Chung Shu offered the rain sacrifice, he put up an earthen dragon. with a view to attract the rain.

When the summer is at its height, the sun reigns supreme, but the clouds and the rain oppose it. The sun is fire, clouds and rain being water. At the collision with water, fire explodes, and gives a sound, which is the thunder. Upon hearing the sound of thunder, the dragon rises, when it rises, the clouds appear, and when they are there, the dragon mounts them. The clouds and the rain are affected by the dragon, and the dragon also rides on the clouds to Heaven. Heaven stretches to the farthest distance, and the thunder is very high. Upon the clouds dispersing, the dragon alights again. Men seeing it riding on the clouds, believe it to ascend to Heaven, and beholding Heaven sending forth thunder and lightning, they imagine that Heaven fetches the dragon.

The scholars of to-day reading the Yiking and the historical records, all know that the dragon belongs to the same class as the clouds. They adhere to the common gossip without knowing, what it means. Besides they look upon the light literature as an authority. Thus they say that Heaven fetches the dragon.

Heaven does not do that, nor does the dragon rise to Heaven. When Lu Chiu Hsin slew the two serpents, he dragged them out with his hands by the tail, but the moment they were out of the pool, a thunder-bolt fell. Serpents are a species similar to dragons. When serpents or dragons make their appearance, clouds and rain arrive, upon their arrival there is thunder and lightning. If Heaven really fetched the dragon for its own use, what benefit would it have from dead serpents? Fish, though living in the water, yet follow the clouds and the rain flying, and riding on them ascend to Heaven. The dragon belongs to the class of fish, it rides on thunder and lightning in the same way as the fish fly. For following the clouds and the rain, fish are not considered to be spirits, the dragons alone are called spirits because of their riding on thunder and lightning. This common belief is contrary to truth.

All the creatures in the world have their peculiar vehicles:The water serpents ride on the fog, the dragons on the clouds, and birds on the wind. To call the dragon alone a spirit, because it is seen riding on the clouds, would not be in accordance with its real nature, and would only detract from its skill.

But the reason why the dragon is looked upon as a spirit is, because it can expand and contract its body, and make itself visible

1 A scholar of the 2nd cent. B.C. See p. 39.

or invisible. Yet the expansion and contraction of the body and its visibility and invisibility do not constitute a spirit.

Yu Jang1 swallowed charcoal and varnished his body, so that he got ulcers, and nobody recognised him. Tse Kung burned off his beard, and took the semblance of a woman, so that nobody knew him. When the dragon transforms itself and absconds, men are also unable to perceive it, such is its skill in metamorphosing and hiding itself.

Much in the nature of creatures is spontaneous:-The rhinopithecus knows the past, magpies foresee the future,5 and parrots can talk. These three peculiarities may be compared to the transformations, which are in the nature of dragons. If by astuteness one could become a spirit, Yü Jang and Tse Kung would be spirits. Confucius said, "The roving animals can be ensnared, the flying birds be shot with an arrow. As regards the dragon, I do not know, whether it can ride on the wind and the clouds, and thus rise on high. To-day I saw Lao Tse. Should he perhaps be like a dragon?"6

Provided that the dragon rises, mounted on a cloud, and, when the cloud disperses, comes down again, then the class of creatures, to which it belongs, might be ascertained, and all about its celestial and terrestrial state known. Yet they say that Confucius did not know. A sage like Confucius ignored the nature of dragons. How much less can common people know, whose learning is deficient, who are biassed in favour of the marvellous, and whose minds are unable to decide, what is possible and what not. That they should call the dragon a spirit, which rises to Heaven can therefore be no matter for surprise.

1 A native of the Chin State, 5th and 6th cent. B.C. He twice made an attempt upon the life of Viscount Hsiang of Chao to avenge the death of his master, the Earl of Chih, whom Hsiang had slain. Both attempts failed. The second time he disguised himself in the way described here.

2 A disciple of Confucius.

3 A kind of monkey in western China.

5

This probably means that monkeys have an excellent memory.

Magpies are believed to know, whether the next year will be very stormy, for in that case they build their nests near the ground. Moreover, they announce future joy, hence their popular name " birds of joy."

6 A quotation from the Biography of Lao Tse in the Shi-chi chap. 63, p. 2v.

CHAPTER XXX.

Arguments on Ominous Creatures (Chiang-jui).

The scholars in their essays claim for themselves the faculty of knowing the phoenix and the unicorn, when they see them. They, of course, rely on the pictures of the phoenix and the unicorn. Besides there is a passage in the Chun-chiu concerning the capture of a unicorn to the effect that it was a sort of a deer with a horn.1 Hence a deer with a horn must be a unicorn. When they see a bird like a phoenix, they take it for a phoenix.

ance.

Huang Ti, Yao, Shun, and the sovereigns of the Chou dynasty, when it was flourishing, all caused the phoenix to make its appearUnder the reign of Hsiao Hsüan Ti2 a phoenix alighted in the Shang-lin park, and afterwards also on a tree at the east-gate of the Chang-lo palace. It was five feet high, and had a beautiful variegated plumage. The unicorn caught by the people of Chou resembled a deer, and had a horn; the unicorn of Wu Ti was also like a deer with a horn. If there be a huge bird with a variegated plumage, or an animal shaped like a deer having one horn on its head, it is possible, they fancy, to determine, whether it be a phoenix or a unicorn, by referring to drawings and pictures, and to ancient and modern traditions.

Now the phoenix is the holy bird, and the unicorn the holy animal as the Five Emperors, the Three Rulers, Kao Yao, and Confucius are the holy ones among men. The Twelve Holy Men3 vary considerably in their appearance, can we then call a deer with a horn a unicorn, or a bird resembling a phoenix by this name? Between the hair and the colour of the holy birds and the holy animals there is as much difference as between the osseous structure of the twelve holy men.

The horn is like the character" wu worn on the front. Chuan Hsu had this character on his brow, but Yao and Shun were not necessarily marked in the same way. If the unicorn caught in Lu

The last paragraph of the Chun-chiu, Duke Ai 14th year, merely mentions the capture of a lin. That it was a deer with one horn is recorded in the "Family Sayings" of Confucius. See Legge's transl. Vol. II, p. 834, Note.

had a horn, it does not follow anyhow that the unicorns observed later on had all a horn. Should we be desirous to learn to know the unicorn of the present day by using the unicorn caught in Lu as a prototype, we may be sure to fail in our endeavour. The fur, the bones, and the horn vary. Notwithstanding their difference, there may be a certain resemblance, but that does not mean identity.

Shun had double pupils, and Wang Mang also, Duke Wên of Chin had his ribs all in one piece, and Chang Yi likewise. If a resemblance be based on the osseous structure, the hair and the complexion, then Wang Mang' was a Shun, and Chang Yi2 a Duke Wên of Chin.3

Yu Jo in Lu bore a striking resemblance to Confucius. After the death of the latter, his disciples all made Yu Jo sit down and questioned him on some points of the doctrine, but Yu Jo could not answer. Why? Because there was only a likeness of his external appearance, whereas his mind was different. Thus, variegated birds and animals with one horn may sometimes look like a phoenix or a unicorn, but, as a matter of fact, they are not real ones. Therefore it is a mistake to distinguish a phoenix or a unicorn by their shape, their hair, or their colour.

In this manner did Yen Yuan almost equal Confucius, but he was not like him, whereas Yu Jo, quite an ordinary type of man, looked like a sage. Consequently a real phoenix or a real unicorn may perhaps not look like it, in its outward shape and, on the other hand, quite common birds and animals resemble the real phoenix and unicorn by their hair and colour. How can they be distinguished? The literati who maintain that they are able to recognise a phoenix or a unicorn, when they see them, must also say of themselves that they know a holy man, when they perceive him.

5

Kao Yao had a horse mouth, and Confucius' arms were turned backwards. If, later on, their wisdom far exceeded that of other people, still they could not be called sages on account of the horse mouth or the concave forehead, for as the features of the Twelve Holy Men differed from those of former sages, they cannot be characteristic either for future sages. The configuration of the bones differs, as do their names and their physical frame; and they

1 The usurper.

2 A political adventurer, cf. p. 115.

3 An enlightened sovereign, cf. p. 162.

4 Disciple of Confucius.

5 Cf. p. 304.

are born in different places. Therefore, how could a sage be known, provided that one were born again?

Huan Chin Shan' said to Yang Tse Yün,2" If in future generations there should be again a man like the sages, people would be well aware that his talents surpassed theirs by far, but they would not be able to know, whether he really was a holy man or not." Yang Tse Yün replied, "So it is, indeed."

It is difficult to know a sage. Even men like Huan Chün Shan and Yang Tse Yün, who could judge the excellence and the attainments of a sage, felt incompetent. The scholars of the age represent mediocrity. The knowledge of mediocrity consists in the combination of ordinary observations, but we can be sure that, on seeing a sage, they would not be in a position to recognise him as such. Being unable to recognise a sage, they could not know a phoenix or a unicorn either. Why must people at the present day, who are speaking of the phoenix and the unicorn, pretend that they have such a knowledge?

In former generations people used the words phoenix and unicorn merely upon hearing of the queerness of a bird or an animal. If those had a peculiar plumage or horn, and if they did not fly at random, or wildly roam about, struggling for their food with other birds or animals, they were called phoenix or unicorn. The knowledge which the men of to-day have of the sages is of very much the same kind. They have been told that sages are wonderful men. Therefore, when a man's body shows some peculiarity of the bones, and his wisdom is profound and extensive, they call him a sage. Those who really know what a sage means, do not give that name at first sight, and when they have heard a man for the first time. They first bow to him, hear his lectures, and receive his instruction, and afterwards learn to know him. This will become more clear from the following facts.

When Tse Kung had served Confucius one year, he thought himself to be superior to Confucius, after two years he thought himself to be his equal, but after three years he had learned that he could never come up to him. During the space of one and two years, he did not yet know that Confucius was a sage, and it was not until three years had elapsed, that he became aware of it. If Tse Kung required three years to find this out, our scholars

1 Huan Tan Huan Chün Shan lived in the 1st cent. B.C. and a.d. He was a man of wide learning. Of his works the "Hsin-lun "New Reflections" have been preserved.

2 The Confucian philosopher, cf. p. 391.