Writing later the Emperor Tai Tsong, the author of a book called the Mirror of Gold, repeated these ideas on ancestor worship in the following ordinance (627 to 650 A. D.):
“The foundation of all the virtues is filial piety. It is the first thing to learn and I in my youth have received the right lessons. I have done my best to place at ease all my subjects to the end that the parents might be in a state to bring their children up properly and that infants in their turn might acquit themselves of their duties toward their parents.
“When the virtue of filial piety flourishes, then all other virtues will follow. In order that the Empire may know that such is my desire and that it is nearest to my heart, I now order that there be distributed in my name and my account to all those who are known for their filial piety, five large measures of rice. To those who have passed their eightieth year, two measures; to those of ninety years, three measures; ... Moreover one shall give, commencing with the first moon, to each woman who gives birth to a son, a measure of rice.”
But twice is there mention of human sacrifice in the Chu’un Ts’ew but both references indicate that there was little regard for honour as well as for human life. In the account of the reign of Duke He, who ruled from 658 to 626 B. C., it is said that when the Viscount Tsang went to covenant with the people of Choo, the Viscount was sacrificed as an animal might be sacrificed on an altar built on the banks of the Suy in order that the wild tribes of the East might be frightened and “drawn toward him.”[87]
In the twelfth year of the reign of Duke Ch’aou, who was Marquis of Loo from B. C. 540 to 509, the army of Ts’oo seized Yew (Yin) and sacrificed him on Mount Kang.[88]
Not until the reign of Choen Tche (1633 to 1662 A. D.) was there any movement to check the slaughter of infants. Then it was found that infanticide had desolated so many of the provinces that it was necessary for this Emperor, the founder of the Tsing dynasty, to condemn the crime and warn the inhabitants of Hang Hoi, of Kiang Sou, and of Fou-kien that the practice must stop.
The first official document endeavouring to save the children was dated the second day of the third moon, 1659, and was an appeal to the Emperor by an under-official.
“The Supreme King,” it begins, “loves to give life and to prevent destruction. All men have received from Heaven a pitying heart. But the corruption of morals comes between the father and the child and causes men to be guilty of cruelty. I, your humble subject, have learned that in the provinces of Kiang Nan, Kiang Si, and Fou Kien there exists the barbarous custom of drowning little girls.”
The request of the official for an imperial edict against the practice was approved by Choen Tche, who condemned the murder of female children and ordered the mandarins of the provinces named to use means to check the practice. On the twenty-third day of the third moon in the same year in the presence of his advisers, he issued the following edict: