assist me on the throne. Woe is me! Alas! O venerable Ne!" Tszekung complained of the inconsistency of this lamentation from one who could not use the master when he was alive, but the duke was probably sincere in his grief. He caused a temple to be erected, and ordered that sacrifice should be offered to the sage, at the four seasons of the year.2 The emperors of the tottering dynasty of Chow had not the intelligence, nor were they in a position, to do honour to the departed philosopher, but the facts detailed in the first chapter of these prolegomena, in connection with the attempt of the founder of the Ts'in dynasty to destroy the monuments of antiquity, show how the authority of Confucius had come by that time to prevail through the empire. The founder of the Han dynasty, in passing through Loo, B.C. 194, visited his tomb and offered an ox in sacrifice to him. Other emperors since then have often made pilgrimages to the spot. The most famous temple in the empire now rises over the place of the grave. K'ang-he, the second and greatest of the rulers of the present dynasty, in the 23d year of his reign, there set the example of kneeling thrice, and each time laying his forehead thrice in the dust, before the image of the sage. In the year of our Lord 1, began the practice of conferring honorary designations on Confucius by imperial authority. The emperor Pings then styled him-"The duke Ne, all-complete and illustrious." This was changed, in A.D. 492, to-"The venerable Ne, the accomplished Sage."5 Other titles have supplanted this. Shunche, the first of the Man-chow dynasty, adopted, in his second year, A.D. 645, the style,-"K'ung, the ancient Teacher, accomplished and illustrious, all-complete, the perfect Sage; "7 but twelve years later, a shorter title was introduced,-"K'ung, the ancient Teacher, the perfect Sage." Since that year no further alteration has been made. At first, the worship of Confucius was confined to the country of Loo, but in A.D. 57 it was enacted that sacrifices should be offered to him in the imperial college, and in all the colleges of the principal 1 Le Ke, II. Pt. I. iii. 43. This eulogy is found at greater length in the after the notice of the sage's death. 2 See the 聖廟 immediately art. on 典圖考卷一, Confucius. I am indebted to this for most of the notices in this paragraph. 3平帝 * 成宣 公 文宣先師孔子 7 6順治 6順治 大成至聖 5文聖 territorial divisions throughout the empire. In those sacrifices he was for some centuries associated with the duke of Chow, the legis lator to whom Confucius made frequent reference, but in A.D. 609 separate temples were assigned to them, and in 628 our sage displaced the older worthy altogether. About the same time began the custom, which continues to the present day, of erecting temples to him, separate structures, in connection with all the colleges, or examination-halls, of the country. The sage is not alone in those temples. In a hall behind the principal one occupied by himself are the tablets-in some cases, the images of several of his ancestors, and other worthies; while associated with himself are his principal disciples, and many who in subsequent times have signalized themselves as expounders and exemplifiers of his doctrines. On the first day of every month, offerings of fruits and vegetables are set forth, and on the fifteenth there is a solemn burning of incense. But twice a year, in the middle months of spring and autumn, when the first ting day of the month comes round, the worship of Confucius is performed with peculiar solemnity. At the imperial college the emperor himself is required to attend in state, and is in fact the principal performer. After all the preliminary arrangements have been made, and the emperor has twice knelt and six times bowed his head to the earth, the presence of Confucius' spirit is invoked in the words, "Great art thou, O perfect sage! Thy virtue is full; thy doctrine is complete. Among mortal men there has not been thine equal. All kings honour thee. Thy statutes and laws have come gloriously down. Thou art the pattern in this imperial school. Reverently have the sacrificial vessels been set out. Full of awe, we sound our drums and bells."10 The spirit is supposed now to be present, and the service proceeds. through various offerings, when the first of which has been set forth, an officer reads the following, 11 which is the prayer on the occasion :"On this....month of this....year, I, A.B., the emperor, offer a sacrifice to the philosopher K'ung, the ancient Teacher, the perfect Sage, and say,-O Teacher, in virtue equal to Heaven and Earth, whose doctrines embrace the past time and the present, thou didst digest and transmit the six classics, and didst hand down lessons for all generations! 9 上丁日 10, 11 See the大清通禮卷十二 Now in this second month of spring (or autumn), in reverent observance of the old statutes, with victims, silks, spirits, and fruits, I carefully offer sacrifice to thee. With thee are associated the philosopher Yen, continuator of thee; the philosopher Tsăng, exhibiter of thy fundamental principles; the philosopher Tsze-sze, transmitter of thee; and the philosopher Măng, second to thee. May'st thou enjoy the offerings." I need not go on to enlarge on the homage which the emperors of China render to Confucius. It could not be more complete. It is worship and not mere homage. He was unreasonably neglected when alive. He is now unreasonably venerated when dead. The estimation with which the rulers of China regard their sage, leads them to sin against God, and is a misfortune to the empire. General appreciation of Confucius. 2. The rulers of China are not singular in this matter, but in entire sympathy with the mass of their people. It is the distinction of this empire that education has been highly prized in it from the earliest times. It was so before the era of Confucius, and we may be sure that the system met with his approbation. One of his remarkable sayings was,-"To lead an uninstructed people to war is to throw them away."1 When he pronounced this judgment, he was not thinking of military training, but of education in the duties of life and citizenship. A people so taught, he thought, would be morally fitted to fight for their government. Mencius, when lecturing to the duke of T'ǎng on the proper way of governing a kingdom, told him that he must provide the means of education for all, the poor as well as the rich. "Establish," said he, "ts'eang, seu, heo, and heaou,-all those educational institutions, for the instruction of the people."2 At the present day, education is widely diffused throughout China. In no other country is the schoolmaster more abroad, and in all schools it is Confucius who is taught. The plan of competitive examinations, and the selection for civil offices only from those who have been successful candidates,-good so far as the competition is concerned, but injurious from the restricted range of subjects with which an acquaintance is required, have obtained for more than twelve centuries. The classical works are the text books. It is from them almost exclusively that the themes proposed to determine the knowledge and ability of the students are chosen. The whole of the magistracy of China is thus versed in all that is recorded of the sage, and in the ancient literature which he preserved. His thoughts are familiar to every man in authority, and his character is more or less reproduced in him. The official civilians of China, numerous as they are, are but a fraction of its students, and the students, or those who make literature a profession, are again but a fraction of those who attend school for a shorter or longer period. Yet so far as the studies have gone, they have been occupied with the Confucian writings. In many schoolrooms there is a tablet or inscription on the wall, sacred to the sage, and every pupil is required, on coming to school on the morning of the 1st and 15th of every month, to bow before it, the first thing, as an act of worship.3 Thus all in China who receive the slightest tincture of learning do so at the fountain of Confucius. They learn of him and do homage to him at once. I have repeatedly quoted the statement that during his life-time he had three thousand disciples. Hundreds of millions are his disciples now. It is hardly necessary to make any allowance in this statement for the followers of Taouism and Buddhism, for, as Sir John Davis has observed, "whatever the other opinions or faith of a Chinese may be, he takes good care to treat Confucius with respect."4 For two thousand years he has reigned supreme, the undisputed teacher of this most populous land. The causes of his influence. 3. This position and influence of Confucius are to be ascribed, I conceive, chiefly to two causes:-his being the preserver, namely of the monuments of antiquity, and the exemplifier and expounder of the maxims of the golden age of China; and the devotion to him of his immediate disciples and their early followers. The national and the personal are thus blended in him, each in its highest degree of excellence. He was a Chinese of the Chinese; he is also represented, and all now believe him to have been, the beau ideal of humanity in its best and noblest estate. 4. It may be well to bring forward here Confucius' own estimate of himself, and of his doctrines. It will serve to illustrate the 3 During the present dynasty, the tablet of, the god of literature, has to a considerable extent displaced that of Confucius in schools. Yet the worship of him does not clash with that of the other. He is the father' of composition only. 4 The Chinese, vol. II. p. 45. and of his doctrines. His own estimate of himself statements just made. The following are some of his sayings.-"The sage and the man of perfect virtue;-how dare I rank myself with them? It may simply be said of me, that I strive to become such without satiety, and teach others without weariness." "In letters I am perhaps equal to other men; but the character of the superior man, carrying out in his conduct what he professes, is what I have not yet attained to." "The leaving virtue without proper cultivation; the not thoroughly discussing what is learned; not being able to move towards righteousness of which a knowledge is gained; and not being able to change what is not good;-these are the things which occasion me solicitude." "I am not one who was born in the possession of knowledge; I am one who is fond of antiquity and earnest in seeking it there." "A transmitter and not a maker, believing in and loving the ancients, I venture to compare myself with our old P'ang." Confucius cannot be thought to speak of himself in these declarations more highly than he ought to do. Rather we may recognize in them the expressions of a genuine humility. He was conscious that personally he came short in many things, but he toiled after the character, which he saw, or fancied that he saw, in the ancient sages whom he acknowledged; and the lessons of government and morals which he laboured to diffuse were those which had already been inculcated and exhibited by them. Emphatically he was "a transmitter and not a maker." It is not to be understood that he was not fully satisfied of the truth of the principles which he had learned. He held them with the full approval and consent of his own understanding. He believed that if they were acted on, they would remedy the evils of his time. There was nothing to prevent rulers like Yaou and Shun and the great Yu from again arising, and a condition of happy tranquillity being realized throughout the empire under their sway. If in any thing he thought himself "superior and alone," having attributes which others could not claim, it was in his possessing a divine commission as the conservator of ancient truth and rules. He does not speak very definitely on this point. It is noted that 1 All these passages are taken from the VIIth Book of the Analects. See chh. xxxiii; xxxii.; iii.; xix.; and i. |