Directory_and_Chronicle_1850 — Page 507

1850.

Defense of an Essay, &c.

469

statement that Shángti when standing alone always and invariably means "the Supreme Being and him only," Dr. M. pledged " every Chinese book of note and worth,” and in addition gave us the result of a careful concordance of the passages in which the phrase occurs “in the Chinese classics;" from which it appears that the phrase Sháng tí in 174 cases designates the individual being styled

"the Supreme Ruler," and only once any other being, a human ruler; which last is ascribed to flattery.

If this be a fair view of the use of the phrase "in the Chinese clas- sics," who can doubt that according to this usage it is a singular term, and that Shảngtí denotes a definite, individual being. Now what does Dr. M. produce from "the Chinese classics" to set aside this conclu- sion? A single sentence from the Hiáu King (a very secondary classic) in which the commentators suppose the phrase Sháng tí must refer not to Tien, the Supreme Ruler, but to the Wú Tí, or Five Rulers. This is the solitary instance Dr. M. can produce to add to the one above given, in which in the classics the title Shángtí,

"the Supreme Ruler" does not designate the god Tien. Dr. Medhurst, and all other Europeans who have made translations from the Chinese classics, uniformly render the phrase Shángti, when standing alone, "the Supreme Ruler," and never "a Supreme Ruler," or "Supreme Rulers." Dr. Legge, throughout his "Argument" so renders it: I think we may therefore take it for granted, that according to the usus loquendi of the Chinese classics, the phrase designates, when standing alone, a definite individual being; and that the literati of the present day, if we exhort them to worship Shángti, would understand us to be referring to the definite individual being so called 174 times in their classics; the being whom the ancient emperors Yáu and Shun worshiped under this title. As a practical question, it is of very little importance to me whether Shángtí has been used in the classics to designate any other being than Tien once, or thrice; the really important practical question is, If I exhort a Confucianist to worship Shángti, will he understand by this phrase a definite individual being? And then, is this definite, individual being, the true or a false God ? If you answer, he will understand by it the being whom Yáu and Shun worshiped at the round hillock; and say further that this being is not "the God over all, blessed for ever," but a man-conceived, a false god; how can I, if the matter stand thus, exhort him to go and worship Shangti? Would it not be directing him to commit idolatry by the worship of a false god? Is it any answer to this to say with Dr. L., "It is a relative term that implies supreme dominion which