order to set them free,[742]
and every morning when you wash your teeth mutter a prayer to Buddha.
Thus, when your last hour comes, a good angel will stand by your side
and purify you of your former sins.
Some steal the bones of people who have been burnt to death or the
bodies of illegitimate children, for the purpose of compounding
medicines; others steal skulls and bones (from graves) with the same
object. Worst of all are those who carry off bones by the basketful,
using the hard ones for making various articles and grinding down the
soft ones for the manufacture of pottery.[743] These, no matter what
may have been their good works on earth, will not obtain thereby any
remission of punishment; but when they are brought down below, the
Ruler of the Infernal Regions will first pass them from the great
Gehenna into the proper wards, and will send instructions to the Tenth
Court that when they are born again on earth it shall be either
without ears, or eyes, hand, foot, mouth, lips, or nose, or maimed in
some way or other. Yet such as have thus sinned may still avoid this
punishment, if only they are willing to pray and repent, vowing never
to sin again. Or if they buy coffins for the poor and persuade others
to do likewise, by these means giving a decent burial to many
corpses--then, when the death-summons comes, the Spirits of the Home
and Hearth will make a black mark upon the warrant, and punishment
will be remitted.
Sometimes, when there is a famine, people have nothing to eat and die
of hunger, and wicked men, almost before the breath is out of their
bodies, cut them up and sell their flesh to others for food--a horrid
crime indeed. Those who are guilty of such practices will, on arrival
in the lower regions, be tortured in the various Courts for the space
of forty-nine[744] days, and then the judge of the Tenth Court will be
instructed to notify the judge of the First Court to put them down in
his register for a new birth,--if among men, as hungry famished
outcasts, and if among animals as loathing the food that falls to
their lot, and by-and-by perishing of hunger. Such is their reward.
Besides the above, those who have eaten what is unfit for food and
willingly continue to do so, will be punished either among men or
animals according to their deserts. Their throats will swell, and
though devoured by hunger they will be unable to swallow, and thus
die. Those who do not err a second time may be forgiven as they
deserve; but those who in times of distress subscribe money for the
sufferers, prepare gruel, give away rice to the needy, or distribute
ginger tea[745] and soup in the open street, and thus sustain life a
little longer and do real good to their fellow creatures--all these
shall not only obtain remission of their sins, but carry on a balance
of good to their account which shall ensure them a happy old age in
the life to come.[746]
Of the above three clauses, two were proposed by the officials
attached to this Seventh Court, the third by the Chief Justice of the
great Gehenna, and the whole submitted together for the approval of
God, the following Rescript being obtained:--“Let it be as proposed;
let the three clauses be copied into the _Divine Panorama_, and let
the officials concerned be promoted or rewarded. Also, in case of
crimes other than those already provided for, let such be punished
according to the statutes of the Rulers of the Four Continents on
earth, and let any evasion of punishment and implication of innocent
people be at once reported by the proper officials for our
consideration. This from the Throne! Obey!”
O ye sons and daughters of men, if on the 27th of the 3rd moon,
fasting and turned towards the north, ye register a vow to pray and
repent, and to publish the whole of the _Divine Panorama_ for the
enlightenment of mankind, then ye may escape the bitterness of this
Seventh Court.
THE EIGHTH COURT.
His Infernal Majesty, Tu Shih, reigns at the bottom of the great
Ocean, due east below the Wu-chiao rock, in a vast noisy Court many
leagues in extent, subdivided into sixteen wards as follows:--
In the first, the wicked souls are rolled down mountains in carts. In
the second, they are shut up in huge saucepans. In the third, they are
minced. In the fourth, their noses, eyes, mouths, &c. are stopped up.
In the fifth, their uvulas are cut off. In the sixth, they are exposed
to all kinds of filth. In the seventh, their extremities are cut off.
In the eighth, their viscera[747] are fried. In the ninth, their
marrow is cauterized. In the tenth, their bowels are scratched. In the
eleventh, they are inwardly burned with fire. In the twelfth, they are
disembowelled. In the thirteenth, their chests are torn open. In the
fourteenth, their skulls are split and their teeth dragged out. In the
fifteenth, they are hacked and gashed. In the sixteenth, they are
pricked with steel prongs.
Those who are unfilial, who do not nourish their relatives while alive
or bury them when dead, who subject their parents to fright, sorrow,
or anxiety--if they do not quickly repent them of their former sins,
the spirit of the Hearth will report their misdoings and gradually
deprive them of what prosperity they may be enjoying. Those who
indulge in magic and sorcery will, after death, when they have been
tortured in the other Courts, be brought here to this Court, and
dragged backwards by bull-headed horse-faced devils to be thrust into
the great Gehenna. Then when they have been tortured in the various
wards they will be passed on to the Tenth Court, whence at the
expiration of a _kalpa_[748] they will be sent back to earth with
changed heads and faces for ever to find their place amongst the brute
creation. But those who believe in the _Divine Panorama_, and on the
1st of the 4th moon make a vow of repentance, repeating the same every
night and morning to the Spirit of the Hearth, shall, by virtue of one
of three characters, _obedient_, _acquiescent_, or _repentant_, to be
traced on their foreheads at death by the Spirit of the Hearth,
escape half the punishments from the first to the Seventh Court
inclusive, and escape this Eighth Court altogether, being passed on to
the Ninth Court, where cases of arson and poisoning are investigated,
and finally born again from the Tenth Court among mankind as before.
To this God added, “Whosoever may circulate the _Divine Panorama_ for
the information of the world at large shall escape all punishment from
the First to the Eighth Court inclusive. Passing through the Ninth and
Tenth Courts, they shall be born again amongst men in some happy
state.”
THE NINTH COURT.
His Infernal Majesty, P‘ing Têng, reigns at the bottom of the great
Ocean, away to the south-west, below the Wu-chiao rock. His is the
vast, circular hell of A-pi, many leagues in breadth, jealously
enclosed by an iron net, and subdivided into sixteen wards, as
follows:--
In the first, the wicked souls have their bones beaten and their
bodies scorched. In the second, their muscles are drawn out and their
bones rapped. In the third, ducks eat their heart and liver. In the
fourth, dogs eat their intestines and lungs. In the fifth, they are
splashed with hot oil. In the sixth, their heads are crushed in a
frame, and their tongues and teeth are drawn out. In the seventh,
their brains are taken out and their skulls filled with hedge-hogs. In
the eighth, their heads are steamed and their brains scraped. In the
ninth, they are dragged about by sheep till they drop to pieces. In
the tenth, they are squeezed in a wooden press and pricked on the
head. In the eleventh, their hearts are ground in a mill. In the
twelfth, boiling water drips on to their bodies. In the thirteenth,
they are stung by wasps. In the fourteenth, they are tortured by ants
and maggots; they are then stewed, and finally wrung out (like
clothes). In the fifteenth, they are stung by scorpions. In the
sixteenth, they are tortured by venomous snakes, crimson and scarlet.
All who on earth have committed one of the ten great crimes, and have
deserved either the lingering death, decapitation, strangulation, or
other punishment, shall, after passing through the tortures of the
previous Courts, be brought to this Court, together with those guilty
of arson, of making _ku_ poison,[749] bad books, stupefying drugs, and
many other disgraceful acts. Then, if it be found that, hearkening to
the words of the _Divine Panorama_, they subsequently destroyed the
blocks of these books, burnt their prescriptions, and ceased
practising the magical art, they shall escape the punishments of this
Court and be passed on to the Tenth Court, thence to be born again
amongst the sons of men. But if, having heard the warnings of the
_Divine Panorama_, they still continue to sin, from the Second to the
Eighth Court their tortures shall be increased. They shall be bound on
to a hollow copper pillar, clasping it round with their hands and
feet. Then the pillar shall be filled with fierce fire, so as to burn
into their heart and liver; and afterwards their feet shall be plunged
into the great Gehenna of A-pi, knives shall be thrust into their
lungs, they shall bite their own hearts, and gradually sink to the
uttermost depths of hell, there to endure excruciating torments until
the victims of their wickedness have either recovered the property out
of which they were cheated, or the life that was taken away from them,
and until every trace of book, prescription, picture, &c. formerly
used by these wicked souls has disappeared from the face of the earth.
