An essential point in the Chinese conception of Filial Piety is that a father's death does not set the son free from the obligations of duty and reverence: it merely changes the outward form or expression of those obligations. He can no longer watch over his father's physical welfare and anticipate his material wants, but he can still bring peace and happiness to his father's spirit by living an upright life and bringing glory and prosperity to the family. If his abilities or opportunities are not such as to enable him to earn for his father posthumous honours (such as the Emperor confers upon the ancestors of those who have deserved well of the State) it is probably within his power to preserve intact the inherited property, to keep the family temple and tombs in good repair, to carry out with propriety and reverence the orthodox ancestral rites during his own lifetime and to provide for their continuance during future generations by bringing up a family of his own. The Chinese belief with regard to the souls of the dead (or rather the ancient beliefs on which the ancestral ceremonies are based) are rather complicated. According to one doctrine every man has no less than ten souls, of which three are _yang_ and seven are _yin_;[213] it is also said that what is called the _hun-_soul goes to heaven, while the _p'o_-soul descends into the earth. The most popular view appears to be that every man has three souls allotted to him: of these one remains in or around the tomb, another hovers about the ancestral tablet, while the third wanders away and, after amalgamating itself with other mysterious forces, is finally reincarnated in another mortal body, which--unless the soul behaved very badly in its last incarnation--will be a human one. For the purpose of the ancestral cult the souls that are of importance are the grave-soul and the tablet-soul. The grave-soul receives its due share of "worship" at the great annual tomb-festivals of spring and autumn. The tablet-soul is supposed to take up its abode, by ceremonious invitation, in the spirit-tablet as soon as the body has been consigned to the grave. "From this very moment," as Dr. De Groot says, "the tablet is considered to be imbued with the afflatus of the dead, and to have become his perpetual duplicate, to serve as a patron divinity in the domestic circle and there to receive the offspring's sacrifices and worship."[214]