to dwell on these civilised
religions. Granting our hypothesis of an early Supreme Being among
savages, obscured later by ancestor-worship and ghost-gods, but not
often absolutely lost to religious tradition, the barbaric and the
civilised polytheisms easily take their position in line, and are easily
intelligible. Space forbids a discussion of all known religions; only
typical specimens have been selected. Thus, nothing has been said of the
religion of the great Chinese empire. It appears to consist, on its
higher plane, of the worship of Heaven as a great fetish-god--a worship
which may well have begun in days, as Dr. Brinton says, 'long ere man had
asked himself, "Are the heavens material and God spiritual?"'--perhaps,
for all we know, before the idea of 'spirit' had been evolved. Thus, if it
contains nothing more august, the Chinese religion is, so far, beneath
that of the Zunis, or the creed in Taa-roa, in Beings who are eternal, who
were before earth was or sky was. The Chinese religion of Heaven is also
coloured by Chinese political conditions; Heaven (Tien) corresponds to the
Emperor, and tends to be confounded with Shang-ti, the Emperor above. 'Dr.
Legge charges Confucius,' says Mr. Tylor, 'with an inclination to
substitute, in his religious teaching, the name of Tien, Heaven, for that
known to more ancient religion, and used in more ancient books--Shang-ti,
the personal ruling deity.' If so, China too has its ancient Supreme
Being, who is not a divinised aspect of nature.

But Mr. Tylor's reading, in harmony with his general theory, is different:

'It seems, rather, that the sage was, in fact, upholding the tradition of
the ancient faith, thus acting according to the character on which he
prided himself--that of a transmitter, not a maker, a preserver of old
knowledge, not a new revealer.'[1]

This, of course, is purely a question of evidence, to be settled by
Sinologists. If the personal Supreme Being, Shang-ti, occupies in older
documents the situation held by Tien (Heaven) in Confucius's later system,
why are we to say that Confucius, by putting forward Heaven in place of
Shang-ti, was restoring an older conception? Mr. Tylor's affection for his
theory leads him, perhaps, to that opinion; while my affection for my
theory leads me to prefer documentary evidence in its favour.

The question can only be settled by specialists. As matters stand, it
seems to me probable that ancient China possessed a Supreme P