Gems of Chinese Literature/Ssŭ-ma Ch‘ien-Confucius

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Gems of Chinese Literature
translated by Herbert Allen Giles

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SSŬ-MA CH'IEN

1st and 2nd CENTURIES b.c.

[Author of the first general History of China. The work begins with the reign of Huang Ti, the Yellow Emperor (2697 b.c.), and closes with the year 104 b.c., at about the period described in the subjoined extract. As a youth, Ssŭ-ma Ch'ien had travelled widely throughout the empire. He finally settled down as Grand Astrologer; but his spirited defence of Li Ling (q.v.) when overthrown and captured by the Huns, brought down upon him the wrath of the Emperor. He was subjected to the punishment of mutilation, and ended his days in disgrace. He reformed the calendar, and determined the chronology which still obtains in China.]

A CENTURY BEFORE CHRIST.

1523665Gems of Chinese Literature — ConfuciusHerbert Allen GilesSsŭ-ma Ch‘ien

The Odes have it thus:―“We may gaze up to the mountain’s brow: we may travel along the great road;” signifying that although we cannot hope to reach the goal, still we may push on thitherwards in spirit.

While reading the works of Confucius, I have always fancied I could see the man as he was in life; and when I went to Shantung I actually beheld his carriage, his robes, and the material parts of his ceremonial usages. There were his descendants practising the old rites in their ancestral home;―and I lingered on, unable to tear myself away. Many are the princes and prophets that the world has seen in its time; glorious in life, forgotten in death. But Confucius, though only a humble member of the cotton-clothed masses, remains among us after many generations. He is the model for such as would be wise. By all, from the Son of Heaven down to the meanest student, the supremacy of his principles is fully and freely admitted. He may indeed be pronounced the divinest of men.