the ancient religion of Media and Persia, known to us by the Zend-avesta, the sacred book of the Zoroastrians. The most ancient portions of the Avesta, the Gâthas, and the hymns of the Rig-veda, are certainly the products of the same intellectual soil. They may even be called twins, and some of the students of the Zend-avesta have not hesitated to represent the Avestic Gâtha, or prayer, as the elder twin of the Vedic Sûkta, or hymn of praise.

The Avesta consists of two parts. The first contains the Vendîdâd, a compilation of religious laws and mythical tales; the Vispered, a collection of sacrificial litanies, and the Yasna, consisting likewise of litanies and of the five ancient Gâthas. When these three are written together, according to the requirements of the liturgy, and without a Pehlevi translation, the collection is called Vendîdâd sâdah, the pure Vendîdâd. The second part is called the Khorda Avesta, or Small Avesta,' containing prayers such as the five Gah, the thirty formulas of the Sîrôzah, the three Afrigân, and the six Nyâyis, with some hymn of praise, the Yasts, and other fragments 1.

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China.

Outside of India and Persia, we have only China, Palestine, and Arabia, as cradles of religious literature. China gives us the works, collected rather than composed, by Confucius, and the manual of the doctrines of Lao-ze, the Tao-te king. Both religions, that of Confucius and that of Lao-zze, are still prevalent in China, together with Buddhism, which was introduced into China from Northern India in the first

1 See Darmesteter, Sacred Books of the East, vol. iv. p. xxx.

century B.C. Confucius and Lao-ze were contemporaries, both living between 600 and 500 B.C. Lao¡ze, however, was 50 or 401 years the senior of Confucius, and it is believed that he was 72 years old at the time of his birth, 604 B.C. This is perhaps the most wonderful of many wonderful achievements ascribed to the founders of religion, and its origin is probably the same as that of many other miracles--a misunderstood expression. Lao-jze in Chinese means the old one, literally the Old Boy. We can easily understand what such an expression really meant. It was probably kindly meant. But when after a time it did not seem sufficiently respectful, it was misinterpreted and became a myth. The founder of Tao-ism was represented as old, even when a boy, and very soon other legends were added by helpful grandmothers, who told their children that this wonderful boy had actually grey hair when he came into the world.

You would probably be inclined to say that such absurdities are possible in China only. But a comparative study of religions teaches us a very different lesson, and enables us to see even in the silliest miracles a rational and human element. We find a very similar legend in Europe-not indeed among Aryan people, but among the Estonians, a Turanian race, akin to the Fins, who live in the Baltic provinces of Russia, on the Gulf of Finland, not very far from St. Petersburg. These Estonians have, like the Fins, some ancient epic poetry; and one of their fabulous heroes is called Wannemuine. He was possessed of extraordinary wisdom; and the poet, in Faber, Famo s Men of China, 1889, p. 7. N n

order to account for it, declared that he was not only grey-headed, but grey-bearded at the time of his birth 1.

We shall meet again and again with this curious longing after a miraculous birth, claimed for the founders or propounders of new religions by their devoted disciples and followers, as if there could be, or as if poor human reason could even imagine, anything more truly miraculous than a natural birth and a natural death.

The Chinese views of religion are so different from our own that their religious classics have never enjoyed the authority which in India, for instance, is conceded to the Veda, or in Arabia to the Qur'ân. They received the title of King, or classic, during the Han dynasty (from 202 B.c.).

The first is the Shû-king, the book of historical documents. They profess to go back to the 24th century B.C., and they end with King Hsiang of the Kâu dynasty, 651–619 B.C. Confucius himself lived, as we saw, in the sixth and fifth centuries B.C.

The second is the Shi-king, the book of poetry. It contains 305 pieces, some of which are said to be as old as the Shang dynasty, 1766–1123 B.C. The character of these poems is by no means exclusively religious, the greater portion are simply relics of more or less ancient popular poetry.

The third is the Yî-king, the book of changes, a most obscure and enigmatic collection, chiefly intended for the purposes of divination, but interspersed with many metaphysical, physical, moral, and religious utterances.

1 Castrén, Finnische Mythologie, p. 294.

The fourth is the Li-kî, the record of rites, with occasional remarks of Confucius on the sacrificial worship of his country, as collected by his disciples and later followers.

The fifth is the Khun-khin, 'the spring and autumn,' the only one which can be called the work of Confucius himself, giving us his account of his own native state of Lû, from 722-481 B. C.

There is one more treatise attributed to Confucius, the Hsiâo-king, or the classic of filial piety, containing conversations between him and his grandson and pupil Zang-zze. It is an attempt to base religion, morality and politics on filial piety, as the cardinal virtue, and has exercised a more extensive influence than even the five great Kings.

Besides these five Kings, the Chinese treat four other books, the four Shû, as likewise of the highest authority.

They are (1) the Lun Yü, or discourses and conversations between Confucius and some of his disciples.

(2) The works of Mencius, a later follower of Confucius.

(3) The Ta Hsio, the great learning, ascribed to Zang-zze.

(4) The Kung Yung, the doctrine of the mean. The third and fourth of the Shûs are really taken from the Li-kî.

Lao-zze's views are embodied in the Tâo-teh-king, the classic of Tâo. This Tâo means primordial reason or sublime intellect, but without action, thought, judgment and intelligence. Dr. Chambers translates Tâo by way, reason, and word. Even the best

Chinese scholars despair of ever comprehending the full meaning of Lao-zze's doctrines, but it is easy to see that the Tâo-teh-king contains fragments of deep thought and high morality.

Palestine.

Though Palestine has produced two Sacred Books only, it may really be called the mother of three religions, of Judaism, Christianity, and Mohammedanism.

Judaism.

It is true, no doubt and recent discoveries among the cuneiform inscriptions have proved it very fully— that the original germs of the Jewish religion formed the property of the whole Semitic race, and that they had reached a considerable development in the Mesopotamian kingdoms, or in Ur of the Chaldees, before they were carried to Palestine. Still the peculiar features which distinguish the Jewish from all other Semitic religions were developed in Palestine, and justify us in claiming that country as the true home of Judaism. What we call the Old Testament was known to the Jews themselves as the Law, the Prophets, and the Hagiographa1.

Christianity.

With regard to Christianity, its Palestine origin is a matter of history-though by its later development that religion has almost ceased to be Semitic, having been re-animated and re-invigorated by Aryan thought and Aryan faith. The books of the New Testament, with the exception of some of the Epistles, were written

1 Εἰς τὴν τοῦ νόμου καὶ τῶν προφητῶν καὶ τῶν ἄλλων πατρίων βιβλίων áváyvwow. Prol. ad Sapient. Sirach.