The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1900-07-06


We know of no national character
about which there is so much dispute
as that of the Chinese. They have been
profoundly studied by able men who
have given their lives to the pursuit,
but the result is not a consensus, eX-
cept upon two points, that they are IN
curably conceited and that even among
Asiatics they are exceptionally callous.
The Chinese are no more moved by hu-
man suffering even among their own
people than the animals are NO emma
man cares IL mamine breaks out near
him, or is shocked if another Chinaman
Is tortured, or will exert himself against
his own interest to prevent suffering TO
any other human being. And no CHINA
man ever forgets or questions that he is
a member of the supreme civilization of
the world-indeed, of the only one to
which in his judgment, that great term
in it's original meaning can be fittingly
applies,
Upon these two points there Is no
doubt among observers, or was none I'M
til the japanese war shook even Chi
nese self-confidence, but upon every
othe~ there Is q violent conflict of opin-
ion Some, especially those who Judge
solelp from living among them, mold
the Chinese to be decidedly inferior peo-
pie, with u low and cumbrous civiliza-
ton, wholly unable to improve, and en-
during q distinctly evil rule because
they are too l,nbocile TO make it better.
The same men. with few exceptions,
consider the Chinese towards, believe
them to be slaves to singulary feeble
auperstitions, and think they would be
immensely benefited by even inferior
European rule. They describe them as
vicious in all ways to degree which in
Europe would dissolve society, corrupt
in the matter Of brides beyond anything
OF which the modern world has expert
ence and, owing to their devotion to
personal interests. incapable of large
combinations. The same observers,
when inferior persons, are universally
struck with something comic in China
and its people-they have the same
feeling about animals the cause in both
cases being that there is always some
thing unaccountable in their ways--and
this feeling has diffused itself in Eu
rope, producing a contempt which
though sometimes kindly, is never tole-
rant. In England especially the idea of
pigtail who dances, as in Tennieps car
toon. because he has cheated Euro
pean ambassador.
These, however are not the views of
those who used few years ago to be
called "Sinologues," the cultivated ex
perts in Chinese literature, history and
politics. These men maintain almost
with one voice that the Chinese are a
great people, with q civilization which
was once energetically progressive
though it Is now arrected, and which
still holds a fourth of the human race in
an orderly contentment; that they pos
sess a philosophy of their own which,
though strangely secularist sets before
them ideal rules Of conduct, and which
has penetrated deeper than any phllos-
ophy has penetrated into any other
race, and that the extraordinary differ
ence which Europeans perceive between
them and every other people is in part
a fancy, in part result Of peculiar ar
tistic notions, and in part a conse-
quence of the civilization having cap
tured even the uneducated, so that there
Is perpetual and amazing as well as
contrast between the maxlms
they profess and the conduct they pur-
sue. 1t Is as If the roughs OF London
had been bred to talk like curates, vet
acted all the same after the manner of
their kind,
Some Sinologues even deny that the
Chinese are exceptionally treacherous,
believing that though suspicious they
are when once they confide as faithful
as any other Asiatics. and quoting in
proof of their assertion that they are
rather punctiliously honest In business
The Chinaman lies till the bargain is
but he will then keep it even
to his own hurt. They deny that cor
ruption in office Is universal or even
worse than 1t Is among Ottomans, Per
slams or Russians, and maintain that in
stead of being without patriotism the
Chinaman has a high sense Of patriotic
pride, often leading him, as it leads
to unreasoning dislike and
scorn of the foreigner, but still acting
as very strong motive power. AS to
his baculty for com bination, they point
to the secret societies which he main
tains in all lands and under all circum-
and as to his capacity for self
government to the fact that he has gov
erned himself for countless ages, and
has imposed upon warning tribes. as
Europe has never done, a single method
Of communication which supersedes all
OF dialect and language, a
single system of administrator based
IN superior culture. and single set of
ideals acknowledged by all Cinnamon
alike to be in the abstract incapable of
inally, they deny even the charge of
,owardice, alleging that Chinese inabil-
ty to succeed in battle Is In no degree
The result of physical fear from which
they are rather exceptionally free, as
he history of the bandits pirates and
revolutionaries among them conclu-
;ively proves, but is the inability inner
mt 1 n every mob, aggravated by the
'act peculiarto to China, that the class
IS which would otherwise furnish lead
RS hold violence of any kind to be eX-
,eedingly ungentlemanly. They say
hat the Chinese converts whether to
or Christianity have ac-
,epted martyrdom more readily than
any other modern concerts; that the
Taipings in our own time fought as
veil as Mexicans did against the early
Spanish conquerors, and that General
Gordon, many officers since mis- time