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CHAPTER IX.FLEXIBLE INFLEXIBILITY.THE first knowledge which we acquire of the Chinese is derived from our servants. Unconsciously to themselves, and not always to our satisfaction, they are our earliest teachers in the native character, and the lessons thus learned we often find it hard to forget. But in proportion as our experience of the Chinese becomes broad, we discover that the conclusions to which we had been insensibly impelled by our dealings with a very narrow circle of servants are strikingly confirmed by our wider knowledge, for there is a sense in which every Chinese may be...

CHINESE CHARACTERISTICSCHAPTER V. THE DISREGARD OF TIMEIT is a maxim of the developed civilisation of our day, that "time is money." The complicated arrangements of modern life are such that a business man in business hours is able to do an amount and variety of business which, in the past century, would have required the expenditure of time indefinitely greater. Steam and electricity have accomplished this change, and it is a change for which the Anglo-Saxon race was prepared beforehand by its constitutional tendencies. Whatever may have been the habits of our ancestors when they had l...

CHINESE CHARACTERISTICSCHAPTER IV. POLITENESS ''THERE are two quite different aspects in which the politeness of the Chinese, and of Oriental peoples generally, may be viewed — the one of appreciation, the other of criticism. The Anglo-Saxon, as we are fond of reminding ourselves, has, no doubt, many virtues, and among them is to be found a very large percentage of fortiter in re, but a very small percentage of suaviter in modo. When, therefore, we come to the Orient, and find the vast populations of the immense Asiatic continent so greatly our superiors in the art of lubricating the f...

CHINESE CHARACTERISTICSCHAPTER III.  INDUSTRYIndustry is defined as habitual diligence in any employment—steady attention to business. In this age of the world industry is one of the most highly prized among the virtues, and it is one which invariably commands respect.The industry of a people, speaking roughly, may be said to unite the three dimensions of length, breadth and thickness; or, to use a different expression, it may be said to have two qualities of extension, and one of intension. By the quality of length, we mean the amount of time during which the industry is exercised. By th...

CHINESE CHARACTERISTICS CHAPTER II.  ECONOMYThe word Economy signifies the rule by which the house should be ordered, especially with reference to the relation between expenditure and income. Economy, as we understand the term, may be displayed in three several ways, by limiting the number of wants, by preventing waste, and by the adjustment of forces in such a manner as to make a little represent a great deal. In each of these ways, the Chinese are, pre-eminently, economical. One of the first things which impresses the traveller in China is the extremely simple diet of the people. T...

(1894 version) Chinese Characteristics CHAPTER I. FACEFace AT first sight nothing can be more irrational than to call that which is shared with the whole human race a "characteristic" of the Chinese. But the word "face" does not in China signify simply the front part of the head, but is literally a compound noun of multitude, with more meanings than we shall be able to describe, or perhaps to comprehend. In order to understand, however imperfectly, what is meant by "face," we must take account of the fact that as a race the Chinese have a strongly dramatic instinct. The t...