perfect in their processes that an enormous waste of twenty per cent. of the best juice is left in the cane and subsequently burned up. Modern machinery would do away with this loss, and in a recent letter from the Rev. W. N. Brewster, of Hinghua City, Fuhkien, he intimates his intention to make the effort to introduce modern sugar-cane mills in that section. Yet, with all the facilities for competition which Western manufacturers possess, native fabrics still hold their own in many parts of Asia. The products of the Indian looms are not so cheap as those of Manchester, but they are more durable, and Sir W. Hunter estimates that about three fifths of the cotton cloth used in India is woven there.1

The facilities of communication form another pressing problem throughout Asia, except where Western capital and skill have "made a highway" for transportation and intercourse. The railway is thrusting itself into China; there is already a magnificent system in India; and Japan is rapidly developing an extensive plant. Siam is as yet untouched, except in the vicinity of its capital,2 although various projects have been announced, and preliminary explorations have been

The demand for improved facilities of transportation.

which gave the country its name in the West in ancient times. The export is growing rapidly, especially in certain varieties, such as raw steam filature, in which it was half a million pounds in 1894, and three and one half millions last year. The increased export of silk is especially marked in Shanghai, where the total value last year was estimated at nearly six millions sterling. Shanghai has now twenty-five silk filatures; new factories are about to be erected in Su-chau and Hang-chau, which are close to the silk-producing districts, and it is believed that before long all the Chinese silk going abroad will be filature reeled before leaving the country. This will involve a large increase in the silk production, in consequence of the abandonment of the native method of reeling from fresh cocoons. Hitherto the silk producers have never reared more worms than could be dealt with in the ten days that elapse between the completion of the cocoon by the worm and the appearance of the moth, as the perfect insects eat their way through the cocoons to the light, and thus destroy them. But with steam filatures the cocoon is baked, or kiln-dried, so that the chrysalis is killed, and the spinning of the silk can take place at any time. The increased production thereby secured in China will probably seriously influence the production in France and Italy. Sir Robert Hart has been instrumental in introducing to China the Pasteur system of treating diseased silkworms, much to the advantage of the cultivators. Canton comes next in importance as a silk port to Shanghai, and is followed by Chifu, though the yellow silk produced in the districts for which the last is the outlet is not in demand in Europe, for the winding of it is not such as to please European manufacturers. Silk goods manufactured in China are also more largely exported."- The Mail (London Times), November 6, 1896.

1 Hunter, "The Indian Empire," p. 702. The whole chapter on "Arts and Manufactures" (pp. 700–721) is an instructive commentary on the industrial capacity and manual skill of native workmen.

2 "The solution of the most pressing problems of Siam's future is, of course,

made with a view to an entrance from Burma on the north. Throughout much of interior Asia the difficulties of transportation and intercommunication are an insurmountable barrier to development.

With

the progress of the new era of national aspiration and social advance which is opening in all parts of the world, we shall witness the acceptance of industrial facilities and their skilful use, when sufficient experience and training have made them serviceable. In the meantime industries lag under the weight of antiquated methods.

VII. THE RELIGIOUS GROUP

(Evils which deprive society of the moral benefits of a pure religious faith and practice)

The universality of religion.

THE universality of the religious instinct in mankind is now no longer an open question among the most eminent students of anthropology and ethnology. Dr. F. B. Jevons, in his recent admirable volume, defends the statement that there never was a time in the history of man when he was without religion. He shows that, although some. writers have endeavored to demonstrate its falsity by producing savage peoples alleged to have no religious ideas whatever, it is nevertheless, as every anthropologist knows, a discussion which "has now gone to the limbo of dead controversies." He confirms this judgment by show

means of communication. So long as this one and only remedy is untouched by any efforts except the present perfunctory and fictitious designs of the Royal Railway Department, so long the vast possibilities of Siamese development must remain unrealized. Take about half an hour's walk from the Grand Palace in Bangkok in any direction you please, and you find you can go no further. Not, however, because the roads are atrocious, as in Korea, or impassable, as in China. They simply do not exist-there are none. Even the great waterway, the one hope and stay of the struggling timber-dealers and despairing rice-traders, is allowed to remain in a more or less unnavigable condition for half of every year. The trade of Siam, the development of Siam, the resources of Siam, have become what they are in the teeth of almost insuperable obstacles. In this complete absence of roads, one can of course only get out of Bangkok and see anything of the country by boat-travelling either on the canals or the main river; and afterwards start from certain recognized centres, on ponies, or more often on foot, with bullocks or coolies for baggage, along the rough trails and jungle paths, created simply by the persistent tramping of feet, without artificial construction of any sort, which still do duty for Internal Communications.'"-Norman, "The Peoples and Politics of the Far East," p. 426.

1 "In South China we have nothing but the sedan-chair or the pony's back to give any variety from walking. Tens of thousands of men in South China are little more

ing that "writers approaching the subject from such different points of view as Professor Tylor, Max Müller, Ratzel, De Quatrefages, Tiele, Waitz, Gerland, and Peschel, all agree that there are no races, however rude, which are destitute of all idea of religion." This universality of religion has been identified with the social life of primitive peoples quite as much, if not more, than with their individual life. Early religion, in fact, entered into the life of the clan or tribe quite as definitely as into that of the family or individual. As Dr. Jevons writes, religion from the beginning was not an affair which concerned the individual only, but one which demanded the coöperation of the whole community; and a religious community was the earliest form of society."2 Thus, for good or for ill, the social evolution of humanity has been to a most impressive degree influenced by religious beliefs and practices, and this is especially true to-day in lands where the social and religious life of the people are largely identical. Social degeneracy has been hastened by the defects of religion, and the advance to better conditions has been stimulated by its superior qualities. The great variety of religious beliefs and practices has occasioned widely divergent tendencies in social life. The difficulty has been not so much the absence of religion as its imperfections and perversions. The history of mankind has not been irreligious, but it has been perversely erroneous and wayward in its religious tendencies.

