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The Chinese as They Are
By J. R. Saunders, Th. D.
Graves Theological Seminary, Canton, China
The Chinese as They Are
i2mo, cloth net Si. 50
The well-known missionary writer in his latest work
shows the exact situation now confronting the Chinese
and the Western world. A book of great fascination for
all interested in the Chinese question.
Men and Methods That Win in the
Foreign Fields
i2mo, cloth net $1.00
The author gives in practical form the result of years
of experience, (his own and others') of workers bearing
upon the problems of Foreign IMissions, the conditions of
non-Christian lands and the kind of missionaries needed
to accomplish the greatest results. The book is an
examination of the imperative need of the foreign field.
The Cross and the Reconstruction of
the World
i2mo, cloth net $1.50
Dr. George W. Truett says: "This book traces the
present rapidly changing world conditions pohtically,
industrially, socially, educationally, religiously, making
the earnest insistence that Christianity must now and
ever be the one, only, all-sufiicient hope for humanity.
It has a distinctly vital message— a message supremely
needed for these momentous days."
a member of an influential official family, who declined
a high official position to help christianity in south
China.
■, ■' , » 5 » 9 ' . ? > ', » > ' ' ' 1 '
The Chinese as They Are
By
J. R. SAUNDERS, Th. D.
Author of ''Men and Methods That Win in the
Foreign Field,' "The Cross and the Recon-
struction of the Worlds'' etc.
ILLUSTRATED
New York Chicago
Fleming H. Revell Company
London and Edinburgh
.«■••■»
''Cdpyngfit^*i92i,' by
FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY
New York: 158 Fifth Avenue
Chicago: 17 North Wabash Ave.
London : 2 1 Paternoster Square
Edinburgh: 75 Princes Street
Because of his great love for the world's
Saviour and longing desire that the Gospel
be preached speedily to all the waiting
heathen nations, as shown by his making
the largest gift ever made in the Southland
for foreign missions by any Baptist brother
this book
is affectionately dedicated to
the memory of the late
COLONEL JOSEPH NEWTON BROWN
Anderson, South Carolina
(^Deceased January 24th, ig2l)
/* •''* <"^ V" T"
c
Preface
IN the past the West and East have been widely
separated, but the time has come when we
must walk together. We must know each
other, join our civiHzations and combine our re-
sources in meeting the world's needs. Before we
can do this effectively, we need to understand each
other and the forces that have been the basis of
our civilization. Travellers and the dwellers in the
port towns have written much about China, but
these have confused rather than revealed the people
as they are. We need to spend many years in
actual contact with the people before we can know
them. Dr. Arthur H. Smith, whose missionary
experience extends over nearly fifty years, answers
the question, Who Knows China? thus: "I have
met only two classes of people who are able confi-
dently to assert, * We Do.' They are the news-
paper reporters and globe-trotters. As for myself,
I am continually discovering a continental area still
unexplored" ("New Currents in China").
The world's civilization and destiny depend on
our understanding the Oriental situation and meet-
ing it wisely. We have not yet understood the im-
portance of the crisis fast approaching its crucial
7
^
8 PREFACE
stage. I wonder if the Christian forces realize
this as the business men do. Thomas W. Lamont,
representing thirty-six of the leading banking cor-
porations in the United States and indirectly the
leading banks in England, France and Japan, was
sent to China to examine the financial situation
with a view of organizing the Consortium to
finance that country. After six months he re-
turned to New York City and made this state-
ment: "If ever a people deserve our effective
friendship these are the ones. In a material way
they will repay it a thousandfold. China has un-
told wealth in her natural resources. It requires
only the stabilization of political conditions there
in order to develop these resources and make the
country perhaps the greatest in the world in actual
as well as potential wealth.
"As I went into the interior, rode on horseback
through the little villages and then on through the
cultivated plains, coming into personal contact with
the people at work, tilling the soil with infinite in-
dustry, and as I began to see how they had carried
on their civilization without let or hindrance
through thousands of years, I became thoroughly
imbued with the innate strength of this great
people."
My object in preparing this volume is to enable
the Christian forces of the West to know the peo-
ple as they are and " become thoroughly imbued "
with the supreme opportunity and the greatness of
PREFACE 9
the task now ours. We need to understand this
in seeking to reveal Christ, the world's Saviour, to
them. Western commerce with its usual attendant
social evils and Western civilization without the
moral ideals and dynamic force of Christianity
ought not to be permitted to mould New China.
These forces are likely to hinder rather than to help
except as Christianity is given first place in the
dawning age. Principal Gaudier at the Des Moines
North American Student Conference, 1920, spoke
these significant words: " Probably the future of
the world depends on no one thing so much as
this: Will Chinese education in the next genera-
tion be dominated by a Prussian or a Christian
spirit? I believe the future of humanity depends
on the answer to that question, and the churches of
Jesus Christ must answer the question."
Our brethren in the Orient struggling for better
things need " a brother who will walk in the sun-
light and show them the way." If we will do
this, they will be a blessing to the world for all
future days. I sincerely hope that the Christian
forces ever5rwhere will be aware of the situation
and will render the necessary effort to meet the
conditions for their needs and the glory of the
Father.
J. R. S.
Richmond, Va.
^
V
The Christian greeting that occurs '
in the letters of all Christians to their '^
fellow-Christians. This means in a ^'^^
rough translation the following: "Ear- " ci^
nestly desire that the big pastor, San,
obtain constantly from God and my
Lord Jesus Christ grace and mercy. -^j^
Amen."
Every character is a word with dis- ^5?}
tinct meaning, written from right to ^t
left and from the top to the bottom.
This is regarded by the Chinese as
very fine handwriting. J«^
Bf5
'fa
10
Contents
I.
Their Country
M
II.
Their Language
24
III.
Characteristics of Greatness .
.
30
IV.
The Chinese and Foreigners
37
V.
The Chinese and Business .
. 44
VI.
The Chinese and Music
52
VII.
The Chinese and Labour .
. 58
VIII.
The Chinese and Government
. 63
IX.
The Chinese and Customs .
. 69
X.
The Chinese and Women
. 7^
XI.
The Chinese and Their Worst Classej
5 81
XII.
The Chinese and Education
. 87
XIII.
The Chinese and Medical Science
. 97
XIV.
The Chinese and Ancestral Worship
. 106
XV.
The Chinese and Religion .
. 113
XVI.
The Chinese and Christianity .
. 121
XVII.
The Chinese and Missions — Opening
New Work ....
• 131
XVIII.
The Chinese and Missions — The Com-
pound
. 137
XIX.
The Chinese and Missions—Me
OF Work
II
thodj
. 142
12 CONTENTS
XX. The Chinese and Christianity's Great
Opportunity . . . .148
XXI. The Chinese and Their Appeal to the
Volunteer 1^5
XXII. The Chinese and How to Meet Their
Needs 161
XXIII. The Chinese and the World Politic . 167
XXIV. The Chinese and the Kingdom of God 171
Illustrations
FACING
PAGE
A Member of an Influential Official Family, Who
Declined a High Official Position to Help Chris-
tianity IN South China .... Frontispiece
Hon. Go\^rnor Mok of Kwangtung Province, China.
He Gave Largely to Mission Work and With His
Fellow Officials Gave Valuable Lands for Schools
AND Hospitals 30
Imperial Grounds in Peking. Until 1900 No Foreigners
Were Permitted to Enter but Now the Grounds
Are Open to Everyone Interested in Chinese
History 38
Chong Lip Sz, Banker, Business Man, and Friend to the
Missionary 44
Wong Kok Shun, a B.anker Who Has Contributed About
$50,000 to Christian Work During the Last Five
Years 44
Mrs. Saunders' Most Talented Pupil in Music in
China or America 52
The Blind Organist; for Years in One of the Best
Churches near Canton 52
A Chinese Farmer and His Mother. The Man Won His
Wife to Christ and Then His Mother, Who was 75
Years Old 58
Christian Chinese Family. Notice the Length of the
Man's Clothing and that of the Mother and
Daughter. The Latter was not Engaged when a
Child, but Allowed to Select Her Own Husband . 70
Girls' High School and Main Building at Hangchow,
Central China. Such Schools are the Hope of
New China 76
A Christian Whose Brother was a Leper. He Himself
was a Monk for Years, His Mother was a Woman
of Bad Character 82
13
14 ILLUSTRATIONS
FACING
PAGE
" The Home Day " of Nanking Christian University's
Alumni. They are Raising $50,000 for this Great
University 88
A Leading Young Physician in Canton, and Helper in
Christian Work 98
Dr. Jew Hawk, Hongkong, China. A A^estern Trained
Physician 98
A Tomb of One of the Ming Emperors. It is 500 Years
Old and Located Near Nanking 106
The Altar of Heaven in Peking, Where the Rulers of
China Turn their Prayers at the Beginning of
Each Year 114
Chinese Students in the Leading Educational Institu-
tions in the United States from tee Pui Ching
Academy, Canton, South China . . . . .122
The River-side Where We Entered Ying-tak and
Started the New Work. Our Compound Was
Located Nearby. (Insert.) A Young Hak-ka
Preacher, Who Helped to Make the Work a
Success 132
A Section of the Shanghm College Compound (Campus) 138
A Section of the Baptist Compound, Tung Shan, Canton 138
A Christian Family of Great Influence. Two Sons and
Two Daughters are in the United States Preparing
for and Doing Christian Work. The Father is a
Native Preacher and Leader 142
Primary BL^LDING in Canton, Erected in Part by Funds
from the Chinese. The Governor sent Nearly
$1,000. Another Building is Being Erected . . 148
Head of Police in Canton, a Great Friend to the Mis-
sion Work i.')6
C. Y. Hui, FROM South China, now Completing His
Third Year in Richmond College, Va 156
A. Section of Great Wall at Nanking . . . .162
B. Entrance to Confucian Temple, Peking . . . 162
C. Entrance to Lama Temple, Peking . . . .162
Map of China 176
THEIR COUNTRY
NOWHERE in all the world and during
all time do we find another nation quite
like the Chinese. The other great fam-
ilies of nations, that have played so large a part in
the world's history, have acted their part and one
by one disappeared, but the Chinese remain^ ever
increasing in numbers and power with a continu-
ous history dating from nearly three thousand
years before Christ. During all this history they
have successfully resisted all forces without and
within, and remain to-day with greater potentiali-
ties than ever. To know these unique people and
the forces that have held them together as one
family is to understand one of the great problems
of the human race. They have many lessons for
the present age that bear on all lands and peoples.
The Chinese have been the greatest force in the
Orient during the last five thousand years. Count-
ing India we have in the Eastern Hemisphere
more than half of the human family, and the domi-
nant people in the highest ideals in these lands
have ever been the people of China. These ideals
•—and not the country — ^have made the people
15
16 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
stand out as one of the greatest civilizations in all
history. They are the only people who have
wholly absorbed the Jews as far as we can ascer-
tain from authentic history. The sons of Abra-
ham reached China a thousand years ago (much
earlier some people think) and settled in Honan
Province, close by the early home of the Chinese.
These people from across the mountains were
amalgamated. Their religion, customs, language
disappeared without leaving any lasting impres-
sion on the Chinese ideals.
The religious leaders of India had a profound
influence on the Chinese in modern days (com-
paratively), yet the religion of China antedates
Buddhism thousands of years and was never des-
troyed by it, but rather the foreign religions were
adapted and made a part of the Chinese. Chinese
have given the Japanese their highest ideals.
Bishop Bash ford in his book, " China: An In-
terpretation," says: "Two facts at least are be-
yond question. The Chinese nation is the largest in
numbers of all the nations on the face of the earth,
and their civilization is the oldest continuous on
the globe. The virility of the race is indisput-
able. The physical vitality is so great that they
have captured industries and trades from the Rus-
sians at Vladivostock and along the Trans-Siberian
railway, and have led in industries and commerce
in competition with the Japanese, Indians, Arabi-
ans, Europeans and Americans in every neutral
THEIR COUNTRY 17
port m Malaysia. The Chinese people can probably
labour more continuously under extremes of heat
and cold than any other people on earth."
Yes, these people have played the principal role
in the Far East for the last five thousand years.
In natural resources and man power, they still are
the greatest in potential power. They will, no
doubt, in the near future take their place in the
nations of the world as one of the greatest.
The origin of the Chinese People.
Although they are the oldest nation with a con-
tinuous history, yet they are not the first to occupy
their present country. There are still to be foimd
the aborigines who have never submitted to the
Chinese. These aborigines are found in many of
the mountains and on the islands. They are a dis-
tinct people in customs, appearance, language, and
religion. They have no written language, do not
worship idols except where they have come in
close touch with the Chinese, have strange mar-
riage laws ; some are larger and much whiter than
the Chinese. They have their own government,
peaceful if left alone; otherwise cruel and resent-
ful. They certainly antedate the Chinese people.
As to the origin of the Chinese people Julian
Arnold, in his "Commercial Handbook" says:
" The origin of the Chinese Is a matter of dispute.
The fertile lands In the Wei Basin in Southern
Shensi Province In West China, are spoken of as
the cradle of China, indicating that the Chinese
18 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
either came from Central Asia or that the race
originated here."
As to their earliest period he has this to say:
" The legendary history of China is believed by
the Chinese to extend back to the beginnings of all
things. The historical period takes its inception
from B. c. 2852, the supposed date of the birth of
the first of the Emperors as credited in Chinese
history. The Emperor is supposed to have given
to the people (1) the marriage ceremony, (2) mu-
sical instruments, (3) the ideogram in writing to
replace knot notation, (4) the six domestic ani-
mals, ( 5 ) the mulberry leaf for the feeding of the
silkworms, and (6) fish nets.
" The Emperor Shen-nung, B. c. 2700, is re-
puted to have given to his people the wooden plow
and the art of husbandry. At this time China was
supposed to extend as far east as Shantung Prov-
ince and as far south as the Yangtze Valley.'*
As to her present territory he gives this infor-
mation :
" Relative position of China, —
" The distance from the coast of China to the
coast of California is about equivalent to twice the
distance from San Francisco to New York City.
The northern latitude of China's territory corre-
sponds with a line running through southern Can-
ada, and the southern latitude with a line trans-
versing southern Mexico. From east to west
China's territory extends over a distance similar
THEIR COUNTRY 19
to that between the Atlantic and Pacific coasts of
the United States.
" Area and Population, —
" Since China has not carried out a proper land
survey or census, the area B.-M population of its
territory can be given only as estimates, as in the
following table (figures for certain other coun-
tries are added for purposes of comparison) :
Area Density
Region (sq. miles) Population (per sq. mi.)
China proper, exclusive
of the Manchurian
Provinces 1,533,000 336,271,000 219.
Manchuria 364,000 14,917,000 41.
Mongolia 1,370,000 2,500,000 2.
Chinese Turkestan 550,000 1,200,000 2.
Tibet 460,000 6,500,000 14.
Total Chinese Territory 4,277,000 361,388,000 84.
(As to population estimates differ very greatly. We
usually think that 450,000,000 is more likely to be the cor-
rect number — Author.)
South America 6,850,000 35,000,000 5.
United States, exclusive
of dependencies 3,620,000 100,000,000 33.
Japanese Empire 260,000 70,000,000 270.
France (continental) .. 207,000 40,000,000 150.
" China is probably one of the best watered
countries on the face of the globe. The Yangtze
River, about 3,200 miles long, and the Yellow
River, about 3,600 miles, rise in Tibet and flow
east across North and Central China, emptying
into the Pacific. The West River, about 1,200
miles long, rises in Yunnan Plateau in southeast-
20 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
ern China and flows east through South China
into the Pacific."
China has all kinds of climate from the frigid
winters of the North to the mild winters and long
summers of the South, being modified greatly and
made a greater blessing by the large and well-
regulated annual rainfall (as a rule). This va-
ries from twenty-five inches in the North to sev-
enty or more in the South. Tientsin and Peking
are in about the same latitude as San Francisco;
Shanghai near that of New Orleans, and Canton
to that of Havana, Cuba, yet the temperature in
China differs very greatly from that of the corre-
sponding places mentioned in the Western Hemi-
sphere, owing to ocean currents and various other
modifying causes. Take Canton for example.
This city has the loveliest autumns I have ever
seen anywhere in the world with three to four
months in the winter needing fire. There is usu-
ally a little frost and ice each winter and once in a
great while a little snow. Canton is reported to
be the coldest city in the world with the same lati-
tude and altitude.
Nature has wonderfully blessed the Middle
Kingdom and suited it for a large family. Its pro-
ductiveness and climatic conditions fit it for one
of the greatest nations in the world. Owing to
sanitary conditions and the Westerner's failure to
adjust himself to existing problems of health, he
may not be as strong at first as in his native coun-
THEIR COUNTRY 21
try, but this is not due primarily to climate. Most
likely to his failure to make the proper adjust-
ment which every country requires of its inhabit-
ants. China unquestionably has one of the best
climates in the world though many wrong impres-
sions have come to us in the West.
Again there are many wrong impressions as to
the food and the manner of living. They live
very differently in the various sections and do not
eat the same things. Taking the nation as a
whole, more people live on wheat products than
rice, yet rice is the staple food in the South as
nature provides. Sweet potato, beans of various
kinds, water chestnuts, many varieties of greens
and vegetables are used extensively. They have
many more vegetables than we have in the West.
In a recent issue of the London Times, as quoted
by Bishop Bashford, we have this information:
" China has the richest temperate flora in the
world. Professor Sorgent, of the Harvard Ar-
boretum, in connection with E. H. Wilson and
other botanists, has introduced into the United
States some twelve hundred species of trees,
plants, and flowers from China. The same has
been done for England. Thus the Western world
is being enriched by the unusual productiveness of
China. Instead of the Chinese being limited to
rice alone, they use a far larger variety of vege-
tables, grains, and tubes than do Europeans and
Americans."
22 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
The Chinese do not know the boundless re-«
sources of their country in natural wealth. Su-
perstition, lack of official protection, money and
transportation have prevented these resources be-
ing discovered and developed. The mountains
are full of coal and iron ore and other minerals,
but the people have thought if they dig into the
mountains the demons would come out with the
dragon and kill the people. These evil spirits
would bring bad luck, with sickness and death.
This superstition has done much to hinder the
mining of these great beds of wealth which God
has created for their good and the world's needs.
Also the officials have been more concerned about
their profits than the protection of the mining in-
terests. The lack of railroads and proper trans-
portation facilities have made it unprofitable to
spend much on the mines. These barriers will be
removed in New China and she will become one
of the wealthiest nations in the world. The dire
poverty of the masses will disappear.
" Baron Richthofen pronounced the coal and
iron resources of China the greatest of any nation
on earth. He estimates the coal area for China
at 419,000 square miles, as compared with 310,-
000 square miles for the United States" (Bash-
ford). It was reported years ago by an expert
that there was enough coal in one province,
Shansi, to supply the world for a thousand years
at the then rate of consumption. A nation's
THEIR COUNTRY 23
wealth is fast being determined by the amount of
coal and iron deposits.
This great wealth of natural resources will be
developed in the near future and do much to make
China a new country, yet it is not of this kind of
wealth we are most concerned. It is the people,
their history, present condition and outlook, possi-
bility as a great nation, being a blessing to each
other and the world, that give us the most interest
and concern. Indeed they are the marvel of his-
tory. Mr. Rounsenvelle Wildman has this to say
about the people: "Since the dawn of history
China has been a civilized and a religious nation
with a written history. She has had a continuous
national life, and has never been driven from her
Garden of Eden. The Chinese of 3,000 years
B. c. are the identical Chinese that greeted us at
the opening of the Treaty Ports."
These people in their relation to each other and
the outside world, their ability to help solve the
world problems and the mutual help the Occident
and Orient may render in the dawning of the
present complex age we are facing, how we can
help them In their struggles to know and appropri-
ate the blessings of advancing civilization which
we have In Christ, are the questions most oppor-
tune and will have largest place in this volume
rather than the country and past records not ger-
mane to present problems.
II
THEIR LANGUAGE
THE Chinese language is probably the old-
est in the world to-day. Mr. Wildman
says the Chinese we met at the opening
of the Treaty Ports were the identical Chinese of
3,000 years before Christ. This may not be true
in every respect, but as to written language is, no
doubt, quite true. The characters they use in
writing have been modified by different genera-
tions, yet the general make-up is the same and the
ideas and ideals conveyed must be much the same.
The very age of the language and the vast num-
bers speaking it add great interest to its study.
These characters, which look so strange to us, do
service for not only the 450,000,000 in China, but
are used in Japan and many of the surrounding
countries with more or less modification. Origi-
nally Japan had no written language. She bor-
rowed her characters from China and has been
using these ever since. In recent years the Japa-
nese have an alphabet of forty odd letters, yet in
the cultural literature and many of the official doc-
uments we see Chinese characters still used. Even
with Japan's splendid adaptation of Western life
to meet her needs, she has not given up altogether
the Chinese characters. Truths written In Chi-
24
THEIR LANGUAGE 25
% nese characters may reach a third of the human
race. This cannot be said of any other language.
There is a distinct difference between the writ-
ten and spoken language. The written may be
understood wherever read. There is also a dif-
ference in the written language. We have the
classical, the book and newspaper, and the collo-
quial styles. The classical is the language of the
sages, the book and newspaper is that used by the
writers of to-day all over China, and the colloquial
is used by the common people. It is called the
vulgar language by the scholars as the classical
scholars in Athens now think of the colloquial
Greek. The colloquial has been used mostly by
the missionary in his efforts to reach the masses
with the gospel.
The scholars are trying to make a modern
alphabet to use in place of these characters. At
this time the language has no alphabet, only 214
radicals, of which each character is composed of
one or more, but there is an effort to produce an
alphabet somewhat like we have in the West. The
language has no grammar of any consequence.
The first Protestant missionary to reach China
was Robert Morrison in 1807. He felt he must
make a grammar. He did so, but this grammar
is not used to-day, and no one since has found it
necessary to make another one. The early priests
from the West tried, but their efforts as well as
Morrison's were not fruitful in learning the lan-
guage. Missionaries in recent times have tried to
26 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
modernize the language by systems of Romaniza-
tion. These have had local use, but have not ap-
pealed to the scholars. The efforts to make a
modern alphabet ought to succeed, but it remains
to be seen whether the Chinese will give up the old
for the new. The tides of Western civilization
are sweeping over the country, and may change
the language as far as the alphabet is concerned.
Commerce and intercourse with the outside world
will encourage the making of the modern alphabet.
The Chinese people love these characters with
thousands of years of sacred memory. Years ago
I was walking with a Chinese scholar. I read a
leaf and threw it down by the roadside. He picked
it up and said to leave the characters to be walked
over would give great offense to his people. He
picked up the leaf and tenderly cared for it.
These characters are indeed precious by reason of
their age and holy memories, and splendid use
through their long history.
