LETTER XCV. From Lien Chi Altangi, to Hingpo, at Moscow." THE FATHER CONSOLES HIM UPON THIS OCCASION. [ON YOUR misfortunes are mine; but, as every period of life is marked with its own, you must learn to endure them. Disappointed love makes the misery of youth; disappointed ambition, that of manhood; and successless avarice, that of age. These three attack us through life; and it is our duty to stand upon our guard. To love, we ought to oppose dissipation, and endeavour to change the object of the affections; to ambition, the happiness of indolence and obscurity; and to avarice, the fear of soon dying. These are the shields with which we should arm ourselves; and thus make every scene of life, if not pleasing, at least supportable. Men complain of not finding a place of repose. They are in the wrong: they have it for seeking. What they should indeed complain of is, that the heart is an enemy to that very repose they seek. To themselves alone should they impute their discontent. They seek within the short span of life to satisfy a thousand desires, each of which alone is insatiable. One month passes, and another comes on; the year ends, and then begins; but man is still unchanging in folly, still blindly continuing in prejudice. To the wise man, every climate, and every soil is pleasing; to him a parterre of flowers is the famous valley of gold to him a little brook, the fountain of the young peach trees; to such a man the melody of birds is more ravishing than the harmony of a full concert; and the tincture of the cloud preferable to the touch of the finest pencil. This letter is a rhapsody from the Maxims of the philosopher Mê. Vide Lett. curieuse et edifiant. Vide etiam Du Halde, vol. ii., p. 98.GOLDSMITH. [The date in the Public Ledger is Oct. 29, 1760.-ED.] 2 This passage the editor does not understand.-GOLDSMITH. [This note is not in the Public Ledger.-ED.] The life of man is a journey; a journey that must be travelled, however bad the roads or the accommodation. If, in the beginning, it is found dangerous, narrow, and difficult, it must either grow better in the end, or we shall, by custom, learn to bear its inequality. But, though I see you incapable of penetrating into grand principles, attend at least to a simile adapted to every apprehension. I am mounted upon a wretched ass, I see another man before me upon a sprightly horse, at which I find some uneasiness. I look behind me, and see numbers on foot, stooping under heavy burdens; let me learn to pity their estate, and thank Heaven for my own. Shingfu, when under misfortunes, would, in the beginning, weep like a child; but he soon recovered his former tranquillity. After indulging grief for a few days, he would become, as usual, the most merry old man in all the province of Shansi. About the time that his wife died, his possessions were all consumed by fire, and his only son sold into captivity; Shingfu grieved for one day, and the next went to dance at a mandarine's door for his dinner. The company were surprised to see the old man so merry, when suffering such great losses; and the mandarine himself coming out, asked him, how he, who had grieved so much, and given way to calamity the day before, could now be so cheerful? 'You ask me one question," cries the old man, let me answer by asking another: Which is the most durable, a hard thing, or a soft thing; that which resists, or that which makes no resistance?”—“A hard thing, to be sure,” replied the mandarine.—“There you are wrong," returned Shingfu, “I am now four score years old; and, if you look in my mouth, you will find that I have lost all my teeth, and not a bit of my tongue." Adieu. 66 66 LETTER XCVI. From Lien Chi Altangi, to Fum, Hoam, First President of the Ceremonial Academy at Pekin, in China. THE CONDOLENCE AND CONGRATULATION UPON THE DEATH OF THE LATE KING RIDICULED. ENGLISH MOURNING DESCRIBED.1 THE manner of grieving for our departed friends in China, is very different from that of Europe. The mourning colour of Europe is black; that of China white. When a parent or relation dies here-for they seldom mourn for friends-it is only clapping on a suit of sables, grimacing it for a few days, and all, soon forgotten, goes on as before; not a single creature missing the deceased, except, perhaps a favourite housekeeper, or a favourite cat. On the contrary, with us in China it is a very serious affair. The piety with which I have seen you behave, on one of these occasions, should never be forgotten. I remember it was upon the death of thy grandmother's maiden sister. The coffin was exposed in the principal hall, in public view. Before it were placed the figures of eunuchs, horses, tortoises, and other animals, in attitudes of grief and respect. The more distant relations of the old lady, and I among the number, came to pay our compliments of condolence, and to salute the deceased, after the manner of our country. We had scarce presented our wax candles and perfumes, and given the howl of departure, when, crawling on his belly from under a curtain, out came the reverend Fum Hoam himself, in all the dismal solemnity of distress. Your looks were set for sorrow; your clothing consisted of a hempen bag tied round the neck with a string. For two long months 2 did this mourning continue. By night, you lay stretched on a single mat, and sat on the stool of discontent by day. Pious man! who could thus 1 Dated Nov. 5, 1760, in the Public Ledger.