China; an interpretation,

Front matter

•JAMBS - W- BASHPORD

PRINCETON, N. J.

Purchased by the Hamill Missionary Fund.

Preface to the Second Edition 15

I. China and the World 17

II. Industrial Life in China 43

III. Commercial Life IN China 73

IV. Educational Life in China 97

V. Woman's Life in China 123

VI. Life Reflected in Literature 146

VII. Life Reflected in Philosophy: Taoism and

Its Schools 173

VIII. Confucius: Moral Philosophy 195

IX. The Confucian School 220

X. Religious Life and Struggles 239

XI. Chinese Law 266

XII. Political Life in China 290

XIII. The Downfall OF THE Manchus 312

XIV. The Transition : Prince Chun’s Regency. . 331

XV. The Chinese Republic 350

XVI. China and Japan 379

XVII. China and the United States 418

XVIII. China AND THE World: Conclusion 446

XIX. Yuan Shih Kai 492

Appendices 503

Index 617

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LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Tomb of Confucius, Chufu Frontispiece

FACING PAGE

208 316

The Empress Dowager, Her Majesty Tzu Hsi

Emperor of China, Kwang-su

Yuan Shih Kai

Every thoughtful man holds fundamental views of human nature which constitute the preconceptions with which he comes to his tasks. In a country so large as China, with so immense a population, whatever one’s preconceptions, he can easily find materials to confirm them. Every view advanced can be supported by numerous illustrations, or it can be challenged, and so many exceptions can be cited as to make the opposite opinion credible. Recognizing this danger, we have meditated for years upon both sides of every problem which has confronted us. We have aimed in dealing with so large a portion of the human race not simply to state facts but also to analyze and sift facts, and to derive from them the truth. We have been governed by the purpose not to discover in the Chinese what we wish were true, but, rather, to recognize those dominant characteristics, those fundamental traits of Chinese character, with which the rest of the world must reckon. All writers should aim to portray, not the countless eddies and cross currents which are so likely to confuse hasty observers, but the deep main current which reveals the trend of a race and forecasts its goal. To do this we must know something more than its external history. We must, if possible, penetrate beneath mere facts and try to discover on the one side that which differentiates the people under

consideration from the rest of the human race, and on the other side those more fundamental traits which make of one all men who dwell upon the earth.

Lord Bryce, in his recent volume on South America, says: “The duty of a traveler or an historian or a

philosopher is, of course, to reach and convey the exact truth, and any tendency either to lighten or to darken the picture is equally to be condemned. But where there is reason for doubt, and whenever that which may be called the ‘temperamental equation’ of the observer comes in, an optimistic attitude would seem to be the safer ; that is to say, likely to be nearer the truth. . . . Moreover, we are disposed, when we deal with another country, to be unduly impressed by the defects which we actually see and to forget to ask what is, after all, the really important question — whether things are getting better or worse. Is it an ebbing or a flowing tide that we see ? Even in reflecting upon the past in our own country, which we know better than we do that of other countries, we are apt, in noting the emergence of new dangers, to forget how many old dangers have disappeared. Much more is this kind of error likely to affect us in the case of a country whose faults repel us more than do our own national faults, and whose recuperative forces we may overlook or undervalue.”’ In this matter we confess that we are optimistic by conviction, because no person permeated by the Christian spirit can be other than optimistic. Moreover, in our opening chapters we are simply setting forth and attempting to account for facts — facts which are undisputed and indisputable, whatever may be their ex])lanation, namely, an im-

> Bryce, James: South America. Introduction, pp. xxii, xxiii.

inense population occupying that region of the earth called China, a civilization which the Chinese have maintained for three to four thousand years, and a struggle now in progress by this race to enter upon a new stage of civilization. Even should our explanation of the facts prove in part mistaken, nevertheless the facts are indestructible and self-assertive. Let any candid student attempt to find a rational explanation of the early development of Chinese civilization, of its long continuance, of the immense population which that country sustains, of the virile qualities of the people, and of their recent awakening, and these indisputable facts in the history of the Chinese must create large expectations as to the future.

To quicken the interest in this vast nation, to help make China and the Chinese better known and better understood, this book has been written ; it is a growth rather than a composition ; it has largely made itself. It is the result of twelve years’ residence and some seventy thousand miles of travel in China, and ten thousand more in Japan and Korea, of hundreds of conversations with the Chinese upon all possible subjects, but chiefly about things Chinese, of unnumbered talks with foreigners of long residence in China concerning the Chinese, of the reading or examination of more than five hundred volumes on China, of more than forty notebooks written during the last twelve years mainly upon China, and of considerable meditation upon the problems of the Pacific Basin. The aim has been to make these problems understandable by Western peoples. In spirit we have tried to follow the Golden Rule and to interpret the Chinese to the Western world as we would like Chinese writers to interpret Americans and Europeans to the Orient. Such a spirit will contribute to the peace, to the commercial progress, and to the civilization of the human race.

We are not unmindful of the ignorance, squalor, and misery of vast masses of the Chinese. We have pointed out the faults of the race and the dangers which threaten their civilization, but we have not dwelt upon the defects of Chinese life ; hence our interpretation may give hasty readers too favorable an impression of the progress and the present condition of China. Our conviction is clear that it is not wise for foreigners to enlarge upon the faults of neighboring nations. Instead of maintaining a critical attitude, we have aimed, while recognizing the defects of a pagan civilization, to be constructive and to set forth the remedies. The chapters frequently lead up to Christ simply because he furnishes the solution, and the only solution, of the grave problems which confront the Chinese.

We have attempted to comply with Spencer’s definition of style, and to give the reader without unnecessary effort on his part a comprehensive view of the country and of its institutions, and as clear an insight as possible into the character of the people. In spelling names of persons we have followed the latest editions of the Encyclopedia Britannica, of Webster’s Dictionary, and of the .Standard Dictionary, because these volumes are the most accessible of any containing Chinese names. In spelling the names of places we have followed the official Postal Guide of China.

No one familiar with the influence of evolution in

II the development of species can fail to realize the profound effect which environment has had upon the history of mankind. Were we to accept a radical conception of evolution, we might be led to the conviction that there have been independent origins of the human species. Even were such an hypothesis called for to account for the pigmies of central Africa or the aborigines of Australia, it is not needed as an explanation of the origin of the Chinese. Any profound study of this people reveals, with some marked variations, the same fundamental type of civilization, the same physical need for food, clothing, and shelter ; the same strong craving for fellowship manifested in the desire for home and social life; the same uneasy sense of sin and the same need of spiritual peace; the same imperious demands of conscience; the same lasting longing for immortality ; the same deep desire for a knowledge of and reconciliation with the Creator of the universe and the Preserver of souls which exists in the hearts of the white races. These two principles, therefore — the marked variations in races and in civilizations on the one side, and the fundamental unity of humanity on the other side — should guide us in an interpretation of the Chinese. To this end we adopt Paul’s resolution “to know no man after the flesh, but all men after the spirit.”

We have spoken our convictions in regard to nations and possible events because in these days of inevitable struggle between races, civilizations, and religions one owes it to his fellows to express freely the judgments which travel and study have produced. If these judgments rest upon the laws of human development, the future will witness the slow and gradual establishment of the tendencies which they forecast. If not, history will modify the forecast. If the former happens — well. If the latter happens — still well, though not so well. Nevertheless, should the warnings uttered lead any nation in any degree whatsoever to change its course and so avoid danger, then the failure of the forecast will be the highest justification for its utterance.

We recognize the very serious limitations which an Occidental experiences in interpreting the Orient when he comes to China in middle life and has not a knowledge of the language; an Occidental overwhelmed with administrative problems ; and, above all, an Occidental all of whose earlier thinking was cast in Western molds. We have been heartened, however, by the fact that, not men born in America but such foreigners as De Tocqueville, Von Holst, and Lord Bryce, looking at America in some measure from the outside, have furnished the people of the United States the best interpretation of themselves; and that Occidentals, Lafcadio Hearn, William Elliot Griffis, and Sidney L. Gulick, have given us the best insight into the heart of that wonderful people, the Japanese; and that President Lowell, of Harvard, has furnished probably the best interpretation of the English people. We have neither the genius nor the talent to repeat these triumphs. But if we can so interpret China that American and European readers will understand better the men and forces with which they must deal in the Far East, and will appreciate more fully — not the mere industrial and commercial qualities of this large section of the human race, but the aspirations, the spiritual aptitudes, and the struggles of our Chinese brothers and sisters, we shall be fully satisfied. If we can in ever so slight a measure so interpret the Chinese as to enable them better to understand themselves and to help them in advancing toward their providential goal, we shall feel amply rewarded.

Peking, China, March 31, 1916.

Preface To The Second Edition

It is a source of gratification that a second edition of this volume is called for. Engrossed as Americans are with very grave problems in connection with Mexico and Europe, a slower sale of the first edition would not have been surprising. I am still more gratified at the favorable review of the volume by leading newspapers and of the receipt of letters of high appreciation of it from Americans w'ho are authorities upon China.

Owing to the recent death of Yuan Shih Kai, the publishers have requested a chapter dealing with his career. I am not in reach of the materials which I have been gathering for years upon this statesman, but have furnished the estimates which I formed upon his character and his career.

I am under deep obligation to my friend and fellow worker, the Rev. F. D. Gamewell, for seeing the first edition through the press and for such additional corrections as the speed of the publishers in issuing the second edition permits. He has labored indefatigably to eliminate errors, often searching for hours to verify or correct a single statement. I have not had time to hear from China since the publication of the volume and am ignorant of the judgment formed in that land upon it. If the judgment of the Chinese is as favorable as the judgment of Americans, and of the Chinese in America, and especially if the volume helps the i6

Chinese to interpret themselves more, fully and so advance more swiftly toward their goal, the years of toil upon the volume will be amply compensated.

New York, July 4, 1916.

Chapter I

The most ominous event in modern history is the World War which burst upon the race in 1914 and which is still spreading at the time these lines are written. No one even attempts at the present moment to forecast the outcome of this world conflagration. We may pray and trust that it will purify the human race, help the ideal of humanitarianism to transcend the ideal of nationalism, and lead to the United States of Europe, or even to a united Western world as the next step in the progress of mankind. But even then the white races would more closely than ever front the yellow races, and we should still have the problem of the Far East to solve. Wide as are the divisions of the Western races, wider still is the division between the Western world and the Eastern world. Rudyard Kipling sings :

O the East is East, and the West is West, and never the twain shall meet

Till earth and sky stand presently at God’s great Judgment Seat.

With this greater and later conflict in mind the late John Hay expressed the conviction that the storm center of the world would gradually pass from the Balkans, from Constantinople, from the Persian Gulf, from India, to China, and added: “Whoever under-

stands that mighty empire — socially, politically, economically, religiously — has the key to world politics for the next five centuries.”

While the Western World War now justly absorbs our thought, we must not forget that events are moving in the Far East with almost tragic swiftness. The race storm is facing eastward as well as westward, and its effects will be felt in Asia long after the storm has died away in Europe. It was with this possible epic or possible tragedy in view that Dr. Reinsch, United States minister to China, speaking as a student of world history, wrote in 1911: “There have been

great crises in past history, but none comparable to the drama which is now being enacted in the Far East, upon the outcome of which depends the welfare not only of a country or a section of the race but of all mankind.” ^ Lovat Frazer says, “The event most fraught with meaning for the rest of the world is the awakening of the East.” B. Putnam Weale writes: “The Chinese question is the world question of the twentieth century.”

In entering upon the study of any nation it is wise to begin with the physical elements which make possible that nation’s population and civilization. There are six physical causes of the population of China : The comparative size of the nation, the quality of the land, the location with reference to the equator, the rainfall, the loess formation, and the salubrity of the climate.

T. Comparative Size of China, The twenty-one provinces of China have an area of 1,896,436 square

' Reinsch, Paul S.: Intellectual and Political Currents in the Far East. Preface, p. vii.

miles, and a population estimated by the Chinese government in 1910 at 331,188,000. This gives an average population of only 122 per square mile. Despite her large aggregate population, therefore, China is surpassed in density of population hy nine countries, whose population per square mile is as follow's: Belgium, 652; Holland, 483; the United Kingdom, 373; Italy, 318; Germany, 310; Switzerland, 234; Austria- Hungary, 207; Japan, 203; and France, 189. Large, therefore, as is China’s aggregate population, nevertheless she ranks tenth in density of population among the nations of the world. The size of China is the first natural cause of her population.

2. Quality of the Land. But the size of China must not blind us to another fact, namely, that portions of the land are very densely populated. The government estimate of population for 1910 makes the population per square mile in certain of the provinces as follows: Shantung, 528; Chekiang, 463;

Kiangsu, 448; Honan, 376; Hupeh, 348; Anhwei, 315; Fukien, 282; Hunan, 282; Chili, 281 ; Kwantung, 277. It will thus be seen that the population of large portions of China is very dense, perhaps the densest of any population depending upon agriculture and hand manufacturing for its maintenance, hence we must not rest with the explanation that China’s population is due solely to the size of the country. An additional cause of the immense population of China is the large proportion of land capable of cultivation. A glance at a relief map^ of China shows that the land consists on its western side of mountain systems, dropping down

* Little, Archibald: The Far East, maps fronting pp. 19 and 44.

to the plain of Szechwan some fifteen hundred miles west of the Pacific and continuing' a mixed region of mountains, hills, and plains, to the Pacific Ocean. This rude outline of China may be compared to a huge half-moon facing southeast with the mountains rising on its outer border. These immense mountain masses have gathered and poured down great quantities of water during geologic ages, bringing down the detritus which forms the deltas of Hwang-ho or Yellow River in the north, the Yangtze in the center, and the West River in the south. This process accounts for the Yangtze basin with some five hundred and seventy thousand square miles of territory, and the Yellow and West River basins, which together add perhaps five hundred thousand square miles more to the delta land of China.^

3. The Location With Reference to the Equator. The third natural cause of the fertility of China, and therefore of her population, is her location with reference to the equator. When the map of China is placed upon proper parallels of latitude over the map of North America, it will cover not only the United States but the West Indies, the Gulf of Mexico, most of Mexico, and a considerable portion of Central America. The location of China in reference to the equator gives her, on the whole, one of the best climates of any large nation on earth. It permits the production of dry rice in Manchuria, and of water rice in each of the eighteen provinces. It permits the production of two or three crops a year from the same land in a considerable portion of the nation.

• Little, Archibald: The Far East, p. 18.

and four crops in some portions, so that all the cultivated land of China proper averages at least two crops a year. Hence the location of China with reference to the equator is a third cause of the immense population of the nation, just as a similar location is a cause of the immense population of India.

4. Rainfall. The rainfall adds immensely to the productiveness of China. A study of the comparative charts of rainfall provided by Bartholomew'* shows that for all of China south of the Yangtze with the exception of Kweichow, Yunnan, and small portions of Hupeh and Szechwan, the average rainfall is from fifty to seventy-five inches per year and for the rest of China proper and of Manchuria from twenty-five to fifty inches. The rainfall of China averages higher than the rainfall of Europe or of the United States. W erner® shows that eighty-four great famines during the last four thousand years were due to excessive rainfall and seventy-one to drought. Moreover, the rainfall is usually well distributed with reference to crop production. During the winter the Pacific Ocean, lying south and east of China, is warmer than the land of central and northern Asia. Hence the warmer air over the Pacific rises and the cold dry air from the north and west flows in. During the summer the land becomes much hotter than the ocean, and the air laden with moisture flows in from the southeast and is arrested and cooled by the mountains, resulting in copious rains. Hence by far the larger portion of the rain in China, and especially in the central and northern

‘ Atlas of World’s Commerce, p. 5, top of page.

