Page:History of Corea, ancient and modern; with description of manners and customs, language and geography (1879).djvu/316

292 COBEA. them ; and the castles they raised so highly and nobly, tumbled down over their ears in eveiy eastern country. What is true of China and Japan, where they were pampered and loaded with un- unheard of honours, is equally true of Corea. But long before Bomanism gained a firm footing in Corea, it had been discovered in China that converts to Romanism were the subjects of Rome and not of the Chinese emperor. It is needless, and would be out of place here to enquire, by what acts the converts everjrwhere proved, or were ready to prove, their attachment to a foreign civil power; but the consequence was the deportation of the priests from China, and latterly the most frightful persecution of their converts ; so that at length there was not a single public professor of Romanism in China, though many remained true at heart Corea, therefore, never took political notice of the converts, who by and by became numerous within her borders. The presence of foreign priests has always been forbidden, smce the very first suspicions in China of political designs by the priests or their converta We learn from M. Ballet's " Church in Corea, that the first Corean converts were made during the Japanese expedition above narrated. These were baptised and died in Japan. But soon thereafi}er one or two Coreans became acquainted with the learned Jesuits in Peking. Science at first attracted them ; but thus began a series of events which has resulted in considerably leavening Corea ; for, according to the statements of the priests, there is scarcely a city or large village in central and eastern Corea^ without its quota of converts, ranging from the lowest to the highest ranks of society. European priests have again and again lived in the country, sometimes in considerable numbers, — but always compelled to remain in hiding ; and the best hiding- place has been the capital. How they remain in hiding, maybe explained by the words of M. Bemeux, the murdered Bishop of Corea: "The abodes of the nobility are hallowed ground. To violate their precincts would be a capital crime. . . . I wished to be a Corean noble, in order to be able to cross rivers and lodge in inns, without fear of being recognised. . . . But inasmuch