-ED. The Ledger has "two years," which perhaps is a misprint. Nevertheless, Sir J. F. Davis says that though interment takes place twentyone days after death, the period of mourning generally required is twenty-seven months. See also note at p. 67.-ED. set an example of sorrow and decorum to our country. Pious country! where, if we do not grieve at the departure of our friends for their sakes, at least we are taught to regret them for our own.1 All is very different here; amazement all! What sort of people am I got amongst ? Fum, thou son of Fo, what sort of people am I got amongst? No crawling round the coffin; no dressing up in hempen bags; no lying on mats, or sitting on stools! Gentlemen here shall put on first mourning, with as sprightly an air as if preparing for a birth-night; and widows shall actually dress for another husband in their weeds for the former. The best jest of all is, that our merry mourners clap bits of muslin on their sleeves, and these are called weepers. Weeping muslin! alas! alas! very sorrowful truly! These weepers, then, it seems, are to bear the whole burthen of the distress. But I have had the strongest instance of this contrast, this tragi-comical behaviour in distress, upon a recent occasion. Their king, whose departure, though sudden, was not unexpected, died after a reign of many years. His age, and uncertain state of health, served, in some measure, to diminish the sorrow of his subjects; and their expectations from his successor seemed to balance their minds between uneasiness and satisfaction. But how ought they to have behaved on such an occasion? Surely, they ought rather to have endeavoured to testify their gratitude to their deceased friend, than to proclaim their hopes of the future! Sure, even the successor must suppose their love to wear the face of adulation, which so quickly changed the object! However, the very same day on which the old king died, they made rejoicing for the new! 1 Sir F. J. Davis says (Chinese,' 1836, v. i. p. 258):-" When a parent or elder relation among the Chinese dies each side of the doors is distinguished by labels in white, which is the mourning colour. The lineal descendants of the deceased, clothed in coarse white cloth, with bandages of the same round their heads, sit weeping round the corpse on the ground, the women keeping up a dismal howl after the manner of the Irish."-ED. 2 George the Second died in the seventy-seventh year of his age, and the thirty-fourth of his reign, 25th October, 1760.—Ed. For my part, I have no conception of this new manner of mourning and rejoicing in a breath; of being merry and sad; of mixing a funeral procession with a jig and a bonfire. At least, it would have been just, that they who flattered the king, while living, for virtues which he had not, should lament him dead, for those he really had. 66 In this universal cause for national distress, as I had no interest myself, so it is but natural to suppose I felt no real affliction. In all the losses of our friends," says a European philosopher, "we first consider how much our own welfare is affected by their departure, and moderate our real grief just in the same proportion."1 Now, as I had neither received, nor expected to receive, favours from kings or their flatterers; as I had no acquaintance in particular with their late monarch; as I knew that the place of a king is soon supplied; and, as the Chinese proverb has it, that though the world may sometimes want cobblers to mend their shoes, there is no danger of its wanting emperors to rule their kingdoms; from such considerations, I could bear the loss of a king with the most philosophic resignation. However, I thought it my duty at least to appear sorrowful; to put on a melancholy aspect, or to set my face by that of the people. The first company I came amongst, after the news became general, was a set of jolly companions, who were drinking prosperity to the ensuing reign. I entered the room with looks of despair, and even expected applause for the superlative misery of my countenance. Instead of that, I was universally condemned by the company for a grimacing son of a whore, and desired to take away my penitential phiz to some other quarter. I now corrected my former mistake, and, with the most sprightly air imaginable, entered a company, where they were talking over the ceremonies of the approaching funeral. Here I sat for some time with an air of pert vivacity; when one of the chief mourners immediately observing my goodhumour, desired me, if I pleased, to go and grin somewhere else; they wanted no disaffected scoundrels there. Leaving this company, therefore, I was resolved to assume 1 Rochefoucauld, probably; Reflection 248, ed. 1665.—Ed. |