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The Chinese are unquestionably the oldest nation in the world, and their
history goes back to a period to which no prudent historian will attempt
to give a precise date. They speak the language and observe the same
social and political customs that they did several thousand years before
the Christian era, and they are the only living representatives to-day of
a people and government which were contemporary with the Egyptians, the
Assyrians, and the Jews. So far as our knowledge enables us to speak, the
Chinese of the present age are in all essential points identical with
those of the time of Confucius, and there is no reason to doubt that
before his time the Chinese national character had been thoroughly formed
in its present mold. The limits of the empire have varied from time to
time under circumstances of triumph or disunion, but the Middle Kingdom,
or China Proper, of the eighteen provinces has always possessed more or
less of its existing proportions. Another striking and peculiar feature
about China is the small amount of influence that the rest of the world
has exercised upon it. In fact, it is only during the present century that
that influence can be said to have existed at all. Up to that point China
had pursued a course of her own, carrying on her own struggles within a
definite limit, and completely indifferent to, and ignorant of, the
ceaseless competition and contests of mankind outside her orbit, which
make up the history of the rest of the Old World. The long struggles for
supremacy in Western Asia between Assyrian, Babylonian and Persian, the
triumphs of the Greek, followed by the absorption of what remained of the
Macedonian conquests in the Empire of Rome, even the appearance of Islam
and the Mohammedan conquerors, who changed the face of Southern Asia from
the Ganges to the Levant, and long threatened to overrun Europe, had no
significance for the people of China, and reacted as little on their
destiny as if they had happened in another planet. Whatever advantages the
Chinese may have derived from this isolation, it has entailed the penalty
that the early history of their country is devoid of interest for the lest
of the world, and it is only when the long independent courses of China
and Europe are brought into proximity by the Mongol conquests, the efforts
of the medieval travelers, the development of commerce, and the wars
carried on for the purpose of obtaining a secure position for foreigners
in China--four distinct phases covering the last seven centuries--that any
confidence can be felt in successfully attracting notice to the affairs of
China. Yet, as a curiosity in human existence, the earlier history of that
country may justly receive some notice. Even though the details are not
recited, the recollection of the antiquity of China's institutions must be
ever present with the student, as affording an indispensable clew to the
character of the Chinese people and the composition of their government.
The first Chinese are supposed to have been a nomad tribe in the province
of Shensi, which lies in the northwest of China, and among them at last
appeared a ruler, Fohi, whose name at least has been preserved. His deeds
and his person are mythical, but he is credited with having given his
country its first regular institutions. One of his successors was Hwangti
(which means Heavenly Emperor), who was the first to employ the imperial
style of Emperor, the earlier rulers having been content with the inferior
title of Wang, or prince. He adopted the convenient decimal division in
his administration as well as his coinage. His dominions were divided into
ten provinces, each of these into ten departments, these again into ten
districts, each of which held ten towns. He regulated the calendar,
originating the Chinese cycle of sixty years, and he encouraged commerce.
He seems to have been a wise prince and to have been the first of the
great emperors. His grandson, who was also emperor, continued his good
work and earned the reputation of being "the restorer or even founder of
true astronomy."
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