ife a victim to some
horrible disease, lands gone, houses destroyed by flood or fire, and
everything in an unutterable plight--the reward of former sins."

Confucius declined absolutely to discuss the supernatural in any form
or shape, his one object being to improve human conduct in this life,
without attempting to probe that state from which man is divided by
death. At the same time, he was no scoffer; for although he declared
that "the study of the supernatural is injurious indeed," and somewhat
cynically bade his followers "show respect to spiritual beings, but keep
them at a distance," yet in another passage we read: "He who offends
against God has no one to whom he can pray." Again, when he was
seriously ill, a disciple asked if he might offer up prayer. Confucius
demurred to this, pointing out that he himself had been praying for a
considerable period; meaning thereby that his life had been one long
prayer.

CHAPTER XII--THE OUTLOOK

There is a very common statement made by persons who have lived in
China--among the people, but not of them--and the more superficial the
acquaintance, the more emphatically is the statement made, that the
ordinary Chinaman, be he prince or peasant, offers to the Western
observer an insoluble puzzle in every department of his life. He is, in
fact, a standing enigma; a human being, it may be granted, but one who
can no more be classed than his unique monosyllabic language, which
still stands isolated and alone.

This estimate is largely based upon some exceedingly false inferences.
It seems to be argued that because, in a great many matters, the
Chinaman takes a diametrically opposite view to our own, he must
necessarily be a very eccentric fellow; but as these are mostly matters
of convention, the argument is just as valid against us as against him.
"Strange people, those foreigners," he may say, and actually does say;
"they make their compass point north instead of south. They take off
their hats in company instead of keeping them on. They mount a horse
on its left instead of on its right side. They begin dinner with soup
instead of dessert, and end it with dessert instead of soup. They drink
their wine cold instead of hot. Their books all open at the wrong end,
and the lines in a page are horizontal instead of vertical. They put
their guests on the right instead of on the left, though it is true that
we did that until several hundred years ago. Their music, too, is so
funn