66 66 66 66 EMPEROR OF CHINA'S PRAYER TO DEITY. 267 "father, the high, the honourable, and pure emperor, "reverently performed a great snow service. I feel im'pelled by ten thousand considerations to look up and "imitate the usage. Prostrate I beg imperial heaven to pardon my ignorant stupidity, and to grant me self renovation, for myriads of innocent people are involved by me, a single man. My sins are so numerous it is difficult to "escape from them; summer is past, autumn arrived, to "wait longer is impossible. Knocking my head nine times "on the ground, I pray imperial heaven to hasten and con"fer gracious deliverance, a speedy and divinely beneficial "rain to save the people's lives, and in some degree redeem my iniquities. O imperial heaven, observe these things, "be gracious, I tremble with fear. In great reverence this 66 "memorial is presented." What a miserably yelping whine it is. He trembles, and is all of a sweat, for what? Clearly he fears the mob, for if they do know what stops the rain, and that their emperor is the Jonah of the nation, it is highly probable that they might add one democratic knock to his majesty's aristocratic and sacred nine kotous, which might prove just one knock too many, and call for the immediate publication in the Pekin Gazette of a royal proclamation, announcing the fact of the emperor's having taken upon himself the most high and imperial prerogative of immortality and returned to heaven from whence he set out to air his celestial faculties in his lower dominions. It is a national, political, commercial, and social crisis. Look here, says he, just look here, here's a go, no rain, and I am responsible for keeping the people down; but law bless you, what is a poor fellow to do if he is not backed up in heaven? I have gone as far as fasting from all victuals and drink, which constitute the chief of my diet, and I have offered sacrifices to all the gods in the court guide, but still no rain. The people are impatient, and I am in a fright, ten thousand considerations conspire to make me sudorifically pious at this crisis, not the least of which is anxiety for my throne and life, and consequently I do not feel it derogatory to my dignity to follow the precedent of those of my ancestors, who have the honour to figure in the sublime records of heaven's imperial chancery. The danger is imminent, and my time is precious, so this memorial of the undersigned respectfully sheweth that your royal petitioner, as in duty bound, will ever pray when he wants what he is legally entitled to get, so God save the emperor. M. Huc relates an anecdote of the style in which the Chinese cold-shouldered his propagandizing zeal. He was told by one attempted convert, that his ideas of religion were all very well in their way and undoubtedly true, but "religions are many, reason is one," said John Chinaman, and the priest says that this is "a deplorable conclusion." Well, but, Huc, my good fellow, pray don't get your nation to try the musket and bayonet dodge, for consider if your Russo-Franco system of propagating orthodoxy at the cannon's mouth, is not certain to find a fitting reward some sunshiny day, not very far off. And by the way, I see you regret much, that Chinese customs do not lead them to pray, or have masses performed for their dead. Indeed, 'tis an infidel bias, much to be deplored. The ignorant mob, you remark, do indeed continue dead offerings, but these offerings to the defunct, are as you truly say, "quite mechanical, "without thinking of any meaning." And again, "It is "impossible to believe that they can delude themselves so grossly." From which I gather that you consider these offerings to the dead are mere traditional etiquette, and you regret that they do not substitute masses for their departed, and perhaps canonize their saints. The scepticism of these Chinese as to the superior efficacy of Europeanized Buddhism is certainly deplorable, but blind and bigoted prejudice, worthy father, is as rampant in Europe as it is on the banks of the Yang-tze-kiang. You shall be gridironed and roasted over your own church's fire. Thus you come to judgment. You say: "The worship of ancestors, which formerly occasioned "such long and deplorable disputes between the Jesuit "missionaries and the Dominicans, may perhaps be regarded PRAYING FOR THE DEAD IN ASIA AND EUROPE. 269 "in the same light as these offerings to the dead. Rome "took effectual measures to prevent the recurrence of these "unfortunate dissentions that have proved more injurious "to the missions in China than the violent persecutions of "the mandarins." Yet this papal concern brags to high heaven unceasingly, about the unity of its creed! Confessedly the rock upon which these priests split to pieces, is the very one, about the "dead" after all. Then why set about preaching and perverting the poor Chinese, if the knotty point respecting dead services is not settled in Europe. If there is any European God of the dead, where, and who is he? No small part of Europeanism consists in saying mass, and praying for the dead, but priests never have established any Deity of the dead yet, so that all their time and labour is but grinding the wind. Major Abbott, a traveller through Russia, writing of what he saw in Moscow, that city of choice orthodoxy, says: "Nothing that I have seen among the Hindoos and "Boodhists descends lower upon the scale of reason than 66 this, and yet over all, the divine spirit of Jesus has shed a "softening radiance that gives to the practical morality of "the Russians an infinite pre-eminence over the purer worship of the Mohammedan world. The intolerance that has "crept like a toad or a viper into almost every sect calling "itself Christian, belongs to man's perverted nature and not "to the holy precepts that religion instils." What is intolerant Christianity, or rather, what has the teaching of Jesus to do with the rabid intolerance of theologians? He preached against theology, not in its favour. The present church system in Europe is really nothing but an ecclesiastical diploma to practice blood letting by royal command. Blackwood's Magazine for August, 1858, contained a comparative estimate of the various military forces in Europe, ready in a few months for their bloody trade, showing how completely the old Roman pagan empire was behind any of the five great Christian powers (so called,) who are supposed to be constantly employed in preaching, "Peace on earth, and good will towards men." The writer in Blackwood remarks: "The military power of pagan Rome has been pretty accurately estimated at 450,000 men. The Christian "monarchies of France and Austria are each reported to "maintain an army of about 600,000 men. Prussia may "be 400,000. Russia larger even than either France or "Austria; and Great Britain without her marine force, "might easily muster 200,000 on one point in a few weeks. "Belgium has 100,000, and Holland 60,000 armed men." The conclusion is as follows: "Hitherto everything has "tendered to develop the military power in Christendom!" To develop the military power in Christendom! What an extraordinary comment this is, nearly nineteen hundred years • after the founder of christianity warned his rash and hotheaded disciples that the appeal to the sword to establish an empire or principle must necessarily end in the destruction of the power so supported, since judgment invocates judgment, and thus the authority that appeals to, and is sustained by, military force, shall ultimately perish by the antagonism of rival powers. CHAPTER XII. ANCIENT JEWISH TRADITION. No true estimate can be formed of the difficulties which Jesus of Nazareth had to overcome during his mission, without some knowledge of the peculiar theological opinions that were then held by what are usually denominated the educated classes, which include the priests and such literati as are more immediately connected with them than with other professions. In those lectures to young men upon the connection between science and religion, by the Rev. Hy. Christmas, alluded to in our third chapter, we find it stated that when any difficulty presents itself to the careful student of the Hebrew scriptures, it is capable of being overcome by reference to the tradition of the Jews on the ambiguous point in question. But this is wholly at variance with Jesus' plainly expressed declaration that these theological traditions, so far from being valuable, had resulted in making the law of the Eternal of no effect. In 1856, Dr. Edersheim published a work entitled "History of the Jews," and as it is a book suited for such popular reference as the mass of readers can afford at present to devote to the investigation of the subject, attention is directed to it. For present purposes the few following extracts are given. Dr. Edersheim remarks,— 66 "When the spiritual reality indicated by the type was lost sight of, and the latter was mistaken for the reality itself, "a direction altogether new and erroneous was given to re |