Things Chinese, Or, Notes Connected with China

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J. Murray, 1926 - China - 766 pages

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Page 3 - It is naught, it is naught, saith the buyer: but when he is gone his way, then he boasteth.
Page 331 - ... the movement of. the progressive societies has hitherto been a movement from Status to Contract.
Page 238 - While a man's father is alive, look at the bent of his will; when his father is dead, look at his conduct. If for three years he does not alter from the way of his father, he may be called filial.
Page 106 - At the end of three days you reach the noble and magnificent city of Kin-sai, a name that signifies "the celestial city," and which it merits from its preeminence to all others in the world, in point of grandeur and beauty, as well as from its abundant delights, which might lead an inhabitant to imagine himself in paradise.
Page 282 - His head became mountains, his breath wind and clouds, and his voice thunder, his limbs were changed into the four poles, his veins into rivers, his sinews into the undulations of the earth's surface, and his flesh into fields, his beard was turned into stars, his skin and hair into herbs and trees! and his teeth, bones and marrow into metals, rocks and precious stones ; his dropping sweat increased to rain...
Page 374 - How do we proceed in hewing an axe-handle ? Without another axe it cannot be done. How do we proceed in taking a wife ? Without a go-between it cannot be done. How do we proceed in planting hemp ? The acres must be dressed length-wise and crosswise. How do we proceed in taking a wife ? Announcement must first be made to our parents.
Page 329 - The most remarkable thing in this code is its great reasonableness, clearness, and consistency ; the business-like brevity and directness of the various provisions, and the plainness and moderation of the language in which they are expressed.
Page 659 - The dialogue of their stage pieces is composed in ordinary fruff ; while the principal performer now and then chaunts forth, in unison with music, a species of song or "vaudeville" ; and the name of the tune or air is always inserted at the top of the passage to be sung.' 'A considerable portion of the plays of the Chinese consists of a sort of irregular verse, which is sung or chanted with music. This is often very obscure in its import; and as, according to the Chinese themselves, the gratification...
Page 338 - Anglo-American law emphasizes the individual as against the family, while the Continental system inherits something of the old Roman familia. The unit of Chinese society being the family, reform naturally seeks to preserve this institution and to modernize it as far as possible after the Continental idea.
Page 489 - T'ang dynasty, and one of the most venerated names in Chinese literature.' From his pen are the following: — THE WOUNDED FALCON. Within a ditch beyond my wall I saw a falcon headlong fall. Bedaubed with mud and racked with pain, It beat its wings to rise, in vain; While little boys, threw tiles and stones, Eager to break the wretch's bones.

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