The language is one of tones and idiom very
different from anything in the West. The vocab-
ulary is complex and extensive. The number of
words is likely greater than in English. So many
words mean the same though used by different
classes. We get some Idea of the number and
make up of the words by their dictionaries and
encyclopaedias. K'ang HsI was a literary ruler
who lived in the early period of the Manchu Dy-
nasty (1644-1911). His greatest work was the
massive concordance and encyclopaedia which
THEIR LANGUAGE 27
contained 44,439 characters. About 200 years
before his day (1407) there was completed an en-
cyclopaedia of 22,877 volumes. Its table of con-
tents consisted of sixty volumes.
The above refers to the written language, yet
in addition to the written characters there are
many colloquial words in daily use for which they
have no characters to represent these. The writ-
ten character — a single character — always repre-
sents a word, yet many words in the common
spoken language have no characters. The mission-
aries have with the help of the Chinese teachers in-
vented a number of characters for colloquial use
in conveying the message of Christianity to the
people. A number of books and tracts are writ-
ten in this colloquial, but these are not popular
with the better class.
Characters pronounced alike, but with different
tones, have altogether different meanings. This
is why the colloquial and the spoken language may
differ in different sections, and one section will not
understand the language of another section, yet
they use the same characters. The Mandarin is
spoken by most of the people. This has four
tones, yet many speak the Cantonese. It has nine
tones, and some think they can find eleven. Per-
haps forty or fifty millions speak Hak-ka and this
has six tones, and there are many local dialects
varying in the number of tones.
If one does not give the right tone, the meaning
may be very different from what one expects.
28 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
Dr. Martin tells about a man in North China who
asked his cook to get eighteen yang mi, a plum-
like fruit. The cook returned bringing twelve
sheep tails (very bushy and heavy in North
China), saying he had walked a long distance and
had been able to secure only twelve sheep tails.
Sheep tail has the same pronunciation as the plum-
like fruit, but a different tone. The missionary
failed to get the right tone for the fruit, giving
the one for the sheep tail. Another missionary
was walking the streets in a Chinese city, and
heard the boys making fun of this new arrival.
He thought he told them to return to their
homes, but he gave the wrong tone, and told
them to go to the demons (devil) — a very
bad advice for a missionary to give to Chinese
boys. Fan kwei may mean return or go to
the demons, depending on the tone you give.
We must master the tones and give the exact
idiom if we are to know the language well, and be
a real help to the people. The tones and idiom
are both exceedingly important.
Those who would know the people and think
with them concerning the real problems of life,
must know the language well. No Westerner
ought to be satisfied with a poor knowledge of
both the written and spoken language. Chil-
dren learn it more readily than they do English —
it is monosyllabic and simple if we follow the ex-
act idiom of the people. A man from the West
should not hesitate to go there because of the Ian-
THEIR LANGUAGE 29
guage. Any one with average attainments and a
determination to give his talents fully to the task
may get a working knowledge of the language.
A musical ear and a willingness to learn from
others will be a great help, yet the most important
thing is ability and willingness to do hard, persist-
ent work on the characters and idiom and a readi-
ness to mix with the people and learn from them.
When one has learned their language, one can
speak a message to the largest group on earth to-
day. It is well worth our time and best effort.
The time spent in learning the language gives an
opportunity to learn the people, which after all is
more important, and one of the chief reasons we
learn the language. A good knowledge of the
language and the people places us in a position to
think with them and help them in all problems of
this life and the life to come.
The task of learning so strange a language is
trying with some, yet with others it is very fasci-
nating. I have never enjoyed any study as I did
my first years with the Chinese. I am sure m.y
enthusiasm for the task and the newness of the
work had something to do with the interest and
joy, yet study still has great pleasure for me, and
many others. When I reached Canton, China, I
found Dr. Graves had been there forty-five years.
He was studying Chinese though he must have
spoken the language better than the ordinary
Chinese and knew well the written language.
Ill
CHARACTERISTICS OF GREATNESS
1
^HE Occident has known but little of the
Orient. Each has stood aloof from the
other, thinking too often that one is
superior to the other. I have known a little about
all classes, and the more I know the better I appre-
ciate their real elements of greatness in spite of
the weakness and backwardness of their civiliza-
tion as we consider real greatness in the West.
Western nations have enjoyed certain blessings
which have not reached them ; but wherein we are
greater than they, we can trace this directly or in-
directly to the Saviour with His enlightening
and liberating powers which Christianity brings to
the individual and society. These forces have
marched westward since the days of Paul, yet
China has retained her civilization and many ele-
ments of greatness to a surprising degree which
those of the West do not understand unless they
have intimate relation with the people as a whole.
As mentioned in the Preface, Mr. Thomas J.
Lamont was sent to China for the leading bankers
of the world. When he returned after six
months' stay, he made his report to the world's
leading financiers. I wish to quote further from
30
Hon. Gov^ernor Mok of Kwangtuxg Provinxe, China. He
gave largely to mission work and with his fellow
officials gave valuable lands for schools and hos-
PITALS.
CHARACTERISTICS OF GREATNESS 31
this report: " As to China, I am aware that many-
people characterize it as a great disorganized,
almost chaotic people. No one can spend even
the short while I was in China without being
deeply impressed with the industry and sobriety of
that people, with the idealism of many of their
leaders, with the growth of public opinion there,
with the profound effort that is steadily being
made to establish a central government that will
function as well as the local governments func-
tion. The present government at Peking, as
every one knows, is weak and inefficient. Yet if
the American people lend to the Chinese the coun-
sel and aid, material and spiritual (words of one
of the world's greatest financial experts) which
the Chinese are so longing for and which they
look to America to give them, we shall, I am con-
fident, witness in the coming years the develop-
ment of a great and powerful nation there, a na-
tion of 400,000,000 whose admiration and warm
friendship for the United States, if we bestow
proper thought and effort upon the matter, will
secure for all time to come." His short stay of
six months revolutionized his Ideas of the people.
He went and saw and realized their innate great-
ness and possibilities.
The true greatness is not in material wealth and
militarism as the uncultured soul may think. The
moral ideals and nobility of character do much to
determine a people's greatness. Judging the Chi-
32 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
nese from this standard, they are among the
world's greatest. These ideals have been the basis
of much of their greatness. Dr. Martin, who
spent sixty-six years in close contact with the
leaders in that country, said of their ideals, that
\ they had the greatest of any nation except that of
the ancient Israel. He speaks of their literature:
** They recognize under the name of Shang Ti and
Ti'en a Supreme Power, who presides over the
destinies of men and dispenses rewards and pun-
ishments, but they do not inculcate the worship of
that august Being. He is consequently forgotten
by the people, and His place usurped by idols. Yet
so pure are the moral teachings of these ancient
wTitings that no nation, with one exception (an-
cient Israel), ever received from antiquity a more
precious heritage. While some of the Sacred
Books of the Hindus are unfit for translation, in
the Chinese Canon there is nothing to offend the
most delicate sense of propriety."
These moral ideals from the sages have had
much to do with their greatness, yet idolatry and
false religion from other lands have done much to
weaken the ideals with the masses. This is seen
in the superstition and cruelty all too prevalent.
However, idolatry has had less influence over the
morals of the people than anywhere else in the
world. Wedhurst says as to their idol worship:
" In every other non-Christian country idolatry
^ has been associated with human sacrifice and the
CHARACTERISTICS OF GREATNESS 33
deification of vice accompanied with licentious
rites and orgies; nothing of all this exists in
China."
In winning most idolatrous people to Christ, we
must wait years for the development of high
moral ideals. This is not true in China. Like
Paul, in many cases we have great characters with
which the work of grace begins its work of devel-
opment and guidance, conserving all forces for the
ideals of our Master. They need to see in Him
the fulfillment of their perfect ideals and the
power to realize these in the daily life of the peo-
ple, and then they will unite with the forces of all
righteousness and holiness to make themselves and
others — all mankind — ^honour and glorify the Fa-
ther of us all. Their moral ideals and noble char-
acters explain, in part anyway, why the Chinese
make such wonderful Christian leaders in a sur-
prisingly short time.
These moral ideals are not found in all. Also
many are not able to make great spiritual leaders.
In fact, the masses are not quick to give up the
old. They are considerate and careful to weigh
the realities of any religion and the relation of
these to the common problems of life. This may
mean less in numbers, but more in quality in the
early efforts in any field, but it means the most in
the end when we have perfect truth and power for
all needs as in Christ Jesus.
One element of greatness is seen in their ability
34 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
to do things. They have invented far more than
we reahze and given many original ideas to the
world. A recent writer in China called our at-
tention to the fact that thirty years ago Kang Yu
\ Wei advocated a League of Nations and claims
that he received his idea from Confucius, who
lived twenty-five hundred years ago, and is still
their greatest teacher. Mr. W. J. Clennell, in an
article describing the Chinese contribution to the
civilization of the West, says: "The use of printed
books, the use of paper money and the negotiable
instruments of exchange, the use of glass lenses
. • . the use of cotton materials for weaving,
the mariner's compass . . . coal as a fuel
and gunpowder as an explosive, of firearms and
artillery as weapons of war . . . all, with
many more, were carried to the West in the wake
of the Mongol Conquest, and fructuated and im-
proved in the soil of Europe, adapted somewhat to
Western needs. Are they not precisely the mate-
rial and mechanical scaffolding inside which the
whole fabric of our modern Western life is built
up?" Comparing the Chinese civilization of the
thirteenth century with that of the West, he says,
" It Is an unhumlliated China with no cause to feel
Itself inferior to the Western visitor, nor does the
Western visitor feel that he Is among a people of
lower culture ; he certainly calls them ' idolaters,'
but in all arts of war and of peace, he seems to
acknowledge them, at least, his equal. He is
CHAEACTERISTICS OF GREATNESS 35
somewhat overwhelmed by the sense of the splen-
dour and immensity of their world."
Since that day the Reformation and the ad-
vance of Christianity in the West have changed our
civilization, but the Chinese have remained much
the same with a larger emphasis upon peace at
home and elsewhere. When the dynamic of noble
ideals of service which we have in Christ Jesus
permeates their life and civilization, then they will
become one of the greatest factors in the whole
world for the very best civilization. They will be
our brothers for world peace and reconstruction
on the basis of unselfish brotherhood. They will
even add their conservatism to the forces of right-
eousness and good-will which the whole of Europe
and the other parts of the world so much need at
this time.
Their persistent plodding and self-control in
meeting the trials of life are a marvel even to the
Christian who has the patience and forbearance of
the Master. "New Life Currents in China says":
" I accompanied a missionary doctor to the clinic
in one of the Red Cross Refuges. She could treat
only a small fraction of the many who flocked to
her improvised bamboo hut, and it wrung my
heart to see how patiently the rest turned away.
They showed that spirit in all their trouble and
losses. I wonder if in all the world there can be
found another people as patient and uncomplain-
ing as the Chinese."
36 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
Julian Arnold, in his " Commercial Handbook
of China/' has this to say: "The Chinese people
have the capacity for organization, for repre-
sentative government, for modern industrial and
commercial development. They need the con-
structive sympathy of the West. A country v^ith
a civilization as old as China's, with the culture of
the centuries filtered down through the masses,
with the peace-loving, industrious propensities of
the people, and with the mental and physical quali-
ties of its sons and daughters, commands our
deepest respect and our genuine sympathy in its
struggles now to bring itself in line with modern
civilization. The people can work out their own
salvation if they are given time and assistance.
It is well to remember that China has not in all its
history repudiated any of its foreign obligations
and that damages to foreign interests in China
have been indemnified in full by the Chinese."
These people whom Mr. Arnold, Commercial
Attache to the United States Government in Pe-
king, describes so admirably and understands their
possibility as a world benefit, are just the people
the world needs for the present crisis. When
.once won to Christ, they will do much to make the
kingdom of this world that of Christ's. The
Yellow Peril is a potential danger, yet if we go to
them In the spirit of the Saviour, we will be
brothers for the world's salvation.
IV
THE CHINESE AND FOREIGNERS
FOREIGNERS have much to overcome in
China before they can remove the bad ef-
fects of the early traders. The first to
reach the Orient from the Occident were traders
who went there to exploit the country — get gain,
and were willing to use almost any method to ob-
tain their selfish aims. For every dollar they
put in their enterprise in that country they ex-
pected many in return. Though they came from
Christian countries in name, they never mani-
fested the slightest indication of the spirit of
Christ. Mr. Wildman tells about these early
traders: "In 1516 Rafael Prestello (Portuguese)
landed in the mouth of the Canton River. He re-
turned to Malacca and reported on the favourable
trade opportunities. This led to the dispatch of
Perez de Andrade for Canton with a squadron of
eight vessels. The behaviour of himself and his
nationals was such that the newcomers were
rightly styled * foreign devils ' — a term of oppro-
brium that is still applied to all foreigners. They
rifled the tombs (the worst possible offense), in-
vaded the temples, robbed and pirated, and acted
upon the same lines as did Cortez in Mexico and
Pizarro in Peru ; but unfortunately for them they
soon found that they were dealing with a race that
knew how to treat * Tartars/ and the pirate An-
37
38 THE CHINESE AS THEY AEE
dres was arrested and beheaded at Peking by the
order of the Emperor Chiaching.
" Four hundred years of commerce and inter-
course with European nations has not been suffi-
cient to correct the impression of foreigners that
was obtained from these early Portuguese ' Navi-
gators.' . . . These Christian pirates virtu-
ally closed the door in China, and it has taken cen-
turies with an expense of millions of treasure and
thousands of lives to force it open even so little."
The Chinese also learned about the Christians
of the West by the way they were treated by the
Spanish in the Philippine Islands. Wildman
again : " For no other reason save the Spanish
feared that too many Chinese were settling in
their islands, they ordered a massacre of the un-
offending settlers, and slaughtered over twenty
thousand of them at one time."
From these early days until the present other
nations have not dealt with the Chinese as their
equals. They have forced by the sword many
treaty rights which the Chinese did not wish to
give and sometimes not fair to them. The na-
tions of the West and Japan have forced terri-
torial claims and spheres of influence wholly out
of keeping with a brother nation. So late as
twenty-five years ago there was a strong m.ove by
these nations to partition China's territory. Rus-
sia and Japan laid claims to certain lands In the
North, Germany and England territory in Shan-
tung, and England made further claims in the
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THE CHINESE AND FOREIGNERS 39
South, and France took Tong Kin. In addition
to actual territory much of the whole nation was
laid off into spheres of influence with trading and
mineral rights. All these greatly endangered the
nation's independence.
There were trivial troubles or offenses these
foreign nations used to base their claims, but these
were mere excuses for grabbing a weak nation's
territory because this nation sought to live in
peace to itself and the world. It is easy to see
how China commenced to suspect every man from
the West as her enemy with sinister motives. In
many cases she was right.
The Chinese did not naturally hate foreigners.
Possibly the first to reach China from the West
in good large numbers were the Nestorians, who
came with a message concerning the true God.
Many accepted their message even among the offi-
cial and educated class. These early mission-
aries did not have a full Gospel, hence could not
conquer the native religions — finally disappeared
altogether. The next were the Jews and the
Catholics. The Catholics were received most
kindly by all classes. Many were made converts.
It looked for a while the nation would become
Catholic. Soon questions arose bearing on the re-
lation of the convert to his government, duties to
the E^mperor and to the Holy See at Rome. These
questions could not be decided by the local priests
and congregations. Many of these intricate
questions must be referred to the Pope. The
40 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
rulers of China soon saw that such a policy as the
** Holy Catholic Church " was fostering in that
country would mean disloyalty with the converts
to the throne in China. Persecution followed
and many of the converts and friends of the new
religion were killed. The priests were either
martyred or had to leave the country. The
breach between the East and the West ought to
have been healed by Christianity, but it was not,
rather widened. The Jews, as mentioned, were
absorbed by the Chinese.
Wherever the foreigner has gone to China and
treated the people with kindness and brotherly
love, they have been treated thus by the Chinese.
There have been exceptions due to misunderstand-
ings and previous erroneous ideas which had their
origin in many cases in the results of bad dealing
on the part of traders and others from the West
who have counted the Chinese unworthy of real
equality. Those who will manifest the spirit of
Christ, as all His disciples should, will be received
graciously whenever understood, and do much to
heal the wounds of the early contact of the East
with the West.
Marco Polo reached China in an early day and
manifested a different spirit from any others.
He came as their friend and was anxious to know
and serve the Chinese. He represents the noble
class from the West who go there and treat them
as brothers. The " Commercial Handbook of
China" gives these words about him: "Marco
THE CHINESE AND FOREIGNERS 41
Polo, the Venetian traveller, gave to the world a
vivid picture of this wondrous land, in many re-
spects with a civilization in advance of Europe at
that time.'* Marco Polo brought to the Chinese
knowledge of Western art and life, adjusted him-
self to their conditions, w^as ready to help them
any way he could. They received him most kindly
and trusted him as their friend. Kublai Khan,
the ruler of that day, chose him as his special in-
spector of the various provinces; no greater posi-
tion of trust could have been given him. He did
his work faithfully. He was also given one of
the most important cities to rule. He was ever
the people's friend, and has ever since been appre-
ciated by them. He went over the most danger-
ous sections in his day and was treated with re-
spect everywhere, and is most fondly remembered
by the Chinese even to-day. There is an idol wor-
shipped in one of the leading temples in Canton in
honour of this man. Also close to Canton there
is a temple named in his honour. He lives on in
the memory and lives of the Chinese.
If this were true of Marco Polo, who did not
seek to show more than a brother's kindness to an
appreciative people, how much more will it be true
if we go in the spirit of our Lord and Master and
reveal His unselfish life of service. Wherever
the missionary is able to reveal this spirit and have
a part in the common problems of life, such things
as the Chinese can see and understand, he has been
appreciated very greatly. I could mention hun-
42 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
dreds of examples, yet I shall give only one as
typical of many.
Foreigners from all lands are in Canton. It is
the first place where the missionary of the West
reached that country. Many live there now.
More and more the masses are beginning to real-
ize the importance of the place of the missionary
in their nation's life. One missionary was asked
to serve with the Chinese in meeting the common
problems that come to a certain section of that
great city. He did this by their request. It did
not take much of his time. Municipal problems
and questions of sanitation, education, gambling,
parks, public roads and streets, etc., were handled
by the missionary and the Chinese. This was
nothing more than any missionary ought to do if
occasion comes, yet for this help, the officials of all
classes and many of the men concerned about the
welfare of the people were anxious to show their
gratitude for his aid. The Civil and Military
Governors, the Secretary of Foreign Affairs, and
a number of the lower of^cials sent or gave words
of appreciation. The head police of China's
greatest city gave him and his wife a great recep-
tion in token of his appreciation of this mission-
ary's labours. Such incidents as this are occurring
in many parts of China wherever the missionary
is able to manifest the spirit of Jesus Christ in
meeting the tangible needs of the people.
Christianity holds the key to all hearts and can
yet remove the chasm between the East and the
THE CHINESE AND FOREIGNERS 43
West, which bad dealings on the part of the West
in the past have created, but we must reveal
Christ, live Him and follow His example in meet-
ing all the needs. If we will, there will be no
" foreign devils " or " native wretches " ; we
will be brothers with common needs and sympa-
thetic hearts for each other.
The first American minister, who sought to re-
place force wath fair play in dealing with the Chi-
nese, was the Honourable Anson Burlingame,
1861-1867. He sought to change the action of
his fellow-ministers from various nations from
force to honourable persuasion. He so impressed
the Chinese with this spirit, that at the suggestion
of Sir Robert Hart (an English friend with great
love for the Chinese), the Emperor wanted to
make Mr. Burlingame Ambassador-General to
represent China in dealing with all foreign na-
tions. The suggestion was accepted. The Em-
peror wrote: "The envoy, Anson Burlingame,
manages affairs in a friendly and peaceful man-
ner, and is acquainted with general relations be-
tween this and other countries. Let him, there-
fore, now be sent to all the treaty powers as the
Minister Plenipotentiary empowered to attend to
every question arising between China and these
countries. This is from the Emperor" (" China:
An Interpretation," pp. 422-434).
This example from a statesman and one also
from a missionary show how the Chinese appreci-
ate kindness in any phase of life.
V
THE CHINESE AND BUSINESS
THE business world is just beginning to
understand the potential power of
China's natural resources. A number
of great business enterprises in the West are send-
ing their men to China to report on conditions.
These findings are bringing much valuable infor-
mation. I noticed this recently in the Chicago
JWihune: " China is on the point of a tremendous
development. What Japan has accomplished in
the last twenty years (this indeed has been great —
Author) in all probability will be duplicated in
China in the next ten years. China needs, at
least, thirty thousand miles of new railroads. She
IS building new cotton mills so fast that the presi-
dent of the Saco-Lowell Company (Massachu-
setts), builders of cotton mill machinery, recently
said that his factory could operate for ten years
solely on orders he has on his books from China.
China's present 7,000 miles of railroad, although
in the hands of politicians and inefficiently man-
aged, are tremendously prosperous. The entire
world is knocking at China's doors for her native
44
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THE CHINESE AND BUSINESS 45
products of vegetable oils, wood oils, tea, raw silk,
raw cotton, and many minerals."
(The facts outlined in this article are in the
archives of the State Department at Washington.)
Although her mineral wealth is the greatest
probably of any nation in the world, yet these
beds of wealth are still comparatively untouched.
Her wealth in other lines is wonderful. Take
the soya (or soy) bean and other bean products.
Our purchase of these products ten years ago
amounted to a few thousand dollars annually.
The last report, as given in the " Commercial
Handbook of China," two years ago, gives the
amount $86,806,174. No doubt last year it
reached $100,000,000. Mr. Arnold thinks this
business with our country will increase from year
to year.
We need each other*s products. We will use
more and more as we understand the value of
each. Years ago a flouring mill sent a man to
China to sell her products. The Chinese would
not buy at first. He gave them sam.ples. They
tested these and found them to be better than their
own. In a little while the mill in California had
to run night and day to meet the orders from
China. I know a man in Shanghai who is doing
a large business in exporting Chinese cotton to the
United States. A tobacco man in Virginia told
me the other day that several cars of Chinese to-
bacco had just reached Richmond to use for spe-
46 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
cial blending. America has none just like this.
We are sending China tin milks, butter (China
never had these), Standard Oil products, ciga-
rettes, electrical goods, machinery of all kinds,
cotton and cotton goods, etc. The Pacific is des-
tined to be the world's greatest mart of trade, and
China will give and receive as one, if not the
greatest, factor.
We are well situated to have a large part in this
mart. We need to go there and deal fairly and
honourably with the Chinese. Our goods stand
high in the Chinese markets because of their real
worth. Worth and prices will determine our suc-
cess if we have the right kind of business men.
We need to know the people, their language and
customs if we are to obtain the greatest results.
The German business man taught the world a
lesson. He learned the language and put himself
on an equality with the Chinese. He was not
after standing, but business and the interest of his
country. He chose the best methods to obtain
results. The Chinese greatly appreciated his atti-
tude. The ruling class, with the pressure of the
Allies, caused China to side with the Allies, yet
the masses of the Chinese remained friendly. No
doubt the attitude of the business men from Ger-
many brought this about. Our manner of contact
with the people will help business as well as the
kind and price of goods.
World business men tell us that the Chinese
THE CHINESE AND BUSINESS 47
business man is among the most honest and hon-
ourable. He is keen and capable, but usually fair
and trustworthy. This refers to the leading busi-
ness man. He is equal to any and superior to
most as a business man. This is shown in contact
with other nations in the neutral ports and in her
own and other ports. " It is said that ninety per
cent, of the business at Manila (Philippine Is-
lands) is in the hands of the Chinese; it is on them
that the economic importance of the east coast of
Sumatra and Java depend, while many of the
richest plantations in Malay peninsula are owned
by multi-millionaire Chinese" ("New Life Cur-
rents in China"). It is estimated that seventy-
five per cent, of the business in Hongkong (an
English Colony) is done by the Chinese. Many
of the largest business firms in Shanghai, where
all nations trade, are owned and conducted by the
Chinese.
A certain writer says this about Chinese busi-
ness men: "Surely a people capable of such eco-
nomics and such self-denial, a people who are not
afraid of beginning at the bottom of any business,
who often work their way to the top, a people
whose traders frequently manufacture their goods
in the intervals of barter, will drive even the Jew
out of business in any land on earth." The Chi-
nese business man rises early and works late, is
satisfied with small profits and safe investment. Is
a keen trader, yet never manifests anxiety to sell
48 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
his goods. He talks prices, starting very high
(especially in the treaty ports in dealing with new-
comers) with the expectation of coming down.
However, the first-class merchant has one price.
If not, he reduces but little. The great business
houses in Canton, Hongkong, and Shanghai have
only one price, and will not vary for any one.
Such houses are growing in favour with the
masses. They have a reasonable profit, give
good service, and expect as fair play as they
give.
A number of these modern business houses are
conducted on Christian principles. Many of the
managers are Christians. One of the largest com-
panies in Canton — Sincere Company — three years
ago offered to engage a religious worker and pay
him a big salary to look after the religious life of
the many employees. This shows the spirit of a
number of the leading business houses in China.
We hope under the good hand of our God to have
the hearty support of modern business In China.
This means much for the kingdom of God. These
business men are making fine laymen who are giv-
ing liberally to the Lord's work. A banker and
large business man In Hongkong, Wong Kok
Shun, has given In the last five years, as best I can
ascertain, about fifty thousand dollars to the
Lord's work. He made one gift worth twenty
thousand dollars to a school. Another ten thou-
sand dollars was given to his church for the build-
\
THE CHINESE AND BUSINESS 49
ing fund. The attitude of modern business with
the great laymen developing means much for the
kingdom of God. To these laymen we can confi-
dently look to have a large part in financing the
onward conquering army that must bear the glori-
ous news of redemption for all peoples. This is
as we have long desired and are now hopefully
realizing.
The Chinese business man loves money, but
there is something worth more than money to
these people. Business honour is guarded with
great care. Even in dealing with the coolies and
common day labourers, we find that these put
great stress on the rules of the game and the ques-
tion of custom and honour in the business world.
One of the finest examples of this is seen in the
bonfire made by the Chinese government two
years ago in Shanghai out of the outlawed opium
held in the godowns of foreign merchants. These
merchants with the Chinese cooperating business
men had accumulated a large supply of opium
from India while it was lawful to deal in the drug.
The Chinese government had put the poison under
ban, and wanted to stop its sale in that country.
To meet the question of honour, the government
bought the opium from these business houses and
burnt it in a great bonfire on the riverside opposite
the city of Shanghai in the presence of many wit-
nesses. This bonfire cost the Chinese government
about $25,000,000, but it manifested to the world
50 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
the moral stamina of the government and the
honour also.
One needs to understand the immensity of the
wealth involved in the opium business to realize
the victory of the government. " The British
Commissioner of Customs reports that during the
years from 1900 to 1916 China must have spent
$1,200,000,000 on imported opium. The amount
of money squandered on the native drug cannot be
estimated" ("New Life Currents in China").
China won a great moral victory in outlawing
opium, yet the battle for freedom of her people
from foreign opium and kindred evils is not
fought to a finish. The evil forces of the West,
cooperating with those in the Orient, are uniting
to satisfy the demands of men who look on the
human family as an occasion to get wealth rather
than an opportunity to make noble men. Japan
through her treaty ports is pouring morphia into
China. There is an army of men pumping mor-
phia into the arms of millions in China. Much of
this morphia had its origin in the United States-
sold to Japan, modified some and then handed
over to China. The United States and England
are furnishing an army of splendidly trained
young business men with ships and ships of ciga-
rettes. These business men are organizing a great
force of Chinese young men to sell cigarettes
and other forms of American and English
tobaccos in China. Then the whiskeys of the
THE CHINESE AND BUSINESS 51
West — outlawed in our country — are reaching the
Chinese people. Efforts are being made to trans-
fer the outlawed cursed stuff of this country to
China.
These worst forms of our civilizations ought
not to be the business of our people in that land.
China needs her young manliood for the nation's
weal, and we ought to help prepare these rather
than to weaken them through evil drugs and bane-
ful habits. The good citizens and lawmakers of
our country must cooperate with the friends of
China in their own country with these here and
prevent these undesirable results.
VI
THE CHINESE AND MUSIC
A CERTAIN writer giving account of Chi-
nese music says that he is reminded of
the man writing about snakes in Iceland
who commenced by saying that there are no
snakes in Iceland. There is no Chinese music in
China of the original kind. The Chinese people
have been musical from the early dawn of history.
The Peking Leader, February, 1919, gives some
interesting facts about early Chinese music. The
more salient points are these: "Music existed in
China as early as the reign of Fu-hsi (2852 b. c.)
and Shen-nung (2747 b. c), that of the former
being called fulai and that of the latter fu-chih.
It was not, however, until the reign of Huang-ti
(2679 B. c.) that the foundation was laid by con-
structing a musical scale of twelve notes, six
* masculine * to imitate the notes of the male phoe-
nix, and six * feminine ' to imitate those of the
female. This was done by the court musician,
Lun, who took the bamboo from the valley of
Hsai-chi and made pipes of different length and
with them produced the musical notes of that mys-
52
Mrs. Saunders' most
talented pupil in
MUSIC IN China or
America.
The blind organist; for years in one of the best
CHURCHES NEAR CaNTON.
THE CHINESE AND MUSIC 53
tic bird.: Since that time the Chinese musical scale
has always contained twelve notes, although the
vulgar (common) music seldom uses all of them."
The writer goes on to say that the scale was modi-
fied by successive Emperors until they had as
many as 360 notes — practically one for each day
of the year, — different Emperors seeking to excel
in musical development.
It is interesting to note that the further we go
back the more general and the more perfect must
have been their music. Many of the early sages
were musical and fostered this art among the
people. Confucius was a noted performer on the
lute, and " like George Herbert, consoled himself
in his last hours with its strains." In a recent is-
sue of the Chinese Recorder Mr. C. S. Champness
gives a most illuminating article about Chinese
music. Hear him: "The real Chinese national
music of ancient days is both extinct and un-
known. The music at present amongst the Chi-
nese people and practiced by them has come to
China from the region of Central Asia known to
the Greeks by the name of Bactria. It is an im-
portation which fulfilled a long-felt loss and need.
The Chinese were without music, and they gladly
welcomed the foreign article."
In the early history of China there are many
stories abounding in musical reference. How-
ever, several hundred years after the life of Con-
fucius there arose an Emperor, Chin Shih, who
54 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
wanted the people to think of him and not the
ancient, hence he destroyed all the books of the
sages, and music went with his " ruthless hand of
hate." After his reign the old men were able to
reproduce from memory the Classics — and likely
hidden copies were found, but the music of the
ancient was never restored — entirely forgotten.
What a loss to the Chinese and the world!
The non-Christian Chinese may sing or play,
but no congregational singing is permitted even
in their temples. They have string bands, but their
instruments give us no idea of music — the only
element of real music is that of time. They usu-
ally keep time. The bands used in the funerals
and festivals give us no idea of music. This is all
the more lamentable because the people were once
great musicians and still have the power to be
such. Mr. Champness says: " It is not at all cor-
rect to speak of the Chinese as being a race that is
not musical. The Chinese have all the capacity
required for being producers of good music, but
they have hitherto lacked inspiration. The sad
fact remains that the Chinese do not at present
show any signs of wanting to become good musi-
cians." He gives the following suggestions: "It
is exceedingly likely that we can find traces of the
old music of China 'in the present-day music of
Japan (this is very beautiful — Author). The
Japanese in reality are not an inventive race; all
that is truly great in Japanese art has been derived
THE CHINESE AND MUSIC 55
from China, and is a development of Chinese
ideas. In all probability, therefore, the strains of
the Japanese zither were derived from the Chi-
nese music of ancient form."
" They lack inspiration," and this comes alone
from the love of God. In the early days they had
some knowledge of the true God, and thought of
Him as a personal being who cared for them. This
may explain the inspiration that gave music and
joy to their homes which have disappeared for
many centuries. Christianity is restoring the an-
cient love for music. As soon as they become
Christians they commence to sing. This may not
be harmonious music, but they sing with the spirit
and a joy to themselves that is indeed gratifying.
Many of these Christians develop gradually into
good musicians. It is a delight to enter a church,
well organized with trained voices, and hear hun-
dreds sing the praises of " the Lamb that was
slain," who brings to them a love of music and
praise most encouraging.
Mrs. Saunders taught music in the United
States and in China. She says that she never had
a student in the United States who could learn as
fast as a girl she had in China. Many Christians
and others are becoming fine musicians, equal to
any people in the world with no more opportunity
than they have had. I know a young man whose
parents were won from heathenism about twelve
years ago. This boy became a disciple of our Sa-
m THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
viour. He studied music in China and came to
this country eighteen months ago and entered one
of our leading colleges. He is a member of the
Glee Club in this college and is a leader in music
with the young people. There is no question that
the Chinese have all the capacity necessary to be-
come great musicians, but Christianity must give
the inspiration. Without this inspiration they
will never have the full blessings of music. This
reveals the great need of Christianity in that coun-
try. If we but think of what our country would
be without the joy of song, we can realize what a
blessing Christianity will be to them. Every joy
that comes to us and our homes through cultured
song is an argument to give the blessings of Christ
to the Chinese. The Saviour whose coming to
this earth was joyfully announced with the heav-
enly host of praise stands ready to give them the
inspiration of music and love and ideals which
they wait in darkness and gloom to receive and
enjoy. Then they will sing His praises forever.
We may hold a service in that country lasting
an hour. There will be the usual song service.
After the regular services are over the Christians
will often say: " We must not stop so soon, let's
sing. We want to sing the old songs and learn
some new ones." This will go on for another
hour. They seem never to tire of singing and
praising our God. In travelling far into the in-
terior, crossing mountains and valleys, we are
THE CHINESE AND MUSIC 57
made to rejoice to hear a man break forth In di-
vine music. We know that this person is a fol-
lower of the Master. I was travelHng in a sec-
tion infested with robbers. I had to engage a
boat. A man came running to me saying he
would take me down the river. I was afraid he
belonged to the robbers, and they had sent him to
get me on their boat. They often did this. We
started down the river. I told him to rush the
little boat and outrun a number of boats coming
behind us. He commenced rowing with all his
might and began singing " There's a Land that is
Fairer Than Day." I said to him, " How about
this?" ''Oh, I am a Christian." I knew we
were one in Christ and all would be well as far as
he could help. He outran the robbers and landed
me safely in the city. Soon the robbers came and
asked about me. He told them that I was secure
in the city. The joy of his song in the midst of
perils of robbers was a delight to me I shall never
cease to remember.
The millions in China will sing His praise all
over the land. What a volume of song will rise
to our Father from their liberated hearts as the
glad tidings reach them.
N
VII
THE CHINESE AND LABOUR
C
OMMON labour is dishonourable in
China, though a large per cent, of the
people are engaged in the daily task of
toil. The educated man takes first rank. The
officials are supposed to come from this class.
The rank of the official is determined by his edu-
' cation. This has been true in theory for thou-
sands of years. The agriculturist stands high in
rank because he produces the necessities of life.
>^ The agriculturist is not supposed to be a common
labourer. The merchants do not stand so high as
the producer. The soldier has a low rating be-
cause he lives on the labour of others. The idea
that he exists to defend his country and protect
all classes is not emphasized because it has not
been true with the average soldier. All classes
look forward to the happy day when they can rise
above labour and be a gentleman of leisure. But
few can do this, yet many are striving for this de-
sired goal.
Probably a larger per cent, of the people in
China depend on common labour for their liveli-
58
A Lhixese farmer and his mother. The man won his wi^e to
Christ and then his mother, who was 75 years old.
\
/
THE CHINESE AND LABOUR 59
hood than any other people in the world. In the
United States over twenty-five per cent, of the
people live in cities with a population of over
25,000, but in China it is estimated that ninety-five
per cent, of the people live in towns and villages
with less than 20,000. Fourteen per cent, here
are devoted to producing, yet in that country there
must be at least eighty per cent. The hardships
of toil, the pressure of the burdens of the ever-
tugging loads that must be borne by man or
woman are enough to make the masses dread la-
bour. In going to the markets we can often see
women with little girls carrying sacks of rice or
wheat weighing from one to two hundred pounds.
These burdens must be borne across streams and
rugged mountains. They must rise early and
work late. The women and girls will go to the
fields and plow and fertilize the farms and look
after the stock on the mountains where the tigers
may come and devour them. The more menial
labour, as a rule, is done by the women.
All kinds of labour is dishonourable, yet not
equally so. The producer and the manager of
farms have a higher standing than certain other
kinds. The chair bearer, who must carry others
with the grating poles on his back, is among the
lowest. If one lives a worthless life, one goes to
the lower regions and may be sent back to this
world in a future generation as a chair bearer —
^he curse of fate determines this. No greater
60 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
punishment can be meted out to the wasted life
than to be forced to do the worst kind of menial
labour.
The labour is all on a very small scale. The
average family in that country must make the liv-
ing for the family out of three acres of land. The
f armicr must produce for his family and others on
this farm. The methods of farming are crude,
yet suited to the intensive farming. The Chinese
produce more than any people in the world ac-
cording to the acre except the scientific farmer of
Germany. The people oppose modern methods
because these would make idle labourers. Men
are hunting work, not work men. Years ago a
reaper was brought to South China and used on
the grain fields. The old men — wise acres —
looked on, yet said this will never do. It will
keep so many men from using the little hand
scythe. The reaper was discarded.
This situation need not exist. A land with
more natural resources than any country in the
world need not be the poorest and force the masses
of the people to look to farming. The people can
become a producing nation and develop their natu-
ral resources, then the land will blossom like a
garden and the barren mountains will turn out
wealth for the people of that country and the
world. Poverty will be replaced with plenty,
menial labour with honourable trade and produc-
tiveness in the mines and in the factories.
THE CHINESE AND LABOUR 61
What does Christianity have to do with the
questions of labour? Much every way. We can
show that labour is not dishonourable. The Chi-
nese are greatly surprised by seeing the missionary
work in the yard and take part in the games.
This would be a disgrace to the old Chinese
scholar. The Y. M. C. A. and the Y. W. C. A.
and the mission schools are doing much to remove
this curse and reveal to the youths of China the
blessing of exercise and labour. This will mean a
new and better generation in the future. The
Chinese are very fond of games and play well
when they are liberated from binding customs.
One of the best ways to help the masses is the
industrial school where the poor boys can make
their way and all can learn to produce more and
help develop the resources of the country. The
opening of the mines, the development of an ade-
cjuate railway, the manufacture of commodities
for their own use as well as the outside world, the
sense of honour given to toil will solve Chinese
economic problems. Applied Christianity to the
daily problems will make these blessings possible.
Industrial work will help greatly in producing
self-supporting churches and remove the burden
of having to carry the work of Christianity too
long with foreign funds.
Industrial education will help in a practical
way, yet do even more: it will reveal to the Chi-
nese that Christianity is not a mere theory of life
62 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
— it is a solver of the common problems of daily
toil. This will remove the fear that v^e are deal-
ing in fanciful theories. The Chinese are bur-
dened with too many of these already.
Industrial training will not solve all her prob-
lems, but will have a wholesome part in making
New China freed from the undue burdens of pov-
erty and superstition and ignorance of the true es-
sentials of highest service which Christianity
holds for all peoples. The eternal realities of
Christianity adjusted and applied to the various
problems of existence is the one and only hope of
making all resources combine to meet the whole
needs of the body and soul.
VIII
THE CHINESE AND GOVERNMENT
1'^HE Chinese have had the best organized
government of any of the ancient na-
tions. Their government was well or-
ganized before the nations of the West existed.
There is no evidence that they borrowed anything
from the outside nations in their early day. They
were independent and satisfied. Herbert H.
Gowen says : '' Whether the Chinese were seated
in their later homes from time immemorial, as
their own historians assume, or whether they ar-
rived from abroad, as some foreign scholars pre-
tended, cannot be proven to the satisfaction of his-
torical critics. Anthropological arguments seem
to contradict the idea of any connection with
Babylonians, Egyptians, Assyrians, or Indians."
These people have been able to preserve their gov-
ernment and rise from failure to renewal as no
other people in history.
They have not always had smooth sailing.
Many bad officials have had control, yet there have
been some very fine men and women who have
ruled the millions of this land. (The rulers of an-
63
64 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
cient time are still honoured and regarded as
worthy of imitation^ As early as S300 b. c, the
famous Yao was greatly loved by the people. He
showed first concern for the welfare of the people
by refusing to place his unworthy son on the
throne, and chose an obscure person, but one with
noble character — character given precedence over
blood relation. Where do we find any other an-
cient ruler doing this in the other nations ? " It
is said that Tsze Ch'an ruled his Duchy so well
from 584 to 571 b. c. that ' the doors were not
locked at night and lost articles were not picked up
from the highways'" (Gowen). Such rulers
have done much to perpetuate the high ideals of
the country, and preserve the nation through the
changing ages."^
One who gives oneself unselfishly to the good
of the people has received the praise of the masses.
Many have not done this, yet those who have are
honoured still and live in the memory of the peo-
ple. About the year 400 b. c. Chu Yuan grieved
greatly because the government was in the hands
of bad men. The world had no joy for him w^hile
his country was in the hands of wicked and selfish
rulers. He had this conversation with a fisher-
man : " * All the world,' he said, * is foul, but I am
clean.' The * true sage,' retorted the fisherman,
* does not quarrel with his environment. If the
world Is foul, why not leap into it and make it
clean ? ' but he clasped a stone and leaped into the
\
THE CHINESE AND GOVERNMENT 65
river" (Gowen). In memory of this man giving
his life to reform his government is held to this
very day one of China's great festivals, The
Dragon Boat Festival. This custom is still SQen
in the Chinese and Japanese giving their lives vol-
untarily to reform their governments.
^he idea of family government has dominated
China from the early times to the present. The
rulers are to have a fatherly care over the people.
The masses look to the officials for protection.
The common people have a perfect right often ex-
ercised of appealing to the rulers^ The wise ruler
is very slow to fail the appeals of the masses.
The President of China last year refused to con-
sider the Shantung settlement with Japan because
the people had rejected the Treaty as forced on
China by the Allies and Japan. The young stu-
dents all over the nation rose in indignation, and
the President dared not fail to heed their voice.
Democracy in local affairs and a large voice in
the national affairs have characterized much of
Chinese history of government. The struggle
between the local democracy and national power
has gone on through her history and is indeed a
most serious problem just now. The local gov-
ernments function, but the national is weak and
cannot force unity of action for the common good.
Many of the old rejected Manchu officials
strengthened by military powers are pleading and
intriguing with the monarchical forces to restore
66 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
the old order, yet the people are fighting for
democracy, especially the young men who have
gone abroad and know the blessings of " govern-
ment by the people and for the people." The
military party is not dead and is making great
headway in certain provinces. This party may
have the help of outside finance and influence, yet
the general trend of political life is hopeful. No
one can tell the final outcome of so great a mass
of untried people in national democracy, yet we
see much to give us hope that the stalwart young
men with real patriotism will bring on the new day
for which many long and labour to see realized.
The nation needs above everything else unselfish,
worthy leaders and the masses will be glad to
follow. Such leaders are growing, but too slow
to suit most of the friends of the country. (The
Chinese are admirably fitted for democratic gov-
ernment when once enlightened and given an
active part in the problems of both local and
national governments'^
Here and there throughout China we find cities
with splendid government and democratic ideals
working well in all local affairs. From the city
the province will be reached and then the nation.
Outside nations ought not to force the Chinese
into any kind of government. They must solve
their problems of government. We can help by
example and encouragement, yet leave the prob-
lems of government entirely in their own hands.
\
THE CHINESE AND GOVERNMENT 67
They are sending picked men to other nations to
study all questions of government. These will
take with them to their own country the ideals of
the various nations, and these different ideals may
be blended and modified to suit local conditions,
producing a model government with the good of
various governments. China has made greater
changes in the last ten years than any nation in
history with less bloodshed. The new order is
not made stable, but wonderful progress has been
made with less destruction of life and property
than any nation in the West has done in recent
years.
^Their long periods of peace and the great desire
of the masses of the people to have peace at home
and with outside nations will do much to preserve
order and make stable their new government,
^hey have always loved peace and avoided mili-
tarism. ' They have been great fighters when
aroused and led by great generals, as seen in the
thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, yet this has
been the exception and not the rule as with some
other nations.
Christianity with her great concern for every
one has done much to prepare the people for good
government. The churches giving the people a
voice in all their labours have done much to make
the people expect larger consideration. The
Christian organization that gives the members
autonomy just as soon as they are able to handle
68 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
all questions bearing on their life and progress
will find great favour with the people. This may
be seen in the popularity of the Y. M. C. A. and
certain churches that stress democratic ideals for
the members. Self-governing schools are giving
their aid to better government. All these forces
are making for democracy and good government.
Christianity always teaches the people to render
unto Csesar the things that are Caesar's and unto
God the things that are God's. This holds good
regardless of the form of government. Each
Christian must be subject to the powers that be,
and in no case rebel against his government if he
is permitted to w^orship with freedom of con-
science; yet enlightenment and individual worth
and freedom to worship always develop noble
manhood and fit the people to live for the other's
good and look to the good of the whole. This is
why the Man of Galilee holds the key to the
destiny of New China in government as well as in
wealth and prosperity. Christ can purify their
ideals and make each live for the other's good and
this will unify all for good government that will
abide.
