1011-1077, in the following lines:--

The heavens are still: no sound.
Where then shall God be found? . . .
Search not in distant skies;
In man's own heart He lies.

Conflict of Faiths.--Han Wen-kung, A.D. 768-824, the eminent
philosopher, poet, and statesman, who suffered banishment for his
opposition to the Buddhist religion, complains that, "of old there was
but one faith; now there are three,"--meaning Confucianism, Buddhism,
and Taoism. He thus pictures the simplicity of China's ancient kings:--

"Their clothes were of cloth or of silk. They dwelt in palaces or in
ordinary houses. They ate grain and vegetables and fruit and fish and
flesh. Their method was easy of comprehension: their doctrines were
easily carried into practice. Hence their lives passed pleasantly away,
a source of satisfaction to themselves, a source of benefit to mankind.
At peace within their own hearts, they readily adapted themselves to
the necessities of the family and of the State. Happy in life, they were
remembered after death. Their sacrifices were grateful to the God of
Heaven, and the spirits of the departed rejoiced in the honours of
ancestral worship."

His mind seems to have been open on the subject of a future state. In a
lamentation on the death of a favourite nephew, he writes,

"If there is knowledge after death, this separation will be but for a
little while. If there is no knowledge after death, so will this sorrow
be but for a little while, and then no more sorrow for ever."