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HABITS AND CUSTOMS. 155
A feebly developed spirit of enterprise is perhaps the feature in which the
Chinese betray their real inferiority to Europeans. They may doubtless show
themselves as ingenious as others in the struggle for existence, but they also remain
enslaved to routine and tradition, relying more on passive resistance than on per-
sonal energy and daring to overcome their difficulties. As a rule they are free
from " vaulting ambition," as shown by the popular sayings and the precepts of
their moral codes. They shrink from adventures, speculation, and sudden changes
of life, and no other nation has fewer warlike songs or more enthusiastic encomiums
of the arts of
"
peace. When we departed the plants were already sprout-
ing ; when we returned they were withered. The journey is long, meagre the
diet ! What undeserved miseries, since I have had to bear arms, ceasing
to follow
"
the ! plough Such is the sad song of the Chinese peasant recruit, so different from
the fiery hymns sung in chorus by the Western conscripts. A strange spectacle is
presented by this national poetry, celebrating above all things the praises of peace,
sobriety, regular toil, the calmer affections of the heart. Yet it lacks neither
dignity nor depth, and vivid thoughts and sentiments are often embodied in a few
striking strophes.
But it is a poetry seldom inspired by personal enthusiasm, while
the meaning is often hopelessly clouded by the exigencies of conventional forms
and stereotyped symbolisms. During the natural evolution of the national intel-
lect the Chinese writers have even at last confounded poetry with a rhymed code
of ethics, the Chinese bard lacking all lyrical sentiment, and appearing always to
speak in the name of a family or a community.
In Chinese society the family group is in any case far more solidly constituted
than in the West. The whole nation, which formerly bore the name of the " Hun-
dred Families," is regarded as forming one family,
in which the social duties
resolv.e themselves into those of the child towards the parent. The whole moral
an extension
system is based on filial respect, and the Government itself is merely
of the paternal authority. As laid down in the Iliao-kingof Confucius, filial
piety
is the foundation of society. The " five immutable laws " are the relations of father
and children, of king and subjects, of man and wife, of age and youth, of friend
and friend. All flows from the natural authority of the father and obedience of
the son, cemented and sanctified by tradition and the laws. Such is the principle
which has for ages held together the various elements of Chinese society, constituting
it a lasting hierarchical system. Social changes have accordingly become more
difficult to realise, and have been attended by more sanguinary struggles than
elsewhere. The Chinese have a fainter conception than Europeans of morality and
freedom, of whatever gives to the individual his personal worth, independent of the
community of which he is a member. The family alone is considered as possessing
any political power in the State, and in former times, when the people were
consulted, voles were taken by the family. Even now in municipal matters the
head of the household alone has a voice, the father being considered as the
depositary of the sentiments of all his kindred. He is honoured and rewarded for
their virtues, but also responsible, and even punished, for their faults. The great
deeds of the son ennoble the hit her and the whole lino of his ancestry ; his crimes