O Thou, who man of baser earth didst make,
And didst with Paradise devise the snake,
For all the sin wherewith the face of man
Is blackened, man’s forgiveness give and take.
“Such is this wonderfully rich, poetic Wen Li, while in Pai Hua (the vernacular) this same thought would cover pages of dull, colorless prose.” Of course, the spoken language is still as poor a vehicle for poetic thought as Italian was before Dante, but its advocates hope for its growth and development.
[11] “Travels of Marco Polo”, Everyman Edition, Dutton and Company, page 186.
[12] The Chinese woman must as a child obey her father, as a wife her husband, and as a widow her son. The four wifely virtues are: (1) to honor and serve her mother-in-law; (2) to respect her husband; (3) to live in peace with her sisters-in-law; and (4) to have pity on the poor.
[13] See [Bibliography].
[14] The Chinese name for the instrument is chin. Chinese writers on music have set down seven conditions under which one should not play the instrument: when one has just heard the news of a death; when some one is playing the flute in the vicinity; when one is oppressed by business cares; when one has not purified his body; when one is not wearing the ceremonial cap and gown; when one has not lighted sweet-smelling incense; and when there is not present a friend who understands music. Chancellor Tsai Yuan-pei, until 1923 the head of the National University in Peking, was a believer in training in æsthetics, and considered a proper appreciation of the music of the chin a most desirable element in the mental equipment of a cultured man.
[15] Giles, “Chinese Literature”, page 155. “A poet should not dot his i’s. The Chinese reader likes to do that for himself, each according to his own fancy. Hence such a poem as the following, often quoted as a model in its own particular line: