COULD THE CHINESE SUPPORT A CHURCH?
By Isaac T. Headland
BY ISAAC T. HEADLAND.
[Professor in Peking University.] VERY many people talk as if the Chinese are so poor that they would not be able to support a church even if it were well established here. Such a supposition is a great mistake. Not to mention the fact that they are supporting four religions—Confucianism, Buddhism, Taoism, and Mohammedanism—a glance at any city or village is enough to convince one of the fact that whatever the Chinese wish to do, and undertake to do, they are abundantly able to do. The country swarms with people—poor people—people who are so very poor that there are thousands who starve every year. It is said that just outside the gate which stands immediately in front of the emperor's palace, there were more than 400 people frozen to death in a single cold night during the past winter. In front of this gate is a bridge called Beggars' Bridge, where half naked men and boys may be seen at any time (except when the emperor passes), eating food which a respectable American dog would not eat. The first time I passed here and saw it I thought they were pails of swill. But while this is all true, I doubt if it would be out of the way to say that there are more temples, and more expensive temples, in Peking than there are churches in New York. Many of them are small and only a few are very large and expensive, but in addition to these all the surrounding hills are thick with temples. Many of them, it is true, are in decay, but many are also large and well kept. There are temples of all sorts and sizes, from the little altar built outside the door of the watchman's house on the top of the wall, and the little temples by the various wells and old trees, to the great Lama temple, which covers many acres of ground and contains several thousand priests. The same condition of things may be seen in every little village. The people may all live in mud huts, but the small temple is built of good bricks, and forms a striking contrast to the homes of the villagers. The very abundance of the people, and their methods of contribution, each one giving a little, enables them to spend a vast amount of money each year in worship. But what they spend thus is only a small part of their outlay. They burn immense quantities of incense, and no one is so poor that he cannot afford this and paper money to burn at the graves of his ancestors. The Chinese are well able to support a church if they are willing to do so.—The Independent.