Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1901-01-19
CONQUEST OF CHINA
Lombroso Takes the Ground That It
is Impossible.
GIVES REASONS FOR this BELIEF
Could Withstand Any Attack by
Sheer Force of Numbers.
NOTHING TO BE GAINED

Written for The Es enng Star by Prof. Cesare LON
broso Of the University OF Turin.
I know not in what fable / have read
about some fishermen who had disembark-
ed upon an unknown island and had al
ready 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 wa
ter-they and their implements-so that the
greater part of them were drowned. They
had set foot upon a huge sumbering whale.
which had subsequently walked up when
the first incursons had been made on his
body by the newly arrived occupants.
This Is fable, but l fear it may become
history when it is applied to the mistaken
calculations of the European powers as to
the occupation of China: the easy conquests
OF some semi-barbaric regions of the far
east: of Madagascar, and the gradual am
putations that are being performed. almost
with impunity, upon the decrepit Turkish
colossus. which have induced the belief In
our diplomats, whose ignorance is worse
than that of the populace, because 1t Is
more masked and Is conducted on le-
gendary, traditional lines, on imitation and
above all according to the prevailing fash
fon-that Europe could easily conquer the
Chinese empire.
Evidently the legend as to the facility of
the Chinese conquest has acquired sodity
during the recent war. In which China
really did display very little knowledge of
the art of modern warfare, and especially
from the easily won successes obtained by
the states In the war now in progress, that
might better be called uncontested loot
Ing, which has outdone the proverbiaI van
dalism 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 il 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 COM
pietely inferior in all the arts of which war
is a eliminating phenomenal application.
They are 80 above all because they are the
only people who deeply despise the arts of
war, which fact Is greatly to their honor,
demonstrating a breadth OF civilization
which is immensely superior to European
civilization that consumes great part of
its forces of its energies. in this sterile and
Injurious institution of militarsm.
Different, but Not Inferior.
Moreover. they have not taken into con-
sideration that the Chinese have different.
rather than an inferior. type of civilization.
AS in medicine they are accustomed to pay
the physician when he keeps them in health.
and not when they are i'll; as in the inter-
ests of the public safety, they recompense
the projects when tranquility reigns and
punish them when disorders arise so also
they have understood, by their internal or
ganization, to forestall the majority Of the
causes which render necessary ornaments,
and therefore they have great reason to
make light of them and to devote them
selves very little to them.
The distance at which. UP to the present
time, they have lived from all the great
armed powers; the respect which they have
managed to inspire in the family toward the
elders in the elders toward the authorities
and toward the head; the safeguards which
they have introduced into their vast gov
eminent 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 a bureaucracy, rel
atively enlightened. because selected by ex-
amfnations and competitions; their having
contrived to eliminate the great feudal
SoreS-soldiers, priests and capitaistS-has
made Of this immense state of four hun
dred million inhabitants not only the great
est. but almost the most politically compact
body in the world.
Interesting Comparisons.
Let us compare it with Austria, where
four or five nationalites are striving against
each other. and which has, moreover, In
prospect the struggle between classes, the
religious struggle. and lastly the struggle
over the ruling Of the state. Let us COM
pare 1t with England which has at her very
center a social and religious struggle with
Ireland, and which cannot maintain her
colonial rule otherwise than by comforting
Liberty so great as to constitute almost a
practical separation, and which possesses
in India and in her colonies a mine of
wealth. but also mine of economical RI
VARY which menaceS the vitality Of the GEN.
ter. and thus great portion of English
agrarian cultivation has been, perforce,
abandoned in the face of colonial competi-
tlon. and even Industrial enterprises are be-
ginning to find powerful rivals in the cot
tons and silks of India and Australia.
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 inc ined the past
to consider nothing beautiful but antiquity
has conferred a stability little worthy OF
laudation in appearance, but extremely for
midable in politics. although the reformers
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 stand
ards of conquest but afterward will happen
pretty much the same as happened with
the tents pitched on the whale by the
legendary fishermen whom l have men
toned; 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.
Complete Possession Impossible.
1t is stupid to believe that 1t suffices to
occupy temporarily with a few ships and
few regiments a part of country SO vast in
order to retain possession Of 1t In perpe-
tuity. 1t is stupid to believe that we are
dea ing with barbarous race like the red
SKINS the Kaffirs or the dervishes, who can
be put to fight with a few guns. Thous-
ands of persons will be slain by the volleys,
as is often done now. thus renewing the
mistakes of Cortes and Pizzaro. but it is
not possible to change the brains of those
persons who do not wish to adapt them
selves to European civilization, and the OPP
preston and the tortures which We ale
infiicting upon them will impel them to
revolt, in which, by force of numbers and
Of the fanaticism which alone survives all
other things in that Countrywide fanaticism
of the state-they will eventually triumph
over us. But 1t Is always said 1t is not
alone in war that they are inferior to u.s.
but also in printing in writing, in technical
conditions. in the distribution Of capital, in
strange laws.
We must, first Of all, remember that 1t
Is not a barbarous country. but civilized
country, after its own fashion, civilized
for that race like the hunchback who was
perfect as hunchback: that 1t has a civil
ization which is superior to ours in some
things-in agriculture for example, which
In other things now. perhaps. superior. as
in Industrial occupations, or may soon be-
come superior and enter into competition,
as 1t is able to carry the cost of pro-
duction to SO low a level-from fifteen to