TaRING part as we are doing in one of the greatest conflicts that has ever occurred, viz., that between Christian and Chinese civilisations, it is well occasionally to look around us and see what has already been done, and what is likely to be the final issue.
Look for a moment at the opposing forces. On the one hand we have Chinese civilisation demanding submission to authority at any cost as to the decrees of the only Son of Heaven teaching that moral force is far nobler than physical force, holding up filial piety as its grandest ideal, and, the better to enforce authority, calling' the mandarins the parents of the people. Besides, while the great nations of antiquity had to thank their mighty rivers for their wealth and prosperity, ~—as in India, Babylon and Egypt—China has the good fortune to have in that respect a double portion in the Yangtsze Kiang and the Yellow River. Further, it has had no mighty nations near it to contend with; it had in-
rope, and inaugurated competitive ex-vented Rrinting 500 years before Eu-aminations centuries earlier than was done in Christendom.
On the other band, we have Christian civilisation demanding liberty of the individual at any cost, holding every man a son of God; subjugating nature for human service; teaching the duty of delivering all the human race from sin and suffering of all kinds; holding up the ideal, not of sacrifice for one's parents merely, but for the whole race—strangers and even rebels,—taking Jesus Christ as its pattern.
But Christianity had its rise in a country of no great rivers, and Judea was surrounded and had been overwhelmed again and again by mighty em) ines—Ezypts Babylon and Rome. Still like the phoenix, each time from its ashes there always arose a stronger brood. Christian civilisation, encouraging freedom, subjugation of nature, and deliverance of man from all evil, increased in force until the nations that at first opposed, either were led to adopt its principles or perished in refusing them. We find these principles triumphing in the early Christian era, in the times of the Renaissance, the Reformation, and modern Revolutions of Europe and America. It had no printing till 400 years ago, but its literature now covers the globe.
We find the fundamental conception of both sides significantly embodied in their respective official documents. In the Chinese document the last word is "Obey!" in that of Christendom the Jast words are "Your obedient servants!" As there is this fundamental difference in attitude, a conflict on the terms of intercourse was inevitable. Trede was the occasion of the wasin China, not forms of religion as in Europe; but the cause of both lay deeper and involved all the relations of life, And THE CONFLICT OF TWO what has been the result of the their school text-books of the geography conflict? Just the same as in Europe or the history of the world outside Asia, 17th Jan.—a series of almost uninterrupted and little outside Chiao. 'I'heir latest triumphs for Christian civilisation, text-books teach that China occupies because it is based on firmer, even the great bulk of the earth, that other eternal laws, like those of nature. nations only occupy small side places First as to the assumption that the or small islands on China's borders, and Emperor of China is the only Son of that the good things of foreigners are Heaven and only source of authority on earth. In every conflict with foreigners, from the first war down to the audience question and the anti-foreign riots, it is nothing but a series of humiliations to China, its position being absolutely untenable.
The same is true of the moral position. When Kuo Sung-tao heard Dr. Legge's opinion that the moral force of Chris-tendon was of a higher order than that of China, he moved his chair back about three yards from the Doctor and looked at him in utter amazement.
He only conceded superior mechanical skill and physical force to foreigners. This was only a dramatical showing forth of the opinion of the great majority of all the educated in China, But what are the facts? here is no crime greater than murder, but when a foreigner was expressing his deep concern that so many millions of the Chinese were dying of famine, the reply of one of the Viceroys'was: " What of that?" showing that the preventible death of millions of his countrymen sat all too lightly on his conscience.
In the diplomatic service Ministers of Christian nations have by their counsel repeatedly delivered China from war and the encroachments and high demands of stronger nations. It was a Consul of a Christian country who called attention to the suffering of the Chinese in Cuba. It is the military and naval officers of Christian countries who help to drill the Chinese forces so that Chiva may not be hopelessly helpless among the great Powers of the world. Again, is not the Customs service manned by foreigners, simply because the Chinese know that men from Christian nations can be better trusted than their own men? And have not the merchants of Christian nations of their own free will repeatedly responded most cordially and liberally to the cry for help of the famine sufferers, and are not thirteen hundred men and women from Christian countries spending all their time and strength to heal the sick, and teach the ignorant, and save the oppressed, with the only thanks so far from the learned of daily curses and diabolical misrepresentations and frequent riots? But who ever heard of Chinamen (except Christian converts) going abroad to do good to any nation but their own? While not ignoring the many excellencies of Chinese moral teaching, these facts sufficiently dispose of the absurd claim of the Chinese to superiority in morals over Christendom. We have already shown that the Chinese ideal—filial piety—limits their benevolence.
As to Education; the educated among the Chinese know nothing from mere crumbs from China's table, and what foreigners pursue is beneath the dignity of true Chinamen. All is about, the glorious past, nothing about the marvellous nineteenth century. As regards the laws of nature, these textbooks teach nothing, or worse than nothing—a semblance without the reality of knowledge. Every school throughout the land daily teaches as truths the ideas which foreign intercourse has for ever demolished as the merest fallacies, fraught with risk to their very existence as enation. he authorities let their ple live in a fool's paradise, not mowing that shrouding themselves in ignorance is only the last act before death. Every true Christian deeply pities the present state of China.
In the meanwhile, if Christendom had no mighty rivers to build its kingdom on, all the better; it has laid its foundation on the ocean ferries,—all nations are but its local wharves and the whole earth is its possession and home. While China is nursing its childish vanity by enrolling the English nation as a tributary nation and fencing for the pre-eminence of its Emperor in audience, the students of Christendom are not only ransacking the archives of every kingdom past and present, and studying everything in them that is worth knowing, but are also pushing on to fresh researches in nature and in mind to discover new kingdoms and new continents in the realm of thought, to bring out of their treasures' again incalculable riches all for the service of man, which the Chinese have not thought possible even for their very gods to do.
Not till China's delusion about its superiority (which supplies a fresh large crop of deluded students annually) is removed, will the conflict in China cease, or true progress commence. Every effort of Christians therefore to shed light on this dense and fatal darkness will commend itself to every intelligent patriot of China as the dawn of a new day and the beginning of a future that will far surpass the best ever dreamt of in the past.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.