CHAPTER XXVI
THE NEED OF A UNIVERSITY EXPLAINED (continued)
The Committees at Oxford and Cambridge had not been without hope that the missionary world would accept the scheme readily once it was well understood.
They had had the advantage of many interviews with missionaries and others in London at their joint meetings so as to make it a matter of some certainty that a large portion of the Western educators of China would agree with them. But they were rather doubtful whether the scheme would be welcomed by the Chinese official world.
The commercial world in London that had dealings with China was rather pessimistic. They held the view that you only had to mention the word Christian or missionary to a Chinese official and it would have the same effect that the word rats has on a terrier. But as I have before related, we were agreeably surprised to find at the very outset that the Chinese official world were far from hostile, and that we were given, unasked, letters of introduction, whose contents I did not know except that they procured for us a welcome in China which was as surprising as it was delightful. I learnt in China that knowledge and learning is so loved and respected that those whose object is its dissemination will ever find a ready welcome, and I learnt also that whatever may have been their sentiments in the past, in the present the Chinese have no hatred towards Christianity, but they regard it as one of the least odious parts of the Western civilisation which has become for them a necessity. I had also the privilege of seeing His Excellency Tong-Shao-Yi in London, and he did not discourage the plan.
When we arrived at Harbin we found an official ready to receive us who had been sent to welcome the scheme to China. His instructions were to accompany us to Kwangchangtzu and to watch over our comfort. As he only spoke Chinese, conversation was difficult; but with the aid of a member of the Imperial Customs we gathered the object of his mission. At Mukden we met with a similar civility. I was invited to dine at the Yamen. I shall always remember my drive to that dinner. At Mukden no carrying chairs are used, but a springless cart, in which the traveller, or more accurately the sufferer, reclines. I was late for dinner, so the order was given to the charioteer to drive quick, and as we bounded over the unpaved streets of a Manchurian town I had an opportunity of realising one of the minor discomforts of Chinese missionary life. At the Yamen the same civility was shown to the scheme, and next day Dr. Ross, my kindly host, took me to see a Manchu noble of high rank. He was more than encouraging. He first sounded the note that I found vibrating through the whole of China. He asked why did not the West concern itself with such things as education, which benefit man, rather than with war, which produces such endless suffering and misery.
At Peking I met some great officials who all were favourable, but it was not till we got south that we encountered what can only be described as enthusiasm for Western education. One gentleman advised that such an institution should be started at once, and recommended the recall of all students studying in Western lands to fill its ranks. Another who was interpreting was not satisfied with the prudent official reply I received that the plan was good, but that I must make inquiries at Peking. He added: "Make inquiries at Peking; but if they refuse, go on with your scheme all the same." A body of young men who had been educated at Boone College sent a petition that the scheme should be forthwith undertaken, but perhaps the most remarkable experience was that which I had at Shanghai. I was entertained by thirteen of the gentry who had all received their education in the West. We discussed every aspect of the plan, and when I pressed upon them that one of the good results of the University would be that it would have a healthy moral environment, an old man turned to his companions and said: "We have ourselves had experience of this. The environment in which we lived when we were in the West was different from that in which we found ourselves when we returned to Shanghai, and did not it largely affect our lives?" After we had talked some time the question was put plainly to them: "Would they support such a University?" One of them turned round and said: "Of course we should. It is obvious that if you will give us in China the same sort of University as there is in England, if only on the score of expense, we shall want to send our sons there; besides which no one likes parting from their children and leaving them in a distant land."
I discussed the matter with a Chinese statesman in Peking. I asked whether Peking would not be a good centre, but he was very adverse to the idea, because he said that Peking had such a bad moral tone that boys would not be able to do any good work, and that he himself far preferred that Chinese boys should be sent at ten years old to England to receive their whole education in our country. When we pointed out to him how, except in the case of a few rich men, such a course would be quite impossible, he said: "Then put your University right away in the western hills out of reach of the immoral influences of a town." There can be few more eloquent testimonies to the necessity of another University; nothing but a Christian University could succeed in creating the moral atmosphere, which this wise man saw was the power of the West. In the same conversation he gave a further testimony to the power of Christianity, all the more striking that it was uttered by a man who was not a Christian. He said: "Yes, I have no doubt that all that is good in the West comes from Christianity."
All the officials we interviewed always ended their encomiums on the suggested scheme by a saving clause to the effect that, before we did anything, we must ask his Excellency Chang-Chih-Tung. When we passed through Peking the first time we failed to see him, and it was therefore with some anxiety I sought an interview with him on our return journey.