it will remain a part of Chinese civilization, and can be
recovered whenever Japan happens to be in difficulties. The Chinese
derive such strength from their four hundred millions, the toughness of
their national customs, their power of passive resistance, and their
unrivalled national cohesiveness--in spite of the civil wars, which
merely ruffle the surface--that they can afford to despise military
methods, and to wait till the feverish energy of their oppressors shall
have exhausted itself in internecine combats.

China is much less a political entity than a civilization--the only one
that has survived from ancient times. Since the days of Confucius, the
Egyptian, Babylonian, Persian, Macedonian, and Roman Empires have
perished; but China has persisted through a continuous evolution. There
have been foreign influences--first Buddhism, and now Western science.
But Buddhism did not turn the Chinese into Indians, and Western science
will not turn them into Europeans. I have met men in China who knew as
much of Western learning as any professor among ourselves; yet they had
not been thrown off their balance, or lost touch with their own people.
What is bad in the West--its brutality, its restlessness, its readiness
to oppress the weak, its preoccupation with purely material aims--they
see to be bad, and do not wish to adopt. What is good, especially its
science, they do wish to adopt.

The old indigenous culture of China has become rather dead; its art and
literature are not what they were, and Confucius does not satisfy the
spiritual needs of a modern man, even if he is Chinese. The Chinese who
have had a European or American education realize that a new element, is
needed to vitalize native traditions, and they look to our civilization
to supply it. But they do not wish to construct a civilization just like
ours; and it is precisely in this that the best hope lies. If they are
not goaded into militarism, they may produce a genuinely new
civilization, better than any that we in the West have been able to
create.

So far, I have spoken chiefly of the good sides of the Chinese
character; but of course China, like every other nation, has its bad
sides also. It is disagreeable to me to speak of these, as I experienced
so much courtesy and real kindness from the Chinese, that I should
prefer to say only nice things about them. But for the sake of China, as
well as for the sake of truth, it would be a mistake to conceal wha