The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1888-09-01
CONFUCIUS.

Try OF one OF Cne most ancient people or
the earth, without ever thinking of
their far-off, oblique-eyed, saffron
skinned, cone-shape-headed cousins
If we may give the name of cousin to
race separated from the Aryan and
Semitic types by boundary line very
strongly defined.
The Chinese call themselves Using
T'song T'sue, after one of their re-
nowned leaders who performed no end
Of miracles in his time, and when dead
was worshiped the Heaven-Father
of. the people. By their neighbors
Kalmucks, Firms and Russians-they
are called Khi-Tai or Winged Death,
in allusion to the winged and scaly
dragons displayed on their banners. By
the ancients they were known as T'sin,
Noe, orScythians, name which i'm
piled anything strange, foreign or bar
barous; and by the ancient Aryans, as
Dur Aryan, Far From or Non Aryan,
once a term of contempt, but now
adopted by European scholars and
modified into TuraniaD, under which
head are classed all races not Aryan or
Semitic.
The history of the Chinese is as ex-
traordinary as their physiognomy.
They claim that two million two
hundred and sixty-seven thousand and
some odd years Intervene between their
establishment in the earthly kingdom
and the birth of their great teacher
Confucius, 551 B. G. In a curious vol
ume called the Bamboo Book are found
no end of legends of the three Dynas-
ties-of P wanku the Celes tial, Fohi the
Terrestrial, and Hwangte the Solar.
In these traditions gigantic and gro
tesque creatures, half spiritual and half
brute, unite with comets, stars, clouds,
earthquakes, thunderbolts, lightnings,
fiery dragons, and forest and sea mon
sters, to teach the earliest settlers how
to make huts, produce fire, cook food,
to weave and spin cloth, to hold the
pillow, to SOW, reap and harvest. The
extraordinary feats of strength, valor
and skill employed in developing
the animal, vegetable and mineral re-
sources of the country and establishing
order out Of chaos, are incomparably
marvellous. One thing, however, stands
out clear amid this mass of mythology
cal history, and that is that the Chinese
account of their development is based
on the Darwinian idea of evolution. In
some of their oldest books their teach
ers and reformers are represented as
half-ape and Mailman; creatures little
removed from the gorilla, who spend
their energies in laboring for the ma
terial rather than the spiritual welfare
Of their fellows.
Confucius was born in the State Of
Loo, now called Shang Tang, in the
reign Of the twenty-third emperor of
the Tcheou dynasty. His father, Shuh-
Liang- Heih, and his noble mother,
Ching Tsai, one of the most remark
able Of Asiatic women, claimed their
descent from the prehistoric Hwangte,
and though renowned for their purity
of life, were so poor that at his fathers
death Confucius was obliged while yet
a child, to gain scanty support as
herdsman for himself and his mother.
Little or nothing is recorded Of his
boyhood, save his passion for initiating
the rites and ceremonials observed by
his elders. His mother, to whose
memory he was always tenderly at
tached, had him instructed in mechani
cal occupations, such as farming, car
pentering, painting, BODYBUILDING.
At fifteen his mind became set on
learning, and at nineteen he had made
himself master of all the knowledge of
his day. Having established his repu-
tation as scholar, he next married and
became the father of one son and two
|
rance of his fellow men so distressed
him that he assumed the Office of a
public teacher OF morals, retaining and
teaching, as he himself has said, "Only
such pupils as had that natural insight
and love of truth which enabled them
from hearing about one corner of
subject to divine without further ex-
PLANTATION the other three" If any,
rich or poor, noble or prince, appeared
Indifferent in the study and practice of
the most rigid morals, he rejected them
at once, without anger, but with firm
ness. 1t is said that it was his custom
to explain his own slow progress in the
virtues in the following words:
Sat fifteen my mind was bent on &C
quiring all knowledge; at thirty stood
firm in my convictions; at forty all
doubts vanished; at fifty 1 began to
perceive the laws of heavenly order
and harmony; at sixty my ear gave
loving obedience to the voice Of truth;
at seventy 1 could follow my hearts
desire without transgressing right;
having at last discovered the golden
rule-'Not to do unto others that
which is distasteful to ones self.
Being appointed chief magistrate of
Chungtoo, Confueius then and there
effected reformation in the conduct