[Illustration: Cover]
[Frontispiece: Railway Map of China]
CHANGING CHINA
BY THE REV.
LORD WILLIAM GASCOYNE-CECIL
ASSISTED BY
LADY FLORENCE CECIL
NEW YORK
D. APPLETON AND COMPANY
1912
{iii}
PREFACE
Our interest in China was first aroused by a letter from an old
school-fellow, Arthur Polhill, who, with heroic self-denial, has spent
the best part of his life in China as a missionary. Subsequently I
joined the China Emergency Committee, who in 1907 invited us to go out
to the Shanghai Centenary Conference. That visit led naturally to a
tour in China, Korea, and Japan. When we returned we found that great
interest was being felt at the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge in
the movement in the Far East; a Committee was formed to study the whole
question, which accepted provisionally the idea of encouraging the
foundation of a Western University. Before finally accepting the idea
it was felt that some one ought to go to the mission centres of China
and find out the opinions of the missionaries working on the field, and
at the same time sound the Chinese Government and see whether it would
be favourable to the scheme. As a result of these deliberations, the
Committee asked us in 1909 to go out again, this time on behalf of the
United Universities Scheme. On our return it was suggested that if we
put our report into the form of a book it might possibly excite
interest in the whole question, especially in the University scheme.
We were deeply impressed with two great facts--the greatness of the
need of Western education from a Christian standpoint and the vital
importance of immediate action.
{iv}
Not only did we seek information from English and American but also
from French and Italian missions as occasion offered. We tested and
compared this information by the information we got from that most
enlightened and able body of men who form the consular body in China.
We are especially grateful to Sir John Jordan, by whose great
diplomatic skill both the position of England and the goodwill of the
Chinese are maintained.
It would be impossible even to record the names of all with whom we
conversed, but our thanks are especially due to the following friends,
not only for their generous hospitality, but also for the patient and
kind way in which they instructed us in the many difficult aspects of
the Chinese problem:--
Sir John and Lady Jordan, British Legation, Peking. H.E. the late
Chang-Chih-Tung. H.E. the late Prince Ito. H.E. Tong-Shao-Yi. H.E.
Tuan-Fang. H.E. Liang-Ten-Sen. Sir Robert Hart. Sir Walter and Lady
Hillier. Sir Robert and Lady Breedon. Dr. Aspland of Peking. Dr. and
Mrs. Avison of Seoul. Dr. and Mrs. Baird of Pyeng-Yang. Bishop and
Mrs. Bashford of Peking. Mr. Blair of Pyeng-Yang. M. et Mme.
Boissonnas, French Legation, Peking. Mr. Bondfield of Shanghai. Miss
Bonnell of Shanghai. Mr. and Mrs. Bonsey of Hankow. Dr. and Mrs.
Booth of Hankow. Miss Brierley of Wuchang. Bishop Cassels of West
China. Mr. U. K. Cheng of Nanking. Dr. and Mrs. Christie of Mukden.
Mr. Chun Bing-Hun of Shanghai. Mr. and Mrs. Clarke of Newchwang. Dr.
Cochrane of Peking. Consul-General and Mrs. Cockburn, late of Seoul.
Miss Corbett of Peking. Mr. Deans of Ichang. Mr. and Mrs. Deeming of
Han-Yang. Dr. Du Bose of Soochow. Mr. Ede of Shanghai. Mr. and Mrs.
Arnold Foster of Wuchang. Consul-General and Mrs. Fraser of Hankow.
Mr. and Mrs. Gage of Changsha. Dr. and Mrs. Gibb of Peking. Dr. and
Mrs. Gillieson of Hankow. Dr. Glenton of Wuchang. Bishop and Mrs.
Graves of Jessfield, Shanghai. Dr. and {v} Mrs. Hawks Pott of
Jessfield, Shanghai. Consul and Mrs. Hewlett of Changsha. Mr.
Hollander of Hankow. Mr. and Mrs. Hoste of the C.I.M. Dr. Huntley of
Han-Yang. Mr. and Mrs. Jackson of Wuchang. Monseigneur Jarlin,
Pe-T'ang, Peking. Dr. Griffith John of Hankow. Miss Joynt of
Hangchow. The late Miss Keane of Shanghai. Dr. and Mrs. Keller of
Changsha. Consul and Mrs. King of Nanking. Dr. and Mrs. Lavington
Hart of Tientsin. Mr. M. T. Liang of Mukden. Mr. and Mrs. Littell of
Hankow. Dr. and Mrs. Lowry of Peking. Mr. and Mrs. MacIntosh of
Tientsin. Dr. and Mrs. Macklin of Nanking. Dr. Macleod of Shanghai.
