Part 9 (2/2)
[Ill.u.s.tration: Mylady24.]
The difference between us all lies not in the real teaching of our Holy Men, Confucius, Buddha, Lao Tze, or Christ, but in the narrowness of the structure which their followers have built upon their words. Those sages reared a broad foundation on which might have been built, stone by stone, a mighty paG.o.da reaching to the skies. There could have been separate rooms, but no closed doors, and from out the pointed roofs might have pealed the deep-toned bells caught by every wandering breeze to tell the world that here spoke the Truth or the One Great G.o.d. But, instead, what have they done? The followers have each built separately over that portion which was the work of their own Master. The stories have grown narrower and narrower with the years; each bell rings out with its own peculiar tone, and there is no accord or harmony.
I do not dispute with those who have found a healing for themselves.
To us our religion is something quite inseparable from ourselves, something that cannot be compared with anything else, or replaced ith anything else. It is like our bodies. In its form it may be like other bodies, but in its relation to ourselves it stands alone and admits of no rival; yet the remedy that has cured us should not be forced upon a people, irrespective of their place, their environment or their temperament.
We of the East ”have sounded depth on depth only to find still deeper depths unfathomed and profound,” and we have learned to say that no sect or religion can claim to be in possession of all the Truth. Let the teachers from other countries learn of our doctrines. Let them learn of Buddha. To one who reads his pure teaching, nothing so beautiful, nothing so high, has been heard in all the world. We admit that, little by little, changes have come, simplicity has been lost, and with every addition something departed from its purity and it became stained.
Yet I believe that much of the kindliness, much of the gentleness now so marked in Chinese nature, may be traced to the teaching of this great apostle of peace and quietude.
That other great religion, the religion of the Way, has become steeped in superst.i.tion and has been made a reproach in all our land. Yet Lao Tze had n.o.ble sentiments and lofty thoughts that have helped generations of mankind in many struggles.
Confucius, it is said, presented high ideals without the breath of spirit; his system was for the head and did not feed the heart; yet he taught that, from the highest in the land to the lowest worker in the field, personal virtue, cleanness of heart and hands, is to be held the thing of greatest value. Men are urged to cherish all that is of good in them, to avoid evil living, to cultivate right feeling, and to be true and faithful to their tasks.
We should not value the teaching of our religion ”as a miser values his pearls and jade, thinking their value lessened if pearls and jade are found in other parts of the world.” But the searcher after Truth will welcome any true doctrine, and believe it no less precious because it was spoken by Buddha, Lao Tze, Confucius or Christ. We should not peer too closely to learn what the temple may enshrine, but ”feel the influence of things Divine and pray, because by winding paths we all may reach the same great Ocean's sh.o.r.e.” We all are searchers for the Way. Whence do I come; where do I go? In this pa.s.sage from the unknown to the unknown, this pilgrimage of life, which is the straight path, which the true road-- if indeed there be a Way? Such are the questions that all the world is asking. What is the true answer; where may we find it? Whose holy book holds the key that will open wide the door?
All have a hunger of the soul for something beside life's meat and drink; all want a remedy for the sorrows of the world. The Buddhists believe that it can be found in the destruction of desire, by renouncing the world and following the n.o.ble path of peace until death shall open the portals of the unknowable, everlasting stillness from which there is no return. The Confucianists say the remedy is found within the world by fulfilling all its duties and leaving to a greater Justice the future and its rewards. The Christians give a whispered message of hope to the lonely soul beating against the bars of the world about him, and say that a life of love and joy and peace is the gift of their great Messenger, and when the years have pa.s.sed that He stands within an archway to welcome those, His chosen, to a land of bliss where we shall meet all who have loved us and whom we have loved in life, and gaze upon His face.
Which is the Way, which path to G.o.d is broad enough for all the world?
Kwei-li.
16 My Dear Mother, I received thy letter which was full of reproaches most unjust. I have not broken my word, given to thee so long ago. I opened the home for friendless children, not because it belonged to a mission of a foreign religion, but because I think it a most worthy cause. There are many homeless little ones in this great city, and these people give them food and clothing and loving care, and because it is given in the name of a G.o.d not found within our temples, is that a reason for withholding our encouragement?
