U N I VERS I T Y Of ILLINOIS Received by bequest from Albert H. Lybyer Professor of History University of Illinois 1916-1949 57 2.59 / SEAL of Grajid Secret Society of ( Inina. . THE THIEN, Tl , HOIH, OR BROTHERHOOD OF HEAVEN & EARTH. Puhjished 'by Snnth. Elder fc C° London 1853 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON OR, THE FORTUNES OF CHRISTIANITY IN CHINA: WITH NOTICES OF THE CHRISTIAN MISSIONS AND MISSIONARIES, AND SOME ACCOUNT OF THE CHINESE SECRET SOCIETIES. JOHN KESSON, OF THE BRITISH MUSEUM. LONDON: SMITH, ELDER, AND CO., 65. CORNHILL. BOMBAY : SMITH, TAYLOR, AND CO. 1854. | The Publishers of this Work reserve to themselves the right of authorising a Translation of if.] London : SroiTtswooDEs and Shaw, N e w -str eet- Square. PREFACE. The subject treated in the following pages re- solves itself into five distinct heads. Under the first, notice is taken of the legends of the introduction of Christianity into China by the Apostle Thomas and his disciples. Under the second head, some space is devoted to the history of the Nestorian Christians in China, in the seventh century, with their leader, Olo-puen, the first apostle. The third head comprises the missions of the Dominicans and Franciscans in the fourteenth century; the chief actor being John of Monte Corvin, the second Chinese Apostle. This mission was speedily extinguished, and no farther attempts were made to introduce a know- ledge of Christianity into China until the sixteenth century, when the Jesuit mission was founded by the celebrated Matteo Ricci. The .labours of IV PREFACE. the Jesuits form the subject of the fourth head; and the fifth is devoted to a notice of the Protest- ant missions of the present century. Under these various heads, the writer has en- deavoured to bring, together a series of interesting facts, scattered about in different histories ; and his book has this merit, if it has no other, — the construction of a whole from the several parts. In common with the general public, he read of an insurrection in China with some surprise, especially when to this it was added that the movement was a religious one, having Christianity for its basis, and not only Christianity, but Pro- testant Christianity ! His inquiries have led him to the conclusion, that here there must be a mistake, and that the rebellion is but feebly charged with the spiritual element. He has, indeed, great doubts whether there exists in China much that is deserving of the name of Chris- tianity at all. It may appear presumptuous to doubt, in the face of so much general belief, and so many sanguine expectations of the future ; but the doubt cannot be avoided. It must be recol- lected that Protestant missions in China do not yet number an existence of fifty years; and that, until within the last ten years. Canton was the PREFACE. V only spot in all the vast empire where the mission- ary could teach, or circulate the religious tract. With the sole exception of Giitzlaff, no Protestant missionary has yet penetrated into the centre of the empire. In saying this much, the writer is far from wishing to depreciate the value of Christian missions in China, or to discourage their sup- porters. It will be found that he has done full justice to the valiant and honourable men, both Catholic and Protestant, who have gone forth as labourers in this vineyard. But too much imme- diate gain must not be expected from their labours. Ripe clusters must not be expected where the buds have scarcely made their appearance. The works of Deity are of slow growth. Our accounts of the origin and progress of the rebellion in China are still very imperfect ; but such as they are, they lead the writer to believe that its motives are entirely political, and that it is fomented by the secret societies which abound throughout the empire, especially in the southern provinces. In this opinion he is confirmed by the latest accounts, which inform us that the city of Shanghai was taken by rebels belonging to the Short Sword Society. This is no doubt a rami- VI PREFACE. fication of the grand triad society, called the Brotherhood of Heaven and Earth. Of this society, and of its constitution and objects, some account will be found at the close of the book. The Chinese are still a mysterious people to Europeans. We barely know them externally, and have yet to gain a knowledge of their inner life. Let us hope that the time is approaching when, either through a successful rebellion, or through the sure and silent strength of commerce, a door will be opened to Europeans, admitting them to observe the kingdom throughout its length and breadth; when we shall get rid of many historical fables and travellers’ tales, and when there will be increased facilities for mis- sionary labour. The thorough evangelisation of China will take place, as a matter of course ; but the process must be a slow one, and the attempt often discouraging. It is many centuries since Augustine first preached in England, and yet we cannot flatter ourselves that Paganism has been thoroughly rooted out of the land. Give China time. CONTENTS. CHAPTER I. Pentecost. — Rapid Spread of Christianity in the First Cen- tury. — St. Thomas in India. — Syrian Christians in the East. — Martyrdom of St. Thomas. — Chinese Intercourse with Western Asia and Europe in the Second Century. — The Emperor Ming- te introduces an Indian Sect, a.d. 74. — Christianity taught about the same Time. — Chinese IndifFerentism. — Legend of Jesus Christ in China Page 1 CHAPTER II. The Nestorians. — Christians in China in the Sixth Century. — Discovery of the Chinese Monument relating to Chris- tianity; placed in a Pagoda. — Translation of the Monu- ment - - - - - -11 CHAPTER III. The Genuineness of the Monument considered. — De Guig- nes. — Gaubil. — Pauthier. — Monastery of the Golden Victory. — Probable Fate of the Nestorians. — Massacre of Jew3 and Christians. — The Arabian Traveller and the Chinese Emperor - - - - - 35 Vlll CONTENTS. CHAPTER IV. Historical Blank. — Prester John. — Ghengis Khan. — Ra- vages of the Mongols in Russia. — Battle of Lignitz, 1241. — New Mode of reckoning the fallen in Fight. — Coublai Khan. — Extent of his Empire.— -Dominican and Fran- ciscan Missionaries. — The Court of Prince Batou. — The Emperor Couyouc. — The Dominicans and Brother An- selm. — Diplomacy. — Tartar Missive to the Pope Page 47 CHAPTER V. Couyouc Khan and his Christian Ministers. — King Louis caught by Tartars. — Another Embassy. — Rubruquis. — A royal Audience.— The Khan a little gone. — The Empress tipsy. — Rubruquis returns to Europe - - 58 CHAPTER VI. Coublai Khan. — John of Mount Corvin. — Arrival in China. — His Letters. — Complains of the Nestorians. — Builds a Church. — Baptizes. — King George in Canonicals.— The nearest Road to China. — Turns Artist. — Church Music. — His Notices of China. — The Characteristics of his Mission. — Made Archbishop of Kambalu. — Assistance arrives from Europe. — Toleration. — Tartar Impostors. — Royal Compliments to Royalty. — The Alans. — Another Gap 70 CHAPTER VII. Europe awake. — Catholic Zeal. — Francis Xavier in India. — — Dies in sight of China. — His Mission. — The Portuguese settle on the Island of Macao. — Attempts to enter China. — Matteo Ricci. — His Missionary Labours. — Mathematics. — Adam Schall, Master of Subtile Doctrines. — A Court Favourite. — Persecutions. — Adam Schall wears the Cang. — His Attainments, Zeal, and Death - - 89 CONTENTS. IX CHAPTER VIII. Literary Activity of the early Jesuits in China. — Magaillan’s Account of their Works. — His Opinion of the Chinese Language. — Missionary Labours of the Franciscans and Dominicans. — Martyrdom of Ferdinand de Capillas. — Quarrels in the Mission. — The Jesuit. — The Monk. — Grounds of Quarrel - Page 104 CHAPTER IX. Khang-he. — The Court of Rites. — Ferdinand Verbiest. — His Services to the Mission. — His Death and Funeral. — Missionaries sent from France. — Gerbillon. — The Em- peror a Free-thinker. — Religious Freedom granted. — Success of the Mission. — Causes thereof. — Various Em- ployments given to the Jesuits. — An imperial Country Seat. — An honest Barber - - - - 117 CHAPTER X. Fresh Quarrels between the Jesuits and Dominicans. — Pro- gress of Hostilities. — Maigrot. — Decision of the Inquisi- tion. — De Tournon dies in Prison. — Consequences of a Bull Papal. — Mezzabarba and the Mandarins. — Death of Khang-he. — Another Papal Bull. — Persecutions in con- sequence - - - - - -128 CHAPTER XI. Rationale of Chinese Persecutions. — Kien-long — Gives Employment to the Missionaries. — Imperial Workshops. — Father Benoit, Astronomer, Copper-plate Printer, and Maker of Water-clocks — His Fountains. — Brother At- tiret, and his Trials. — The Emperor knows everything 141 a X CONTENTS. CHAPTER XII. Decay of the Catholic Mission. — Bread and Baptism. — Dissolution of the Society of Jesus. — The Lazarists. — State of the Mission at the Commencement of the Nineteenth Century. — Persecutions. — Destruction of Churches. — Martyrs. — English Cannon. — Present State of the Catholic Mission. — Cemetery of the Jesuits at Pekin. — Their Monument - Page 155 CHAPTER XIII. Religious Influences in China. — Confucius and his System. — Taouism. — Buddhism - - - - 169 CHAPTER XIV. Estimate of Catholic Missionary Labours. — Francis Xavier. — Mode of Conversion. — The Angelic Labour. — Early Protestant Missions in the East. — Formosa. — Tragical Fate of Dutch Missionaries - - - 187 CHAPTER XV. Protestant Missions. — Robert Morrison. — The Chinese MS. — Nature of the Chinese Language. — Its Difficulties. — Its Poverty. — Morrison arrives in China. — His Studies. — Translator to the British Factory. — His Skill in the Language of China. — The Chinese Dictionary. — Dr. Milne — Assists in the Translation of the Bible — Opens a School. — Slow Progress of Protestant Missions, ap- parently. — The first Baptism. — Temporising, what ? — The Heart-opening Cake. — Character of Milne - 200 CONTENTS. XI CHAPTER XVI. GiitzlafF. — Birth and Education. — Early Desire to become a Missionary. — Studies at Berlin. — Arrives at Rotterdam. — His Powers as a Linguist. — Adopted into a Chinese Family. — Passes into the Interior of China as a Steers- man. — The Physician and Tract Distributor. — Formosa. — Japan. — Interpreter to English Government. — His Character. — Progress of Christianity — What of Reli- gious Tracts ? — Characters of the Chinese as given by Missionaries. — Are they Atheists? — What Share has Christianity in the present Insurrection - Page 221 CHAPTER XVII. Early Origin of Secret Societies. — Red Beards and White Jackets. — The Pe-lin-kioa. — The Adventures of Wang- lung. — Comedy and Tragedy. — Wang-fu-ling and his Amazons. — Water-lilies. — Family of the Queen of Heaven.— Troublesome Children. — The Brotherhood of Heaven and Earth - - - - 242 CHAPTER XVIII. Rules of the Society. — Signs and Passwords. — Their Ode. — The “Chop.” — Form of the Secret Seal. — Translation of the Inscriptions. — Duties of the Members of the Society — Their Hopes - 268 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. CHAPTER I. Pentecost. — Rapid Spread of Christianity in the First Cen- tury. — St. Thomas in India. — Syrian Christians in the East. — Martyrdom of St. Thomas. — Chinese Intercourse with Western Asia and Europe in the Second Century. — The Emperor Ming-te introduces an Indian Sect, a.d. 74. — Christianity taught about the same Time. — Chinese IndifFerentism. — Legend of J esus Christ in China. For our knowledge of the progress of Chris- tianity in the East, in very early ages, we are more dependent upon tradition than certain his- tory. Tradition, nevertheless, may be entitled to our respect, and even accepted as evidence where it does not outrage probability or widely depart from historical antecedents. That Christianity was preached beyond the Euphrates before the B 2 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. close of the first century, is a traditionary state- ment, but one not hard to believe. That the pentecostal dispensation, when “ devout men out of every nation under heaven, — Parthians, and Medes, and Elamites, and the dwellers in Meso- potamia,” — heard spoken in their own tongues “ the wonderful works of God,” should be ex- tended by these men to their own countrymen, need not greatly tax our faith. The rapid ex- tension of Christianity after the Ascension is be- yond all doubt. The entire world was in a state of peace, and favoured the exertions of apostles, disciples, and missionaries to propagate the gospel of peace to the remotest bounds of the Empire. All ancient ecclesiastical writers concur in as- signing an almost miraculous rapidity to the disse- mination of the doctrines of the prophet of Galilee. They compare it to the velocity of light, — to the speed of lightning. J ustin, who wrote about the fortieth year of the second century, says, that then there was no nation of Greeks, or Barbarians, or people of whatsoever name, whether living in their chariots, or in the open air, or under tents feeding their flocks, who did not address prayers and render thanksgivings to the Father of the uni- verse through Jesus Christ crucified. Greek and EARLY CHRISTIANITY. Syrian writers * agree in stating that the gospel was preached to the Hyrcanians, the Bactrians and the Margae by Saint Thomas the apostle ; and that Agheus, the disciple of Adheus, carried it, beyond the Caspian, to the Gehe and other peoples, even to the farthest East. St. Ephrern is said to have preached the gospel, by order of St. Thomas, not only in^ Syria, but also in Persia, among the Parthians, and in Media. The great orientalist Assemanni has carefully collected, from the writings of the Chaldean and Syrian Christians, all that bears upon this subject. According to these, Thaddeus, one of the seventy disciples, instructed by St. Thomas, went into Mesopotamia, accompanied by two other disciples, also of the seventy, of whom one was named Marus. Marus survived the martyrdom of his companions, but was obliged to move eastwards. He preached in Assyria and all the land of Shinar. He taught, according to Bar-Hebrseus, in three hundred and sixty churches, which were built in the East during his time ; and, having fulfilled his ministry for three-and-thirty years, he departed to the Lord in a city named Badaraja, and was buried in a church which he had built there. * Assemanni, Bibl. Orient., tom. iii. pt. 2. c. L 4 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. The apostle Thomas not only sent missionaries eastwards, but, as tradition reports, went east- wards himself, preaching the gospel through all Mesopotamia, Chaldea, Persia, and India,— yea, to the confines of the East. If we can admit that he sent disciples eastwards to found churches, it is not difficult to admit, in addition, that he might have visited the churches so founded as their overseer or bishop. The Syrian Christians, who still abound on the coasts of Malabar and Coro- mandel, hold firmly by the tradition that he was the founder of their churches. He went from Meliapore, they say, after he had converted the king and people, and preached the gospel in Kambalu (now Pekin), the city of the great khan, and built a church there. Andrea Govea re- lates, that from thence he returned to Coro- mandel, where, by his zeal in making converts, he excited the enmity of two Brahmins, who buried him under a heap of stones ; but another Brahmin, finding him afterwards still alive, ran him through with a spear. In the Chaldean ritual there is still an office to the apostle of India : “ By the blessed St. Thomas the Chinese and Cushites were con- verted to the truth. By the blessed St. Thomas the Indian idolatries were dissipated. By St. CHINESE INTERCOURSE WITH THE WEST. 5 Thomas they received the virtue of baptism and the adoption of children. By him the kingdom of heaven penetrated into China.” His martyr- dom is supposed to have taken place a.d. 68. On the 22nd August, a.d. 380, his bones were dug up and brought from India to the temple of Edessa; and this day is still held in commemo- ration by the Syrian Christians of India. These statements, whether legendary or histo- rical, will be received with different degrees of credence by different minds. They plainly lead to the conclusion that Christianity was partially known as far east as China in the apostolical age. Whether this conclusion is admissible or not, at all events it is not improbable that Christianity may have been known in China at a very early date ; soiled and enfeebled, no doubt, through its far-eastern journey, but still preserving some of its characteristic features, and presenting its dis- tinctive marks to the religious systems that already obtained there. The probability is strengthened when we consider the relations of the Chinese em- pire, about this time, with the nations and people of the West. The land of flowers and golden floods was not then the jealous, exclusive land of after- centuries. The intercourse of the Chinese with 6 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. their neighbours, according to De Guignes*, was frequent. We find that 126 years before Christ the em- peror Vou-ti sent his general Tchang-kiao into the West ; that this general entered Maouren- nahar or Transoxania ; that he went through Kho- rasan, and travelled in that part of India which afterwards formed the states of the Mogul ; that since that time the Chinese have not ceased to be in communication with the people to their west as far as the Caspian Sea; that they received their ambassadors and sent ambassadors to them in return ; that under the reign of Ming- te, A. d. 74, the general Pan-tchao with the Chinese armies overran the whole of Little Buk- haria ; that he established peace in the countries of Kaschgar and Khoten ; that in A. d. 97 he sent one of his officers to the shores of the Caspian, with the design of penetrating Ta-tsin, or the Boman empire ; that the Chinese emperors had a governor at Akzou or in its neighbourhood ; and that in A. D. 166 the emperor M. Aurelius Antoninus sent ambassadors to China with the view, according to every appearance, of establish- ing a direct commerce with that country by way Hist. Generate des Huns, tom. i. p. 27. THE EMPEROR MING-TE. 7 of India, instead of through the medium of the Parthians. China, then, might have been known to the early Christians ; and to enter it either by the way of India, which was open to them, or through Scythia or Tartary, was not more than their zeal could easily accomplish. Add to this that central Asia at an early period was the stronghold of Gnostics and Manicheans, and it is not difficult to believe that travelled natives of China might have become acquainted with their doctrines. It is singular that, just about the time when tradition reports the apostle Thomas to have been labouring in China, the emperor Ming-te, of the famous Han dynasty, had, according to the chro- nicles of the country, a vision in which he saw a golden figure of gigantic size, which called to his mind the saying of Confucius — c< The Holy One is in the West.” Hereupon he sent forth his am- bassadors, who returned from India bringing with them the doctrine of Fo and of a metempsychosis, — an act for which he was greatly blamed by the literati and historians of China. According, how- ever, to the learned Sinologue, Andreas Miiller * who appears to rely upon the veracity of the * Disq. geo g. hist, de Chataja, p. 58. Ji 4 8 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. Chinese historians, it was in A. D. 65 in the tenth month that Xa-cam, an Indian philosopher, entered China and preached, among other doc- trines, three Gods in one. He holds with those who think that Christianity was at this time in- troduced, and that its doctrines were afterwards interpolated and consequently bastardised by the Chinese.* To reconcile the conflicting suppositions of the simultaneous introduction of an Indian and a Christian religion into China, it is necessary to bear in mind that the Chinese distinguish all foreign divinities by the name of Fo, however contrary their doctrines, and apply it to the divinities of India as well as to the God of Christians, Jesus Christ, and others. And this observation, made by De Guignes, leads us to believe, that the difficulties that would have been opposed to the introduction of Christianity would rather have been of a political than of a religious or theological character ; for no people are more * The sect was called Xe-kiao ; also Fo-kiao. “ Xe,” says Muller, “ denotes cross ; Fo, Jove ; and Kiao, doctrine. Hence Xa-ca (Sakja) or Se-kiao means doctrine of the cross. The bonzes or priests of Fo (Buddha) were also called Xe-idao ; and Fo is called Fo-kTian , which corre- sponds with the name of the Indian Xa-cam .” CHINESE LEGENDS OF CHRIST. 9 tolerant of conflicting creeds than the Chinese — a tolerance, however, which arises from their long having held the error that all religions are good, although opposed to each other ; that each may be useful to the people who follow it ; and that the different religions would never have been published by their founders if they had not believed that they were calculated to lead man- kind to virtue. To the legends or histories already given may be added the statement of Du Halde, that the famous emperor Kouan-yun-tchang, who lived about the beginning of the second century, knew of Jesus Christ, as monuments written by his own hand and then graven upon stones testify. It is said that in these monuments Kouan-yun-tchang speaks of the birth of our Saviour in a grotto open to every quarter of the heavens, of his resur- rection, his ascension, and of vestiges of his sacred feet. Whether these monuments are known to any one besides Du Halde it is hard to tell ; and his authority in some matters is rather question- able. At this point a dead blank of five centuries ensues, wherein we have neither tradition nor history to guide us to a knowledge of the for- 10 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. tunes of the Christianity which it is conjectured was introduced into China late in the first or early in the second century. It must have been too feeble to make head against idolatry, too dim to shed great light in the midst of heathen dark- ness. It is asserted, that various ancient Chris- tian monuments have been found in China, and among others an iron cross, in the province of Kiang-see, on which there is a date which corre- sponds to the year a. d. 239. A cross need not necessarily be a relic of Christianity, especially if it be true, as we read, that the Chinese had a cross upon their coinage before the Crucifixion, and adored the cross before the expiatory cross was erected upon Calvary. THE NESTORIANS. 