2t)2 Air. Duns's Notices of Western Tartary. 



NOTE. 



I take tliis opportunity of explaining a passage at page 409 of the first volume of tliesc 

 Transactions, where it is observed, that the religious ritual of the Chinese empire is founded on 

 the sacred books of Confucius and his school. Confucius sanctioned, by his countenance and 

 adoption, the religious system which he found among his countrymen, and his works being the 

 oldest extant, may, in this sense, be properly considered as the foundation of tlie Joo-keaou, 

 or state religion, which exists at present. He did not, however, himself originate or invent 

 it, and indeed occasionally confesses the imperfection of his knowledge on such subjects. He 

 was strictly a moral philosopher ; and we should always keep distinct the system of ethics which 

 he invented, and the system of worship which he merely left as he found it. The former is, 

 for the most part, excellent ; the latter, not very far removed above materialism. His imperial 

 Majesty, as Pontifex Maxinms, worships the heavens in one temple, the earth in another, the 

 winds in a third ; and every mountain and river throughout the country has its altar and its 

 presiding genius. I have myself seen a market gardener (in his particular vocation) paying 

 devout adoration to the fertile powers of the earth, under the semblance of a huge pebble- 

 stone ; the same circumstances of roundness and smoothness, which would have caused an 

 English school-boy to select it for a missile, having led this poor Chinese to choose it as the 

 object of his especial addresses. 



If there be any meaning at all in the Chinese philosophy of the Yin and the Yang, it 

 resembles more nearly the atomic system expounded by Lucretius, than any thing else I have 

 ever met with ; nor can I at all concur in an attempt, which has lately been made, to explain 

 what is called the Tae-keih by a " first cause ;" since it appears to be nothing more than some 

 unintelligible beginning of niateri,il action. As the Chinese themselves seem unable to convey 

 any clear notions on this profound subject, we might well be excused if we allowed it, without 

 regret, to remain involved in its native and original obscurity. 



