China and the West

Samuel Shaw reist nach China, wird krank und stirbt auf der Rückreise nach Amerika.

Jean-François-Régis Clet ist als Missionar in Hubei tätig.

Louis Antoine de Poirot wird Mandarin.

Godwin, William. An inquiry concerning political justice and its influence on general virtue and happiness [ID D27224].
Vol. 1 :
"While the French, the Greeks and the Persians have been remarkable for their gaiety, the Spaniards, the Turks and the Chinese are not less distinguished by the seriousness of their deportment."
"In China hieroglyphical writing has never been superseded by alphabetical, and this from the very nature of their language, which is considerably monosyllabic, the same sound being made to signify a great variety of objects, by means of certain shadings of tone too delicate for any alphabet to be able to represent. They have however two kinds of writing, one for the learned, and another for the vulgar. The learned adhere closely to their hieroglyphical writing, representing every word by its corresponding picture ; but the vulgar are frequent in their deviations from it. Hieroglyphical writing and speech may indeed be considered in the first instance as two languages, running parallel to each other, but with no necessary connection. The picture and the word each of them represent the idea, one as immediately as the other. But, though independent, they will become accidentally associated ; the picture at first imperfectly, and afterwards more constantly suggesting the idea of its correspondent found. It is in this manner that the mercantile classes of China began to corrupt, as is is styled, their hieroglyphical writing. They had a word suppose of two syllables to write. The character appropriate to that word they were not acquainted with, or it failed to suggest itself to their memory. Each of the syllables however was a distinct word in the language, and the characters belonging to them perfectly familiar…"
Vol. 2 :
"There are various methods by the practice of which population may be checked; by the exposing of children, as among the ancients, and, at this day, in China ; by the art of procuring abortion, as it is said to subsist in the island of Ceylon ; by a promiscuous intercourse of the sexes, which is found extremely hostile to the multiplication of the species; or, lastly, by a systematical abstinence, such as must be supposed, in some degree, to prevail in monasteries of either sex."

