EDUCATION AND CULTURE.
Corea received her culture from China, and gave it freely to Japan. If
we may believe the doubtful story of Ki Tsze, then the Coreans have
possessed letters and writing, or, what is the equivalent thereto, they
have had “civilization,” during three thousand years. It is certain
that since about the opening of the Christian era, the light of China’s
philosophy has shone steadily among Corean scholars. Japanese early
tradition—unworthy of credence in the matter of chronology—claims that
literature was brought to Nippon as early as the period 157–30 B.C. The
legend of Jingu bringing back books and manuscripts from Shinra is more
probable; while the coming of Wani from Hiaksai, to teach the Chinese
characters and expound the classics, is a historic fact, though the
real date may be uncertain, or later than the accepted one, which is
285 A.D. While the Kokorai people may have brought letters with them,
as they migrated southward, in Hiaksai the Confucian analects were not
studied until the fourth century, when official recognition of
education was made by the appointment of Hanken as master of Chinese
literature. This is said to have been the first importation of learning
into the peninsula. It was so in the sense of being formally introduced
from China into the country south of the Ta-tong River.
As in most of the Asiatic countries, into which Chinese culture
penetrated, popular education was for centuries a thing unthought of.
Learning was the privilege of a few courtiers, who jealously guarded it
from the vulgar, as an accomplishment for those about the royal person,
or in the noble families. The classics and ethical doctrines seem in
every case to have penetrated the nations surrounding the Middle
Kingdom, and formed the basis of courtly and aristocratic education.
Buddhism furnished the popular or democratic element, which brought
learning to the lower strata of society. Neophytes were usually taken
from the humbler classes, and thus culture was diffused. Even the
idols, pictures, and scrolls, with the explanations and preaching in
the vernacular, served to instruct the people and lift their thoughts
out of the rut of every-day life—a result which is in itself true
education. Wherever Buddhism penetrated, there was more or less
literature published in the speech of the unlearned, and often the
first books for the people were works on religion. China gave her
language and ideographs; India sent Sanskrit and phonetic letters, from
which syllabaries or alphabets were constructed, not only for
vernacular writing and printing, but as aids to the easier apprehension
and more popular understanding of the tenets of Confucius.
The Corean syllabary seems to have been first invented by Chul-chong,
one of the ministers at the court of the king of Shinra, in the seventh
century. This was the Nido; like the kana of the Japanese, purely a
collection of syllables and not a true alphabet. The Nido was made by
giving to some of the commoner Chinese characters a phonetic value,
though the idea of having a vernacular system of writing was most
probably suggested by the Sanskrit letters, [13] some of which
accurately represented Corean sounds. The true alphabet of the Coreans,
called Unmun (common language), was invented by a Buddhist priest named
Syel-chong, or Sye′-chong, who is regarded as one of the ablest
scholars in the literary annals of Corea. The “Grammaire Coréenne”
states that this took place under the dynasty of Wang, at Sunto,
“toward the end of the eighth or ninth century of the Christian era.”
This is a palpable mistake, as the dynasty of Wang was not established
at Sunto until the tenth century. Mr. Aston, whose researches are based
on the statements of Corean and Japanese writers, believes that the
Unmun, or true Corean alphabet, “was invented not earlier than the
first half of the fifteenth century.” Yet, in spite of their national
system of writing, the influence of the finished philosophy and culture
of China, both in form and spirit, has been so great that the
hopelessness of producing a copy equal to the original became at once
apparent to the Corean mind. Stimulating to the receptive intellect, it
has been paralyzing to all originality. The culture of their native
tongue has been neglected by Corean scholars. The consequence is, that
after so many centuries of national life, Chō-sen possesses no
literature worthy of the name. Only in rare cases are native books
translated into either Chinese or Japanese.
At present, Corean literary men possess a highly critical knowledge of
Chinese. Most intelligent scholars read the classics with ease and
fluency. Penmanship is an art as much prized and as widely practised as
in Japan, and reading and writing constitute education. From the fifth
to the seventeenth century the Corean youth of gentle blood went to
Nanking to receive or complete their education. Since Peking has been
the Chinese capital (under the Mongols from 1279, and under the Ming
emperors from 1410) few young men have gone abroad to study until
within the last year, when numbers of Corean lads have entered the
naval, military, and literary schools of the imperial government.
The practical democratic element pervading China was long absent from
the nations which were her pupils and vassals. Of all these borrowers,
Corea has most closely imitated her teacher. She fosters education by
making scholastic ability, as tested in the literary examination, the
basis of appointment to office. This “Civil Service Reform” was
established in Chō-sen by the now ruling dynasty early in the fifteenth
century. Education in Corea is public, and encouraged by the government
only in this sense, that it is made the road to government employ and
official promotion. By instituting literary examinations for the civil
and military service, and nominally opening them to all competitors,
and filling all vacancies with the successful candidates, there is
created and maintained a constant stimulus to culture.
Corean culture resembles that in mediæval Europe. It is
extra-vernacular. It is in Latin—the Latin of Eastern Asia—the classic
tongue of the oldest of living empires. This literary instrument of the
learned is not the speech of the modern Chinamen, but the condensed,
vivid, artificial diction of the books, which the Chinese cannot and
never did speak, and which to be fully understood must be read by the
eye of the mind. The accomplished scholar of Seoul who writes a
polished essay in classic style packs his sentences with quotable
felicities, choice phrases, references to history, literary prismatics,
and kaleidoscopic patches picked out here and there from the whole
range of ancient Chinese literature, and imbeds them into a
mosaic—smooth, brilliant, chaste, and a perfect unity. This is the acme
of style. So in the Corean mind, the wise saws and ancient instances,
the gnomic wisdom, quotations and proverbs, political principles,
precedents, historical examples, and dynasties, are all Chinese, and
ancient Chinese. His heaven, his nature, his history, his philosophy,
are those of Confucius, and like the Chinaman, he looks down with
infinite contempt upon the barbarians of Christendom and their
heterodox conceptions of the universe. Meanwhile his own language,
literature, and history are neglected. The Corean child begins his
education by learning by voice, eye, and pen, the simple and beautiful
native alphabet of twenty-five letters, and the syllabary of one
hundred and ninety or more combinations of letters. He learns to read,
and practises writing in both the book or square style and the script
form or running hand. The syllabary is not analyzed, but committed to
memory from sight and sound. Spelling is nearly an unknown art, as the
vowel changes and requirements of euphony—so numerous as to terrify the
foreign student of Corean—are quickly acquired by ear and example in
childhood. With this equipment in the rudiments, which is all that
nearly all the girls, and most of the boys learn, the young reader can
master the story-books, novels, primers of history, epistles, and the
ordinary communications of business and friendship. If the lad is to
follow agriculture, cattle-raising, trade, mining, or hunting, he
usually learns no more, except the most familiar Chinese characters for
numbers, points of the compass, figures on the clock-dial, weights,
measures, coins, and the special technical terms necessary in his own
business. Thus it often happens that a Corean workman, like a Chinese
washerman, may be perfectly familiar with the characters even to the
number of hundreds relating to his trade or occupation, and yet be
utterly unable to read the simplest book, or construct one Chinese
sentence. With the Chinese characters, one can write English as well as
Corean or Japanese, but a thorough knowledge of the terms necessary to
a sailor, a jeweller, a farmer, or a lumber merchant would not enable
one to read Ivanhoe or Wordsworth.
If the Corean lad aspires to government service, he begins early the
study of the “true letters” or “great writing.” The first book put into
his hands is, “The Thousand Character Classic.” This work is said to
have been composed by a sage in one night—a labor which turned the hair
and beard of the composer to whiteness. In it no character is repeated,
and all the phrases are in two couplets, making four to a clause. The
copies for children are printed from wooden blocks in very large type.
At the right side of each character is its pronunciation in Corean, and
on the left the equivalent Corean word. The sounds are first learned,
then the meaning, and finally the syntax and the sense of the passages.
Meanwhile the brush-pen is kept busily employed until the whole text of
the author is thoroughly mastered by eye, ear, hand, and memory. In
this manner, the other classics are committed. Education at first
consists entirely of reading, writing, and memorizing. Etiquette is
also rigidly attended to, but arithmetic, mathematics, and science
receive but slight attention.
After this severe exercise of memory and with the pen, the critical
study of the text is begun. Passages are expounded by the teacher, and
the commentaries are consulted. Essays on literary themes are written,
and a style of elegant composition in prose and verse is striven for.
For the literary examinations in the capital and provinces, the
government appoints examiners, who give certificates to those who pass.
Those who succeed at the provincial tests, are eligible only to
subordinate grades of employ in the local magistracies. The aspirants
to higher honors, armed with their diplomas, set out to Seoul to attend
at the proper time the national examination. The journey of these lads,
full of the exultation and lively spirit born of success, moving in
hilarious revelry over the high roads, form one of the picturesque
features of out-door life in Corea. The young men living in the same
district or town go together. They go afoot, taking their servants with
them. Pluming themselves upon the fact that they are summoned to the
capital at the royal behest, they often make a roystering, noisy, and
insolent gang, and conduct themselves very much as they please. The
rustics and villagers gladly speed their parting. At the capital they
scatter, putting up wherever accommodations in inns or at the houses of
relatives permit.
Though young bachelors form the majority at these examinations, the
married and middle-aged are by no means absent. Gray-headed men try and
may be rejected for the twentieth time, and grandfather, father, and
son occasionally apply together.
On the appointed day, the several thousand or more competitors assemble
at the appointed place, with the provisions which are to stay the inner
man during the ordeal. The hour preparatory to the assignment of themes
is a noisy and smoky one, devoted to study, review, declamation, or to
eating, drinking, chatting, or sleeping, according to the inclination
or habit of each. The examination consists of essays, and oral and
written answers to questions. During the silent part of his work, each
candidate occupies a stall or cell. The copious, minute, and complex
vocabulary of terms in the language relating to the work, success and
failure, the contingencies, honest and dishonest shifts to secure
success, and what may be called the student’s slang and folk-lore of
the subject, make not only an interesting study to the foreigner, but
show that these contests subtend a large angle of the Corean
gentleman’s vision during much of his lifetime.
Examination over, the disappointed ones wend their way home with what
resignation or philosophy they may summon to their aid. The successful
candidates, on horseback, with bands of musicians, visit their patrons,
relatives, the examiners and high dignitaries, receiving
congratulations and returning thanks. Then follows the inevitable
initiation, which none can escape—corresponding to the French “baptism
of the line,” the German “introduction to the fox,” the English
“fagging,” and the American “hazing.”
One of the parents or friends of the new graduate, an “alumnus,” or one
who has taken a degree himself, one also of the same political party,
acts as godfather, and presides at the ceremony. The graduate presents
himself, makes his salute and takes his seat several feet behind the
president of the party. With all gravity the latter proceeds, after
rubbing up some ink on an ink-stone, to smear the face of the victim
with the black mess, which while wet he powders thickly over with
flour. Happy would the new graduate be could he escape with one layer
of ink and flour, but the roughness of the joke lies in this, that
every one present has his daub; and when the victim thinks the ordeal
is over new persons drop in to ply the ink-brush and handful of flour.
Meanwhile a carnival of fun is going on at the expense, moral and
pecuniary, of the graduate. Eating, drinking, smoking, and jesting are
the order of the day. It is impossible to avoid this trial of purse and
patience, for unless the victim is generous and good-natured, other
tricks and jokes as savage and cruel as those sometimes in vogue in
American and British colleges follow. After this farce, but not until
it has been undergone, is the title recognized by society.
The three degrees, corresponding somewhat to our B.A., M.A., and Ph.D.,
are cho-si, chin-sa, kiup-chiei. The diplomas are awarded in the king’s
name, the second written on white paper, and the third on red adorned
with garlands of flowers. The degrees are not necessarily successive.
The highest, or the second, may be applied for without the first. The
holder of the second degree may obtain office in the provinces, and
after some years may become a district magistrate or guardian of one of
the royal sepulchres. The highest degree qualifies one to fill
honorable posts at the palace and in the capital, in one of the
ministries, or to be the governor of a province, or of a great city.
Properly, the place of a “doctor” is in Seoul. The usual term of office
is two years.
The examinations for civil titles and offices attract students of the
highest social grade. The military studies are chiefly those of archery
or horsemanship, the literary part of their exercises being slight. But
one degree, the lowest, is awarded, and if the holder is of gentle
blood, and has political influence, he may rise to lucrative office and
honors, but if from the common people, he usually gets no more than his
title, or remains a private or petty officer.
The system of literary examinations which, when first established, and
during two or three centuries, was vigorously maintained with
impartiality, is said to be at present in a state of decay, bribery and
official favor being the causes of its decline.
The special schools of languages, mathematics, medicine, art, etc., are
under the patronage of the government. The teachers and students in
these branches of knowledge form a special class midway between the
nobles and people, having some of the privileges of the former. They
may also attend the examinations, gain diplomas, and fill offices.
Their professions are usually hereditary, and they marry only among
themselves. In most respects, these bodies of learned men resemble the
old guilds of scholars in Yedo, and the privileged classes, like
physicians, astronomers, botanists, etc., in Japan.
There are eight distinct departments of special knowledge. The Corps of
Interpreters include students and masters of the Chinese, Manchiu,
Mongol, and Japanese languages. These attend the embassy to Peking,
have posts on the frontier, or live near Fusan. The treaties recently
made with the United States and European powers will necessitate the
establishment of schools of foreign languages, as in Tōkiō and Peking.
The School of Astronomy, geoscopy, and the choice of fortunate days for
state occasions is for the special service of the king. Corea, like
China, has not yet separated astrology from astronomy, but still keeps
up official consultation with the heavenly bodies for luck’s sake. The
School of Medicine trains physicians for the royal, and for the public,
service. The School of Charts or documents has charge of the archives
and the preparation of the official reports sent to Peking. In the
School of Design, the maps, sketches, plans and graphic work required
by the government are made, and the portraits of the king are painted.
The School of Law is closely connected with the Ministry of Justice,
and serves for the instruction of judges, and as a court of appeals.
The School of Mathematics or Accounts assists the Treasury Department,
audits accounts, appraises values, and its members are often charged
with the task of overseeing public works. The School of Horology at
Seoul keeps the standard time and looks after the water-clock. Beside
these eight services, there is the band of palace musicians.
It is evident from all the information gathered from sources within and
without the hermit nation, that though there is culture of a certain
sort among the upper classes, there is little popular education worthy
of a name. The present condition of Chō-sen is that of Europe in the
Middle Ages. The Confucian temples and halls of scholars, the memorial
stones and walls inscribed with historical tablets and moral maxims,
the lectures and discussions of literary coteries, and the poetry
parties concentrate learning rather than diffuse it. The nobles and
wealthy scholars, the few monasteries and the government offices
possess libraries, but these are but dead Chinese to the common people.
Nothing like the number of book stores, circulating libraries, private
schools, or ordinary means of diffusing intelligence, common in China
and Japan, exists in Corea. Science and the press, newspapers and
hospitals, clocks and petroleum, and, more than all, churches and
school-houses, have yet a mighty work to do in the Land of Morning
Calm.
Paganism and superstition, Confucianism and Buddhism, having taken root
in Chō-sen, each with its educational influence, Christianity entered
within the last century to plant an acorn within the narrow bottle of
the Corean intellect. It is needless to say that the receptacle was
shattered by the spreading of the oak. The Corean body-politic,
confronted by this rooted and growing influence, must be transformed.
How the seed was dropped, how the tiny stem grew, how the trunk
received into its bosom the lightning bolts of persecution, how the
boughs were riven, and how life yet remains, will now be narrated.
III.
MODERN AND RECENT HISTORY.