434 Voyage of the Novara. 



back, whether an official or one of the people, is compelled to 

 quit his vehicle and traverse the consecrated space* on foot. 

 Over the entrance to the right is written: ''His virtue is 

 comparable to Heaven and Earth ; " and above the door to 

 the left we read, " His teachings comprise all the wisdom 

 of ancient and modern days." Behind the temple is a 

 smaller edifice, dedicated to the five progenitors of Confucius. 

 The temple itself is similarly surrounded with various apart- 

 ments, all, as their bombastic inscriptions announce, devoted 

 to the honour and advancement of knowledge. One of these 

 chambers is dedicated to the god of Literature, another to 

 the guardian spirit of Science. The latter is curiously 

 represented as a figure holding in one hand a stylus^ in the 

 other a lump of silver, emblematic, we presume, of '' man 

 through wisdom attaining unto riches." 



In every city throughout China there is, as well as a tea- 

 garden, a temple in honour of the great teacher Kong-fu-tse, 

 whose knowledge and whose moral system, 2400 years after 

 his mortal pilgrimage, instruct and gladden not merely his 

 own countrymen, but all admirers throughout the world of 

 what is noble and virtuous. 



Among the various monasteries of the city, we visited one 

 of the Taouists, called the Du-Kung or Great Mirror (probably 

 of Virtue), where strangers provided with introductions are 

 received and entertained at 150 cash {fod. per diem). This 

 cloister, whose sole inhabitants are some five or six Cliinese 



