The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1901-01-20
THE CONQUEST OF CHINA
SOME OF THE PERILs SUCH ACTION
ny EUROPE WOULD INVOLVE.
Trade Advantages Are Not What They
Are Claimed, and Chinese Alliance
with Japan Might Result.

about some fishermen who had disem-
barked upon an unknown island, and had
already begun to set up their tents and to
sow their grain. feeling great pride in their
unexpected acquisition, when, all at once.
they found themselves hurled into the
water-they and their implements-so that
the greater part of them were drowned.
They had set foot upon huge. sIunbering
whale, which had subsequently walked up
when the first incursions had been made
on his body by the newly arrived occu-
pants.
This is a fable, but I fear It may be-
come history when 1t is applied to the
powers as to the occupation OF China; the
easy conquests of some half-barbaric re-
gions Of the far East, of Madagascar, and
the gradual amputations that are being
performed, almost with impunity, upon the
decrepit Turkish colossus which have in
duced the belief in our diplomats. whose ig-
norance is worse than that of the populace,
because il is more masked and is concealed
by legendary, traditional lines, in imitation
and above all according to the prevailing
fashion, that Europe could easily conquer
the Chinese Empire. Evidently the legend
has acquired solidity during the recent war,
in which China really did display very
little knowledge of the art Of modern war
fare, and especially from the easily won
successes obtained by the states in the
war now in progress. that might better be
called an uncontested footing, which
has outdone the proverbial vandalism Of
the ancient vandals. But as only too many
of the diplomats are unintelligent they have
not taken into consideration one rather
important point. that If the Chinese show
themselves to be so inferior to us in war
this does not arise. as 1t would in Europe.
from the fact that they are completely in
ferior in all the arts of which war is a
eliminating phenomenal application. They
are so above all because they are the only
people who deeply despise the arts Of war,
which fact is greatly to their honor, dem
onstrating a breadth Of civilization which
| is immensely superior to European civil
| ization that consumes a great part of its
| forces, of it's energies, in this sterile and
injurious institution of militarism.
CHINESE METHODS.
| Moreover, they have not taken into con-
ent rather than an inferior type of civiliza-
| ton. AS in medicine they are accustomed
to pay the physician when he keeps them
iri health and not when they are i'll; as, in
the interests of the public safety, they rec
| ompense the projects when tranquility
| reigns and punish them when disorders
arise, so, also. they have undertaken by
| their internal organization to forestall the
| majority of the.causes which render neces-
| sary ornaments, and. therefore. they have
| great reason to make light of them and to
| devote themselves very little to them. The
| distance to which. up to the present time
| they have lived from all the great armed
| powers; the respect which they have man.
| aged to inspire in the family towards the
| elders; in the elders towards the author RI
| ties and toward the head; the safeguards
which they have introduced into their vas;
government against all religious fanaticism
and against all conflicts between classes
| not allowing the growth of a trace of
| feudalism, or clergy or of plutocracy, but
| causing the state to be governed by q
bureaucracy relatively enlightened because
selected by examinations and competitions
| their having contrived to eliminate the
| great feudal sores-soldiers, priests and
capitalists-has made OF this immense state
of four hundred million inhabitants not
only the greatest, but almost the most po-
| litica1ly compact body in the world
| Let us compare 1t with Austria, where
| four or five nationalities are striving
| against each other, and which has, more
| over, in prospect the struggle between
classes, the religious struggle, and lastly
| the struggle over the ruling of the state
Let us compare 1t with England, which
| has at her very center a social and re-
ligious struggle with Ireland, and which
| cannot maintain her colonial rule other
wise than by comforting a liberty so great
as to constitute almost a practical separa-
| ton, and which possesses in India and in
| her colonies a mine of wealth. but also a
mine of economical rivalry which menaces
| the vitality of the center, and thus a great
portion of English agrarian cultivation has
been, perforce, abandoned in the face OF
| colonial competition, and even industrial
enterprises are beginning to find powerful
| rivals in the cottons and silks of India and
| Australia.
| DEVELOPMENT IN CHINA
| In China, on the contrary, there is an
arrest of development; there are fewer
needs, but there are also fewer inequalities
| and fewer forms of rivalry. The same ten
dency which has eternally inclined the past
to consider nothing beautiful but antiquity
has conferred stability little worthy OF
laudation in appearance, but extremely
| formidable in politics, although the re-
formers. with the Emperor himself at their
head. were subdued with a very slight
| struggle, or. rather, almost without a
struggle. All this forms an enormous force
1t will be easy to plant, in glorious wise
the standards of conquest. but afterwards
will happen pretty much the same as hap
pened with the tents pitched on the whale
by the legendary fishermen whom have
mentioned: by dint of blows and counter
blows the whale will be aroused and will
| toss into the air the tent. the implements
and the fishermen.
| 1t is stupid to believe that 1t suffices tc
| occupy temporarily with few ships and a
| few regiments a part of a country so vas
| In order to retain possession of it in per.
petuity. II is stupid to believe that we are
| dealing with a barbarous race like the RED
skins, the Kaffirs or the Dervishes, who car
be put to fight with few guns. Thousand: