Edward Harper Parker

“ Legge considers that even now this basis of monotheism is no more destroyed by popular additions than is our own monotheism by the worship of saints by large numbers of Christians. Of all the things which we, as Christians, profess to believe, there are only two things which it was reasonably possible for Confucius to believe. He might have believed in a Maker of Heaven and Earth, in the Resurrection of the Body, and in Life Everlasting; but that scarcely amounts to a religion, as nearly all primitive men have had beliefs of this kind. ”

“ It is a little difficult for us, even after stringing together such a galaxy of virtues as we have shown Confucius to have really possessed, to under- stand the Chinese enthusiasm for his memory. Our own history teaches us to admire manly grace and beauty ; bodily activity and love of nature ”

“ Confucius was as far as possible from regarding himself as a prophet, not to say a god. In using the expression " Heaven gave birth to what virtue is in me," he distinctly recognises him- self as a created being, and owing duty as such to a higher than himself. ”

“ A slow time dance, something after the fashion of our minuets, is performed by fifty youths, and meanwhile the six bands, each of six players, discourse shrill music. The airs are the same as those played in Confucius' time. The suovetaurilia and other symbolical offerings stand on tables between the incense vase flanked by two candles upon the altar and a roll of spotless white silk spread out upon the floor, the last ready for burning before the Sage's tablets, after the departure of the spirit. ”

“ At all events Confucius was loyal to the princely houses, and had no axe of his own to grind : the utmost that can be charged against him is a certain canniness which prefers to be on the safe side, and, if it must err, then to err on the side of cold prudence rather than on that of warm impulse. ”

“ Probably Confucius fell in with popular views. One thing is quite certain : whatever Confucius believed in a vague way as to the spiritual form which man took after death, he certainly
/ never conceived any such idea as the doctrine of rewards and punishments. His view, concisely expressed, was that "life and death are a matter of destiny : wealth and honours are disposed by Heaven." ”

“ Confucius' own deportment was in consonance with his teachings. He used, giving them a negative turn, almost the exact words so familiar to all Christians : he said : " What you do not wish / others to do to you, do not to them." Self-control, modesty, forbearance, patience, kindness, orderliness, absence of effusiveness and passion, studious- ness, industry, mildness, dutifulness, neighbourliness, fidelity, uprightness, moderation, politeness, ceremoniousness ; these were the qualities which Confucius consistently practised and taught. ”

“ No prayer is offered to Confucius, nor is his assist- ance sought in any way ; and, as we have already shown, a Tartar dynasty 1,400 years ago prohibited the vulgar innovation, then being introduced by barren women, of seeking his mediation in their favour. Confucius is simply worshipped as one who codified learning ; as a sort of re-embodiment of the Duke of Chow, civil founder of the first truly historical imperial dynasty, whose memory was worshipped in Confucius' time both at the imperial and ducal capitals, and whose tomb still lies near to that of Confucius. ”

“ There is almost no architectural variety in China. There are innumerable other antiquities and objects of historical interest, not only within the precincts of the temple and palace, in the city, and in the immediate neighbourhood, but in neighbouring cities, and all over the province, which of all Chinese provinces, is perhaps archseologically the most interesting ; but I have only undertaken to write ^a paper upon Confucius, and space compels me to narrow and confine myself to that one subject. ”

“ He objected to commit himself so far as to say the dead were conscious, lest rash sons should waste their substance in sacrifices ; he equally declined to assert that they were unconscious, lest careless sons should not sacrifice at all. At the same time he himself always sacrificed as though the spirits were present.
Some blame Confucius because he was unable to grasp the full nobility of the Taoist maxim : " Return good for evil." Confucius took time to consider, and finally decided that evil should be repaid by justice, and good reserved for the recompense of good. ”

“ The philosopher Mencius, in alluding to this episode, says that " a superior man may occasionally accept office purely for the relief of his poverty." We may therefore fairly conclude that the duke gave the carp because Confucius was a ducal officer, and that Confucius accepted office, as people do in modern times, to relieve his own poverty. ”

“ In China daughters do not count for so much as sons, and are often killed as useless incumbrances, the great object being to have at least one son to peiform religious rites, those rights which the Romans used to call sacra privuta. Confucius' father appears to have resolved therefore in his old age to stake everything upon a supreme effort, and he married a mere girl. Either he or she, or both of them, went to pray for a son at a temple on Mount JVi-k'iu, a spot which I mark on the map with a circle. ”

“ His fondness for forms, ceremonies, and, above all, for funerals and mourning is not at all in our line. But here, again, a due show of grief at the loss of a parent only forms a continuous chain with the filial obedience required during life, and solemn sacrifices after death. In short, we can only account for the unmeasured reverence which Confucius has secured in the hearts of his countrymen by slightly modifying the words of Lord Beaconsfield, who remarked that " every country possessed the government it deserves," and by suggesting that China possesses the teacher she deserves ”

“ The easternmost bridge leads to the modern cemetery, in which each member of the six or seven thousand existing Confucian families has a right to be buried. The heads of the clan alone have mounds and stone figures : the others mere slabs. The western bridge leads to a large hall, without image or tablet, in which the family offer sacrifices twice a year, and the back door of which faces the tomb. The tomb enclosure is walled off from the general cemetery above mentioned, and contains only the graves of Confucius, his son, and his grandson. ”

“ To this extent, therefore, it may
1 be said that Confucius had no religion, and preached no religion. Like the Persians and Chaldseans, the Chinese and the Tartars had a sort of Sabaean religion, in which worship was offered to the Sun, Moon, and Stars : at times also to other forces of nature, such as wind, the forests, and the rivers. But these beliefs, as also that in divination, may be popular excrescences which have been superadded at a later date upon the more ancient monotheism. ”