The fact of a general religious defection.

The explanation of the religious wanderings and defections of mankind is not a matter which it is necessary to discuss here. The theory which biblical history clearly indicates is intelligible and consistent. The fact of primitive monotheism is sufficiently clear as a doctrine of Scripture, and there seems to be no good reason, based upon either philosophical or scientific data, to doubt it; but it is equally plain that early monotheism failed to hold the race in allegiance. Mankind. deserted God the Creator and turned to the creature. Man forsook the law of his Maker, turned to vain and superstitious imaginations concerning the supernatural, and through various gradations of totemism, than beasts of burden. Rice and sugar and tobacco and tea are brought for miles and miles on the shoulders of men, as the only means of conveyance, until the produce reaches some river, and is thence transported by boat.”—Rev. J. G. Fagg (Ref. C. A.), Amoy, China.

1 Jevons,

"An Introduction to the History of Religion," p. 7.

Professor Ratzel, in his "History of Mankind," remarks: "Ethnography knows no race devoid of religion, but only differences in the degree to which religious ideas are developed" (vol. i., p. 40).

2 Page 101.

fetichism, animism, idolatry, and the prostitution of religion to the service of sensuous and destructive desires, lost spiritual contact with his God and fell into deep and general apostasy. This collapse would no doubt have been universal and final had not God laid hold of a remnant of humanity, and, by spiritual touch and strenuous discipline, preserved them from the prevalent defection, and guided them by many and varied interventions into the ways of allegiance and obedience. Judaism, however, as revealed in Hebrew history, was not free from faults and gross scandals, culminating in an almost total eclipse; although in its deep and wonderful religious development, and as a preparatory training for the spiritual doctrine and the larger life of Christianity, it bears every evidence of its divine mission. In the case of other peoples, however, the spiritual defection has been a dark and overshadowing calamity, which has culminated in the long tragedy of man's spiritual history. The loss of the true God out of the consciousness of the race is a sufficient and, under all the circumstances, a perfectly natural explanation of its religious blindness, perversity, and degeneracy.

The genesis of ethnic faiths.

In the deep and awful excesses of man's sinful career there have appeared from time to time men of nobler and higher, but, alas! most defective vision, whose natures have revolted from the spiritual and sensual degradation of their environment, and some of whom have sought, upon the basis of philosophy or ethics or devout aspiration or partial rehabilitation of the remnants of truth still present in religious tradition, to reform the spiritual life of mankind. Such, we may believe, has been in the main the spirit of the purer heathen sages, and the true genesis of the great ethnic faiths of the Orient, which in most instances originated in a revolt from degeneracy, a break with pagan despair, and a struggle to establish a truer and nobler religious cult. These religious revivals, some far purer than others in their original conception, have themselves in time suffered collapse. The resulting cult has become corrupted, and in certain instances defiled by gross lapses into idolatry or compromising alliances with the flesh. There is a pathos in their aspiration, a nobility in their revolt, but, alas! a sorrowful incapacity in their vital spiritual forces to cope with the sinful perversity of the human heart. They have had their partial and imperfect messages to mankind and have helped humanity in a measure; they have brought fitful gleams of light and disproportionate religious instruction; but they have failed at vital points, and have advocated fatal compromises and concessions, which have weakened, if not in some instances wholly destroyed, their capacity to lift humanity to higher levels.

Mankind has been in some respects indebted to them, but in other respects they have proved disappointing and deceptive. The world of to-day, with its manifold miseries and iniquities, is probably as good a world as the ethnic faiths could be expected to produce.

The social value of true religion.

In considering, therefore, the social benefits which may be hoped for through religious influence, it will be seen that everything depends upon the character of the religion itself. If it is not true in doctrine and pure in practice, if it is not gifted with spiritual vitality sufficiently persuasive and vivifying to control the moral nature, if it does not, in fact, lead men to the living and true God and produce in them a transformation of character after the likeness of the Eternal Goodness, then its powerlessness dooms it to failure. The absolute essential of a true and efficient religion is that it secures reconciliation between God and man, and produces in the latter a worthy moral character. In other words, it must put sinful man into right relations with God, and so renew and purify his nature by the processes of training and soul culture that he is spiritually made over. Whatever else it does, if it does not do this in the case of its individual believers and followers, it will inevitably fail to reconstruct society after the pattern of divine righteousness. There is no basis for purified social ethics except a transformed individual character. If, however, the religious life of a community is true to the higher standards of righteousness, a high and noble religious experience will prove an immense and inspiring force in the moulding of social development. In a word, true religion is a fountain of social and national ideals, and is the source of higher ethical impulses in the State. It becomes also a conservative restraint in times of passion and excitement; it creates a respect for law, and quickens the reverence for justice; it rebukes not only individual, but social and even national selfishness; it stimulates the aspiration after liberty; it checks the spirit of revenge and retaliation; it quickens the desire for peace and conciliation; it identifies true manhood with gentleness, true courage with forbearance, true manly and womanly character with virtue. The constructive forces of society are, therefore, moral; the genesis of all true and high enthusiasm for goodness is religious. It is only through religious faith that the influence of invisible realities is brought to bear in an environment of visible things. Faith in immortality, that mighty secret of the soul, comes to us through religion. Only thus can men live here in this world "under the power of the

1 Cf. Hillis, "A Man's Value to Society," especially chap. i., "Elements of Worth in the Individual."