11 CHAPTER II. The Nestorians. — Christians in China in the Sixth Century. — Discovery of the Chinese Monument relating to Chris- tianity; placed in a Pagoda. — Translation of the Monu- ment. The second epoch in the history of Christianity in China, is assuredly better defined than the first. We can speak with more confidence, if we cannot with absolute certaint} 7 . We approach the period when the Nestorian, or rather the Chaldean or Syrian Christians, as they called themselves, spread so rapidly, planting Chris- tianity in the heart of Asia, carrying it to the remotest East, and giving rise to the belief that they entered the provinces of China early in the seventh century. Assemanni, who has written a dissertation on the Nestorians in his Bibliotheca Orientalis , again assists us to some extent. He makes a remarkable quotation from Ebed-Jesu, Chaldean metropolitan of Nisibis in the thirteenth century, to the effect that Saliba Zacha, who was 12 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. Jacelich , i. e. Catholicus or patriarch, of the Chaldean Christians from 714 to 728, sent certain metropolitans towards China, as far as Samar- cund, to visit the Christians residing there, “ be- cause,” he adds, “according to ancient accounts, a metropolitan was appointed to China, by Silas in the seventh century, and even by Achaeus in the sixth.” It is certain that, in an ancient list of Syrian metropolitans*, the metropolitan of China is expressly mentioned, and that before the metropolitan of India ; which has given rise to the belief that if the list has been arranged according to seniority, then China had a metropolitan before India, and that China did not receive its Chris- tianity through India, but through some other channel.* These statements are supported by the cele- brated Christian Monument which was found in China in the year 1625. By this, it appears, that Christian missionaries arrived in China about the year 635 of our era ; that their leader was Olo- puen ; that he was well received by the reigning emperor, Tai-tsong, by whose command an edict was published commending the Christian doc- Mosheim, Hist. Tartar. Eccles., App. i. THE CHRISTIAN MONUMENT. 13 trines to his subjects; that within a few years after several Christian churches were built ; that subsequently the Christians experienced much opposition and persecution, especially in A. d. 698, under the empress Woeheu ; that they were again favoured by several emperors in succession, and were strengthened by fresh missionaries from the West in A. D. 744. The Monument was erected in A. d. 781, at which time it would appear that the Chaldean Christians in China were in a state of prosperity, having their own metropolitan, and living under a regular eccle- siastical constitution. The value of this Monument we shall have presently to consider. In addition to this testi- mony, it appears from a Nestorian relation dis- covered by Assemanni that the Chaldean pa- triarch Timotheus, who filled this dignity from 778 to 810, accredited two ecclesiastics of the monastery of Beth-abe, in Mesopotamia, by name Kardach and Jabdallaha, with fifteen other mis- sionaries, to Chataja (i. e. China) ; and that one of these, called David, was metropolitan there, while the others were bishops and priests. A Mahommedan writer, Abulpharagius, farther re- lates, that, in the year 978, six ecclesiastics were 14 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. sent to China by a Chaldean patriarch to assist in the church services openly performed there.* Such are the historical grounds for believing that Christianity was taught in China in the seventh century. The evidence, it will be ob- served, is entirely supplied by Orientals, writing more than five centuries after the events recorded are said to have taken place; and we are ignorant of the nature of the materials upon which their history rests. Such evidence as the Syrian writers afford us, must not, however, be ignored ; and we shall now proceed to inquire how far it is supported by the Monument already referred to. The announcement of the discovery of an ancient Christian Monument in China created considerable sensation in Europe. Its high an- tiquity raised the surprise and provoked the curiosity of some ; the same antiquity, and the medium through which the intelligence was trans- mitted to the West, created suspicions in others. The Monument, which is still preserved in China, was discovered in 1625 by some labourers who were engaged in digging out the foundations of an old building in the city of Si-gan-foo, capital of the north-western province Shen-se, which was * Golius, p. 98. THE CHRISTIAN MONUMENT. 15 then also the capital of the empire. It is of marble, about ten palms in length, five palms in breadth ; and it is said — but we cannot credit this part of the story — that thirty men could hardly move it. Its upper part terminates in a pyramid, upon the face of which is sculptured a cross, whose arms terminate in fleurs-de-lys, like those upon the pretended tomb of St. Thomas at Miliapore. The cross is surrounded with clouds, and above it are three lines of Chinese characters containing the title of the inscriptions which are found on the upper surface of the marble. These inscriptions are also in the Chinese character, and on both sides there are farther inscriptions in the ancient Syrian or Estrangelo character. When the Monument was discovered, the governor of the city had it transported from its place, and after having it cleaned and examined he caused it to be raised upon a pedestal and placed under a roof, that it might be seen of the public and protected from the weather. Shortly after, the emperor, hearing of the discovery, had it placed in a pagoda, or temple of bonzes, about a quarter of a mile from Si-gan-foo, where it is still preserved with great care. The first who interpreted this inscription was the 16 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. Mandarin Leon, a recent convert to Christianity, and who published a book upon the subject. The Portuguese Jesuit, Father Alvares Sernedo, also bestowed much pains to interpret the Monument, but the missionaries were not satisfied with the labours of either the one or the other. Another interpretation was undertaken, which will be found in Father Kircher’s China Illustrata. A careful transcription of the Monument was first brought to Pome by the Jesuit Couplet, and an account of its discovery and meaning was pub- lished there, in 1631, in the Italian language. The contents of both the Syrian and Chinese in- scriptions are highly curious. The Syrian, on both sides, mentions the erection of the Monument, in the time of Mar Anan-Jesu, Catholic patriarch of the Nestorian or Chaldean Christians, and of Adam, papas or metropolitan of Zinostlian , by Mar Jazed-Buzid, suffragan-bishop of Chumhdan , son of Milef the priest from Balecli in Togursthan , in the Greek era 1092, that is, in 781 of the Christian era. After this follows a list of not less than seventy names, being the bishops, priests, and monks who had preached Christianity in the church founded in China down to that date. The subjoined version of the Chinese inscription THE CHINESE MONUMENT. 17 we have translated from the French translation made by the most learned Sinologue M. Leon- tiewski. It differs from the version of the learned missionary Visdelou, bishop of Claudiopolis, which will be found in the Journal des S 9 avans for 1760. The discrepant translations arise from the greater or less knowledge of the Chinese language pos- sessed by the translator, or from imperfect tran- scripts of the original having been employed. Notwithstanding the great poverty of that lan- guage, and its want of precision, we cannot un- derstand otherwise how European versions should so greatly differ : — THE CHINESE MONUMENT. 7. Tchoung, middle. 4. Kiao, doctrine. 1. Ta , great. 8. Koug, kingdom. 5. Lieou, vast. 2. Tsin, Tsin. 9. Pig, monument. 6. Hing, promulgation. 3. King, most clear. Monument of the vast promulgation of the splendid doctrines of Great Tsin (Judea) in the Middle Kingdom. c 18 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. ec The Ideal, the Eternal, the Perfect and the Happy gave origin to the uncreated; — he the incomprehensible, infinitely wise, eternal, imma- terial, infinite and supreme, superior to all that is created, is the source of all existence and pre- serves all things. This supreme increate Being, superior to all the saints, very honoured by his divine nature, one of the persons of the mira- culous Trinity increate and true — this is the Aloho ( King of the Jews )*, who extended the four quarters of the earth like a cross, vanquished chaos and made two kinds of airf, transformed darkness and the void, and created the heavens and the earth. Having given motion to the sun and moon, he separated the day from the night ; he created every living creature and men first; prescribing to the latter to live with his like in peace and love, he gave him the empire of the earth. “ In the beginning the inclinations of this first * Eloha is the Syriac name of God. f The two airs spoken of are supposed to refer to the waters above and under the earth mentioned in Gen. i. 7. The Jesuit Yan-man, in his explanation of the Monument in 1741, gave a different reading of the Chinese words, and made them signify active and passive agents, as heat and cold, for example. TRANSLATION OF THE MONUMENT. 