University of Nanking - Linguist Yearbook (Nanking, China)

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JOTTINGS FROM CHINESE HISTORY 47 I But the Chinese student is alert not only in his thinking butin his action as well. There was ageneral feeling of surprise in 1919 when the students joined hands and in three months terminated the official Careers of three ministers of the government, because they were traitors to japanng led the president and his entire cabinet to resigng and nerved the Chinese delegates at Paris to astound the powers by refusing to sign the treaty with Germany. But today it is the normal thing. The spirit, long brewing, has tried its strength and found it adequate, and today the moral influence of the students is no small factor in the determination of government policies. The student class IS easily the most active element in the country and it is also the most fllert to any message, whether it be Christianity or Bolshevisin, Idealism or materialism. What shall we make it? T - j. B. YAUKEY. -1--41 - 1 There are three great organizations working here with the one aim of giving Light to China. The Standard Oil is permeating the most interior places to bring its light, The British American Tobacco Company has as its ambition a light in the mouth of every Chinese,-The light of a cigarette. The Missionary organization is here to bring Light. The Light of Jesus Christ. Shall not the Christians do as much for their Savior as these people are doing for private gain? -.,, .-pu-:nu-yur-wi . . A Craftsman

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46 THE LINGUIST THE NEW LEARNING AND THE STUDENT. just as the spirit of the old classic scholar was characteristic of old China, so the Student Movement at present is the most significant evidence of her new day. The student has dominated China in her sleeping, and he is also leading her in her awakening. What could be more typical of that ancestor-bound China of only a few decades ago than the slavish confinement of the student to the ancient Classics of Confucius and Mencius? Generation after generation memorized the words of these remote sages and none dared the sacrilege of a new idea. From time to time they repaired to the now fabled examination halls, there to shuffle the phrases of the Classics into new arrange- ments, and for this accomplishment to receive their degrees, only to return and teach their children that they in their day might repeat the endless round. That was education, as China knew it, until about twenty years ago. But today, how ditiferent! Today there are 10,000 students in twenty-hve modern colleges and universities throughout the country, the growth largely of the last decade. Each year increasing numbers of students are going abroad to continue their study, and even those who remain at home are satisfied with nothing less thana world scope in their thinking. Such men as Haeekel, Bergsen or Tolstoy are referred to with scarcely less familiarity than Motzu, Yang Chu or Hsu Ch'ing. Probably nowhere else in the world would John Dewey and Bertrand Russel have been givena larger welcome or a more eager hearing than that accorded by the Chinese students. The college libraries and reading rooms are continually occupied, and more than live hundred student magazines, touching on every subject under the sun, havesprung up almost overnight. China is experiencinga true Rennaissanee. , While the old scholars dared to question nothing, those of the present leave nothing go unquestioned. The family, the most sacred institution in all Chinese life, is held up and examined just as fearless- ly as the questions of industry, or philosophy, or government., And we may be sure that in such an atmosphere the religions are receiving their shareof attention,-- and especially Christianity, for it is the religion of 'the West, the religion of largest present interest to China. In this examination there is not the restraint of reverence fer an established order, nor is there the tolerance which with us grows out of the gradual development of our views from childhood onward. The questions cover anything from the existence of God to the truth of the Scriptures, and often begin with a query as to the need for any religion at all. Under such scathing examination, the Church, the Scriptures, and every phase of Christianity is being tested, with, we hope, ultimately good effect. Itis interesting in this connection to see how the person of Christ stands out unscathed in the attack, and is being made the rallying point of Christians throughout the Student world,

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48 'FI-ll? LINGUIST JOTTINGS FROM CHINESE IIISTCRY ',l'I-Ili GROWTI-I AND 1'lX'I'lf1N'll OF T1--lkl CHURCH IN Cl-UNA. The jesuits, coming to China by way of the overland routes. began their work as early as 1600. Matteo Ricci and joannes Adam Schaal figure prominently in Chinese annals. They made no attempt to interfere with Chinese customs like ancestor worship and idol wor- ship, so no hostility was encountered. By 1636 no fewer than 340 treatises had been published,-some on religion, some on natural philosophy and mathematics. The troubles attending the fall of the Mings had a serious effect on the work of the Jesuits, but it revived under the Manchus. Protestant Christianity began to come to China about the middle of the last century. The period previous to 1900,-the year of the Boxer Uprising,-can be called the Pioneer Period, the planting-time of the Church in China. It took Christianity into every province, altho in many cases the occupation was weak. In North China the era of greatest advance was the decade immediately preceding the Boxer Movement. During this time mission stations increased nearly four- fold. The China Inland Mission and the Church Missionary Society were particularly active. The Christian Church was largely known but little understood. lt was supported by treaties which gave it a political tinge much enhanced for a time,-about 1900,--through in- demnities and special privileges granted to Roman Catholic priests. Suspicion on the part of the officials and misunderstanding on the part of the people were the predominating attitudes before 1900. Then came the Boxer Uprising against Western expansion, which included Christianity as something also Western. Territorially it affected only one tenth of China, but the effect went deep into the whole country and into the whole life of the Christian Movement. How real was the stoppage of Christian work is shown from the fact that all the schools in the north and west of China were temporarily abandoned or closedg churches, chapels, and other foreign property were looted, burned, or destroyedg hundreds of native Christians and employees, as well as many missionaries were massacred. ' But the Boxer Movement came as a stimulus. 'It focussed thc attention of the world on China, and the attention of China upon her- self. Pagan superstition gave an exhibition of its futility which will never be forgotten. The two decades since 1900 have been distinctly revolutionary in tendency. More significant than any other change has been that in the temper ofthe people. China is now moving in the direction of a Chinese Church giving in its own terms its Christian belief. There is no longer that passive Chinese acquiescence in Christianityg the Chinese Church is now positively reacting to its inner message. Since 1900 it has entered into its own experience: it is no longer dependent only on the experience of the missionaries. It is making an earnest attempt to live first thc spirit of Christ, and in addition to promoting the salvation of the individual it is now trying to put him to work. China today is not the China of 20 years