The first book that is put into the hands of the young scholar is called the Three Word Classic, because it is written in stanzas of three words each. It would naturally be supposed that this book was of the simplest and most elementary character, and suited for the immature minds and brains of the lads who are called upon to study it. In the West this would certainly have been the case, but the East, with its metaphysical trend of thought and tendency to mysticism, refuses to consider that it has to come down to the level of the young who are just beginning their studies, and whose minds can grasp only the commonest and the most everyday thoughts.

The result is there is not to-day a single child’s book in China, and no fairy stories for children, and no household rhymes that can be bought at the booksellers, and put into the hands of the little ones in the nursery. The books in this land are for grown-up men, and demand thought and study and ponderous commentaries in order to be understood; and yet it is these very same that are put into the hands of a youth of tender years when he begins to grapple with this gigantic system of mystic pictures that contain the thoughts and passions and feelings of the Chinese race.

The Three Word Classic is a very admirable instance of the beau ideal kind of book that the educationist of this land puts into the hands of a boy, say, of eight or nine years of age. It begins by saying—

“Man at birth,
His Nature’s virtuous,
All natures alike,
Vary by experience.
Formerly Mencius’ mother
Chose her locality,
Son refused study
She severed web,” etc.

The meaning of this passage when put into a little more diffuse language is that when a child is born his heart is naturally good and inclined to virtue. All children in fact come into the world with natures very much like each other, and that it is only as they grow up and come under the influence of surrounding circumstances that they do not all turn out good. It is not men’s natures that are corrupt, but it is the influence of evil companions and bad training that lead so many astray, and prevent men from following the bent that is in every man’s mind towards virtue.

To illustrate this, the case of the great philosopher Mencius is described with some minuteness. It appears that he had a mother who was a woman of great force of character. She was determined that her son should grow up to be a great man, but in order to secure this it was essential that his surroundings should be such as would be helpful to the carrying out of this ambition of the mother’s heart. Three times did she remove from the localities she had chosen for her home, because the neighbours were not up to the moral standard that would qualify them to be proper examples for her son.

At length having found the home that satisfied her, she discovered to her sorrow that Mencius was not inclined to work up to her ideal. He was a high-spirited lad and full of animal spirits, and preferred to be flying kites or spinning tops, or tossing the shuttlecock from one to another with the side of his shoe, to serious study with his books. She was a brave woman was this mother of the future philosopher. She was quite alone in the world, for her husband was dead and her relatives lived far away, and her only source of livelihood was the loom on which she wove the webs that she disposed of in the nearest market town.

At length the crisis came. One day she had been begging and entreating her son to be a good boy and give his heart to his studies. He did not seem moved, however, by her passionate appeals, and in her agony of spirit, and feeling that life had no charm for her, she grasped a knife that lay by and began to cut and mangle the web she was weaving. Mencius was so horrified at this proceeding of his mother, and so cut to the heart that his conduct should have driven her to such an act of despair, that with tears in his eyes he promised that he would never trouble her again with any misconduct of his. From that day he was completely changed. With heart and soul he entered into his studies. He became a distinguished scholar, and finally produced works that have moulded and influenced the thinkers of this nation from his own times (B.C. 372-289) down to the present.

Other examples are given in this famous school-book of men who, desiring to conform to the high principles that lie embedded in the soul of every child at birth, have fought manfully against external circumstances and have come out successful in the end. It is told of one man who subsequently became very distinguished, that when he was a young man he was so poor that he had no money to buy oil with which to study after dark. So determined, however, was he that his evenings should not be wasted, that he hit upon the ingenious plan of catching a number of fireflies, and from the light they threw out he kept up his reading as late into the night as he desired. Another man equally poor used to take his book out on a winter’s night, and by the lights of the snow that fell on it pursue his studies after all the rest of the family were buried in slumber.

The next book that follows hard upon the Three Word Classic is the Classic on Filial Piety, a book that was written by the great sage Confucius, and is a voluminous disquisition upon the duties and virtues of honouring one’s parents. There is no doubt but that the profound respect that the Chinese have for the doctrine of filial piety has been fostered in the nation by this work having been for so many centuries the school-book of the children in all the schools throughout the length and breadth of the land.