have been compiled the analects-in the native tongue Lungyu-Speeches and Replies-which present so vivid a portraiture of the sage, his principles, teachings, and daily life. These disciples assisted him in rendering the last tribute of respect to his mother, who died in the year B. C. 528, when Confucius was twenty-five years of age. He desired that a resting-place should be prepared for her at Fang, the first home of the K'ung in Loo, and that his father's remains should repose beside her's. But a conscientious scruple arose in his mind as to the propriety of disturbing his father's bones. Ascertaining, however, that their present interment was never intended to be more than temporary, he removed the coffin and deposited it beside that of his mother, in one grave, at Fang. He wished to raise a mound or tumulus over them, but the intense veneration for established usages and past traditions, which appears so conspicuously in his writings, induced him to hesitate. Finally he said:

"In old times they had graves, but raised no tumulus over them. But I am a man who belongs equally to the north and the south, the east and the west. I must have something by which I can remember the place."

Accordingly he raised a mound four feet high over the graves. His disciples undertook its completion, but a storm of rain having destroyed their work they returned to their master with the words, "The grave in Fang fell down." Confucius wept. "Alas!" he said, "they made not thus their graves in antiquity."

This touching incident presents to us the sage in his daily life, his strength and his weakness. Of an affectionate nature, he desires to honor the remains of his parents; but, regarding ancient usages as immutable, he has not courage to attempt an innovation for their sakes. This exaggerated reverence for precedent and usage will be found to have acted as a dead weight on no small part of his career and teachings. Finally his reason comes to his aid. He says: "I am not a citizen of any one place. Why should I be bound slavishly by the tra

* Le Ke, II., Part I., i., 10.

ditions of Loo?" Accordingly he puts into execution his pious project; but, when it is frustrated by natural causes, he sees in this result an evidence of divine displeasure, and resolves henceforth to yield a blind obedience to the voice of tradition.

The name of Confucius was gradually becoming extensively known in the province, and persons of rank came to seek his instructions. When he was thirty-four years of age, an event occurred which was the means of greatly enlarging his sphere of usefulness. His reputation having reached the ears of Ming-Ho, one of the principal ministers of Loo, that functionary on his death-bed charged his son Ho-ke (called in the analects Ming-E), to go and study proprieties under him. Accordingly the minister's son, together with a brother Kingshnh, were added to the number of the sage's disciples.*

Confucius had long been desirous of visiting the court of Tcheou, and conferring on the subject of ceremonies with Laou, the chief of the neighboring State of T'an, who was then at court, and whose learning on these abstruse subjects was said to be marvellous. This wish he was now enabled to carry into effect through the influence of his new disciple, King-shuh.

Arriving at the city of Loo in the province of Ho-nan, where the imperial court was then held, the sage maintained little intercourse with the court, but occupied himself with the instructions of Laou-Tan-otherwise called Laou-tsze or the Master Laou--on the ceremonies and maxims of the founders of the dynasty. Of their conversations but slight record is preserved, but in them we may presume was laid the foundation of much of the wisdom which Confucius has recorded in the Five Books, especially in the Shoo-king and the Le-ke. Laou-tsze appears to have impressed Confucius with the most intense veneration, while his own deportment was overbearing and indeed supercilious.† Yet has the philosophy

*Amyot, vol. xii., p. 59.

+ Sze-ma Ts'een. Amyot, vol. xii., p. 68.

of that master borne no such fruit as the teaching of Confucius, nor enured in like manner to the benefit of posterity. Laou-tsze was the founder of the school or religion of Ta‘ou, one of the two creeds held in opposition to that of Confucius; the other being Buddhism or the religion of Fo. Laoutsze was a transcendental philosopher, whose system was based on the existence of an absolute, spiritual, and impersonal being, to whom he gave the name of Taou or the Way. According to his teaching, virtue and happiness were to be sought in an intimate union with that Being, and the extinction, as far as possible, of human appetites and passions. The religion still exists, but has been degraded into a low form of superstition, whose adherents are held in contempt by the educated classes in China.

