Chinese Freemasonry.

from Ms orig inal doctrine . Officially he held position as the Treasurer of the ancient Chow dynasty , and he must have been an old man when Kung-fu-tsze saw him , and was led to make the complimentary remark I have used as the motto of this paper . In his capacity of Treasurer , particularly among a literary nation like the Chinese , he had probably charge of , and , at any rate , access to ,

the records of the preceding reigns and dynasties , for the object Confucius had in conferring with him was to learn everything he might about the observances and ceremonies connected with antiquity . It was a laudable ambition , and met on the part of Lau-Tsze with the greatest frankness . " Those , " said Lau-Tsze , " whom you talk about are dead , and their bones are mouldered to dust ; onl y their words remain . When the superior man gets his opportunity , he mounts

aloft ; but when the time is against him , he moves as if his feet were entangled . I have heard that a good merchant , though he has rich treasures deeply stored , appears as if he were poor , and that the superior man , whose virtue is complete , is yet , to outward seeming , stupid . Put away your proud air and many desires , your insinuating habits and wild will . Those are of no advantage to you . This is what I have to tell you . " It is quite clear to any one reading the account ^ of the conference of two

such earnest men—one very advanced in years , and the other full of enthusiastic desire to reclaim his countrymen—that a great juncture had arisen in the morals of the people , and that the junior , subsequently destined to , immortal fame , sought the senior from no common motive . That Lau-Tsze was the teacher and the restrainer in this instance seems sufficiently clear . We seem to see a touch of Talleyrand in this Oriental mode of enforcing the maxim : Sur toutpoint de zele . It was evidentthereforethat there was knowledge worth

, , , seeking with the Old Philosopher—the man whose position , as Guardian of the Imperial Treasury of the Brother of the Sun and Moon , placed him . above and beyond criticism . The question in hand now is , first , what did this great official teach ; next did he teach it of himself , or was he the head of a great moral secret society , similar to our Freemasonry ? We know from every document obtained from China how exclusively merit was the passport to great rank

and to privilege , and under the Chow dynasty history notes continual promotions from the ranks . As to Confucius , his family was ancient and respectable , and , therefore , his conference with Lau-Tsze was by no means out of the way . But to a great officer of the Empire , or Middle Kingdom , it was alone likel y that so remarkable a function as that of Grand Master would be entrusted .

It is , however , very likely that Lau-Tsze was practically the reformer of ancient beliefs on morality , as twelve centuries later the Muhammad was the Periclyte or Reformer of the elder Arabians . But the influence of Lau-Tsze was great upon Kung-fu-tsze , and the joint influence of teacher and pupil at any rate left a large body of moral philosophy for the literati to examine and study . Before we enter upon an examination of the Tau Teh Xingin which the

, doctrines of Lau-Tsze are contained , it may be convenient to say that four secret societies , in addition to the Triad Society , exist in China ( as shown in my Royal Masonic Cyclopaedia , p . 679 ) , viz ., the Thian-ti-we , or Union of Heaven ancl Earth , the doctrines of which enforce the equality of mankind and the dut y of the rich to share superfluities with the poor ; the Pe-llan-Kiao , or Society of the Lotus , introduced from Hindustan at a very remote era , and similar to the

Society of the Seven Brethren ; the Thicm-le , or Society of Celestial Reason , rationalistic and destructive ; and the Thiaii-ko-pe , or Society of the White Waterlily , a purely political society . With these societies in the rest of this paper we shall have nothing to do . The first point of contact between the teachings of Lau-tsze and the teachings of Freemasonry , particularly when we remember the era ( B . C . 600 ) of the writer , is sufficiently remarkable as to arrest the attention of the most superficial H 2