mes for one and the
same Being.[139]

It represents God as having all the attributes of supreme Deity. He
created the world by His direct power and for the revelation of His
glory to His creatures. Man, according to the Aryas, came not by
evolution nor by any of the processes known to Hindu philosophy, but by
direct creation from existing atoms.

In all this it is easy to see that much has been borrowed from the
Christian conception of God's character and attributes, but the value of
this Aryan testimony lies in the fact that it claims for the ancient
Vedas a clear and positive monotheism.

If we consult the sacred books of China, we shall find there also many
traces of an ancient faith which antedates both Confucianism and
Taouism. The golden age of the past to which all Chinese sages look with
reverence, was the dynasty of Yao and Shun, which was eighteen centuries
earlier than the period of Confucius and Laotze. The records of the
Shu-king which Confucius compiled, and from which unfortunately his
agnosticism excluded nearly all its original references to religion,
nevertheless retain a full account of certain sacred rites performed by
Shun on his accession to the full imperial power. In those rites the
worship of One God as supreme is distinctly set forth as a "customary
service," thereby implying that it was already long established.
Separate mention is also made of offerings to inferior deities, as if
these were honored at his own special instance. It is unquestionably
true that in China, and indeed in all lands, there sprang up almost from
the first a tendency to worship, or at least to fear, unseen spirits.
This tendency has coexisted with all religions of the world--even with
the Old Testament cult--even with Christianity. To the excited
imaginations of men, especially the ignorant classes, the world has
always been a haunted world, and just in proportion as the light of true
religion has become dim, countless hordes of ghosts and demons have
appeared. When Confucius arose this gross animism had almost monopolized
the worship of his countrymen, and universal corruption bore sway. He
was not an original thinker, but only a compiler of the ancient wisdom,
and in his selections from the traditions of the ancients, he compiled
those things only which served his great purpose of building up, from
the relations of family and kindred, the complete pyramid of a
well-ordered state in which the Emperor should hold to