CERAMIC ART IN CHINA. 377 



The tirt^t Sutra (that of forty-two sections) \va.s translated into Chinese 

 in the year A. D. 67, during the time of the Later or Eastern Han 

 dynasty, whose capital was at Loj-ang in Honan province, by Kas'- 

 yapa Matanga, a disciple of S'tikyamuni, who entered China with 

 Han ^ling-ti's embassy on its return from Badakshan. By its means 

 the Buddhist doctrines first became known in China. Sucli trans- 

 lations from the Sanskrit form the earliest and still continue to be the 

 most important i)art of Chinese Buddhistic literature; ])ut from the 

 fifth century onward they have been supplemented by original com- 

 positions in the Chinese language from the pens of native adherents 

 to that religion. During the first eight centuries of the existence of 

 the Buddhistic religion in China the smallest circle of S'akyamuni's 

 disciples comprised the same number as in India, sixteen, which was 

 increased under the T'ahg dynasty, in the ninth century, A. D., by 

 the enrollment of two additional disciples to its present complement 

 in China — eighteen. 

 34, 3o. Bowls (2), everted, of thin white K'anghsi porcelain. Replicas of Nos. 'A2, 33, 

 but of larger size. Mark, same as in Xo. 26. Diameter, 6| inches. 



36. H7»('-c»;^, tall, everted, of thin white K'anghsi porcelain; ornamentation: Between 



boniers of Grecian pattern are diamond-shaped panels containing the p(i-kua, 

 in deep-blue under transparent glaze. ^lark, as al)ove. Height, 3 ifiches; 

 diameter, 3J inches. 



The pa-kna, or eight diagrams, are the combinations which may l)e formed 

 of three lines, Avhole or divided into two equal jjarts. They are said 

 to have been developed by Fuh-hi, the legendary founder of Chinese 

 polity, who is believed to have lived from B. C. 2852 to 2738 liy aid 

 of a plan or arrangement of figures revealed to him on the back of a 

 "dragon-horse." These eight figures, which can be traced bai-k to 

 the trto primary forms representing the first development of the ]'/» 

 and Yank (the primordial essences) from the ritimate Principle, 

 together with certain presumjitive explanations attributed to Fuh-hi, 

 were the basis, according to Chinese belief, of an ancient system of 

 philo.sophy and divination during the centuries preceding the area 

 of Wen Wang (twelfth century, B. C ), but of which no records have 

 been preserved beyond the traditional names of its schools. Wen 

 Wang, the founder of the Chou dynasty, while undergoing imprison- 

 ment (B. C. 1144) at the hands of the tyrant Shou, devoted himself 

 to study of the diagrams, and appended to each of them a short 

 explanatory text. These explanations, with certain amplifications by 

 his son, Chou Kung, constitute the work known as the " Book of 

 Changes" of the Chou dynasty, which, with the commentary added 

 l)y Confucius, forms the Yih Ching, the Canon of Changes, the most 

 venerated of the Chinese classics. In this work, which serves as a 

 basis for the philosophy of divination and geomancy, and is largely 

 appealed to as containing not alone the elements of all metaphysical 

 knowledge but also a clue to the secrets of nature and of being the 

 entire system reposed upon these eight diagrams, a ceaseless process 

 of revolution is held to be at work, in the course of which the vari- 

 ous elements or properties of nature indicated by the diagrams mutu- 

 ally extinguish and give birth to one another, thus producing the 

 phenomena of nature.' 



37. la.st' of white K'anghsi porcelain, i i the shape of a gourd contracted in the mid- 



dle {hu-lu), having a vine trailing over it, from which hang large l)unchesof 



'Mayers, Chinese Reader's Manual, p. 333. 

 NAT MU8 li<(»() 27 



