m CHINA. 



and sixty- eight volumes ; and consist of the pieces that have been 

 composed by the tribunal or department of history, established in 

 China for transmitting to posterity the public events of the empire, 

 and the lives, characters, and transactions, of its sovereigns. It is 

 said, that all the facts which concern the monarchy, since its founda- 

 tion, have been deposited in this department ; and from age to age 

 have been arranged according to the order of time, under the inspec- 

 tion of government, and with all the precautions against illusion or 

 partiality that could be suggested. These precautions have been 

 carried so far, that the history of the reign of each imperial family 

 has only been published after the extinction of that family, and was 

 kept a profound secret during the dynasty, that neither fear nor flat- 

 tery might adulterate the truth. It is asserted, that many of the 

 Chinese historians exposed themselves to exile, and even to death, 

 rather than disguise the defects and vices of the sovereign. But the 

 emperor Chi-hoang-ti, at whose command the great wall was built, 

 in the year 213 before the Christian sera, ordered all the historical 

 books and records which contained the fundamental laws and prin- 

 ciples of the ancient government to be burnt, that they might not be 

 employed by the learned to oppose his authority, and the changes he 

 proposed to introduce into the monarchy. Four hundred literati 

 were burnt, with their books : yet this barbarous edict had not its 

 full effect; several books were concealed, and escaped the general 

 ruin. After this period, strict search was made for the ancient books 

 and records that yet remained ; but, though much industry was em- 

 ployed for this purpose, it appears that the authentic historical 

 sources of the Chinese, for the times anterior to the year 200 before 

 Christ, are very few, and that they are still in smaller numbers, for 

 more remote periods. But notwithstanding the depredations that 

 have been made upon the Chinese history, it is still immensely volu- 

 minous, and has been judged by some writers, superior to that of all 

 other nations. Of the grand annals before mentioned, which amount 

 to six hundred and sixty-eight volumes, a copy is preserved in the 

 library of the French nation. A chronological abridgment of this 

 great work, in one hundred volumes, was published in the forty- 

 second year of the reign of Kan-hi; that is, in the year 1703. This 

 work is generally called Kam-mo, or the abridgment. From these 

 materials the abbe Grosier proposed to publish at Paris, in the French 

 language, a General History of China, in twelve volumes quarto, some 

 of which have been printed ; and a smaller work, in twelve volumes 

 octavo, by the late father de Maille, missionary at Peking, has been 

 published. 



But the limits to which our work is confined will not permit us to 

 enlarge upon so copious a subject as that of the Chinese history; 

 and which indeed would be very uninteresting to the generality of 

 European readers. A succession of excellent princes, and a dura- 

 tion of domestic tranquillity, united legislation with philosophy, and 

 produced their Fohi, whose history is enveloped in mysteries ; their 

 Li-Laokum ; and, above all, their Kon-foo-tse, or Confucius, at once 

 the Solon and the Socrates of China. After all, the internal revolu- 

 tions of the empire, though rare, produced the most dreadful effects, 

 m proportion as its constitution was pacific ; and they were attended 

 with the most bloody exterminations in some provinces: so that, 

 though the Chinese empire is hereditary, the imperial succession 

 has been more than once broken into, and altered. Upwards of 