Dr. and Mrs. Main of Hangchow. Consul-General and Miss Mansfield, late
of Canton. Dr. Martin of Peking. Mr. and Mrs. Meigs of Nanking. Miss
Miner of Peking. Archdeacon and Mrs. Moule of Ningpo. Mr.
Mun-Yew-Chung of Shanghai. Dr. and Mrs. Murray of Peking. Mr. Norris
of Peking. Mr. Oberg of Shanghai. Miss Phelps of Hankow. Mr. Arthur
Polhill of the C.I.M. Miss Porter of Peking. Bishop Price of Fukien.
Deaconess Ransome of Peking. M. et Mme. Ratard, French Consulate,
Shanghai. Mr. Ready of Changsha. Dr. and Mrs. Gilbert Reid of
Shanghai. Dr. Timothy Richard of Shanghai. Mr. and Mrs. Ricketts of
Shan-hai-kwan. Mr. and Mrs. Ridgley of Wuchang. Bishop and Mrs. Roots
of Hankow. Dr. and Mrs. Ross of Mukden. Miss Russell of Peking.
Bishop Scott of North China. Mrs. Scranton of Seoul. Mr. and Mrs.
Sedgwick of Tientsin. Mr. Shen-Tun-Lo of Shanghai. Mr. and Mrs.
Sherman of Hankow. Mr. and Mrs. Smalley of Shanghai. Mr. and Mrs.
Sparham of Hankow. Mr. Sprent of Newchwang. Mr. Squire of Ichang. Mr
and Mrs. Stockman of Ichang. Mr. and Mrs. Symons of Shanghai. Taotai
J. C. Tong of Shanghai. Taotai S. T. Tsêng of Nanking. Mr. James
Tsong of Wuchang. Mr. and Mrs. Turley of Mukden. Bishop Turner of
Korea. Mr. and Mrs. Upward of Hankow. Dean and Mrs. Walker of
Shanghai. Miss Wambold of Seoul. Consul-General Sir Pelham and Miss
Warren of Shanghai. Mr. Warren of Changsha. Mr. Watson of Mukden.
Dr. and Mrs. Weir of Chemulpo. Dr. and Mrs. Wells of Pyeng-Yang.
Consul and Mrs. Willis of Mukden. Mr. and Mrs. Wilson of Changsha.
Mr. Yih-Ming-Tsah of Shanghai. Père Recteur of Ziccawei, Shanghai, and
many others.
{vi}
The following books were consulted:--
Among the Mongols: by James Gilmour, M.A. Annuaire Calendrière pour
1909. Appeal, An: by H. E. T'ang-K'ai-Sun. Buddhism in China: by Rev.
S. Beal. Catholic Church in China, The: by Rev. Bertram Wolferstan,
S.J. Catholic Encyclopædia of Missions. Century of Missions in China:
by D. MacGillivray. China and the Allies: by A. Henry Savage Landor.
China in Transformation: by A. R. Colquhoun. China's Book of Martyrs:
by Luella Miner. China's Only Hope: an Appeal by her greatest Viceroy,
Chang-Chih-Tung. Chin-Chin: by Tcheng-Ki-Tong. Chinese
Characteristics: by Dr. Arthur Smith. Chinese Classics, The: Legge's
Translation. Chinese Empire, The: by Marshall Broomhall. Chinese
Shi-King: by Jennings. Chinese, The: by J. S. Thomson. Development of
Religion in Japan: by Knox. Diplomatic and Consular Reports,
1905-1908. Early Chinese History: by H. J. Allen. Educational
Conquest of the Far East, The: by Lewis. Education in the Far East: by
Thwing. Embassy to China: by Lord M'Cartney. Four Books, The:
Anonymous. Griffith John: by R. Wardlaw Thompson. John Chinaman: by
E. H. Parker. History of China, The: by Boulger. Indiscreet Letters
from Peking: by Putnam Weale. Les Missions Catholiques Françaises aux
XIX. Siècle: by Père J. B. Piolet, S.J. Life and Works of Mencius: by
Legge. Martyred Missionaries of the China Inland Mission, edited by
Marshall Broomhall. Mission in China, A: by Soothill. Mission Methods
in Manchuria: by John Ross, D.D. New China and Old: by Archdeacon
Moule. Original Religion of China: by John Ross, D.D. Pastor Hsi: by
Mrs. Taylor. Railway Enterprise in China: by P. H. Kent. Religions in
China: by Edkins. Religious System of China: by J. J. M. de Groot,
vol. v. Sidelights on Chinese Life: by MacGowan. Taoist Tests.
