validity, ideas which are components of an ideology do reflect the reality
in which they emerge and so should be treated in conjunction with
objective conditions. But it does not follow that ideas are the effects, and
conditions the cause. The first cause or causes of history are forever
beyond our understanding. All we can do in studying historical devel-
opments and movements is to take a convenient point in history and
start to analyze the course of events from then on. We shall then find
that there are times when ideas, while reflecting the conditions of the
time, also influence the course of events and the action of men; and
men's action is after all the chief factor in determining the nature of
their society. Whatever our view of ideas in relation to concrete condi-
tions, ideas do furnish us with valuable primary data with which to
study our society--both the existing society and the society the ideology
is meant to create.

On the basis of this understanding of ideas, the approach and purpose
of our study of the ideology of the T'ai-p'ing t'ien-kuo can be simply
stated. We seek to know what kind of movement the T'ai-p'ing t'ien-kuo
was and what kind of society it sought to replace, and for what reason.
To do this obviously requires a careful analysis of the social, political,
and economic conditions at the time it took its rise as well as an analysis
of its ideology--its sources, its functions, its development, its interpreta-
tions. In the process of finding the unique characteristics that distinguish
the Taiping ideology from previous rebel ideologies, I have found a
more or less uniform pattern in all rebellions: the recurring conditions
prior to the emergence of rebellions, the nature and components of
rebel ideologies, and the reasons for success or failure. These similarities
show that rebel ideologies tend to have a tradition of their own, a
tradition which on closer scrutiny turns out to be part and parcel of the
main current of the orthodox ideology.

As ideas reflect the reality in which they emerge, so the Taiping
ideology reflected China in the middle of the nineteenth century and
the periods immediately preceding. China was then rudely shaken out
of her complacent belief that she was the center of the world, culturally
or otherwise. The empire, beset with troubles of all kinds, was well on
its way to decline. The process of decline had started some time earlier.
just as in the past the seeds of decline had been sown during periods of
prosperity and strength (during the reign of Emperor Wu, 140-87
B. C., in the Han and during the T'ien-pao reign, A. D. 742-56, in the
T'ang), so in the Ch'ing it was during the unprecedented period of peace

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