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mat in lying down, they should not ask or receive anything from one another, and they should not wear upper or lower garments alike." (Bk. x., sect. i., 12.)

The following explanation of the reasons for such separation is attributed in the "Li Ki" to Confucius himself: "The Master said: "The ceremonial usages serve as dykes for the people against evil excesses. They exemplify the separation between the sexes which should be maintained, that there may be no ground for suspicion and human relations may be clearly defined. So it was intended to guard the people; yet there are women among them who offer themselves.' " (Bk. xxvii., 33.)

In a more extended passage, also attributed to Confucius, the reason for the strictness of the rules is more fully stated, together with illustrations of their application, as follows: "The Master said: "The love of virtue should balance the love of beauty. Men of position should not be like anglers for beauty in those below them. The superior man withstands the allurements of beauty, to give an example to the people. Thus men and women, in giving and receiving, allow not their hands to touch; in driving even with his wife in his carriage, a husband holds forth his left hand; when a young aunt, a sister, or a daughter is wed and returns to her father's house, no male relative should sit with her upon the mat; a widow should not lament at night; in asking after a wife who is

ill, the nature of her illness should not be referred to. Thus it was sought to guard the people. Yet there are those who become licentious and introduce disorder and confusion into their fami

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lies.' (Li Ki, bk. xxvii., 37.)

There was no relaxation of this separation before marriage. Thus Mencius says: "When a son is born, what is desired for him is that he may have a wife; when a daughter is born, that she may have a husband. All men as parents have this feeling. If, without awaiting the instructions of their parents and the arrangements of the intermediary, they bore holes to steal a sight of each other, or climb over a wall to be with each other, their parents and all others will despise them." (Bk. iii., pt. ii., c. iii., v. 6.)

In the "Yi King" (appendix iii., sect. i., c. viii., 48) the adornment of women so as to attract men is thus referred to: "Careless laying up of things excites to robbery, as a woman's adorning herself excites to lust."

Under the rules laid down in the "Li Ki" this delicacy about sex was carried so far that "a man was not permitted to die in the hands of women, nor a woman in the hands of men!" (Bk. xix., sect. i., I.)

Confucius and for centuries before his time the dominant persons in Chinese society were firm believers in the home as the sphere of woman. Within the home she was supreme; the privacies of her realm should not be revealed without, nor

the hardships and worries of the outside world brought within to annoy and terrify her. In the "Li Ki" it is said: "The men should not speak of what belongs to the inside of the house, nor the women of what belongs to the outside."

sect. i., 12.)

(Bk. x.,

And again: "Outside affairs should not be talked of inside the home, nor inside affairs outside of it." (Bk. i., sect. i., pt. iii., c. vi., v. 33.)

The severity of the rules enjoined by Confucius and his Chinese predecessors in the matter of avoiding temptation is well illustrated by the following, the enforcement of which must have rendered the childhood and youth of the sage, himself the only son of a widow, unusually and even painfully solitary at times:

"The Master said: 'One does not pay visits to the son of a widow. This may seem an obstacle to friendship, but the superior man, in order to avoid suspicion, will make no visits in such a case. Hence, also, in calling upon a friend, if the master of the house be not at home, unless there be some great cause for it, the guest does not cross the threshold.'" (Bk. xxvii., 36.)

CHAPTER IV

THE FAMILY

WITH the Chinese, as with the ancient Romans, the family is the social unit, and Confucius has much to say on this subject. As he connected propriety, the relation of a man to his fellows, with self-development, so he does even more intimately the relation of a man to the members of his household.

Prerequisites to its Regulation. "What is meant by 'The regulation of one's own family depends on his self-development' is this: Men are partial where they feel affection and love, partial where they despise and dislike, partial where they stand in awe and reverence, partial where they feel sorrow and compassion, partial where they are arrogant and harsh. Thus it is that there are few men in the world who love and at the same time know the bad qualities of them they love or who hate and yet know the excellences of them they hate. Hence it is said, in the common adage: 'A man does not know the wickedness of his son; he does not know the richness of his growing corn.' This is what is meant. by saying that if

there is not self-development, a man cannot regulate his family." (Great Learning, c. viii.)

The idea expressed in this passage from "The Great Learning" seems to be that the love of an inferior man for his family is not really affectionate regard for the welfare of wife or child but merely an indulgent disposition, permitting them, partly through favour, partly because to take the trouble to regulate them is too great a detriment to his own personal comfort, to go their own way without restraint. Such, the sage conceives, is the conduct of the inferior man whose partiality so blinds him to the faults of those whom he loves, that he cannot bring himself to correct them. The superior man, he holds, should be, and indeed necessarily is, of the contrary view and practice. Of this it is said in the "Li Ki": "The superior man commences with respect as the basis of love. To omit respect is to leave no foundation for affection. Without love there can be no union; without respect the love will be ignoble." (Bk. xxiv., 9.)

Precisely the opposite of mere indulgent laxity is indicated as the course of the superior man in respect to his family; and it is asked by Confucius with full assurance as to what the reply must be if veracious: "Can there be love which does not lead to strictness with its objects?" (Analects, bk. xiv., c. viii.)

The essential mutuality and the prerequisites of that union of hearts upon which alone true

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