f the K'un-lun
Mountains. Then they prayed, saying, "If thou, O God, hast sent us to
be man and wife, the smoke of our sacrifice will stay in one place;
but if not, it will be scattered." The smoke remained stationary.

But though Nue Kua is said to have moulded the first man (or the first
human beings) out of clay, it is to be noted that, being only the
successor of Fu Hsi, long lines of rulers had preceded her of whom no
account is given, and also that, as regards the heavens and the earth
at least, she is regarded as the repairer and not the creator of them.

Heaven-deaf (T'ien-lung) and Earth-dumb (Ti-ya), the two attendants
of Wen Ch'ang, the God of Literature (see following chapter), have
also been drawn into the cosmogonical net. From their union came the
heavens and the earth, mankind, and all living things.

These and other brief and unelaborated personal cosmogonies, even if
not to be regarded as spurious imitations, certainly have not become
established in the Chinese mind as the explanation of the way in which
the universe came to be: in this sphere the P'an Ku legend reigns
supreme; and, owing to its concrete, easily apprehensible nature,
has probably done so ever since the time of its invention.

Early Cosmogony Dualistic

The period before the appearance of the P'an Ku myth may be divided
into two parts; that from some early unknown date up to about the
middle of the Confucian epoch, say 500 B.C., and that from 500 B.C. to
A.D. 400. We know that during the latter period the minds of Chinese
scholars were frequently occupied with speculations as to the origin
of the universe. Before 500 B.C. we have no documentary remains
telling us what the Chinese believed about the origin of things;
but it is exceedingly unlikely that no theories or speculations at
all concerning the origin of themselves and their surroundings were
formed by this intelligent people during the eighteen centuries or
more which preceded the date at which we find the views held by them
put into written form. It is safe to assume that the dualism which
later occupied their philosophical thoughts to so great an extent
as almost to seem inseparable from them, and exercised so powerful
an influence throughout the course of their history, was not only
formulating itself during that long period, but had gradually reached
an advanced stage. We may even go so far as to say that dualism, or
its beginnings, existed in the very earliest times,