IX
THE CHINESE AND CUSTOMS
THE Chinese have not had much written
law, but customs have been their law. The
highest appeal to a Chinese is to say that
this is customary. This is the law of the ages and
must be obeyed. It w^as my happy privilege to
have part in opening new work. Mrs. Saunders
and I travelled where the people had never seen
a foreign woman. We would make long journeys
and have our lunch by the roadside. The people
would gather around us to watch us use knives
and forks and see what we had to eat. We were
a real curiosity. When we commenced, the an-
nouncement would be made and great numbers
would stand about us. This was very trying to
Mrs. Saunders. I did not know how to get the
people to leave us so we could have our meal with
peace. One day I told a Chinese preacher about
our desire, and he looked up to the crowd and
said, " Are }^ou vile men with no idea of cus-
toms?" Then all left us alone. It is not cus-
tomary to watch others eat in that country. I
learned the lesson of appealing to custom if I
wanted to get results.
69
70 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
Many of their customs are strange to us, yet
like the customs of most countries there are rea-
sons why these customs have obtained. Fashions
are not controlled by money as so often in the
West. The question of need and propriety has
more to do with them than with us. The custom
of holding the family responsible for the acts of
its members has had a wholesome effect on cer-
tain characters. The family and the clan must be
responsible for the behaviour of the bad charac-
ters. This forces family control and punishment
of the wayward ones. In the modern government
this custom is passing away and each is held re-
sponsible for his own deeds and not that of an-
other. The emphasis is passing from the clan to
the individual.
We will not understand the reasons for many
customs, yet until we can offer something better,
we had better let their customs remain. It is
rude and uncivil to be disrespectful to their
ancient customs which they hold to be very sacred.
I was led to raise the roof of a certain building,
but as the work was to start a woman whose house
was located to the south came to me and said I
must not raise the building. If I did sickness
would come to her family and maybe death and
we would be to blame since we had raised the
house a few feet higher than the other houses to
the south. I was anxious to raise the roof so we
could get fresh air, yet her pleadings revealed to
THE CHINESE AND CUSTOMS 71
me that she was sincere, hence I heeded her re-
quest and suffered with heat in order to have re-
spect to a custom though wrong. A little patience
and kindness and explanation will often work
wonders even with cruel customs.
One of the most foolish customs to us is that
used in the burial services. Before a person is
buried, he must remain in the house or in a booth
in the yard until the graveyard doctor finds a
lucky place and a lucky day. This may take
months, yet they will not bury their loved ones
until this luck finder gives orders as to the place
and day. If they fail to heed his advice, death
may come to others and great trouble to the de-
parted spirit. The outraged departed spirit will
come back to the home and claim three members
because of their neglect. When the eventful day
comes to lay away the cofifin, they will precede the
cofifin with loads of firecrackers of various sizes,
strewing these firecrackers in flaming strings
along the pathway. The sounds will echo across
the mountains like a battle in full force. As they
lay the coffin in the grave, the whole hillside will
seemingly rise up in smoke and sounds from the
firecrackers. These drive the demons away and
give the spirit a great and hilarious entrance into
the spirit world. It will also protect the living
from the revenge of the departed spirits.
Such funerals are often very expensive. A
Hongkong paper had this to say about a recent
72 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
funeral in that city: "All decorations were
brought from Canton and over $20,000 spent on
the funeral, the coffin alone costing $1,500.
Prayers will be offered for the dead forty-nine
days." The cost and anxiety concerning the dead
in caring for their needs in the other world are
great burdens to the people. The graves must be
worshipped, the spirits satisfied, the filial duties
performed.
The customs bearing on marriage are also very
strange to us. The young people, as a rule, never
see each other until the day they are married.
The selection and arrangement are attended to by
the parents and the middle-man. There are no
social functions giving the young people an op-
portunity to know each other. The sexes are en-
tirely separated. Christianity is overcoming this
to some extent, yet we think that it is better to go
slow with the customs which have grown up
through the centuries. The moral ideals and
honour given woman and man's relation to the
finest of God's creation, which the Master will
give, are needed before the safeguards of ancient
life are removed. Buying girls for wives, the
slavery of women for men, the lower position of
womanhood as taught by Confucius, the idea that
educated girls will not make obedient wives, etc.,
will be overcome by the advance of Christianity,
yet it will take time and the general spread of the
truths of our Saviour.
THE CHINESE AND CUSTOMS 73
Even in our churches we are having to erect
partitions keeping the v^omen on one side and the
men on the other, making the separating barrier
so high that the men cannot look over and see the
women. This is true in the beginnings of work,
but in the older churches the barriers are re-
moved, yet the women are on one side and the
men on the other. Men do not eat with the
women even in their own homes except where the
gospel has made progress or Western culture
given liberty. Where this is true in the port cities,
we can see the young folks playing games to-
gether, and now and then a young man and his
wife walking the streets and manifesting real love
and concern about each other. The liberating
power of Christianity is doing its glorious work.
The blessings of the gospel we do not understand
— and I fear appreciate — until we see baneful
customs that the gospel alone can remove and
make perfect the better life.
I was travelling in the interior and reached a
chapel by night. I found that a missionary
woman from Indiana, United States, had also
reached this same city with a Bible-woman and
other Christian workers. The Chinese were so
glad we had come that they decided to give us a
feast. The feast was made ready. A few of the
leaders came to me and said, Do you think It will
be all right for the men and women to eat together
at this feast ? We are all Christians, yet we want
74 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
your opinion. I told them that I could eat with
or without the women, and would leave the ques-
tion entirely with them. They decided to have us
all eat together. We did so. A large crowd
were seated at the tables, eight at a table, men and
women mixed up. At my table there were several
Chinese preachers, the woman from Indiana and
her helpers. We were using our chopsticks and
clearing each dish one by one as it was passed to
us. Every one seemed happy and having a big
time. One of the Chinese preachers spoke saying,
" * If the Son shall make you free, ye shall be free
indeed.' But for Christianity we could never
have done this. It would have created a mob."
The messenger of the Cross is daily seeing the
fruits of Christianity to be the following: bring-
ing deliverance to the prisoners of customs, sight
to the blind (physical and spiritual), liberty to them
that are bruised by superstition and ignorance,
healing to the broken-hearted, hope and joy given
to the poor, and the power to renovate the indi-
vidual and society. These blessings are so full
and free in Christ Jesus, we often wonder why the
millions in the Orient have been denied them so
long. Their Saviour and ours is sufficient for all
their needs even In liberating them from the cruel
customs of the ages, but He must be given a
chance by our lives and message.
X
THE CHINESE AND WOMEN
THE Chinese men have thought of women
as distinct from them. Even in the cre-
ation man came from one source and
woman from another. Confucius taught woman
had no soul, hence inferior to man. She is man's
property and he can do as he pleases with his own.
A husband can beat and kill his wife and no one
has a right to interfere. This is according to cus-
toms, yet in spite of this teaching and practice,
woman, as in other parts of the world, asserts her
rights many times, and dominates the home and
even the throne in the past. Several of the great-
est rulers China ever had were women. They ob-
tain these positions of great influence in the home
and in the nation by their inherent greatness, not
by any encouragement by man. The women are
not taught to read, only about one in a thousand
can, and these learned mostlv from mission
schools. We are glad to note in the new govern-
ment of China the girls are encouraged to attend
school and take their place with the boys In mak-
75
76 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
ing New China. This is one of the most hopeful
signs in that land.
Though the Chinese women have not had the
privilege of the women of the West, yet they have
great moral worth and becoming modesty.
Bishop Bash ford pays them this tribute: "Owing
to the Confucian teaching and the rigid practice
of the Chinese, the women of China are probably
freer from immorality than any other pagan
women on earth. Indeed in this fundamental vir-
tue, they surpass the women in some of the Chris-
tian nations." This makes the Chinese women
capable of producing one of the greatest nations
on earth in real moral worth. They will give
their sons and daughters ideals of virtue and
power that will fit them for noble lives that must
be the bases of any nation's greatness. Sin and
prodigality, as in the case of the Roman Empire,
eventually destroy any nation. The Western na-
tions at this time are having a struggle not too
hopeful with these destroying elements.
The Chinese have not educated the women for
a number of reasons. They said that the women
were unable to learn. Also if they did obtain an
education, they would not obey their husbands
and perform the duties of the home as they ought.
The first duty of the nation is to the sons. Each
family felt this way. They could not send all
their sons to school, much less the girls. The
progress of Christianity has done much to over-
■SI
'3
'/J
3 "^
THE CHINESE AND WOMEN 77
come this curse. The girls, can attend mission
schools in many places. The new government is
establishing lower grade schools and normals for
the girls, and means to have colleges as they ad-
vance in their education. In the fifteen hundred
students in the United States from China about
two hundred are girls who are taking first rank in
a number of our leading institutions. The first
girls who reached the United States from China
to be educated arrived here thirty years ago and
entered our leading universities. They graduated
and returned to their own country as helpers in
lifting their sisters from the slavery of ignorance
to the liberty of full womanhood. In my own
city, Canton, there is a young woman active in
helping her sisters, a Ph. D. from the University
of Paris, France. The Chinese girls are capable
and worthy of the highest training.
In 1910 we were spending several weeks at the
China Inland Mission Home in London, England.
There came to this home a young Chinese girl
who had just finished her course in kindergarten
in New York City. She wanted to join our party
and see Europe and Palestine. Miss Mary Chang
joined our party. She spoke good English,
was at home w^ith any people, keen to learn
wherever she went. She had noble Ideals. Her
chief concern was to learn about her Saviour and
how she could witness for Him most effectively.
She viewed the scenes of His earthly career with
78 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
deep emotion. Every one who saw her had a dif-
ferent idea of Chinese women, and their power
to bless their nation and the world.
We need to see the following statement to un-
derstand the poverty of educational work with the
women of China: "According to * The Educa-
tional Directory and Year Book of China ' for
1918, the number of pupils in the schools of China
during 1917 was 4,075,338. This grand total is
made up of 3,898,065 boys and 177,273
girls'' ("Commercial Handbook of China").
There are over twenty million girls in that coun-
try who ought to be in school, yet less than
200,000. Many of these, who are in school, are
in the mission schools. The present number of
girls, however, in government schools must be
considerably larger than four years ago.
One of the surprises of our contact with the
women is their ability to learn in spite of their
long neglect. When given a chance, they learn as
rapidly as the girls of most any country. Old
women of fifty or more, who never knew a Chinese
character, will learn many hundreds of these so
they can read the New Testament or use the song
book. Well do T remember a woman approaching
sixty very closely turned from idols and followed
the Saviour. She commenced to study and was
able in a few years to read the New Testament
and have a splendid part in leading women and
girls to Christ in her own city. She had to learn
THE CHINESE AND WOMEN 79
several thousands of Chinese characters to be able
to read the New Testament well.
The women of China are the hope of Christian-
ity. Dr. Martin says that ignorant woman made
China Buddhist, will not intelligent woman make
it Christian? The women hold the nation in their
grasp, hence if the nation is to be Christian, we
must reach the women with the gospel. Thus far
many more men have entered the churches than
women owing to the fact that we can approach the
men more easily than the women. The women
have the idols in their kitchens, in front of the
houses, and their own special idols in the temples.
They teach their little ones to worship these in
the homes and in the temples. They are zealous
in worshipping the idols to prevent bad luck and
sickness in the homes.
These women have many sorrows by reason of
idolatry and ignorance. They have the same
anxiety about their children and homes that the
women of other lands have. Superstition and igno-
rance add to their share an awful burden. I shall
never forget the agony which I saw on the faces
of two women as they approached a shrine with
paper and fire. The paper was burnt on the
shrine's altar. As the flames of this paper lighted
up their faces, I could see the writhing pangs of
sorrow that distorted their womanly faces. They
took a child's garment and waved it over the
flames asking that the demons would permit the
80 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
child's spirit to return. If the spirit could not be
induced — rather the demons to give up the spirit
— the child Would certainly die.
The favoured Christians of our own country
ought to give the liberating power of the gospel
to these sisters who suffer untold sorrow by rea-
son of their neglect. Christianity will give them
blessings which will brighten all their days and
spread the glorious light of hope over all the fu-
ture. They will never cease to be grateful to us
if we will give them a chance. They need this
chance. If they fail to take advantage of this
chance or seek the passing pleasures of the world
as so many do in other countries, it will not be
to our shame or neglect; but if we fail to give
them the opportunity, they cannot be free even if
they wanted to be.
The gratitude of those who learn about the
Saviour is most encouraging. I saw a mission-
ary returning from the United States to her work
in Shantung Province. As she approached the
mission compound, a great crowd of women and
girls came to meet her. They gathered around
her and sang songs of rejoicing. It was Indeed a
beautiful sight. I feel that the 200,000,000 of
girls and women in China are waiting the joyful
message of salvation. It ought to be our chief
concern and joy to give this message to them and
do it speedily.
XI
THE CHINESE AND THEIR WORST
CLASSES
IT would not be true to the situation to discuss
the Chinese as they are without teUing about
their bad elements — robbers, beggars, gam-
blers, lepers, etc. The Manchus, who ruled China
from 1644 to 1911, had a form of squeezing in
government which encouraged robbery and gam-
bling. The officials were paid little salary if any
at all, but they were expected to " squeeze " from
the people all the money they needed. They often
used very cruel methods to obtain results. They
had to remit certain amounts to the central gov-
ernment in Peking and when this was done, they
were free to do pretty well as they pleased. Such
a practice destroyed confidence in the officials and
government and made the people resort to rob-
bery and gambling.
This explains in part the bad condition which
has risen throughout China as to government.
Good men rise up and try to put down robbery
and gambling, but they have hard tasks because
of the broken down consciences of the people.
The mania for gambling is a national curse.
8i
82 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
They use every method conceivable and practice
the vice in public and private places. Great sec-
tions of their cities and important places in the
market-towns are devoted to gambling. All
classes of men and even women took part. The
gambling mania produced a large crop of robbers
and cut-throats who preyed upon the public. Sl\^
bands of the robbers pillaged the country and
robbed towns until life and property were nPt
safe. Business destroyed, lives disappointed, Sdi-
cide and national weakness would follow.
The Ideals of the present government are far
better than the old, though it lacks the stability to
enforce its better aims. Dr. Smith once said that
a bad government with ability to enforce its laws
is better than a weak government with noble
ideals. Gambling and patriotic officials do not go
together. In the present government gambling is
prohibited and good salaries are paid the officials
— in promise anyway. We are looking for rule to
be established and better conditions to prevail, but
there has not been made great progress in the na-
tion as a whole. In certain sections much better
conditions prevail, however.
The banditti are still causing much unrest in
many sections and worrying the Chinese govern-
ment In dealing with the needs of the people as
well as in her efforts to protect foreign Interests.
These banditti are no respecter of persons. We
thought in the past that foreigners were safe, but
A Christian whose brother was a leper. He himself was a
MONK FOR years. HiS MOTHER WAS A WOMAN OF BAD CHAR-
ACTER.
THE WORST CLASSES 83
this is no longer true. I have had a number of
experiences with them. I have been robbed twice
of all I had and partly robbed two other times.
The first time the robbers came to a Chinese boat
about midnight and took all we had — Chinese and
foreigners. The second time we were travelling
across the mountains and we were attacked about
nine o'clock in the morning.
Foreigners need to learn how to treat robbers.
If we will observe the laws of the banditti, we
will be able to escape the evils of robbing that pre-
vail in the West. The Chinese robbers are not
likely to do you any bodily harm if you do not
make fight. It is very unwise to resist them in
the least or show any desire to do this. If you
do, they will kill you; but if not, they will let you
alone except take the things or money. A num-
ber of foreigners have been killed, but always be-
cause they resisted or the robbers were afraid
they would resist. I never go armed and do not
want to make the impression I can or will resist.
They have some heart left anyway. When I was
robbed the first time, it was winter time. They
took about all my clothes, but left me a quilt.
They are supposed to leave you at least one thing.
You are permitted to make a request as to what
this will be, yet they reserve the right to reject
your request.
The robbers are well organized into guilds.
The head of the bands may be highly educated or
84 THE CHINESE AS THEY ABB
an ex-captain of soldiers. In fact the soldiers and
robbers are very closely connected in many places.
Some of the leading men were formerly leaders
of these bands, but became tired of this kind of
life and have become loyal to the government.
The Chinese government often shows a mercy in
dealing with those who wish to change their lives
that encourages others to turn from lives of crime
to loyal citizenship. Christianity has done a real
service to China in making good, loyal citizens out
of a number of robbers.
The beggars form a large class. They are seen
in crowds in the great cities. They are in all kinds
of places and conditions, wrecks of human beings
with unsightly forms that remind us how low hu-
man beings can become when all their ambition
and hope are gone. These beggars also organize
and have their headmen. Begging is a business.
The one who begs receives a part of one's gain,
yet the corporation who sends one out gets the
other part. Many beggars, however, are helpless
and worthy of pity, yet if we help one, hundreds
may understand and crowd our homes.
Another class that makes our hearts bleed with
pity are the unfortunate ones with incurable dis-
eases which have caused their family and clan to
cast them out. The lepers and sometimes the
blind and sick with other incurable diseases form
this class. It is indeed large and appeals to every
humane instinct of our souls.
THE WOEST CLASSES 85
These classes are a great burden to society.
The humane principles of Christianity will over-
come such classes, but these must pervade society
first. The missionary shows the worth of all hu-
man beings, and this becomes the foundation of
meeting the needs of all classes. Buddhism and
Confucianism with Taoism offer certain merits to
those who will help others, but these religions or
teachings do not reach the foundation and show
love and pity for human souls because these are
eternal and need our help. The mission interests
have started many eleemosynary institutions, and
these have encouraged the Chinese to aid nobly in
this kind of work. Only last year Dr. Wu Ting
Fang gave five thousand dollars to help lepers in
the city of Canton, and the Chinese government
furnished land for the leper home, yet back of
these gifts from the Chinese were a missionary
and his wife who had in their hearts the prompt-
ing — **' constraining '* — love of Christ to inaugu-
rate the enterprise.
These eleemosynary institutions do far more
than helping the unfortunate ones. They are well
worth while for this purpose; but they reveal the
love of the Father for wayward lives and show
to all classes that the worth of any nation must be
determined by the way she treats her children. If
we are to have great nations, we must have great
ideals of common brotherhood and family inter-
ests. For one to suffer all will be more or less
86 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
touched and all may be seriously affected. Chris-
tianity has brought a great truth to the Orientals
in revealing this fact. When I reached China
twenty years ago, many officials thought it to their
credit to report that they had beheaded great num-
bers of bad characters. Human life in the hands
of the officials was cheap; but now they are tak-
ing pride in building up society and caring for
human life. The principles of Christianity have
helped to bring about these better ideals.
China has in spite of these bad classes a great
wealth of human life. The forces that make for
the nation's good are organizing. In the new or-
der, no doubt, some old crushed stones will need
to be cast aside — or permitted to disappear, yet the
hope of these forces who love China is that the
polishing power of Christianity will remove grad-
ually the causes for these worst classes and make
all into useful citizens of a great republic. The
opportunity and aims of the world's Saviour need
to be conserved and realized in the faithful la-
bours of His children to bring about these results.
XII
THE CHINESE AND EDUCATION
IT is a great mistake to think of the Chinese
as uncivilized since they have the oldest
civilization in the world in all probability.
We can go back about five thousand years in
authentic history and we find at the beginning of
this period they had a form of writing, domestic
arts, ideas of government, etc., which must have
given them the highest civilization of that time.
This civilization has never utterly disappeared and
has increased for many centuries after the early
period.
Education has played a large part in the na-
tion's history. Mr. Julian Arnold gives this testi-
mony: " It may be said that there is no place in the
world where the printed word carries more weight
and influence among the literate class than in
China to-day. China has always venerated the
scholar and writer. Literary men have consti-
tuted the only distinct class that Chinese ever paid
homage to." Yet the Chinese have never had
general education. Only the wealthier class could
send their sons to school, and these went to a
87
88 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
private school. A few picked boys were educated.
The common boy had little if any education while
the girls had none.
Education until a few years ago consisted in
memorizing the ancient Classics. The educated
man was the one who could write acceptable es-
says on these Classics. Men gave their whole
lives poring over the sayings of the sages and
seeking to interpret these to the satisfaction of the
great scholars and obtain degrees in the great
centers of learning. The ability to perform this
arduous task determined the scholar's standing in
the eyes of the nation and his fitness for official
position. In the great Confucian temple in Pe-
king we find immense marble slabs that record the
degrees of the honoured ones from the various
provinces of China. The ambitious student of the
Classics was willing to spend a life of ceaseless
toil to have his name carved on these white marble
slabs. His children's children would rise up to
call him blessed. Each village and city prides it-
self in the number of monuments standing close
by the thoroughfares of travel erected in memory
of the honoured scholars or scholar in these
places. Their memory is held sacred by all the
people.
The Chinese no longer turn their eyes to the
Classics. Modern education has come to replace
the Classics. A young man to-day must study in
China the same books we do In the West, and edu-
m
■Jl pj
H ^
^ I— f
THE CHINESE AND EDUCATION 89
cation to him means much the same as it does to
us. The change from the old Classics to modern
books has not been made long, yet it means a new
China as they break with the past and link up
with the living forces of to-day. Two forces have
brought about this change. Many of the young
men went abroad for their education. They re-
turned with new ideas and ideals. They propa-
gated these in the old soil. Then the missionary
brought his message and life. He started schools
where the young studied modern books. Many
who entered these schools became most helpful
leaders in all movements to better the masses.
These two forces have united to bring about a new
form of education to replace the old.
The Chinese government is establishing modern
schools from the kindergarten to the university
where all classes may attend. The government
welcomes the aid of the mission schools. The
mission schools are still more favourably received
than the government. Great crowds are seeking
to attend the mission schools in many of the pop-
ular centers whereas the government schools are
struggling to make their way to the front. Fifty
million who ought to be in school with only four
million attending reveals a gigantic problem need-
ing all the help the government can get. The
Christian forces could do the whole of China no
greater blessing than to send splendidly equipped
teachers to help in the solving of this problem.
90 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
These teachers ought to be real educationists equal
to the very best work in any country, yet Chris-
tian ideals and life should permeate all they do if
the future education of that land is to be useful in
saving the masses from the culture that may be
their curse and the world's, too. The Christian
forces still have the opportunity in their hands.
In the Providence of God we believe that the situ-
ation continues in its formative period in order
that we may mould the youths for the kingdom of
God. To fail to use this opportunity to train an
army of trusted soldiers for helping solve China's
physical and spiritual needs, we will pass by our
brother in dire need and leave to other forces to
direct the New China which Christianity alone is
capable of transforming all forces to the glory of
our God.
The 200,000 teachers who are now struggling
with this gigantic problem ought to be increased
to at least 1,500,000. Many of these ought to be
Christian teachers from the West or Chinese
Christian teachers trained in well-equipped mis-
sion schools. The mission forces are combining
to meet the task, but their number and inadequate
equipment hinder them in meeting the situation.
In a tour of China T found a number of great edu-
cational centers, like Nanking University, Peking
University, Shantung Christian University, St.
John's College (University), Shanghai College,
Canton Christian College, Changsha University
THE CHINESE AND EDUCATION 91
and West China Christian University and a num-
ber of other great institutions uniting their forces
to produce well-trained workers for the task.
