Chapter II.

Confucius and the Chinese, or the Prose of Asia.

§ 1. Peculiarities of Chinese Civilization.

§ 2. Chinese Government based on Education. Civil-Service Examinations.

§ 3. Life and Character of Confucius.

§ 4. Philosophy and subsequent Development of Confucianism.

§ 5. Lao-tse and Tao-ism.

§ 6. Religious Character of the "Kings."

§ 7. Confucius and Christianity. Character of the Chinese.

§ 8. The Tae-ping Insurrection. NOTE. The Nestorian Inscription in China

of the Eighth Century.

§ 1. Peculiarities of Chinese Civilization.

In qualifying the Chinese mind as prosaic, and in calling the writings of

Confucius and his successors _prose_, we intend no disrespect to either.

Prose is as good as poetry. But we mean to indicate the point of view from

which the study of the Chinese teachers should be approached. Accustomed

to regard the East as the land of imagination; reading in our childhood

the wild romances of Arabia; passing, in the poetry of Persia, into an

atmosphere of tender and entrancing song; then, as we go farther East into

India, encountering the vast epics of the Mahá-Bhárata and the

Rámáyana;--we might naturally expect to find in far Cathay a still wilder

flight of the Asiatic Muse. Not at all. We drop at once from unbridled

romance into the most colorless prose. Another race comes to us, which

seems to have no affinity with Asia, as we have been accustomed to think

of Asia. No more aspiration, no flights of fancy, but the worship of

order, decency, propriety, and peaceful commonplaces. As the people, so

the priests. The works of Confucius and his commentators are as level as

the valley of their great river, the Yang-tse-kiang, which the tide

ascends for four hundred miles. All in these writings is calm, serious,

and moral They assume that all men desire to be made better, and will

take the trouble to find out how they can be made so. It is not thought

necessary to entice them into goodness by the attractions of eloquence,

the charm of imagery, or the fascinations of a brilliant wit. These

philosophers have a Quaker style, a dress of plain drab, used only for

clothing the thought, not at all for its ornament.

And surely we ought not to ask for any other attraction than the subject

itself, in order to find interest in China and its teachers. The Chinese

Empire, which contains more than five millions of square miles, or twice

the area of the United States, has a population of five hundred millions,

or half the number of the human beings inhabiting the globe. China proper,

inhabited by the Chinese, is half as large as Europe, and contains about

three hundred and sixty millions of inhabitants. There are eighteen

provinces in China, many of which contain, singly, more inhabitants than

some of the great states of Europe. But on many other accounts this nation

is deeply interesting.

China is the type of permanence in the world. To say that it is older than

any other _existing_ nation is saying very little. Herodotus, who has been

called the Father of History, travelled in Egypt about 450 B.C. He studied

its monuments, bearing the names of kings who were as distant from his

time as he is from ours,--monuments which even then belonged to a gray

antiquity. But the kings who erected those monuments were possibly

posterior to the founders of the Chinese Empire. Porcelain vessels, with

Chinese mottoes on them, have been found in those ancient tombs, in shape,

material, and appearance precisely like those which are made in China

to-day; and Rosellini believes them to have been imported from China by

kings contemporary with Moses, or before him. This nation and its

institutions have outlasted everything. The ancient Bactrian and Assyrian

kingdoms, the Persian monarchy, Greece and Rome, have all risen,

flourished, and fallen,--and China continues still the same. The dynasty

has been occasionally changed; but the laws, customs, institutions, all

that makes national life, have continued. The authentic history of China

commences some two thousand years before Christ, and a thousand years in

this history is like a century in that of any other people. The oral

language of China has continued the same that it is now for thirty

centuries. The great wall bounding the empire on the north, which is

twelve hundred and forty miles long and twenty feet high, with towers

every few hundred yards,--which crosses mountain ridges, descends into

valleys, and is carried over rivers on arches,--was built two hundred

years before Christ, probably to repel those fierce tribes who, after

ineffectual attempts to conquer China, travelled westward till they

appeared on the borders of Europe five hundred years later, and, under the

name of Huns, assisted in the downfall of the Roman Empire. All China was

intersected with canals at a period when none existed in Europe. The great

canal, like the great wall, is unrivalled by any similar existing work. It

is twice the length of the Erie Canal, is from two hundred to a thousand

feet wide, and has enormous banks built of solid granite along a great

part of its course. One of the important mechanical inventions of modern

Europe is the Artesian well. That sunk at Grenelle, in France, was long

supposed to be the deepest in the world, going down eighteen hundred feet.

One at St. Louis, in the United States, has since been drilled to a depth,

as has recently been stated, of about four thousand.[9] But in China these

wells are found by tens of thousands, sunk at very remote periods to

obtain salt water. The method used by the Chinese from immemorial time has

recently been adopted instead of our own as being the most simple and

economical. The Chinese have been long acquainted with the circulation of

the blood; they inoculated for the small-pox in the ninth century; and

about the same time they invented printing. Their bronze money was made as

early as 1100 B.C., and its form has not been changed since the beginning

of the Christian era. The mariner's compass, gunpowder, and the art of

printing were made known to Europe through stories told by missionaries

returning from Asia. These missionaries, coasting the shores of the

Celestial Empire in Chinese junks, saw a little box containing a

magnetized needle, called Ting-nan-Tchen, or "needle which points to the

south." They also noticed terrible machines used by the armies in China

called Ho-pao or fire-guns, into which was put an inflammable powder,

which produced a noise like thunder and projected stones and pieces of

iron with irresistible force.

Father Hue, in his "Christianity in China," says that "the Europeans who

penetrated into China were no less struck with the libraries of the

Chinese than with their artillery. They were astonished at the sight of

the elegant books printed rapidly upon a pliant, silky paper by means of

wooden blocks. The first edition of the classical works printed in China

appeared in 958, five hundred years before the invention of Gutenberg. The

missionaries had, doubtless, often been busied in their convents with the

laborious work of copying manuscript books, and the simple Chinese method

of printing must have particularly attracted their attention. Many other

marvellous productions were noticed, such as silk, porcelain,

playing-cards, spectacles, and other products of art and industry unknown

in Europe. They brought back these new ideas to Europe; 'and from that

time,' says Abel Remusat, 'the West began to hold in due esteem the most

beautiful, the most populous, and the most anciently civilized of all the

four quarters of the world. The arts, the religious faith, and the

languages of its people were studied, and it was even proposed to

establish a professorship for the Tartar language in the University of

Paris. The world seemed to open towards the East; geography made immense

strides, and ardor for discovery opened a new vent for the adventurous

spirit of the Europeans. As our own hemisphere became better known, the

idea of another ceased to appear a wholly improbable paradox; and in

seeking the Zipangon of Marco Polo, Christopher Columbus discovered the

New World.'"

The first aspect of China produces that impression on the mind which we

call the grotesque. This is merely because the customs of this singular

nation are so opposite to our own. They seem morally, no less than

physically, our antipodes. Their habits are as opposite to ours as the

direction of their bodies. We stand feet to feet in everything. In boxing

the compass they say "westnorth" instead of northwest, "eastsouth" instead

of southeast, and their compass-needle points south instead of north.

Their soldiers wear quilted petticoats, satin boots, and bead necklaces,

carry umbrellas and fans, and go to a night attack with lanterns in their

hands, being more afraid of the dark than of exposing themselves to the

enemy. The people are very fond of fireworks, but prefer to have them in

the daytime. Ladies' ride in wheelbarrows, and cows are driven in

carriages. While in Europe the feet are put in the stocks, in China the

stocks are hung round the neck. In China the family name comes first, and

the personal name afterward. Instead of saying Benjamin Franklin or Walter

Scott they would say Franklin Benjamin, Scott Walter. Thus the Chinese

name of Confucius, Kung-fu-tsee, means the Holy Master Kung;--Kung is the

family name. In the recent wars with the English the mandarins or soldiers

would sometimes run away, and then commit suicide to avoid punishment. In

getting on a horse, the Chinese mount on the right side. Their old men fly

kites, while the little boys look on. The left hand is the seat of honor,

and to keep on your hat is a sign of respect. Visiting cards are painted

red, and are four feet long. In the opinion of the Chinese, the seat of

the understanding is the stomach. They have villages which contain a

million of inhabitants. Their boats are drawn by men, but their carriages

are moved by sails. A married woman while young and pretty is a slave, but

when she becomes old and withered is the most powerful, respected, and

beloved person in the family. The emperor is regarded with the most

profound reverence, but the empress mother is a greater person than he.

When a man furnishes his house, instead of laying stress, as we do, on

rosewood pianos and carved mahogany, his first ambition is for a handsome

camphor-wood coffin, which he keeps in the best place in his room. The

interest of money is thirty-six per cent, which, to be sure, we also give

in hard times to stave off a stoppage, while with them it is the legal

rate. We once heard a bad dinner described thus: "The meat was cold, the

wine was hot, and everything was sour but the vinegar." This would not so

much displease the Chinese, who carefully warm their wine, while we ice

ours. They understand good living, however, very well, are great epicures,

and somewhat gourmands, for, after dining on thirty dishes, they will

sometimes eat a duck by way of a finish. They toss their meat into their

mouths to a tune, every man keeping time with his chop-sticks, while we,

on the contrary, make anything but harmony with the clatter of our knives

and forks. A Chinaman will not drink a drop of milk, but he will devour

birds'-nests, snails, and the fins of sharks with a great relish. Our

mourning color is black and theirs is white; they mourn for their parents

three years, we a much shorter time. The principal room in their houses is

called "the hall of ancestors," the pictures or tablets of whom, set up

against the wall, are worshipped by them; we, on the other hand, are only

too apt to send our grandfather's portrait to the garret.[10]

§ 2. Chinese Government based on Education. Civil-Service Examinations.

