great machine of empire are not absolutely deprived of volition, a rebellious cog-
wheel or insignificant pinion will sometimes disarrange and impede the entire
machinery.”
Confucius held that the universe had been generated by the union of two
material principles,—a heavenly and an earthly, Yang and Ya. He represents
man as having fallen by his own act from his original purity and happiness, and
asserts that by his own act he can recover that condition. For this purpose he
must lead a life of obedience to the law, and he must not do unto others that
which he would not have others do unto him. He made the supremacy of
parental authority the basis of his political teaching, and strongly advocated that
the son’s submission to the father must be as complete as that of the servant to
the master, of the master to the magistrate, of the magistrate to the crown, and of
the crown to the law. Of course this implied that the reciprocal obligations must
be observed. This rigid application of the family ideal to the administration of
the government, and the consequent creation of a pure despotism, has been the
cause of all that is most perplexing to Europeans in the Chinese civilisation, and
explains why it has never advanced beyond the standard or mark to which it had
attained in the era of Confucius.
The Confucian doctrines are set forth in Gze-Chou, “The Four Books,” and
King, “The Five Canonical Works,” of which the following particulars may
interest the reader.
The Ta-heo, or “Great Study.”The Ta-heo, or “School of Adults,” has been translated by Dr. Marshman, in the
“Clavis Sinica.” It is a treatise, in two chapters, on politics and morals, rising
gradually from the government of oneself to the government of a family, thence
to the government of a province, and finally to the control of the affairs of an
empire. Its leading principle is self-improvement, self-culture. In one of the
sections an eulogium is bestowed upon the beauty of virtue as a means of self-
enjoyment. And the book closes with a fine exhortation to be just, and truthful,
and honest, to those whom fortune places at the head of the state.
The Chung-Yung, or “The Invariable in the Mean,”