These institutions have made great headway, but
they are not able to solve the problem. There is
room for all effort and all kinds of institutions,
and still millions and millions waiting our aid.
In my tour I was greatly encouraged by what
I saw at Ginling College for girls at Nanking.
This institution has been started but a few years.
It began with very little equipment and not much
encouragement. Its growth has been most won-
derful. The whole atmosphere gives one the im-
pression of real college life with dynamic ideals
bursting forth into noble life. The girls are act-
ive and happy in preparing to do great things for
their country. Their willingness to seek to know
the real problems of life and how we can labour
to solve these for the individual and national good
was a most hopeful sign. It is most encouraging
to note how the faith of the few who began this
work has been more than realized and large gifts
are coming to make this school one of the great
institutions of the world.
Other colleges for girls are being started in
China. I find we have three already in operation
and the Shanghai College (sometimes called the
Baptist College of Shanghai) announce they will
have co-education commencing with September of
this year. The Canton Christian College has re-
92 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
ceived a few girls for years, yet only a few. Co-
education will come in China, yet we have to in-
troduce it with great caution and many safe-
guards.
The influence of mission schools is a mighty
force in making New China. The history of the
new nation is greatly interlocked with the mission
schools. 1 could mention much proof to verify this,
yet I will note only one institution, St. John's Uni-
versity, Shanghai. We find in the " Commercial
Handbook" this information about the alumni:
" Willington Koo, minister to the United States;
Alford Sze, Chinese minister to London; W. W.
Yen, formerly Chinese minister to Berlin; Dr. Y.
T. Tsur, formerly president of Tsinghua College
(one of China's greatest institutions) ; Z. T. K.
Woo, superintendent of the Hanyang Steel and
Iron Works; S. C. Chu, LL.B., general secretary
of the Shanghai-Nanking Railway; Dr. H. L.
Yen, Secretary of the Board of Foreign Affairs;
David Z. T. Yui, M. A., general secretary of
Y. M. C. A. (for China); Mr. Yen Fu Ching,
dean of the medical faculty Yale College, Chang-
sha; W. Y. Hu, Justice of the Supreme Court of
Appeals, Peking." These men show the influence
St. John's University has upon the nation in all
the walks of life. Not only have these great lead-
ers gone forth, but there are many others in the
leading centers of China's political, religious, eco-
nomic, intellectual, and social life.
THE CHINESE AND EDUCATION 93
There is one school in South China with rather
a unique history. This school is Pui Ching
Academy belonging to the native Christians of
Leung Kwang Association. It is located at Can-
ton, but influences a large field. This institution
was started by a group of Christians belonging to
the Baptist denomination thirty-one years ago.
Their work was begun under the most trying con-
ditions, no money, no hope of help from the home-
land, with one desire to have a Christian school
where their boys could receive an education free
from the environment of the heathen idolatrous in-
stitutions. From that day to this the school has
been under the control of the Chinese, managed
and mostly financed by them. They have prop-
erty worth about e$150,000. The board in the
homeland has given them, as straight gifts at
critical tim.es, $12,000. They are raising funds to
enlarge the work at this time. The amount de-
sired is some $200,000. This will be used to buy
additional lands and erect needed buildings. The
Chinese will raise more than half of this amount.
In their plans for a junior college they will need
help in funds and foreign teachers, yet the gen-
eral management and far the greater amount of
money and man power will be supplied by the
Chinese.
Many have doubted the ability of the Chinese
to manage and finance a Christian institution with
its chief aim to produce well-trained leaders for
94 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
the churches. The experience of this school has
proven they can. It has a standing by reason of
its grade of work among the best we have in
South China. It is correlated with the Canton
Christian College ; graduates from it will enter the
College without examination. They have won
this recognition by the quality of their work.
They have a student body of about five hundred
boys from all classes who are making a fine record
in Christian work and influence among the leaders
of political and religious and educational life.
The one phase of the work which has meant the
most to the school is the fact that the school be-
longs to the Chinese. They have sacrificed and
struggled to make it possible, and this has given
them a love for the institution that is worth more
than all its property. It is the pride of their work
and their joy to labour to make it a success.
Their splendid devotion has made possible the
financial aid and grade of work which give the
school its long and encouraging history with an
ever-growing hope for larger and larger useful-
ness.
Institutions of this kind where the Chinese as-
sume the responsibility of management and de-
velopment reveal to us the possibility of the whole
of China being reached with the gospel. We do
not need to educate the Chinese masses. This is
neither possible nor desirable. We ought to send
to aid them many well-equipped teachers from this
THE CHINESE AND EDUCATION 95
country to help in directing the work. Those we
send ought to be capable of becoming great leaders
with actual or potential powers of managing great
enterprises for large sections of the country.
They ought to be teachers of large visions and
practicable experience and unfailing consecration
to the task of our Saviour. These labourers from
the Occident will find a growing army in that
land who will be able to share with them in all
phases of the work. Those in that country will
know the situation, their own people, and how best
to adjust all things to accomplish the greatest re-
sults, and will gladly join their lives with us to
make the whole of China shine with the knowl-
edge and power and life of Him who holds the
treasure of wisdom and knowledge for all peoples.
Their help will make our gifts and lives accom-
plish the most.
The immense tasks before us urge Christians
everywhere to lend a hand. Great colleges and
universities and lower grade schools must be de-
veloped. Large sums of money and an army of
teachers from the West ought to reach the con-
flict just as soon as possible. To hesitate now in
the transitional period from the old order to the
new, we will lose the opportunity of establishing
the educational life of the nation. To fail to
make this thoroughly Christian and suitable to
meet all the needs of the people, we will make the
great failure of history. The Immensity of the
96 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
opportunity and the pressing claims of the present
and future generations require that we rise up
equal to the task and mould the leaders of the fu-
ture in the schools needing our help.
The undeveloped material with endless possi-
bilities of power for the world's good awaits our
sympathetic love and divine skill. We readily
understand that those who guide and mould the
lives of the little ones will determine the destiny
of the nation. These little ones cry everywhere
for help. The whole of the land needs the skill-
ful hand and compassionate heart to make of
these little ones great leaders for the making of
New China. The Chinese of all classes welcome
our help and will ever count us brothers if we
enter the country with the right spirit of service
and devotion to the real problems of the indi-
vidual and society.
XIII
THE CHINESE AND MEDICAL SCIENCE
IN the mission work in China we endeavour
" to follow in His steps " and preach, teach,
and heal the multitudes. No one can labour
in non-Christian lands long without feeling like
Dr. Wilfred Grenfell as expressed in the follow-
ing: "Just so the church needs 'cranks/ like Ed-
ward Worcester, whose protest is that the interest
of mind and body are so intimately intertuned
that the church must have a message for both if it
is to reach the soul in its apostleship of things
spiritual." The medical work in China cannot be
overemphasized when it is properly related to
" things spiritual." The Chinese are a most prac-
^ticable people, placing far more emphasis on what
we do than what we say. By going about healing
all manner of diseases, as the Master did, we re-
veal to the eye the heart of love which sets forth
Christ before the people in the most appealing
manner. If we will follow the Master in this, the
common people will hear our message gladly, and
all classes will be able to see the blessings of Chris-
tianity.
The lack of medical science in these lands is
97
98 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
beyond our comprehension. William B. Lipphard
in his '* Ministry of Healing " gives a vivid picture
of the non-Christian lands as to medical science:
" The non-Christian v^^orld is an unspeakable sick
world and needs relief. Notwithstanding the re-
markable efforts of the British government in
checking the spread of disease in India, there are
still one hundred millions of people in that un-
happy country beyond the reach of even the
simplest medical aid. Can any one possibly im-
agine the population of the United States abso-
lutely deprived of all resource to medical assist-
ance? Ninety out of every one hundred people
who die in the non-Christian world suffer their
pain and agony to the end without any attention
on the part of a doctor or a nurse. In the entire
Province of Szechuan, China, with a population
of sixty millions, there are only two hospitals for
women and children (all the more pathetic since
women in that country must have separate hos-
pitals to comply with the customs — Author).
There are a thousand walled cities in China which
have never seen a missionary physician. . . .
In the Back Bay district of Boston one can find
the offices of as many as fifteen physicians in a
single block, whereas in China a traveller can pass
through, not fifteen blocks, but fifteen hundred
villages and find no evidence of the presence of a
doctor."
Several years ago I travelled five hundred miles
A LEADING YOUNG
PHYSICIAN IN Can-
ton, AND HELPER
IN Christian
WORK.
Dk. Jew Hawk, Hongkong, China. A western trained
PHYSICIAN.
*
%
MEDICAL SCIENCE 99
er the interior of China where the country was
densely populated in many places with cities of
over one hundred thousand, and did not find one
medical missionary in all this territory. The
people clamoured everywhere with all manner of
diseases for our aid, but we were powerless. The
country was beautiful and the people fairly pros-
perous for the Orient. The needs were appalling,
as could be seen by the pitiable sights of the
maimed and suffering who greeted us at every vil-
lage and many times along the roadside. How
could any Christian doctor or any other follower
of the Master pass through such a section and see
the people without any resource in all their distress
of body and mind without being "touched with the
feelings of their infirmities *' ? I cannot conceive
of such Christians. How long the Christian phy-
sicians of this country will permit such a condition
to exist we cannot say, but surely not long if the
" mind of Christ " is in them, and moves them in
all their life's duties.
Sickness and disease play a large part In the
life and customs of the people. Around disease
gather many of their most distressing supersti-
tions. Before the child enters this world until
generations after death sends It to the grave, we
find superstition deciding all actions concerning
life. The mother is moved by superstition In
many of her dealings with the Infant and the old
of a hundred years are placed In the grave, all
100 THE CHINESE AS THEY AEE
action being prompted by superstition. These
graves are cared for and worshipped from genera-
tion to generation by reason of superstition.
These superstitions greatly affect disease of
childhood and life as well. If a child takes sick,
and ordinary remedies do not restore it, the par-
ents may think that the child is possessed or
claimed by the demons. They must give this
child over to the demons to prevent the angry gods
claiming the lives of three other members of the
family. Dr. and Mrs. Hayes soon after we
reached China and opened a new field were called
to see an official's boy. We were happy to have
an opportunity to reach the ruling class, thinking
this would enable us to come in sympathetic touch
with the people. They went night and day to
look after the sick boy and were hopeful of heal-
ing him; but one morning they returned to our
room with sad faces, Mrs. Hayes telling us that
they had seen a sight she hoped never to see again.
The sick boy was cast aside as hopeless, left to
the demons. If they had the cooperation of the
parents, the boy might have been saved, but these
parents were afraid to offend the gods of fate.
Many similar superstitions are found all over
that unfortunate land. Another most common
one is not to permit one to die in a house or in a
boat. This will bring bad luck. I recall seeing
a man taken from a steam launch near Canton and
left on the river bank in an open field to suffer the
MEDICAL SCIBNCife " ' ' : 101
rays of a tropical sun in the month of September.
He was left to die. We urged them to take him
to Canton, less than a hundred miles away, need-
ing only a few hours to reach a missionary hos-
pital; but they refused, saying he might die, and
this would bring bad luck to their business.
Then the remedies they do use are often worse
than the disease. Medical men with their witchery
and enchantment have great influence over the
people. No medical science, but many crude doc-
tors with all kinds of remedies. These so-called
doctors thrive mostly on the credulities and super-
stition of the people. They may use herbs and
certain medicines, yet they find their greatest in-
fluence in magic.
A boy has paroxysm due to stomach infection.
The doctor locates the trouble and seeks to bring
relief by pouncing the abdomen, and the boy dies
in thirty minutes due to the remedy rather than the
disease. In " The Ministry of Healing " we have
these words from Dr. W. R. Morse of the West
China Mission: " The Chinese profess to heal dog
bites by writing characters on the wound; to heal
sores by writing characters with the claw of a wild
beast on the abscess; to cure trachoma by making
passes and reciting charms; and to cure rheuma-
tism by drinking monkey and bear bones in wane.
They chew the bones of deer and dog meat for a
tonic, swallow a stone for accelerating child-birth ;
and eat mud from the center of the fireplace for
102 TtK CHINESE A ? THEY ABE
the cure of palpitation of the heart." Many other
as fooHsh and harmful as these could be men-
tioned, but these will be sufficient to show how
helpless the sick must be in the hands of such doc-
tors as these in China.
We rejoice to be able to turn from this dark
picture and show the good progress of medical
missions and Western medical science in overcom-
ing the above forms of medical superstition. We
have made wonderful headway for the time and
effort given to heal the people and enlighten the
masses, yet we have only begun to reach the prob-
lem. The missionary doctor and nurse have done
more to show the spirit of Christianity than to
heal the masses. They have prepared the people
to understand and appreciate the work of the mis-
sionary physician and nurse. The first mission
hospital started in China was the Canton Hospital
opened by Peter Parker in 1834. The hospital is
now doing an imm.ense amount of work for the
suffering. It is supported by fees and gifts in
South China, only a few of the foreign staff being
supported by funds from this country. The insti-
tution is one of the most powerful factors in
South China to meet the needs of the people both
physical and spiritual. The last report I have gives
the number of treatments in one year to be 50,000.
They are training Chinese doctors and helping
with the problems of the adequate supply of
Chinese trained nurses. All classes are being
MEDICAL SCIENCE 103
helped and are showing their appreciation by giv-
ing thousands of dollars to enlarge the hospital so
as to meet the constant growing needs.
The Wesleyans at Fat Shan have a hospital that
paid all expenses a few years ago and had twelve
thousand dollars to use for other work. The Re-
form Presbyterians started a hospital quite a dis-
tance in the interior from Canton. It has been in
operation only a few years, has paid all running
expenses, erected the buildings for the hospital,
and the Chinese are considering giving a resi-
dence to the American physician for his use in
running their hospital. The Southern Baptists at
Wuchow, Kwangsi, are conducting a hospital
that paid for all running expenses three years ago,
except the salary of the American physician, and
had at the end of the year three thousand dollars
to apply on the building fund. This was true
three years ago, and the hospital is ever increas-
ing in patients, last year reporting forty thousand
treatments.
Nowhere in the world do we have a greater op-
portunity to help in medical work than we now
have in China. The medical work in many cen-
ters will speedily become self-supporting and help
in the evangelistic work. Many cities will put up
the buildings for the needed hospitals and pay all
the running expenses. The native Christians of
the Leung Kwang Association started a move-
ment to build a first-class hospital in Canton. For
104 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
the first unit they are to raise fifty thousand dol-
lars. The government gave the land for the en-
terprise. All they have asked is that we in America
give ten thousand dollars and furnish a first sur-
geon — they will do all the rest in completing the
first unit. The work has commenced most hope-
fully.
The Chinese are capable of caring for the
medical work and will do so as soon as they see
its usefulness. These people are fine physicians
and nurses when once given an opportunity.
Some of the very best hospitals are now being
conducted by the Chinese. Miss Mary Stone has
just started an independent institution in Shang-
hai with fme beginning. She will receive help
from individuals in the United States in the early
building efforts, yet, no doubt, in the near future
her hospital will not only be self-supporting, but
will have funds to help in other lines of mission
work. I know a native physician quite a distance
in the interior from Canton who has a large
medical work entirely self-supporting. He re-
ceived a very meager education in Western medi-
cine about twenty-five years ago, but with this
meager knowledge he has made great success.
The American physician can do great good in
his art of healing and the nurse with her tender
sympathetic touch, yet there ought to be to get
the greatest results the love of Christ Jesus for the
whole man dominating all their action — physician
MEDICAL SCIENCE 105
and nurse — if we are to use medical science to
win China to the noble life we have in the
Saviour. Of course we should not lower our
standards for medical work in the field of sci-
ence. The object and the results encourage us in
the mission hospitals to have the very best hos-
pitals possible. This requires the best trained
physicians and nurses and adequate equipment;
however, no American doctor or nurse should en-
ter the mission service unless spiritual results are
sought with joy and constancy.
I wish to emphasize the great good that will
come to China through the medical colleges being
established. These train Chinese doctors and
nurses to handle the work in their own country.
The Rockefeller Foundation and others are doing
much in this way.
XIV
THE CHINESE AND ANCESTRAL
WORSHIP
ANCESTRAL worship is the one force that
has done more than anything else to bind
the Chinese together during the long his-
tory of the past. We do not know how long they
have worshipped their ancestors, yet as far back
as authentic history goes, they have worshipped
them. How much good this custom may have
brought them we do not pretend to say, yet it ex-
plains much of their history and accounts for
their unbroken family chain that connects the liv-
ing with the traditions of the ancient. Their
most sacred memories are clustered around the
graves and family reunions that bring the way-
ward far away to join those who remain around
the family tree. Each year in the spring and in
the autumn we see great crowds of merchants
and travelling men and labourers returning to
their native cities and villages to have a part in
this worship. The family may be poor and unable
to have meat at the ordinary meals, but saving of
months will provide for the feast at the reunion
io6
A TOMB or ONE OF THE MiNG EMPERORS. It IS 50O YEARS OLD
AND LOCATED NEAR NANKING.
ANCESTRAL WORSHIP lOT
held at the graves. Here pork, chicken, duck,
beef, wine, rice, vegetables, etc., will be offered at
the graves of the ancestors and then the living
will feast on these things — an idea prevailing
that somehow the departed loved ones will enjoy
the feast with the living. The spirits do not actu-
ally eat this food, but they enjoy the aroma which
is the elixir of the spirit world.
This worship has had its good effects as well
as its evil. We cannot approve of such worship
in the light of Jehovah's revelation, yet in the
days gone by the family has been preserved and
many ideals created and related to the present by
reason of this worship. Christianity nowhere per-
mits the old crude worship, but we need to be
careful not to destroy reverence for the noble past
in our efforts to solve the problems of the present
and the future. There is a wide chasm in the
eyes of the Chinese between the East and the West
in the way we care for our departed loved ones.
This ought to be closed by showing the Chinese
we care for the dead in the most practicable way.
Jesus came not to destroy the good in any thing
or person, but to make perfect by removing the
error and revealing the fuller truth. He will do
this In ancestral worship if He is given His full
sway in the hearts of the Chinese. We need to
make this possible by revealing Christ to them in
His fullness.
We cannot do this by ruthlessly condemning
108 THE CHINESE AS THEY AEE
the custom which has meant so much to their civi-
Hzation. We need to handle it carefully and
cautiously in order that we may be able to mani-
fest not only the truth of Christ, but His spirit.
We have the custom in our own country of sweep-
ing the graves and planting flowers, making
" Decoration Day " a holiday with many happy
memories. The chasm between this and the
Chinese ancestral worship is indeed a broad one,
yet with such practice we have the basis of fellow-
ship that will eventually close up the span be-
tween false worship and the true. In all our re-
lation to the question we ought to be careful not
to offend the sense of propriety the Chinese feel.
If we do much trouble may come. A number of
American young men were surveying a railroad
close to Canton twenty years ago. They reached
a village about fifty miles in the interior. As
they made their survey close to the graves, the
people said they would disturb these graves. A
mob was started and these young men had to be
hidden away and escorted out of the town to pre-
vent murder and international complications.
One of the best ways to overcome the evils of
this custom is to make much of the needs of the
living, and show how the present determines all
the future. A great evil of ancestral worship is
in neglecting the living to care for the dead. Old
men and women will have to toil night and day
for their living while the younger members of the
ANCESTRAL WORSHIP 109
family may be looking after the graves. The
needs of the dead are far more important than
those of the Hving. One's own mother, old and
frail, may have to go far into the mountains to
cut grass or labour late at night beating out rice
in order not to starve while the son is looking
after the ancestors.
The graves are given first consideration, not the
need of the living. I found in the most densely
populated province in China, Shantung, where the
direst poverty abounds everywhere, that much of
the fertile farming lands are converted into grave-
yards. The reverence for the ancestors is shown
by marking off a section of the field for the
grave. This grave win be located there and then
the dutiful children will erect a great mound to
mark this spot. These children will die in the
course of time and their children will follow and
bury close by and erect another mound which
must alike be held sacred and free from the plow
of the living. Much of the valuable farm lands
is ruined this way. In other parts of China the
hillsides and mountains are used for burying.
This will not interfere with farming so much as
in Shantung, but it interferes more with mining
and general improvement of the country. They
believe that the spirits dwell in the mountains.
If we molest them, the spirits will come back and
bring death and sorrow in revenge for their neg-
lect or disturbance.
110 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
Much of the ancestral worship Is purely selfish
after all. They do not love their dead so much as
they fear them. They are afraid if they do not
perform their filial duties, these departed ones will
return and punish the living. There are certainly
many more evils than good coming from this
habit. It has done much to weaken the national
spirit and cause the people to break up into clans
which are interfering seriously in establishing the
nation at this time.
Christianity will overcome the evils of this
worship and liberate the people, freeing them
from the burdens of a dead past and linking them
to the living present with hopes not in the decayed
past but in the unfolding future. This has ever
been true of any nation who would give Christ
first place. The hopes of the living are not buried
in the graves. We expect the glad day to come
when these graves will give up the dead and the
departed with the living, who look for His com-
ing, will meet the Lord in the air and will dwell
with Him forevermore in the heavenly city.
Such realities as these liberate the gloomy hearts
of those who have looked into the misty past
and have never known the glorious hope we
have in the risen Lord of the dead and the liv-
ing.
The fruitfulness of Christianity can be seen in
the lives of His children in that country to-day.
They do not fear the dead. They have no grave-
ANCESTRAL AYORSHIP 111
yard doctor spending their money to find a lucky
place. When a Christian dies, he is buried with
other Christians in a sacred spot owned by the
church. These graves have their monuments and
are swept once or twice a year, but never wor-
shipped,
Christianity shows its most wonderful power in
changing this custom. Idols may be given up, the
temples may not be visited any more, incense not
burned in the homes, but still they will worship
the graves. Filial piety is a duty instilled into the
hearts of childhood which lingers on after all
other evil forms of worship are given up. Then
when one breaks with this duty, one is an ingrate
unworthy of clan protection or respect. The
power of this custom may be seen in this incident :
the wife of the minister from China to England,
Mrs. Liu of Macao, became interested in Chris-
tianity, Her husband was educated at Harvard (I
think), and is one of China's most noted states-
men. He did not interfere w4th his wife's re-
ligious life. She expressed a desire to join the
church. She said she was willing to give up idol
worship and every other kind of worship, but she
must look after the graves of her ancestors. She
could not give up filial piety. She was told that
the Saviour demanded the whole heart. She must
be willing to give up all things if she would be
worthy of His discipleshlp. She hesitated quite
a while, yet in the end gave up ancestral worship
112 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
and has become a mighty force in her city for the
Saviour.
