The dynasty of Chow, the third which within historic time had ruled the country, lasting from 1122 to 256 b.c., had passed its zenith, and its kings no longer held the sceptre with a firm grasp. It must not be supposed that the territory under their sway extended over all the eighteen provinces which now constitute what is called “China proper.” It was not a sixth part of the present empire. On the south it hardly reached half-way from the Ho, or Yellow River, to the Kiang, or Yang-tze. Cheh-kiang, Kiang-si, Hu-nan, Fuh-kien, Kwang-tung, Kwang-si, Kweichow, and the great provinces of Yun-nan, Sze-ch*uen, and Kan-suh on the west, were thinly peopled by barbarous tribes which acknowledged no subjection to “the Middle State.” Ho-nan and Shan-si, with portions of Shen-si, Chih-li, Shan tung, Gan-hwui, Kiang-su, and Hu-pih, were all which formed the dominions of Chow. 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-pih. Many Europeans now living have travelled over much more of China than he did. The fact helps us to realize the relation of Confucius to his age, and it shows us that he gained his high position through his own unaided powers and the influences of his native country. It has never been hinted, as in the case of his contemporary, the founder of Taoism, that he learned anything from abroad.

Within this China of the Chow dynasty there might be a population, in Confucius’s time, of from 10,000,000 to 15,000,000. We read frequently, in the classical books, of the “ten thousand states,” in which the people were distributed; but that is merely a grand exaggeration. 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 i iu-ming, not much posterior to the sage, is under 150.

Chow was a feudal kingdom. The lords of the different territories belonged to five orders of nobility, corresponding closely to the dukes, marquises, earls, counts, and barons of feudal Europe. The theory of the constitution required that the princes, on every fresh succession, should receive investiture from the king, and thereafter appear at his court at stated times. They paid to him annually certain specified tributes, and might be called out with their military levies at any time in his service. A feudal kingdom was sure to be a prey to disorder unless there were energy and ability in the character and administration of the sovereign; and Confucius has sketched, in the work referred to above, the Annals of Lu, his native state, for 242 years, from 722 to 481 b.c., which might almost be summed up in the words: “In those days there was no king in China, and every prince did what was right in his own eyes.” In 770 b.c. a northern horde had plundered the capital, which was then in the present department of Si-gan, Shen-si, and killed the king, whose son withdrew across the Ho and established himself in a new centre, near the present city of Loh-yang in Ho-nan; but from that time the prestige of Chow was gone. Its representatives continued for four centuries and a half with the title of king, but they were less powerful than several of their feudatories. The Annals of Lu, enlarged by Tso K i iu-ming so as to embrace the history of the kingdom generally, are as full of life and interest as the pages of Froissart. Feats of arms, great battles, heroic virtues, devoted friendships, and atrocious crimes make the chronicles of China in the 5th, 6th, and 7th centuries before the birth of Christ as attractive as those of France and England in the 14th and some other centuries after it. There was in China in the former period more of literary culture and of many arts of civilization than there was in Europe in the latter. Not only the royal court, but every feudal court, had its historiographers and musicians. Institutions of an educational character abounded. There were ancient histories and poems, and codes of laws, and books of ceremonies. Yet the period was one of wide-spread and ever-increasing suffering and degeneracy. While the general government was feeble, disorganization was at work in each particular state.

But three things must be kept in mind when we compare feudal China with feudal Europe,—three elements which wrought to give to the former peculiarities of character for which our better acquaintance with the latter will not have prepared us. First, we must take into account the long duration of the time through which the central authority was devoid of vigour. For about five centuries state was left to contend with state, and clan with clan in the several states. The result was chronic misrule, and misery to the masses of the people, with frequent famines. Secondly, we must take into account the institution of polygamy, with the low status assigned to woman, and the many restraints put upon her. In the ancient poems, indeed, there are a few pieces which are true love songs, and express a high appreciation of the virtue of their subjects; but there are many more which tell a different tale. The intrigues, quarrels, murders, and grossnesses that grew out of this social condition it is difficult to conceive, and would be impossible to detail. Thirdly, we must take into account the absence of strong and definite religious beliefs, properly so called, which has always been a characteristic of the Chinese people. We are little troubled, of course, with heresies, and are not shocked by the outbreaks of theological zeal; but where thought as well as action does not reach beyond the limits of earth and time, we do not find man in his best estate. We miss the graces and consolations of faith; we have human efforts and ambitions, but they are unimpregnated with divine impulses and heavenly aspirings.

Confucius appeared, according to Mencius, one of his most distinguished followers (371-288 b.c. ), at a crisis in the nation’s history. “The world,” he says, “had fallen into decay, and right principles had disappeared. Perverse discourses and oppressive deeds were waxen rife. Ministers murdered their rulers, and sons their fathers. Confucius was frightened by what he saw,—and he undertook the work of reformation.”

The sage was born, according to the historian Sze-ma Ts’in, in the year 550 b.c.; according to Kung-yang and Kuh-liang, two earlier commentators on his Annals of Lu, in 551; but all three agree in the month and day assigned to his birth, which took place in winter. His clan name was K‘ung, and it need hardly be stated that Confucius is merely the Latinized form of K i ung Fu-tze, meaning “the philosopher or master K'ung.” He was a native of the state of Lu, a part of the modern Shan-tung, embracing the present department of Yen-chow and other portions of the province. Lu had a great name among the other states of Chow, its marquises being descended from the duke of Chow, the legislator and consolidator of the dynasty which had been founded by his father and brother, the famous kings Wan and Wu. 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. A scion of the house of Shang, the surname of which was Tze, was invested by King Wu with the dukedom of Sung in the present province of Honan. There, in the Tze line, towards the end of the 8th century b.c., we find a K i ung Kia, whose posterity, according to the rules for the dropping of surnames, became the K'ung clan. He was a high officer of loyalty and probity, and unfortunately for himself had a wife of extraordinary beauty. Hwa Tuh, another high officer of the duchy, that he might get this lady into his possession, brought about the death of K t ung Kia, and was carrying his prize in a carriage to his own palace, when she strangled herself on the way. The K i ung family, however, became reduced, and by-and-by its chief representative moved from Sung to Lu 1 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.

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. He was the son of Heih’s old age. That officer, when over seventy years, and having already nine daughters and one son, because that son was a cripple, sought an alliance with a gentleman of the Yen clan, who had three daughters. The father submitted to them Heih’s application, saying that, though he was old and austere, he was of most illustrious descent, and they need have no misgivings about him. Ching-tsai, the youngest of the three, observed that it was for their father to decide in the case. “You shall marry him then,” said the father, and accordingly she became the bride of the old man, and in the next year the mother of the sage. 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.

Heih died in the child’s third year, leaving his family in straitened circumstances. 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. When he was five or six, people took notice of his fondness for playing with his companions at setting out sacrifices, and at postures of ceremony. He tells us himself that at fifteen his mind was set on learning; and at nineteen, according to the ancient and modern practice in China, in regard to early unions, he was married,—his wife being from his ancestral state of Sung. A son, the only one, so far as we know, that he ever had, was born in the following year; but he had subsequently two daughters. Immediately after his marriage we find him employed under the chief of the Ki clan to whose jurisdiction the district of Tsow belonged, first as keeper of stores, and then as superintendent of parks and herds. Mencius says that he undertook such mean offices because of his poverty, and distinguished himself by the efficiency with which he discharged them, without any attempt to become rich.

In his twenty-second year Confucius commenced his labours as a teacher. He did so at first, probably, in a humble way; but a school, not of boys to be taught the elements of learning, but of young and inquiring spirits who wished to be instructed in the principles of right conduct and government, gradually gathered round him. He accepted the substantial aid of his disciples; but he rejected none who could give him even the smallest fee, and he would retain none who did not show earnestness and capacity. “When I have presented,” he said, “one corner of a subject, and the pupil cannot of himself make out the other three, I do not repeat my lesson.”

Two years after, his mother died, and he buried her in the same grave with his father. Some idea of what his future life was likely to be was already present to his mind. It was not the custom of antiquity to raise any tumulus over graves, but Confucius resolved to innovate in the matter. He would be travelling, he said, to all quarters of the kingdom, and must therefore have a mound by which to recognize his parents’ resting-place. He returned home from the interment alone, having left his disciples to complete this work. They were long in rejoining him, and had then to tell him that they had been detained by a heavy fall of rain, which threw down the first product of their labour. He burst into tears, and exclaimed, “Ah! they did not raise mounds over their graves in antiquity.” His affection for the memory of his mother and dissatisfaction with his own innovation on ancient customs thus blended together; and we can sympathize with his tears. For the regular period of 27 months, commonly spoken of as three years, he observed all the rules of mourning. When they were over he allowed five more days to elapse before he would take his lute, of which he had been devotedly fond, in his hands. He played, but when he tried to sing to the accompaniment of the instrument, his feelings overcame him.

For some years after this our information about Confucius is scanty. Hints, indeed, occur of his devotion to the study of music and of ancient history; and we can perceive that his character was more and more appreciated by the principal men of Lu. He had passed his thirtieth year when, as he tells us, “he stood firm” in his convictions on all the subjects to the learning of which he had bent his mind fifteen years before. In 517 b.c. two scions of one of the principal houses in Lu joined the company of his disciples in consequence of the dying command of its chief; and being furnished with the means by the marquis of the state, he made a visit with them to the capital of the kingdom. There he examined the treasures of the royal library, and studied the music which was found in its highest style at the court. There, too, according to Sze-ma Ts i in, he had several interviews with Lao-tze, the father of Taoism. 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.

On his return to Lu, in the same year, that state fell into great disorder. The marquis was worsted in a struggle with his ministers, and fled to the neighbouring state of Ts‘i. Thither also went Confucius, for he would not countenance by his presence the men who had driven their ruler away. He was accompanied by many of his disciples; and as they passed by the T‘ai Mountain, an incident occurred, which may be narrated as a specimen of the way in which he communicated to them his lessons. The attention of the travellers was arrested by a woman weeping and wailing at a grave. The sage stopped, and sent one of his followers to ask the reason of her grief. “My husband’s father” said she, “was killed here by a tiger, and my husband also, and now my son has met the same fate.” Being asked why she did not leave so fatal a spot, she replied that there was there no oppressive government. “Remember this,” said Confucius to his disciples, “remember this, my children, oppressive government is fiercer and more feared than a tiger.”

He did not find in Ts‘i a home to his liking. The marquis of the state was puzzled how to treat him. The teacher was not a man of rank, and yet the prince felt that he ought to give him more honour than rank could claim. Some counsellors of the court spoke of him as “impracticable and conceited, with a thousand peculiarities.” It was proposed to assign to him a considerable revenue, but he would not accept it while his counsels were not followed. Dissatisfactions ensued, and he went back to Lu.

There for fifteen more years he continued in private life, prosecuting his studies, and receiving many accessions to his disciples. He had a difficult part to play with the different parties in the state, but he adroitly kept himself aloof from them all; and at last, in his fifty-second year, he was made chief magistrate of the city of Chung-too. A marvellous reformation, we are told, forthwith ensued in the manners of the people , and the marquis, a younger brother of the one that fled to Ts‘i and died there, called him to higher office. He was finally appointed minister of crime,—and there was an end of crime. Two of his disciples at the same time obtained influential positions in the two most powerful clans of the state, and co-operated with him. He signalized his vigour by the punishment of a great officer and in negotiations with the state of Tssl. He laboured to restore to the marquis his proper authority, and as an important step to that end, to dismantle the fortified cities where the great chiefs of clans maintained themselves like the barons of feudal Europe. For a couple of years he seemed to be master of the situation. “He strengthened the ruler,” it is said, “and repressed the barons. A transforming government went abroad. Dishonesty and dissoluteness hid their heads. Loyalty and good faith became the characteristics of the men, and chastity and docility those of the women. He was the idol of the people, and flew in songs through their mouths.”

The sky of bright promise was soon overcast. 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 Tsst would be the first to suffer. A large company of beautiful women, trained in music and dancing, and a troop of fine horses, were sent to Lu. The bait took; the women were welcomed, and the sage was neglected. The marquis forgot the lessons of the master, and yielded supinely to the fascinations of the harem. Confucius felt that he must leave the state. The neglect of the marquis to send round, according to rule, among the ministers portions of the flesh after a great sacrifice, furnished a plausible reason for leaving the court. He withdrew, though very unwillingly and slowly, hoping that a change would come over the marquis and his counsellors, and a message of recall be sent to him. But no such message came; and he went forth in his fifty-sixth year to a weary period of wandering among various states.

It may be well to pause here in the sketch of his life, and consider what his object and hope had been.

A disciple once asked him what he would consider the first thing to be done, if intrusted with the government of a state. His reply was, “The rectification of names.” When told that such a thing was wide of the mark, he held to it, and indeed his whole social and political system was wrapped up in the saying. He had told the marquis of Ts i i that good government obtained when the ruler was ruler, and the minister minister; when the father was father, and the son son. Society, he considered, was an ordinance of heaven, and was made up of five relationships,— ruler and subject, husband and wife, father and son, elder brothers and younger, and friends. There was rule on the one side of the first four, and submission on the other. The rule should be in righteousness and benevolence; the submission in righteousness and sincerity. Between friends the mutual promotion of virtue should be the guiding principle. It was true that the duties of the several relations were being continually violated by the passions of men, and the social state had become an anarchy. But Confucius had confidence in the preponderating goodness of human nature, and in the power of example...