'4

ancient books laid down by Mencius himself, and the rule for us after men in reading about what purport to be lost books of his. The seven Books we have 'comprehend the doctrine of heaven and earth, examine and set forth ten thousand topics, discuss the subjects of benevolence and righteousness, reason and virtue, the nature of man and the decrees of Heaven, misery and happiness. Brilliantly are these things treated of, in a way far beyond what any disciple of Kung-sun Ch'ow or Wan Chang could have attained to. What is the use of disputing about other matters? Ho She has his 'Expurgated Mencius, but Mencius cannot be expurgated. Lin Kinsze has his 'Continuation of Mencius,' but Mencius needs no continuation. I venture to say-Besides the Seven Books there were no other Works of Mencius."

3. I have said, in the note at the end of this volume, that Chaou K'e gives the total of the characters in Mencius as 34,685, while they are now found actually to amount to 35,226. This difference has been ingeniously accounted for by supposing that the continually recurring "Mencius" and "Mencius said" were not in his copies. There would be no use for them on his view that the whole was composed by Mencius himself. If they were added subsequently, they would about make up the actual excess of the number of characters above his computation. The point is not one of importance, and I have touched on it simply because it leads us to the question of the authorship of the Works.

4. On this point Sze-ma Ts'een and Chaou K'e are agreed. They say that Mencius composed the seven Books himself, and yet that he did so along with certain of his disciples. The words of the latter are: -" He withdrew from public life, collected and digested the conversations which he had had with his distinguished disciples, Kung-sun Ch'ow, Wan Chang, and others, on the difficulties and doubts which they had expressed, and also compiled himself his deliverances as ex cathedra; and so published the Seven Books of his writings."

This view of the authorship seems to have been first called in question by Han Yu, commonly referred to as "Han, the duke of

4 This is the language of Chaou K'e. 5 Ma Twan-lin mentions two authors who had taken in hand to expurgate Mencius, but neither of them is called 何涉. He mentions Lin Kin-sze, ealling him Lin Shin-sze (林慎思), and his Work. 6韓愈字退之

Literature," a famous scholar of the eighth century, under the T'ang dynasty, who expressed himself in the following terms:-"The books of Mencius were not published by himself. After his death, his disciples, Wan Chang and Kung-sun Ch'ow, in communication with each other, recorded the words of Mencius."8

5. If we wish to adjudicate in the matter, we find that we have a difficult task in hand. One thing is plain-the book is not the work of many hands like the Confucian Analects. "If we look at the style of the composition," says Choo He, "it is as if the whole were melted together, and not composed by joining piece to piece." This language is too strong, but there is a degree of truth and force in it. No principle of chronology guided the arrangement of the different parts, and a foreigner may be pardoned if now and then the "pearls" seem to him "at random strung;" yet the collection is characterized by a uniformity of style, and an endeavour in the separate Books to preserve a unity of matter. This consideration, however, is not enough to decide the question. Such as the work is, we can conceive it proceeding either from Mencius himself, or from the labours of a few of his disciples engaged on it in concert.

The author of the "Topography of the Four Books"10 has this argument to show that the works of Mencius are by Mencius himself: "The Confucian Analects," he says, "were made by the disciples, and therefore they record minutely the appearance and manners of the sage. But the seven Books were made by Mencius himself, and therefore we have nothing in them excepting the words and public movements of the philosopher." This peculiarity is certainly consonant with the hypothesis of Mencius' own authorship, and so far may dispose us to adopt it.

On the other hand, as the princes of Mencius' time to whom any reference is made are always mentioned by the honorary epithets conferred on them after their death, it is argued that those at least must have been introduced by his disciples. There are many passages,

7韓文公 孟軻之書非軻自著軻沒其徒萬章 公孫丑相與記軻所言焉耳; ; see note by Choo He in his prefatory notice to Mencius. 9觀其筆勢如鎔鑄而成非綴緝所就者: quoted # 四書摭餘說孟子,art T. 10 See vol. I., proleg., p. 132. 11 論語成 于門人之手故聖人容貌甚悉七篇成于已手故 但記言語或出處 R; see, sect. xxiv., at the end.

again, which savour more of a disciple or other narrator than of the philosopher himself. There is, for instance, the commencing sentences of Book III. Pt. I: "When the duke Wan of T'ang was crown-prince, having to go to Ts'oo, he went by way of Sung, and visited Mencius (lit., the philosopher Măng). Mencius discoursed to him how the nature of man is good, and when speaking, always made laudatory reference to Yaou and Shun. When the crown-prince was returning from Ts'oo, he again visited Mencius. Mencius said to him, 'Prince, do you doubt my words? The path is one, and only one."

6. Perhaps the truth after all is as the thing is stated by Sze-ma Ts'een, that Mencius, along with some of his disciples, compiled and composed the Work. It would be in their hands and under their guardianship after his death, and they may have made some slight alterations, to prepare it, as we should say, for the press. Yet allowing this, there is nothing to prevent us from accepting the sayings and doings as those of Mencius, guaranteed by himself.

7. It now only remains here that I refer to the reception of Mencius' works among the Classics. We have seen how they were not admitted by Lew Hin into his catalogue of classical works. Mencius was then only one of the many scholars or philosophers of the orthodox school. The same classification obtains in the books of the Suy and T'ang dynasties; and in fact it was only under the dynasty of Sung that the works of Mencius and the Confucian Analects were authoritatively ranked together. The first explicitly to proclaim this honour as due to our philosopher was Ch'in Chihchae, 12 whose words are "Since the time when Han, the duke of Literature, delivered his eulogium, 'Confucius handed the scheme of doctrine to Mencius, on whose death the line of transmission was interrupted, 18 the scholars of the empire have all associated Confucius and Mencius together. The Books of Mencius are certainly

12. 陳直齋 The name and the account I take from the 'Supplemental Observations on the Four Books," art. I. on Mencius. 直, I apprehend, is a misprint for It, the individual referred to being probably 陳傳艮, a great scholar and officer of the 12th century, known also by the designations of 君nd止齋

superior to those of Seun and Yang, and others who have followed them. Their productions are not to be spoken of in the same day with his." Choo He adopted the same estimate of Mencius, and by his "Collected Comments" on him and the Analects bound the two sages together in a union which the government of China, in the several dynasties which have succeeded, has with one temporary exception approved and confirmed.

CHAPTER II.

MENCIUS AND HIS DISCIPLES.

SECTION I.

LIFE OF MENCIUS.

The

1. The materials for a Memoir of Mencius are very scanty. birth and principal incidents of Confucius' life are duly chronicled Paucity and uncertainty in the various annotated editions of the Ch'un of materials. Ts'ew, and in Sze-ma Ts'een. It is not so in the case of Mencius. Ts'een's account of him is contained in half a dozen columns which are without a single date. That in the "Cyclopædia of Surnames" only covers half a page. Chaou K'e is more particular in regard to the early years of his subject, but he is equally indefinite. Our chief informants are K'ung Foo, and Lew Heang in his "Record of Note-worthy Women," but what we find in them has more the character of legend than history.