Thou hast made my heart most heavy. Twenty-five years ago, when my first-born son was taken from me, I turned from G.o.ds who gave no comfort in my time of need: all alone with hungry winds of bitterness gnawing the lute strings of my desolate mother-heart, I stood upon my terrace, and fought despair. My days were without hope and my nights were long hours filled with sorrow, when sleep went trailing softly by and left me to the old dull pain of memory. I called in anguish upon Kwan-yin, and she did not hear my prayer. The painted smile upon her lips but mocked me, and in despair I said, ”There are no G.o.ds,” and in my lonely court of silent dreams I lost the thread of worldly care until my tiny bark of life was nearly drifting out upon the unknown sea.
Thou rememberest that the servants brought to me from out the market-place the book of the foreign G.o.d, and in its pages I woke to life again. I looked once more from out my curtained window, and saw the rosy glow of dawn instead of grey, wan twilights of the hopeless days before me; and, as on a bridge half seen in shadows dim, I returned to the living world about me. Thou saidst nothing until it had brought its healing, then thou tookest the book and kept it from me.
Thou toldst me with tears that it would bring thine head in sorrow to thy resting-place upon the hillside if I left the G.o.ds of my ancestors and took unto my heart the words and teachings of the G.o.d of an alien race. I promised thee that I would not cause thee grief, and I have kept my word.
In my ignorance I have longed for knowledge, for some one to explain the teaching that rolled away for me the rush of troubled waters that flooded all my soul; but as I looked about me and saw the many warring factions that follow the great Teacher of love and peace, I did not know which way to turn, which had the truth to give me; and I wanted all, not part. I have this book, and have not sought for wisdom from outside, but only search its pages to find its messages to me.
Thou must not say I have deserted China's G.o.ds, nor is it just to write that my children are wandering from the Way. I have observed the feasts and fastings; each morn the Household G.o.d has rice and tea before him; the Kitchen G.o.d has gone with celebrations at springtime to the spirit up above. The candles have been lighted and the smoke of incense has ascended to propitiate the G.o.d of Light, Lord Buddha, and Kwan-yin, and my children have been taught their prayers and holy precepts. It is not my fault, nor shouldst thou blame it to my teaching if rites and symbols have lost their meaning, and if the G.o.ds of China are no longer strong enough to hold our young.
Oh, Mother mine, thou knowest I would not cause thee sorrow, and thou hast hurt me sorely with thy letter of bitterness and reproach. If thou couldst have seen within my heart these many ears, and known the longing for this light that came to me in darkness, then thou wouldst not have burned the book that brought me hope and life again when all seemed gone.
Thou askest me to promise thee anew that I will not trouble thy last few years with thoughts that seem to thee a sacrilege and a desecration of thy G.o.ds. Thou art the mother of my husband, and 'tis to thee I owe all loyalty and obedience. I promise thee, but-- that which is deep within my heart-- is mine.
Thy daughter, Kwei-li.
17 My Dear Mother, I, thy son's wife, have been guilty of the sin of anger, one of the seven deadly sins-- and great indeed has been my anger. Ting-fang has been bringing home with him lately the son of Wong Kai-kia, a young man who has been educated abroad, I think in Germany. I have never liked him, have looked upon his aping of the foreign manners, his half-long hair which looks as if he had started again a queue and then stopped, his stream of words without beginning and without end, as a foolish boy's small vanities that would pa.s.s as the years and wisdom came. But now-- how can I tell thee-- he asks to have my daughter as his wife, my Luh-meh, my flower. If he had asked for Man-li, who wishes to become a doctor, I might have restrained my anger; but, no, he wants the beauty of our house-hold, and for full a s.p.a.ce of ten breaths' breathing-time, I withheld my indignation, for I was speechless. Then I fear I talked, and only stopped for lack of words.
My son is most indignant, and says I have insulted his dear friend.
His dear friend indeed! He is so veiled in self-conceit that he can be insulted by no one; and as for being a friend, he does not know the word unless he sees in it something to further his own particular interests.
I told my son that he is a man who leads a life of idleness and worse.
The tea-house knows him better than his rooftree. He is most learned and has pa.s.sed safely many examinations, and writes letters at the end of his name, and has made an especial study of the philosophers of the present time; and because of this vast amount of book learning and his supposedly great intelligence he is ent.i.tled to indulgence, says my son, and should not be judged by the standards that rule ordinary people, who live upon a lower plane. I say that his knowledge and greater intelligence (which latter I very much doubt) increase his responsibilities and should make of him an example for the better living of men.
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