Things Chinese: by J. Dyer Ball. Troubles de Chine, Les: par Raoul
Allier. Uplift of China, The: by Arthur Smith.
{vii}
CONTENTS
CHINA IN TRANSITION
CHAP. PAGE
I. WHAT HAS AWAKENED CHINA? . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
II. WHAT CHINA MEANS TO THE WORLD . . . . . . . . . . 20
III. ORIENTAL AND OCCIDENTAL . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
IV. FOREIGN RELATIONS OF CHINA . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
V. CHINESE CIVILISATION--ITS WEAK SIDE . . . . . . . 56
VI. CHINESE CIVILISATION--ITS GOOD SIDE . . . . . . . 70
VII. RAILWAYS AND RIVERS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80
VIII. THE CITIES OF CHINA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
IX. OPIUM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107
X. THE WOMEN'S QUESTION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
XI. CHINESE ARCHITECTURE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137
RELIGIONS OF CHINA AND THE MISSIONARY
XII. RELIGIONS IN CHINA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147
XIII. CONFUCIAN PHILOSOPHY AND WESTERN CULTURE . . . . . 163
XIV. INTERVIEW AT NANKING . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172
XV. ROMAN CATHOLIC MISSIONS IN CHINA . . . . . . . . . 183
XVI. OTHER MISSIONS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 198
XVII. THE EFFECT OF WESTERN LITERATURE IN CHINA . . . . 207
XVIII. MEDICAL MISSIONS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 220
XIX. MOVEMENT IN KOREA AND MANCHURIA . . . . . . . . . 232
XX. THE FUTURE OF CHRISTIANITY IN CHINA . . . . . . . 242
THE NEW AND THE OLD LEARNING
XXI. EDUCATION, CHIEFLY MISSIONARY . . . . . . . . . . 253
XXII. GOVERNMENT EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM . . . . . . . . . . 266
XXIII. THE SAME IN PRACTICE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 279
XXIV. DIFFICULTIES IN THE WAY OF EDUCATION . . . . . . . 293
XXV. THE NEED OF A UNIVERSITY EXPLAINED . . . . . . . . 305
XXVI. THE NEED OF A UNIVERSITY EXPLAINED (continued) . . 317
XXVII. CONCLUSION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 325
APPENDIX
WILL RUSSIA BE REPRESENTED ON THE MISSION FIELD? . . . . . 329
INDEX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 337
{3}
CHINA IN TRANSITION
CHAPTER I
WHAT HAS AWAKENED CHINA?
For centuries China has been the land that never moved. It had a
political history full of wars and bloodshed, of intrigue and murder;
periods of prosperity and enlightenment; periods of darkness and
desolation; but the country remained essentially the same country.
There might be some small alteration in its customs, but China was
distinctly unprogressive. And everybody who knew China ten or fifteen
years ago was prepared to prophesy that it would continue to remain
unprogressive.
Many a missionary speaks of the China that he used to know as a very
different land from the China of to-day. It used to be a sort of Rip
Van Winkle land that had slept a thousand years, and showed every sign
of remaining asleep for another thousand. Mrs. Arnold Foster told us
that when she first came to Wuchang she used to see the soldiers
dressed mediævally, learning to make faces to inspire terror in the
hearts of the adversary. Monseigneur Jarlin, the head of the French
mission in Peking, described the China of olden times by saying that in
his young days all Chinamen had a rooted contempt for everything
Western. Theirs was the {4} only civilised land. The West was the
land of barbarism. Now, he added, the positions are reversed; every
Chinaman despises China, and is convinced that from the West comes the
light of civilisation. Arch-deacon Moule tells how he sailed out to
China in a sailing ship, and found a land absolutely indifferent to the
existence of the West--more ignorant of the West than the West was of
the East, and that, when he was young, was saying a great deal; and now
he finds himself in a land that has telephones and motor cars and takes
an active interest in flying machines.
China has fundamentally altered. She used to be absolutely the most
conservative land in the world. Now she is a land which is seeing so
many radical changes, that a missionary said, when I asked him a
question about China, "You must not rely on me, for I left China three
months ago, so that what I say may be out of date."
China is now progressive; yes, young China believes intensely in
progress, with an optimistic spirit which reminds the onlooker more of
the French pre-Revolution spirit than of anything else. And this
intense belief in progress shows itself at every turn; the Yamen runner
has become a policeman, towns are having the benefit of water-works,
schools are being opened everywhere, railways cover the land. One may
well ask what has accomplished this change, what has awakened China?
Perhaps, like many other great events in history, {5} this change of
opinion in China should be attributed to more than one cause. There
are two chief causes. One may be small, but it is not insignificant;
the other is certainly great and obvious. The less appreciated factor
that is causing the regeneration of China is Christianity; the larger
and more obvious factor is the new national movement.
The cause of the new national movement was the sense of humiliation
brought about by political events culminating in the battle of Mukden,
where a flagrant act of insolent contempt for the laws of neutrality
was felt all the more deeply because China had to submit to that which
she was powerless to resist.
The events of the last few years are so well known that I must ask the
indulgence of the reader in recapitulating them. China, confident in
the number of her people, which reached to a quarter of the world's
population, attempted to assert her rights of suzerainty over Korea
against Japan. She had not realised then that Japan was no longer an
Eastern power, where knights with two-handed swords did deeds of valour
and won for themselves everlasting renown. And when at Ping-yang the
armies met, the Chinese General ascended a hill that he might direct
the armies of the Celestial Empire with a fan. He conceived the battle
to be merely a small affair, where a fan could be seen by all the
officers engaged. The result was, of course, that the German-trained
Japanese army had a very easy victory. The war ended in the taking of
Port Arthur by the Japanese, {6} and China was in the humiliating
position of having to appeal to Western countries to secure her
territory.
So far, however, the sting of her humiliation gave to China a sense of
resentment against all foreigners, rather than a sense of repentance
for her own shortcomings, and the missionaries found hostility to their
work in every part of China. That hostility resulted in the murder of
two German Roman Catholic missionaries in Shantung. The well-known
action of Germany in demanding a cession of territory as a punishment
for this murder may have been a good stroke of policy, but it has
brought but little honour either to Germany or to Christianity. In
fact it may be regarded as a most regrettable action from a missionary
point of view, for it convinced the Chinese that the missionary was but
a part of the civil administration of a hostile country, and that if
China was to be preserved from the foreigner, missionaries must be
induced to leave the country. A deep feeling of national resentment
spread over the land, which was encouraged by some in authority. The
direct connection between Government patronage of the anti-foreign
movement and the German occupation of Kiauchau can be deduced from the
fact that the Governor who was responsible for the awful murders in
Shansi had been Governor of Shantung when Germany took Kiauchau.
The result of this bitter feeling was the creation of a secret and
patriotic society which concealed the nature of its propaganda under a
name with a double {7} meaning. The Boxer Society was, as its name
suggests, apparently an athletic society--a society which had for its
object the encouragement of the art of self-defence. But the name had
another signification. Its real object, as a Chinaman explained to me,
was to "knock the heads of the foreigners off." It was a religious as
well as a political movement, however. It had its prophets, who did
wonders or were thought to do them, and its disciples were believed to
be invulnerable to any Western weapon. It protested against the
movement towards Western ideas, which it regarded as immoral; it
condemned and destroyed everything Western, from straw hats and
cigarettes to mission houses and railways; its disciples believed that
the spirits that defend China were angry at the introduction of Western
things, that they were withholding the rain so necessary to the light
loess land of that district, and that the only way they could be
propitiated was by the sacrifice of a Western life or by the
destruction of a Western building. One of the things that precipitated
the siege of Peking was the apparent success of such an action. In
pursuance of their faith, the Boxers set a light to the rail-head
station of the half-made Hankow-Peking railway, a place called
Pao-ting-fu; the station was a mere wooden barrack, and blazed up
merrily with an imposing column of smoke; hardly had the smoke reached
the heavens, when the sky was overcast with heavy thunder-clouds, and
in a short time the thirsty land received the long-wished-for rain, and
the Boxer {8} prophets pointed with sinister effect to the heavenly
confirmation of their doctrine.
