Of civilised peoples, China has had least intercourse with the outer world. The Chinese knew too little of other races to imitate them; they did not come into conflict or co-operation with others, save in a very partial manner at long intervals of time, or only with their Mongol conquerors, whom they despised as inferior to them in everything but warfare, and whom they abhorred. Hence, in spite of the homogeneity of the people, of the common culture, and of the vast influence of great teachers, national consciousness and the group spirit in all its forms remained at a low level. Hence, a great deficiency in those virtues which have their root in the social consciousness; a low standard of public duty, a lack of the sense of obligation to society. Hence, the corruptness and hollowness of all official transactions and political life. Want of honesty in public affairs is not the expression of an inherent defect of the Chinese character; for in commercial relations with Europeans the Chinaman has proved himself extremely trustworthy, much superior indeed in this respect to some other peoples. It is probable that, if China, like Europe, had long ago been divided into a number of nations, each of them, through action and reaction upon the rest, would have developed a much fuller national consciousness than exists at present and some considerable degree of public spirit and would consequently have advanced very much farther in the scale of social evolution, instead of standing still as the whole people has done for so long.
Everywhere we can see the illustrations of this law. Of all forms of intercourse, conflict and competition are the most effective in developing national consciousness and character, because they bring a common purpose to the minds of all individuals; and that is the condition of the highest degree and effectiveness of collective mental action and volition. It is under these conditions that the idea of the nation and the will to protect it and to forward its interests become predominant in the minds of individuals; and the more so the greater the public danger, the greater and the more obvious the need for the postponement of private ends to the general end.
Already there is beginning to develop a European self-consciousness and a European purpose, provoked by the demonstration of the hitherto latent power of Asia; and, if a federation of European peoples is ever to be realised, it will be the result of their further development through opposition to a great and threatening Asiatic power, a revived Moslem empire, or possibly a threatened American domination[90].
Although war has hitherto been the most important condition of the development of national consciousness, it is not the only one; and it remains to be seen whether industrial or other forms of rivalry can play a similar part. Probably, industrial rivalry cannot; the accumulation of wealth is too largely dependent upon the accidents of material conditions to become a legitimate source of national satisfaction; for, unlike the satisfaction arising from successful exertion of military power, it does not imply intrinsic superiorities. If the natural conditions of material prosperity could be equalised for all nations, then the acquisition of superior wealth, implying as it would superior capacities, might become a sufficiently satisfying end of national action; just as the equalisation of conditions among individuals in America has for the present rendered the accumulation of wealth a sufficient end, because such accumulation implies superior powers and is the mark of personal superiority.
Other forms of rivalry—rivalry in art, science, letters, in efficiency of social and political organisation, even in games and sports, all play some part; and it is possible that together they might suffice to constitute sufficient stimulus, even though the possibility of war should be for ever removed[91].
But national self-consciousness is not developed by conflict and rivalry only. It is refined and enriched by all other forms of intercourse. In studying other peoples, their organisation and their history, we become more clearly aware of the defects and the qualities and potentialities of our own nation. And in this way, refinement of national consciousness is now going on rapidly in the European peoples. The latest considerable advance is due to the observation of Japan; for this has clearly demonstrated the imperfection of many conceptions that were current among us and has brought a certain abatement of national complacency and a greater earnestness of national self-criticism, which is highly favourable to increase of national self-knowledge[92].
We might place nations in a scale of nationhood. The scale would correspond roughly to one in which they were arranged according to the degree to which the public good is the end, and the desire of it the motive, of men’s actions; this in turn would correspond to a scale in which they were arranged according to the degree of development and diffusion of the national consciousness, of the idea of the nation or society as a whole; and this again to one in which they were arranged according to the degree of intercourse they have had with other nations. At the bottom of the scale would stand the people of Thibet, the most isolated people of the world; near them the Chinese, who also have until recently been almost entirely excluded from international intercourse. Such peoples have a national consciousness and sentiment which is extremely vague and imperfect. They do not realise their weakness, their strength or their potentialities, but have an unenlightened pride without aspiration for a higher form of national life. A little above them would stand Russia, which has remained for so long outside the area of European international life. While at the top of the scale would be those nations which have borne their part in all the strain and stress and friction of European rivalry and intercourse.
These degrees of international intercourse have been very largely determined by geographical conditions; isolation, and consequent backwardness in national evolution, being in nearly every case due to remoteness of position. The most important factor of modern times making for more rapid social evolution is probably the practical destruction or overcoming of the barriers between peoples; for thus all peoples are brought into the international arena, and their national spirit is developed through international intercourse and rivalry.
It is this increasing contact and intercourse of peoples, brought about by the increased facilities of communication, which has quickened the growth of national self-consciousness throughout all the world and has made the principle of nationality or, more properly, the desire for nationhood and for national existence and development, for self-assertion and for international recognition, the all-important feature of modern times, overshadowing every other phenomenon that historians have to notice, or statesmen to reckon with.
The American nation is interesting in this connexion. If we ask—Why is their public life on a relatively low level, in spite of so many favouring conditions, including a healthy and strong public opinion?—the answer is that they have been until recently too much shut off from collective intercourse with other nations, too far removed from the region of conflict and rivalry. And judicious well-wishers of the American nation rejoice that it has recently entered more fully into the international arena, and has not continued to pursue the policy of isolation, which was long in favour; because, as is already manifest, this fuller intercourse and intenser rivalry with other nations must render fuller and more effective their national spirit, develop the national will and raise the national life to a higher plane, giving to individuals higher ends and motives than the mere accumulation of wealth, and removing that self-complacency as regards their national existence which hitherto has characterised them in common with the peoples of Thibet and China.