Mar, 20.
'THERE. has reached us from Home a little pamphlet by Professor Herbert Giles entitled "Chaos in China" which in these dismal days it is decidedly encouraging to read. The writer, it may be advisable to recall, Professor of Chinese at Cambridge University, he lived in China from 1867 to 1892 and his knowledge of the Chinese lange uage and classics would probably suffice to make him a Hanlin with examination still well polemical, excited by two articles from the "Times'" Peking correspondent, written last December; the which unhappy cor tributer Professor Giles flays methodically and mercilessly. The purely controversial part of the pamphlet is too long to quote. But Professor Giles's conelusions are both helpful and hopeful—especially, perhaps, his contention that "superficial thinkers may occasionally be right and profound thinkers may sometimes be wrong." Every journalist at least should feel the cockles of his heart warmed by that and be encouraged to read farther. Unfortunately it would seem that only the really profound can dare to be superficial. Professor Gil is particularly enraged by dictum of the "Times" that it is fallacious to assume from the fact of China having lived through worse periods in the|Av has completely changed its value that it is for the people of China to' settle with their rulers we heartily agree. If the Powers are not going to intervene with force—and it is a very, very open question whether they actually could do so with any extensive result—neither should they with blandishments. If they will not try to compel the politicians to be good, "neither should they bribe them with tariff revision and other sweetmeats cooked in the mephytic atmosphere of ill-instructed and worse advised international conferences. Professor Giles thinks that if the Chinese people are really as apathetic as they are made out to be, it is the first time in history that they have ever suffered for Tong, in an apathetic condition, anything like tyrannical cruelty from their rulers. The Chinese people have always governed themselves. No laws have ever been introduced to last for any time, which have not gained their full' acceptance.
This recalls the recent saying of a Chinese friend to the present writer: that in her history China has suffered much worse things than she is suffering now, before the breaking point of the people' patience has come, but always it has come and they have combined to set matters right.
In one particular, however, Professor Giles finds serious fault with modern tendencies. It has long been his personal opinion that China suffers badly from "over-Westernization and over-
Americanization"
1 see the ease, it is not so much past, that she will equally live|the amount, greater or less, of through the present: for, ""time|modern education which is at' the bottom of whatever trouble there believe that Chang Tso-lin has bien that chang, eon, has|im* itary and. the: change io] ™y, 0 He he kind of education The Kuomintang are antagonistic, Proceeding with intensified rapid-|'"V9"°d,, Teo much chemistry, too is the Southntest. By common|ity.
The world moves faster branch consent, the corruption, greed every decade." Thus, comments biology, economics, or what not, and low morality of the average Professor Giles, "the idea of|would hardly lead a great empire run of officials in Peking is such history being of any value in|astray, if it were still held in the as has perhaps never been seen, and if their superiors are personally of any higher standard, they are powerless in their underlings' hands. To talk of a tariff revision conference in these circumstances is merely to pave the way to throwing good money after bad. An essential prelimin nary to such revision, as stipulated at Washington, is the abolition of likin. Does any sane individual suppose for one moment! that it would be abolished without the provinces' consent? The name might go, never the reality. All that would come of an upward revision of the tariff would be the payment of some old debts and the immediate contracting of new. A fresh impost would be put on trade at the treaty ports and) internally it would continue to be stifled by the same exactions as of yore.
If the tariff revision conference] is to be of any real service to China, its Scope must. be much greater than that. projected a Washington. Let it be stipulated by the Powers that the conference must cover a general consideration of China's finances and reorganization of the system of. taxation. Let us know exactly. what she can count on in revenue! and what debts are claimed of her. There is no doubt, believe, that the latter could and, should be pared down with generous hand, only, under present conditions, it is to no one's interest to do so. It must also} be stipulated that in such a cor ference the provinees and busi ness associations must be represented and the conclusions arrived at be attested by them. If such a proposal were made with the full force of the Powers: behind it, and if it were accepted, then there would be real evidence of a desire on the part of China' politicians, in the' old phrase, to set their house in order.
If the proposal were rejected, then nothing less should be considered. It is a test case to judge the sincerity of the men in power. helping to forecast the future is now dismissed without a hei ing. The Chinese have always attached great importance to history and hold that one can see the future in the past."
Turning then to history Professor Giles recalls that in China there have been twenty-four dynasties all of them, except the last, involving frightful bloodshed ' and rapine on a large scale and covering Jong periods, as for the overthrow of the dynasty about A. D. 220, when for nearly one hundred years the empire was divided between three martial rulers, who maintained large armies " and fought one another without cease for the leadership. Then the reigning House was dismissed and the empire broken up into small and irreconcilable dynasties, which for at least fifty years made the land unfit for any exception bandits to live in, The Chow dynasty, from' 1122 to 255. B.C., is particularly: interesting for the analogy it' offers to present conditions.
China was split up into a_number of lesser and greater States ruled each by its own baron.
The "Three Character Class tells us that "when the Chows made tracks eastward, the feudal bond was slackened: the arbitra:
ment of spears and shields prevailed, and peripatetic politicians -_were held in high esteem.
Here, says, Professor Giles, we have the Tuchuns of to-day. He protests strongly against the idea of force from without to bring the Tuchuns to their senses.
Force might avail to some extent when there was still a central point of Government, from which reactions might extend throughout the country. Now there is no such point, of course, and the suggestion that a public example' made of one Tuchun would bring the others to their senses he utterly derides. This is a matter of opinion but, as the world wags to-day, the truth one way or the other does not appear'
ely to be put to the test. With his further conclusion, however, grip of lofty doctrines enunciated by one who for nearly twenty-five has been regarded as a semi-divine Teacher. It is when the ancient moral and ethical standards of a nation are thrown Jout on the dust-heap that "men deco; just as much as when The Chinese, says Professor Gil "have dropped the faithful pilot who steered them aright through so many centuries and the captains now in charge are not equal to the task Why was it impossible to preserve under the Republic, with certain modifications ud additions, the ancient and valuable examinations through which the poor might, and often did, reach the highest offices of State?
Had the Republic held fast from the very first to. the Confucian deal, coupled with their own system cof examination as the main issue, graduates from the provinces would have flocked usual to gain the much-coveted stinetions and share in the - government: of the the. vital link' would have been preserved.
"The Chinese cannot without risk jettison their ideals of more than two millenniums." The thought occurs that the recent manifestation of anti-foreign feeling may bbe due to two main causes: first, that the most vocal part of the nation have cast away their old wisdom and are endeavouring to assimilate Western styles, in which, by comparison not to be ignored, they find themselves bunglers and amateurs; and secondly, that the nation' as a whole, with its deep historical sense, is conscious that it can settle its own troubles as it has in the past, and that it irritated and' bewildered by the foreigner's impatience and hustling ways. But altogether Professor Giles's pamphlet is rather encouraging, 'THe Civil Governor of Chili has ordered the people of his province prepare. each to. plant. a tree jon. Ching-ming (formerly Puyo Brightness but now less picturesque~
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.