1 697-] OPPRESSION REPROBATED. 247 



slowly to his Grave. . . . Wicked Governors ! You are often- 

 times guilty of the Sins of the Poor, as you are the occasion 

 of their Misfortunes. . . } 



" There is a necessary Coherence and Dependance between 

 certain Laws. As one is, so you must suppose the other to 

 be, and tliat one cannot subsist unless the other be main- 

 tain'd. Now, the Law which forbids anyone to appropriate 

 to himself what belongs to another Man is founded upon 

 another Law, according to which no Man is to perish by un- 

 happy Poverty. . . ," 



" High and Mighty Lords !" says elsewhere this Chinese 

 Philosopher, " inexorable and Fleshly-minded Piobbers ! Ob- 

 stinate and insatiable Blood-suckers ! High and mighty 

 Thieves that you are, who haughtily seize upon what does 

 not belong to you, but to others ! Or who do not restore 

 that which your Ancestors have usurp'd without Pity or 

 Justice ! By what Law of Nature or Equity, think you, all 



belongs to you, and nothing to anybody else ? You are 



at present applauded, most illustrious Wretches, and the 

 good Men whom you, or the Villains whose Heirs you are, 

 have robb'd, fall now prostrate to the Ground when you 

 pass by with your gilded Pakmqtiin. But soon your worth- 

 less Souls shall be of no other use than to swell the backs 

 of Toads,^ and the poor Man, who is of much greater worth 

 tho^ at present oppress'd, shall crush you to pieces. . . . 



" Whether it be that thy Eapins, or those of thy Fathers, 

 have enrich'd thee, Ti-Fa ! (for of a thousand rich Men 

 there is hardly one that is not either wicked himself or an 

 Heir to one that was so), whether it may be thy good 

 Fortune or thy Industry have heap'd on thee Gold and 



1 "All this is something like passages in Chuang Tsze's writings ; but 

 I cannot identify Xantung or Keu-Han with any names to be found or 

 likely to be found in liim. The fact is Leguat was writing about what 

 he knew very little about, and wrote therefore loosely and incorrectly." 

 (J. Legge.) 



- Ihis indicates a belief in the doctrine of the nietempsycho&is. 



