INTRODUCTION.

framer of the UniverseOriginal: "Kosmos," the Greek term for the world seen as an ordered, harmonious system.. This Mind or second God is he whom “the generations of men take for the First, they looking up no higher than to the immediate architect of the world.”¹ This idea of an animated Universe is confessedly taken from Man. Ralph Cudworth, whose work is cited here, was a 17th-century philosopher who compared Western and Eastern thought. Plotinus, for instance, thus states the opinion of the ancient philosophers on this point: “It is absurd to affirm that Heaven (or the World) is inanimate or devoid of life and soul, when we ourselves, who have but a part of the mundane body in us are endued with soul. For, how could a part have life and soul in it, the whole being dead and inanimate?”²

The Confucian system as given in the text of the Classics, is precisely similar to this. In the Yih King The I Ching or Book of Changes, an ancient manual of divination and philosophy., the great authority on CosmogonyThe branch of science or philosophy dealing with the origin of the universe., and the oldest Chinese book in existence, the Universe or “Heaven” is declared to be a Great Man, and its eight portions The Eight Trigrams, or Bagua, which represent the fundamental principles of reality. are stated to correspond to eight parts of the human body; for example: Khëen (Heaven) is the head; Khwăn (Earth) is the bowels and womb; Ching (Thunder) is the feet; Seuen (Wind) is the thighs; Kan (Water) is the ears; Le (Fire) is the eyes; Kăn (Mountain) is the hands; and Tuy (Lake) is the mouth.”³

Man, according to the Confucianists, is a compound of Mind and Body, Mind being the Ruler; secondly, the body they regard as twofold, the head being the superior portion, and the feet and lower part the inferior portion; thirdly, the Mind or Soul is also twofold, partly Rational (hún; the spiritual soul) and partly Irrational or Sentient (pò; the physical soul), the former ruling chiefly in the head and upper portion of the body, yet pervading the whole being. Lastly, inherent in this Mind is the Divine Reason, which “makes Mind to be Mind.” Mind is pure ether, while the sentient portion of this soul is grosser Air; and the Divine Reason is designated the First God (zhì shén; the Supreme Divinity); the “God who adorns all things” (of the Yih King) and unites with the Rational Soul, the subtle Ether, which is therefore styled God (shén; spirit or deity); and this latter, in the Universe, is the second God or “Mind” or Shang-te “the Supreme Emperor;” the DemiurgicA term from Greek philosophy referring to an artisan-like figure responsible for fashioning and maintaining the physical universe. Ruler and framer of all things. All this is transferred from Man to the Universe which is designated “Heaven,” and is declared to be a “Great Man,” while Man is regarded as “a little Heaven.”

1. Cudworth, vol. i, 484.     2. Ibid. vol. ii, 176.
3. Book iv., chapter ix.