At the summer examinations of 1893 I submitted to the graduating classes, for a composition theme, the question, "What is eternal in literature?" I expected original answers, as the subject had never been discussed by us, and was certainly new to the pupils, so far as their knowledge of Western thought was concerned. Nearly all the papers proved interesting. I select twenty replies as examples. Most of them immediately preceded a long discussion, but a few were embodied in the text of the essay:—
1. "Truth and Eternity are identical: these make the Full Circle,—in Chinese, Yen-Man."
2. "All that in human life and conduct which is according to the laws of the Universe."
3. "The lives of patriots, and the teachings of those who have given pure maxims to the world."
4. "Filial Piety, and the doctrine of its teachers. Vainly the books of Confucius were burned during the Shin dynasty; they are translated to-day into all the languages of the civilized world."
5. "Ethics, and scientific truth."
6. "Both evil and good are eternal, said a Chinese sage. We should read only that which is good."
7. "The great thoughts and ideas of our ancestors."
8. "For a thousand million centuries truth is truth."
9. "Those ideas of right and wrong upon which all schools of ethics agree."