Romanization, although as yet far from being accomplished,
must sooner or later come into vogue, as is patent at the first glance
at business. If commerce in the Interior is to grow to any great extent
in succeeding generations, warranting direct correspondence with the
ports at the coast and with the outside world, the Chinese hieroglyph
will not continue to suffice as a satisfactory means of communication.
No correspondence in Chinese will ever be written on a machine such as I
am now using to type this manuscript, and this valuable adjunct of the
office must surely force its way into Chinese commercial life. But only
when Romanization becomes more or less universal.
This, however, by the way.
My point is, that no matter how Occidentalized he may become, the
Chinese will never lose his national characteristics--not so much
probably as the Japanese has done. What the youth has been at home, in
his habits of thought, in his purpose and spirit, in his manifestation
of action, will largely determine his after life. Chinese mental and
moral history has so stamped certain ineffaceable marks on the language,
and the thought and character of her people, that China will never--even
were she so inclined--obliterate her Oriental features, and must always
and inevitably remain Chinese.
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