Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 36.djvu/413

Rh carried it back and put it in the place from which it came. Children were taught that if they found a piece of metal they must not touch it. No silver, nor gold, nor jade was to be seen in any dwelling. To the wise, dreams were given, in which the universal parent spoke, saying: 'Child, the gold, the jade, the metals, and the gems are all parts of my body. Touch them not, nor meddle with them to my hurt and yours. To take stones from the earth is to dislocate the bones of one's parent; when the parent suffers, the dependent child is harmed.' In those days the soil was red and rich; it was heavy as iron, and so ductile that it could be drawn into filaments. There was no need of fertilizing the fields. Whatever was planted grew quickly, and the kernels of grain were as large as chestnuts, and the potato-tubers were as large as squashes now are. The products of the earth were so nutritious that one meal a day was sufficient, and so luscious were they that condiments were needless. It is the disrespect shown to the divine body that has made the life of man so hard. One should be content with what may be had without deeply disturbing the soil. The displeasure of Heaven is often manifestly visited upon the agriculturists who give the land no rest, and the lightning frequently strikes those who are at work in the fields. Those who walk on mountains soon tire, because they tread upon the bones, while those who keep to the artificial highways are not so soon fatigued."

This pantheistic theory being in its loftiest conceptions too abstract for the masses, it is expressed by them in the assertion that "there is a god to every eight feet of space." Every tree, grotto, and hummock has its tutelary deity. Consequently, no man begins to dig a cistern, to remove earth from a hill, to cut a stone, or to till a garden, without offering propitiatory gifts to the local divinity. If fever, headache, or dyspepsia follow the effort, the displeasure of the god is believed to be its cause, and the work is apt to be abandoned.

It is at once apparent that this pantheistic theory of evolution offers serious hindrance to the utilization of the metals contained in the mountains, to the opening of mines, the building of rail-roads, and the erection of structures requiring deep foundations. It has prevented the Chinese from availing themselves of the vast mineral resources of their country, from leveling thoroughfares where they are pressingly required for traffic, and from full use of the products of the earth in promoting the well-being of man. It is the chief reason why the emigration of hundreds of thousands of men in search of work has now become necessary. If the Chinese were unhampered by fear of the invisible ones who are considered by all to be the real proprietors of the land, they would have an abundance of lucrative work within their own