Bulletin of Catholic University of Peking

CATHOLIC UNIVERSITY OF PEKING 39

places throughout the whole length and breadth of the land: on mountaintops, and amid sequestered groves; on

the banks of their majestic rivers, and

on the shores of beautiful lakes; high up in rocky eyries, and on islands in the sea; on every spot, in fine, where Nature seemed to be haunted with mystery, to be redolent of the occult, to be in touch with forces weird and inscrutable. Their mystic imagination animated and peopled the elements, the rivers, the woods, and the clouds with a multitude of spirits and demons, which, invested in plastic form, look, for the most part, grotesque and fantastic rather than divine. But what is peculiarly admirable and arresting is the delicate sentiment and really fine taste which they display in harmonizing the construction of these sanctuaries with the natural surroundings and scenery, in making them, so to speak, an integral part of the landscape itself. Every temple, in fact, seems to cling to Nature like a child toitsmother. In this quality of adapting their religious architecture to a particular natural environment, the Chinese are hardly surpassed by any other people.

The Temple Hall forms a part of the palace, the yamen, and every typical Chinese compound. Its architectonic forms, moreover, have influenced in no small degree the construction of secular buildings. Hence it has come to pass that the greater part of Chinese architecture partakes to some extent of its religious character. From a visit to the average palatial residence, one carries away the impression of cloistral solemnity rather than of worldly pomp. The best building in the compound is always the Family Temple, showing

what-a considerable part the sense of religion plays in Chinese family lifeIn short, Chinese architecture is.at bottom profoundly religious, and as such

is intimately bound up with the daily life of the people, constituting, as itwere, the venerable patrimony of their

time-honored civilization and history.

What, then, must we think of those

who would have us disregard all this

in building our churches, and who

would make it a cardinal point of mis-

sionary policy to supplant the national

heritage by the importation of spurious

Foreign forms? Would we not serve

the purpose of Religion far more ef-

fectively by adopting the architecto-

nic forms that have sprung from the

native soil? Such a course is in mani-

fest conformity with the dictates of

logic and common sense, and by fol-

lowing it we are enabled to pay to the

culture of the Chinese nation the well-

deserved tribute of our homage and

appreciation.

The tenacious conservatism evinced by this people in clinging to their national customs, forms and ideals is, and has always been, proverbial. We know, therefore, how extremely reluctant the Chinese are to adopt innovations or to admit alien influences. The realization of this fact should suffice to deter the missionary from the misguided policy of encumbering the Catholicreligion with unnecessary Western forms. Catholic truth is essentially universal and as such will not be deemed extraneous to the genius of the Chinese people, but the Foreign vesture in which that truth is needlessly clothed may well be felt as something distinctly out of place and not at all in keeping with Chinese feelings and surroundings. For the Chinese (as