Confucius evidently possessed, in a very high degree, one of the most valuable qualifications in a teacher-the power of gaining and preserving the love and admiration of those he taught.

It may interest sportsmen to know, that Confucius was a lover of the "gentle craft," and would only fish with a hook, having a great dislike to the use of a net. Also that, when in pursuit of game, he would not shoot at birds, perching or at rest.

Though we are told that he avoided any unnecessary reference to the gods, it is clear that he was a man of strong religious feeling and deep convictions, both being quite compatible with an incapacity for formulating theological dogmas; and it is this incapacity, or, it may be, unwillingness, which obliges us to rest content with such abstract ideas on the subject as we are able to glean from his writings, or the writings of his disciples.

Thus we are told of him that, at one time, being ill, it was suggested to him, it would perhaps be as well that he should pray for his recovery. "Is there any authority for my doing so?" asked the sick man, as if to test his disciples' knowledge. "Undoubtedly," was the answer; "is it not written-thou shalt offer up thy prayers to the gods of heaven and earth'?" "Truly, you are right," said Confucius; "and can you suppose that I have not long since done so ?"

HIS MANY VIRTUES.

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Though a believer in himself, and highly estimating the work to which he had devoted himself, he was without arrogance, and there is frequent testimony of his being deeply impressed with a sense of his own shortcomings. From a passage in the "Dialogues," we learn that his majestic carriage was combined with mild and pleasing manners; that he was grave without being austere; and that he was quite free from any approach to selfishness, prejudice, bigotry, or vanity.

In addition to this he is said to have been charitable and humane. If at any timé a case was brought to his notice, of a family, through poverty, being unable to bury a deceased relative in a befitting manner, he at once arranged for the proper performance of the funeral rites at his own expense.

To sum up: he was above all things a man. A man with high aims and aspirations—none, perhaps, higher. And it is as a man, with all the personal characteristics which have been described stamped upon him, that he stands out, in the present day, through the dimness of distant ages, before the many millions who have been taught to venerate his memory, as the great example, the teacher for all

time.

To those amongst us who have studied his life and teaching, he cannot fail to present himself as an

eminently religious-minded man. His beliefs may have been vague, for he was confessedly ignorant of dogmas; but there is sufficient evidence to show that they included the immortality of the soul, the eternity of truth, and the over-ruling providence of a just God.

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CHAPTER XII.

The Confucian literature-The first of the "Five Classics: " the "Yih-King," or the "Transmutations."

"I LOVE and revere the ancients," was the declaration of Confucius to his disciples, "for their writings are so far-reaching and comprehensive that I am never weary of studying them. They afford, indeed, an inexhaustible mine of intellectual wealth, and so it is that, when I write, I do not seek to set forth or originate new ideas, but confine myself as much as possible to compiling and elaborating all that was taught by the holy sages of antiquity."

He considered that there was something approaching to a divine inspiration in these ancient records; that those who had written them were alone worthy of being called sages; and that he would have been guilty of a gross act of presumption, and have led people to suppose that he desired to place himself on the same level with them, had he written anything new or original.

According to most authorities, his mode of procedure seems to have been to collect and bring together everything, no matter how fugitive or fragmentary, that might present itself in a written form, likely to elucidate or explain the frequently obscure meaning of the scanty, but highly prized, literature which had been handed down as a sacred legacy from the past.

From this mixed and incongruous mass of materials he selected, after due examination and deliberation, everything which he deemed worthy of being retained, whilst he rigidly discarded all that might have, in the slightest degree, an immoral or licentious tendency. These selected portions he subsequently classified and re-arranged, and he finally either incorporated them in those works to which they seemed properly to belong, or, as happened in a single instance, gave them a distinct form.

The works so arranged form the series known under the title of the "Five Classics," and it is upon them, conjointly with the "Four Books," of which an account will be given later on, that the whole superstructure of education in China has been raised.

The "Five Classics" comprise the "Yih-King," Shoo-King," "She-King," "Lē-King" anciently divided into two parts-and the "Chun-tsieu," or, as these titles may be translated-leaving out the