chapter 17
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I have been a long way, but now I ahe question which you asked me awhile ago. You asked me, you will remember, how without a belief in God which religion teaches_how ake men, make the mass of mankind, follow and obey the moral rule which fucius teaches in his State religion_the absolute duty of loyalty to the Emperor? I have shown you that it is not the belief in God taught by religion which really makes men obey moral rules or rules of moral duct. I showed you that religion is able to make mehe rules of moral duct principally by means of an anisation called the Church which awakens and kindles in men an inspiration or liviion necessary to make them to obey those rules. Now, in ao your question I am going to tell you that the system of the teags of fucius, called fuism, the State Mencius, speaking of the two purest and most Christlike characters in ese history, said: "When men heard of the spirit and temper of Po-yi and Shu-ch*i, the dissolute ruffian became unselfish and the cowardly man had ce. " Mencius Bk. Ill, Part II, IX, religion in a, like the Church religion in other tries, makes mehe rules of moral duct also by means of an anisation corresponding to the Church of the Ch<var>?</var>urch religion in other tries. This anisation iate religion of fuism in a is_the school. The school is the Church of the State religion of fucius in a. As you know, the same word " chiao" in ese fion is also the word for education. In fact, as the Chur a is the schoion to the ese means education, culture. The aim and object of the school in a is not, as in modern Europe and America to-day, to teach men how to earn a living, how to make money, but, like the aim and object of the Church religion, to teach men to uand what Mr. Froude calls the primitive a, "Thou shalt not lie" and" Thou shall not steal" ;in fact, to teach men to be good. "Whether we provide for a or versation, " says Dr. Johnson. "whether we wish to be useful or pleasing, the first requisite is the religious and moral knowledge ht and wrong; the , an acquaintah the history of mankind and with those examples which may be said to embody truth and prove by events the reasonableness of opinions. "But then we have seen that the Church of the Church religion is able to make mehe rules of moral duct by awakening and kindling in men an inspiration or liviion, and that it awakens and kihis inspiration or liviion principally by exg and arousing the feeling aion of unbounded admiration, love, ahusiasm for the character and person of the first Teacher and Founder ion. Now, here there is a differeween the school_the Church of the State religion of fucius in a_and the Church of the Church religion in other tries. The school_ the Church of the State religion in a_it is true, enables and makes mehe rules of moral duct, also like the Church of the Church religion, by awakening and kindling in men an inspiration or liviion. But the means which the school in a uses to awaken and kihis inspiration or liviion in men are different from those of the Church of the Church religion in other tries. The school, the Church of the State religion of fucius in a, does not awaken and kihis inspiration or liviion in men by exg and arousing the feeling of unbounded admiration, love, ahusiasm for fucius. fucius in his lifetime did indeed inspire in his immediate disciples a feeling aion of unbounded admiration, love, ahusiasm, and, after his death, has inspired the same feeling aion in all great men who have studied and uood him. But fucius even while he lived did not inspire, and, after his death, has not inspired in the mass of mankind the same feeling aion of admiration, love, ahusiasm which the founders of all the great religions in the world, as we know, have inspired. The mass of the population in a do not adore and worship fucius as the mass of the population in Mohammedan tries adore and worship Mohammed, or as the mass of the population in European tries adore and worship Jesus Christ. In this respect fucius does not belong to the class of men called founders of a religion. In order to be a founder of a religion in the European sense of the word, a man must have an exceptionally or even an abnormally stroional nature. fucius indeed was desded from a race of kings, the house of Shang, the dynasty which rule<var>藏书网</var>d over a before the dynasty under which fucius lived_a raen who had the stroional nature of the Hebrew people. But fucius himself lived uhe dynasty of the House of Chow_a raen who had the fiellectual nature of the Greeks, a race of whom the Duke of Chou, the founder, as I told you, of the pre-fu religion ion of the old dispensation in a was a true representative. Thus fucius was, if I may use a parison, a Hebrew by birth, with the stroional nature of the Hebrew race, who was trained in the best intellectual culture, who had all that which the best intellectual culture of the civilisation of the Greeks could give him. In fact, like the great Goethe in modern Europe, the great Goethe whom the people of Europe will one day reise as the most perfect type of humanity, the real European which the civilisation of Europe has produced, as the ese have aowledged fucius to be the most perfect type of humanity, the real aman, which the ese civilisation has produced_like the great Goethe, I say, fucius was too educated and cultured a man to belong to the class of men called founders ion. Indeed, even while he lived fucius was not known to be what he was, except by his most intimate and immediate disciples.
The school in a, I say, the Church of the State religion of fucius, does not awaken and kihe inspiration or liviion necessary to make men obe<mark></mark>y the rules of moral duct by exg and arousing the feeling aion of admiration, love, ahusiasm for fucius. But then how does the school in a awaken and kihe inspiration or liviion necessary to make mahe rules of moral duct? fucius says: "In education the feeling aion is aroused by the study of poetry; the judgement is formed by the study of good taste and good manners; the education of the character is pleted by the study of music. " The school_ the Church of the State religion in a_awakens and kihe inspiration or liviion in men necessary to make them obey the rules of moral duct by teag them poetry_in fact, the works of all really great men in literature, which, as I told you, has the inspiration or liviion that is in the rules of moral duct ion. Matthew Arnold, speaking of Homer and the quality of nobleness in his poetry, says: "The nobleness in the poetry of Homer and of the few great men in literature refihe raw, natural man, transmute him. " In fact, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report, if there be any virtue and if there be <tt>?99lib?t>any praise_the school, the Church of the State religion in a, makes men think ohings, and in making them think ohings, awakens and kihe inspiration or liviion necessary to enable and make them obey the rules of moral duct.
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