Such are a few of the external differences between the Chinese customs and

ours. But the most essential peculiarity of this nation is the high value

which they attribute to knowledge, and the distinctions and rewards which

they bestow on scholarship. All the civil offices in the Empire are given

as rewards of literary merit. The government, indeed, is called a complete

despotism, and the emperor is said to have absolute authority. He is not

bound by any written constitution, indeed; but the public opinion of the

land holds him, nevertheless, to a strict responsibility. He, no less than

his people, is bound by a law higher than that of any private will,--the

authority of custom. For, in China, more than anywhere else, "what is gray

with age becomes religion." The authority of the emperor is simply

authority to govern according to the ancient usages of the country, and

whenever these are persistently violated, a revolution takes place and the

dynasty is changed. But a revolution in China changes nothing but the

person of the monarch; the unwritten constitution of old usages remains in

full force. "A principle as old as the monarchy," says Du Halde, "is this,

that the state is a large family, and the emperor is in the place of both

father and mother. He must govern his people with affection and goodness;

he must attend to the smallest matters which concern their happiness. When

he is not supposed to have this sentiment, he soon loses his hold on the

reverence of the people, and his throne becomes insecure." The emperor,

therefore, is always studying how to preserve this reputation. When a

province is afflicted by famine, inundation, or any other calamity, he

shuts himself in his palace, fasts, and publishes decrees to relieve it of

taxes and afford it aid.

The true power of the government is in the literary class. The government,

though nominally a monarchy, is really an aristocracy. But it is not an

aristocracy of birth, like that of England, for the humblest man's son can

obtain a place in it; neither is it an aristocracy of wealth, like ours

in the United States, nor a military aristocracy, like that of Russia, nor

an aristocracy of priests, like that of ancient Egypt, and of some modern

countries,--as, for instance, that of Paraguay under the Jesuits, or that

of the Sandwich Islands under the Protestant missionaries; but it is a

literary aristocracy.

The civil officers in China are called mandarins. They are chosen from the

three degrees of learned men, who may be called the bachelors,

licentiates, and doctors. All persons may be candidates for the first

degree, except three excluded classes,--boatmen, barbers, and actors. The

candidates are examined by the governors of their own towns. Of those

approved, a few are selected after another examination. These again are

examined by an officer who makes a circuit once in three years for that

purpose. They are placed alone in little rooms or closets, with pencils,

ink, and paper, and a subject is given them to write upon. Out of some

four hundred candidates fifteen may be selected, who receive the lowest

degree. There is another triennial examination for the second degree, at

which a small number of the bachelors are promoted. The examination for

the highest degree, that of doctor, is held at Pekin only, when some three

hundred are taken out of five thousand. These are capable of receiving the

highest offices. Whenever a vacancy occurs, one of those who have received

a degree is taken by lot from the few senior names. But a few years since,

there were five thousand of the highest rank, and twenty-seven thousand of

the second rank, who had not received employment.

The subjects upon which the candidates are examined, and the methods of

these examinations, are thus described in the Shanghae Almanac (1852).[11]

The examinations for the degree of Keujin (or licentiate) takes place at

the principal city of each province once in three years. The average

number of bachelors in the large province of Keang-Nan (which contains

seventy millions of inhabitants) is twenty thousand, out of whom only

about two hundred succeed. Sixty-five mandarins are deputed for this

examination, besides subordinate officials. The two chief examiners are

sent from Pekin. When the candidates enter the examination hall they are

searched for books or manuscripts, which might assist them in writing

their essays. This precaution is not superfluous, for many plans have been

invented to enable mediocre people to pass. Sometimes a thin book, printed

on very small type from copperplates, is slipped into a hole in the sole

of the shoe. But persons detected in such practices are ruined for life.

In a list of one hundred and forty-four successful candidates, in 1851,

thirteen were over forty years of age, and one under fourteen years; seven

were under twenty; and all, to succeed, must have known by heart the whole

of the Sacred Books, besides being well read in history.

Three sets of themes are given, each occupying two days and a night, and

until that time is expired no one is allowed to leave his apartment, which

is scarcely large enough to sleep in. The essays must not contain more

than seven hundred characters, and no erasure or correction is allowed. On

the first days the themes are taken from the Four Books; on the next, from

the older classics; on the last, miscellaneous questions are given. The

themes are such as these: "Choo-tsze, in commenting on the Shoo-King, made

use of four authors, who sometimes say too much, at other times too

little; sometimes their explanations are forced, at other times too

ornamental. What have you to observe on them?" "Chinshow had great

abilities for historic writing. In his Three Kingdoms he has depreciated

Choo-ko-leang, and made very light of E and E, two other celebrated

characters. What is it that he says of them?"

These public-service examinations are conducted with the greatest

impartiality. They were established about a thousand years ago, and have

been gradually improved during the intervening time. They form the basis

of the whole system of Chinese government. They make a good education

universally desirable, as the poorest man may see his son thus advanced to

the highest position. All of the hundreds of thousands who prepare to

compete are obliged to know the whole system of Confucius, to commit to

memory all his moral doctrines, and to become familiar with all the

traditional wisdom of the land. Thus a public opinion in favor of existing

institutions and the fundamental ideas of Chinese government is

continually created anew.

What an immense advantage it would be to our own country if we should

adopt this institution of China! Instead of making offices the prize of

impudence, political management, and party services, let them be competed

for by all who consider themselves qualified. Let all offices now given by

appointment be hereafter bestowed on those who show themselves best

qualified to perform the duties. Each class of offices would of course

require a different kind of examination. For some, physical culture as

well as mental might be required. Persons who wished diplomatic situations

should be prepared in a knowledge of foreign languages as well as of

international law. All should be examined on the Constitution and history

of the United States. Candidates for the Post-Office Department should be

good copyists, quick at arithmetic, and acquainted with book-keeping. It

is true that we cannot by an examination obtain a certain knowledge of

moral qualities; but industry, accuracy, fidelity in work would certainly

show themselves. A change from the present corrupt and corrupting system

of appointments to that of competitive examinations would do more just now

for our country than any other measure of reconstruction which can be

proposed. The permanence of Chinese institutions is believed, by those who

know best, to result from the influence of the literary class. Literature

is naturally conservative; the tone of the literature studied is eminently

conservative; and the most intelligent men in the empire are personally

interested in the continuance of the institutions under which they hope to

attain position and fortune.

The highest civil offices are seats at the great tribunals or boards, and

the positions of viceroys, or governors, of the eighteen provinces.

The boards are:--

Ly Pou, Board of Appointment of Mandarins.

Hou Pou, Board of Finance.

Lee Pou, Board of Ceremonies.

Ping Pou, Board of War.

Hing Pou, Board of Criminal Justice.

Kong Pou, Board of Works,--canals, bridges, &c.

The members of these boards, with their councillors and subordinates,

amount to twelve hundred officers. Then there is the Board of Doctors of

the Han Lin College, who have charge of the archives, history of the

empire, &c.; and the Board of Censors, who are the highest mandarins, and

have a peculiar office. Their duty is to stand between the people and the

mandarins, and between the people and the emperor, and even rebuke the

latter if they find him doing wrong. This is rather a perilous duty, but

it is often faithfully performed. A censor, who went to tell the emperor

of some faults, took his coffin with him, and left it at the door of the

palace. Two censors remonstrated with a late emperor on the expenses of

his palace, specifying the sums uselessly lavished for perfumes and

flowers for his concubines, and stating that a million of taels of silver

might be saved for the poor by reducing these expenses. Sung, the

commissioner who attended Lord Macartney, remonstrated with the Emperor

Kiaking on his attachment to play-actors and strong drink, which degraded

him in the eyes of the people. The emperor, highly irritated, asked him

what punishment he deserved for his insolence. "Quartering," said Sung.

"Choose another," said the emperor. "Let me be beheaded." "Choose again,"

said the emperor; and Sung asked to be strangled. The next day the emperor

appointed him governor of a distant province,--afraid to punish him for

the faithful discharge of his duty, but glad to have him at a distance.

Many such anecdotes are related, showing that there is some moral courage

in China.

The governor of a province, or viceroy, has great power. He also is chosen

from among the mandarins in the way described. The only limitations of his

power are these: he is bound to make a full report every three years of

the affairs of the province, _and give in it an account of his own

faults,_ and if he omits any, and they are discovered in other ways, he is

punished by degradation, bambooing, or death. It is the right of any

subject, however humble, to complain to the emperor himself against any

officer, however high; and for this purpose a large drum is placed at one

of the palace gates. Whoever strikes it has his case examined under the

emperor's eye, and if he has been wronged, his wrongs are redressed, but

if he has complained unnecessarily, he is severely punished. Imperial

visitors, sent by the Board of Censors, may suddenly arrive at any time to

examine the concerns of a province; and a governor or other public officer

who is caught tripping is immediately reported and punished.

Thus the political institutions of China are built on literature.

Knowledge is the road to power and wealth. All the talent and knowledge of

the nation are interested in the support of institutions which give to

them either power or the hope of it. And these institutions work well. The

machinery is simple, but it produces a vast amount of happiness and

domestic virtue. While in most parts of Asia the people are oppressed by

petty tyrants, and ground down by taxes,--while they have no motive to

improve their condition, since every advance will only expose them to

greater extortion,--the people of China are industrious and happy. In no

part of the world has agriculture been carried to such perfection. Every

piece of ground in the cultivated parts of the empire, except those

portions devoted to ancestral monuments, is made to yield two or three

crops annually, by the careful tillage bestowed on it. The ceremony of

opening the soil at the beginning of the year, at which the emperor

officiates, originated two thousand years ago. Farms are small,--of one or

two acres,--and each family raises on its farm all that it consumes. Silk

and cotton are cultivated and manufactured in families, each man spinning,

weaving, and dyeing his own web. In the manufacture of porcelain, on the

contrary, the division of labor is carried very far. The best is made at

the village of Kiangsee, which contains a million of inhabitants. Seventy

hands are sometimes employed on a single cup. The Chinese are very

skilful in working horn and ivory. Large lanterns are made of horn,

transparent and without a flaw. At Birmingham men have tried with machines

to cut ivory in the same manner as the Chinese, and have failed.

