Evening star., 1900-06-28
WANTS TO BE LET ALONE
A cHINANAN EXPLAIks ANTIPATHY
TO FOREIGNERS.
Says His Co"ntryn.en Have Found the
Highest Civilization ahd the Secret
of Right Living.
From the London EXPRESS

There is living inS London-in fact, HI
holds high position in a. firm of eastern
merchants-a Chinese gentleman who ha!
| for many years belonged to the Boxers
1 society in China, and with whom a rep
resentative Of the Express has had a most
interesting interview. 1t Is astonishing how
much this terrible Boxer had to say fol
himself and his associates.
You English he observed, speaking
our language with remarkable fiuency. only
look at Chinese matters from your own
| point of view. Oh. if you could only look
| at them from ours, Western civiiza ton
is to us mere mushroom. 1t is thing
| of yesterday. Chinese civilization is un-
| numbered thousands of years old. We con-
| slider ourselves at least 1900 years ahead
of you.
There was a time when we had, like
you, our Struggle for life,' our race for
wealth. our ambition for power, our haste
| and hurry and worry. We, too, had your
| clever nventions-gunpowder, printing and
the rest-but we have lived long enough to
| find out how essentially unnecessary all
| these things are. We have also had our
periods of doubt. fanaticism and dissen-
| sion in matters of religion. We have had
our martyrs, our reformations, our non
conformists, our intolerance, and, finally
| our federation. Yes, thousands of years
ago.
But, as I say, we have outgrown it all.
From the experience of past centuries we
have learned wisdom; from the mistakes
and disasters of our ancestors we have
learned that none of the things for which
we strove were really worth striving for.
Our passions and ambitions have settled
down into calm desire for happiness in
| this world; our religion is reduced to
philosophy of life which the test Of the
last 1000 years has proved to be absolutely
sound
I'VE believe that the best thing to pur-
sue in this life Is happiness, and we teach
our children that their happiness can only
be secured by the performance OF duty, by
the observance Of moral and business OBJ
| legations and by surrounding ones self with
| a circle of equally happy friends anu rela-
tiveS. If q Chinaman prosperS beyond the
| lot which falls to his kindred he finds his
greatest happiness in sharing his good for
| tune with them. And in China we never
| cease to work. There is no such thing as
| retiring from business Work Is part of
our pleasure, because it is part Of our duty.
| 1--WE believe in making the best of this
| life which is the only one we know any
| thing about for certain. That is the Be All
and End All of Chinese philosophy. All
| through China You will find the same level.
| uniform spirit of content. You may think
| We live lives of ignorance and squalor and
| 1dleness, but assure you 1t Is not We
| are well off as we want to be, and no
man can improve on that.
| Now, these being our circumstances, you
| of the western world come to us with what
| you call your new ideas. You bring us your
| religion. an infant Of nineteen hundred years
| You invite US to build railways that we
| may fly from place to place at a speed
| which for us has neither necessity nor
| charm. You want to build mills and fac
| tories to debase our beautiful arts
| and crafts, and produce tawdry finery in
| place of the beautiful textures and hues
| which we have evolved after ages Of ex-
| pertinent.
Against all this we protest. We want
to be let alone. We want to be free to en-
/ inv boo foul
| of our centuries Of experience When we
ask you to go away you refuse and you
| even threaten us If we do not give you
| our harbors, our lands our towns.
| And now, having carefully considered
| the matter, we of the so-called Boxers
Society have decided that the only way
to get rid Of a,, you is to kill Sou We are not
not thieves. But when persuasion and
argument and appears te your sense of
| justice are of no avail we find ourselves
face to face with the fact that the only
| resource Is to put you out of existence.
| Consider your missionaries. They come
| as l have said. with a new religion, upon
| the main principles Of which they bit
| terly divided among themselves. They tell
| us that unless we accept their doctrines We
| shall suffer eternal punishment. They
| frighten our children and the more weak
| minded Of our older people, and create all
| kinds OF diSsenSions between families and
| individuals. No wonder that we will not
| tolerate them.
! IF wanted your railways and ma
| chimes we could, of course buy them; but
We do not. We have no use for them. We
| have learned to do without them. Yet you
| say you will force US to buy them, whether
we will or not. Is that just? / say it is an
| impertinence-an outrage A good deal is
made of the fact that we are not soldiers.
| Well, we have ceased to be soldiers be-
| cause have become civilized. War Is a
| barbarsm. The effect of our having ar
| rived at our present stage of civilization is
| that we have increased and multiplied be-
| yond every other race on the face OF the
| earth. In spite of our great mortality
(Which seems to be very shocking to you.
| although we recognize in 1t only wise
| provision of nature), the Chinese race Is
| increasing at greater rate than any other
| people in the world.
| I'VE could If we chose overwhelm the
| rest Of mankind. That we do not do so Is
| due to the perfection of our civilization,
| our philosophy and our morals. We num-
ber 4OO,O0O,OOO human beings. and who
| could withstand us If We chose to assert
| our power? Do you think we are uncon-
| scous of it? On the contrary, we under
| stand 1t only too well. Let the white races
| Of the earth appreciate the fact that We
| and not they are its masters.
| There have been twenty so-called sue
cessful invasions Of China But what has
Chinese? No. The conquered have alb
sorbed their conquerors. All have become
| Chinese. The very Jews who have come
| among us have been absorbed by our race
| "a thing which has never happened else
| where
| LET me repeat that all the forces which
| divide men in the west have practically no
| existence in China. Politics. religion. pri-
vate ambitions, the necessity for expansion,
land hunger, gold hunger-all these have
no existence in China. You think that be-
| cause the Chfnaman is inert. careless and
simple he is a child. There never was a
greater mistake.
HE has learned the secret of being
| happy. His life is placid, and nothing
| troubles him 80 long as his conscience Is
| clear. There you have our character in
4 a sentence. Let US alone. and we will let
| you alone"
| MONEY For STATE MILITIA.