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Defense of an Essay, &c,
JULY,
Father and Mother of all things," this highest sacrifice was always offered to Earth as well as to Heaven, the only distinction between them being, that this sacrifice was offered to Earth at the summer solstice and at the northern border of the country, whereas it was of fered to Heaven at the winter solstice and southern border of the country. Some greater deference to Heaven is no doubt designed in these slight distinguishing circumstances, but not greater than the Chinese would accord to the father over the mother.
I hope that those who find in the Chinese classics proof that the ancient Chinese knew and worshiped the true God, will produce it. I do not think tradition could have done much for Shun, when he thus worshiped "the expansive heavens," under the title of the Su- preme Ruler, and added to this the worship of the six venerable Ones, i. e. 1. the four Seasons; 2. Heat and cold; 3. the Sun; 4. the Moon; 5. the Stars; and 6. Drought; and not content with all this Sabianism, descended to earth and worshiped the hills and rivers, and hosts of deceased worthies.
The onus probandi is with Dr. Legge, and the nature of the case is such that we are constrained, "for conscience sake," to call upon him to give us the clearest proof, before we can go with him. A mistake here is most fatal. While we have a single doubt that “the Shangtí of the Chinese people" is God, truly and properly God,—the very identical Being we are taught in the Sacred Scriptures to wor- ship-we dare not teach others to worship him. Where love and affiance are due, we must be cautious and jealous; for God is jealous. The wife must have no doubt that "her man
"her man" is her husband: if she have the shadow of a doubt, and yet lives with him, she commits adultery. God uses this very relationship to illustrate his own jealousy : we therefore say, our God," the God we worship, must be Jehovah. If there is a single doubt that "the Shángti of the Chinese people is Jehovah—the very same identical Being, and not merely the most like Jehovah of any of the Chinese gods-and we proceed, notwith- standing this doubt, to worship him, we are guilty of spiritual adultery.
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We can not but think that Dr. Legge has a very difficult task before him, whether he appeals to the Chinese cosmogony, or the Chinese ritual, to prove that "the Shangti of the Chinese classics and the Shángti of the Chinese people is God over all blessed for ever." But if Dr. Legge should succeed in proving to our satisfaction that the being whom the Chinese designate by the phrase Shangtí is to be regarded as truly and properly God, I would still object to the use of this phrase to render Elohim and Theos.