Bulletin of Catholic University of Peking

“KNOW THYSELF”

Address of the Most Rev. Celso Costantini at the Inaugural Ceremony

Epitor’s Note:—As mentioned in the previous article, His Excellency Archbishop ‘Costantini delivered his Address immediately after that of the Minister of Education. His Excellency elected to speak in Latin (as being 2 non-national, or better, a catholic and international, language). At the conclusion of the Address, a Chinese translation of the same was read by the Librarian of the University, Mr. Lu Pei-ch’en.

His Excellency, as will be seen, makes reference in the opening lines to the new Chinese name of the Catholic University, namely, Fu Jen Ta-hstieh, under which the University was recently recognized by the Chinese Government. Formerly, the Chinese name of the University was Kung Chiao Ta-hsiieh and the title Fu Jen was confined to the Preparatory School. (Cf. Bulletin No. rt, pp. 7, 8,41). But inasmuch as the latter title is taken from the Chinese Classics and makes a powerful appeal to the mentality of the Chinese people, and especially because it expresses very accurately the function which the University hopes to fulfill in the life of the Chinese nation, the name, as already stated, was recently adopted as the official Chinese title of the Catholic University of Peking.

To make clear the significance of His Excellency’s allusion to FU JEN, a few words of explanation seem to be in order. These two characters are taken from a sentence in the 24th chapter of Book XII of the Confucian Analects, which is ascribed to the philosopher Tséng Shen, a disciple of Confucius. In the conventional “‘romanization”’ it is rendered as follows: ‘ Chiin'-tse*i°wen hui ‘yo's*yo'furjen’,” and it is translated by Legge: ‘‘ The Superior Man on grounds of culture meets with his friends, and by their friendships helps his virtue.” Tséng Shen, it may be remarked,

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flourished about 450 B.c. under the Chow dynasty (1122-255 B.C.).

The Chinese make use of allusions rather than quotations in full. Hence the selection of the two characters, fu(help) and jem(humaneness, virtue) from the above-cited passage is in accord with the Chinese custom of taking one or two essential words from a classical passage to convey the complete meaning of that passage. Tséng Shen, in the passage under consideration, says that by means of letters, that is, common literary studies and pursuits, the Superior Man comes in contact with desirable friends and that the friendships thus formed are helpful to his own growth in selfdiscipline and righteousness. We may analyze the passage as follows: (1) ‘the Superior Man” (Chiin-tse) means a man par excellence, the possessor of every manly virtue, or, as the

English put it, a ‘‘gentleman’’; (2) “culture”

(wen) means intellectual and literary accomplishments; (3) ‘“‘righteousness’’ (jez) means “humanity,” ‘‘humaneness,” “kindness,” “‘love of one’s fellow creatures,’ “the first of the constant virtues,"’ ‘the embodiment of all virtues’’—the character consists of the radical jen(man) joined to the numeral erh(two) and hence signifies humanity, the sum of all the social virtues, for minus quam inter duos carttas haberi non potest....sed dilectio in alterum tendit, ut carilas esse possit (St. Gregory, the Great, Hom. 17); (4) ‘‘friendship’’(yo) means social intercourse, the interchange of benefits, reciprocal support; finally, FU JEN(‘ Promotion of Righteousness’’) conveys to the Chinese mind the threefold ideal of perfection in the intellectual, the moral, and the social order.

The English version here given of the Apostolic Delegate’s Address appeared in the Peking Leader of September 30, 1927.