Confucius did not remain long at the Court, but returned within the year to Loo, and resumed his work of teaching. His visit, however, had widely extended his fame. Disciples came to hear him from all parts of the empire until their number exceeded three thousand.* He was not destined to remain much longer a simple instructor of youth. An event was at hand which would render him the adviser of princes.

The three families who virtually governed Loo had been steadily increasing in their usurpations until they aspired to almost royal prerogatives. Confucius often rebuked their assumptions. When the head of the K'e family, in emulation of imperial privileges, caused eight rows of pantomimists to stand before him in the temple services instead of four, the highest number permitted to a grand officer, the sage remarked sadly, "If he can bear to do this, what may he not bear to do?" When the three families used the Yung Ode, which was intended to be sung only in the imperial temples, Confucius ironically quoted the words of the Ode, "Assisting are the princes-the emperor looks profound and grave," and inquired, "What application can these words have in the halls. of the three families?"† But when the K'e chief presumed

* Legge, 67, Prolegomena.

Ana., iii., 1, 2.

to sacrifice on the T'ae Mountain, where emperors and princes were alone permitted by the ritual to sacrifice, the sage felt that confusion was nigh at hand. In the year B. C. 516— the year succeeding the return to Loo-the three families rose against the duke Ch'aou, and, having expelled him from Loo, administered the government in his name. The duke sought refuge in T'se, the State adjoining Loo on the north. Hither Confucius followed him unwilling to witness the disorders of his native State.

The duke King-as he was called-of T'se was a man of little merit, as we gather from the incidental words of Confucius that, on the day of his death, the people did not praise him for a single virtue.* He appears, however, to have been impressed with the wisdom of Confucius; for he sent for him and consulted him on the principles of government, and was so well pleased with his answers that he offered to assign to him the town of Lin-k'ew with its revenues. But Confucins declined the offer, saying, "A superior man will receive reward only for services which he has done. I have given advice to the duke King, but he has not received it."

The duke King was at this time so completely under the influence of his ministers as to have seriously entertained the idea suggested by them of setting aside his eldest son from the succession. Among the questions propounded by him to Confucius was this: "What is government?" The sage replied, "There is government when the prince is prince, and the minister is minister; when the father is father, and the son is son." The duke King felt the implied rebuke, and answered, “If, indeed, the prince be not prince and the minister not minister; the father not father and the son not son; although I have the grain, shall I be able to eat it?"

The duke King for awhile constantly sought Confucius for advice, and, by way of retaining him permanently in his state, proposed to assign to him the fields of Ne-k'e. The jealousy of his ministers prevented the fulfilment of this pur

* Ana., xvi., 12.

pose, and eventually the fickle duke became tired of so uncompromising a monitor, and said, "I am old, I cannot use his doctrines." These and other remarks intended directly to wound the sage induced him to take his departure.*

He returned to Loo, where for fifteen years he remained without official employment, devoting himself to instruction. The three families still maintained sway in Loo, and on the death of the duke Ch'aou set aside the rightful heir, and substituted another member of the family of the name of T'ing, in whose name they continued to govern. But the chiefs of these families were themselves controlled and oppressed by their officers, who carried their annoyance to such an extent that Yang-Ho, the most powerful among them, actually held his chief Ke-Hwan a prisoner, and only released him on obtaining a promise of absolute obedience to his will. This Ho was anxious to avail himself of the services of Confucius; but the sage firmly refused to countenance him or any of the usurpers. This period he devoted to researches into the poetry, history, ceremonies, and music of the empire, to the instruction of his disciples, and to the compilation of some of the great works which have rendered him famous.

These productions are commonly classified in two series, -the U-king or Five Canons, and the Sse-shu or Four Books—although, in fact, of the Five Canons three are rather compilations than original works; while the Four Books, although consisting chiefly of the wisdom of Confucius, were put into form by his disciples, and the last by a disciple of his grandson.

The term U-king or Five Canons is commonly understood by the Chinese to contain the idea of fundamental, unalterable, and sublime doctrines. The first, known as the Yih-king or Canon of Changes, is said to be the oldest in the world. The Chinese attribute its authorship to Fo-hi, the oldest of their recognized emperors, who reigned about 2800 B. C., but to Confucius is due the credit of collecting, arranging, and an

* Ana., xviii., 3.