XX. BOOK that he entered China on the side of Thibet, passing through the provinces Shensee and Shan1794. see. The present Tartar dynasty had continued, in 1793, during a course of four reigns, 149 years. Every square mile in China contains, upon an average, upwards of 300 inhabitants, in all 335 millions, in the fifteen provinces of China Proper, and exclusive of the Tartarian and Thibet territories beyond the great wall.There are nine orders of mandarins; but the office is not hereditary, and the only public or personal distinction is that of being employed in the public service; and knowledge and virtue alone qualify for public employments.-When the mandarins, accompanying the embassy, were told that in England a child might claim, in virtue of his birth, the highest offices and dignities of the state, they could not sufficiently express their astonishment, and intimated that this was a matter unfit to be repeated to the emperor. From the entrance of the embassy into China not one person in the guise of a beggar had been seen, nor any one observed to solicit charity. In the intervals of military service the soldiers assume the common habit of the people, and are occupied in manufactures or the cultivation of land.-The government of China does not interfere with mere opinions. There is in China no STATE religion, None is XX. paid, preferred, or encouraged by it. The em- BOOK peror is of one faith, many of the mandarins are of another, and the majority of the common people 179. of a third, which is that of Fo. The possessions of the father are equally divided among all the sons; and the ancient public law of the empire is founded on the broadest basis of universal justice. The examinations in the public seminaries or schools of students for degrees are always public. Oral questions are put, and others in writing, to the candidates. The honors conferred upon those who succeed become the ascending steps which lead to all the offices A method of adand dignities of the state. vancement so open to all classes of men tends to reconcile them to the power, from attaining which no individual is precluded. In these trials wealth must yield to talents and genius The number of manufacturers bears but a very small proportion to that of husbandmen in China. Few parks or pleasure-grounds are to be seen. There are no commons or lands suf fered to lie waste by the neglect or caprice, or for the sport, of great proprietors. Every large or ornamental building was found upon enquiry to be destined for some public use, or for the habitation of a man in office.-In seasons of calamity the emperor of China always comes forward: He orders the granaries to be XX. BOOK opened: He remits the customary taxes to those who are visited by misfortune: He af1794. fords assistance to enable them to retrieve their affairs: He appears to his subjects as almost standing in the place of a tutelary divinity. In all public labors there appeared a promptitude and cheerfulness of obedience, which argued a confidential expectation of an adequate recompence. The execution of criminals, convicted of capital offences, takes place on the same day with circumstances of peculiar solemnity; the usages of the empire requiring the emperor formally to consult the mandarins of his council upon each case separately, in order to know whether he can with safety to the state avert the sentence. Such are the customs, observances, and institutions of a stupendous empire, far exceeding in riches and population all the kingdoms of Europe; and which has been, from the earliest periods of history, celebrated for the profound wisdom of its government, and for that which is the necessary consequence of this wisdomthe unexampled prosperity of the people. The British settlements in India enjoyed at this period a seasonable repose under the wise and equitable government of sir John Shore, successor to earl Cornwallis. The most remarkable occurrence of the present year in XX. Death of Bengal was the death (April 27, 1794) of sir BOOK William Jones, who had been appointed, March 1783, a judge of the Supreme Court of Judica- 1794. ture in India on the recall of sir Elijah Impey, sir William. as if it were determined by this choice to rescue Jones. the English name and character from reproach, and to manifest by way of contrast how high public and private virtue could ascend. Sir William Jones had long been celebrated, as the wonder of the present age, for the profundity and universality of his attainments. As a linguist he was equally familiar with the modern and the antient, the occidental and the oriental, languages. As a writer and professor of jurisprudence he was not merely versed in the laws and usages of his native country, but deeply skilled in the Roman and Grecian, the Hindoo and Mahometan systems. He was at once a mathematician, a poet, and an historian. He excelled in musical, in chymical, and in botanical pursuits; and his attainments in every one of these different objects of research were such as might justify the supposition that he had made the study of it the great object of his life. Yet was that life circumscribed by the comparatively short term of forty-seven years. To his great and unrivalled intellectual accomplishments he added the highest moral excellence; and no greater or juster eulogium could XX. BOOK be pronounced upon him, than that his virtues were equal to his talents. Europe and Asia 179+. acknowledged his worth, and mourned his loss. "Of the ability and conscious integrity with which he exercised the functions of a magistrate in India (lord Teignmouth, late sir John Shore, assures us) the public voice and public regret. bore ample and merited testimony. The same penetration which marked his scientific. researches distinguished his legal investigations and decisions, and his oratory was as captivating as his arguments were convincing*." While yet on his voyage to India, he formed the plan of an institution for the purpose of investigating the history and antiquities, arts, science, and literature, of India. 'It gave me,' to use his own words in the preliminary discourse addressed to the members of the association, one evening, on inspecting the map, inexpressible pleasure to find myself in a noble amphitheatre, almost encircled by the vast regions of Asia, the nurse of sciences, the inventress of delightful and useful arts, the scene of glorious actions, abounding in natural wonders, and infinitely diversified in the forms of religion and government. I could not help remarking how important and extensive a field was yet unex * Address to the Society for Asiatic Researches. |