Chapter 29 chapter 29

Is there then no truth in Kipling s famous dictum that East is East and West is West? Of course there is. When you deal with plusequal , there is little or no difference. It is only when you come to problems as a plus b equal c that there is a great deal of difference between East and West. But to be able to solve the equation a plus b equal c between East and West, one must have real aptitude for higher mathematics. The misfortune of the world to-day is that The solution of the equation a plus b equal c in Far Eastern problems, is in the hands of John Smith who not only rules the British Empire, but is an ally of the Japanese nation, _John Smith who does not understand the elements even of algebraical problems. The solu-* Chinese employed by foreign firms in China to be agents between them and Chinese merchants.

The equation of a plus b equal c between East and West is a very complex and difficult problem. For in it there are many unknown quantities, not only such as the East of Confucius and the East of Mr. Kang Yu-wei and the Viceroy Tuan Fang, but also the West of Shakespeare and Goethe and the West of John Smith. Indeed when you have solved your a plus b equal c equation properly, you will find that there is very little difference between the East of Confucius and the West of Shakespeare and Goethe, but you will find a great deal of difference between even the West of Dr. Legge the scholar, and the West of the Rev. Arthur Smith. Let me give a concrete illustration of what I mean.

The Rev. Arthur Smith, speaking of Chinese histories, says:_ "Chinese histories are antediluvian, not merely in their attempts to go back to the ragged edge of zero of time for a point of departure, but in the interminable length of the sluggish and turbid current which carries on its bosom not only the mighty vegetation of past ages, but wood, hay and stubble past all reckoning. None but a relatively timeless race could either compose or read such histories: none but the Chinese memory could store them away in its capacious abdomen!" Now let us hear Dr. Legge on the same subject. Dr. Legge, speaking of the standard dynastic histories of China, says:

"No nation has a history so thoroughly digested; and on the whole it is trustworthy." Speaking of another great Chinese literary collection. Dr. Legge says:_"The work was not published, as I once supposed by Imperial authority, but under the superintendence and at the expense (aided by other officers) of Yuen Yun, Governor-General of Kwangtung and Kwangse, in the th year of the last reign, of Kien-lung . The publication of so extensive a work shows a public spirit and zeal for literature among the high officials of China which should keep for- eigners from thinking also of them."

The above then is what I mean when I say that there is a great deal of difference not only between the East and West but also between the West of Dr. Legge, the scholar who can appreciate and admire zeal for literature, and the West of the Rev. Arthur Smith who is the beloved of John Smith in China. A GREAT SINOLOGUE Don't forget to be a gentleman of sense, -while you try to be a great scholar; Don't become a fool, while you try to be a great scholar. Confucius Sayings, Ch: VI. II. I have lately been reading Dr. Giles "Adversaria Sinica, " and in reading them, was reminded of a saying of another British consul Mr. Hopkins that "when foreign residents in China speak of a man as a sinologue, they generally think of him as a fool."

Dr. Giles has the reputation of being a great Chinese scholar. Considering the quantity of work he has done, that reputation is not undeserved. But I think it is now time that an attempt should be made to accurately estimate the quality and real value of Dr. Giles work. In one respect Dr. Giles has the advantage over all sinologues past and present,_he possesses the literary gift: he can write good idiomatic English. But on the other hand Dr. Giles utterly lacks the philosophical insight and sometimes even common sense. He can translate Chinese sentences, but he cannot interpret and understand Chinese thought. In this respect. Dr. Giles has the same characteristics as the Chinese literati. Confucius says, "When men s education or book learning get the better of their natural qualities, they become literati."

To the Chinese literati, books and literature are merely materials for writing books and so they write books upon books. They live, move and have their being in a world of books, having nothing to do with the world of real human life. It never occurs to the literati that books and literature are only means to an end. The study of books and literature to the true scholar is but the means to enable him to inter- pret, to criticize, to understand human life. Matthew Arnold says, "It is through the apprehension either of all literature, _the entire history of the human spirit, _or of a single great literary work as a connected whole, that the power of literature makes itself felt." But in all that Dr. . Giles has written, there is not a single sentence which betrays the fact that Dr. Giles has conceived or even tried to conceive the Chinese literature as a connected whole.

It is this want of philosophical insight in Dr. Giles which makes him so helpless in the arrangement of his materials in his books. Take for instance his great dictionary. It is in no sense a dictionary at all. It is merely a collection of Chinese Phrases and sentences, translated by Dr. Giles without any attempt at selection, arrangement, order or method. As a dictionary for the purposes of the scholar. Dr. Giles dictionary is decidedly of less value than even the old dictionary of Dr. Williams.