Page:The Spirit of the Chinese People.djvu/45



(A Paper that was to have been read before the Oriental Society of Peking.)

ET me first of all explain to you what I propose, with youyour [sic] permission, this afternoon to discuss. The subject of our paper I have called "The Spirit of the Chinese people." I do not mean here merely to speak of the character or characteristics of the Chinese people. Chinese characteristics have often been described before, but I think you will agree with me that such description or enumeration of the characteristics of the Chinese people hitherto have given us no picture at all of the inner being of the Chinaman. Besides, when we speak of the character or characteristics of the Chinese, it is not possible to generalize. The character of the Northern Chinese, as you know, is as different from that of the Southern Chinese as the character of the Germans is different from that of the Italians.

But what I mean by the spirit of the Chinese people, is the spirit by which the Chinese people live, something constitutionally distinctive in the mind, temper and sentiment of the Chinese people which distinguishes them from all other people, especially from those of modern Europe and America. Perhaps I can best express what I mean by calling the subject of our discussion the Chinese type of humanity, or, to put it in plainer and shorter words, the real Chinaman.