§ 3. Life and Character of Confucius.

Of this nation the great teacher for twenty-three centuries has been

Confucius. He was born 551 B.C., and was contemporary with the Tarquins,

Pythagoras, and Cyrus. About his time occurred the return of the Jews from

Babylon and the invasion of Greece by Xerxes. His descendants have always

enjoyed high privileges, and there are now some forty thousand of them in

China, seventy generations and more removed from their great ancestor. His

is the oldest family in the world, unless we consider the Jews as a single

family descended from Abraham. His influence, through his writings, on the

minds of so many millions of human beings is greater than that of any man

who ever lived, excepting the writers of the Bible; and in saying this we

do not forget the names of Mohammed, Aristotle, St. Augustine, and Luther.

So far as we can see, it is the influence of Confucius which has

maintained, though probably not originated, in China, that profound

reverence for parents, that strong family affection, that love of order,

that regard for knowledge and deference for literary men, which are

fundamental principles underlying all the Chinese institutions. His minute

and practical system of morals, studied as it is by all the learned, and

constituting the sum of knowledge and the principle of government in

China, has exerted and exerts an influence on that innumerable people

which it is impossible to estimate, but which makes us admire the power

which can emanate from a single soul.

To exert such an influence requires greatness. If the tree is to be known

by its fruits, Confucius must have been one of the master minds of our

race. The supposition that a man of low morals or small intellect, an

impostor or an enthusiast, could influence the world, is a theory which

is an insult to human nature. The time for such theories has happily gone

by. We now know that nothing can come of nothing,--that a fire of straw

may make a bright blaze, but must necessarily soon go out. A light which

illuminates centuries must be more than an ignis fatuus. Accordingly we

should approach Confucius with respect, and expect to find something good

and wise in his writings. It is only a loving spirit which will enable us

to penetrate the difficulties which surround the study, and to apprehend

something of the true genius of the man and his teachings. As there is no

immediate danger of becoming his followers, we can see no objections to

such a course, which also appears to be a species of mental hospitality,

eminently in accordance with the spirit of our own Master.

Confucius belongs to that small company of select ones whose lives have

been devoted to the moral elevation of their fellow-men. Among them he

stands high, for he sought to implant the purest principles of religion

and morals in the character of the whole people, and succeeded in doing

it. To show that this was his purpose it will be necessary to give a brief

sketch of his life.

His ancestors were eminent statesmen and soldiers in the small country of

Loo, then an independent kingdom, now a Chinese province. The year of his

birth was that in which Cyrus became king of Persia. His father, one of

the highest officers of the kingdom, and a brave soldier, died when

Confucius was three years old. He was a studious boy, and when fifteen

years old had studied the five sacred books called Kings. He was married

at the age of nineteen, and had only one son by his only wife. This son

died before Confucius, leaving as his posterity a single grandchild, from

whom the great multitudes of his descendants now in China were derived.

This grandson was second only to Confucius in wisdom, and was the teacher

of the illustrious Mencius.

The first part of the life of Confucius was spent in attempting to reform

the abuses of society by means of the official stations which he held, by

his influence with princes, and by travelling and intercourse with men.

The second period was that in which he was recalled from his travels to

become a minister in his native country, the kingdom of Loo. Here he

applied his theories of government, and tested their practicability. He

was then fifty years old. His success was soon apparent in the growing

prosperity of the whole people. Instead of the tyranny which before

prevailed, they were now ruled according to his idea of good

government,--that of the father of a family. Confidence was restored to

the public mind, and all good influences followed. But the tree was not

yet deeply enough rooted to resist accidents, and all his wise

arrangements were suddenly overthrown by the caprice of the monarch, who,

tired of the austere virtue of Confucius, suddenly plunged into a career

of dissipation. Confucius resigned his office, and again became a

wanderer, but now with a new motive. He had before travelled to learn, now

he travelled to teach. He collected disciples around him, and, no longer

seeking to gain the ear of princes, he diffused his ideas among the common

people by means of his disciples, whom he sent out everywhere to

communicate his doctrines. So, amid many vicissitudes of outward fortune,

he lived till he was seventy-three years old. In the last years of his

life he occupied himself in publishing his works, and in editing the

Sacred Books. His disciples had become very numerous, historians

estimating them at three thousand, of whom five hundred had attained to

official station, seventy-two had penetrated deeply into his system, and

ten, of the highest class of mind and character, were continually near his

person. Of these Hwuy was especially valued by him, as having early

attained superior virtue. He frequently referred to him in his

conversations. "I saw him continually advance," said he, "but I never saw

him stop in the path of knowledge." Again he says: "The wisest of my

disciples, having one idea, understands two. Hwuy, having one understands

ten." One of the select ten disciples, Tszee-loo, was rash and impetuous

like the Apostle Peter. Another, Tszee-Kung, was loving and tender like

the Apostle John; he built a house near the grave of Confucius, wherein to

mourn for him after his death.

The last years of the life of Confucius were devoted to editing the

Sacred Books, or Kings. As we now have them they come from him. Authentic

records of Chinese history extend back to 2357 B.C., while the Chinese

philosophy originated with Fuh-he, who lived about 3327 B.C. He it was who

substituted writing for the knotted strings which before formed the only

means of record. He was also the author of the Eight Diagrams,--each

consisting of three lines, half of which are whole and half broken in

two,--which by their various combinations are supposed to represent the

active and passive principles of the universe in all their essential

forms. Confucius edited the Yih-King, the Shoo-King, the She-King, and the

Le-Ke, which constitute the whole of the ancient literature of China which

has come down to posterity.[1] The Four Books, which contain the doctrines

of Confucius, and of his school, were not written by himself, but composed

by others after his death.

One of these is called the "Immutable Mean," and its object is to show

that virtue consists in avoiding extremes. Another--the Lun-Yu, or

Analects--contains the conversation or table-talk of Confucius, and

somewhat resembles the Memorabilia of Xenophon and Boswell's Life of

Johnson.[12]

The life of Confucius was thus devoted to communicating to the Chinese

nation a few great moral and religious principles, which he believed would

insure the happiness of the people. His devotion to this aim appears in

his writings. Thus he says:--

"At fifteen years I longed for wisdom. At thirty my mind was fixed in the

pursuit of it. At forty I saw clearly certain principles. At fifty I

understood the rule given by heaven. At sixty everything I heard I easily

understood. At seventy the desires of my heart no longer transgressed the

law."

"If in the morning I hear about the right way, and in the evening I die, I

can be happy."

He says of himself: "He is a man who through his earnestness in seeking

knowledge forgets his food, and in his joy for having found it loses all

sense of his toil, and thus occupied is unconscious that he has almost

reached old age."

Again: "Coarse rice for food, water to drink, the bended arm for a

pillow,--happiness may be enjoyed even with these; but without virtue both

riches and honor seem to me like the passing cloud."

"Grieve not that men know not you; grieve that you know not men."

"To rule with equity is like the North Star, which is fixed, and all the

rest go round it."

"The essence of knowledge is, having it, to apply it; not having it, to

confess your ignorance."

"Worship as though the Deity were present."

"If my mind is not engaged in my worship, it is as though I worshipped

not."

"Formerly, in hearing men, I heard their words, and gave them credit for

their conduct; now I hear their words, and observe their conduct."

"A man's life depends on virtue; if a bad man lives, it is only by good

fortune."

"Some proceed blindly to action, without knowledge; I hear much, and

select the best course."

He was once found fault with, when in office, for not opposing the

marriage of a ruler with a distant relation, which was an offence against

Chinese propriety. He said: "I am a happy man; if I have a fault, men

observe it."

Confucius was humble. He said: "I cannot bear to hear myself called equal

to the sages and the good. All that can be said of me is, that I study

with delight the conduct of the sages, and instruct men without weariness

therein."

"The good man is serene," said he, "the bad always in fear."

"A good man regards the ROOT; he fixes the root, and all else flows out of

it. The root is filial piety; the fruit brotherly love."

"There may be fair words and an humble countenance when there is little

real virtue."

"I daily examine myself in a threefold manner: in my transactions with

men, if I am upright; in my intercourse with friends, if I am faithful;

and whether I illustrate the teachings of my master in my conduct."

"Faithfulness and sincerity are the highest things."

"When you transgress, do not fear to return."

"Learn the past and you will know the future."

The great principles which he taught were chiefly based on family

affection and duty. He taught kings that they were to treat their

subjects as children, subjects to respect the kings as parents; and these

ideas so penetrated the national mind, that emperors are obliged to seem

to govern thus, even if they do not desire it. Confucius was a teacher of

reverence,--reverence for God, respect for parents, respect and reverence

for the past and its legacies, for the great men and great ideas of former

times. He taught men also to regard each other as brethren, and even the

golden rule, in its negative if not its positive form, is to be found in

his writings.

Curiously enough, this teacher of reverence was distinguished by a

remarkable lump on the top of his head, where the phrenologists have

placed the organ of veneration.[13] Rooted in his organization, and

strengthened by all his convictions, this element of adoration seemed to

him the crown of the whole moral nature of man. But, while full of

veneration, he seems to have been deficient in the sense of spiritual

things. A personal God was unknown to him; so that his worship was

directed, not to God, but to antiquity, to ancestors, to propriety and

usage, to the state as father and mother of its subjects, to the ruler as

in the place of authority. Perfectly sincere, deeply and absolutely

assured of all that he knew, he said nothing he did not believe. His power

came not only from the depth and clearness of his convictions, but from

the absolute honesty of his soul.

