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    1 edged , "but they have degenerated into superstitious practices without end , and gross idolatry ; so difficult is it-Jot 'the human mind to rest in a purely abstract idea * ~ The penal code , though batrbarous enough , as it sanctions torture , cruel forms of death , and summary punishment feV the bamboo , is not so bad as it has been represented . Mr . Davis says , that numbers of prints representing the torments of the danmed in the Budhist Hell , have been misunderstood as

    representing forms of Chinese legal punishments . The condition of women i& of extreme degradation . They are in fact domestic slaves , unless they attain the enviable state of widowhood with a family of sons and daughters ; they then become the most inexorable tyrants , especially to the wives of their sons , who are said often to commit suicide to

    escape the intolerable yoke . Marriages are very early ; an unmarried man of twenty is a prodigy , and though onl y one wife is allowed , concubinage is the constant custom . I 3 ut if a rn&n have 6 ons by his wife , it becomes derogatory to his character to take concubines . Love , nevertheless , is accidental , as mere sensualism is systematic . A woman who is known even to have been seen by her husband before marriage , entirely loses her reputation , and in the Chinese novels all kinds of fortunate accidents are resorted to , such as a chink in the wall , or a

    shadow in the water , to account for the growth of love . Mr . " Davis denies the frequency of infanticide of female children , which has been Jaid to the charge of the women of China . The strongest argument against it appears ro us to be , that it is difficult enough to discover how there can be a sufficient number of women to enable every man to possess a wife , and also a

    handmaid , one or more , without still further increasing the difficulty , by supposing that numbers of female infants are drowned . In a country like Turkey , where female slaves are imported , this question is solved at once , but we own it remains an enigma to us , as to China , where all intercourse with other nations \ h reckoned something like profanation . IVor do we

    think the earlier period at which women are marriageable than men * could s ^ ive a permanent balance in favour of the former that satisfactorily gets over the difficulty . The condition and prospects of trade with China , so difficult to carry on in con&equence of the repugnance to strangers , are treated at large in both these works . From these various facts we see with entire clearness the

    principle which has caused tlie vast empire of China to remain during" so many ages calm as its own skies , and immoveable }> eyond the ciiancc * of cliange , as the fixfcd stars to whose unprogressive thrones its successive Rulers claim so near a kindred . The spirit of Paternity overcomes all othei * spirit * as th « y rite , and uiergew every individuality , > fto < Mte Tp ° *'

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    Muiorit * of China . 415

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), July 2, 1836, page 415, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2659/page/23/