‘ Werner, E. T. C.: Descriptive Sociology of the Chinese. Table VIII, col. 37.

portions of the nation, falls in the summer when needed by the growing crops. Even in the most arid provinces like Kansu, Shensi, and Shansi, where famines from drought are somewhat common, the summer rains vary from ten to thirty inches, and usually are sufficient to insure a harvest. The large rainfall of China and its favorable distribution is a fourth cause of the immense population of the nation.

5. Loess Formation. A fifth cause of the population is the fertility of the northern and central portions of China due to the loess formation. This is due to the trade winds mentioned above. As the weather is dry and the vegetation dead during the late fall, winter, and early spring months, when the winds blow from the northwest, these winds bring a large amount of dust from Turkestan, Mongolia, and Siberia. This dust is deposited over the plains of northern and central China. When the wind changes in the spring and the southeast monsoon brings air from the Pacific expanded by heat and laden with moisture, the moisture is soon condensed by the mountains and falls in the form of rain; thus the dust which is brought down from the northwest during the winter months is soon wet and covered with vegetation and is not carried back to the northwest again. The northern plains of China and Manchuria are largely of loess formation, aided and modified by the deposits of the Yellow River, while the central China plain is partly of loess formation, aided and modified by the Yangtze River deposits. The main loess deposits are in northern and central China, though we have seen dust storms in the winter as far south as Canton. The average depth of the loess in central and northern China has been estimated at thirty-three feet. When the land is covered to a depth of several feet with this wind-borne loess — the richest soil of the region whence it came — deposited in columnar structure such that the soil readily absorbs the rain and also enables the roots to penetrate deeply, its fertility is almost inexhaustible. The size and the extraordinary richness of the loess formation of China constitute an additional natural cause of her immense population.

6. Salubrity of China. S. Wells Williams says: “The healthy climate of China has had much to do with the civilization of its inhabitants. No similar area in the world exceeds it for general salubrity.”® Later observations show that the climates of North America and Europe contribute to a speedier and higher form of civilization.^ But upon the whole Williams’ statement is confirmed as to the value of this climate for the maintenance of a widespread and long lived civilization. However observers may explain the fact, the Chinese are one of the toughest and most virile races on earth. So far as this virility of the Chinese is due to climate, its salubrity becomes one of the natural causes of China’s population.

Thus, in accounting for the immense population which China sustains, we must bear in mind, first, her size, which, omitting the immense mountain and desert masses of her dependencies, is about one million nine hundred thousand square miles ; second, the proportion

* The Middle Kingdom, vol. i, p. 57.

’ See Huntington, Ellsworth : Civilization and Climate.

of arable land as compared with other nations or areas of equal size ; third, a climate which permits the growth of from two to four crops a year; fourth, the large amount and admirable distribution of the rainfall; fifth, the loess formation; and, sixth, the salubrity of China. These six physical causes have made possible the immense population of the nation.

But physical causes do not insure a large population. Most of these causes operate in the Tigris and the Euphrates Valleys, and they once sustained dense populations, though they are to-day sparsely settled. Physical advantages alone do not create populations. Human causes must be added in order to create, and especially in order to maintain, a nation century after century.

Probably no other people exhibit a larger combination of the human qualities necessary for the maintenance of a large population than do the Chinese. The Chinese possess those qualities of virility and industry, intelligence and reasonableness, adaptability and cheerfulness, solidity, common sense, and religion, which, under suitable conditions, make an exceedingly numerous people. The qualities of the country and of the people are united in the agricultural and industrial life of China.

