t do such a thing; and shall we say that a
man of talents and virtue did it?"

[Footnote 37: The Book is named from Wan Chang, who is almost the only
interlocutor with Mencius in it. The tradition is that it was in
company with Wan's disciples that Mencius, baffled in all his hopes of
doing public service, and having retired into privacy, composed the
Seven Books which constitute his works. The part which follows is all
occupied with discussions in vindication of Shun and other ancient
worthies.]

THE SHI-KING

[_Metrical translation by James Legge_]

INTRODUCTION

The wisdom of Confucius as a social reformer, as a teacher and guide
of the Chinese people, is shown in many ways. He not only gave them a
code of personal deportment, providing them with rules for the
etiquette and ceremony of life, but he instilled into them that
profound spirit of domestic piety which is one of the strongest
features in the Chinese character. He took measures to secure also the
intellectual cultivation of his followers, and his Five Canons contain
all the most ancient works of Chinese literature, in the departments
of poetry, history, philosophy, and legislation. The Shi-King is a
collection of Chinese poetry made by Confucius himself. This great
anthology consists of more than three hundred pieces, covering the
whole range of Chinese lyric poetry, the oldest of which dates some
eighteen centuries before Christ, while the latest of the selections
must have been written at the beginning of the sixth century before
Christ. These poems are of the highest interest, and even nowadays may
be read with delight by Europeans. The ballad and the hymn are among
the earliest forms of national poetry, and the contents of the
Shi-King naturally show specimens of lyric poetry of this sort. We
find there not only hymns, but also ballads of a really fine and
spirited character. Sometimes the poems celebrate the common pursuits,
occupations, and incidents of life. They rise to the exaltation of the
epithalamium, or of the vintage song; at other times they deal with
sentiment and human conduct, being in the highest degree sententious
and epigrammatic. We must give the credit to Confucius of having
saved for us the literature of China, and of having set his people an
example in preserving the monuments of a remote antiquity. While the
literatures of ancient Greece and Rome have largely perished in the
convulsions that followed the breakin