Page:Ningpo to Shanghai.djvu/86

72   The writer then goes on to point out the way in which idolatry sprang up in China. From the earliest antiquity, he says, down to the close of the three dynasties (B. C. 220) both princes and people generally wor shipped God. Some innovations had, however, spr ung up two thousand years previously, when the Kew Le believed in evil spirits, and corrupted the tribes of Meaou, who are accounted the aborigines of China.‖ Corruptions had crept in, also, about a thousand years afterwards, when men were employed to represent the ghost of the departed; but during all this period, according to this writer, the mass of the people continued to be monotheists, as at the first. As we approach the Christian era, a superstitious regard for ghosts and hobgoblins increased, and the sea was looked to as the abode of the genii. This led to an interference with the previous monotheistic practice, and one of the rulers of the. Han dynasty erred egregiously, in supposing that the four quarters with the centre of the world were each under the dominion of a separate Deity. Corruptions speedily increased, and soon after the rise of the Christian era, the emperor Ming, hearing that a holy man had arisen in the west, sent men to look for him, who instead of penetrating to Judea, stopped short at India, from whence they introduced the religion of Buddha, with its numerous images and superstitious rites. The founder of the Taou sect, also, came in for his share of religious honours and one of the emperors thence gave himself up to be a priest in one of the monasteries, from whence his ministers had to redeem him, at a large sum. Things went on from bad to worse, according to our author, when Hwuy, one of the emperors of the Sung dynasty, changed the name which had been used for God into one used to designate an imaginary deity. This alteration of the venerable name of God is looked upon by our author as displaying a great want of reverence towards him,¶ and he proceeds to trace the subesquent misfortunes which came upon the emperor Hwuy, and his son, to this source. In consequence of all these corruptions having crept in,our author says it is not to be wondered at that the Chinese should be now so ignorant of God, and destitute of his fear.     ‖

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