Note 62 — Chapter VII · FALLACIES IN POPULAR ARGUMENTS

Alluding to the mixture of Confucianism with Taoism and Buddhism, he remarks: “Any kind of a divinity which seems adapted to exert a favourable influence in any given direction will be patronised, just as a man who happens to need a new umbrella goes to some shop where they keep such goods for sale. To inquire into the antecedents of the divinity who is thus worshipped no more occurs to a Chinese than it would occur to an Englishman who wanted the umbrella to satisfy himself as to the origin of umbrellas, and when they first came into general use.... The Chinaman has carried ‘intellectual hospitality’ to the point of logical suicide, but he does not know it, and cannot be made to understand it when he is told.”62