192 SURGEON-GENERAL C. A. GORDON. 
It is related in reference to Minati, seventeenth emperor of 
the same dynasty that: Remembering the words of Confucius 
that ‘* The Holy One is in the West,” he sent ambassadors in 
that direction in search of the true religion. When they had 
reached India they found that the followers of BuppHa were 
being persecuted by the Brahmins, and ready to take 
advantage of the opportunity thus afforded them of pro- 
ceeding to a new field. They accordingly declared that they 
were priests of the new doctrine which the ambassadors — 
sought ; a body of their class accordingly accompanied the 
messengers on their return journey. ‘Thus was introduced 
among the millions of China (A.D. 64-68), a philosophy which 
teaches that ‘from nothing all things proceed; into nothing 
they will return” ; whereas the religion they sought was that 
of Christianity. 
Under Minetr, and his successor Cuaneti, the Chinese 
extended their conquests westward, to the Caspian Sea, over- 
coming in their progress various tribes on the confines of the 
Desert, and at the foot of the Tienshan mountains. In those 
distant conquests the Chinese came for the first time in 
contact with the Romans, whose merchants then traded with 
India and Persia. 
From that time to the present, dynasty has succeeded 
dynasty, but the political tradition has remained unchanged ; 
though Mongols and Manchous have at different times 
wrested the throne from its legitimate heirs, they have ulti- 
mately been engulphed in the homogeneous mass inhabiting 
the empire, and, instead of impressing their seal on the 
country, have become but the reflection of the vanquished.* 
Judging from the past, are we not justitied in expressing the 
belief that a great future isin store for China, and that the 
teeming multitudes of that vast country are destined to play 
a very important part among nations, as heretofore they have 
done in Hastern Asia ? 
* Douglas. 
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