CONFUCIUS THE SAGE, AND THE RELIGION

OF CHINA.

BY PROFESSOR JAMES LEGGE

THE subject which I have undertaken to bring before you is, you perceive, twofold: Confucius the Sage, and the Religion of China. I purposely worded it so. Two errors are frequently fallen into about Confucius. Some writers represent him as the author of what I may call the Statereligion of his country; while others contend that his teaching is merely a system of morality, without the element of religion. I have thought it would be well if I constructed my lecture this afternoon so as to correct both those errors, and give you, so far as the time will permit, some information as to who and what Confucius was, and what was the nature of that religion which was his by inheritance. We shall thus see how the two errors about him have arisen, be able to form an opinion as to the service which he did for China and the world, and also to pass a judgment as to the religious beliefs and practices which have obtained among the Chinese people from time immemorial.

First, then, let me speak to you of Confucius, giving you a brief sketch of his history, character, and teachings, without bringing in the subject of religion. I need hardly tell you that the name Confucius is merely the Latinized form of the three Chinese words Kung Fů-tsze (A), meaning "The Master K'ung," equivalent, in the mouths of his disciples, to "Our Master K'ung," and accepted generally as the denomination of him as the most distinguished, or among the most distinguished, of all human teachers. He was emphatically a teacher. He was not a hero, whose history can be made interesting by a record of his military prowess, nor a man of science, who enlarged the boundaries of knowledge and opened the way to new triumphs of man over nature. He was the sage, the man of calm and practical wisdom, inspired by the love of mankind, and inculcating the lessons of human duty.

His surname, as I have just intimated, was K'ung; and his birth took place in the year B.C. 551, in what was then the feudal State of Lû, a portion of what is now the province of Shan-tung, on the eastern seaboard But though he was born in Lû, his family had migrated thither from the duchy of Sung, in the present province of Ho-nan. The K'ung clan was a branch of the ducal House of Sung, which itself was descended from the kings of the dynasty of Shang, who had ruled from B.C. 1766 to 1123, and who traced their lineage back to Hwang Ti, the first year of whose reign is said to have been in B.C. 2697. There are tens of thousands

of Kungs now living, who boast of being descended from Confucius, and who have thus an ancestry going back into the mists of antiquity more than four thousand five hundred years ago. Between the K'ungs and another more powerful clan of Sung there was an hereditary enmity; and the great-grandfather of our subject fled in consequence to the marquisate of Lû, and settled there. Confucius' father, called Sha-liang Hih, is known to us as sustaining an honourable position, and an officer of extraordinary strength and bravery. We are told that, in the year B.C. 562, when serving at the siege of a place called Pih-yang, a party of the assailants made their way in at a gate which had purposely been left open, and that no sooner were they inside than the portcullis was dropped. Hih was entering with the others; but, catching the massive structure with both his hands he gradually by his great strength raised it, and held it up till all his friends had turned and made their escape out. In his old age, for reasons into a detail of which I need not go, he divorced his wife, and contracted a second marriage with a young lady of the family of Yen, of whom Confucius was born in B.C. 551, as I have said.

The old father died soon afterwards, when the boy was in his third year; and his mother and he were left in straitened circumstances. The lad developed early the tendencies of his character. He has left us a very brief account of his mental growth, saying that at fifteen his mind was set on learning, and that at seventy he could do whatever his heart prompted, confident that it was right. When his mother died, in his twenty-third or twenty-fourth year, he raised the coffin in which, probably on account of her poverty, she had buried her husband near the place where they lived, and took it and her coffin to the place in which the K'ungs had first found refuge in Lû, and laid them there in the same grave. Before his mother's death he had married himself; and he appears to have lived with his wife happily enough for about fifty years. There is no sufficient evidence that he divorced her, as has been alleged, or ever introduced a concubine into his family. So far as his own practice is concerned, Confucius was a monogamist. His children were not many. He had one son, merely an ordinary, average man, but who left a son superior to himself, and to whom we are indebted for the most complete and philosophical account of his grandfather's teachings. Mention is made, in the Confucian Analects, Book V., of a daughter, whom he married to an officer that had been imprisoned under a false charge, but of whose worthiness Confucius was convinced; and in a smaller cemetery adjoining that where he, his son, and grandson were buried, there is the grave of another daughter, who died when she was quite young. These appear to have been all his children. Probably in his twenty-second year Confucius commenced his labours as a teacher in his native village. But he was not what we call a schoolmaster, teaching boys the rudiments of education. His house was the resort of young and inquiring spirits, whose attention he directed to the ancient monuments of the nation's history and literature, unfolding to them at the same

