Feb., 1912. Jade. 121 



tablet ts'ung are, by their separation, symbolical of Heaven and Earth." 

 (Biot, Vol. I, p. 490.) 



It will be recognized that there is a correlation between the jade 

 objects used in nature worship and those buried in the grave. Heaven, 

 Earth, and the Four Quarters were six cosmic powers or deities, and 

 the jade carvings serving their worship were nothing but the real images 

 of these deities under which they were worshipped, as we shall see in 

 detail when discussing the jade pieces in question. The idea upheld 

 hitherto that the ancient Chinese possessed no religious images is 

 erroneous: they had an image of the Deity Heaven, of the Deity Earth 

 and of the Four Deities representing the Four Quarters and identified 

 at the same time with the four seasons. We must, of course, not 

 suppose that all religious images must be anthropomorphic and rep- 

 resent the figure of some human or animal being. Anthropomorphic 

 conceptions are lacking in the oldest notions of Chinese religion, and 

 therefore, there are no anthropomorphic images. The ancient Chinese 

 had an abstract metaphysical mind constantly occupied with the 

 phenomena of heaven and deeply engaged in speculations of astronomy 

 and mathematics. Their religion is essentially astronomical and 

 cosmological, and everything is reduced by them to measurable quan- 

 tities expressed by numbers and to a fixed numerical system. They 

 did not conceive of their cosmic gods as human beings, but as forces of 

 nature with a well denned precinct of power, and they constructed 

 their images on the ground of geometric qualities supposed to be im- 

 manent to the great natural phenomena. The shapes of these images 

 were found by way of geometric construction, a jade disk round and 

 perforated representing Heaven, a hollow tube surrounded by a cube 

 Earth, a semicircular disk the North, etc. The West forms the only 

 exception, being worshipped under the image of a tiger, the first and 

 oldest example in China of a personal image of a deity. The geometric 

 abstract aspect of the divine images is in perfect harmony with the 

 whole geometric culture of the. Chou period established on the interre- 

 lations of celestial and terrestrial phenomena formulated by numerical 

 categories and holding sway over the entire life and thought of the 

 nation in all matters pertaining to government, administration, relig- 

 ion and art. 1 The grave means only a change of abode, and if the 

 corpse is surrounded by the images of the six cosmical gods, this signi- 



1 1 beg to refer the reader to the epoch-making researches of Leopold de Saussure 

 which have appeared in various instalments in the T'oung Pao for 1909, 19 10, and 

 191 1 under the title, Les origines de l'astronomie chinoise. De Saussure has 

 with brilliant acumen proved the ancient and indigenous origin of Chinese astron- 

 omy and elucidated the fundamental ideas composing the culture of the Chou dy- 

 nasty. He deserves congratulations for his work which marks a new era in sin- 

 ological research, and an English translation of this should be given to the world. 



