'He may be compared to heaven and earth in their supporting
and containing, their overshadowing and curtaining all
things; he may be compared to the four seasons in their
alternating progress, and to the sun and moon in their
successive shining.... Quick in apprehension, clear in
discernment, of far-reaching intellect and all-embracing
knowledge, he was fitted to exercise rule; magnanimous,
generous, benign, and mild, he was fitted to exercise
forbearance; impulsive, energetic, firm, and enduring, he
was fitted to maintain a firm hold; self-adjusted, grave,
never swerving from the Mean, and correct, he was fitted to
command reverence; accomplished, distinctive, concentrative,
and searching, he was fitted to exercise discrimination....
All-embracing and vast, he was like heaven; deep and active
as a fountain, he was like the abyss.... Therefore his fame
overspreads the Middle Kingdom and extends to all barbarous
tribes. Wherever ships and carriages reach, wherever the
strength of man penetrates, wherever the heavens overshadow
and the earth sustains, wherever the sun and moon shine,
wherever frost and dews fall, all who have blood and breath
unfeignedly honour and love him. Hence it is said--He is the
equal of Heaven' (p. 53).

This is certainly very magnificent phraseology, but it will hardly
convey any definite impression to the minds of those who are not
acquainted with the life and teaching of the great Chinese sage. These
may be studied now by all who can care for the history of human
thought, in the excellent work of Dr. Legge. The first volume, just
published, contains the Confucian Analects, the Great Learning, and
the Doctrine of the Mean, or the First, Second, and Third Shoo's, and
will, we hope, soon be followed by the other Chinese Classics.[93] We
must here confine ourselves to giving a few of the sage's sayings,
selected from thousands that are to be found in the Confucian
Analects. Their interest is chiefly historical, as throwing light on
the character of one of the most remarkable men in the history of the
human race. But there is besides this a charm in the simple
enunciation of simple truths; and such is the fear of truism in our
modern writers that we must go to distant times and distant countries
if we wish to listen to that simple Solomonic wisdom which is better
than the merchandize of sil