time the principles of human duty and of government. This was the work C of his life, for he neither wrote nor instituted much himself. His first biographer, the historian Sze-ma Ch'ien, says that "he wrote a Preface to the Book of History; carefully digested the Rites and Ceremonies determined by the wisdom of the ancient Sages and Kings; collected and arranged the ancient Poems; and undertook the reform of Music." But Confucius's labours on the ancient writings appear to have been slight, and there is no reliable ground for supposing that he either added to or took from the Books of History and Rites, which had come down to his time. The only work which he claimed as his own was the "Chronicle of the Spring and Autumn," which can only be considered a meagre compilation, and would have little interest but for the three Supplements to it by other hands which have also been preserved. Perhaps he made some alterations in the Book of Poetry, for he says himself, “I returned from Wei to Lu, and then the music was reformed; and the pieces in the Imperial Songs and Praise Songs found all their proper place."

His disciples, first and last, amounted, it is said, to three thousand; and among them there were between seventy and eighty whom he highly valued, and praised as "scholars of extraordinary ability." From the time that he thus comes before us on the stage of public life, and especially during the long period of wandering among different States that subsequently befell him, he always appears attended by companies of his disciples. These must have supported him. In his earlier school he received all who came to him for instruction, and did not refuse the smallest fee; but he required from all an ardent desire for improvement and a good measure of capacity. It is difficult for us, however, to understand this feature of his course :how, while dependent on the sympathy and support of his followers, he yet maintained among them the most entire authority and independence. When Mencius, who is styled "the secondary Sage," came after him, about a century and a half later, and went about the country in the same way, enforcing the lessons of "the Master," he accepted the gifts of different princes to an extent that startled even his disciples. But Confucius never did so. He would not demean himself to receive help from a ruler whom he disapproved, and who would not carry out his principles in the government of his people. Confucius must have been supported by the free-will contributions of his disciples. This point in the study of his course has often suggested to me the passage in the Gospel of Luke where it says (chap. viii. 1-3) that Jesus "went about through cities and villages, preachng the good tidings of the kingdom of God, and with Him the twelve and certain women that had been healed of evil spirits and infirmities:-Mary Magdalene and Joanna, the wife of Chuza, Herod's steward, and Susanna. and many others, which ministered to them of their substance."

A noble by descent, and soon widely known for his attainments, Conucius might have expected to be called to a position in the government of he State. But the time was one of great corruption and disorder. The

