There is an interesting account of his death in Book II, i, Part i, 18. In the department of Liû Hsin's Catalogue, which contains "Works of the Literati," there are entered "18 Treatises (phien) of 𝖅ǎng-𝖟ze" but without any further specification of them. Ten of those treatises, or fragments of them, are found in the Lî of the Greater Tâi, but this Book is not among them, nor have I seen it anywhere ascribed to him as the writer of it. It must have been compiled, however, from memoranda left by him or some of his intimate disciples. The names of only two other disciples of the Master occur in it—those of 𝖅ze-yû and 𝖅ze-hsiâ[1]. The reference to the disciples of the former in Section ii, 19, must be a note by the final compiler. The mention of Lâo-𝖟ze or Lâo Tan, and his views also, in Section ii, 32, 24, 38, strikes us as remarkable.
If it were necessary to devise a name for the Book, I should propose—"Questions of Casuistry on the subject of Ceremonial Rites." 𝖅ǎng-𝖟ze propounds difficulties that have struck him on various points of ceremony, especially in connexion with the rites of mourning; and Confucius replies to them ingeniously and with much fertility. Some of the questions and answers, however, are but so much trifling. Khung Ying-tâ says that only 𝖅ǎng-𝖟ze could have proposed the questions, and only Confucius have furnished the answers. He applies to the Book the description of the Yî in the third of the Appendixes to that classic, i, 40, as "Speaking of the most complex phenomena under the sky, and having nothing in it to awaken dislike, and of the subtlest movements under the sky, and having nothing in it to produce confusion."
Book VI. Wǎn Wang Shih-𝖟ze.
No hint is given, nothing has been suggested, as to who was the compiler of this Book, which the Khien-lung editors publish in two Sections. Its name is taken from the first
- ↑ 子遊 and 子夏.