I. Early Marriage and Desire for Sons. The first and perhaps the chief human cause of the immense population of China grows out of a strange mixture of spiritual conviction and of the strongest passion of man. It is a religious conviction of the Chinese that no man can be at peace after death unless he leaves behind a son to perform the ancestral rites for the

CHINA AND THE WORT.D repose of his spirit. Future felicity is of such vital concern that every man old enough for marriage is determined to have a son before his death; and as death is no respecter even of youth, the earlier this young man marries, the safer his eternal interests. But the matter is of more than future and individual concern. All the dead members of the clan are supposed to be unfavorably affected by failure in the performance of ancestral rites ; and the penalty for neglect of ancestral worship falls not only upon the individual but upon the family, and upon all the members of the clan, usually coming in the form of drought, flood, or plague. Hence not the young man alone, but his father and mother, brothers and sisters, cousins, uncles, and aunts, are interested in his early marriage and the birth of a son. And for the same spiritual and yet intensely practical reason, namely, to placate the ancestral spirits and avoid calamity to the clan, the first and supreme duty of women in China is motherhood. Dr. De Groot calls IMencius China’s second greatest philosopher, and quotes from him two statements which De Groot thinks have had the mightiest influence upon the family life of China : “Unfilial conduct is the worst of sins.” “Three things are unfilial, and having no sons is the worst.” ® W'^estern peoples find difficulty in understanding these Chinese maxims, but De Groot explains them as follows : “We have to consider the worship of parents and ancestors as the very core of the religious and social life of the Chinese people.

As I have said, it is mentioned in the ancient books with so much frequency that no doubt is possible that it was the kernel of religious life as early as the oldest historical, and even semihistorical times.” ^ When observers understand that so grave a people as the Chinese take their religion seriously, that there has been an almost universal belief for the past three thousand years that failure to perform the ancestral rites results in the suffering of all one’s ancestors in their spirit life, and that this sin is sure sooner or later to bring dire penalties upon the clan in the present life, they will see why the Chinese consider unfilial conduct to be the worst of crimes and sonlessness the worst of unfilial conduct. So deep is this conviction among the Chinese that for three thousand years bearing no son has been recognized as ample ground for divorcing a wife and marrying another. Not only so, but in lieu of divorcing the first wife, it has justified concubinage, or the taking of a second wife, for the sake of securing a son. At just this point the Chinaman’s strongest passion supports his deepest religious conviction. If successive wives, or a wife and concubines, do not result in a son, the case is so urgent that any younger brother who has two sons must give his eldest to his older brother ; or the sonless husband must buy a son of a more fortunate member of his clan who has one to spare. This adopted or purchased son becomes not only the legal heir but the spiritual descendant of his putative father. Even if a wealthy man has sons by his first wife, nevertheless the possibility of their death and the safety and glory of having many sons is made an excuse for concubinage. Thus the other human causes of population in China are all made operative by tliis spiritual cause combined with the element of human passion.

2. Value of Grain and Vegetable Diet. The second human cause of the immense population of China is the Chinese discovery made centuries ago of the superior value of a grain diet as over against a meat diet. C. G. Hopkins says, “One thousand bushels of grain has at least five times as much food value and will support five times as many people as will the meat or milk which can be made from this grain.” The Chinese, relying solely on experimental knowledge, discovered centuries ago that many more could live by eating grains and vegetables directly than by turning the grain into pork, beef, and mutton, and indulging in a meat diet. The Chinese secure far larger food values from an acre of land by growing, for instance, rape upon it and extracting oil from the seed, than by pasturing a cow on the land and making butter from her milk. Moreover, the Chinese eat while it is growing and pickle for future consumption, as we make saurkraut, large quantities of rape; thus they derive much food directly from the plant itself as well as a large amount of oil from the seed. Moreover, the rape in southern and central China is largely a winter crop, growing when other crops are not so valuable, and leaving ample time for two or more summer crops to be taken from the same field. Hence, instead of securing their fat for cooking and consumption indirectly from the land through animals in the form of butter, lard, and tallow, the Chinese derive their oils very