Page:The Spirit of the Chinese People.djvu/180

134 written, and lo! it was done, and done in a way that took away all chance of contemporary as well as future competition.

That the work of translating the Chinese Classics had to be done, was also a necessity of the time, and Dr. Legge has accomplished it, and the result is a dozen huge, ponderous tomes. The quantity of work done is certainly stupendous, whatever may be thought of the quality. In presence of these huge volumes we feel almost afraid to speak. Nevertheless, it must be confessed that the work does not altogether satisfy us. Mr. Balfour justly remarks that in translating these classics a great deal depends upon the terminology employed by the translator. Now we feel that the terminology employed by Dr. Legge is harsh, crude, inadequate, and in some places, almost unidiomatic. So far for the form. As to the matter, we will not hazard our own opinion, but will let the Rev. Mr. Faber of Canton speak for us. "Dr. Legge's own notes on Mencius," he says, "show that Dr. Legge has not a philosophic understanding of his author." We are certain that Dr. Legge could not have read and translated these works without having in some way tried to conceive and shape to his own mind the teaching of Confucius and his school as a connected whole; yet it is extraordinary that neither in his notes nor in his dissertations has Dr. Legge let slip a single phrase or sentence to show what he conceived the teaching of Confucius really to be, as a philosophic