A disciple once asked Confucius what he would consider the first thing to be done, if intrusted with the government of a state.
Almost every sentence in it is enigmatic. As now published, there are always subjoined to it certain appendixes, which are ascribed to Confucius himself.
Bahrdt, who regarded Christ as merely a noble teacher like Moses, Confucius and Luther.
But Confucius could not be so extinguished.
But Confucius had confidence in the preponderating goodness of human nature, and in the power of example in superiors.
China had a literature before Confucius.
Confucius appeared, according to Mencius, one of his most distinguished followers (371-288 B.C.), at a crisis in the nation's history.
Confucius did not see this, and it was impossible that he should.
Confucius felt that he must leave the state.
Confucius said that" by the Spring and Autumn men would know him and men would condemn him."
Confucius said, "If a state is governed by the principles of reason, poverty and misery are subjects of shame; if a state is not governed by the principles of reason, riches and honors are the subjects of shame."
Confucius said, "To know that we know what we know, and that we do not know what we do not know, that is true knowledge."
Confucius says truly, "Virtue does not remain as an abandoned orphan; it must of necessity have neighbors."
Confucius was frightened by what he saw, - and he undertook the work of reformation."
Confucius was in his fifty-sixth year when he left Lu; and thirteen years elapsed ere he returned to it.
Confucius was wont to say that he who was not acquainted with the Shih was not fit to be conversed with, and that the study of it would produce a mind without a single depraved thought.
Confucius would not abandon the cause of the people.
Confucius, it is recorded, sacrificed to the dead, as if they were present, and to the spirits, as if they were there.
Confucius, though unwilling to discuss any questions concerning the dead, by approving ancestor-worship recognized a future life.
Confucius's annals do not bear a greater proportion to the events which they indicate than the headings in our Bibles bear to the contents of the chapters to which they are prefixed.
Confucius's own ancestry is traced up, through the sovereigns of the previous dynasty of Shang, to Hwang-ti, whose figure looms out through the mists of fable in prehistoric times.
During the China War in 1860 he commanded the gunboat Confucius employed in the rivers.
For some years after this our information about Confucius is scanty.
For thirteen years of his life Confucius wandered about from state to state, seeking rest and patrons; but his journeyings were confined within the modern provinces of Ho-nan and Shantung, and the borders of Chih-li and Hu-peh.
He had been a follower of Confucius and an opium addict and his wife had demonic problems.
His clan name was Kung, and Confucius is merely the latinized form of Kung Fu-tze, meaning " the philosopher or master K`ung."
If not intended from the first for purposes of divination, it was so used both before and after Confucius, and on that account it was exempted, through the superstition of the emperor of the Ts'in dynasty, from the flames.
In attempting to pass from Wei to another state, Confucius was set upon by a mob, which mistook him for an officer who had made himself hated by his oppressive deeds.
In his twenty-second year Confucius commenced his labours as a teacher.
In what has been called, though erroneously, as we shall see, Confucius's History of his own Times, we find only 13 states of note, and the number of all the states, large and small, which can be brought together from it, and the much more extensive supplement to it by Tso K`iu-ming, not much posterior to the sage, is under 150.
It is characteristic of the two men that the latter, a transcendental dreamer, appears to have thought little of his visitor, while Confucius, an inquiring thinker, was profoundly impressed with him.
It is doubtfully referred to in the book of ancient poems edited by Confucius, all of which are previous in date to 550 B.C. A tradition exists in China that a knowledge of tea travelled eastward to and in China, having been introduced S43 A.D.
It is one of the undesigned coincidences which confirm the credibility of Confucius's history, that his favourite disciple was a scion of the Yen clan.
It is the most densely inhabited part of China, and is celebrated as the native province both of Confucius and Mencius.
It was in his sixty-ninth year, 483 B.C., that Confucius returned to Lu.
It was not the custom of antiquity to raise any tumulus over graves, but Confucius resolved to innovate in the matter.
Long afterwards, when Confucius was complimented on his acquaintance with many arts, he accounted for it on the ground of the poverty of his youth, which obliged him to acquire a knowledge of matters belonging to a mean condition.
Several of them were men of mark among the statesmen of the time, and it is the highest testimony to the character of Confucius that he inspired them with feelings of admiration and reverence.
State after state went down before his blows, but the name and followers of Confucius were the chief obstacles in his way.
Such were the ideas, the dreams of Confucius.
