will not be content till with a flirt of his wings and an aspect gravely solemn he has you in fits of laughter again.  His is really a book that belongs to world-literature; as good reading, for us now, as for any ancient Chinaman of them all.  I think he worked more strenuously in the field of sheer intellect—­stirred the thought stuff more—­than most other Chinese thinkers,—­and so is more akin to the Western mind; he carves his cerebrations more definitely, and leaves less to the intuition.  The great lack in him is his failure to appreciate Confucius; and to explain that, before I go further with Butterfly Chwang, I shall take a glance at the times he lived in.

They were out of joint when Confucius came; they were a couple of centuries more so now.  Still more was the Tiger stalking abroad:  there were two or three tigers in particular, among the Great Powers, evidentlv crouching for a spring—­that should settle things.  Time was building the funeral pyre for the Phoenix, and building it of the debris of ruined worlds.  In the early sixth century, the best minds were retiring in disgust to the wilds;—­you remember the anchorite’s rebuke to Tse-Lu.  But now they were all coming from their retirement—­the most active minds, whether the best or not—­to shout their nostrums and make confusion worse confounded.  All sorts of socialisms were in the air, raucously bellowed by would-be reformers.  A “loud barbarian from the south” (as Mencius called him—­I do not know who he was) was proclaiming that property should be abolished, and all goods held in common.  One Yang Chu was yelling universal egoism:  “Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die.”  Against him, one Mo Ti had been preaching universal altruism;—­but I judge, not too sensibly, and without appeal to philosophy or mysticism.  Thought of all kinds was in a ferment, and the world filled with the confused noise of its expression; clear voices were needed, to restate the message of the Teachers of old.

Then Mencius arose to speak for Confucius in this China so much further progressed along the Gadarene road.  A strong and brilliant man, he took the field strongly and brilliantly, and filled the courts of dukes and kings with a roll of Confucian drums.  Confucius, as I have tried to show you, had all Mysticism divinely behind and backing him, though he said little about it; Mencius, I think, had none.  Mencius remade a Confucius of his own, with the mystical elements lacking.  He saw in him only a social reformer and teacher of ethics; and it is the easiest thing in the world to see Confucius only through Mencian spectacles.