If we could but see how Christianity overcomes
this evil form of worship and makes the Chinese
free and hopeful in the better way, we would find
more joy in giving them the glad tidings which
alone can make them free and joyful in the divine
hope which they have so freely given them in
Christ Jesus. How long will the milhons in China
turn their faces to the shadowy past and cry in
vain to their ancestors for help in solving the
problems of the present? They must look in vain
to these ancestors or maybe to things more harm-
ful if we do not give them the eternal and ever-
present truths which we have in " the Ancient of
days." He stands in readiness, a loving brother,
to guide them away from the past that cannot help
to the Father who will graciously give them all
things to enjoy if they will give the Son the right
to rule in their hearts. They cannot do this until
we reveal the Son to them. He must have our
help. We who know Him and enjoy the priceless
blessing of His fellowship and power must co-
operate with Him to give the liberties of the gos-
pel to these waiting millions.
XV
THE CHINESE AND RELIGION
THE Chinese are a religious people and
have been from the dawn of history.
There are no young men and others in
that country, as in many countries of the West,
who do not worship. " No Worship Gods' Socie-
ties " are found in certain sections as modern
thought advances, yet these are not numerous even
at this time. Worship may not be connected with
morals. The thieves and robbers burn their in-
cense and worship the idols as devoutly as others.
The gods do not demand righteousness and holi-
ness in their devotees. Idols are seen everywhere.
Each day great volumes of smoke rise up from the
leading cities at the morning and evening sacri-
fices, coming from the burning of incense in wor-
ship. In front of each business house and each
home there are shrines used in worship. The
mother as well as the old man with the little chil-
dren worship morning and evening. The first
and fifteenth of each month and most of the first
month of the year are times of special worship.
They perform their devotions with a sincerity and
regularity that would put to shame many of the
so-called Christians of other lands. They spend
large sums of money in worship.
There are three leading religions in that coun-
try. Taoism is likely the oldest and contains
113
114 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
more of the native elements of their ancient reli-
gion, yet it is crude, full of superstition and cre-
dulities that have their origin in the mysteries of
this religion. Taoism had its beginning in China
near the time of Confucius, and, no doubt, grew
rapidly as Confucianism spread, since this mystic
religion met a need which Confucianism, with its
practical teaching, did not seek to meet. Both
Confucius and Lao-tsze lived about the same time,
five hundred years before Christ. Lao-tsze taught
about the Tao, the truth, the way, the path. Tao-
ism sought to give light on the mysteries and meet
the spiritual needs of the people. Spirit worship,
demons, fairies, evil forces in the air and hills and
mountains were either created by this cult or
found encouragement. From Taoism came many
vagaries.
Confucianism is not really a religion, simply a
code of ethics. Its teaching has done more to
influence the Chinese and the Orient in the field of
ethics than all other forces combined. As a
teacher Confucius sought to impart noble ideals to
the governing class and give practicable knowledge
to his fellow-men in all their earthly relationships.
He was greatly admired by his scholars though the
officials regarded him with too much idealism and
dangerous. He referred to the heavens and the
Supreme Ruler, but seemed to be using the terms
of the ancient with little knowledge of these re-
ligious forces. One of his pupils asked him to
teach them about the Supreme Ruler — the heav-
THE CHINESE AND RELIGION 115
ens, but he replied, " I have not yet understood the
problems of the earth fully, how can I teach about
the heavens ? " He urged his people to look well
to the earthly relationships, and leave the heavenly
and future to others.
He was a great teacher and gave many fine
ideals for man in his earthly affairs, but he was
not greatly concerned about the divine. He was
not a teacher of heavenly things. We would class
such a man in our day as an agnostic with many
noble ideals in the realms of ethics. From his day
to this he has been the Great Teacher of the Ori-
ent. More have followed him during the last two
thousand years than any other teacher on earth,
even Christ not excepted. Almost a third of the
human family has accepted his teaching as the
purest ethical and most practical code. Not only
has China done this, but Japan and other countries
close to China have also.
Although he never sought to teach religion,
many of the Chinese worship him and are seeking
to get him accepted as their divine personage
worthy of worship. His shrine may be found in
government schools and in many temples erected
to his memory. Recently a strong pressure was
brought to bear on the government to make Con-
fucianism the state religion, but it failed. Con-
fucius will be accepted by all classes as a great
teacher, but the masses will not regard him as di-
vine except in the sense all great men are divine.
He cannot meet their religious needs by any
116 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
method that may be used to force this on the peo-
ple.
Buddhism reached China from India and spread
over the country near the beginning of the Chris-
tian era. It sought to meet the rehgious need of
the people. It taught concerning the horrors of
hell, punishment for the evils of this life, future
life directly connected with the kind of life we live
on this earth, rewards for merit, etc. Buddhism
was more of a religion than practical Confucian-
ism or superstitious Taoism.
This foreign religion was brought to China by
priests who performed wonders in the eyes of the
Chinese. These priests from India planted their
religion in the soil made ready by Taoism and
Confucianism • — opposed to, but supplementing
both. It soon became indigenous and univer-
sal and has remained so to this day. This
explains its universal hold on the Chinese and Jap-
anese — -its ability to adjust its message to the
ideals of the people rather than opposing the pre-
vailing religious thought.
These three teachings — -two religions and one
code of ethics — were all preceded by a purer re-
ligion and a monotheism that reminds us of the
religion of the Old Testament. This ancient re-
ligion has no beginning in the history of that peo-
ple. The further we go back in Chinese history
the closer it approaches to pure monotheism. The
great scholars of Chinese religions from the West
and the Chinese themselves many believe that in
THE CHINESE AND EELIGION 117
the ancient times they knew and worshipped one
God and He was a personal being who cared for
the affairs of men.
In Peking there is the Altar of Heaven, where
the emperors have gone and in the open space,
with their thoughts heavenward, have worshipped
for ages. This beautiful marble altar stands there
still with no sign of idolatry — no idols were ever
used here. Dr. Martin has this to say about the
worship on this altar: " The Divinity there wor-
shipped is the Ruler of the universe, and the priest
who officiates is the sovereign of the Empire.
Like Melchizedek of old, he is the priest of the
Most High God. . . . The cults of Buddha
and Tao are of yesterday in comparison with this
venerable relic of a purer faith, which, in China,
has behind it a record of forty centuries.'*
This " purer faith " had no idols and knew
something of the One God of all the earth even in
the early days. We know when idolatry reached
that country. Rouncewell Wildman gives this In-
formation: " Wu Yih, one of China's most wicked
emperors, has the distinction of introducing idols
into China (b. c. 1199-1194). He did this to
show his utter unbelief in God and all religion.
He is called a wicked ruler by the Chinese for do-
ing this." Herbert A. Giles, a great scholar on
Chinese religions, gave a lecture years ago at Ox-
ford, in which he sought to give the exact situa-
tion from scholarship, and in no sense was leaning
to the missionary propaganda. He makes this
118 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
significant statement: "Beginning with the pure
monotheism of a personal God (which history re-
veals in our first insight into Chinese life — -Au-
thor) we ultimately reach the substitution of Con-
fucius and his worship with almost the total dis-
appearance of a supernatural power/* He gives
this as his opinion " from a purely secular point of
view " concerning the conflict of the religious
ideals of the people.
Dr. Giles, in a scholarly treatise to the scholars
of the West, dwells at length on this phase of the
question. I quote a few more sentences from this
treatise: "Almost, however, at the beginning of
the Canon of History (extending back nearly
3000 B. c. — Author) and before there is any
mention of Ti'en, we are faced by another
term, which, under the skillful leadership of Dr.
Legge (is revealed), as the one and only correct
equivalent for ' God.' This (other term) is Shang
Ti, meaning Supreme Ruler." In the Canon of
History, " here we find that Ti'en is used in the
sense of * God ' more than 150 times, whereas
Shang Ti only about twenty times; and, in the
words of Dr. Legge, this Supreme Governing
Power is understood to be omniscient, omnipotent,
and righteous." Dr. Giles brings out clearly that
in the early dawn of history the term Ti'en meant
God and the abode of God, and this God with the
early Chinese was a personal Being who was much
concerned about the affairs of men with many of
the attributes we ascribe to Jehovah-God.
THE CHINESE AND RELIGION 119
In the teachings of Confucius we see remnants
of the early monotheism. Bishop Bashford says,
" Confucius beheved vaguely in a personal Crea-
tor, or, at least, in editing the Shu Ching, he left
untouched numerous passages which he found in
these ancient books relating to a personal God."
Bishop Bashford has this to say about the philoso-
f'J pher. Mo Ti, who lived about the time of Confu-
cius: " On the same utilitarian grounds he argues
for the existence of a supreme God, of intelli-
gence, reason, and love, and of a Divine provi-
dence ruling in the affairs of men. Indeed, his
arguments for Theism anticipates by twenty-live
hundred years the pragmatism of William James.
" He (Mo Ti) comes the nearest of any ancient
philosopher to the discovery of the scientific test
of trutli; and he devoted all his energies to pro-
moting that doctrine of love which later was re-
vealed and embodied by Jesus Christ."
Unquestionably the further back we go the
more evidence we have that the Chinese believed
in a personal God whose attributes, in part any-
way, were common with those of the God of
Christian history. Blindness caused by the re-
jection of the light they had and the introduction
of idols removed them further and further from
the true God. Idolatry and false religions occupy
fully the hearts of the people at this time, yet we
have a mighty appeal in reverting their thought to
the " faith of their fathers." Every true lover of
the people will do this and seek to conserve the
120 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
truths of the ancient in meeting the needs of the
present. A people who worship the sages of long
ago will greatly appreciate the knowledge of the
God of these ancients as they understand that one
Supreme Ruler of heaven and earth is their God
and ours.
We would not destroy their devotion to the
false gods until we can reveal to them the true
God. If we did, we might have a nation of ag-
nostics and infidels as we see in certain sections of
South America, Europe and Japan. We need to
turn their waiting hearts from the " vain idols to
the true and living God " who is ready to bless
them. The situation just now is indeed surpass-
ing in importance and most hopeful of results if
we are willing to meet the needs.
We must not and cannot successfully force on
the Chinese a foreign religion. Christianity, as
far as it has gathered through national contact and
Western philosophies and become foreign to the
eternal religion of Jehovah, must be removed of
this, and given its original setting and then ad-
justed to meet the conditions now confronting the
people of China. This should be done speedily
before the restless skepticism of a blasted faith
throws its shadows over the devotion of the peo-
ple. Happily for them and the world, Christianity
can do this. It will ever do it when willing hearts
go as ambassadors to live and labour for any peo-
ple's good. The whole of China ought to be
reached with the true message while their hearts
are worshipful and ready to know the truth.
XVI
THE CHINESE AND CHRISTIANITY
HRISTIANITY has approached China at
different times. There is a tradition that
the Apostle Thomas went there. If he
did, his uncertain attitude, no doubt, made it im-
possible for him to leave any lasting results. The
Nestorians crossed the mountains and commenced
their work with the Chinese in the sixth or seventh
century. They made great headway at first, espe-
cially with the official class because of their supe-
rior culture and knowledge. They preached the
one God and His Son Jesus Christ, but their gos-
pel was an attenuated one and failed utterly to
overcome the idolatry and religions of their day.
Their work collapsed and disappeared altogether
after a few centuries of remarkable progress.
There is nothing left except the Nestorian Tablet
which briefly records what they taught and partial
results of their labours.
The Roman Catholics came next, reaching there
about six hundred years after the Nestorians made
their first appearance. They, too, were most fa-
vourably received and given a place in the royal
household as teachers from the West. Many be-
121
122 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
lieved and entered their fold, but their success may
have been their occasion of boldness in demanding
that the Decrees from Rome take precedence over
the edicts of the emperors. This brought the
charge of disloyalty to the Throne in China and
the believers were persecuted and martyred with
the priests. This went on unrelentingly until the
early Catholic efforts were practically extermi-
nated. In 1807 the first Protestant missionary,
Robert Morrison, reached the Orient, landing in
Canton. He had to face hostile Chinese and un-
sympathetic Westerners who were there before
him as traders. Since his day steady progress has
been made to plant Christianity in China. Prog-
ress was exceedingly slow at first, but with accel-
erating power in recent years.
The Boxer Uprising in 1900 marks a new epoch
in Christianity. This uprising was not primarily
against Christianity, but against foreigners in gen-
eral and especially the movement to partition
China's territory and grab as much of it as pos-
sible by the contending nations of the West and
Japan. The Boxers were against everything for-
eign, men or institutions. Christianity to them
was foreign, and the Chinese who believed in
Christianity must be disloyal to the ideals of their
own country, hence the persecution was directed
against the Christians. Missionaries and native
Christians suffered more than any one else because
they were located in isolated and unprotected sec-
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THE CHINESE AND CHRISTIANITY 123
tions, whereas the business men and officials from
the West could be protected in the foreign lega-
tions or rushed to the gunboats.
The persecution which the Christians had to en-
dure was of the most testing kind. They had to
renounce Christianity by worshipping idols or be
counted traitors to all things Chinese and worthy of
the most cruel death. We rejoice to be able to re-
port that the Christians, with few exceptions, were
loyal to Christ and stood the fires of persecution
unto death before they would deny their Saviour.
It is estimated that upwards of twenty thousand
suffered martyrdom at the hands of the Boxers in
the most cruel manner known to heathen butchery.
From the graves of these noble followers of the
Christ has come a better Christianity, made pure
in the fires of affliction, ready to have a larger part
in winning their own country to the Master. The
onward march is steady and most hopeful.
The present situation of the Christian forces
ought to be of interest to those in the homeland
who are supporting the advancing columns. I
give the reports from the " Chinese Year Book,"
1918. There has been some increase since then,
yet not a great deal more than enough to supply
the vacancies caused by the troubles of the West.
These figures and ratios would not differ greatly
at present. This autumn ought to add many more
missionaries and may change the ratios.
The following gives the number of missionaries
124 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
in the leading denominations, counting the various
countries:
Anglican, England and America 621
Baptist of Europe and America 534
Congregationalists of all countries 284
Lutheran of Europe and America 385
Methodist, all branches 754
Presbyterian, including all countries . , . 943
China Inland Mission, including various
denominations 9^76
Other societies and the remaining de-
nominations 912
It will be noted in the above that we have more
than five thousand missionaries from the churches
of the West labouring in China. This means we
count the single ladies, wives of missionaries, doc-
tors, and teachers, pastors and laymen giving their
lives to make China Christian. The relative
strength of the six largest denominations accord-
ing to the missionaries is the following:
First, Presbyterian; second, Methodist; third,
Anglican; fourth, Baptist; fifth, Lutheran; and
sixth, Congregationalist. It is interesting to note
that about a third of the missionaries are con-
nected with the China Inland Mission and other
organizations. Many of these belong to one of
the six denominations whose records are given.
For various reasons they have chosen to go as mis-
sionaries under a different organization than that
of their own denomination.
THE CHINESE AND CHRISTIANITY 125
A comparison of the church members shows the
following:
First, Presbyterian; second, Methodist; third,
China Inland Mission; fourth, Baptist; fifth, Lu-
theran; sixth, Congregationalist ; seventh, Angli-
can. As to the amounts contributed by the na-
tives of the different denominations in China, the
Presbyterians and Methodists are far ahead, their
native Christians giving about the same. The
Baptists are third, yet followed closely by the
Anglican and Congregationalist. These refer to
the gifts of the native Christians.
A rather close investigation of the great centers
of mission work revealed the fact that most of our
money and men are devoted to educational institu-
tions and other kinds of institutional work. Such
work does not mean no evangelistic effort, as the
institutional efforts may be directly as well as indi-
rectly evangelistic. However, they are not prima-,
rily so. There is a feeling in certain sections that
we are emphasizing this phase of mission enter-
prise too much. I visited the Shantung Christian
University at Tsinanfu and saw the Institution
and went over its plans with the president, the
Rev. J. Percy Bruce, M. A. Their plans include
millions of dollars and a great foreign and native
teaching force. There are a number of such in-
stitutions in China. The president, however, of
this institution felt that they had asked the home
boards for about all the money that they could
126 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
expect to get without weakening other needs of
the work. He thought it would be better for such
institutions to have separate boards or committees
in the homeland who would make direct appeals.
This would protect the general evangelistic and
other kindred mission work. The direct appeal
for the institution would receive help from certain
people who otherwise would not give.
One of the most hopeful features of the present
outlook is that the native is becoming a great
leader in spreading Christianity. Many of the
outstanding Chinese Christians are conscious that
they must not lean on foreign countries. They
want to be free to lead in developing Christianity
in their own land. Many whose sincerity and love
for Christ we cannot question are restless imder
the restraint of foreign domination. Everywhere
among the ruling class they are met with the
stigma that Christianity is a foreign religion and
under the control of foreign nations. Certain
forms of church government lend themselves to
this accusation more than others, yet the desire for
native freedom and initiative we want to encour-
age just as soon as they are prepared to safeguard
the truths they live to propagate. This is likely
to come v/ith a great people like the Chinese before
we are prepared to believe it.
The number of self-supporting churches where
Christianity has been established any length of
lime, and the rather national movement on the
THE CHINESE AND CHRISTIANITY 127
part of certain Christian leaders to enter new fields
speak of that longed-for day when the natives
will assume far the larger burdens of the work.
Christianity can never receive the support of the
leading Chinese until it is recognized as their re-
ligion. The masses will reject the message as
long as It is clothed in forms of Western thought
and life. The pride and self-respect of a people
of great history must make this true. It is not
the poverty of the people that prevents the self-
support as much as we might think. They have al-
ways supported Buddhism and every other form
of religion which costs as much or more than
Christianity would cost them. More depends on
making Christianity theirs and their willingness to
assume responsibility for its spread and upkeep.
Another hopeful thing is that Christianity Is
reaching the better classes. In the early efforts
results were confined mostly to the lower classes,
but this is not true at this time. The Chief Justice
of the Supreme Court in South China is a very
fine Christian. Mr. C. T. Wang, who was China's
most aggressive envoy at the Peace Conference In
Europe, Is an outstanding Christian character.
The Superintendent of Education In Kwangtung
Province was recently baptized. The Mayor of
the great city of Canton Is a Christian brother.
The Secretary of Foreign Affairs In South China
Is a minister and very active In the Lord's work,
and has been for years. A number of the presi-
128 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
dents of the leading colleges and universities are
Christians.
As in the early efforts in winning the Roman
Empire, the soldiers are having an important part
in making the nation Christian. Rev. A. L.
Warnshuis, of Shanghai, gives a report bearing on
this phase of the work; "Last summer General
Feng, one of the great Christian generals in
China's army, sent a request to a British mis-
sionary to come to his camp for a week of evan-
gelistic services. When that missionary returned
I met him and he was overwhelmed with his expe-
rience. He said he left a thousand men ready for
baptism, and he knew not how many other hun-
dreds asking for more light. A few weeks later
General Feng wrote to us and said, * I want a
Christian attached to my staff.' To-day we have
in China's army the first Christian chaplain. Last
week I picked up the Christian Intelligencer and
read there one of the first letters that chaplain
wrote. In the first paragraph of that letter he
said, * Last Sunday I baptized six hundred sol-
diers.' This in the army of China."
This general was not satisfied for his men only
to have the gospel. He paid the expenses of a
lady missionary to come and win the wives to
Christ. Just before I left China I was helping in
a baptizing. We had received a captain for bap-
tism. Just before he was to be baptized he asked
us to wait a short while. He turned his face to-
THE CHINESE AND CHEISTIANITT 129
wards the heavenly Father and prayed that the
Holy Spirit might descend on him as He did on
the Lord when He was baptized. Such men will
be a great power in winning their soldiers to the
Saviour.
The governors of Kwangtung Province (Can-
ton) for years have been very friendly to Christi-
anity. Five years ago the governor visited many
of the Christian schools and made presents to the
graduates, commending their work most highly.
He gave a reception at the end of the school year
to the missionaries. His band furnished music,
the Chinese ladies served tea, cakes and ice-cream,
and the governor in person received the guests and
praised their noble work. The man who followed
him gave large sums of money to the mission work.
The present governor during the last few months
attended a series of evangelistic services in Canton
and manifested great interest personally. The
head police in Canton is active in Y. M. C. A.
work.
I would not make the impression by these facts
that the whole of China is rushing to the churches.
The real situation, we need to understand, is that
Christianity is being favourably considered by
many of the leaders. It is the psychological time
to press forward in the work. This friendly con-
dition will not remain if w^e do not give them the
blessings of Christianity. All classes are becom-
ing more friendly and welcome the messenger and
130 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
are ready to hear what he has to say. Great evan-
gelistic services are being held. Hundreds, and
even thousands, are attending and expressing a de-
sire to follow the Lord and know Him in His sav-
ing grace. These all will not accept Him fully,
but many will if we have the men and women
ready to lead them into the full light of the gospel.
The student leaders and reformers in the new
government are the most friendly and the most
hopeful, yet all classes are showing signs of awak-
ening wherever the gospel has been preached.
The business class is very hopeful and friendly
indeed. Then the middle class, as in other coun-
tries, is the foundation of much of our work, yet
the lower class is being reached and the fruits of
the gospel with these are most marked and readily
comprehended by all classes. Yes, all classes are
ready to hear if we are ready to impart the truths
of our Lord and Master.
XVII
THE CHINESE AND MISSIONS— OPEN-
ING NEW WORK
ALTHOUGH the first missionary started
work in China 114 years ago, we have
had a desultory warfare. The great
mass of the people remain as though no mission-
ary ever reached their shores. During the first
hundred years we won a few tens of thousands.
Even at this time we have only about five hundred
thousand Protestant church members. The Cath-
olics, who reached China hundreds of years before
the arrival of Robert Morrison, claim two to three
million adherents, yet they count the family, no
doubt, in their reckoning rather than those who
have definitely comm.itted themselves to the Catho-
lic church. The Mohammedans claim between ten
and fifteen millions, living mostly in the south-
west. Even counting these China still remains a
land without much religious influence from with-
out unless we count Buddhism a foreign religion,
but the Chinese do not count it as such, since it
has become indigenous to their coimtry.
Christianity has reached a number of the great
132 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
centers and thoroughfares of trade and poHtical
life, but the whole of the nation remains very
much as it has been for the centuries. In reaching
the centers we did well in the beginning, but the
time has come when we must " launch into the
deep and make a great haul." Since about ninety-
five per cent, of Chinese millions live in towns and
villages with less than 30,000 population, the time
ought to come shortly when we will seek to reach
the great untouched sections in these smaller towns
and villages with an adequate force. In the past
we have sought to reach these through the larger
centers, but in the future the emphasis will be
placed where the great majority of the people live.
To do this we shall need to open many new cen-
ters. In order that we may understand how new
work IS opened, I thought I would give an account
of the beginning of a new station in one of the
South China fields, known as the Hak-ka field.
Nineteen years ago Dr. and Mrs. Hayes and
Mrs. Saunders and myself were chosen by the
older missionaries in Canton to start a new station
where foreigners had never lived. We had been
in China less than ten months, knew but little
about the language and the people. We asked the
older ones what we should do as to customs, eta
They wisely refrained from giving advice but to
our sorrow. They did say we needed to trust the
Lord, use common sense, and do the best we could.
