The next of the pre-Confucian works, and possibly the oldest of all, is the famous _I Ching_, or Book of Changes. It is ascribed to WÊN WANG, the virtual founder of the Chou dynasty, whose son, WU WANG, became the first sovereign of a long line, extending from B.C. 1122 to B.C. 249. It contains a fanciful system of philosophy, deduced originally from Eight Diagrams consisting of triplet combinations or arrangements of a line and a divided line, either one or other of which is necessarily repeated twice, and in two cases three times, in the same combination. Thus there may be three lines ☰, or three divided lines ☷, a divided line above or below two lines ☱ ☴, a divided line between two lines ☲, and so on, eight in all. These so-called diagrams are said to have been invented two thousand years and more before Christ by the monarch Fu Hsi, who copied them from the back of a tortoise. He subsequently increased the above simple combinations to sixty-four double ones, on the permutations of which are based the philosophical speculations of the Book of Changes. Each diagram represents some power in nature, either active or passive, such as fire, water, thunder, earth, and so on. The text consists of sixty-four short essays, enigmatically and symbolically expressed, on important themes, mostly of a moral, social, and political character, and based upon the same number of lineal figures, each made up of six lines, some of which are whole and the others divided. The text is followed by commentaries, called the Ten Wings, probably of a later date and commonly ascribed to Confucius, who declared that were a hundred years added to his life he would devote fifty of them to a study of the _I Ching_. The following is a specimen (Legge’s translation):-- “_Text._ ䷉ This suggests the idea of one treading on the tail of a tiger, which does not bite him. There will be progress and success. “1. The first line, undivided, shows its subject treading his accustomed path. If he go forward, there will be no error. “2. The second line, undivided, shows its subject treading the path that is level and easy;--a quiet and solitary man, to whom, if he be firm and correct, there will be good fortune. “3. The third line, divided, shows a one-eyed man who thinks he can see; a lame man who thinks he can walk well; one who treads on the tail of a tiger and is bitten. All this indicates ill-fortune. We have a mere bravo acting the part of a great ruler. “4. The fourth line, undivided, shows its subject treading on the tail of a tiger. He becomes full of apprehensive caution, and in the end there will be good fortune. “5. The fifth line, undivided, shows the resolute tread of its subject. Though he be firm and correct, there will be peril. “6. The sixth line, undivided, tells us to look at the whole course that is trodden, and examine the presage which that gives. If it be complete and without failure, there will be great good fortune.