It is necessary to remind the reader of the religious aspect of
Boxerdom, so that he shall realise what its fall meant to many Chinese.
Really their faith in it was wonderful. A Boxer, for instance, at the
siege of Peking walked composedly in front of the Legation, waving his
sword and performing mystic signs; the soldiers first of one then of
another Legation fired on him with no effect; probably his coolness put
out their aim. Another example of their credulity was told me at
Newchwang. The Russians had occupied Newchwang, and, _more suo_, were
pacifying it; they were shooting all the Boxers on whom they could lay
hands, and, I am afraid, a great number who were not Boxers. They
chained one of these fanatics to a stone seat with the intention of
executing him; but they thought they might get some useful information
out of him, so they asked an Englishman who spoke Chinese perfectly to
make inquiries of him, giving him authority to offer a respite as a
reward. He went to the prisoner, and sitting down by him, tried to
induce him to save his life by giving information, but he was met by a
contemptuous refusal; and when he pointed out that the firing party was
there, the misguided man merely said, "I am a Boxer, and their bullets
cannot hurt me." Another minute, of course, proved his error. But his
firmness showed the reality of his conviction.
Sometimes this fanaticism had curious results. {9} A Boxer prophet
assured the village that no works of the West could hurt him, no bullet
could harm him, no train could crush him. As a railway ran near the
village, he and all the inhabitants adjourned thither to put his
invulnerability to the test. The daily train came puffing along, as
the Boxer, waving his sword, stood right in its path. The driver was a
European, and seeing some one on the line, pulled up his train to avoid
running over him. The Boxer pointed to the train triumphantly, and the
astonished villagers became Boxers. There was, however, a sceptic who
refused to believe, so next day they repaired again to the line, and
the Boxer again made his passes and uttered his charms. Alas for him!
this time the driver was a Chinaman, and he was not going to stop his
master's train because a coolie fellow got in the way, so he put on
full steam and cut him to pieces, and the village deserted the Boxer
faith to a man.
With the relief of Peking, the Boxer Society fell; but the popular view
was not that Boxer teaching was false, but that the spirits behind
Western religion were stronger than those behind Boxerdom. So one of
the immediate results of the fall of the Boxers was to establish the
spiritual prestige of Christianity; the second result was to inspire
the Chinese with a respect for the military power of the foreigner.
The Boxers had failed, the foreign powers had taken Peking, the Son of
Heaven had become a fugitive; all this was gall and {10} wormwood to
the Chinaman. The sack of Peking was especially felt, both because of
the wanton destruction that was committed--one informant told me he saw
a vase worth £200 smashed into a thousand atoms by a drunken
soldier--and because the enlightened Chinese knew very well that no
civilised city is sacked at the present time, and that they were being
treated as no other race is now treated.
Yet the old spirit of pride prevented them learning completely the full
truth. The thinking Chinaman was still disposed to attribute the
victory of the West to the superior fighting powers of Western men. A
Chinese gentleman, explaining the fear his people have of Europeans,
said, "They regard you as tigers." The troops who sacked Peking were
to the thinking Chinaman but another example of the well-known truth,
that those nearer the savage state fight better than civilised men, and
really, considering the behaviour of some of the European troops, no
surprise can be felt at this conclusion; it needed another lesson to
make them finally and thoroughly realise the superiority of our
civilisation.
The bitterness of their next humiliation made them ready to learn as
they had never been before in the whole of their history, and events
provided them with teachers who taught them that the cause of this
humiliation was their refusal to accept Western ideas, and that if they
would maintain {11} their independence they must learn the art of war
from their conquerors.
After the siege of Peking came the Russo-Japanese war. The Russians
had long been known and feared by the Chinese; they were to the Chinese
mind the embodiment of the warlike and blood-thirsty spirit of the
West; they were hated for their cruelty and feared for their prowess.
The awful story of the massacre of Blagovestchensk in 1900 was still
present to the popular mind. The story was this. The Amur divides
China from Siberia. When the Boxer movement broke out the Russians
required all the Chinese to go to their side of the river; but with
sinister intent, they removed all the boats, so that no one could
cross. The Chinese pointed this out, and the respectable merchants of
the town presented a petition saying they were ready to obey the
Russian Government in everything, but without the boats they could not
do so; but the Russians insisted that boats or no boats, they must
cross the Amur; they protested, but in vain; a half-circle was formed
round them by the soldiery, and the whole Chinese population of the
city was driven into the river at the point of the bayonet.
