e: A widely-diffused respect for learning; the
possibility of doing without a hereditary aristocracy; the selection of
administrators who must at least have been capable of industry; and the
preservation of Chinese civilization in spite of barbarian conquest.
But, like so much else in traditional China, it has had to be swept away
to meet modern needs. I hope nothing of greater value will have to
perish in the struggle to repel the foreign exploiters and the fierce
and cruel system which they miscall civilization.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: Legge's _Shu-King,_ p. 15. Quoted in Hirth, _Ancient
History of China_, Columbia University Press, 1911--a book which gives
much useful critical information about early China.]

[Footnote 2: Hirth, op. cit. p. 174. 775 is often wrongly given.]

[Footnote 3: See Hirth, op. cit., p. 100 ff.]

[Footnote 4: On this subject, see Professor Giles's _Confucianism and
its Rivals,_ Williams & Norgate, 1915, Lecture I, especially p. 9.]

[Footnote 5: Cf. Henri Cordier, _Histoire Generale de la Chine_, Paris,
1920, vol. i. p. 213.]

[Footnote 6: _Outlines of Chinese History_ (Shanghai, Commercial Press,
1914), p. 61.]

[Footnote 7: See Hirth, _China and the Roman Orient_ (Leipzig and
Shanghai, 1885), an admirable and fascinating monograph. There are
allusions to the Chinese in Virgil and Horace; cf. Cordier, op. cit., i.
p. 271.]

[Footnote 8: Cordier, op. cit. i. p. 281.]

[Footnote 9: Cordier, op. cit. i. p. 237.]

[Footnote 10: Murdoch, in his _History of Japan_ (vol. i. p. 146), thus
describes the greatness of the early Tang Empire:

"In the following year (618) Li Yuen, Prince of T'ang, established the
illustrious dynasty of that name, which continued to sway the fortunes
of China for nearly three centuries (618-908). After a brilliant reign
of ten years he handed over the imperial dignity to his son, Tai-tsung
(627-650), perhaps the greatest monarch the Middle Kingdom has ever
seen. At this time China undoubtedly stood in the very forefront of
civilization. She was then the most powerful, the most enlightened, the
most progressive, and the best governed empire, not only in Asia, but on
the face of the globe. Tai-tsung's frontiers reached from the confines
of Persia, the Caspian Sea, and the Altai of the Kirghis steppe, along
these mountains to the north side of the Gobi desert eastward to the
inner Hing-an, while Sogdiana, Khorassan, and the regions around the
Hindu Rush also