Then, and only then, may they pass into the Tenth Court to be born
again in one of the Six States of existence.
O ye who have committed such crimes as these, on the 8th of the 4th
moon, or the 1st or 15th (of any moon), fasting swear that you will
buy up all bad books and magical pamphlets and utterly destroy them
with fire; or that you will circulate copies of the _Divine Panorama_
to be a warning to others! Then, when your last moment is at hand, the
Spirit of the Hearth will write on your forehead the two words _He
obeyed_, and from the Second up to the Ninth Court your good deeds
will be rewarded by a diminution of such punishments as you have
incurred. People in the higher ranks of life who secure incendiaries
or murderers, who destroy the blocks of bad books, or publish notices
warning others, and offer rewards for the production of such books,
will be rewarded by the success of their sons and grandsons at the
public examinations. Poor people who, by a great effort, manage to
have the _Divine Panorama_ circulated for the benefit of mankind, will
be forwarded at once to the Tenth Court, and thence be born again in
some happy state on earth.
THE TENTH COURT.
His Infernal Majesty, Chuan Lun,[750] reigns in the Dark Land, due
east, away below the Wu-chiao rock, just opposite the Wu-cho of this
world. There he has six bridges, of gold, silver, jade, stone, wood,
and planks, over which all souls must pass. He examines the shades
that are sent from the other courts, and, according to their deserts,
sends them back to earth as men, women, old, young, high, low, rich,
or poor, forwarding monthly a list of their names to the judge of the
First Court for transmission to Fêng-tu.[751]
The regulations provide that all beasts, birds, fishes, and insects,
whether biped, quadruped, or otherwise, shall after death become
_chien_,[752] to be born again for long and short lives alternately.
But such as may possibly have taken life, and such as must necessarily
have taken life, will pass through a revolution of the Wheel, and
then, when their sins have been examined, they will be sent up on
earth to receive the proper retribution. At the end of every year a
report will be forwarded to Fêng-tu.
Those scholars who study the Book of Changes, or priests who chant
their liturgies, cannot be tortured in the Ten Courts for the sins
they have committed. When they come to this Court their names and
features are taken down in a book kept for the purpose, and they are
forwarded to Mother Mêng, who drives them on to the Terrace of
Oblivion and doses them with the draught of forgetfulness. Then they
are born again in the world for a day, a week, or it may be a year,
when they die once more; and now, having forgotten the holy words of
the Three Religions,[753] they are carried off by devils to the
various Courts, and are properly punished for their former crimes.
All souls whose balance of good and evil is exact, whose period, or
whose crimes are many and good deeds few, as soon as their future
state has been decided,--man, woman, beautiful, ugly, comfort, toil,
wealth, or poverty, as the case may be,--must pass through the Terrace
of Oblivion.
Amongst those shades, on their way to be born again in the world of
human beings, there are often to be found women who cry out that they
have some old and bitter wrong to avenge,[754] and that rather than be
born again amongst men they would prefer to enter the ranks of hungry
devils.[755] On examining them more closely it generally comes out
that they are the virtuous victims of some wicked student, who may
perhaps have an eye to their money, and accordingly dresses himself
out to entrap them, or promises marriage when sometimes he has a wife
already, or offers to take care of an aged mother or a late husband’s
children. Thus the foolish women are beguiled, and put their property
in the wicked man’s hands. By-and-by he turns round upon and reviles
them, and, losing face in the eyes of their relatives and friends,
with no one to redress their wrong, they are driven to commit suicide.
Then, hearing[756] that their seducer is likely to succeed at the
examination, they beg and implore to be allowed to go back and compass
his death. Now, although what they urge is true enough, yet that man’s
destiny may not be worked out, or the transmitted effects of his
ancestors’ virtue may not have passed away;[757] therefore, as a
compromise, these injured shades are allowed to send a spirit to the
Examination Hall to hinder and confuse him in the preparation of his
paper, or to change the names on the published list of successful
candidates; and finally, when his hour arrives, to proceed with the
spirit who carries the death-summons, seize him, and bring him to the
First Court of judgment.