19 man were innocent, and his heart was free from passions. But soon Sa-dan (Satan), by means of cunning and flattery, succeeded in extinguishing the sentiment of submission and obedience to the Creator, inspired him with pride, rendered him discontented with his lot, and led him to follow the voice of his passions. Hence, everywhere on earth, error and evil, and the 365 doctrines*, which are so like to one another, and all so contrary to the truth. “ One of these doctrines consisted in deifying the creature ; another sometimes confounded nothing and existence, and at other times separated them. There were some which gave victims to inanimate beings, and promised for this beatitude ; others glorified the victim and only developed pride. | * This determinate number, corresponding to the number of days in the year, must be taken figuratively, according to the genius of the Chinese language. Thus 10,000 ex- presses the number of things created. f The Indians at the present time believe that the age in which the human species lives, is an age of corruption and decay, and that nothing has been done for thousands of years which merits passing down to posterity. Reinaud, in his Memoire sur VInde (p. 329.), gives the following curious passage from Massoudi : — “ According to the science which they hold from Brahma, the sun should rest 3000 years in every sign of the zodiac, which would extend his revolution 20 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. Some confused the mind, hardened the heart, and offered nothing useful ; others required human victims, and ordained them to be burned and ex- terminated. In fine, in the course of time men entirely forgot truth and virtue and thought not of correcting themselves. Therefore it was that one of the persons of our very venerated Trinity, the saint of saints, Met-si-ho (the Messiah), hiding his majesty, appeared in the world under human form, and the celestial spirits announced the joyful tidings of his incarnation in the bosom of the holy to 36,000 years. When he shall have passed into the signs situated to the south of the equator, the inhabited part of the earth will be displaced ; that which is habited shall be covered with water, and that which is now under the water shall become habitable. The north shall become south, and the south, north.” The passage finishes thus : — “ In the primitive ages, life was very long, and human strength had a greater space in which to exercise itself. In the latter ages, life has become shorter, because the circles are narrowed, and troublesome accidents are multiplied. In short, the forces of the body and its chances of health were greater in the first age, and developed themselves the more because purity was raised above corruption. Now, life is prolonged in proportion to the purity of temperament. Nevertheless, corruption has penetrated everywhere, and entire nature is liable to a fatal decadence.” TRANSLATION OF THE MONUMENT. 21 virgin in (. Dat-sin ).* * * § A brilliant star signalised the miracle, and the Po-tse f, guided by its light, came to adore the divine incarnate. It was then that was accomplished the prophecy of the four- and-twenty prophets J, and that families and kingdoms received their organisation. “ This person of the Holy Trinity, pure, vivi- fying, and ineffable, rectified the ancient ideas, taught virtue, and disseminated a new doctrine. He prescribed eight commandments §, uprooted evil, led all to good, opened the way of the three virtues ||, triumphed over death, and gave life. 2 36 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. church whose claims to a high antiquity it was considered to support. The native Chinese were the first to doubt its genuineness; and subse- quently, and upon similar grounds, — the absence of historical evidence on the part of ancient Chinese historians respecting the introduction of Christianity, — the Jesuit missionaries who were in China when it was discovered hesitated to claim a memorial which, although it does not express the tenets of the Western church, they might still have appealed to as a proof that the Messiah’s doctrine had been taught in China a thousand years before their time. It was not until after careful examination that its genuineness was ad- mitted by the Jesuits. The zeal, the learning, the perseverance, the indomitable courage, of the followers of Loyola cannot for a moment be dis- puted; but, lying under the suspicion of both Ro- manists and Protestants, their veracity in report- ing the discovery of the Monument was doubted, and they were even accused of having forged it.*' The researches of De Guignes and other ori- entalists h^ve since discovered that the Chinese chronicles are not altogether silent on the subject Celebrated Jesuits, by the Rev. W. Rule. DE GUIGNES. GAUBIL. 37 of the introduction of Christianity. Gaubil, who writes on the Tang dynasty, says that the astro- nomical and astrological books of the Chinese mention a people from the kingdom of Yu-sse, who taught them the use of the cycle of 28 years. The situation of this kingdom is not mentioned : hence this writer is inclined to believe that the Chinese did not mean, by Yu-sse, to express a country, but people of the Christian religion ; for Yssa is the name the Mahommedans give to Jesus Christ, and Yu-sse is the same name badly pronounced by the Chinese. To all appearance, then, the people who came to instruct the Chinese in astronomy were Olo-puen and his followers, who arrived in China about the beginning of the Tang dynasty. The Chinese historians of this same dynasty farther say that, in the ninth year, called Chin- kouan, i. e. a.d. 635, the emperor Tai-tsong received ambassadors from Sin-lo, Yu-tien, Sou- le, and other countries named, all situated to the west of China. These historians also, De Guignes informs us, mark the arrival in the same year of a person of remarkable virtue, to whose religion the emperor was attached. This man who was also from the west, and to whom 38 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. they give the title of Bonze, had power, they say, by his prayers to raise the dead. He experienced some obstacles at court, but this did not prevent the religion of Fo from making considerable progress in the empire. These facts correspond with what the Monument relates respecting the arrival of Olo-puen. The religion of Fo here mentioned cannot designate the Indian religion, for that had been held in China for many centuries ; hence the obstacles which Olo-puen experienced must have been for teaching a reli- gion different from the Indian. The Chinese an- nals further mention the attachment of Kao-tsong to the religion of the Christian bonzes, and con- tain some traces of the persecution they suffered under the empress Chen-li or Heou-vou-chi. Hiuen-tsong, who, according to the Monument, restored peace to the church, was solicited to be favourable to Christianity by the emperor of Con- stantinople, Leo the Isaurian, who sent an em- bassy to this prince, a circumstance confirmed by the Chinese annals, which report* that, in the seventh year, called Kai-yuen , i. e. a.d. 719, the king of Fou-lin or Ta-tsin paid tribute to the * Gaubil, Hist. Manusc. de la Dynastie des Tang. PAUTHIEE. 39 emperor and sent him a priest of great virtue named Ta-mou-tou, — a corruption of the name Thomas, perhaps, — who was versed in mathe- matics. A complimentary present would most likely, in Chinese parlance, be termed a tribute. The names of other sovereigns which occur in the inscription, are also mentioned by Chinese writers. The bonzes that came from Ta-tsin are expressly named in the edict of the emperor Vou- tsong, published in 845*, for the reduction of Bonzeries, and in which this prince adroitly insinuates that Tai-tsong I., under whom Olo- puen arrived in China, was favourable to the Christians, inasmuch as he acted too leniently towards them. Pauthier f, a Chinese scholar, brings, however very direct evidence in favour of the genuineness of the Monument, from the Grand Imperial Geography, a Chinese work of authority. Under the head of sc Monastery of the Golden Victory ” it is written : “ This monastery is situated outside the western suburb of Tchang-ngan (now Si-gan-foo) ; it is the monastery of the * De Guignes, i. 60. f Univers pittoresque. Chine, tom, ii. p. 107. 40 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. Great Humanity ; it was founded under the Tang. This monastery possesses the (Buddhic) inscriptions of the pagod of the master of the law in the time of the Tang (about 635) engraven upon sandal-wood. It possesses also the inscrip- tion upon stone entitled King-hiao-lieou-hing - tchoung-kou 'e-pie ; that is, inscription upon stone of the religion of King propagated in the middle kingdom.’ In the years thien , ckun (1457 and 1464) the strangers of Thsin (or Ta-tsin) re- paired it.” Ta-tsin signifies the countries of Western Asia belonging to the Homan empire and includes Judea. The same is also the name of China. The stone existed then, and had been repaired by Christians, in China, a hundred years before the Jesuits entered the country. Thus far, the history and chronology of the Chinese Monument are borne out by the native annalists. The Jesuit missionaries, at the time of its discovery, were clearly ignorant of the exist- ence of the Chinese annals, and could not, in con- sequence, avail themselves of their assistance in perpetrating the alleged forgery. Nor is it likely that, if they had intended to commit a religious fraud, on either the Chinese or Europeans, that they would have put forth a creed more allied to FATE OF THE NESTORIANS. 41 the Greek than the Latin Church ; or that they would have omitted such an opportunity of set- ting forth the supremacy of the pope, the mass, transubstantiation, purgatory, and some of the leading dogmas of their own communion. The creed is so evidently Nestorian, that it were supererogatory to prove it to be so. The state- ment that the Monument was manufactured by Marco Polo, the Venetian, during his seventeen years’ residence in China, has been frequently re- futed. The genuineness of the Monument has been denied by La Croze, Beausobre, by Voltaire in his off-hand manner, and more recently by Von Bohlen and Neumann. But, if the authority of names were to be held to decide the question, one would prefer ranging himself on the side of such profound philologists and unprejudiced writers as Renaudot, De Guignes, Visdelou, Abel-Remusat, Mosheim, Le Beau, Neander, and above all of Professor Kist of Leyden, who has examined the question more minutely than any writer of modern times — men who no longer hesitate to admit the validity of this remarkable Monument, and to use it as historical evidence. How far Nestorian Christianity was affected by the edict of 845, it is not easy to say. Its 42 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. priests may have been temporarily compelled to withdraw from the empire, and many of the native converts may have again relapsed into Buddhism. The name of Christianity was not rooted out, as we shall hereafter discover; but probably about this time began to grow up the singular complications of the religions of the Indian Fo, and the Syrian Fo, which have since given rise to so much speculation in history and vituperation in theology in Europe. The events of the ninth and tenth centuries remain in com- parative darkness. One thing only is certain, that, from this time, all intercourse between the Christians of Thibet and China, with the Chal- dean mother-church and her patriarchs on the banks of the Tigris, appears to have ceased. In the absence of European authorities, as to the fate of Christianity in the East, during this period, we have to resort to such light as Oriental annalists can afford us. Ferista, in his History of Hindostan, says that, in the year of the Hegira 264 (a.d. 878), a rebel named Banschoua (Hoang -chao) laid siege to Khan-foo (Hang- tcheou-foo), capital of the province of Tche-kiang. The town was taken by assault and the inha- bitants put to the sword. It is said that upon THE TRAVELLER AND THE EMPEROR. 