Genghis Khan told them that he believed himself in the first of these articles, and he approved of the three succeeding ones. It was very well, he said, to give one fortieth of one's income to the poor, and to pray to God five times a day, and to set apart a month in the year for a fast. But as to the last article, he could not but dissent from it entirely, for the whole world was God's house, and it was ridiculous, he said, to imagine that one place could really be any more fitting than another as a place for worshiping him. The learned doctors were much dissatisfied with this answer. They were, in fact, more displeased with the dissent which the emperor expressed from this last article, the only one that was purely and wholly ritual in its character, than they were gratified with the concurrence which he expressed in all the other four. This is not at all surprising, for, from the times of the Pharisees down to the present day, the spirit of sectarianism and bigotry in religion always plants itself most strongly on the platform of externals. It is always contending strenuously for rites, while it places comparatively in the background all that bears directly on the vital and spiritual interests of the soul. CHAPTER XXIII. GRAND CELEBRATIONS. 1221-1224 The great hunting party.--Object of the hunt.--The general plan.--The time arrives.--Orders.--Progress of the operations.--Terror of the animals.--The inner circle.--Condition of the beasts.--The princes enter the ring.--Intimidation of the wild beasts.--They recover their ferocity when attacked.--The slaughter.--Petition of the young men.--End of the hunt.--The assembly at Toukat.--Return of Genghis Khan's sons.--Present of horses.--The khans arrive.--Grand entertainment.--Drinks.--Great extent of the encampment.--Laying out the encampment.--The state tent.--The throne.--Business transacted.--Leave-taking.--The assembly is dismissed. When Genghis Khan found that his conquests in Western Asia were in some good degree established and confirmed, he illustrated his victory and the consequent extension of his empire by two very imposing celebrations. The first was a grand hunt. The second was a solemn convocation of all the estates of his immense realm in a sort of diet or deliberative assembly. The accounts given by the historians of both these celebrations are doubtless greatly exaggerated. Their description of the hunt is as follows: