Chongqing

“ At the age of fifteen, Ching Chong was as handsome and intelligent a boy as could be found in the city of Hong Kong.
One day his benefactor called him to him, and told him of the distant gold land. "There, my son," he said, "you shall go to seek your fortune. I will provide you with every thing necessary for the journey, but you must keep a strict account, and at the end of five years return, and share the gains with me."
"If you do well in all things, I will reward you doubly, for I love you as my own son." ”

“ He beholds all things as though one, without observing their discrepancies. And thus the discrepancy of his toes is to him as would be the loss of so much mud."
"He devotes himself in fact to himself," said Ch'ang Chi, "and uses his wisdom to perfect his mind, until it becomes perfect. But how then is it that people make so much of him?"
His virtue being wholly, as it were, of a selfish order. "A man," replied Confucius, "does not seek to see himself in running water, but in still water. For only what is itself still can instil stillness into others. ”

“ But Confucius had confidence in the preponderating goodness of human nature, and in the power of example in superiors. “Not more surely,” he said, “does the grass bend before the wind than the masses yield to the will of those above them.” Given the model ruler, and the model people would forthwith appear. And he himself could make the model ruler. He could tell the princes of the states what they ought to be; and he could point them to examples of perfect virtue in former times, - to the sage founders of their own dynasty; to the sage Tang, who had founded the previous dynasty of Shang ”

“ Ho-nan and Shan-si, with portions of Shen-si, Chih-li, Shan-tung, Gan-hwui, Kiang-su, and Hu-pih, were all which formed the dominions of Chow. For thirteen years of his life Confucius wandered about from state to state, seeking rest and patrons; but his journeyings were confined within the modern provinces of Ho-nan and Shan-tung, and the borders of Chih-li and Hu-pih. Many Europeans now living have travelled over much more of China than he did. ”

“ The above review of the closing centuries of the dynasty of Chow, and of its overthrow by the king of Ts‘in, seems to prove, brief as it has been, that, given a number of warring States or nations, victory will in the long run declare itself in favour of that one which has the most extensive territory and the largest population. Ts‘in and Ts‘oo, when they first came into contact with the States of Chow proper, were, no doubt, inferior to them in the arts of civilization generally, and among these of the art of war ”

“ But, as today I have not the time, I will only here try to tell you of one principal and most important thing which Confucius has done for the Chinese nation—the one thing he did in his life by which, Confucius himself said, men in after ages would know him, would know what he had done for them. When I have explained to you this one principal thing, you will then understand what that something is in Confucianism which can give to the mass of mankind the same sense of security and sense of permanence which religion affords them. ”

“ Few heroes look the character except in their native clothes and surroundings; and, as Carlyle said, a naked House of Lords would look much less dignified than a naked negro conference.
As a philosopher, Confucius in his own time had scarcely the reputation of Tsz-ch'an of Cheng, who in many respects seems to have been his model and guide. Much more is said of Tsz-ch'an's philosophy, of his careful definition of the ritual system, of his legal acumen, of his paternal care for the people's welfare; but, like his contemporaries and friends of Ts'i, Tsin, Cheng, Sung, Wei; and even of Wu and Yueh ”

“ With this event the Western Chow dynasty was brought to a close.
Here, also, the Book of History comes to an end, and the Spring and Autumn Annals by Confucius takes up the tale of iniquity and disorder which overspread the land. No more dreadful record of a nation's struggles can be imagined than that contained in Confucius's history. The country was torn by discord and desolated by wars. Husbandry was neglected, the peace of households was destroyed, and plunder and rapine were the watchwords of the time.
Such was the state of China at the time of the birth of Confucius (B.C. 551) . ”

“ Dominating all is the rather imposing walled city of Chining-chou. The high, strong wall, the handsome gates and towers, the trees bordering the little stream and the crowded streets looked quite metropolitan. With its imme- diate suburbs built Chinese fashion close to the wall, Chining- chou has 150,000 inhabitants. It is a business city with a considerable trade, the produce of a wide adjacent region being brought to it for shipment, as it is on the Grand Canal which gives easy and cheap facilities for exporting and importing freight. ”

“ Ching Chong told him all, only omitting the merchant's story and his secret of the wand.
"Never mind, boy," said the giant, "you shall win the prize, and go back to China a rich man. See, the morning sun is rising. Now we will enter the cavern, and you shall have as much gold and precious stones as you can carry away."
Ching Chong felt a momentary thrill of joy in his heart, which was saddened by the memory of the merchant's last words, "beware of the giant."
"I have wandered in this cold, stranger land for three long years, and found nothing until now.
"Wealth is within my grasp ”

“ He thought of the curious legend the merchant had told him, and whispering89 softly to himself, he said: "Where the wand leads I will go—on to fortune, or death; any thing is better than the weariness of my present life."
It was a beautiful, balmy night. The silvery moonlight and the stars brightened even the dim cavern, and flooded the mountains with a luminous beauty.
Ching Chong went silently up the mountain path until he came to a ledge the miners had been prospecting that day.
Still the divining-rod urged him on, till he had gone miles farther into the mountains than ever before. ”

“ Tzu-kung said, This is like the palace wall. My wall reaches to the shoulder: peeping over you see the good home within. The Master's wall is several fathoms high: no one can see the beauty of the Ancestral Temple and the wealth of its hundred officers, unless he gets in by the gate. And if only a few men find the gate, may not my lord have spoken the truth?
24. Shu-sun Wu-shu cried down Chung-ni.
Tzu-kung said, It is labour lost. Chung-ni cannot be cried down. The greatness of other men is a hummock, over which we can still leap. Chung-ni is the sun or moon, which no one can overleap. ”

“ It cannot be doubted that there have been many intellects of commanding power among the Chinese, but ignorance of the literature and condition of other nations has led them to infer that there was nothing worthy of notice out of their own borders, and to rest contented with explaining and enforcing the maxims of their sage.
Confucius must be regarded as a great man, if superiority to the times in which one lives is a criterion of greatness. The immense influence he has exercised over the minds of his countrymen cannot, perhaps, be regarded as conclusive evidence of his superiority ”

“ Confucius in his history hardly alludes to him as a civilized being until the year 561, when the King died; and as his services to China (i.e. to orthodox Tsin against unorthodox Ts'u) could not be ignored, the philosopher- historian condescends to say "the Viscount of Wu died this year." It must be explained that the Lu capital had been celebrated for its learning ever since the founder of the Chou dynasty sent the Duke of Chou, his own brother, there as a satrap (1122 B.C.) . ”

“ While the downfall of Chow has led me thus to speak of the success which must inevitably attend the efforts of the combatant whose resources are the greatest, if the contents of my volume led me to trace the history of China downwards for a few more years, it would be as evident that, while material strength is sure, when not deficient in warlike skill, to gain a conquest, it cannot consolidate it. The brief existence of the Ts‘in dynasty seemed but to afford a breathing time to the warring States, and then China became once more horrid with the din of arms. ”

“ But as Confucius said thousands of years ago, "not all words are in books, nor all thoughts in words," and the traditions of nature worship, Taoism, Buddhism, of Confucius himself, have all put their stamp upon the Chinese, whether of the North or South, and the journeying coolie (and it must be remembered he is a great wanderer) , no matter where he goes in China, will find himself among men who recognize the same obligations, cringe under the same superstitious fears, and strive toward the same goal of material well-being as himself. Fundamental differences do certainly exist ”

“ The rule of Chow is to perform it at the top of the western steps, treating the dead as if he were a guest. I am a man of Yin, and last night I dreamed that I was sitting, with offerings before me, between the two pillars. No intelligent monarch arises; there is not one in the empire who will make me his master. My time is come to die." It is eminently characteristic of Confucius that in his last recorded speech and dream, his thoughts should so have dwelt on the ceremonies of bygone ages. ”

“ When the Ch‘un Ts‘ëw period opens upon us, we find existing an all but anarchal condition of things. There was virtually no king in China in those days, and the lord of each feudal State did what was right in his own eyes. In 706, the earl of Ch‘ing the most recently established of all the States, if perhaps we should except Ts‘in, engaged in hostilities with the king himself, who was wounded in the battle between them. ”

“ The scholars of China are ready, even forward, to admit that Confucius in the Ch‘un Ts‘ëw often conceals [1] the truth about things. On V. i. 6 Kung-yang says, Chinese scholars admit that the Classic conceals things.'The Ch‘un Ts‘ëw conceals [the truth] on behalf of the high in rank, out of regard to kinship, and on behalf of men of worth.' [2] On V. i. 1 Tso says that it was the rule for the historiographers to conceal any wickedness which affected the character of the State. ”

“ A sneer at Confucius. No-toes himself had only been punished by man.
Duke Ai of the Lu State said to Confucius, "In the Wei State there is a leper, named Ai T'ai T'o. The men who live with him like him and make no effort to get rid of him. Of the women who have seen him, many have said to their parents, Rather than be another man's wife, I would be his concubine.
"He never preaches at people, but puts himself into sympathy with them. He wields no power by which he may protect men's bodies. He has at his disposal no appointments by which to gratify their hearts. He is loathsome to a degree. ”

“ Yet if he was lost to his contemporaries, he has been preserved by posterity. Perhaps there never lived a man so worshipped by posterity who had so slight a following by the men of his own time,--unless we liken him to that greatest of all Prophets, who, being despised and rejected, is, and is to be, the "headstone of the corner" in the rebuilding of humanity. Confucius says so little about the subjects that interested the people of China that some suppose he had no religion at all. Nor did he mention but once in his writings Shang-te, the supreme deity of his remote ancestors ”

“ So in Chow China.
But the young Confucius knew his history. He looked back from that confusion to a wise Wu Wang and Duke of Chow; to a Tang the Completer, whose morning bath-tub was inscribed with this motto from The New Way: "If at any time in his life a man can make a new man of himself, why not every morning?" Most of all he looked back to the golden and sinless age of Yao and Shun and Yu, as far removed from him, nearly, as pre-Roman Britain is from us: he saw them ruling their kingdom as a strong benevolent father rules his house. ”

“ After the death of Confucius, who appears to have been respected by the sovereigns of nearly all the independent states of China, a series of sanguinary contests arose among them, which gave to this period of history the name of Chen-kwo, or the “contending nations,” and proved at length the ruin of the race of Chow. The king of Tsin, who had long been growing very powerful at the expense of the neighbouring states, fought against six other nations, and after a course of successes, compelled them all to acknowledge his supremacy (B.C. 200) . ”

“ But Confucius simply wrote the thing correctly as it was, and the good or evil of it was manifest of itself. If people feel that they must express themselves as I have said, we must get into our hands the old text of the historiographers of Loo, so that, comparing it with what we now have, the difference and agreement between them would be apparent. But this is now impossible.’ [23]
Chaou Yih adduces two paragraphs from the ‘Annals of the Bamboo Books,’ which, he thinks, may be the original form of two in the Ch‘un Ts‘ëw. ”

“ That night after the loud snoring of the giant announced that he was sleeping soundly, Ching Chong rose carefully, and lighting the torch, crept softly out of the large cave, and through the narrow passage that led to the entrance.
He took nothing with him. "The treasure of the giant is cursed," he said.
98
When he came to the rock he took the divining-rod from his bosom, and, pressing it lightly against the rock, said: "Giant rock remove quickly at the spell of the divining-rod." ”