43 this occasion 120,000 persons, Jews, Christians, and Magi, who were established in the town and carrying on trade there, were massacred. This is exclusive of the number of natives who were slain ; and the writer adds, that the figures were known so accurately because of the government tax which was levied upon them as citizens of a foreign origin. The Mohammedan author gives us, further, an interesting account of an interview which an Arabian traveller, Ibn-Vahab by name, had with the emperor Y-tsoung. The emperor asked him, through an inter- preter, respecting the affairs of the West, and among others put the question to the Arab — “Would you recognise your master, were you to see him ? ’* Ibn-Vahab, who tells his own tale, says: “I perceived that the emperor wished to speak of the prophet of God, to whom God be propitious, and I replied, — e How can I see him, now that he is with God the most High ? ’ ’’ The emperor replied, “ That is not what I meant : would you know his likeness ? ” “ Yes ! ” said the Arab ; and immediately the emperor ordered a box to be brought and placed 44 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. on a table before him. Then, taking some leaves out of it, he said to the interpreter : “ Show him his master ! ” Upon this Ibn-Vahab, continuing his narrative, says: “ I recognised upon these leaves the por- traits of the prophets ; at the same time I made vows before them, and my lips moved. The emperor did not know that I recognised the prophets, and asked, through the interpreter, wherefore my lips moved. The interpreter did so, and I replied, f By means of the attributes which distinguish them. Tlius ; behold Noah in the ark, who was saved with his family. When God, the most High, commanded the waters, the whole earth, with its inhabitants, was submerged ; but Noah with his household escaped.”’ At these words, the emperor began to laugh and said, “ You are right when you recognise Noah here. As to the submersion of the whole earth, that we do not admit. The Deluge could not cover the whole earth ; it never reached our country, nor India.” Ibn-Vahab was afraid to refute what fell from the imperial lips ; but continued : C£ Behold Moses with the children of Israel ! ” “ True ! ” said the emperor ; “ but Moses shows THE TRAVELLER AND THE EMPEROR. 45 himself on a very narrow stage, and his people show themselves evilly disposed towards him.” “Behold Jesus on an ass, surrounded by his apostles ! ” said Ibn in reply. “ He had but a short time to appear on the stage,” returned the learned emperor ; “ his mis- sion lasted scarcely more than thirty months.” Ibn-Vahab continued to pass before him the different prophets ; but we limit ourselves to repeating a portion only of what he tells us. He states that under each portrait there was a long inscription, which he supposed to contain the name of the prophet and his country, and the leading facts of his mission. He then continues : — “ I saw the likeness of the Prophet, on whom be peace. He was mounted on a camel ; and his disciples, who were with him, were also mounted on camels. All had Arabian slippers upon their feet, and all had tooth-picks stuck in their girdles. Beginning to weep, the emperor charged the in- terpreter to ask me, ‘ Wherefore I shed tears ? * I replied, f Behold our Prophet, our lord and our cousin, on whom be benediction ! ’ The emperor answered, ‘ Thou hast said truly. He and his people have raised a most glorious empire : but his eyes have not beheld the edifice he erected ; it 46 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. has been seen by those only who followed him.’ I saw a great number of figures of other pro- phets, some of whom made a sign with the right hand, bringing the thumb and fore-finger together, and making a motion as if they would attest some truth.”* Here we close this portion of our history. * Relation des Voyages faits par les Arabes et les Persans dans le 9me Siecle ; par M. Reinaud, tom. i. p. 82. 47 HISTORICAL BLANK. CHAPTER IV. Historical Blank. — Prester John. — Ghengis Khan. — Ra- vages of the Mongols in Russia. — Battle of Lignitz, 1241. — New Mode of reckoning the fallen in Fight. — Coublai Khan. — Extent of his Empire. — Dominican and Fran- ciscan Missionaries. — The Court of Prince Batou. — The Emperor Couyouc. — The Dominicans and Brother An- selm. — Diplomacy.—-- Tartar Missive to the Pope. During the eleventh and twelfth centuries strange rumours were circulated in Europe of the exist- ence of Christians in the heart of Asia, and of a Christian prince who had his abode in some remote province there, — the enigmatical Prester John; but it was not until the close of the thir- teenth century that the broken links between Europe and the far East were again restored, and the fortunes of Christianity once more essayed upon the soil of China. About the commencement of this century oc- curred one of those remarkable historical events whose consequences, as regards both men and nations, are felt through many centuries. This 48 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. was the establishment of the Mongolian empire under the famous Ghengis Khan and his suc- cessors, — that vast power which extended from the eastern seas to the Danube stn:l Huno-ary.* China was subjugated. A Mongolian expedition crossed the Volga. Bulgaria was conquered, — a triumph followed by the conquest of Northern Russia, and the submission of all the tribes north of the Caucasus.! In 1240 the Mongols ravaged the Russian principality of Galicia, and in the same year entered Poland and ra- vaged in the province of Lublin. Next year they advanced on Cracow, which they set on fire, and continuing their march entered Silesia. Pass- ing the Oder on rafts they proceeded to Breslau, which they found reduced to cinders, the inha- bitants having fired it and fled on their approach. After keeping the citadel in a state of siege for some days they retired and re-assembled at Lignitz, where, on the 9th April, 1241, was fought the battle wherein they completely routed the forces of Duke Henry of Silesia and killed the duke himself. The number of the Poles that fell on this occasion was so great that the Mongols in order to count them cut an ear from each corpse, * Gaubil, Histoire de Gentchiscan. Paris, 1739, 4to. f D'Ohsson, Histoire des Mongols, tom. ii. liv. 2. c. 3. EXTENT OF THE EMPIRE. 49 and filled nine large sacks with them. After this they invaded and devastated Hungary, and had entire dominion over Russia. Suffice it that Coublai Khan, who reigned from 1260 to 1294, became, through the success of his own arms and those of his predecessors, sovereign of the vastest empire ever recorded in history. It comprised China, the Corea, Thibet, Tong-king, Cochin China, and a great part of India beyond the Ganges, several islands in the Indian Seas, and the north of Asia from the Eastern Sea to the Dneiper, although during his reign the Ghengisian princes, who possessed the country to the east of the Kang-kai Mountains, would not acknowledge the legitimacy of his rule. Persia was feudatory to his throne, and her sovereigns received their investiture from Pekin ; and as the domination of his creat vassals extended to the Mediterranean and the frontiers of the Greek empire, it may be said that nearly the whole of Asia submitted to the laws of the great khan.* No wonder that the victories of the Mongols, or Tartars, attended as they were with every species of enormity and cruelty, carried terror and * D’Ohsson, tom. ii. p. 477. E 50 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. dismay into the very heart of Europe. To divert their attention from the Christian powers, it became the policy of Louis IX. of France and Pope Inno- cent IV. to induce them to turn their arms against the Mohammedan princes of Western Asia, their direct foes. To convert these pagan hordes to the Christian faith, and to conquer with the word where the sword was found to be impotent, was a project mooted at the same time. It kindled the zeal and fired the ambition of the two mendicant orders which had been founded about half a century before this time with the special object of carrying the light of the gospel to heathen nations.* It was at the first Council of Lyons, in 1245, that In- nocent IY. decreed to send missionaries to the Tartars, who then accounted China but a simple province of their vast empire. The Dominicans and Franciscans obeyed the invitation made to them with alacrity, and those who obtained per- mission to devote themselves to the perilous enter- prise were objects of envy to their brethren, who beheld them depart kissing their credentials as the certain pledges of martyrdom. Leaving the Dominicans for the present, who f Waddingus, Annales Minorum, vol. i. p. 641. FRANCISCAN MISSIONARIES. 51 ventured into the midst of the Mongolian bands encamped at the mouth of the Volga, let us follow the Franciscans. Of all who were present at the installation of the Mongolian emperor Gayouk (or Couyouc), none in that magnificent scene created more attention than two simple European monks; these were Jean de Plan Carpin and Benoit, who after a long and painful journey had arrived thus far on their mission. They left home in 1247, and traversed Bohemia, Silesia, and Poland. At Lencinsk, they learned that it would be necessary to carry presents to the chiefs of the Mongols, if they wished to succeed in their errand. As they subsisted on alms, and had no goods of their own, Duke Conrad, his wife, the Bishop of Lencinsk, and several Polish nobles, gave them peltries to make use of as presents. From Kiew, in six days they reached the out- posts of the Mongols on the banks of the Dneiper ; but as there was no one there who could read the Latin letters with which they had been charged, the officer in command sent them to the court of Batou, situated on the Volga, where they arrived, after having rode at full speed for nine-and-thirty days, changing horses four or five times a-day. By a judicious disposal of their presents, and 52 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. having stated the object of their journey, they were admitted to an audience with Prince Batou. But first they had to pass through two fires, to destroy any malign influences they might have brought with them. Two lances erected by these fires supported a stretched cord, from which depended several pieces of rags ; and beneath this cord, to be purified, had to pass men, beasts, and goods ; two females, one on each side, sprinkled them with water at the same time, and recited certain words. The missionaries had then to bend the left knee three times before the tent of the prince, and were charged to be careful not to tread on the threshold. Batou was seated on a raised platform, with one of his wives by his side. His family and principal officers occupied a bench in the centre of the pavilion, and behind these, seated on the ground, persons of inferior rank ; the men on the right, the women on the left. In addressing the prince, the monks had to fall upon their knees. Having delivered their letters, they asked that they might be interpreted. They were placed on the left of the prince, and on the right were placed the ambassadors from the court of the grand khan. The tent, which was large and of fine linen, had been taken from the king COURT OF PRINCE BATOU. 53 of Hungary. Here they saw a table covered with gold and silver cups, filled with various beverages ; every time that Batou drank, songs and instrumental music were heard. The letters, which after a few days were translated into the Mongol, Russian, and Arabian languages, con- tained an explanation of the leading dogmas of Christianity, commended the monks to the pro- tection of the khan, exhorted him no longer to shed the blood of Christians, and inquired very innocently, why the Tartars were excited to destroy other nations, and what they intended doing for the future. By Batou, the envoys of the pope were sent in charge of two Tartars to the great khan. “We parted,” says Carpin,* “ with tears in our eyes, thinking that we were going to die ; for we were so weak that we could scarcely sit on horseback. During the whole of Lent we had nothing to eat but millet boiled in water with salt, and nothing to drink but melted snow.” With all the haste they could make it was five months after they had entered the Mongolian ter- ritory before they stood under the yellow tent of * Vincentii Specul. Hist. lib. xxxi. cap. 23. 54 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. the Son of Heaven, which happened a few days after his elevation to the throne. The princes and nobles, who were admitted to an audience with Couyouc, at the same time, brought rich presents of stuffs of gold and silver. The poor monks when asked what they had brought from their master the pope replied, that they had brought nothing. They received an answer to the pope’s letter however, and after another audience with the empress mother, who gave to each of them a fox skin pelisse with the fur inside, they took their leave of the imperial court, and reached the sovereign pontiff in the following year, 1247. The nature of the answers given to the pope’s letters is unknown ; but it has been conjectured, that as the great khan regarded himself the greatest sovereign on the earth and all its princes as his vassals, the Mongolian missive in reply was not unlike the verbal one given to an ambassador, as reported by the Constable of Armenia in a letter to the king of Cyprus. “ Know also,” says the constable, “that our lord the pope sent an ambassador to the said khan, asking him whether he was a Christian, and why he sent the people of his nation to tread under foot and destroy the universe ? To which the khan replied, That THE DOMINICANS AND BROTHER ANSELM. 55 God had ordered his ancestors and himself to send forth his people to destroy the wicked nations. But as to the question whether he was a Christian he replied, God only knows, and if the pope wishes to know he has only to come and learn.” The Dominican Anselm of Lombardy with three companions reached, in 1247, the camp of Baid- jou, the Tartar general in Persia, with a letter from the pope, exhorting the Tartars not to renew their ravages in Christian countries, and to repent of the crimes they had committed. The Dominicans were, no doubt, better Christians than diplomatists, and wasted a deal of time in wrang- ling with the officers of Baidjou as to the relative merits and dignity of the pope and the khan, each party having it, that theirs was the greatest master, Brother Anselm winding up one of these debates by saying, “ Our lord the pope is above all other men, because God has granted to St. Peter and his successors authority over the church universal, to the end of time.” Every time the officers went into the tent of Baidjou to carry the words of the monks and to receive his com- mands, they had to change their vestments — a ceremony which, added to the haughtiness and obstinacy of the brethren, was not at all calculated £6 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. to mollify the Tartar temper. Every day for more than nine weeks, they resorted to head- quarters, where they remained for several hours exposed to the heat of the sun, expecting from Baidjou an answer to the pope’s letter. Father Simon, one of Anselm’s companions, records : “The missionaries were regarded by these Tar- tars as wretches unworthy of a reply, and even as dogs ; it was thus that Baidjou exercised his resentment against the brethren, who had offended him by their frankness. In his rao;e he was about to put them to death, and thrice he gave the order.” At length they received the general’s answer, and had leave to depart. In what favour they stood in his eyes may be gathered from the terms of his letter, which is worth transcribing: — “By the order of the divine Khan, Baidjou noyan addresses to thee these words : Know, 0 Pope ! that thy envoys have come to us bearing thy letters. Thy envoys have spoken high words ; we know not whether thou hast ordered them to speak in this manner, or whether they speak of themselves. Thy letters among others have these words : You slay , and destroy many men ; but behold the commandment of God and the order TARTAR MISSIVE TO THE POPE. 57 that has been given to us by him who is the master of all the earth : Whosoever shall obey us, remains in possession of his land, his water , and his patrimony, and yields his strength to the master of all the earth; but whosoever resists him shall be destroyed. We transmit this order, by virtue of which, if thou hast a wish to preserve thy land, thy water, and thy patrimony, thou must appear before us in person, Pope, and then thou must present thyself before him who is master of all the earth. And if thou dost not obey the command- ment of God, and of him who rules upon earth, we know not what shall be done to thee — God only knows. Send thy messengers to announce to us whether thou wilt come or not, if thou hast a wish to be our friend or not ; and send promptly thy response to this order, which we send by Aybeg and Sargis. Done in the district of Sitiens, the 20th of July.” Brother Anselm and his companions, whose boldness after all probably saved them from the bow-string, remained nearly a year in Persia, and returned to the court of the pope after an absence of three years and seven months. 58 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. CHAPTER V Couyouc Khan and his Christian Ministers. — King Louis caught by Tartars. — Another Embassy. — Rubruquis. — A royal Audience.— The Khan a little gone. — The Empress tipsy. — Devilled Blade-bones. — Rubruquis returns to Europe. These missions, though destitute of the splendid results anticipated by the zealous mendicants, were not without their uses. Ground had been broken ; a way had been opened into Tartary, and the judicious diplomacy of the Franciscans, compared with the polemical bearing of the Do- minicans, found them favour at the court of the emperor. Couyouc Khan, who indulged rather too freely in the pleasures of the cup and the harem, abandoned the care of public affairs to his two ministers, Cadac and Tchingcai, both Chris- tians. Cadac had inspired the grim Tartar with respect for the religion he professed. The parti- cular attention which Christians found at his court attracted a great number of monks from Asia Minor, Syria, from Bagdad and Russia. KING LOUIS. 59 They acquired so much the more influence, as the physicians of the khan were of the same re- ligion. Carpin saw before his tent a Christian chapel, wherein service was performed daily ; and says, that Couyouc salaried several Christian priests, which made him think that he intended to become a convert. Two years after his death, which happened in 1248, an ambassador from St. Louis of France arrived at the court of his widow. Two witty Tartar messengers, David and Mark, had brought the king a letter from a Tartar general, full of flatteries and plausibilities, and promising him the khan’s assistance against the Mohammedans the following spring. The letter might have been indited by some liberal spirit of the nineteenth century, so tolerant was it of Latins, Greeks, Armenians, and Nestorians. It stated farther that the khan and his court had been baptized into the true faith, and henceforth were to be the king’s allies. Louis and his court received the messengers with joy, and entertained them without suspicion. It was resolved that an embassy should be sent to the khan ; and David having insinuated that the most precious gift for the Mongol emperor would be a chapel in the form of a tent, one was prepared of stuff of scarlet CO THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. embroidered with gold, and furnished with books, chalices, and all the other necessary ornaments re- quired in performing the sacred mysteries. The embassy consisted of three Dominicans, the chief of whom was Andre de Lonjumel. They reached Tartary through Transoxiana, and were well re- ceived at court ; but the result of the mission did not answer the hopes of Louis, who was busy forti- fying Caesarea, when Lonjumel and his companions returned. The Mongolian court simply looked upon the presents which had been brought in the light of an act of fealty on the part of the king of France ; and the answer returned was the cus- tomary one — to obey, pay tribute, and to come in person to court to render homage to the chief of the Mongol empire. Louis, however, whose ears were always open to every tale having for its burden conversions among the Pagans, and who was ready to adopt any measures to extend the faith, once more despatched a mission to the East. During his sojourn in Palestine, having heard from certain Nestorian Christians just arrived from Tartary, that Sartac, eldest son of that Batou who had rather alarmed Carpin and his companions, had become Christian, he judged that missionaries RUBRUQUIS. 61 might be despatched to propagate the faith among the Tartars, under the protection of that prince, and gave a Cordelier, named William of Ru- bruquis, letters of recommendation to Sartac, and asking his permission for the monk to remain in Tartary to preach the gospel. Rubruquis departed in 1253, and after tra- velling two months reached the camp of Sartac, two days’ journey beyond the Volga. From the time of leaving Soudac in the Crimea, “ we never slept in a house,” writes the Cordelier, “nor in a tent, but always in the air or under our carriages ; and during the whole of the way we found no village or vestige of buildings, but tombs of the Comans in great numbers.” Rubruquis with his companions were intro- duced to the commander in great state, — he in his canonicals, with Bible and Psalter, cross and censer. Sartac was simply civil, and told them that they must have his father’s permission to tarry in the country, to whose court he would send them. William quietly observes, that though Sartac was attended by Nestorian priests he was no great Christian. “ It seems to me rather,” he says, tf that he mocks the Christians and despises them.” Perhaps the poor Cordelier measured his 62 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. Christianity by his hospitality. During the four days that he and his companions remained at his court they had nothing to eat or drink but once ; and what they had given them was only a little coumiz, or sour mare’s milk. From the son the missionaries had to proceed to the father, who received them, upon the whole, cordially; and who, after hearing their message from King Louis, caused them to be seated and to be presented with milk to drink ; it being re- puted a great favour to drink coumiz with him in his own house. Batou, however, had not power to permit them to remain in the country, and it became necessary to proceed to the court of the •Emperor Mangu, to solicit his authority. More than three months were spent upon this journey, during which they had to endure the ex- tremes of hunger and thirst, cold and weariness. They traversed the vast plain which formed the territory of the Kankalis before the Mongol con- quest, then Turkistan, the country of the Oui- gours, and that of the Naimans, and arrived on the 27th December, 1253, at the court of the great khan, then some days’ journey south of Karaku- rum. After a week’s delay they were introduced to Mangu with much ceremony. The gossiping A ROYAL AUDIENCE. 63 Cordelier gives an interesting account of his re- ception, and of the khan and his court. “ The felt which was before the door of his palace being raised, we entered,” he says; “and as Christmas was not yet over we began to chant the hymn A solis ortus, &c., which when we had ended he sent to have us searched, to see whether we had knives concealed about us, and constrained even our interpreter to leave his girdle and knife in charge of the porter. At the entrance of this place there was a bench, and above it coumiz, and near to this they placed our interpreter standing, and us they made sit down upon the bench oppo- site the ladies. This place was all hung with cloth of gold : in the centre there was a chafing- dish, with a fire made of thorns and roots of wormwood, which grows here in great abund- ance ; and this fire was lit with bullocks’ dung*. “ The great khan was seated upon a small couch clothed with a rich fur robe, glossy as the skin of a seal. He was a man of middle height, with a nose a little flat and compressed, and about forty- five years of age. His wife, who was young and pretty, was seated near him, with one of her daughters, named Cyrina, about to be married, and tolerably ugly. Several little children were 64 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. resting upon a couch close by. The khan asked us what we would have to drink — whether wine, or terasine , which is a beverage made of rice, or cara coumiz , which is pure cow’s milk, or ball, which is made of honey ; for in winter they use these four sorts of drinks. To this I replied, that we were not people greatly given to drink ; but that at the same time we should be contented with what his Grandeur pleased to give us of the terasine , made of rice, which was as clear and sweet as white wine, and of which we tasted a little to obey him. But our interpreter, to our great displeasure, was so drowsy with what he had taken to drink, that he made all sorts of blunders. After this the khan had several kinds of birds of prey brought to him, which he placed on his wrist, considering them much for a long time. Then he commanded us to speak. He had for his interpreter a Nestorian, and we had ours badly incommoded with wine, as I have said. “We being then upon our knees I said to him that we gave thanks to God, who had led us thus far to see and salute the great Mangu Khan, to whom God had given such great power upon the earth ; that we supplicated also the same goodness through our Lord Jesus Christ, in whom we live and die, that it would please him to give his A ROYAL AUDIENCE. 65 Majesty a long and happy life, which was all they desired. I added to this, that we had heard say in our country that Sartac was a Christian, at which all Christians were greatly rejoiced, and especially the king of France, who had sent us to him on that account, with letters of peace and friendship, in order to bear witness what kind of people we were, and that he wished us to be per- mitted to stay in his country, inasmuch as we were obliged by the statutes of our order to teach men how they are to live according to the law of God, and to pray for him and for his wives and children ; that we had neither gold, nor silver, nor precious stones, but only our services and prayers, which we would make continually to God for him. We begged that he would, at least, permit us to stay until the rigours of winter were past, because we were tired and sore with our long travel, and because it was impossible to set out immediately on a journey without running our lives in danger.” After some more to the same effect the khan opened his mouth and spake : the narrative here is uncommonly naive. “ To all this,” says Ru- bruquis, “ the khan replied to us, that where- soever the sun extended his rays, there his power F 68 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. and the power of Batou extended; and that with our gold and silver he had nothing to do. Thus far only I understood our interpreter ; as to the rest I understood nothing at all, seeing that he was very drunk : and in my opinion Mangu himself was un peu charge , — a little gone. After this he made us sit down, and after a little space we retired with the secretaries. As we were on the point of returning to our lodgings came the interpreter, who said to us, that Mangu had pity upon us, and gave us two months to tarry there until the cold was gone ; and he mentioned also, that not far from there, there was a town called Karakurum, where, if we liked to go, we should be provided with everything we stood in need of ; but if we preferred rather to stay where we were, we should likewise have all things need- ful ; but that we should be put to great trouble in following the court about everywhere.” Mangu, like his great predecessor Ghengis Khan, was, in religious matters, extremely tole- raut, and with his family assisted equally in the religious ceremonies of the Christians, the Moham- medans, and the Buddhists. But all he knew of Christianity was its exterior rites, such as incense- burning, the adoration of the cross, and blessing THE EMPRESS TIPSY. 67 the cup. His patronage was dispensed with singular impartiality, to all appearance. Besides Cames or magicians, he entertained priests of the three religions ; but there was an alloyed motive in this : he hoped thereby to earn their collective blessings and to avoid their curses. Bubruquis accuses the Nestorian priests he found at court, of ignorance, superstition, and of being addicted to wine ; but perhaps there is some prejudice in his statement. Once during Epiphany he entered their chapel, when the emperor and empress were present, and where the service, if it was conducted in orthodox fashion, must have been highly edifying to the brethren. He and his companion were desired by the emperor to sing, and they began chanting the Veni, sancte Spiritus ; but the emperor did not tarry long, probably having no ear for church music. The empress, however, remained and made presents to all the Christians. Attendants brought wine, tarasine, and the invariable coumiz. Farther, and it is to be hoped the good Cordelier does not indulge in scandal , — “ The empress took a cup, kneeled, asked a benediction, and whilst she was drinking the priests sang. The latter drank, turn about, and got drunk ; and thus they 68 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. passed the day. Towards evening the empress, being as tipsy as the rest, returned home in her chariot, accompanied by the priests, who did not cease to sing, or rather to howl.” It does not lie within our immediate object, or we might devote some space to details of the su- perstitious usages and religious ceremonies of the Tartar races at this period, supplied by the journals of the Western missionaries.* * Rubruquis gives us an account, for instance, of a new use to which a devilled blade-bone of mutton was applied. “ On Saturday, the eve of Septuagesima, which is the Easter of the Armenians, we went, with the Restorian priests and an Armenian monk, in procession to the palace of Mangu. As we entered, a servant came out carrying several shoulder blades of a sheep, which had been burnt in the fire and were black as charcoal, at which we were greatly astonished ; and asking of them what it meant, they informed us that nothing is undertaken in this country without first consulting the bones. When the khan wishes to undertake any affair, he has three of these bones which have not been in the fire brought him, and holding them in his hands he thinks of the matter he wishes to consult about, whether it may be done or not. Then he sends the bones to be burned, and there are two small places near the palace where the khan sleeps, where they are carefully burned ; and, being well passed through the fire and blackened, they are brought before him, when he examines them curiously, to see that they are entire, and that the heat of the fire has not cracked or broken them, and in that case the affair will prosper ; but if the bones are found to be broken, then the affair must not be undertaken.” RETURN OF RUBRUQUIS. 69 During his residence at court, which extended to five months, Rubruquis saw and learned much, and burned with desire to instruct the Mongols in a purer religion ; but the time had now arrived when he should take his departure for Europe. The khan charged him with letters in answer to those of the king of France. Rubruquis asked, whether after having delivered the letters he might return to care for the Christian souls who were found in that part of Tartary ; but on this subject Mangu gave no answer. He advised him however, to provide well for his long journey, and after making him drink, whether of wine or coumiz is not stated, he dismissed him. “ I took my conge of him,” he says, with much simplicity, “ thinking that, if it had pleased God to grant me grace to perform the miracles that Moses did of old, I should have converted him.”* * Relation du Voyage en Tartarie de Frere Guillaume de Rubruquis. Paris, 1634. 