Page:Christianity in China, Tartary, and Thibet Volume I.djvu/141

129 RELIGIOUS FAITH OF TCIIINGUIZ-KIIAN. 129 cognised; "and this is the fruit of so many victories!" The furious conqueror, who thought to get possession of all the kingdoms of the earth, has not kept so much as a tomb in his own country. History has left us little information concerning the religion of Tchinguiz-Khan, probably because that was a matter in which he had small concern himself. It is known that in the armies, and among the nations sub- ject to him, there were idolaters, Mahomcdans, and Christians, and it is even said that one of his wives, a Keraite by birth, and the niece of Ung-Khan, had been baptized. Tchinguiz-Khan himself, however, was neither Christian, Mahomedan, nor even idolater. He protected one religion no more than the other, and favoured each in turn, as suited the interests of his policy. He strongly recommended his successors to give no preference to an}', but desired that the priests of the various faiths should be exempt from taxes and contributions. He seems to have believed in a supreme being, but that it mattered little in what way he was worshipped ; so that his religion may be called Deism. On some public occasions, he is known to have prayed publicly, and implored the protection of the Divinity, and it is related, that when the Sultan Mo- hammed put to death some Mongol ambassador in Turkestan, Tchinguiz-Khan, on receiving the intelli- gence, not only shed tears of indignation, but went to the summit of a mountain, where, prostrate on the ground, with his head uncovered, his face to the earth, and his girdle round his neck, he passed three days and nights in prayer and mortification. In his dealings with foreign nations, he liked to appeal to the Divinity ; VOL. i. k