Lao-tse, for twenty-eight years his contemporary, founder of one of the

three existing religions of China,--Tao-ism,--was a man of perhaps equal

intelligence. But he was chiefly a thinker; he made no attempt to elevate

the people; his purpose was to repress the passions, and to preserve the

soul in a perfect equanimity. He was the Zeno of the East, founder of a

Chinese stoicism. With him virtue is sure of its reward; everything is

arranged by a fixed law. His disciples afterwards added to his system a

thaumaturgic element and an invocation of departed spirits, so that now it

resembles our modern Spiritism; but the original doctrine of Lao-tse was

rationalism in philosophy and stoicism in morals. Confucius is said, in a

Chinese work, to have visited him, and to have frankly confessed his

inability to understand him. "I know how birds fly, how fishes swim, how

animals run. The bird may be shot, the fish hooked, and the beast snared.

But there is the dragon. I cannot tell how he mounts in the air, and soars

to heaven. To-day I have seen the dragon."

But the modest man, who lived for others, has far surpassed in his

influence this dragon of intelligence. It certainly increases our hope for

man, when we see how these qualities of perfect honesty, good sense,

generous devotion to the public good, and fidelity to the last in

adherence to his work, have made Confucius during twenty-three centuries

the daily teacher and guide of a third of the human race.

Confucius was eminently distinguished by energy and persistency. He did

not stop working till he died. His life was of one piece, beautiful,

noble. "The general of a large army," said he, "may be defeated, but you

cannot defeat the determined mind of a peasant." He acted conformably to

this thought, and to another of his sayings. "If I am building a mountain,

and stop before the last basketful of earth is placed on the summit, I

have failed of my work. But if I have placed but one basketful on the

plain, and go on, I am really building a mountain."

Many beautiful and noble things are related concerning the character of

Confucius,--of his courage in the midst of danger, of his humility in the

highest position of honor. His writings and life have given the law to

Chinese thought. He is the patron saint of that great empire. His doctrine

is the state religion of the nation, sustained by the whole power of the

emperor and the literary body. His books are published every year by

societies formed for that purpose, who distribute them gratuitously. His

descendants enjoy the highest consideration. The number of temples erected

to his memory is sixteen hundred and sixty. One of them occupies ten acres

of land. On the two festivals in the year sacred to his memory there are

sacrificed some seventy thousand animals of different kinds, and

twenty-seven thousand pieces of silk are burned on his altars. Yet his is

a religion without priests, liturgy, or public worship, except on these

two occasions.

§ 4. Philosophy and subsequent Development of Confucianism.

According to Mr. Meadows, the philosophy of China, in its origin and

present aspect, may be thus briefly described.[14] Setting aside the

Buddhist system and that of Tao-ism, which supply to the Chinese the

element of religious worship and the doctrine of a supernatural world,

wanting in the system of Confucius, we find the latter as the established

religion of the state, merely tolerating the others as suited to persons

of weak minds. The Confucian system, constantly taught by the competitive

examinations, rules the thought of China. Its first development was from

the birth of Confucius to the death of Mencias (or from 551 B.C. to 313

B.C.). Its second period was from the time of Chow-tsze (A.D. 1034) to

that of Choo-tsze (A.D. 1200). The last of these is the real fashioner of

Chinese philosophy, and one of the truly great men of the human race. His

works are chiefly Commentaries on the Kings and the Four Books. They are

committed to memory by millions of Chinese who aspire to pass the

public-service examinations. The Chinese philosophy, thus established by

Choo-tsze, is as follows.[15]

There is one highest, ultimate principle of all existence,--the Tae-keih,

or Grand Extreme. This is absolutely immaterial, and the basis of the

order of the universe. From this ultimate principle, operating from all

eternity, come all animate and inanimate nature. It operates in a twofold

way, by expansion and contraction, or by ceaseless active and passive

pulsations. The active expansive pulsation is called Yang, the passive

intensive pulsation is Yin, and the two may be called the Positive and

Negative Essences of all things. When the active expansive phase of the

process has reached its extreme limit, the operation becomes passive and

intensive; and from these vibrations originate all material and mortal

existences. Creation is therefore a perpetual process,--matter and spirit

are opposite results of the same force. The one tends to variety, the

other to unity; and variety in unity is a permanent and universal law of

being. Man results from the utmost development of this pulsatory action

and passion; and man's nature, as the highest result, is perfectly good,

consisting of five elements, namely, charity, righteousness, propriety,

wisdom, and sincerity. These constitute the inmost, essential nature of

man; but as man comes in contact with the outward world evil arises by the

conflict. When man follows the dictates of his nature his actions are

good, and harmony results. When he is unduly influenced by the outward

world his actions are evil, and discord intervenes. The holy man is one

who has an instinctive, inward sight of the ultimate principle in its

twofold operation (or what we should call the sight of God, the beatific

vision), and who therefore spontaneously and easily obeys his nature.

Hence all his thoughts are perfectly wise, his actions perfectly good, and

his words perfectly true. Confucius was the last of these holy men. The

infallible authority of the Sacred Books results from the fact that their

writers, being holy men, had an instinctive perception of the working of

the ultimate principle.

All Confucian philosophy is pervaded by these principles: first, that

example is omnipotent; secondly, that to secure the safety of the empire,

you must secure the happiness of the people; thirdly, that by solitary

persistent thought one may penetrate at last to a knowledge of the essence

of things; fourthly, that the object of all government is to make the

people virtuous and contented.

§ 5. Lao-tse and Tao-ism.

One of the three religious systems of China is that of the Tao, the other

two being that of Confucius, and that of Buddhism in its Chinese form. The

difficulty in understanding Tao-ism comes from its appearing under three

entirely distinct forms: (1) as a philosophy of the absolute or

unconditioned, in the great work of the Tse-Lao, or old teacher;[16] (2)

as a system of morality of the utilitarian school,[17] which resolves duty

into prudence; and (3) as a system of magic, connected with the belief in

spirits. In the Tao-te-king we have the ideas of Lao himself, which we

will endeavor to state; premising that they are considered very obscure

and difficult even by the Chinese commentators.

The TAO (§ 1) is the unnamable, and is the origin of heaven and earth. As

that which can be named, it is the mother of all things. These two are

essentially one. Being and not-being are born from each other (§ 2). The

Tao is empty but inexhaustible (§ 4), is pure, is profound, and was before

the Gods. It is invisible, not the object of perception, it returns into

not-being (§§ 14, 40). It is vague, confused, and obscure (§ 25, 21). It

is little and strong, universally present, and all beings return into it

(§ 32). It is without desires, great (§ 34). All things are born of being,

being is born of not-being (§ 40).

From these and similar statements it would appear that the philosophy of

the Tao-te-king is that of absolute being, or the identity of being and

not-being. In this point it anticipated Hegel by twenty-three

centuries.[18] It teaches that the absolute is the source of being and of

not-being. Being is essence, not-being is existence. The first is the

noumenal, the last the phenomenal.'

As being is the source of not-being (§ 40), by identifying one's self with

being one attains to all that is not-being, i.e. to all that exists.

Instead, therefore, of aiming at acquiring knowledge, the wise man avoids

it: instead of acting, he refuses to act. He "feeds his mind with a wise

passiveness." (§ 16.) "_Not to act_ is the source of all power," is a

thesis continually present to the mind of Lao (§§ 3, 23, 38,43,48, 63).

The wise man is like water (§§ 8, 78), which seems weak and is strong;

which yields, seeks the lowest place, which seems the softest thing and

breaks the hardest thing. To be wise one must renounce wisdom, to be good

one must renounce justice and humanity, to be learned one must renounce

knowledge (§§ 19, 20, 45), and must have no desires (§§ 8, 22), must

detach one's self from all things (§ 20) and be like a new-born babe. From

everything proceeds its opposite, the easy from the difficult, the

difficult from the easy, the long from the short, the high from the low,

ignorance from knowledge, knowledge from ignorance, the first from the

last, the last from the first. These antagonisms are mutually related by

the hidden principle of the Tao (§§ 2, 27). Nothing is independent or

capable of existing save through its opposite. The good man and bad man

are equally necessary to each other (§ 27). To desire aright is not to

desire (§ 64). The saint can do great things because he does not attempt

to do them (§ 63). The unwarlike man conquers.[19] He who submits to

others controls them. By this negation of all things we come into

possession of all things (§ 68). _Not to act_ is, therefore, the secret of

all power (§§ 3, 23, 38, 43, 48, 63).

We find here the same doctrine of opposites which appears in the Phædo,

and which has come up again and again in philosophy. We shall find

something like it in the Sánkhya-karika of the Hindoos. The Duad, with the

Monad brooding behind it, is the fundamental principle of the Avesta.

The result, thus far, is to an active passivity. Lao teaches that not to

act involves the highest energy of being, and leads to the greatest

results. By not acting one identifies himself with the Tao, and receives

all its power. And here we cannot doubt that the Chinese philosopher was

pursuing the same course with Sakya-Muni. The Tao of the one is the

Nirvana of the other. The different motive in each mind constitutes the

difference of their career. Sakya-Muni sought Nirvana, or the absolute,

the pure knowledge, in order to escape from evil and to conquer it. Lao

sought it, as his book shows, to attain power. At this point the two

systems diverge. Buddhism is generous, benevolent, humane; it seeks to

help others. Tao-ism seeks its own. Hence the selfish morality which

pervades the Book of Rewards and Punishments. Every good action has its

reward attached to it. Hence also the degradation of the system into pure

magic and spiritism. Buddhism, though its course runs so nearly parallel,

always retains in its scheme of merits a touch of generosity.