general government of the kingdom was feeble, and every feudal State was torn by contentions between its ruler and the chiefs of the clans in it, as well as by collisions between those clans themselves. We find him, indeed, when he was about twenty, employed as keeper of the stores of grain, and in charge of some public fields and herds; but, according to Mencius, he undertook those humble offices because of his poverty, and contentec himself with the simple discharge of their duties. Still his character and reputation were gradually making themselves felt through the State. He found means to visit the capital of the kingdom, and examine many of its most remarkable monuments; and there he met and also conversed with Lâo-tsze, the prophet of Tâoism. He was able also to take refuge for a time from the disorders of Lû in the neighbouring State of Chi. At last, when he was over fifty, he was made governor of one of the towns of Lû. There his administration was so successful that he was soon raised to higher dignities, and at last became Minister of Crime for the whole State. "He strengthened," we are told, "the ruling house, and weakened the usurping chiefs. A transforming government went abroad. Dishonesty and dissoluteness were ashamed, and hid their heads. Loyalty and good faith became the characteristics of the men, and chastity and docility those of the women. Confucius became the idol of the people, and flew in songs through their mouths. The people of other States flocked in crowds to La, to enjoy the blessing of its good order." But this sky of bright promise was soon overcast. The other States became jealous of the prosperity of Lû, and afraid of the influence of its Minister of Crime. The Marquis of Ch'î, the nearest of them, succeeded, by a most scandalous scheme, in alienating the mind of the ruler of Lû from his wise counsellor. Confucius became convinced that it was unbecoming his character to continue longer in the State. Slowly and sorrowfully he left it, and in B.C. 496 went forth with a company of his disciples, to thirteen years of homeless wandering, trying to find a ruler who had ears to hear his instructions, and goodness and wisdom to follow them. The quest was in vain; but the record of his experiences during that long and painful time is full of interest.

More than once he and the faithful few who would not leave him were in danger of perishing from want, or at the hands of excited mobs. On one occasion, when they were surrounded by an infuriate multitude and the disciples were alarmed, he calmly said to them, "Heaven produced the virtue that is in me. What can these people do to me?" This was always the way in which Confucius spoke in his highest utterances about himself. He never claimed to be anything more than man; but he felt that he had a divine mission. He knew the Way ;-the way for the indi- | vidual to perfect himself and the way for governors to rule so as to make their people happy and good. To teach this was his mission, and he would be faithful to it to the last. In the midst of his disciples, famishing and frightened, he was always calm, and cheered them, singing to his lute. We cannot doubt that he was well skilled in the music of his time and

country, and found in it for himself and his followers a solace and source of strength; but it is important to keep in mind that he never claimed to possess any supernatural endowments. There are passages, indeed, in Sze-ma Ch'ien's Biography which ascribe to him a knowledge such as nobody else possessed; but, where they are most evidently legendary and ridiculous, they yet come short of anything approaching to the supernatural or miraculous. When a high officer was once complimenting the disciples on the various ability of their master, Confucius said, "When I was young, my condition was low, and so I acquired my ability in many things; but they were mean matters. Must the superior man have such variety of ability? He does not need it." On the subject of his knowledge, again, he said, "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."

When travelling with his disciples, the wanderer occasionally came across recluses, men who had withdrawn from the world in disgust, and derided him, always striving, and striving in vain, with his plans of reformation. "Than follow one who withdraws from this ruler and that, had you not better follow those who withdraw from the world altogether ?" said one of those recluses to a disciple. When his words were reported to the Master, he said, "It is impossible to associate with birds and beasts. If I associate not with the people, with whom shall I associate ? If the right way prevailed in the world, there would be no need for me to change its state."

At length Confucius was recalled to Lû, in B.C. 483, but he was now in nis sixty-ninth year. Only five years more remained to him. He hardly re-entered public life, but devoted the time to completing his literary tasks. His son died in 482, but he bore that event with more equanimity than he did the death of his favourite disciple, Yen Hui, in the year following. His own death took place in the spring of 478. The account which we have of it is the following:-Early one morning he got up; and with his hands behind him, and trailing his staff, he moved about by the door, crooning over

"The great mountain must crumble,

The strong beam must break,

And the wise man wither away like a plant."

After a little he entered the house, and sat down opposite the door. The disciple Tsze-kung, who was in attendance on him, had heard the words, and said to himself, "I am afraid the master is going to be ill." With this he hastened into the house, when Confucius told him a dream which he had had in the night, and which he thought presaged his death, adding, "No intelligent monarch arises; there is no ruler in the kingdom who will make me his master; my time has come to die." So it was. He took to his couch, and after seven days expired.

Such was the death of the great sage of China. pressive, but it was melancholy. He uttered no

VOL. I.

His end was not unimprayer, and he betrayed

F