Chinese Sketches by Herbert A. Giles — Read

The following inflammatory placard, which was posted up last year at a place called Lung-p'ing, near the great tea mart of Hankow, will give a faint idea of native prejudice against the propagation of Christianity in China. The original was in verse, and evidently the work of a highly-educated man: --

Strange doctrines are speedily to be eradicated: / The holy teaching of Confucius is now in the ascendant. / There is but one most sacred religion: / There can be but one Mean. / By their great virtue Yao and Shun led the way, / Alone able to expound the "fickle" and the "slight; "[*] / Confucius' teachings have not passed away, / Yet working wonders in secret[+] has long been in vogue. / Be earnest in practising the ordinary virtues: / To extend filial piety, brotherly love, loyalty, and / considerateness, is to benefit one's-self. / Be careful in your speech, / And marvels, feats of strength, sedition, and spirits,[: ] will / disappear from conversation. / I pray you do not listen to unsubstantiated words: / Then who will dare to deceive the age with soft-sounding phrases. / Our religion is for all who choose to seek it; / But we build no chapels to beguile the foolish. / Our true religion has existed from of old, up to the present day, / undergoing no change. / Its true principles include in their application those of the middle / and outside nations alike.