Yet we speak of the Chinese empire as an instance
of arrested growth, for which there is no salvation, except it shall
catch the spirit of progress abroad in the world. What is this progress,
and where does it come from?
Think for a moment of this significant situation. For thousands of years,
empires, systems of society, systems of civilization--Egyptian, Jewish,
Greek, Roman, Moslem, Feudal--have flourished and fallen, grown to a
certain height and passed away; great organized fabrics have gone down,
and, if there has been any progress, it has been as often defeated as
renewed. And here is an empire, apart from this scene of alternate
success and disaster, which has existed in a certain continuity and
stability, and yet, now that it is uncovered and stands face to face with
the rest of the world, it finds that it has little to teach us, and
almost everything to learn from us. The old empire sends its students to
learn of us, the newest child of civilization; and through us they learn
all the great past, its literature, law, science, out of which we sprang.
It appears, then, that progress has, after all, been with the shifting
world, that has been all this time going to pieces, rather than with the
world that has been permanent and unshaken.
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