Tae Asiatic Society have don introduce the debating clem their programme, and we heartily congratulate them on the success which attended their first essay. The audience which filled the lower room in the Masonic Hall on Monday evening was appreciative, and the members spoke with intelligence and aviation. And what an important subject they discussed, "the Incompatibility of Cbinw with Western Nations for social intercourse." On the face of it, the question presents enormous difficulties, and we Are not surprised to see that opinions a conflicting as they were numerous were elicited. One gentleman showed the total incompatil observable. between Europeansand Chinese. Another demonstrated that there was no common standing ground between us and Chinamen, whereon social intercourse can be founded. A third speaker thought that mutual contempt was the main cause of separation betwoon Chinamen and foreigners; and a fourth urged that there really' was little or: no ground for our contempt, at all. The subject is one about which plainness of speech is in some respects possible. But one thing is obvious on the face and front of the matter, The mere raising of the question is a bitter satire upon the way in which our reli-, gion has been taught us, for eighteen lrundred years. If the Christian. religion meant anything at all, it meant that we are not to call that common which God hath cleansed. The object of the preaching of Christ and his Apostles was to remove caste prejudices, and to show henceforth that the various nations of the world should drop their masks, look each other in the face, and acknowledge that there was a common standing ground upon which the Jow and the Gentile, and therefore the European and the Mongol, might meet—even as there was a common sun to light them, and a common sky arching over their heads. Theology however has been substituted for ligion; and obscure dogmas have covered with their unintelligiblerabbish, the bright and strong foundation stones of right principle. Hence the prevalence of questions like that discussed on Monday. Men are still groping in darkness, and seek in various ways to explain their own narrow-mindedness.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.