Ye who on the 17th of the 4th moon swear to carry out the precepts of
the _Divine Panorama_, and frequently make these words the subject of
your conversation, may in the life to come be born again amongst men
and escape official punishments, fire, flood, and all accidents to the
body.
The place where the Wheel of Fate goes round is many leagues in
extent, enclosed on all sides by an iron palisade. Within are
eighty-one subdivisions, each of which has its proper officers and
magisterial appointments. Beyond the palisade there is a labyrinth of
108,000 paths leading by direct and circuitous routes back to earth.
Inside it is as dark as pitch, and through it pass the spirits of
priest and layman alike. But to one who looks from the outside
everything is seen as clear as crystal, and the attendants who guard
the place all have the faces and features they had at their birth.
These attendants are chosen from virtuous people who in life were
noted for filial piety, friendship, or respect for life, and are sent
here to look after the working of the Wheel and such duties. If for a
space of five years they make no mistakes they are promoted to a
higher office; but if found to be lazy or careless they are reported
to the Throne for punishment.
Those who in life have been unfilial or have destroyed much life, when
they have been tortured in the various Courts are brought here and
beaten to death with peach twigs. They then become _chien_, and with
changed heads and altered faces are turned out into the labyrinth to
proceed by the path which ends in the brute creation.
Birds, beasts, fishes and insects, may after many myriads of _kalpas_
again resume their original shapes; and if there are any that during
three existences do not destroy life, they may be born amongst human
beings as a reward, a record being made and their names forwarded to
the First Court for approval. But all shades of men and women must
proceed to the Terrace of Oblivion.
Mother Mêng was born in the Earlier Han Dynasty. In her childhood she
studied books of the Confucian school; when she grew up she chanted
the liturgies of Buddha. Of the past and the future she had no care,
but occupied herself in exhorting mankind to desist from taking life
and become vegetarians. At eighty-one years of age her hair was white
and her complexion like a child’s. She lived and died a virgin,
calling herself simply Mêng; but men called her Mother Mêng. She
retired to the hills and lived as a _religieuse_ until the Later Han.
Then, because certain evil-doers, relying on their knowledge of the
past, used to beguile women by pretending to have been their husbands
in a former life, God commissioned Mother Mêng to build the Terrace of
Oblivion, and appointed her as guardian, with devils to wait upon her
and execute her commands. It was arranged that all shades who had been
sentenced in the Ten Courts to return in various conditions to earth
should first be dosed by her with a decoction of herbs, sweet, bitter,
acrid, sour or salt. Thus they forgot everything that has previously
happened to them, and carry away with them to earth some slight
weaknesses such as the mouth watering at the thought (of something
nice), laughter inducing perspiration, fear inducing tears, anger
inducing sobs, or spitting from nervousness. Good spirits who go back
into the world will have their senses of sight, hearing, smell, and
taste very much increased in power, and their physical strength and
constitution generally will be much bettered. But evil spirits will
experience the exact contrary of this, as a reward for previous sins
and as a warning to others to pray and repent.
The Terrace is situated in front of the Ten Courts, outside the six
bridges. It is square, measuring ten (Chinese) feet every way, and
surrounded by 108 small rooms. To the east there is a raised path, one
foot four inches in breadth, and in the rooms above-mentioned are
prepared cups of forgetfulness ready for the arrival of the shades.
Whether they swallow much or little it matters not; but sometimes
there are perverse devils who altogether refuse to drink. Then beneath
their feet sharp blades start up, and a copper tube is forced down
their throats, by which means they are compelled to swallow some. When
they have drunk, they are raised by the attendants and escorted back
by the same path. They are next pushed on to the Bitter Bamboo
floating bridge, with torrents of rushing red water on either side.
Half way across they perceive written in large characters on a red
cliff on the opposite side the following lines:--
“To be a man is easy, but to act up to one’s responsibilities as such
is hard.
Yet to be a man once again is harder still.