The Japanese were also well known to the Chinese; they had been till
lately, when the Western movement had altered everything in Japan,
their pupils in civilisation. The Japanese believed in Confucius, used
Chinese characters, worshipped in Buddhist temples, sacrificed to
ancestors, in fact {12} were in Chinese estimation a civilised race,
though inferior of course to themselves.
When these two antagonists met in Manchuria, the war could not fail to
make a deep impression on China. To begin with, it was an insult
surpassing that of the sack of Peking to the Chinese _amour propre_, to
have the war carried on in Manchuria. Russia and Japan were disputing
over Korea, and both nations were at peace with China. Russia might
have invaded Japan; Japan might have invaded Russia, or both might have
met in Korea, but what they did was to select a province of a neutral
State and decide that there should be the scene of conflict. What made
this more striking was that they agreed to respect the neutrality of
the rest of China; in fact they selected their battle-ground with the
same equanimity as if China and her national rights did not exist.
But the deepest impression made on the Chinese was by the victory of
the Eastern over the Western. The Japanese demonstrated that there was
no essential inferiority of the East to the West, and that when an
Eastern race adopted Western military methods it proved itself superior
to the most powerful of the Western races. This was the lesson the
battle of Mukden taught the Chinese, and which convinced the
anti-foreign party in China, that however much they might hate the
foreigner, they must adopt Western methods if they would retain their
independence. The result was that the progressive and {13}
anti-foreign parties found themselves at one. Both agreed that Western
ideas were necessary. The first, because they believed in Western
progress; the second, because they felt that the only way to preserve
China from the hated foreigner was to learn the secret of his military
power. The first thing to be done was to study Western education, and
then they could hope to hold their own against the Western races, as
Japan had more than held her own against the Russians.
I believe the battle of Mukden will prove one of the turning points in
the history of the world. Few of us have any conception of the
bitterness of the humiliation of China. People speak of Russia as
having been humiliated, but my experience is that the Russians looked
at the whole question as a colonial war in which a bungling Government
embroiled their country--a war which, if it demonstrated the incapacity
of their officers, proved the courage of their soldiers. But the
humiliation of China was intense. When one remembers the position that
the Emperor occupies in China; when one also remembers the reverential
feeling that exists towards ancestors, one realises what it must have
meant to the Chinaman that the site of the tombs of their Emperors
should have been the scene of that titanic struggle between the East
and the West. But the result of that humiliation was to burn in the
lesson that Japan had taken the right course, and that, however hateful
were {14} Western ways, they were a necessity, and that every lover of
China must do his best to introduce them into the Empire.
Of course there are many Chinamen--nay, I should think a vast
majority--who intend to preserve to China the essential points of the
Confucian civilisation; they mean to accept Western ideas only in so
far as they are necessary to struggle against the West. Some, no
doubt, definitely admire the West, but most are anxious for a
compromise; they want to preserve China with its customs, with its
essential thought, but to strengthen it by foreign knowledge and a
foreign military system. The exact degree of what should be preserved
in China and what should be destroyed and replaced by Western
innovations, differs according to the age and the temperament of the
thinkers, but the principle is most generally accepted--Western thought
must be grafted on to Eastern civilisation. When we remember the size
of China, we may well ask ourselves what effect this policy will have
on the rest of the world. We have at present a period of reflection,
for how long we cannot tell. The task of welding East and West into
one whole is in practice proving difficult, and at present failure is
very often the result; but with Japan as a successful example, and with
the threat of national extinction and foreign domination before them,
the Chinese can never give up the effort; and whatever the exact result
may be, I think one may assert {15} without rashness that not only will
it fundamentally alter the whole of China, but through China affect the
whole world.
