--- title: Improvement Era description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930. authors: - Young, Levi Edgar collections: - periodicals tags: - magazine - improvement-era periodical: Improvement Era volume: 11 number: 5 published: 1908-03 publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations publisher_place: Salt Lake City language: en type: magazine reference: 'Levi Edgar Young, "The World’s Great Religions—III. Confucianism," *Improvement Era* 11, no. 5 (March 1908): 375–378.' source: url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera1105unse transcription: Transcribed from the Internet Archive scan of each issue (the item for each issue is named in the issue's own source); unnumbered advertising leaves are omitted, printed page numbers are kept as page markers. identifier: improvementera1105unse start_page: 375 end_page: 378 rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1908-03) source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera1105unse publication_year: 1908 note: The Internet Archive item metadata carries a blanket "© Copyright by Intellectual Reserve, Inc." notice. The library owner judged it inapplicable because this issue was published in 1908, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright. --- # The World’s Great Religions—III. Confucianism THE WORLD'S GREAT RELIGIONS. BY PROFESSOR LEVI EDGAR YOUNG, OF THE UNIVERSITY OF UTAH. III. CONFUCIANISM. Fine words and an insinuating appearance are seldom associated with true virtue. Hold faithfulness and sincerity as first principles. When we see men of worth, we should think of equalling them; when we see men of a contrary character, we should turn inwards, and examine ourselves. They who know the truth are not equal to those who love it, and they who love it are not equal to those who find pleasure in it. — From the Writings of Confucius. Of all oriental people, none strikes the European and American so strangely as do the Chinese. Down through the manyyeared history of the world, China has remained isolated; and though she boasts of a third of the world's population, and an extent of the world-empire greater than all Europe, she has kept herself away from the neighboring nations, and has been especially undesirous of mingling with Occidental people. No land in all the world is more beautiful than China; no land is richer in minerals and vegetation. Wheat and rye fields stretch through the valleys in almost endless vision; hundreds of wild flowers grow along the rivers and streams ; and the blossoms of the tea plant perfume the air the land over. To the native, China is horizoned by heav^en. Heaven is the blue sky which gently folds the earth to it and gives it sunshine and life. In the Tian-Shan mountains, which are said to be a part of heaven, the glories of nature are seen at their best. The soil teems with the most luxuriant vege- 376 IMPROVEMENT ERA. tation, and the light of the warm oriental sun recalls the words of Tennyson : And in the East, God made himself an awful Rose of Dawn. The Chinese are naturally nature-worshipers. Ages ago the great law-giver, Confucius, taught them that there is a divine, active energy that takes hold of materiality and molds it into shape. Materiality always existed, and is the passive substance of the universe upon which divine energy plays . This active force was never personified, as was the God of Gautama, Brahm, Zoraster, or Mohammed. The Chinese have never tried to explain the power that lies beyond the things of nature. To them it has always been the "Unknowable." They never indulge in speculative controversies; and, therefore, we do not find in their religion metaphysical problems. They did not reach beyond their everyday life to try to solve those problems that have always puzzled man. This may in part account for their isolation, and for the consequent stationary condition of the Chinese, both intellectually and morally. China boasts of but one supreme law-giver and reformer, a man who is dear to the Mongolian today, and who has become a world character. This was Confucius, who was born of very poor parents, about 500 B.C. His life comes down to us free from tradition and myth. He typified the divine, active essence: his life was one of constant work. He was not a special gift of the Supreme Intelligence to the race. He was poor and lowly in standing, so he told his followers, and therefore was his life devoid of miracle and super-naturalism. "He grew; he did not come full blown," remarks Professor Inoue Tetsujirb, of the Imperial University of Tokyo. The Chinese speak of Confucius as the man who met every difficulty of life and overcame it because of his remarkable strength and will to achieve. He possessed an all-compelling passion for study, and like the man of today who steps into the open, his conquest of the things of life came through the toil of an anguished soul. When manhood's day came, he gathered about him his followers and taught them as did Socrates before the temples of Athens. "Man is by nature virtuous," he said, "and con- THE WORLD'S GREAT RELIGIONS. 377 tains the true life, which is the life of heaven." In the writings ©f this remarkable man, one finds no boasting; only a soul-desire of knowledge. We find him saying, possibly at a time when a feeling of pessimism came over him: "In learning, it is as if I can never attain the end. Moreover, I fear I shall lose what I have learned." His humility resembles that of Faust who, in a moment of discouragement, falls back in his study chair, and says: Alas! I have explored Philosophy, and Law, and Medicine; And over deep Divinity have pored, Studying with ardent and laborious zeal ; And here I am at last a very fool. With useless learning cursed, No wiser than at first. Confucius compiled the traditions of his people to show how righteousness and virtue had triumphed over wrong. He became the founder of a system of doctrines that have controlled the intellectual and spiritual lives of the Chinese down to the present day. By reflecting on the laws of morality, he traced them to their origin, and they became the absolute principles of government, both locally and nationally. His was a quiet life. The Chinese say that his soul became pure, because of the complete harmony between his body and spirit. In his older days, Confucius never stopped working. His will never became weakened; his dream was the perfection of self. Said he, "When I study the way, I never become weary of it; when I teach others, I never become tired.''* Though the teachings of China's great law-giver were practical, they made of the "Unknowable" an abstract creative force. This could not appeal to the material senses, so the people demanded "some external, direct manifestation of the divine." In order to visualize the power beyond self, the belief in spirits naturally grew among them. It was not long before the Chinese, like all other oriental people, became polytheists, and down through the ages, they developed a gross idolatry, which of all idolatries is the most reprehensible in existence . It is carried into the government of the state and home, and has resulted jn a system of pun- * Quoted by Professor Inoue Tetsujiro, Imperial Qniversityjof Tokyo. 378 IMPROVEMENT ERA. ishment for evil action, that causes the nations of the Occident to shudder. Confucius died in 479 B.C. His people have made but little progress since his day. Their manners and customs became set, ages ago, and they have sunk to a very low condition of intelligence. But China is emerging from her long sleep, and, thanks to our own nation, she is coming in contact with the progress of the twentieth century. Her stepping into the light of the new day will be slow, but as sure as the law of progress is the law of God, China will in time come under the redeeming influence of Jesus Christ. Salt Lake City, Utah.