We find thus, in the Tao-te-king, the element afterwards expanded into the

system of utilitarian and eudæmonic ethics in the Book of Rewards and

Punishments. We also can trace in it the source of the magical tendency in

Tao-ism. The principle, that by putting one's self into an entirely

passive condition one can enter into communion with the unnamed Tao, and

so acquire power over nature, naturally tends to magic. Precisely the same

course of thought led to similar results in the case of Neo-Platonism. The

ecstatic union with the divine element in all nature, which Plotinus

attained four times in his life, resulted from an immediate sight of God.

In this sight is all truth given to the soul. The unity, says Plotinus,

which produces all things, is an essence behind both substance and form.

Through this essential being all souls commune and interact, and magic is

this interaction of soul upon soul through the soul of souls, with which

one becomes identified in the ecstatic union. A man therefore can act on

demons and control spirits by theurgic rites. Julian, that ardent

Neo-Platonician, was surrounded by diviners, hierophants, and

aruspices.[20]

In the Tao-te-king (§§ 50, 55, 56, etc.) it is said that he who knows the

Tao need not fear the bite of serpents nor the jaws of wild beasts, nor

the claws of birds of prey. He is inaccessible to good and to evil. He

need fear neither rhinoceros nor tiger. In battle he needs neither cuirass

nor sword. The tiger cannot tear him, the soldier cannot wound him. He is

invulnerable and safe from death.[21]

If Neo-Platonism had not had for its antagonist the vital force of

Christianity, it might have established itself as a permanent form of

religion in the Roman Empire, as Tao-ism has in China. I have tried to

show how the later form of this Chinese system has come naturally from its

principles, and how a philosophy of the absolute may have degenerated into

a system of necromancy.

§ 6. Religious Character of the "Kings."

We have seen that, in the philosophy of the Confucians, the ultimate

principle is not necessarily identical with a living, intelligent, and

personal God. Nor did Confucius, when he speaks of Teen, or Heaven,

express any faith in such a being. He neither asserted nor denied a

Supreme God. His worship and prayer did not necessarily imply such a

faith. It was the prayer of reverence addressed to some sacred,

mysterious, unknown power, above and behind all visible things. What that

power was, he, with his supreme candor, did not venture to intimate. But

in the She-King a personal God is addressed. The oldest books recognize a

Divine person. They teach that there is one Supreme Being, who is

omnipresent, who sees all things, and has an intelligence which nothing

can escape,--that he wishes men to live together in peace and brotherhood.

He commands not only right actions, but pure desires and thoughts, that we

should watch all our behavior, and maintain a grave and majestic demeanor,

"which is like a palace in which virtue resides"; but especially that we

should guard the tongue. "For a blemish may be taken out of a diamond by

carefully polishing it; but, if your words have the least blemish, there

is no way to efface that." "Humility is the solid foundation of all the

virtues." "To acknowledge one's incapacity is the way to be soon prepared

to teach others; for from the moment that a man is no longer full of

himself, nor puffed up with empty pride, whatever good he learns in the

morning he practices before night." "Heaven penetrates to the bottom of

our hearts, like light into a dark chamber. We must conform ourselves to

it, till we are like two instruments of music tamed to the same pitch. We

must join ourselves with it, like two tablets which appear but one. We

must receive its gifts the very moment its hand is open to bestow. Our

irregular passions shut up the door of our souls against God."

Such are the teachings of these Kings, which are unquestionably among the

oldest existing productions of the human mind. In the days of Confucius

they seem to have been nearly forgotten, and their precepts wholly

neglected. Confucius revised them, added his own explanations and

comments, and, as one of the last acts of his life, called his disciples

around him and made a solemn dedication of these books to Heaven. He

erected an altar on which he placed them, adored God, and returned thanks

upon his knees in a humble manner for having had life and health granted

him to finish this undertaking.

§ 7. Confucius and Christianity. Character of the Chinese.

It were easy to find defects in the doctrine of Confucius. It has little

to teach of God or immortality. But if the law of Moses, which taught

nothing of a future life, was a preparation for Christianity; if, as the

early Christian Fathers asserted, Greek philosophy was also schoolmaster

to bring men to Christ; who can doubt that the truth and purity in the

teachings of Confucius were providentially intended to lead this great

nation in the right direction? Confucius is a Star in the East, to lead

his people to Christ. One of the most authentic of his sayings is this,

that "in the West the true Saint must be looked for and found." He has a

perception, such as truly great men have often had, of some one higher

than himself, who was to come after him. We cannot doubt, therefore, that

God, who forgets none of his children, has given this teacher to the

swarming millions of China to lead them on till they are ready for a

higher light. And certainly the temporal prosperity and external virtues

of this nation, and their long-continued stability amid the universal

changes of the world, are owing in no small decree to the lessons of

reverence for the past, of respect for knowledge, of peace and order, and

especially of filial piety, which he inculcated. In their case, if in no

other, has been fulfilled the promise of the divine commandment, "Honor

thy father and thy mother, that thy days may be long in the land which the

Lord thy God giveth thee."

In comparing the system of Confucius with Christianity, it appears at once

that Christianity differs from this system, as from most others, in its

greater completeness. Jesus says to the Chinese philosopher, as he said to

the Jewish law, "I have not come to destroy, but to fulfil." He fulfils

the Confucian reverence for the past by adding hope for the future; he

fulfils its stability by progress, its faith in man with faith in God, its

interest in this world with the expectation of another, its sense of time

with that of eternity. Confucius aims at peace, order, outward prosperity,

virtue, and good morals. All this belongs also to Christianity, but

Christianity adds a moral enthusiasm, a faith in the spiritual world, a

hope of immortal life, a sense of the Fatherly presence of God. So that

here, as before, we find that Christianity does not exclude other

religions, but includes them, and is distinguished by being deeper,

higher, broader, and more far-reaching than they.

A people with such institutions and such a social life as we have

described cannot be despised, and to call them uncivilized is as absurd in

us as it is in them to call Europeans barbarians. They are a good,

intelligent, and happy people. Lieutenant Forbes, who spent five years in

China,--from 1842 to 1847,--says: "I found myself in the midst of as

amiable, kind, and hospitable a population as any on the face of the

earth, as far ahead of us in some things as behind us in others." As to

the charge of dishonesty brought against them by those who judge the whole

nation by the degraded population of the suburbs of Canton, Forbes says,

"My own property suffered more in landing in England and passing the

British frontier than in my whole sojourn in China."

"There is no nation," says the Jesuit Du Halde, "more laborious and

temperate than this. They are inured to hardships from their infancy,

which greatly contributes to preserve the innocence of their manners....

They are of a mild, tractable, and humane disposition." He thinks them

exceedingly modest, and regards the love of gain as their chief vice.

"Interest," says he, "is the spring of all their actions; for, when the

least profit offers, they despise all difficulties and undertake the most

painful journeys to procure it" This may be true; but if a Chinese

traveller in America should give the same account of us, would it not be

quite as true? One of the latest writers--the author of "The Middle

Kingdom"--accuses the Chinese of gross sensuality, mendacity, and

dishonesty. No doubt these are besetting sins with them, as with all

nations who are educated under a system which makes submission to

authority the chief virtue. But then this writer lived only at Canton and

Macao, and saw personally only the refuse of the people. He admits that

"they have attained, by the observance of peace and good order, to a high

security of life and property; that the various classes are linked

together in a remarkably homogeneous manner by the diffusion of education;

and that property and industry receive their just reward of food, raiment,

and shelter." He also reminds us that the religion of China differs from

all Pagan religions in this, that it encourages neither cruelty nor

sensuality. No human victims have ever been offered on its altars, and

those licentious rites which have appeared in so many religions have never

disgraced its pure worship.

The Chinese citizen enjoys a degree of order, peace, and comfort unknown

elsewhere in Asia. "He can hold and sell landed property with a facility,

certainty, and security which is absolute perfection compared with the

nature of English dealings of the same kind."[22] He can traverse the

country for two thousand miles unquestioned by any official. He can

follow what occupation he pleases. He can quit his country and re-enter it

without a passport. The law of primogeniture does not exist. The emperor

appoints his heir, but a younger son quite as often as an elder one. The

principle that no man is entitled by birth to rule over them is better

known to the three hundred and sixty millions of China than to the

twenty-seven millions of Great Britain that they have a right to a trial

by their peers.[23] The principle of Chinese government is to persuade

rather than to compel, to use moral means rather than physical. This rests

on the fundamental belief in human goodness. For, as Mr. Meadows justly

observes: "The theory that man's nature is radically vicious is the true

psychical basis of despotic or physical-force government; while the theory

that man's nature is radically good is the basis of free or moral-force

government." The Chinese government endeavors to be paternal. It has

refused to lay a tax on opium, because that would countenance the sale of

it, though it might derive a large income from such a tax. The sacred

literature of the Chinese is perfectly free from everything impure or

offensive. There is not a line but might be read aloud in any family

circle in England. All immoral ceremonies in idol worship are forbidden.

M. Hue says that the birth of a daughter is counted a disaster in China;

but well-informed travellers tell us that fathers go about with little

daughters on their arms, as proud and pleased as a European father could

be. Slavery and concubinage exist in China, and the husband has absolute

power over his wife, even of life and death. These customs tend to

demoralize the Chinese, and are a source of great evil. Woman is the slave

of man. The exception to this is in the case of a mother. She is absolute

in her household, and mothers, in China, command universal reverence. If

an officer asks leave of absence to visit his mother it must be granted

him. A mother may order an official to take her son to prison, and she

must be obeyed. As a wife without children woman is a slave, but as a

mother with grownup sons she is a monarch.

§ 8. The Tae-ping Insurrection.

Two extraordinary events have occurred in our day in China, the results of

which may be of the utmost importance to the nation and to mankind. The

one is the Tae-ping insurrection, the other the diplomatic mission of Mr.

Burlingame to the Western world. Whatever may be the immediate issue of

the great insurrection of our day against the Tartar dynasty, it will

remain a phenomenon of the utmost significance. There is no doubt,

notwithstanding the general opinion to the contrary, that it has been a

religious movement, proceeding from a single mind deeply moved by the

reading of the Bible. The hostility of the Chinese to the present Mantchoo

Tartar monarchs no doubt aided it; but there has been in it an element of

power from the beginning, derived, like that of the Puritans, from its

religious enthusiasm. Its leader, the Heavenly Prince, Hung-sew-tseuen,

son of a poor peasant living thirty miles northeast of Canton, received a

tract, containing extracts from the Chinese Bible of Dr. Morison, from a

Chinese tract distributor in the streets of Canton. This was in 1833, when

he was about twenty years of age. He took the book home, looked over it

carelessly, and threw it aside. Disappointed of his degree at two

competitive examinations, he fell sick, and saw a vision of an old man,

saying: "I am the Creator of all things. Go and do my work." After this

vision six years passed by, when the English war broke out, and the

English fleet took the Chinese forts in the river of Canton. Such a great

national calamity indicated, according to Chinese ideas, something rotten

in the government; and such success on the part of the English showed

that, in some way, they were fulfilling the will of Heaven. This led

Hung-sew-tseuen to peruse again his Christian books; and alone, with no

guide, he became a sincere believer in Christ, after a fashion of his own.

God was the Creator of all things, and the Supreme Father. Jesus was the

Elder Brother and heavenly Teacher of mankind. Idolatry was to be

overthrown, virtue to be practised. Hung-sew-tseuen believed that the

Bible confirmed his former visions. He accepted his mission and began to

make converts All his converts renounced idolatry, and gave up the worship

of Confucius. They travelled to and fro teaching, and formed a society of

"God-worshippers." The first convert, Fung-yun-san, became its most ardent

missionary and its disinterested preacher. Hung-sew-tseuen returned home,

went to Canton, and there met Mr. Roberts, an American missionary, who was

induced by false charges to refuse him Christian baptism. But he, without

being offended with Mr. Roberts, went home and taught his converts how to

baptize themselves. The society of "God-worshippers" increased in number.

Some of them were arrested for destroying idols, and among them

Fung-yun-san, who, however, on his way to prison, converted the policemen

by his side. These new converts set him at liberty and went away with him

as his disciples. Various striking phenomena occurred in this society. Men

fell into a state of ecstasy and delivered exhortations. Sick persons were

cured by the power of prayer. The teachings of these ecstatics were tested

by Scripture; if found to agree therewith, they were accepted; if not,

rejected.

It was in October, 1850, that this religious movement assumed a political

form. A large body of persons, in a state of chronic rebellion against the

Chinese authorities, had fled into the district, and joined the

"God-worshippers." Pursued by the imperial soldiers, they were protected

against them. Hence war began. The leaders of the religious movement found

themselves compelled to choose between submission and resistance. They

resisted, and the great insurrection began. But in China an insurrection

against the dynasty is in the natural order of things. Indeed, it may be

said to be a part of the constitution. By the Sacred Books, taught in all

the schools and made a part of the examination papers, it is the duty of

the people to overthrow any bad government. The Chinese have no power to

legislate, do not tax themselves, and the government is a pure autocracy.

But it is not a despotism; for old usages make a constitution, which the

government must respect or be overthrown. "The right to rebel," says Mr.

Meadows, "is in China a chief element of national stability." The

Tae-ping (or Universal-Peace) Insurrection has shown its religious

character throughout. It has not been cruel, except in retaliation. At the

taking of Nan-king orders were given to put all the women together and

protect them, and any one doing them an injury was punished with death.

Before the attack on Nan-king a large body of the insurgents knelt down

and prayed, and then rose and fought, like the soldiers of Cromwell. The

aid of a large body of rebels was refused, because they did not renounce

idolatry, and continued to allow the use of opium. Hymns of praise to the

Heavenly Father and Elder Brother were chanted in the camp. And the head

of the insurrection distinctly announced that, in case it succeeded, the

Bible would be substituted in all public examinations for office in the

place of Confucius. This would cause the Bible to be at once studied by

all candidates for office among three hundred and sixty millions of

people. It would constitute the greatest event in the history of

Christianity since the days of Constantino, or at least since the

conversion of the Teutonic races. The rebellion has probably failed; but

great results must follow this immense interest in Christianity in the

heart of China,--an interest awakened by no Christian mission, whether

Catholic or Protestant, but coming down into this great nation like the

rain from heaven.

In the "History of the Ti-Ping Revolution" (published in London in 1866),

written by an Englishman who held a command among the Ti-Piugs, there is

given a full, interesting, and apparently candid account of the religious

and moral character of this great movement, from which I take the

following particulars:--

"I have probably," says this writer,[24] "had a much greater experience

of the Ti-Ping religious practices than any other European, and as a

Protestant Christian I have never yet found occasion to condemn their form

of worship. The most important part of their faith is the Holy Bible,--Old

and New Testaments, entire. These have been printed and circulated

gratuitously by the government through the whole population of the Ti-Ping

jurisdiction." Abstracts of the Bible, put into verse, were circulated and

committed to memory. Their form of worship was assimilated to

Protestantism. The Sabbath was kept religiously on the seventh day. Three

cups of tea were put on the altar on that day as an offering to the

Trinity. They celebrated the communion once a month by partaking of a cup

of grape wine. Every one admitted to their fellowship was baptized, after

an examination and confession of sins. The following was the form

prescribed in the "Book of Religious Precepts of the Ti-Ping

Dynasty":--[25]

_Forms to be observed when Men wish to forsake their Sins_--"They must

kneel down in God's presence, and ask him to forgive their sins. They may

then take either a basin of water and wash themselves, or go to the river

and bathe themselves; after which they must continue daily to supplicate

Divine favor, and the Holy Spirit's assistance to renew their hearts,

saying grace at every meal, keeping holy the Sabbath day, and obeying all

God's commandments, especially avoiding idolatry. They may then be

accounted the children of God, and their souls will go to Heaven when they

die."

The prayer offered by the recipient of Baptism was as follows:--

"I (A. B.), kneeling down with a true heart, repent of my sins, and pray

the Heavenly Father, the great God, of his abundant mercy, to forgive my

former sins of ignorance in repeatedly breaking the Divine commands,

earnestly beseeching him also to grant me repentance and newness of life,

that my soul may go to Heaven, while I henceforth truly forsake my former

ways, abandoning idolatry and all corrupt practices, in obedience to

God's commands. I also pray that God would give me his Holy Spirit to

change my wicked heart, deliver me from all temptation, and grant me his

favor and protection, bestowing on me food and raiment, and exemption from

calamity, peace in this world and glory in the next, through the mercies

of our Saviour and Elder Brother, Jesus, who redeemed us from sin."

In every household throughout the Ti-Ping territory the following

translation of the Lord's Prayer was hung up for the use of the children,

printed in large black characters on a white board:--

"Supreme Lord, our Heavenly Father, forgive all our sins that we have

committed in ignorance, rebelling against thee. Bless us, brethren and

sisters, thy little children. Give us our daily food and raiment; keep

from us all calamities and afflictions; that in this world we may have

peace and finally ascend to heaven to enjoy everlasting happiness. We pray

thee to bless our brethren and sisters of all nations. We ask these things

for the redeeming merits of our Lord and Saviour, our heavenly brother,

Jesus. We also pray, Heavenly Father, that thy will may be done on earth

as in heaven: for thine are all the kingdoms, glory, and power. Amen."

The writer says he has frequently watched the Ti-Ping women teaching the

children this prayer; "and often, on entering a house, the children ran up

to me, and pulling me toward the board, began to read the prayer."

The seventh day was kept very strictly. As soon as midnight sounded on

Friday, all the people throughout; Ti-Pingdom were summoned to worship.

Two other services were held during the day. Each opened with a doxology

to God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit. Then was sung this hymn:--

"The true doctrine is different from the doctrine of this world;

It saves men's souls and gives eternal bliss.

The wise receive it instantly with joy;

The foolish, wakened by it, find the way to Heaven.

Our Heavenly Father, of his great mercy,

Did not spare his own Son, but sent him down

To give his life to redeem sinners.

When men know this, and repent, they may go to Heaven."

The rest of the services consisted in a chapter of the Bible read by the

minister; a creed, repeated by the congregation standing; a prayer, read

by the minister and repeated by the whole congregation kneeling. Then the

prayer was burned, the minister read a sermon, an anthem was chanted to

the long life of the king; then followed the Ten Commandments, music, and

the burning of incense and fire-crackers. No business was allowed on the

Sabbath, and the shops were closed. There was a clergy, chosen by

competitive examination, subject to the approval of the Tien-Wong, or

supreme religious head of the movement. There was a minister placed over

every twenty-five families, and a church, or Heavenly Hall, assigned to

him in some public building. Over every twenty, five parishes there was a

superior, who visited them in turn every Sabbath. Once every month the

whole people were addressed by the chief Wong.

The writer of this work describes his attendance on morning prayers at

Nan-king, in the Heavenly Hall of the Chung-Wang's household. This took

place at sunrise every morning, the men and women sitting on opposite

sides of the hall. "Oftentimes," says he, "while kneeling in the midst of

an apparently devout congregation, and gazing on the upturned countenances

lightened by the early morning sun, have I wondered why no British

missionary occupied my place, and why Europeans generally preferred

slaughtering the Ti-Pings to accepting them as brothers in Christ. When I

look back," he adds, "on the unchangeable and universal kindness I always

met with among the Ti-Pings, even when their dearest relatives were being

slaughtered by my countrymen, or delivered over to the Manchoos to be

tortured to death, their magnanimous forbearance seems like a dream. Their

kind and friendly feelings were often annoying. To those who have

experienced the ordinary dislike of foreigners by the Chinese, the

surprising friendliness of the Ti-Pings was most remarkable." They

welcomed Europeans as "brethren from across the sea," and claimed them as

fellow-worshippers of "Yesu."

Though the Ti-Pings did not at once lay aside all heathen customs, and

could not be expected to do so, they took some remarkable steps in the

right direction. Their women were in a much higher position than among the

other Chinese; they abolished the custom of cramping their feet; a married

woman had rights, and could not be divorced at will, or sold, as under the

Manchoos. Large institutions were established for unmarried women. Slavery

was totally abolished, and to sell a human being was made a capital

offence. They utterly prohibited the use of opium; and this was probably

their chief offence in the eyes of the English. Prostitution was punished

by death, and was unknown in their cities. Idolatry was also utterly

abolished. Their treatment of the people under them was merciful; they

protected their prisoners, whom the Imperialists always massacred. The

British troops, instead of preserving neutrality, aided the Imperialists

in putting down the insurrection in such ways as this. The British

cruisers _assumed_ that the Ti-Ping junks were pirates, because they

captured Chinese vessels. The British ship Bittern and another steamer

sank every vessel but two in a rebel fleet, and gave up the crew of one

which they captured to be put to death. This is the description of another

transaction of the same kind, in the harbor of Shi-poo: "The junks were

destroyed, and their crews shot, drowned, and hunted down, until about a

thousand were killed; the Bittern's men aiding the Chinese on shore to

complete the wholesale massacre."[26]

It is the deliberate opinion of this well-informed English writer that the

Ti-Ping insurrection would have succeeded but for British intervention;

that the Tartar dynasty would have been expelled, the Chinese regained

their autonomy, and Christianity have been established throughout the

Empire. At the end of his book he gives a table of _forty-three_ battles

and massacres in which the British soldiers and navy took part, in which

about four hundred thousand of the Ti-Pings were killed, and he estimates

that more than two millions more died of starvation in 1863 and 1864, in

the famine occasioned by the operations of the allied English, French, and

Chinese troop's, when the Ti-Pings were driven from their territories. In

view of such facts, well may an English writer say: "It is not once or

twice that the policy of the British government has been ruinous to the

best interests of the world. Disregard of international law and of treaty

law in Europe, deeds of piracy and spoliation in Asia, one vast system of

wrong and violence, have everywhere for years marked the dealings of the

British government with the weaker races of the globe."[27]

Other Englishmen, beside "Lin-Le" and Mr. Meadows, give the same testimony

to the Christian character of this great movement in China. Captain

Fishbourne, describing his visit in H.M.S. Hermes to Nan-king, says: "It

was obvious to the commonest observer that they were practically a

different race." They had the Scriptures, many seemed to him to be

practical Christians, serious and religious, believing in a special

Providence, thinking that their trials were sent to purify them. "They

accuse us of magic," said one. "The only magic we employ is prayer to

God." The man who said this, says Captain Fishbourne, "was a little

shrivelled-up person, but he uttered words of courageous confidence in

God, and could utter the words of a hero. He and others like him have

impressed the minds of their followers with their own courage and

morality."

The English Bishop of Victoria has constantly given the same testimony. Of

one of the Ti-Ping books Dr. Medhurst says: "There is not a word in it

which a Christian missionary might not adopt and circulate as a tract for

the benefit of the Chinese."

Dr. Medhurst also describes a scene which took place in Shanghae, where he

was preaching in the chapel of the London Missionary Society, on the folly

of idolatry and the duty of worshipping the one true God. A man arose in

the middle of the congregation and said: "That is true! that is true! the

idols must perish. I am a Ti-Ping; we all worship one God and believe in

Jesus, and we everywhere destroy the idols. Two years ago when we began we

were only three thousand; now we have marched across the Empire, because

God was on our side." He then exhorted the people to abandon idolatry and

to believe in Jesus, and said: "We are happy in our religion, and look on

the day of our death as the happiest moment of life. When any of our

number dies, we do not weep, but congratulate each other because he has

gone to the joy of the heavenly world."

The mission of Mr. Burlingame indicated a sincere desire on the part of

the sagacious men who then governed China, especially of Prince Kung, to

enter into relations with modern civilization and modern thought. From the

official papers of this mission,[28] it appears that Mr. Burlingame was

authorized "to transact all business with the Treaty Powers in which those

countries and China had a common interest," (communication of Prince Kung,

December 31, 1867). The Chinese government expressly states that this step

is intended as adopting the customs of diplomatic intercourse peculiar to

the West, and that in so doing the Chinese Empire means to conform to the

law of nations, as understood among the European states. It therefore

adopted "Wheaton's International Law" as the text-book and authority to be

used in its Foreign Office, and had it carefully translated into Chinese

for the use of its mandarins. This movement was the result, says Mr.

Burlingame, of the "co-operative policy" adopted by the representatives in

China of the Treaty Powers, in which they agreed to act together on all

important questions, to take no cession of territory, and never to menace

the autonomy of the Empire. They agreed "to leave her perfectly free to

develop herself according to her own form of civilization, not to

interfere with her interior affairs, to make her waters neutral, and her

land safe" (Burlingame's speech at San Francisco). There is no doubt that

if the states known as the "Treaty Powers," namely, the United States,

Belgium, Denmark, France, Great Britain, Holland, Italy, North Germany,

Russia, Spain, and Sweden, will loyally abstain from aggression and

interference in China and respect her independence, that this great

Empire will step forth from her seclusion of fifty centuries, and enter

the commonwealth of nations.

The treaty between the United States and China of July 28, 1868, includes

provisions for the neutrality of the Chinese waters; for freedom of

worship for United States citizens in China, and for the Chinese in the

United States; for allowing voluntary emigration, and prohibiting the

compulsory coolie trade; for freedom to travel in China and the United

States by the citizens of either country; and for freedom to establish and

attend schools in both countries.

We add to this chapter a Note, containing an interesting account, from

Hue's "Christianity in China," of an inscribed stone, proving that

Christian churches existed in China in the seventh century. These churches

were the result of the efforts of Nestorian missionaries, who were the

Protestant Christians of their age. Their success in China is another

proof that the Christianity which is to be welcomed there must be

presented in an intelligible and rational form.

* * * * *

NOTE.

The Nestorian Inscription in China.[29]

In 1625 some Chinese workmen, engaged in digging a foundation for a

house, outside the walls of the city of Si-ngau-Fou, the capital of the

province of Chen-si, found buried in the earth a large monumental stone

resembling those which the Chinese are in the habit of raising to

preserve to posterity the remembrance of remarkable events and

illustrious men. It was a dark-colored marble tablet, ten feet high and

five broad, and bearing on one side an inscription in ancient Chinese,

and also some other characters quite unknown in China.

* * * * *

Several exact tracings from the stone were sent to Europe by the

Jesuits who saw it. The library of their house at Rome had one of the

first, and it attracted numerous visitors; subsequently, another

authentic copy of the dimensions of the tablet was sent to Paris, and

deposited at the library in the Rue Richelieu, where it may still be

seen in the gallery of manuscripts.

This monument, discovered by chance amidst rubbish in the environs of

an ancient capital of the Chinese Empire, excited a great sensation;

for on examining the stone, and endeavoring to interpret the

inscription, it was with surprise discovered that the Christian

religion had had numerous apostles in China at the beginning of the

seventh century, and that it had for a long time flourished there. The

strange characters proved to be those called _estrangélhos_, which were

in use among the ancient inhabitants of Syria, and will be found in

some Syriac manuscripts of earlier date than the eighth century.

* * * * *

_Monument of the great Propagation of the Luminous Doctrine in the

Central Empire, composed by Khing-Tsing, a devout Man of the Temple of

Ta-Thsin._

1. There has always been only one true Cause, essentially the first,

and without beginning, supremely intelligent and immaterial;

essentially the last, and uniting all perfections. He placed the poles

of the heavens and created all beings; marvellously holy, he is the

source of all perfection. This admirable being, is he not the _Triune_,

the true Lord without beginning, _Oloho_?

He divided the world by a cross into four parts. After having

decomposed the primordial air, he gave birth to the two elements.

Chaos was transformed, and then the sun and the moon appeared. He made

the sun and the moon move to produce day and night. He elaborated and

perfected the ten thousand things; but in creating the first man, he

endowed him with perfect interior harmony. He enjoined him to watch

over the sea of his desires. His nature was without vice and without

error; his heart, pure and simple, was originally without disorderly

appetites.

2. But Sa-Thang propagated lies, and stained by his malice that which

had been pure and holy. He proclaimed, as a truth, the equality of

greatness, and upset all ideas. This is why three hundred and

sixty-five sects, lending each other a mutual support, formed a long

chain, and wove, so to speak, a net of law. Some put the creature in

the place of the Eternal, others denied the existence of beings, and

destroyed the two principles. Others instituted prayers and sacrifices

to obtain good fortune; others proclaimed their own sanctity to deceive

mankind. The minds of men labored, and were filled with anxiety;

aspirations after the supreme good were trampled down; thus perpetually

floating about they attained to nothing, and all went from bad to

worse. The darkness thickened, men lost their sight, and for a long

time they wandered without being able to find it again.

3. Then our Triune God communicated his substance to the very venerable

Mi-chi-ho (Messiah), who, veiling his true majesty, appeared in the

world in the likeness of a man. The celestial spirits manifested their

joy, and a virgin brought forth the saint in Ta-Thsin. The most

splendid constellations announced this happy event; the Persians saw

the splendor, and ran to pay tribute. He fulfilled what was said of old

by the twenty-four saints; he organized, by his precepts, both families

and kingdoms; he instituted the new religion according to the true

notion of the Trinity in Unity; he regulated conscience by the true

faith; he signified to the world the eight commandments, and purged

humanity from its pollutions by opening the door to the three virtues.

He diffused life and extinguished death; he suspended the luminous sun

to destroy the dwelling of darkness, and then the lies of demons passed

away. He directed the bark of mercy towards the palace of light, and

all creatures endowed with intelligence have been succored. After

having consummated this act of power, he rose at midday towards the

Truth. Twenty-seven books have been left. He has enlarged the springs

of mercy, that men might be converted. The baptism by water and by the

Spirit is a law that purifies the soul and beautifies the exterior. The

sign of the cross unites the four quarters of the world, and restores

the harmony that had been destroyed. By striking upon a piece of wood,

we make the voice of charity and mercy resound; by sacrificing towards

the east we indicate the way of life and glory.

Our ministers allow their beards to grow, to show that they are devoted

to their neighbors. The tonsure that they wear at the top of their

heads indicates that they have renounced worldly desires. In giving

liberty to slaves we become a link between the powerful and weak. We do

not accumulate riches, and we share with the poor that which we

possess. Fasting strengthens the intellectual powers, abstinence and

moderation preserve health. We worship seven times a day, and by our

prayers we aid the living and the dead. On the seventh day we offer

sacrifice, after having purified our hearts and received absolution for

our sins. This religion, so perfect and so excellent, is difficult to

name, but it enlightens darkness by its brilliant precepts. It is

called the Luminous Religion.

5. Learning alone without sanctity has no grandeur, sanctity without

learning makes no progress. When learning and sanctity proceed

harmoniously, the universe is adorned and resplendent.

The Emperor Tai-Tsoung illustrated the Empire. He opened the

revolution, and governed men in holiness. In his time there was a man

of high virtue named Olopen, who came from the kingdom of Ta-Thsin.

Directed by the blue clouds, he bore the Scriptures of the true

doctrine; he observed the rules of the winds, and traversed difficult

and perilous countries

In the ninth year of Tching-Kouan (636) he arrived at Tehang-ngan. The

Emperor ordered Fang-hi-wen-Ling, first minister of the Empire, to go

with a great train of attendants to the western suburb, to meet the

stranger and bring him to the palace. He had the Holy Scriptures

translated in the Imperial library. The court listened to the doctrine,

meditated on it profoundly, and understood the great unity of truth. A

special edict was promulgated for its publication and diffusion.

In the twelfth year of Tching-Kouan, in the seventh moon, during the

autumn, the new edict was promulgated in these terms:--

The doctrine has no fixed name, the holy has no determinate substance;

it institutes religions suitable to various countries, and carries men

in crowds in its tracks. Olopen, a man of Ta-Thsin, and of a lofty

virtue, bearing Scriptures and images, has come to offer them in the

Supreme Court. After a minute examination of the spirit of this

religion, it has been found to be excellent, mysterious, and pacific.

The contemplation of its radical principle gives birth to perfection

and fixes the will. It is exempt from verbosity; it considers only good

results. It is useful to men, and consequently ought to be published

under the whole extent of the heavens. I, therefore, command the

magistrates to have a Ta-Thsin temple constructed in the quarter named

T-ning of the Imperial city, and twenty-one religious men shall be

installed therein.

* * * * *

10. Sou-Tsoung, the illustrious and brilliant emperor, erected at

Ling-on and other towns, five in all, _luminous_ temples. The primitive

good was thus strengthened, and felicity flourished. Joyous solemnities

were inaugurated, and the Empire entered on a wide course of

prosperity.

11. Tai-Tsoung (764), a lettered and a warlike emperor, propagated the

holy revolution. He sought for peace and tranquillity. Every year, at

the hour of the Nativity (Christmas), he burnt celestial perfumes in

remembrance of the divine benefit; he prepared imperial feasts, to

honor the _luminous_ (Christian) multitude.

* * * * *

21. This stone was raised in the second year of Kien-Tchoung of the

great dynasty of Thang (A.D. 781), on the seventh day of the moon of

the great increase. At this time the devout Ning-Chou, lord of the

doctrine, governed the luminous multitude in the Eastern country.

Such is the translation of the famous inscription found at Si-ngau-Fou,

in 1625. On the left of the monument are to be read the following words

in the Syriac language: "In the days of the Father of Fathers,

Anan-Yeschouah, Patriarch _Catholicos_." To the right can be traced,

"Adam, Priest, and Chor-Episcopus"; and at the base of the inscription:

"In the year of the Greeks one thousand nine hundred and two (A.D.

781), Mar Yezd-bouzid, Priest and Chor-Episcopus of the Imperial city

of Komdam, son of Millesins, priest of happy memory, of Balkh, a town

of Tokharistan (Turkistan), raised this tablet of stone, on which are

described the benefits of our Saviour, and the preaching of our fathers

in the kingdom of the Chinese. Adam, Deacon, son of Yezd-bouzid,

Chor-Episcopus; Sabar-Jesu, Priest; Gabriel, Priest, Archdeacon, and

Ecclesiarch of Komdam and Sarage."

* * * * *

The abridgment of Christian doctrine given in the Syro-Chinese

inscription of Si-ngau-Fou shows us, also, that the propagators of the

faith in Upper Asia in the seventh century professed the Nestorian

errors.

Through the vague and obscure verbiage which characterizes the Chinese

style, we recognize the mode in which that heresiarch admitted the

union of the Word with man, by indwelling plenitude of grace superior

to that of all the saints. One of the persons of the Trinity

communicated himself to the very illustrious and venerable Messiah,

"veiling his majesty." That is certainly the doctrine of Nestorius;

upon that point the authority of the critics is unanimous.

History, as we have elsewhere remarked, records the rapid progress of

the Nestorian sects in the interior of Asia, and their being able to

hold their ground, even under the sway of the Mussulmans, by means of

compromises and concessions of every kind.

Setting out from the banks of the Tigris or the Euphrates, these ardent

and courageous propagators of the Gospel probably proceeded to

Khorassan, and then crossing the Oxus, directed their course toward the

Lake of Lop, and entered the Chinese Empire by the province of Chen-si.

Olopen, and his successors in the Christian mission, whether Syrians or

Persians by birth, certainly belonged to the Nestorian church.

Voltaire, who did not like to trouble himself with scientific

arguments, and who was much stronger in sarcasm than in erudition,

roundly accuses the missionaries of having fabricated the inscription

on the monument of Si-ngau-Fou, from motives of "pious fraud." "As if,"

says Remusat, "such a fabrication could have been practicable in the

midst of a distrustful and suspicious nation, in a country in which

magistrates and private people are equally ill-disposed towards

foreigners, and especially missionaries, where all eyes are open to

their most trivial proceedings, and where the authorities watch with

the most jealous care over everything relating to the historical

traditions and monuments of antiquity. It would be very difficult to

explain how the missionaries could have been bold enough to have

printed and published in China, and in Chinese, an inscription that had

never existed, and how they could have imitated the Chinese style,

counterfeited the manner of the writers of the dynasty of Thang,

alluded to customs little known, to local circumstances, to dates

calculated from the mysterious figures of Chinese astrology, and the

whole without betraying themselves for a moment; and with such

perfection as to impose on the most skilful men of letters, induced, of

course, by the singularity of the discovery to dispute its

authenticity. It could only have been done by one of the most erudite

of Chinese scholars, joining with the missionaries to impose on his own

countrymen."

"Even that would not be all, for the borders of the inscription are

covered with Syrian names in fine _estranghélo_ characters. The forgers

must, then, have been not only acquainted with these characters, but

have been able to get engraved with perfect exactness ninety lines of

them, and in the ancient writing, known at present to very few."

"This argument of Remusat's," says another learned Orientalist, M.

Felix Neve, "is of irresistible force, and we have formerly heard a

similar one maintained with the greatest confidence by M. Quatremère,

of the Academy of Inscriptions and Belles-Lettres, and we allow

ourselves to quote the opinion of so highly qualified a judge upon this

point. Before the last century it would have been absolutely impossible

to forge in Europe a series of names and titles belonging to a

Christian nation of Western Asia; it is only since the fruits of

Assemam's labors have been made public by his family at Rome, that

there existed a sufficient knowledge of the Syriac for such a purpose;

and it is only by the publication of the manuscripts of the Vatican,

that the extent to which Nestorianism spread in the centre of Asia, and

the influence of its hierarchy in the Persian provinces could have been

estimated. There is no reason to suppose that missionaries who left

Europe in the very beginning of the seventeenth century could have

acquired a knowledge which could only be obtained from reading the

originals and not vague accounts of them."

The sagacity of M. Saint Martin, who was for a long time the colleague

of M. Quatremère, has pointed out in a note worthy of his erudition,

another special proof, which is by no means to be neglected.

"Amongst the various arguments," he says, "that might be urged in favor

of the legitimacy of the monument, but of which, as yet, no use has

been made, must not be forgotten the name of the priest by whom it is

said to have been erected. The name _Yezd-bouzid_ is Persian, and at

the epoch when the monument was discovered it would have been

impossible to invent it, as there existed no work where it could have

been found. Indeed, I do not think that, even since then, there has

ever been any one published in which it could have been met with.

"It is a very celebrated name among the Armenians, and comes to them

from a martyr, a Persian by birth, and of the royal race, who perished

towards the middle of the seventh century, and rendered his name

illustrious amongst the Christian nations of the East." Saint Martin

adds in the same place, that the famous monument of Si-ngau-Fou, whose

authenticity has for a long time been called in question from the

hatred entertained against the Jesuit missionaries who discovered it,

rather than from a candid examination of its contents, is now regarded

as above all suspicion.