While detailing the causes which have created the national movement
which is now inducing China to make every effort to perfect her
defences against foreign aggressions, we must not forget that the
awakening of China has a higher side, and one which we can attribute
directly and indirectly to Christianity. The influence of Christianity
can be traced back to the seventh century when missions of Nestorian
Christians came to Thibet and China; they left behind them, it is true,
no converts, but their influence was probably felt through the power
that Lamaism had had over a great part of the Eastern world. A learned
Japanese, discussing this subject, said that no one could study Lamaism
and Buddhism without realising how intimately it had been in touch with
some form of Christianity. Later on the great Roman Catholic missions,
initiated by St. Francis Xavier in the thirteenth century, began to
work in China, and have slowly but surely raised up a large population
who have been Christians for many generations. Their missions were
interrupted by persecutions, but with varying and lately increasing
success they have maintained themselves ever since. In 1807 the
pioneer of Protestant missions, Dr. Morrison, began his work and the
translation of the Bible into Chinese. The work increased, his mission
was followed by other missions, which pursued {16} a policy even more
influential in altering the opinion of China; not only did they with
great heroism preach the Gospel in every province of China, but they
took two actions which have affected China in a very special degree.
First the American missions made the very greatest effort to get hold
of intelligent Chinese men, both Christian and non-Christian, to teach
them Western knowledge, so that they might understand how intimately
Christianity was connected with Christian thought. The result of their
efforts has been that there are a considerable number of enlightened
Chinese gentry who are either Christians or who have a great sympathy
with the Christian side of Western civilisation. Sometimes they
educated these men in China, sometimes they induced them to go to
America for their education; and there they were brought into contact
with the intense, yet rather narrow, New England Christianity. I had
the honour of meeting many of these men in China, and I was convinced
that they have no small part in her awakening.
The English and American missionaries, under the leadership of Dr.
Williamson, inaugurated a second policy, which has had far-reaching
results in causing the changes in China. The Christian Literature
Society was started to supply the Chinese with translations of the best
Western literature. They were followed by Chinese imitators who were
also Christians, and who founded a Chinese Commercial {17} Press.
These two bodies have given to China a vast amount of Western
literature, the first on philanthropic lines with the definite
intention of spreading Christianity, the second on a commercial basis
but with the intention of presenting to their fellow-countrymen the
purer and more beautiful side of Western thought. The publications of
these two bodies reach, I am told, to every educated man in China. If
the humiliations of public events made the Chinese willing to study
Western civilisation, it was these men who afforded them the means of
studying and understanding the best side of that civilisation.
But perhaps those who have done most to give the Chinese a proper
conception of Christianity are the Bible Societies, especially the
British and Foreign Bible Society. Ever since, with the optimism of
faith, the translation of the Scriptures by Dr. Morrison was published
in 1814, they have been scattering the Christian Scriptures throughout
the whole of China, from Mongolia to Tonkin, and I am told that those
Scriptures are read by men in the highest positions and with the most
conservative antecedents in the whole empire. It cannot be doubted
that the indirect fruit of their work has been very great indeed.
China has, through the agencies of these bodies, been brought into
close contact with Christian thought, and has at last realised the true
nature of our religion.
Lastly, there has been the influence of those who {18} died for the
Christian faith during the many persecutions to which Christianity has
been exposed, and which culminated in the Boxer persecution. If
Germany, by her action in Shantung, put before China a false and most
repellent view of Christianity, the heroic sufferings of the martyred
missionaries, both yellow and white, presented Christianity to a
wondering world in its purest aspect. After those thousands of
Christians had suffered in Shan-si, the Home bodies, especially the
China Inland Mission, refused to take any compensation for the blood
that had been shed in the cause of the Gospel. The Chinese were then
convinced that the German presentation of Christianity was not the only
one; if Germany could look on Christianity only as a stalking horse
behind which she could creep up to her prey, the English-speaking races
had a holier ideal to teach and one which was more consonant with the
words of the Founder of our religion. The sufferings of the Christians
were intense, their heroism was great, but the result has been
commensurate with their efforts, and an awakening China looks to our
countries, not solely to teach her the art of war and of killing men,
but also to teach her the great thoughts and the great religion which
has before her very eyes proved capable of producing such noble men and
women.
The awakening of China has two aspects. From one aspect China is
awakening to the value of the science and the arts of the West; from
the other {19} China is awakening to the fact that there is in the West
a power which comes from goodness, and that goodness has its root in
Christian faith. It is this twofold aspect of the awakening of China
which is so important to bear in mind, for if she is to share in our
civilisation in the future, it is both our duty and our interest to see
that this great world-movement is encouraged to develop on its higher
side.
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