for Your Ladship's informalin.
I have the hover to be,
Your Sexdolipi
That obedient servant,
Ratud frums Murdonnell,
18 bay
∞
BBB
Governor.
THE CHINA MAIL.
HONGKONG, FRIDAY, MARCH 5, 1887,
THE PEKING FOREIGN BOARD ON WESTERN EDUCATION IN CHINA.
We have been favoured with the following translation of an important Memorial by the Foreign Board at Peking, relating to the establishment of the proposed School for the study of European sciences, the first memorial upon which subject we recently copied from the Shanghai newspapers.
MEMORIAL by the Chinese Board of Foreign Affairs setting forth the arguments in favour of the study of astronomy and mathematics, and proposing regulations to this end.
Your Majesty's servants present a respectful memorial in which they submit the views they have formed respecting the study of Astronomy and Mathematics, and an extended system for calling forth candidates, both private and official, for examination.
They humbly premise by observing that they have already, on the 5th day of the 11th month, (December 11th 1866), presented a memorial in which, in consequence of the existing need for pursuing astronomical and mathematical study with a view to the construction of machinery and firearms, they proposed the institution of a school in addition to that of the Tung Wen Kwan (the school for languages) and the selection of Manchoo or Chinese literary graduates of the second class or of the five subsidiary degrees of the same class, as also of officials of the 5th rank and below it who are already in actual employ, whether at Peking or in the Provinces, who should be enrolled after selection by examination, and the engagement by Europeans as instructors for the school, the regulations for which were to be carefully framed in detail and submitted for approval on the Imperial assent being signified to the proposition. In reply to the Memorial a decree has been issued, commanding that the proposition it contains be carried into effect, as has reverently been placed on record.
Your servants now proceed to observe that the proposal for inviting candidates to examinations for the study of astronomy and mathematics does not in any wise imply a study due to mere curiosity and love of strangeness or deriving its impulse from the arts and science of the men of the West. It is simply that, inasmuch as the methods followed by Europeans in their manufacture of machinery are in every case derived from the knowledge of mensuration and numbers, now that China has formed the desire to study the principles of the construction of steamships and machinery, unless Western teachers are made use of as guides to expound the fundamental principles of construction which form the basis of mechanical skill, and the attempt be made to be our own instructors, a useless waste of the public money without advantage to the actual necessities of the time may be apprehended as the result. Your Servants have accordingly weighed this subject with repeated deliberation before setting forth the statement of their views. If, however, the matter be viewed without careful reflection, there will doubtless be some who will hold that the undertaking mooted by Your Servants is a matter brought forward without urgent necessity, and others who will deem it wrong to abandon the methods in vogue in China for the purpose of following in the footsteps of Europeans; whilst there will even be some who will maintain that for men of China to apply themselves to study under European instruction is a thing deeply to be ashamed of. Such views as these, however, only spring from lack of discernment in the questions of the day.
73 $4390/67.
The necessity that China should devise means for giving strength to herself has by this time reached its highest extreme, and no man of discernment believes otherwise than that the way to strengthen ourselves consists in pursuing certain of the European studies and in the manufacture of foreign appliances. Among the Provincial Viceroys, such men as Tso Tsung-fang and Li Hung-chang have been able clearly to appreciate this principle, and to adhere firmly to its enunciation; and in their memorials they have constantly dwelt at length upon the subject. Last year, Li Hung-chang established a Factory at Shanghai, to which officers and men selected from among the troops of the capital have been sent for purposes to study; and quite recently Tso Tsung-tang has also requested permission to set on foot an Institute of Arts in Fukien, to select youthful and promising students and to engage foreigners as instructors of spoken and written languages and of mathematics and designing, to serve as a stepping-stone to the future construction of steamships and machinery. When the subject is thus regarded, it is plain that it is impossible to do otherwise than pursue the study of Western knowledge, and that this is not by any means the mere unsupported opinion of Your Majesty's present few Memorialists.
It may indeed be objected that transactions such as the hiring of steamships and the purchase of foreign arms, have already been carried out at the various Ports, and it may be asked, this plan being at once convenient and economical, what need exists for further trouble and expense? Views such as those are due to insensibility of the fact that the study which China stands in need of is in no wise confined to steamships, muskets, and artillery; but even on the ground of steamships and firearms, although the plan of hiring and purchasing as occasion dictates is a convenient one, yet by such a course the art of their production remains for ever in the hands of others, whilst by studying to elucidate their principles of origin, both the art is made intelligible and its practical application is placed within our power. The one course is an expedient to meet the requirements of circumstances, the other is a plan adapted to lasting needs; which of the two is the right one it requires no discussion to make clear.
This is the ...
The idea that it is wrong to abandon Chinese methods and to follow in the steps of European may also be dilated upon. It is to be remarked that the germ of Western sciences is in fact originally borrowed from the Heaven-sent elements of Chinese knowledge. The eyes of Western philosophers having been turned towards the East, and the genius of these men being minutely painstaking and apt for diligent thought, they have succeeded in pursuing study to new results. For these they have usurped the name of sciences brought from overseas; but in reality the methods (of their philosophy) are Chinese methods. The case with astronomy and mathematics, and it is equally so with the remaining sciences. China has originated the method, which Europeans have received as an inheritance. If now China be enabled to exalt herself to (their) level, and we thoroughly master the fundamental knowledge of these affairs, we shall no longer need to seek aid abroad when circumstances arise, and the advantages in this respect will assuredly be neither slight nor few. Moreover, the sciences of Europe were highly appreciated by your Majesty's sacred ancestor, the Emperor Benevolent (K'ang-Hi). During his reign, Europeans were ranged among the officials of the Court, were appointed as functionaries of the astronomical department: they were included in like favour with that which embraced their colleagues; in its comprehensive largeness the Imperial wisdom knew no distinction of country. Neither is it fitting that among the canons of the past which our reigning House upholds, ...