“ Time, however, will not permit of our dwelling further upon this period of wanderings : suffice it to say that the philosopher had as many rebuffs as he had successes, and that most of the rulers, whilst willing to listen to his counsels, seemed to consider that they possessed more of an academic than a practical value. At the age of 66 Confucius heard of the death of his wife, and that his son continued weeping for her notwithstanding the lapse of the regulation period of one year. ”

“ Legge is of opinion, however, that the Lordship of Heaven was, to the Chinese fathers, exactly what the notion of God was to our fathers. Con- fucius, like everyone else, grew up totally ignorant of any world except that in which he found himself. His prudent attitude has led some European divines to brand him outright as a sceptic, who only veiled his disbelief out of deference for antiquity. ”

“ China had now been split up into three separate empires, but was reunited towards the close of the third century : the founder of this new unifying Tsin dynasty ordered quarterly suovetaurilia, both at the imperial capital and at the village. In the fifth century China was again divided into northern and southern empires. Though the northerners were Tartars of nomadic origin, they it was who first erected a Confucian temple in their capital, which was near the Tenduc of Marco Polo's time ; and they also conferred a new title upon the philosopher. ”

“ What is the use of exposing the weak nesses of those in power ? Is it of real advantage to us that Bacon should be proved to have been the meanest as well as the wisest of mankind ? The Chinese idea that rulers are the vicegerents of God is tempered by the conviction that bad rulers may be dethroned. Perhaps Confucius thought it better not to rake up slumbering guilt unless it were possible to punish at the same time. ”

“ Even the founders of our principal religions, including those of Buddhism and Muhammadanism, have very little of Confucius in their attitude ; notwithstanding that in the two instances of Christianity and Buddhism the qualities which have secured the reverence of hundreds of millions are in many respects precisely the qualities possessed by Con- fucius. ”

“ The third emperor of this dynasty meddled a great deal with Confucius' titles and privileges, amongst other things depriving him of his taurus, and leaving him only suovilia : after this monarch's death, his usurping wife, the Chinese Catherine II., also conferred a separate title of her own upon the philosopher. Early in the eighth century Confucius was promoted to the rank of " Literature Dis- seminating Prince or King " ; provided with a robe and crown ; made to face south like a royal personage, instead of east as hitherto ; and given precedence over the Duke of Chow. ”

“ In China there can, except under very special circumstances, only be one strictly legal wife, but should this wife fail to present her lord with a son, it was and is still permissible to take a wife of the second class, or, in Scriptural language, a handmaid, who may in certain eventualities hope for future promotion to the full rank of wife. ”

“ He declined to pray for recovery when he was sick, but he did this in such a dubious way that the commentators and the missionaries have not yet come to an understanding upon what he really thought on the subject of prayer. Dr. Edkins considers that, in the absence of Christian revelation to serve him as a guide to belief in the doctrine of rewards and punishments, Confucius did the next best and noblest thing, by maintaining the impartiality of moral retribution and the immortality of good fame. ”

“ Of course these trees are emblematic of immortality or imperishability. The road is beautified by numerous bridges and honorary portals, more, how- ever, for ornament than to serve any useful purpose. Half-way up the avenue are two handsome pavilions, erected 300 years ago by the last Chinese dynasty. The cemetery, described 1,000 years ago as lying between the Rivers Sz and Chu, J- of a mile from the older city, is a densely-wooded enclosure of 50 acres, surrounded by high walls : the only gate is on the south side. A writer of the 5th century gives the then area as 1 6 English acres. ”

“ Professor Tiele of Leyden treats the worship of spirits and nature as though the ancient religion were not monotheistic ; but Dr. Legge, in criticising this view, defends Confucius from the charge of animism and fetichism in their most unfavourable sense.
Others again have charged Confucius with cold-blooded eudasmonism, that is with only insisting upon virtue because it leads to temporal happi- ness. What Confucius said was " He who heaps up goodness shall have much happiness," and vice-versa. ”

“ He noticed that the imaginations of his fellow men led them to express belief in much that was not evident to him, so he adopted the safe course of admitting nothing but the possible existence, in a form not quite apparent to him, of sentient beings that had already lived in this world. ”

“ It is stated to lie a mile and a half to the west of the ancient capital of the ducal state of Lu, whose rulers Confucius served. It is described by those who have seen it as being a small neat city, surrounded, as is customary in China, by high walls ; like the walls of Chester, but more solid ; and pierced by four gates, with broad towers and guard-houses above them. The eastern part of the city contains the temple erected to Confucius' chief disciple by the Mongols, 500 years ago. ”

“ Where nothing is known of an extinct genus^ it is vain to enquire into its species. The royal dynasty nominally ruling in Confucius' time began 671 years before his birth, and one of Confucius' ancestors, who was a half-brother of the last monarch of the dethroned dynasty, was enfeoffed in a State called Sung, the capital of which I mark in the map with, a cross. About 250 years before Confucius' birth, the reigning duke of this state resigned his rights of succession to a younger brother. ”

“ This apparently singular choice of names was made in consequence of the reigning duke having sent a congratula- tory present of a couple of carp to the young pair. The carp is the king of fish, and no doubt the duke's action had some hidden meaning ; just as, in modern marriages, the Chinese often send a couple of geese as a present to wedded couples : the goose is supposed to be the only creature which does not marry again when its spouse dies. ”

“ The Golden Tartars were displaced by the Mongols, who soon absorbed the Manzi empire as well, besides Persia and Russia. In 1220 Genghiz Khan sent all the way from Afghanistan to fetch a Chinese Taoist philoso- pher from his native village, which lay to the east of Confucius' town ; but he does not seem to have been at any time struck with the Confucian sentiments. In 1281 Kublai Khan even deprived Confucius of his title of " holy," and reduced it to that of " mediocre sage " ”