70 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. CHAPTER VI. Coublai Khan. — John of Mount Corvin, — Arrival in China. — His Letters. — Complains of the Nestorians. — Builds a Church. — Baptizes. — King George in Canonicals. —The nearest Road to China. — Turns Artist. — Church Music. — His Notices of China. — The Characteristics of his Mission. — Made Archbishop of Kambalu. — Assistance arrives from Europe. — Toleration. — Tartar Impostors. — Royal Compliments to Royalty. — The Alans. — Another Gap. It was nearly a quarter of a century after the return of Rubruquis from Tart ary, before an- other mission was sent from Europe in that direction. Pope John XXI., having heard, from two Georgians who appeared at his court in 1277 as envoys from Khan Abaca, that the emperor Coublai, who succeeded Mangu, had been baptized and instructed in the Christian religion, and that he ardently desired missionaries to come and preach the gospel to his subjects, made choice of several ecclesiastics to proceed to Tartary; but his death suspended their de- parture. The following year, Nicholas III., his JOHN OF MOUNT COR YIN. 71 successor, charged five Franciscans to propagate Christianity among the Mongols and Chinese, and gave them letters to Abaca and Coublai. But the most important mission of all was that sent forth under the conduct of John of Mount Corvin, by Nicholas IV., in 1289. This zealous Franciscan had already been labouring for ten years in the heart of Asia, among the Mongols, and was in many respects well qualified for the task. The envoys of Argoun, the Mongol khan of Persia, had assured the pope that Coublai stood well affected towards the Christian religion, and had demanded in his name the sending out of missionaries to China. To this prince, then, the pope sent letters by John of Mount Corvin, in which he testified the joy he felt in knowing of his good disposition towards the Christians, and recommended to his protection the eccle- siastics he sent to his court. Coublai Khan was the most intelligent sove- reign who had sat upon the Mongol throne since the days of the great Genghis. Unlike his predecessors, he did not regard religion with indifference ; but, on the contrary, was a sincere Buddhist, respecting, nevertheless, the religion of the Christians and Mussulmans, his subjects. 72 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. He was the patron of learning, had founded an academy of literati and schools for the education of youth; and, at the same time, carried out many reforms calculated to soften the ferocious character of his nobles and elevate the condition of his Tartar subjects. It is not, therefore, at all improbable that he desired the presence of European ministers of religion to assist in the work of civilisation. John of Mount Corvin went through Persia, and then entered India, where he tarried thirteen months, residing near the church of St. Thomas the apostle, as he informs us. In 1293 he reached China, and entered Kambalu* where Coublai then held his court. Two letters which he wrote from China still exist. f As they are not with- out interest, and as their authenticity has never been called in question, they may well find a place here. The first, as it would appear from a passage in the second, was addressed to the vicar * Khan-balik, that is, the city of the Khan, the modern Pekin. In winter, Coublai lived in a city founded near the ancient capital of Kin, called Ta-tou, the grand resi- dence. Pe-kin means the northern court, but its true name is Chun-tien-fou. f Waddingii Annal. Minor, vol. vi. p. 69. COMPLAINT OF THE NESTORIANS. 73 of the Minor friars in the province of Gazaria ; that is, in the Crimea. It commences: “ I, Father John, of Monte Corvino, of the order of Minor brothers, went from Tauris, the city of the Persians, to India, in the year 1291, where I remained for thirteen months near the church of the apostle St. Thomas, with my companion, Father Nicholas of Pistorio, of the order of Predicants, who there died and was buried. From thence I came into Cathay, the kingdom of the emperor of the Tartars, who is called the Great Khan, to whom I delivered the pope’s letters and whom I endea- voured to bring over to the Catholic faith. But he is too immersed in idolatry, although he shows many favours to the Christians. I have now been two years at his court. ef In this country the Nestorians, who assume the title Christians, but who have strayed from the Christian doctrine, have so much influence that they will not permit Christians of any other persuasion ( alterius ritus ) to have a small ora- tory or to teach any other than the Nestorian doctrines. As no apostle nor disciple of the apostles has ever penetrated these regions, the Nestorians for this reason have excited perse- 74 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON.- cutions against me, asserting that I have not been sent by the pope, but that I am a spy and a traitor, and, farther, that an ambassador was indeed sent to the emperor with a large treasure, but that he was robbed and murdered by me in India. These machinations lasted about five years ; so that I had frequently to appear with shame and fear of death before the tribunals. At last, through God’s goodness, from the con- fession of one of them, the emperor discovered my innocence and the guilt of my accusers, who, with their wives and children, were sent into banish- ment. “ Meanwhile I was eleven long years quite alone in this pilgrimage, without a companion; until within the last two years, when Arnold, a Ger- man from the province of Cologne, came unto me. I have built a church in the city Cambaliech (Kambalu), the chief residence of the king, which I finished six years ago, with a tower, in which I have placed three bells. I estimate that up to the present time I have baptized about six thousand persons ; and if the above-mentioned accusations had not been brought against me, I should probably have baptized above thirty thou- sand, because I am always busy baptizing. I have bought successively a hundred and fifty boys, KING GEORGE IN CANONICALS. 75 the sons of heathens, from seven to eleven years of age, and who yet know no religion. These I have baptized and instructed in Latin and Greek letters and our service. I have written thirty psalters for them and two breviaries ; so that eleven of these youths already know our offices, and chant, as is done in our convents, whether I am present or not. Several of them write psalters, or anything else that is needful. Our lord the emperor, also, takes a pleasure in hearing them sing. I ring the bells at the proper hours, and perform the service with the children and others who have been instructed. We sing only, however, according to custom, because we have no office ( notatum officium) provided with notes. “A certain king in these regions, George, of the sect of the Nestorians, who belongs to the family of the great king who was called Prester John, attached himself to me the first year that I was here, and, after he had been convinced by me of the truth of the Catholic faith, was received into the Ordines Minores and stood by me in royal vestments while I said mass. Some Nestorians have accused him of defection, but he has brought a great portion of his people to the true Catholic faith, and with royal magnificence has built a fine church to the honour of our God, the Holy 76 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. Trinity, and the pope, naming it the Romish Church. This king George fell asleep in the Lord, a Christian, six years ago, leaving a son and successor, who is now nine years of age. His brothers, attached to the errors of the Nestorians, were all converted by him, but since the king’s death have determined to return to the old sect. “ When I was alone and could not leave the emperor I was unable to reach the church, which is twenty days’ journey from this. If, however, some good helpers and fellow-labourers should come over, I have hope in the Lord that the whole may be converted ; because I still possess the privilege of the above-mentioned deceased king George. I say once more, that if calumnies had not arisen respecting us both the fruits of my labours would have been greater. If I had had only two or three fellow-labourers, the emperor- khan would willingly have been baptized. I pray, therefore, that such brethren may come over who desire to set an example, and who do not seek to magnify their own glory ( non suas Jimbras magnijicare). “ Respecting the way, I may mention that the shortest and safest way is through the country of the Goths, and of the emperor of the northern Tartars, so that one can come THE NEAREST ROAD TO CHINA. 77 over with the messengers within five or six months. But there is another long and dan- gerous way, on which we must twice take shipping, — the first time as far as from Achon ( St . Jean d'Acre ?) to Provence, the second time as far as from Achon to England. It may happen that two years may be consumed in this way. But, on account of wars, the first way has not been used for a long time. Hence it is now over twelve years since I have received any accounts respecting the Boman see, our order, and the state of the West. It is now two years past since a certain Lombardian physician and chi- rurgeon was here, who blackened with all sorts of incredible calumnies the Boman see, our order, and the state of the West, on which account I the more desire to know the truth. “ I pray the brethren who may receive this letter, to do their best to make the contents known to the holy pope, to the cardinals, and to the procurators of our order in the Boman see. I humbly beg of the general of our order a copy of an Antiphonarium , the Legenda Sanctorum , a Graduate , and Psalter with notes , because I have only a portable Breviary and a small Missal. If I had a copy the youths would transcribe it. I am now busy building a second church, in order 78 THE CROSS AND THE DRAGON. to be able to distribute the youths in different places. “ I am now become old and grey, more through toil and labour than through age, since I am only eight-and-fifty years. I know the Tartar language and letters sufficiently, and have already translated into it the New Testa- ment and Psalms, which I had then copied over in their fairest characters. I write and read, and openly preach the testimony of the religion of Christ. Farther, with the aforesaid king George I had agreed to translate the entire Latin office, that it might be sung throughout the whole land ; and while he lived I performed mass in his church according to the Latin rite, and read in that language the words of the Canon as well as the preface. The king’s son, also, is named John, after me, and I hope in the Lord that he will follow the footsteps of his father. According to what I have heard and seen, I believe that no prince or king in the world can be compared with the khan in extent of dominions, in multitude of people, and in greatness of riches.