THE ANALECTS· OF CONFUCIUS BY WILLIAM EDWARD SOOTHILL. Principal of the Imperial University, Shansi, a Mission in China, Etc., Etc. 1910. PUBLISHED BY THE AUTHOR. Printed by the Fukuin Printing Company, Ld., Yokohama. in Japan. The Methodist Publishing House, Tokyo. 48256 cap. 2 PREFACE. The Discourses of Confucius, commonly known as the Analects, no student of Chinese, least of all the missionary, can afford to neglect. In this brief treatise is revealed to us, more or less fully, the mind of China's most illustrious son, and consequently the mind of his race at its best. Here is the model on which for two thousand years this people has blocked the plastic mass of its mind and Sof (Core; we me character. To understand the matrix is to understand at least the form if not the material of the impression, and in this book we have the die from which millions have been minted, sometimes of fine, more oft of baser metal. Nevertheless, however varied the substance, the form sought after has ever been the same, and he who understands the revelation of China's model of wisdom, grace and honour herein exhibited, will also apprehend what is the noblest ideal, however imperfect, that this multitudinous race has set before itself. He will, too, by this means come into so close a mental touch with its aspirations as to see distinction and dignity where before a swamp of mental and moral stagnation may have seemed to be his sole environment. If any one ask why another translation be presented, the leply offered is that this work receives less attention at the |