the
popular religion in China at the present day, the religion which Dr.
Farrar ventures to call "atheism fast merging into idolatry," [174] is
not free from the nature worship which deifies the moon. But
Buddhism, like most other imperfect systems, has precious gold
mixed with its dross; and at the expense of a digression we delight
to quote the statement of a recent writer, who says: "There is no
record, known to me, in the whole of the long history of Buddhism,
throughout the many countries where its followers have been for
such lengthened periods supreme, of any persecution by the
Buddhists of the followers of any other faith." [175] How glad we
should feel if we could assert the same of the Christian Church!

We come at once to those celebrations which still take place in
China, and illustrate the worship of the moon. The festival of
_Yue-Ping_--which is held annually during the eighth month, from the
first day when the moon is new, to the fifteenth, when it is full--is of
high antiquity and of deep interest. Dr. Morrison says that "the
custom of civil and military officers going on the first and fifteenth
of every moon to the civil and military temples to burn incense,
began in the time of the Luh Chaon," which would be not far from
A.D. 550. Also that the "eighth month, fifteenth day, is called
Chung-tsew-tsee. It is said that the Emperor Ming-hwang, of the
dynasty Tang, was one night led to the palace of the moon, where he
saw a large assembly of Chang-go-seen-neu--female divinities
playing on instruments of music. Persons now, from the first to the
fifteenth, make cakes like the moon, of various sizes, and paint
figures upon them: these are called Yue-ping, 'mooncakes.' Friends
and relations pay visits, purchase and present the cakes to each
other, and give entertainments. At full moon they spread out
oblations and make prostrations to the moon." [176] Dennys writes:
"The fifteenth day of the eighth month is a day on which a
ceremony is performed by the Chinese, which of all others we
should least expect to find imitated among ourselves. Most people
resident in China have seen the moon-cakes which so delight the
heart of the Chinese during the eighth month of every year. These
are made for an autumnal festival often described as 'congratulating'
or 'rewarding' the moon. The moon, it is well known, represents the
female principle in Chinese celestial cosmogony, and she is further
supposed to be inhabited by a