i6o A Short History of The World covery of iron somewhen after 1000 B.C. And just as in the western case so ever and again these eastern nomads would achieve a sort of poUtical unity, and become the conquerors and masters and revivers of this or that settled and civihzed region. It is quite possible that the earliest civilization of China was not Mongolian at all any more than the earliest civilization of Europe and western Asia was Nordic or Semitic. It is quite possible that the earliest civilization of China was a brunet civilization and of a piece with the earliest Egyptian, Sumerian and Dravidian civiliza- tions, and that when the first recorded history of China began there had already been conquests and intermixture. At any rate we find that by 1750 B.C. China was aheady a vast system of little kingdoms and city states, all acknowledging a loose allegiance and paying more or less regularly, more or less definite feudal dues to one great priest emperor, the " Son of Heaven." The " Shang " dynasty came to an end in 1125 B.C. A " Chow " dynasty succeeded " Shang," and maintained China in a relaxing unity until the days of Asoka in India and of the Ptolemies in Egypt. Gradually China went to pieces during that long " Chow " period. Hunnish peoples came down and set up principalities ; local rulers discontinued their tribute and became independent. There was in the sixth century B.C., says one Chinese authority, five or six thousand practically indepen- dent states in China. It was what the Chinese call in their records an " Age of Confusion." But this Age of Confusion was compatible with much intel- lectual activity and with the existence of many local centres of art and civilized living. When we know more of Chinese history we shall find that China also had her Miletus and her Athens, her Per- gamum and her Macedonia. At present we must be vague and brief about this period of Chinese division simply because our know- ledge is not sufficient for us to frame a coherent and consecutive story. And just as in divided Greece there were philosophers and in shattered and captive Jewry prophets, so in disordered China there were philosophers and teachers at this tinae. In all these cases in- security and uncertaintj' seemed to have quickened the better sort of mind. Confucius was a man of aristocratic origin and some official importance in a small state called Lu. Here in a very parallel mood to the Greek impulse he set up a sort of Academy for discovering and teaching A'isdom. The lawlessness and disorder of China