The chief points were (I) the lawfulness and expediency of certain terms employed by the Jesuits in naming God Almighty, such as Tien, " Heaven," and Shang-ti, " Supreme Ruler" or "Emperor," instead of Tien-Chu, " Lord of Heaven," and in particular the erection of inscribed tablets in the churches, on which these terms were made use of; 2 (2) in respect to the ceremonial offerings made in honour of Confucius, and of personal ancestors, which Ricci had recognized as merely "civil" observances; (3) the erection of tablets in honour of ancestors in private houses; and (4), more generally,- sanction and favour accorded to ancient Chinese sacred books and philosophical doctrine, as not really trespassing;on Christian faith.
The education of a mandarin includes local history, cognizance of the administrative rites, customs, laws and prescriptions of the country, the ethics of Confucius, the rules of good breeding, the ceremonial of official and social life, and the practical acquirements necessary to the conduct of public or private business.
The grave of Confucius is in a large rectangle separated from the rest of the Kung cemetery, outside the city of K`iuh-fow.
The Kung family, however, became reduced, and by-and-by its chief representative moved from Sung to Lu, where in the early part of the 6th century we meet with Shuh-liang Heih, the father of Confucius, as commandant of the district of Tsow, and an officer renowned for his feats of strength and daring.
The learned hold the doctrine of Confucius, and Buddhism, alloyed with much popular superstition, has some influence.
The leather thongs, by which the tablets of Confucius's copy were tied together, were thrice worn out by his constant handling.
The marquis of Ts`i and his advisers saw that if Confucius were allowed to prosecute his course, the influence of Lu would become supreme throughout the kingdom, and Ts`i would be the first to suffer.
The most conspicuous figure in Chinese literature is Confucius (55 1 -475 B.C.).
The peach has not, it is true, been found wild in China, but it has been cultivated there from time immemorial; it has entered into the literature and folk-lore of the people; and it is designated by a distinct name, "to" or "tao," a word found in the writings of Confucius five centuries before Christ, and even in other writings dating from the 10th century before the Christian era.
The preface is, in fact, only a schedule, without any remark by Confucius himself, giving the names of 100 books, of which it consisted.
The primary school, in which the pupils learn only Chinese writing and the precepts of Confucius, stands at the base of this system.
The state was now in the hands of the son of the marquis whose neglect had driven the sage away; but Confucius would not again take office.
The tablet itself was in October 1907 removed by Chinese officials into the city proper, and placed in the Pei Lin or "forest of tablets," a museum in which are collected tablets of the Han, Tang, Sung, Yuen and Ming dynasties, some of which bear historical legends, notably a set of stone tablets having the thirteen classics inscribed upon them, while others are symbolical or pictorial; among these last is a full-sized likeness of Confucius.
The Tao-teh-king, or book of aphorisms on " the Tao and virtue " ascribed to Lao Tsze, is wholly unlike such a composition as Deuteronomy; and the disciples of Confucius carefully refrained from attributing to him any kind of supernatural inspiration in his conversations about social and personal morality.
The Vie de Confucius, the twelfth volume of that collection, is complete and accurate.
There the tablets of "the soul of the most holy ancestral teacher, Confucius," and of his ten principal disciples stand as objects of worship for their countless followers.
There was a screen between them at the interview, such as the present regentempresses of China use in giving audience to their ministers; but Tze-lu, one of his principal disciples, was indignant that the master should have demeaned himself to be near such a woman, and to pacify him Confucius swore an oath appealing to Heaven to reject him if he had acted improperly.
There was thus no grander lineage in China than that of Confucius; and on all his progenitors, since the throne of Shang passed from their line, with perhaps one exception, he could look back with complacency.
They are still more than sufficiently voluminous, but they were edited, when recovered under the Han dynasty, with so many additions, that it is hardly worth while to speak of them in connexion with Confucius, though much of what was added to them is occupied with his history and sayings.
This is known from the orders promulgated by the emperor Yao about 2300 B.C., as recorded in the Shu Chung, a collection of do'.uments antique in the time of Confucius (550-478 B.C.).
Thither also went Confucius, for he would not countenance by his presence the men who had driven their ruler away.
Through the centuries, others that contributed to the I Ching include the Duke of Chou, King Wen and Confucius.
Thus some arose who declared allegiance to the idealistic intuitionalism of Wang Yang-ming, and others advocated direct study of the works of Confucius and Mencius.
Twice a year, in spring and autumn,' a Chinese ruler goes in state to the imperial college in Pekin, and presents the appointed offerings before the spirit-tablets of Confucius and of the worthies who have been associated with him in his temples.
We pay cult to Confucius and to the dead to express our respect for them.
While travelling about, Confucius repeatedly came across recluses, - a class of men who had retired from the world in disgust.
Within the China of the Chow dynasty there might be a population, in Confucius's time, of from io,000,000 to 15,000,000.