Objects of the Lectures.--Lectures based upon principle and not upon
grounds of expediency.--Lecturer's knowledge of the Opium question derived
from actual acquaintance with the facts, acquired during nearly fifteen
years' residence in Hong Kong.--Opium smoking as practised by the Chinese
perfectly innocuous, beneficial rather than injurious.--Opinion of Dr.
Ayres.--Charges made by the Anti-Opium Society and its supporters false
and unfounded.--Alleged knowledge of the members and supporters of the
Anti-Opium Society founded on hearsay evidence of the worst and most
untrustworthy character.--Lecturer not acting in the interests of the
British merchants in China, nor of any other party or person.--Has no
personal interest in the Opium question, and is actuated only by a desire
to dispel the false and mischievous delusions spread abroad in England by
the Anti-Opium Society.--British and other foreign residents in China hold
opposite views to those disseminated by the Anti-Opium people.--British
merchants as a body have no interest in the trade.--China a great Empire
as large as Europe, with a much greater population.--Country and people of
China described.--Impossible to demoralize and debase such a people.--Opium
smoking a general custom throughout the eighteen provinces of China.--
Reasons for the prolonged existence of the Anti-Opium Society.--False
charges of the Anti-Opium Society respecting the Indo-China Opium trade
more fully formulated.--Petition to the House of Commons of the Protestant
Missionaries at Peking.--Refusal to sign it of the Rev. F. Galpin.--If
half those charges were true the British residents in China would be the
first to raise their voices against the Opium trade.--Official Yellow
Book published by Sir Robert Hart, the Inspector-General of Chinese
Customs, negatives the allegations of the members of the Anti-Opium
Society and the Protestant Missionaries.--Roman Catholic Missionaries make
no complaint against the Indo-China Opium trade.--Allegations of the
Anti-Opium Society that British trade with China has suffered from the
alleged forcing of Opium upon China untrue.--Friendly relations between
the British merchants in China and the Chinese people.--Englishmen more
esteemed by the Chinese than any other nation.--Hong Kong described.--
Government of China described.--Hong Kong the head-quarters of the
Indo-China Opium trade, Chinese residing there have better means of
procuring the drug than elsewhere--no sufferers from Opium smoking found
there.--Exposure by Dr. Ayres, the Colonial Surgeon of Hong Kong, of the
fallacy that Opium smoking, although indulged in for years, cannot be
dropped without injury to the system.--Fallacy of comparing the Chinese
with the savages of Central Africa by the Secretary of the Anti-Opium
Society exposed.--Archdeacon Gray, a resident for twenty years at Canton,
silent, in his recent work on China and her people, as to the alleged
iniquity of the Indo-China Opium trade.--Character of the Chinese as
described by various authors.--Chinese a frugal and abstemious people.--
Opium smoking less injurious than beer or tobacco.--Charges of the
Anti-Opium Society based upon fallacies; those fallacies detailed.--
Alleged objections of the Chinese to receive the Gospel on account of the
Indo-China Opium trade the merest subterfuge, and utterly absurd and
untenable.--The opinion of the late John Crawfurd, Esq., F.R.S., formerly
Governor of the Straits Settlements.--His Dictionary of the Indian Islands
and Adjacent countries.