We first rented a Chinese house in the heart of the
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THE CHINESE AND MISSIONS 133
city. This house was surrounded on three sides
by other Chinese houses with no space between.
We had one entrance at the front, where we came
into an open court and small side rooms opening
into this court. Into these places we went to live.
No windows letting in fresh air except one in the
roof, and this had to be closed much of the time
because of the rain and the cold.
The Chinese were afraid of us, and we were of
them. They thought we were sent by our govern-
ment to spy out their country and get the gold and
silver in the mountains and report conditions to
our people who wanted to exploit their country.
Some of the foreigners whom they knew about
had come to China for these purposes. They would
not rent us a dispensary and chapel at first. Dr.
Hayes had his dispensary in our " hired house "
and the dispensary room was used also for a
chapel. No one would dare sell land to us — this
might have meant death. We would walk the
streets and into the market towns in the country
and great crowds would follow us. If we went
out by the riverside to get fresh air we found they
were also following us.
One missionary had laboured in this field for
two years before we sought to live in that section,
but he had remained in Canton as his home.
However, soon after we went to our home in the
Chinese house, he married a lady from Indiana
and they came to live with us in the same house —
134 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
three families, yet not suitable for one, but we In
spite of these hardships commenced the language
study and the work of preparation with great joy
and enthusiasm. As a rule, during these first
years, we gave from four to six hours each day to
language study. It was not trying. The joy of
anticipating the hour v/hen we could speak to these
who never had known the glad tidings, filled each
day with wonderful hope and assurance in the
Lord.
Each morning we had our private devotions,
breakfast, then prayers with the Chinese helpers,
language study, and work in the dispensary and
chapel and efforts to get land for our houses and
hospital and school buildings. We spoke the mes-
sage as best we could, yet we found the gospel
tracts and Scripture portions were a great aid to
our poor Chinese In getting the knowledge of Him
In His saving power to the hungry souls waiting
for the bread of life. We commenced going to
the market towns and making long trips to the
country visiting the scattered believers and bap-
tizing those who had trusted the Saviour. Some-
times these country trips would be two months,
filled with active preaching, teaching, and planning
for the work.
Dr. Hayes was soon called to heal the chief offi-
cial In the city, which he did. The Mandarin was
so grateful that he gave Dr. and Mrs. Hayes two
goats, several chickens, ducks, and other presents.
THE CHINESE AND MISSIONS 135
which they kindly shared with the rest of us. The
people began to realize we had come not to exploit
the country, but to help them to be well and know
about the true God. Our physicians (Mrs. H.
was a trained physician and nurse) had great
crowds at the dispensary and were called to go to
the best families in that section. This removed
the prejudice. We were able to buy land for the
needed buildings. Many believed and were bap-
tized, several from the well-to-do families. All
classes becam.e our friends. They called us " for-
eign devils " at first, but they stopped this and
called us their old friends. Even travelling men
would say they could tell when they approached
our place because the people would not call them
" foreign devils " any more. The large business
firms were glad to help us. We organized a
church, erected the needed buildings, and saw
signs everywhere of the power of the gospel. The
church has since become self-supporting, the
schools with constantly increasing numbers, the
hospital built, and the fruits of the believers shin-
ing for the Saviour in this and other places with
great joy to us who had a part in opening the new
work.
We often wonder how we were able to meet the
problems of the new field, winning the good-will
of the people and accomplishing so much during
our first seven years of service. As I review the
beginnings from this angle, I think it was due to
136 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
the fact that we had to trust our Saviour and de-
pend wholly on Him for wisdom and prudence.
We were too far from men to trust them, and so
ignorant of real conditions we could not trust our-
selves. The Lord was with us and did great
things for us whereof we are glad. We shall ever
look back to these days of hardships and trials as
blessed days filled with His presence and power.
Trials of various kinds came, but with Him to
guide we were more than conquerors. A number
of those whom we won to Christ in the early pe-
riod have become outstanding leaders in the work
of to-day. He has given us double for all we suf-
fered for Him. To Him we ascribe all praise and
honour for the results of these first efforts in a
new field.
There are hundreds, yea thousands, of places in
China's territory of over four hundred millions,
much like the place where we started this new
work, awaiting faithful men and women of God
who will go there and start a new work. The
Gospel of redemption and grace for every need is
sufficient to equip us for the task. We need the
labourers who will go to these untouched waiting
fields to live and labour to reveal Christ, and then
the people will hear and follow Him.
XVIII
THE CHINESE AND MISSIONS— THE
COMPOUND
THE compound represents not the begin-
ning of mission activities, but the or-
ganization and development that ade-
quately cares for advancing Christianity. The
compound is the land and buildings used for this
purpose. We must have trained leaders to con-
serve the best results of the beginnings. The
well-equipped compound will have school build-
ings for various kinds of institutions, hospitals,
residences for the missionaries, and other needed
buildings for institutional work. Many com-
pounds are great beehives of activity for the
Lord, famous for beauty and power in establishing
the Lord's kingdom. Every traveller and student
of missions in the Orient has seen or heard about
the Methodist compounds in Tokyo, Japan and
Peking, China, the Episcopal compound at Shang-
hai where St. John's College (University) is lo-
cated, the Union compound at Polk Hawk Tung,
and the Baptist compound, Tung Shan, both in
Canton. One of the best known and most beauti-
ful and influential compounds in China is the Bap-
137
138 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
tist compound in Canton. To describe this will
give us the idea of compounds throughout the
Orient and other mission fields.
This compound is located in the eastern part of
the city in a new addition greatly influenced by
Christian work. The lands belonging to the Mis-
sion Board and the Christian Chinese amount to
about twenty-five acres. The buildings and insti-
tutions are the following: The kindergarten with
about sixty little tots, the lower and higher pri-
maries for the boys' and girls' schools with five
hundred pupils, the grammar with prospec-
tive junior college or colleges with two or three
hundred, the woman's school with about a hun-
dred, the woman's missionary training school, just
started, patterned after such institutions in the
United States, the Theological Seminary with sev-
enty-five preachers and colporters, the home for
the blind, the orphanage, the hospital, and the pub-
lication society. There is also the church, with a
Sunday-school of about a thousand. The church
is self-supporting as far as the pastor's salary and
general expenses are concerned.
In this compound leaders are being trained for
all phases of Christian work; the minister, the
doctor, the Bible-woman, the colporter, the editor,
the railroad man, the merchant, the farmer, the
Christian layman, and general Christian worker
for both men and women. These trained leaders
are the hope of the work for all future time. The
z t:
5 z
9X
THE COMPOUND 139
literature prepared here reaches not only all parts
of China, but Japan, South America, the United
States and wherever Chinese are found. The
work of the publication society develops the Chris-
tian constituency by furnishing needed and whole-
some literature and sends out the gladsome mes-
sage of redemption to the millions in darkness.
We need to remember the compound is to
" teach them to observe all things " after they have
heard the message of salvation. The compound is
the later half of the commission and opening new
work the first part, both absolutely necessary for
a complete program. We can get an idea of the
importance of the compound by the work this one
does. This has a student body of about twelve
hundred. These students represent Chinese life
in its most formative period. All grades of work
are done from the joyful kindergarten to the Theo-
logical Seminary and highest training work for the
women. We are reaching all kinds of needs, in-
cluding the blind, the orphans, the hopeful young
people, and the plodding advanced student seeking
to fit himself better for the Lord's work. In
many places in China and the United States, as
well as in other countries, we find students from
this compound or others who have been influenced
by its work.
The schools on this compound are correlated
with schools in other parts of the city and the two
Kwang provinces, where there are over thirty mil-
140 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
lions of people. From these two provinces and
elsewhere we gather the student body. These
learn about the Saviour or more perfectly the
truths of His Word. They then return to their
homes and become a shining light to reveal Christ
to others. It is a power house for our God send-
ing its benign influences far out into the needy
places of the earth.
I was in New York City taking a meal at a Chi-
nese restaurant on Park Row near the foot of
Brooklyn Bridge. I found the manager of this
great restaurant was a subscriber to one of the
publications which is sent out from this compound.
He knew me through several articles I had for-
merly written in this publication. He was so
happy to see me that he gave me the very best in
his restaurant all free. He wanted to show his
gratitude for the work on this compound in his
native country.
These compounds are the bases of the Father's
advancing army in the conquest of the nation,
training, marshalling and unifying the forces. We
must have thoroughly trained native leaders to
whom we can commit the task of " teaching
others also " who will go everywhere doing the
Lord's work. Without these great training camps
we can never have adequately trained leaders to
supply the needs of the churches and the schools.
As much as we need to open new work, we cannot
minimize the importance of the compound. In
THE COMPOUND 141
fact, without the compound new work would be
too expensive and too much in the hands of for-
eigners to win China to Christ or even witness to
all the people His saving grace. These com-
pounds become great feeding bases for the native
forces to whom we must look to Vv^in their own
people to the Saviour. Leaders for this important
task is the great need of all fields in the Orient and
all non-Christian lands where we have begun
work.
Christianity in these non-Christian lands espe-
cially must be developed symmetrically so as to
meet all needs. The whole future of the battle
depends on us doing this well. New and old,
evangelistic, medical, and educational all are re-
lated to the compound, mutually helpful and inter-
dependent.
XIX
THE CHINESE AND MISSIONS-
METHODS OF WORK
N the two preceding chapters we have noted
the opening of new work and developing the
army of conquest. In the present chapter I
want us to think of the methods used by most
missions. Methods ever remain important in the
changing conditions that we face in these non-
Christian lands. We are fortunate, however, in
that we do not need to transplant Western meth-
ods into these lands. It is never best to attempt
this. It may do much harm. A missionary will
be a misfit who tries to do this, causing unrest to
himself and others. His first duty is to learn the
situation in his field of labour — the Chinese or
other non-Christian people, their life and method
of thought — and adjust his life to fit into these.
If he fails here, he is doomed to utter failure as a
great leader among non-Christian people in the
Orient, and I judge anywhere in the earth where
he labours with a great people.
It is far better to go back to the source of all
truth and the perfection of all methods, Christ
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METHODS OF WORK 143
Jesus, and learn from Him in His touch with hu-
manity, and use this in our approach to the prob-
lems of the non-Christian peoples. It is always
essential to be true to the realities of the gospel as
revealed to us in the life and teachings of our Sa-
viour, and use the methods suited to each field,
setting forth the winning power of these essential
truths.
The Oriental brother is first of all a practical
man. It is worth while to repeat many times that
he learns more from what we do and are than
from what we say. Christ, who is our life, ought
to be revealed in our daily touch with them if we
are to lead them to put their faith in Him and not
in the material things of mission work. Dr.
Giles' words are to the point: " With highly prac-
tical nations like the Chinese, the acts of human
beings have always been reckoned of infinitely
greater importance than their opinions. The
value of morality has completely overshadowed
any claims of belief." In looking over the New
Testament Epistles we find that morality and eth-
ical teachings formed a large part of the whole.
Indeed, the practical workings of Christianity took
up far more space than the theories or doctrinal
statements. In the early work of any mission
fields this must be true. We in no sense minimize
the verities of the gospel, but give due emphasis to
the fact that we are His epistles known and read
by all men.
144 THE CHINESE AS THEY AEE
Preaching the gospel ever remains the chief
method in non-Christian lands. We may go to
the markets, the highways, the schoolroom, the
hospital, the church, the matshed, but proclaiming
the good news is the method that will do the most
good to needy souls. Evangelists with divine
fervour giving the whole gospel in its dynamic
power will turn weary hearts from the deceiving
claims of all else to the outstretched hands of the
world's Saviour to receive and bless. With the
preaching we must teach and wait results, yet now
and then we find -souls ready who accept as soon as
they hear the Saviour's love. We may have a
series of evangelistic meetings where hundreds
come and listen with joy to the proclamation and
turn to a native Christian for further knowledge
of the truth. We may use the schoolroom as a
center for winning the lost, yet others may teach
the way of the Lord as they walk along the roads
or sit in their homes or places of business.
We use teaching as a most effective method.
In the daily touch with the student in the most
wholesome environment, such as the Christian
school, we can use this as a method of touch to
mould this life for the Saviour. Many of the
schools are most fruitful in reaching the lost. The
Christian boy or girl will win many Individuals to
Christ. The schools do far more than teach the
common branches; they may be great centers for
evangelistic work. Indirectly the schools train an
METHODS OF WORK 145
army of soul winners and these go everywhere
preaching the Word. This is the ideal though it
is not always true, to our sorrow.
Then the medical work is a most effective
method of revealing Christ and influencing lives
for His kingdom. We rejoice in the results in
many of our hospitals in the souls saved for the
kingdom. We can think of great sections being
blessed directly or indirectly through the art of
healing. A little girl went to a hospital in Can-
ton, heard about the Lord's redemptive work for
her and all suffering ones. She soon developed
leprosy and was transferred to a leper village be-
yond the eastern gate. She took with her the love
of Jesus Christ and witnessed to His love to the
lepers. Soon forty to fifty believed and were bap-
tized and organized into a leper church. A busi-
ness man was crossing the mountain and was
caught by a tiger. His comrades rescued him and
took him to a Christian hospital. He learned
about the Great Physician who healed his soul.
He became a great Christian worker who won
many to Christ and helped start a number of
churches. An official was healed and gave five
thousand dollars to the Lord's work. Many inci-
dents of this kind could be mentioned to show that
the doctor and nurse in their methods of work
bring many to Christ.
W"e need to think of the methods of Christ and
the early Christian leaders in understanding the
146 THE CHINESE AS THEY AEB
importance of throwing the responsibiUty of sav-
ing the lost and developing the churches upon the
natives. In spite of the weaknesses of the first
disciples Jesus did this. Paul called the early fol-
lowers of the Master " saints " and committed to
them the greater burdens of the early churches in
the worst conditions of heathen life in his day.
The Chinese have a far more highly developed
moral character than many of those in Paul's day.
The Chinese have always had great love for de-
mocracy, and many of their great teachers have
sought to inculcate freedom and responsibility in
the common people. " China: An Interpretation"
gives this interesting message from one of her
early teachers: "Heaven sees as the people see.
Heaven hears as the people hear. The people are
the most important element in the nation. . . .
When one by force subdues men, they do not sub-
mit to him in heart. When he subdues them by
virtue, in their heart's core they bless him and sin-
cerely submit to him." The great teachers of
China have realized that we need to win men's
hearts by "virtue," and then they will follow us
gladly. This is far more important in the Chris-
tian propaganda than in the ordinary affairs of
men. To do this well we must love, trust, and
throw the responsibility on the native Christians as
soon as possible.
I am not ignorant of the fact that the heavenly
Father has chosen us to start them right and guide
METHODS OF WORK 147
them in their early efforts to do His work, but this
does not mean we are to lord it over them as the
military leaders do the soldiers, and hold the reins
of government and responsibility until the natives
are made weaklings or lose their self-respect and
ambition in " things religious." We learned a
lesson from the history of early Catholicism in
their first contact with the Orient. They lost their
first great opportunity because they did not leave
local questions to the people of China rather than
referring these to the Holy See at Rome. Any
church that seeks to do this in the present age in
the Orient will hopelessly fail in developing the
Christians as they need to be developed.
I had a long talk one night just before I re-
turned to the United States on furlough with one
of China's most highly educated and influential
young men. He asked many questions about the
policies and methods of the various churches in
China. He told me that he could not retain his
self-respect as a Chinese citizen and belong to a
foreign church in his country — a church domi-
nated by foreign ideals and government. He
wanted to see Christian churches where the natives
could be normally developed and given responsi-
bility and initiative in working out their own prob-
lems. This is indeed important for the kingdom's
largest growth.
XX
THE CHINESE AND CHRISTIANITY'S
GREAT OPPORTUNITY
WE need to take all lands in our scope and
see the relation of each nation to the
world forces and opportunities. All
plans of conquest for the kingdom of God ought
to consider the crises as these nations emerge into
larger activity. China is just now seeking to
emerge from the past moribund civilization and
take her place in the modern nations of the earth.
We need to realize the surpassing importance of
this nation in the world in all things that make for
.the weal or woe of the nations in the Orient and
the entire world. We have not yet understood
what is involved in the making of New China.
Julian Arnold, an American statesman with twenty
1 years of experience in China, has sensed the situa-
tion far more than many Christian leaders.
Though he is a statesman, he is concerned about
all questions of the life, development and destiny
of the people. These are his words: "Where in
the world is there a country that presents greater
opportunities for constructive work or which
needs it more than China. We speak of the New
148
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CHRISTIANITY'S OPPORTUNITY 149
China not because of any great changes in the ap-
pearance of the country, for the villages, towns
and cities of this country are little different to-day
in outward appearances from what they were
decades ago. China is new internally rather than
externally. The nation has experienced a change
in heart and mind. China of to-day is receptive
to the lessons of Western civilization. The aboli-
tion of the three-legged essay, the persistent call
for a representative constitutional government, the
anti-opium campaign, the development of the na-
tive press, the growth of nationalism, and last but
not least the development of modern education, —
these are the forces that proclaim New China."
" China is receptive to-day," but she was not in
the past. She is ready to learn from others and
understand the good of Christianity in meeting
her needs. She is not ready to break with the past
and inaugurate a reign of terror, but rather to in-
graft her ancient civilization on to the good of the
new and adjust the wonderful ages of her long
past to the throbbing life of the present. She is
willing to consider sincerely and sympathetically
the power of Christianity to help in this transition.
China is not anxious to excel in the arts of war or
conquest. She much prefers that quiet, peaceful
life which has characterized her long history. We
can be thankful that she does not aspire to great-
ness as the nations of the West and Japan have
sought to determine greatness in the arena of w^ar.
150 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
Many believe that China presents the greatest
opportunity Christianity ever had. I am glad to
give a number of reasons why the present oppor-
tunity is one of surpassing importance to all the
world. What are the main reasons?
1. The Attitude of the Leaders to Christianity,
Where and when did we ever find a nation with
leaders like the Chinese so friendly to Christian-
ity? The president giving funds with many of
the governors and leading men in all lines of devel-
opment to the missionary enterprise and giving re-
ceptions and dinners in honour of the ambassadors
of Jesus Christ. Christian workers throughout
China, where they are really helping to solve the
nation's problems, are held in highest honour by
all classes. These leading men are not accepting
Christianity hastily, but are giving it a careful con-
sideration and weighing its power and value in re-
lation to their needs. We are glad they are con-
sidering the realities of Christianity this wa}^
We are aware that change and restlessness char-
acterize all countries just now, but not in that
wholesome way which we find in China. Of
course the Chinese leaders are not all great men or
seeking the nation's good, but we find many who
are, and this gives us great hope that in the end
the better element will prevail and make a New
China wherein righteousness and order will domi-
nate. The change and outlook in China are
greater and more hopeful than anywhere else just
CHRISTIANITY'S OPPORTUNITY 151
now. Many ups and downs will come, but the
general trend at this time is most hopeful. The
future depends on strengthening the constructive
wholesome elements which Christianity always
seeks to foster.
2. The Greatness of the Task Adds to Its Im-
portance,
The heavenly Father must look on all souls as
of infinite importance. Greatness in His sight will
not be determined by barren lands, fertile fields,
beds of material wealth, but in the number of pre-
cious souls. The importance of any task with
Him surely is decided by the number of endless
lives involved and their needs. Judging the Chi-
nese this way, we see how important must be their
evangelization.
Every fourth person in the world is a Chinese.
Not only is this true, but the Chinese people in
moral, ethical and religious ideals influence many
more people than their own. Their power in these
things has had a wonderful influence over the
Japanese and the other neighbouring countries.
The destiny of the Orient where over half of the
human family lives is certainly largely bound up
with the Chinese. In the " Commercial Hand-
book," from w^hlch I have quoted so often, we
have these significant words : " The greatest single
factor in the Far East is China, which possesses a
territory more extensive than that of the United
States and a population nearly four times as great.
152 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
The entire population of South America is only
one-seventh that of China, whose people are homo-
geneous and civilized." Take all the peoples of
North America, South America, England, France,
Spain and Germany and we would still have less
than we have in China.
Some people would say the Chinese are not civ-
ilized and cannot compare with the Anglo-Saxon
or Western nations. We are not judging as the
Father does. It is true they are not advanced in
the arts of war and commerce and the modern
sciences, but dare we say any longer that these are
necessarily in their destroying and blasting powers,
as are .often used in our present civilization, a
great step forward? These material things are
important as they are properly related to the eter-
nal things of the kingdom, but used so lavishly as
they are so often done for selfish pleasure to the
weakening and destruction of the nobility of the
physical and spiritual in man, they often become a
curse. We hope that in New China the best of
our civilization, as true Christianity has made pos-
sible, will guide and dominate, and then their
numbers and natural resources will count for the
good of the Orient and all the world. In this is a
nation's greatness.
3. China's Relation to Potential Nations.
We are inclined to think that China is disap-
pearing whereas in the West new' nations are
dawning with endless possibilities. This is true as
CHRISTIANITY'S OPPORTUNITY 153
fo the West, but none the less true as to the East.
A student of Oriental questions says that in the
islands to the south and east of China there is
room for many great nations. These islands are
almost wholly undeveloped. This student says
that a number of these islands could support na-
tions with populations from fifty to one hundred
and twenty-five millions. He estimates that in
these many groups of islands there could be sup-
ported a population as large as China now has and
be supported far better than her present popula-
tion. From the great centers of life in China
there are pouring forth into these islands many of
China's best sons and daughters who will develop
them to the highest point of efficiency. New
worlds — nations — are In the making in this section
as well as in the West, and the virile race of the
Chinese and Japanese will make these fertile lands
blossom as a garden. In reaching China with the
gospel we are determining the civilization of these
new nations.
4. China's Location Adds to Her Importance.
She is the key-nation of the Orient as to loca-
tion. She has been the inventive people and the
leader in moral ideals for the Orient. There is no
reason to believe this will not be true In the future,
as in the past, if Christianity is given a chance to
purify and adjust these Ideals to present problems.
The Chinese have the character and the endurance
to make one of the greatest nations in the world in
154 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
all that makes for the world's good. She needs
only the unselfish ideals of the world's Saviour
rightly related to all problems of her own life and
the world's needs. She will then be fitted by na-
ture, by position, and innate power and worth to
give to the Orient and the world heaven's greatest
blessings of peace, good-will, and service which all
lands so much need at this time.
If we are wise in this our day, we will use every
material and spiritual blessing of our culture and
civilization to give the liberty and power of the
gospel to these people at this critical hour of tran-
sition from the old to the new. For us to selfishly
hold on to the material wealth or seek to save our-
selves with worldly ease and vanishing pleasure
and fail to give them the gospel in all its pristine
purity, beauty and power, we will make the tragic
mistake of all history and be unworthy of the
matchless trust which the Master has given us in
the treasures of the gospel of the Son of God and
Man. I hope we will see the importance of the
opportunity and use all our talents in life and
money to buy up the inviting fields to the endless
glory of the Father and the whole human family's
needs.
