It is indeed likely enough that as time goes on certain superannuated features of ancestor-worship, as of other Chinese religious practices, will gradually disappear, but it is probable that this will be due rather to rationalistic pressure than to Christianity. The Chinese are beginning to imbibe Western culture—especially Western science and philosophy—with avidity, and the more they do so the more ready will they be to abandon some of their traditional ideas with regard to demonology, fêng-shui, the burning of paper furniture and money, the worship of the "gods" of Taoism, and many other superstitious beliefs and practices; indeed this lopping off of the rotten branches of the religious life of China began several years ago, and is not likely to cease until there are no more rotten branches left on the tree. But it is a very noteworthy fact that the abandonment of many popular superstitions does not necessarily imply the establishment of Christian dogmas in their place.
A year ago, while travelling in the province of Anhui, I visited a town which had so far abandoned its "heathen" rites that a long row of images had been dragged from their roadside shrines and tossed into the river. Yet I was told by resident European missionaries that their converts had had nothing whatever, directly or indirectly, to do with this proceeding; it had been carried out solely by the young local literati, who had shown themselves as absolutely impervious to the Christian propaganda as they were contemptuous of the puerile superstitions of the masses. But it will be a long time yet before the essential rites and observances connected with the cult of ancestors begin to suffer from the inroads either of Rationalism or of Christianity. Buddhism and Taoism are China's privileged guests, who—unless they speedily adapt themselves to new conditions—may shortly find they have outstayed their welcome; but the cult of ancestors is enthroned in the hearts of the people, and if Christianity is ever to dislodge it, or even find a place by its side, the intruder will be obliged to adopt a less arrogant and less uncompromising attitude than it has assumed hitherto. Dr. A. H. Smith, Dr. Edkins,[310] and other missionaries declare that China must choose between Christianity and ancestor-worship. She made up her mind on the subject in the middle of the eighteenth century, as a result of the controversy between the Jesuits and the Vatican,[311] and there is no indication that she regrets her choice.
It will be remembered that in the controversy alluded to, the Jesuit missionaries, who had hitherto been amazingly successful in their propaganda, strongly advocated the toleration of ancestor-worship on the ground that the rites were merely civil and commemorative, and were not idolatrous. This view, after lengthy disputes, was finally condemned as erroneous, and the cult of ancestors on the part of Christians was prohibited by the Roman pontiff (Benedict XIV.) "without qualification or concession of any kind."[312] The result of this was the collapse of the young and vigorous Roman Church in China. The Chinese Emperor, who had found himself contradicted on Chinese soil by papal edicts, was naturally disinclined to treat the foreign religion and its professors with the tolerance and respect that had hitherto been extended to it.[313] It is interesting to note the Protestant attitude towards the papal decision on this matter. "It is not easy to perceive, perhaps," writes Dr. Wells Williams, "why the Pope and the Dominicans were so much opposed to the worship of ancestral penates among the Chinese when they performed much the same services themselves before the images of Mary, Joseph, Cecilia, Ignatius, and hundreds of other deified mortals."[314]
Evidently the good Doctor could not withstand the temptation to administer a sharp Protestant pin-prick to his Romanist rivals, though "it is not easy to perceive" why he should find fault with the Papists in this respect when missionaries of his own branch of Christianity were (as some still are) equally ready to attempt the cheerless task of reconciling contradictories. They condemn the Chinese for their demonology and superstitious follies, yet many of them are merely substituting Western superstition for Eastern. They expel demons from the bodies of sick men, they report in their journals the occurrence of miracles wrought by the Deity on behalf of their propaganda, they pray for the supersession of the laws of meteorology, they report cases of real devils actually speaking through "idols," they believe in the existence of real witches, and they still teach the "heathen" fabulous stories of the creation of the world and the origin of man.[315]
That missionaries of this class are less numerous than formerly is fortunately true, but their teachings presumably remain the treasured possession of their converts, and if those converts or their descendants ever break out in acts of fanatical bigotry and intolerance, or take to enforcing their beliefs on others, the responsibility will rest with the Mission Boards for sending out Christian teachers whose religious beliefs were of a type that flourished widely in our own land in the age of witch-burning and about the time of Mr. Praise-God Barebones, but which, thanks chiefly to Biblical criticism and the study of comparative mythology and the advance of scientific knowledge, has happily become all but extinct among our educated classes.
But to return to the specific charge brought against Romanists by Dr. Wells Williams—that the Pope and the Dominicans condemned ancestor-worship as idolatrous although they conducted much the same services themselves before the images of the Mater Dei and other deified mortals—this charge is one that has never yet been rebutted in a manner satisfactory to those who are not Romanists.