The Philosophy of History. Friedrich von Schlegel
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extraordinary fertility of the soil is produced by the many rivers of greater or less magnitude that intersect the country, but which at the same time threaten the flat plains with inundation, it is the first object and most important care of government, to avert the danger of such inundations, to distribute the fertilizing waters in equal abundance over the whole country, and thus by means of canals, to maintain in all parts the communication by water which is at the same time of equal benefit and importance to industry and internal commerce. In no civilized state are establishments of this kind so extensively diffused and brought to so high a state of perfection as in China. The great imperial canal which extends to the length of 120 geographical leagues, has, it is said, no parallel on the earth. Although the construction of canals, and all the regulations on water-carriage could have attained by degrees only to their present state of perfection, still this alone would prove the very early attention which this people had bestowed on the arts of civilized life. Mention is often made of them in the old Chinese histories and imperial annals; and the canals of China, like the Nile in Egypt, were ever the objects of most anxious solicitude to the government. These annals, whenever they have occasion to speak of those great inundations and destructive floods, which are of such frequent occurrence in Chinese history, invariably represent the attention bestowed on water-courses and water-regulations, as the most certain mark of a wise, benevolent, and provident administration. On the other hand the neglect of this most important of administrative concerns is ever regarded as the proof of a wicked, reckless and unfortunate reign; and in these histories some great calamity, or even violent catastrophe, is sure to follow, like a stroke of divine vengeance, on this unpardonable neglect of duty. Together with the imperial canal, the great Chinese wall, which extends on the Northern frontier of China proper, to the length of 150 geographical leagues, is another no less important, and still standing monument of the comparatively high civilization which this country had very early attained. Such is the height and thickness of this wall, that it has been calculated that its cubic contents exceed all the mass of stone employed in all the buildings in England and Scotland; or again that the same materials would serve to construct a wall of ordinary height and moderate thickness round the whole earth. This great wall of China may be considered as a characteristic, and as it were a symbol of the seclusive spirit and aversion to every thing foreign in person, manners and modes of thinking which distinguish the Chinese state. This spirit, however has been as little able as the great wall itself, to defend China against foreign conquests, or even against the introduction of foreign sects. This wall, which was built about two centuries before the Christian era, is a historical monument, which furnishes far stronger proof than all the dubious accounts of the old annals that even in ancient times, and long before the conquest of the Monguls, and the establishment of the present dynasty of Mantchou Tartars, the empire had been often conquered, or at least was constantly exposed to the invasions of the Tartar tribes of the North.
The long succession of the different native dynasties of China, Tchin, Han, Tang, and Sung, down to the Monguls, which fills the diffuse annals of the empire, furnishes few important data on the intellectual progress of the Chinese; and every thing of importance to the object of our present inquiries, that can be gathered out of the mass of political history, may be reduced to a very few plain facts. The English writer, whom we have already cited, though otherwise inclined to a certain degree of scepticism in his views, fixes the commencement of the historical ages of authentic history in the ancient dynasty of Chow, eleven hundred years before the Christian era. The first fact of importance, as regards the moral and intellectual civilization of China, is that this country was originally divided into many small principalities, and, under petty sovereigns, whose power was more limited, enjoyed a greater share of liberty; and that it was formed into a great and absolute monarchy only two hundred years before Christ. The general burning of the books, of which more particular mention will be presently made, as well as the erection of the great wall, are attributed to the first general Emperor of all China, Chi-ho-angti; in whose reign, too, Japan became a Chinese colony, or received from China a political establishment. At a still later period, as in the fifth century of our era, and again at the time of the Mogul conquest under Zingis Khan, China was divided into two kingdoms, a northern and a southern. But there is another fact already mentioned that throws still stronger light on the high civilization of China—it is that at every period, when this empire has been conquered by the Moguls and Tartars, the conquerors, overcome in their turn by the ascendancy of Chinese civilization, have, within a short time, invariably adopted the manners, laws, and even language of China, and thus its institutions have remained, on the whole, unaltered. But here is a circumstance in Chinese history particularly worthy of our attention. In no state in the world do we see such an entire, absolute, and rigid monarchical unity as in that of China, especially under its ancient form; although this government is more limited by laws and manners, and is by no means of that arbitrary and despotic character which we are wont to attribute to the more modern oriental states. In China, before the introduction of the Indian religion of Buddha, there was not even a distinct sacerdotal class—there is no nobility, no hereditary class with hereditary rights—education, and employment in the service of the state, form the only marks of distinction; and the men of letters and government functionaries are blended together in the single class of Mandarins; but the state is all in all. However, this absolute monarchical system has not conduced to the peace, stability, and permanent prosperity of the state, for the whole history of China, from beginning to end, displays one continued series of seditions, usurpations, anarchy, changes of dynasty, and other violent revolutions and catastrophes. This is proved by the bare statement of facts, though the official language of the Imperial annals ever concedes the final triumph to the monarchical principle.
The same violent revolutions occurred in the department of science and of public doctrines, as in the instance already cited of the general burning of the books by order of the first general Emperor; when the men of letters, or at least a party of them, were persecuted, and four hundred and sixty followers of Confucius burnt. This act of tyranny undoubtedly supposes a very violent contest between factions—an important political struggle between hostile sects, and a mighty revolution in the intellectual world. At the same time, too, a favourite of this tyrannical prince introduced a new system of writing, which has led to the greatest confusion, even in subsequent ages. Such an intellectual revolution is doubtless evident on the introduction of the Indian religion of Buddha, or Fo (according to the Chinese appellation), which took place precisely three-and-thirty years after the foundation of Christianity. The conquest of China by the Moguls, under Zingis Khan, occurred at the same time that their expeditions towards the opposite quarter of Europe spread terror and desolation over Russia and Poland, as far as the confines of Silesia. This conquest produced a re-action, and a popular revolution, conducted by a common citizen of China, by name Chow, restored the Empire; this citizen afterwards ascended the throne, and became the founder of a new Chinese dynasty. The Emperors of the present dynasty of Mantchou Tartars, that has now governed China since the middle of the 17th century, are distinguished for their attachment to the old customs and institutions of China, and even to its language and science; and their elevation to the throne has given rise to many great scientific enterprises, and has been singularly favourable to the investigations of those European scholars whose object it is to make us better acquainted with China. But at the moment I am speaking, a great rebellion has broken out in the northern part of the kingdom, and in the opposite extremity the Christians are exposed to a more than ordinary persecution.
These few leading incidents in Chinese history may suffice to make known the principal epochs in the intellectual progress and civilization of this people. As the constitution and development of the human mind are in each of those ancient nations closely connected with the nature of their language, and even sometimes (as in the case of the Chinese) with their system of writing, the language of the latter people, being on account of its amazing copiousness less fit for conversation than for writing, I shall now make a few remarks on the very artificial mode of Chinese writing, which is perfectly unique in its kind; but I shall confine my observations to its general character, and shall forbear entering into the vast labyrinth of the 80,000 cipher-signs of speech, and all the problems and difficulties which they involve. The Chinese writing was undoubtedly in its origin symbolical; though the rude marks of those primitive symbols can now scarcely be discerned in the enigmatical abbreviations, and in the complex combinations of the characters at present in use. It is no slight problem even for the learned of China to reduce with any