China and the West

Clarke, James Freeman. Ten great religions [ID D32174]. (1)
Chapter II.
Confucius and the Chinese, or the Prose of Asia.
§ 1. Peculiarities of Chinese Civilization
§ 2. Chinese Government based on Education. Civi-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

§ 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.