For those who would be born again in some happy state there is no
great difficulty;
It is only necessary to keep mouth and heart in harmony.”
When the shades have read these words they try to jump on shore, but
are beaten back into the water by two huge devils. One has on a black
official hat and embroidered clothes; in his hand he holds a paper
pencil, and over his shoulder he carries a sharp sword. Instruments of
torture hang at his waist, fiercely he glares out of his large round
eyes and laughs a horrid laugh. His name is _Short Life_. The other
has a dirty face smeared with blood; he has on a white coat, an abacus
in his hand and a rice sack over his shoulder. Round his neck hangs a
string of paper money; his brow contracts hideously, and he utters
long sighs. His name is _They have their reward_, and his duty is to
push the shades into the red water. The wicked and foolish rejoice at
the prospect of being born once more as human beings; but the better
shades weep and mourn that in life they did not lay up a store of
virtuous acts, and thus pass away from the state of mortals for
ever.[758] Yet they all rush on to birth like an infatuated or drunken
crowd; and again, in their early childhood, hanker after the forbidden
flavours.[759] Then, regardless of consequences, they begin to destroy
life, and thus forfeit all claims to the mercy and compassion of God.
They take no thought as to the end that must overtake them; and
finally, they bring themselves once more to the same horrid plight.
FOOTNOTES:
[695] The _Yü Li_ or _Divine Panorama_.
[696] The Divine Ruler, immediately below God himself.
[697] See No. XXVI., note 182.
[698] See _Author’s Own Record_ (in _Introduction_), note 28.
[699] The three worst of the Six Paths.
[700] That the state of one life is the result of behaviour in a
previous existence.
[701] _Lit._--the skin purse (of his bones).
[702] Buddhism, Taoism, and Confucianism.
[703] Violent deaths are regarded with horror by the Chinese. They
hold that a truly virtuous man always dies either of illness or old
age.
[704] Good people go to Purgatory in the flesh, and are at once passed
up to Heaven without suffering any torture, or are sent back to earth
again.
[705] The Supreme Ruler.
[706] See No. I., note 36.
[707] Supposed to be the gate of the Infernal Regions.
[708] Hades.
[709] Literally, “ten armfuls.”
[710] To Heaven, Earth, sovereign, and relatives.
[711] Held to be a great relief to the spirits of the dead.
[712] It is commonly believed that if the spirit of a murdered man can
secure the violent death of some other person he returns to earth
again as if nothing had happened, the spirit of his victim passing
into the world below and suffering all the misery of a disembodied
soul in his stead. See No. XLV., note 267.
[713] A very common trick in China. The drunken bully Lu Ta in the
celebrated novel _Shui-hu_ saved himself by these means, and I have
heard that the Mandarin who in the war of 1842 spent a large sum in
constructing a paddle-wheel steamer to be worked by men, hoping
thereby to match the wheel-ships of the Outer Barbarians, is now
expiating his failure at a monastery in Fukien. _Apropos_ of which, it
may not be generally known that at this moment there are small
paddle-wheel boats for Chinese passengers, plying up and down the
Canton river, the wheels of which are turned by gangs of coolies who
perform a movement precisely similar to that required on the
treadmill.
[714] In order that their marriage destiny may not be interfered with.
It is considered disgraceful not to accept the ransom of a slave girl
of 15 or 16 years of age. See No. XXVI., note 185.
[715] The soil of China belongs, every inch of it, to the Emperor.
Consequently, the people owe him a debt of gratitude for permitting
them to live upon it.
[716] Do their duty as men and women.
[717] A Chinaman may have three kinds of fathers; (1) his real father,
(2) an adopted father, such as an uncle without children to whom he
has been given as heir, and (3) the man his widowed mother may marry.
The first two are to all intents and purposes equal; the third is
entitled only to one year’s mourning instead of the usual three.
[718] As taxes.
[719] Visitors to Peking may often see the junkmen at T‘ung-chow
pouring water by the bucketful on to newly-arrived cargoes of Imperial
rice in order to make up the right weight and conceal the amount they
have filched on the way.