Was our man a prig at all?  Was he a pedant? have those who have sedulously spread that report of him in the West told the truth about him?  Or—­hath a pleasant little lie or twain served their turn?

Duke Ching went home and thought things over.  He had learned his lesson:  that ting was but a camouflage lion, and by no means the one to strike at, if business was to be done.  He devised a plan, sweet in it simplicity, marvelous in its knowledge of what we are pleased to call ‘human’ nature.  He ransacked his realm for beautiful singing and dancing girls, and sent the best eighty he could find to his dear friend and ally of Lu.  Not to make the thing too pointed, he added a hundred and twenty fine horses—­ with their trappings.  What could be more appropriate than such a gift?

It worked.  Ting retired to his harem, and day after day passed over a Lu unlighted by his countenance.  Government was at a standstill; the great Minister of Crime could get nothing done.  The Annual Sacrifice was at hand; a solemnity Confucius hoped would remind Ting of realities and bring him to his right mind.  According to the ritual, a portion of the offering should be sent to each high official of the state:  none came to Confucius.  Day after day he waited; but Ting’s character was quite gone:  the lion-skin had fallen off, and the native egregious muttonhood or worse stood revealed.—­“Master,” said Tse Lu, “it is time you went.”  But he was very loath to go.  At last he gathered his disciples, and slowly went out from the city.  He lingered much on the way, looking back often, still hoping for sight of the messenger who should recall him.  But none came.  That was in 497.

The old century had ended about the time he took office; and with it, of course, the last quarter in which, as always, the Doors of the Lodge were open, and the spiritual influx pouring into the world.  So the effort of that age had its consummation and fine flower in the three years of his official life:  to be considered a triumph.  Now, Laotse had long since ridden away into the West; the Doors were shut; the tides were no longer flowing; and the God’s great Confucius remained in a world that knew him not.  As for holding office and governing states, he had done all that was necessary.

XI.  CONFUCIUS THE HERO

He had done enough in the way of holding office and governing states.  Laotse had taught that of old time, before Tao was lost, the Yellow Emperor sat on his throne and all the world was governed without knowing it.  Confucius worked out the doctrine thus:  True government is by example; given the true ruler, and he will have the means of ruling at his disposal, and they will be altogether different from physical force.  ‘Example’ does not covey it either:  his thought was much deeper.  There is a word li—­I get all this from Dr. Lionel Giles—­which the egregious