Such are a few of the external differences between the Chinese customs and
ours. But the most essential peculiarity of this nation is the high value
which they attribute to knowledge, and the distinctions and rewards which
they bestow on scholarship. All the civil offices in the Empire are given
as rewards of literary merit. The government, indeed, is called a complete
despotism, and the emperor is said to have absolute authority. He is not
bound by any written constitution, indeed; but the public opinion of the
land holds him, nevertheless, to a strict responsibility. He, no less than
his people, is bound by a law higher than that of any private will,--the
authority of custom. For, in China, more than anywhere else, "what is gray
with age becomes religion." The authority of the emperor is simply
authority to govern according to the ancient usages of the country, and
whenever these are persistently violated, a revolution takes place and the
dynasty is changed. But a revolution in China changes nothing but the
person of the monarch; the unwritten constitution of old usages remains in
full force. "A principle as old as the monarchy," says Du Halde, "is this,
that the state is a large family, and the emperor is in the place of both
father and mother. He must govern his people with affection and goodness;
he must attend to the smallest matters which concern their happiness. When
he is not supposed to have this sentiment, he soon loses his hold on the
reverence of the people, and his throne becomes insecure." The emperor,
therefore, is always studying how to preserve this reputation. When a
province is afflicted by famine, inundation, or any other calamity, he
shuts himself in his palace, fasts, and publishes decrees to relieve it of
taxes and afford it aid.

The true power of the government is in the literary class. The government,
though nominally a monarchy, is really an aristocracy. But it is not an