XXI
THE CHINESE AND THEIR APPEAL TO
THE VOLUNTEER
AS we see the importance of giving the gos-
pel to the Chinese for their as well as
the world's sake, we realize the great need
of suitable and adequate labourers who will give
their lives to the Master to make this possible.
This should be done with all possible haste. Mr.
Arnold, in his closing words in the '' Commercial
Handbook,'* bearing on this phase of the question,
gives this message (The "Handbook" has just
been published by the United States Printing De-
partment, Washington, D. C, where these words
may be seen) : " In fact, China has, during the
next few decades, to be made over — rebuilt as it
were. It is difficult for the human mind to con-
ceive the extent of the developments that must
take place in China during that process, so tre-
mendous must those developments be. The Chi-
nese people are now receptive and desirous of em-
bracing all that the West has to offer; thus one
may say that the country is at the threshold of a
renaissance which within a few decades will
transform it into a society entirely different from
155
156 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
that which exists to-day. The extent to which
American standards and ideals find a place in New
China will depend in a large measure upon the in-
terest that Americans now take in furthering their
relations with the people of their sister Pacific
Republic. The United States already has an ad-
vantage, in that its relation with China during the
entire stretch of its history has been such as to
command the admiration, respect, and friendship
of the Chinese people."
The Chinese everywhere say we are their old
and tried friends, and they are looking to us to
help. We have never wanted any of China's ter-
ritory, no special privileges, always advocated fair
dealings in diplomatic relations, wanted nothing
more than actual expense in the Boxer Uprising,
and eventually returned much of this; we helped to
put down the coolie slave traf^c and opium curse.
We stood against and, no doubt, prevented the
partitioning of China. These things have won
the confidence and friendship of the Chinese which
they will be slow to forget.
This confidence and friendship ought to be used
for the people's permanent good. American com-
mercial interests are using it for all it Is worth
commercially. This is seen in the millions of
cigarettes reaching there from here every month,
boats of Standard Oil products, American tin
goods in immense quantities, " fifty-seven vari-
eties," patent medicines, sewing machines, elec-
o o
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<
APPEAL TO THE^ VOLUNTEER 157
trical goods, railroad machinery, outlawed Ameri-
can liquors, etc., etc. Some of these things will
help, but many will not — even harm ; yet they are
being rushed to the friendly markets. Many of
the well trained young business men are going to
sell these products — going from our Christian
schools and homes. They see the great business
career waiting them.
What will the volunteer do about the situation ?
Will w^e be satisfied to let the worst forms of our
civilization outrun the best we have ? Christianity
is able to mould the situation for their eternal
good, but men and women must be ready to reveal
Christ. Never in all the world has the volunteer
such an opportunity to guide a nation of friends
unto the Master. We have the nation ready to be
guided by friendly and unselfish workers, great
leaders in potential powers need to be trained to
help, and the old order crumbling to make way for
the " highway of righteousness " in Christ Jesus.
Here we have a people of virgin soil, not burnt
over as in Europe and South America with holy
names and vain forms of depleted Christianity.
We have the unusual opportunity to lay the foun-
dation and build a new structure for our God.
All these countries are in dire need of the original
gospel, yet the conditions are not the same as in
China.
China appeals to the volunteer not only by the
greatness of the task, the number and kind of the
158 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
people, crucial importance of the transitional
period, but she appeals to us by her great need, the
utter inadequacy of the present force trying to
cope with the situation. The gospel is the only
hope, yet we do not have the necessary workers to
give them this gospel. We were horrified at the
waste of human life in Europe and felt ashamed
when our young people hesitated to give their-
lives to stop the conflagration, yet there are more
people who die every year in China without the
gospel of hope than were killed in action during
the entire war in Europe. This is all the sadder
by reason of the fact that our Christian people can
hear about this situation in China and not be
moved to hasty action to prevent its continuation.
We must look to the volunteers of North
America to give the gospel to the Chinese people.
Europe looks in pity upon the flower of her young
manhood mouldering in the graves of wrecked
nations. Through the Providence of our Cod we
have our people mostly remaining strong and able
for service in the conflict of our Saviour. While
the reconstruction of devastated war-torn Europe
continues, we must furnish the bulk of the money
and men to give the Saviour's message to China.
Will our volunteers see the responsibility of the
hour and respond to the call of China and go on
Christ's joyful errand of peace and victory to the
perishing millions? The world history's crucial
hour and Christianity's supreme need and oppor-
APPEAL TO THE VOLUNTEER 159
tunity seem to have focused upon the American
volunteer. Is he ready for the task ?
We have heard considerably about China and
wonder if her needs are not very well met. We
have hardly begun the work. She is the most
neglected mission field in the world considering
the number of people and the workers we have,
both foreign and native. Li a recent Chinese
Year Book we gather this information:
Missionaries per million of population — Africa, 39
China, 18
India, I7
Japan, 19
Native workers (in some respects more important
for a nation's conquest) — Africa, 213
China, 49
India, 124
Japan, 54
Communicants per 10,000 of population — Africa, 53
China, 8
India, 18
Japan, 14
Comparing these three tests we find that China
is the most neglected mission field by far and
Japan is next. There are many reasons why she
should be the neglected nation, yet none of these
will excuse us now in the face of her changed at-
titude and readiness to hear the gospel.
They are indeed our brothers for whom Christ
died as well as those nearer us by racial ties or
territorial location. These brothers will welcome
160 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
us if we go to them in the spirit and purpose of
the Saviour and our hearts will be bound together
forever in union with Christ. Their appealing
needs and dire distress will make our coming all
the more welcome and appreciated as they find the
blessings of the world's Saviour. Jesus called us,
as He did Paul and his comrades at Troas,
through the cries of neglect and need. Through
these voices never yet heeded we ought to gather
assuredly that the Lord is calling us to preach the
gospel unto them.
I find that some make the excuse of climate,
difficulties of learning the language, lack of a defi-
nite call. The climate is like all great countries,
varied, yet among the best in all the mission fields.
The language is no insuperable barrier. None of
these things should move us. Did not the Master
call us all to go and disciple the nations as He
left for the Father's throne? Has this command
ever been revoked? Why wait for additional
call? Do not the fields of greatest need and where
the helpers are less adequate make the strongest
appeal to us? Would not Jesus have us there if
we are fitted by nature and training to render
good service? In the light of these facts every
volunteer ought to give himself absolutely into
the Lord's hands to be used in China or elsewhere
to make these countries His kingdom as He may
guide.
XXII
THE CHINESE AND HOW TO MEET
THEIR NEEDS
THERE is going to be a new China, the
chaotic forms will take life, the plastic
conditions will be crystallized, the wait-
ing hearts will be occupied. The good seed must
multiply or the pernicious weeds will choke the
tender plants. The ripened fields must be har-
vested or the decaying grain will destroy the op-
portunities. Life from above must fill the anxious
hearts or life from beneath will make its way and
determine the future. What will be the perma-
nent outcome?
We must answer this question in our relation
to their present needs. We cannot shirk the re-
sponsibility if we would. They have placed their
destiny in our hands through the good hand of
our God to bless. The Lord of the harvest field
has made fertile the fields and prepared us to do
the sowing and the reaping. Just how are we to
meet their needs in the most effective way ?
It is too commonplace to say that Western cul-
ture apart from Christianity may hinder rather
than help. Culture they have which has grown up
natural to their environment. To mix this with
i6i
162 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
Western culture, we may find the last stage worse
than the first. The tendency of our own civiUza-
tion as seen in fashions and amusements hangs
heavily upon the hearts of those who look to Jesus
for life's ideals. Our hope for China and the
world is not in Western culture or civilization, as
powerful and attractive and helpful as some
phases of this is.
We place our hopes entirely In Jesus Christ.
He has given us the message and life from the
Father. We must give the Chinese the gospel.
Not an attenuated gospel, not a lopsided or muti-
lated message, but the full redemptive gospel.
This ought to be made very tangible in sympa-
thetic deeds and practical lives wrought out in
their midst. The fact that they have never heard
and are wholly dependent on what we give them
adds responsibility to us who are chosen to go to
them for the first time. The eternal verities ap-
plied to all needs and conditions should be our
chief concern and will give permanent results.
The new leaders of reform in China are watching
the results of Christianity in their country's needs.
They will decide their relation to it by what we
can do to meet the social, economical, Industrial,
political, religious needs. We must not disap-
point the leaders by falling to apply the gospel
as our Lord did to meet all the people's needs by
first making the tree good and then sending forth
its leaves of healing. I fear we have failed too
Section of great
WALL AT Nanking.
Entrance to Con-
fucian Temple, Pe-
king.
Entrance to Lama
Temple, Peking.
HOW TO MEET THEIR NEEDS 163
often in the West to do this and have brought the
reproach of so many upon the present forms of
Christian work. We must not repeat this in the
great mission fields, and especially in China and
the Orient.
I wish to quote again from Mr. Arnold though
part of what he says is somewhat personal: "I
have your letter of April fifth and am glad you
have met with much encouragement. I am not sur-
prised in this for the Chinese everywhere will en-
courage missionary effort if only it meets the
needs of the environment in which it seeks to
work.
" China is now emerging from a medieval agri-
culture, commerce, industry and government into
a. modern organized society, and its great demand
to-day is men capable of leading its people through
this very trying transitional period. The call is
for men of initiative, men of character, men edu-
cated to understand the demands of modern com-
merce, agriculture and industry, men capable of
sacrifice and service and who can inspire others
to service and sacrifice.
" China is primarily agricultural and will re-
main so for some time to come, but China needs
to adopt what the West has learned In agriculture
during the last century, If China's agriculture is
to support the needs of New China. Is not Chris-
tian leadership needed In aiding this momentous
change involving as it does the welfare of four-
164 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
fifths of the entire population, and how can Chris-
tian leadership be made effective if it does not
understand the problems with which the people
have to contend and be a factor in aiding to solve
these problems ?
*' Similarly in industry, in commerce, in educa-
tion, in social and civic activity. Bear in mind
also that the New China will fall far of the mark
of its potentialities, in fact will be most disap-
pointing, unless the Chinese woman is elevated to
the position which she should and is capable of
occupying in the new social order. She will have
much indeed to do with the moulding of the New
China. The work among the women is vastly im-
portant and here also needs leadership."
Mr. Arnold furthermore says the great need is
the right kind of leaders from the home churches.
It is interesting to note these helpful words from
a man who sees the problems as a whole and has
given sympathetic concern about mission work
though he is the American Commercial Attache
at Peking. I am sure that every close student of
Chinese problems whether in the mission service
or that of our government realizes the importance
of what he says. The outcome of the situation
and the future destiny of the millions in the Orient
depend on the kind of mission leaders we send.
They need to be men of large vision, capable of
adjusting themselves to the situation, willing and
anxious to give their lives whole-heartedly to
HOW TO MEET THEIR NEEDS 165
solving the physical and spiritual problems of the
masses.
I am led to think if our home churches were
to follow the example of the church at Antioch
and wait upon the Lord in prayer and fasting,
teaching and winning the lost to Christ as their
chief reason for existence in this world, the Holy
Spirit could say separate unto the work leaders
worthy of the task awaiting God's people in the
Orient. The Church and the Holy Spirit could
send these forth, as in the case of Paul and Barna-
bas, to turn the tides of history for great nations
for all time to come. The situation in China un-
doubtedly calls for the great leaders in the
churches, but the churches must enter fully upon
the Lord's world program before these leaders
will be " thrust out " clothed with all power to do
His work.
In a brief discussion like this I cannot go into
detail as to how the missionary can help in solving
the problems of the masses. I will mention one in-
cident that will be suggestive of the many ways the
earnest labourer will study the situation and make
the adjustment — contact — so as to reach the peo-
ple with the gospel in the most effective way.
While in Tsinanfu, Shantung Province, I visited
the Institute conducted by an Englishman, Dr. J.
S. White wrIght. In this Institute he seeks to re-
veal the progress of the Western nations and the
enlightening saving power of Christianity to the
166 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
individual and society by attractive informing pic-
tures. Modern education, hygiene, government,
church life, etc., are told to the streams of visiting
people every day by these objects and pictures.
The world's industrial and commercial and agri-
cultural centers send the results of their work to
this institution for exhibition and use.
Large buildings are given up to its work. Re-
ligious services and everything is done to win men
and women to Christ and all that is good in our
civilization. All classes are encouraged to come
without cost or hindrance any time during the
day. I found that the highest officials in the
province as well as the common coolie were de-
lighted with the Institute and were willing to help
in its upkeep. Dr. Whitewright estimated that
the number of visits last year would be 600,000,
and the number is constantly on the increase. The
whole of North China has been influenced by such
an enterprise which is costing the home board but
a little — expense borne mostly by the Chinese.
This is done by free-will offering as the lover of
the people may desire. Such and many other
kinds of institutions could be established all over
China and supported by the people with our help
in opening the work.
Christianity is equal to the situation. If we
will but be true to its realities adjusted to all con-
ditions and problems, It will solve the needs for
the present and all time to come.
XXIII
THE CHINESE AND THE WORLD
POLITIC
T
"^HE Orient and the Occident cannot be
separated in the world politic any longer.
We are one great family and must be
alive to each other's heart-throbs. The age of
commerce, steam, electricity, aircraft will break
all barriers and throw us together for woe or for
weal. In every line China will count more and
more in the reckoning. Mr. Chi Chin Nieh of
Peking Chamber of Commerce said the other day
to a group of Americans: "If you want to de-
velop the Chinese as buyers, you must help de-
velop their industries. You in America spend
more than fifty dollars each year for clothing per
person, while we in China spend only one dollar.
If we could increase our buying power to two
dollars, we could take the entire output of your
New England mills. Such are the enormous pos-
sibilities of the Chinese market." Commercially
China is bound to affect the world greatly.
She will also affect the political life. This can
be easily seen. The center of militarism has
167
168 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
shifted from the West to the East. China and
the world are greatly involved in the growing
militarism of the Orient. The heinous growing
octopus is rising, as it were from the sea, and
reaching out and organizing in such a way to be-
come easily a world menace. Enlightenment,
modern advancement in material things, unified
and thoroughly organized with the natural re-
sources and the splendid man power of the Orient
could become the " peril " of the world's peace.
If China is not moulded by outside militarism, but
given the noblest ideals of world service, we do
not fear the outcome; but should the forces of
righteousness and salvation, which we have in
Christ, remain indifferent or weak-hearted in the
present crisis, we cannot foretell the outcome to
the world's peace and usefulness in all things that
are worth while.
The conflagration that may be possible will not
come if we give the Chinese the ideals of Christ
our Lord. They have been a peace-loving people,
yet among the greatest warriors when once
aroused. Their possibility for evil or for good in
the world politic is indeed worth our most serious
consideration. In this question of government
and militarism it behooves us to lend our aid to
the forces that will help reconstruct China on
a Christian basis.
In questions of disease and hygiene we cannot
look lightly upon China in her relation to other
THE WORLD POLITIC 169
nations. Some of the physicians in the Orient
maintain that the influenza germ is very closely
related to the pneumonic plague, and that the
world's scourge of " Flu " of the last few years,
taking away many more lives than the war, had
its origin in China, immediately following the
pneumonic plague outbreak of North China. The
natural habitat of plague and cholera is in China
and India. We are having to spend great sums
of money to protect our western and southern
coasts against these diseases. We cannot permit
the Orient and especially China to be sick and we
remain well. We must suffer together and rise
together if we are willing to be brothers in reality.
We must be brothers in the world's problems,
hence it Is far better to be mutually helpful.
All other questions are directly or indirectly
bound up with that of religion. In this we cannot
be separated. China will influence the world
politic. Many of the modern cults casting their
shadows on our own homes at this time are noth-
ing more than certain heathen religious ideas tak-
ing root and adjusted to our people. They are
seen with their developed fruitage In China.
These cults are deep-rooted In the very life of the
Chinese, and they will find rootage — as they are
now doing — In the shallow religious life of so
many of our people. We go to the Pacific coast
where Oriental life has influenced our people most
and we find these cults flourishing. Stalwart, true
170 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
Christianity need never fear, but Christianity in
name so often seen in too many churches will not
conquer such evil forces. We need to give the
Cross all its realities and power in truth and life
if we are to conquer false religions and prevent
Oriental cults from rising with their baneful in-
fluences in our own lands of the West.
We can readily see that in revealing Christ in
all His saving power, we are not only helping the
Chinese, but the world. We indeed are one fam-
ily. Christianity must conquer all or all will suf-
fer in the wake of our failure. With unspeakable
joy and confidence I know that He is King of
kings and Lord of lords and will conquer the
forces of evil as we give ourselves to His world
program. We shall need to deal with individual
and international questions as Christ would have
us to if we are able to cope with the many ques-
tions in China as these bear on the world politic.
This was ever in the dreams of the prophets and
the Son of Man when He dwelt in our midst.
Should it not be in the heart of every believer in
this our day? Then we will help China make
her contribution to all questions of the world
politic in the most wholesome way.
XXIV
THE CHINESE AND THE KINGDOM
OF GOD
JESUS as He left His disciples to return to
the Father spoke this message : " All author-
ity hath been given unto me in heaven and
on earth, Go ye therefore, and make disciples of
all the nations." Paul, in a letter to contentious
believers desiring position of prominence, says:
" That in the name of Jesus every knee should
bow, of things in heaven and things on earth and
things under the earth." He also wrote a letter to
new converts, who were mystified by the cults of
their day, in which he says : " And through Him
to reconcile all things unto Himself, having made
peace through the blood of His cross; through
Him, I say, whether things upon the earth, or
things in the heavens." The heavenly messenger,
direct from the risen and exalted Christ, speaking
to the Apostle John In the darkening hours of the
terrible Roman persecution, gave these hopeful,
comforting words: "The kingdom of the world
is become the kingdom of our Lord, and of His
Christ, and He shall reign for ever and ever."
171
172 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
These words point to the time when the powers
of the world will be subjugated to the " Lamb
that was slain," and He shall reign supreme.
None can doubt that the world's Saviour had
China in His plans of conquest as well as the na-
tions of the West. The same sun that shines in
our country lights up the fields and mountains of
China; the same stars bedecking the heavens in
our land are recognized in China as the friends of
our childhood ; the silver rays of the moon we love
so well in the summer nights in the West appear
even brighter in the Orient — these all are from
one common mind and for all. Even so are the
blessings of the Son of God to all who will accept
them. He is their Elder Brother as well as ours.
We have no blessings from the Father that are
not suitable or were not meant for the Chinese.
We rejoice to report that they are recognizing
Him as their Father. Prejudice to the mission-
ary is disappearing and the good things the Father
has in store for them are being seen. The friends
of the kingdom from all lands have helped to put
down the curse of opium, foot-binding, coolie
slave traffic, bad diplomacy and encourage self-
respect and independence from outside pressure,
freedom from the binding traditions of the past,
and turning their hopeful lives to the giver of all
power and wisdom for every time of need. As
the results of the good seed of the kingdom new
hope and new life are filling the hearts of many
THE KINGDOM OF GOD 173
young men and women. These are seeking to
have new bodies, new conditions, and a new nation
for the good of all. A young army is forming
with these happy aims.
The labours of the past add hope to the present
kingdom movements. Many have suffered and
entered on rest, but from their persecution and
arduous toils a brighter day is dawning for the
sons of the kingdom. The trials are not all over,
for still persecutions in the family and in the clan
are often rampant, but there are signs of better
days just ahead even in these things. However,
we see that the sufferings of the past are not in
vain. The type of Christianity has come out of
these that give us our greatest hope. The mis-
sionary of world conquest longs to see a better
type of Christianity so that our Lord's kingdom
may have a fair chance in the affairs of men. As
yet it never has been given a fair test. The purer
the type the stronger will be its conquering forces.
If Jesus had absolute freedom in the hearts of His
children in our own country to do as He pleases
with their lives and possessions, He could hasten
the coming of His kingdom in China. The faith-
ful whom He has called from among the heathen
— choosing a people for the Lord — would add their
lives to ours and we would speed the day when all
should know the Lord from the least to the great-
est.
The disciples of the Lord the world over need to
174 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
understand the importance of the present condi-
tion of all forces in that land. All the past has
made possible the present and the present m.ust
determine the whole future. The plastic restless
condition of the rising nation with such marvel-
lous man-power and unmeasured natural re-
sources plead for the soldiers of the Saviour to
use all efforts to mould the situation for our God.
The kingdom the world over is greatly influenced
by the results of the conflict. Desultory battles
we have had along the coast and in the increasing
centers throughout the nation, but we are now
entering into trench warfare — a siege of conquest
that must reach the little towns and hamlets the
nation over, and make known to all the people the
good news of the kingdom.
I believe the immense amount of material
wealth in our country, the wonderful culture of
our schools, the magnificent structure of many of
the home churches, the aroused conscience of the
Christians of all sections in questions of world
import and their brother's need regardless of place
or colour, have prepared us to unite all efforts and
center all action on these great mission fields. If
we will consecrate all our material and spiritual
wealth to this holy task, we like David will serve
our generation and those to follow according to
the will of God, and make our contribution to the
kingdom of God in all non-Chrlstlan lands, and
what is best for the Father's kingdom anywhere^
THE KINGDOM OF GOD 175
in the world will be best for it in China. All our
material blessings as well as spiritual may be in
vain to us and the kingdom if not related properly
to the kingdom's needs where the battle is most
terrific and the siege warfare most important.
What I have written will be in vain if I have
not been able to show that the battle for the king-
dom forces in China seriously affects the kingdom
the world over. If we realize this and understand
the supreme importance of the present transitional
period as it bears on the peoples of the Orient and
the world, I shall rejoice. In what I have written
I have drawn from all sources for my information
in order that the situation may be revealed to us
by the official, the business man, the teacher and
the missionary. This I have hoped would give an
unbiased revelation of the exact condition we are
now facing and will encourage all followers of the
Master to contribute to the utmost to buy up the
situation for our God.
The task is so immense and fraught with such
endless possibilities for the kingdom of God, all
His children should be doing their best to meet
the needs of the hour. To let this transitional
hour pass and not mould the nation for the
Saviour, we shall never be able to labour with as
hopeful results in all probability again. Nations
in their making have their adolescence, as well as
individuals, and during this time in all probability
their destiny as a kingdom force is determined.
176 THE CHINESE AS THEY ARE
Every student of China believes the nation is in
this period. The time to labour for endless re-
sults is now. The group of Christians, who will
hesitate or let home or other duties prevent them
from helping to mould the situation for our God,
will be recreant to duty and unworthy of the
blessed trust and honour of the gospel for all the
world. We will be handling lightly the eternal
realities of the divine message which China and all
the world needs.
May our common Lord guide us in our relation
to the Master in His plans of conquest for China
and the world and enable each one to see his duty
as this bears on China and the world, and then
may the Spirit of all truth and wisdom and
strength move each heart to perform well his task
in making all lives and all deeds bring on His
world reign according to the will of the Father.
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