Godwin, William. Of population [ID D17232].
Quellen :
John Barrow
David Hume
Du Halde, Jean-Baptiste. Description géographique... de la Chine [ID D1819].
Staunton, George Leonard. An historical account of the embassy to the emperor of China [ID D1893].
Chap. VI. : Illustrations from the history of China.
Nothing can be more ludicrous than that part of Mr. Malthus's book, in which, for 698 successive pages, he professes to treat of the checks by which population has actually been kept down to the level of the means of subsistence, whether in ancient or modern times. He acknowledges that in most countries population is at a stand. He takes little notice of the many instances, both in ancient and modern times, in which it has glaringly decreased. And he affirms, upon what evidence it is one of the special objects of this book to examine, that population, if unchecked, would go on, doubling itself every twenty-five years, or in a much shorter period, for ever.
Now, if Mr. Malthus had intended a fair and full examination of this question, he should have set down, in the first place, in each country how many children, in the natural order of things, would be born, and then have proceeded, in the second place, to show how they were cut off. This would have been to have reasoned like a mathematician, like a genuine political economist, and like a philosopher. But the first of these points Mr. Malthus has uniformly omitted. He has therefore appeared to walk over the course at an easy pace, somewhat like Bobadil in the play, calling for 'twenty more, kill them too', simply by directing the keeper of the lists on no account to give entrance to a real combatant.
Since the author of the Essay on Population has omitted this essential part of the consideration, I will endeavour to supply the defect.
The fairest instance on many accounts to begin with, is that of China. In Mr. Malthus's book there is a chapter, entitled 'Of the Checks to Population in China and Japan' : and the author, having spent a number of smooth sentences on the subject, to amount of thirty-four pages, seems well satisfied that he has shewn that the actual state and history of China and Japan serve fully to confirm his opinion, that the population of the world would go on, unchecked, at the rate of doubling itself every twenty-five years or sooner.
China is a country that is supposed to be more fully peopled than any other country in the world. According to Mr. Malthus the population of that empire has been wholly at a stand for the last hundred years : for he quotes Du Halde in the beginning of the last century, to confirm the enumeration of Sir George Staunton at the end of it, and concludes that these two authorities substantially agree with each other. Now China is a country of so uniform a tenour, its manners, its customs, its laws, its division of property, and its policy continuing substantially the same, that, if the population has been at a stand during the last century, there is every reason to suppose it has been at a stand, perhaps for ten centuries. Chine therefore is the most desirable instance that can be taken, of any old country, upon which to try the doctrine of the geometrical ratio.
China has other advantages of no mean importance to the application of our argument. First, that in this empire 'extraordinary encouragements have always been given to marriage. Hume states, that every man in China is married before he is twenty, Mr. Barrow, a recent traveller, who accompanied Lord Macartney in his embassy in 1793, says, 'Public opinion considers celibacy as disgraceful, and a sort of infamy is attached to a man who continues unmarried beyond a certain time of life. As an encouragement to marriage, every male child may be provided for, and receive a stipend from the moment of his birth, by his name being enrolled on the military list. ' He adds, 'In China there are few of those manufacturing cities, which among us produce so great a waste of human life. No great capitals are here employed in any one branch of the arts. In general each labours for himself in his own profession. The still and inanimate kind of life which is led by the women, at the same time ; that it is supposed to render them more prolific, preserves them from accidents that might occasion untimely births'. So that here full scope is afforded to the principle of population.
It is somewhat remarkable that in this country, where the principle of population might reasonably be expected to have been first understood, if not in the exact period of its duplication, at least in its tremendous tendency to excess, no remedies should ever have been thought of by the governors of the country. China is something like the republic of Venice, as it stood for a period of a thousand years, famous for the profoundness of its policy, and the rigidness of its regulations. The great length of time during which its political economy has remained unchanged, implies this. All human things are subject to decay. The law of mutability is so powerful within us, that scarcely any thing is of force enough to control it. But there is somewhat of so vivifying nature in the constitution of China, as to bid defiance to corruption.
Mr. Malthus every where, up and down in the Essay on Population, preaches against the extensive use that we make of the institution of marriage, and seems to think that the great remedy we have for the miseries of mankind as arising from the principle of population, is to be found in discountenancing marriage among the poor. How shallow then are the politicians of this ancient empire, who have uniformly afforded the most 'extraordinary encouragements to marriage' !
Another circumstance is scarcely less miraculous. The exposing of children is a very common practice in China. So far, so good ; this is an obvious way of keeping down population ; though Mr. Malthus seems in some places to doubt its efficacy. But the shallow politicians of China again set themselves against this ; and edict after edict has been published to put an end to it.
The statesman of China have confessedly had the knowledge and experience of several thousand years : but experience is thrown away upon some people. The government is celebrated for the paternal spirit displayed by the head of it towards his subjects : but some fathers, though with no want of love, become the authors of misery to their children by their injudicious conduct.
I proceed however to supply that which, as before stated, Mr. Malthus has omitted, viz. an account how many children, upon the hypothesis of the Essay on Population, would be born, that we may afterwards proceed, with the more perfect preparation, to consider how they are cut off.
Mr. Malthus takes the population of China at 333,000,000. For the sake of a more convenient and compendious arithmetic I will put it down at three hundred millions. Now the doctrine of the Essay on Population is, that 'population, when unchecked, goes on doubling itself every twenty-five ears'. Therefore in China, after every proper deduction has been made for balancing the number of deaths by an adequate number of births, that so the population may not decrease, there must be an additional number of births, or a sort of superfetation, to the amount of three hundred millions every twenty-five years, to provide for the doubling required by the Essay of Population.
In other countries, we will suppose, population is more or less kept down by the various discouragements to marriage held froth in those countries, and, according to Mr. Malthus, by the late period of life at which marriage frequently takes place. But in China extraordinary encouragements are given to marriage, and every man is married before he is twenty. We may be secure therefore that in that country the full number of children is born, whatever may become of them afterwards.
Hereafter, perhaps before the close of the present century, we shall know something of the population of the United States of America. But, in the mean time, and while, in the sense of genuine statesmen and legislators, we know nothing, Mr. Malthus informs us, and lays it down as the corner-stone of his portentous and calamitous system, that 'the population there has been found to double itself, for above a century and a half successively, in less than twenty-five years', and that this 'has been repeatedly ascertained to be from procreation only'. How many children on an average to a marriage are produces in the United States ? No noe has pretended authentically to inform us. Are they more than in the old countries of Europe ? Probably not. What number of those that are born, die before ten or sixteen years of age ? Of all this we are ignorant.
But whatever be the number of the children born in the United States of America, that die before they arrive at maturity, we know that in China three hundred millions of children more in proportion than in America, die every twenty-five years. This is as certain, as the doctrine of the Essay on Population is true.
The human mind is but ill adapted to grapple with very high numbers ; and I am persuaded that important errors have been committed by theoretical writers in consequence of this infirmity. I will therefore endeavour to conform myself to the limited nature of human faculties, by reducing these numbers. It has already appeared, that three hundred millions of extra-infants must perish in China every twenty-five years, beyond the proportion of the number of infants that would perish in the United States. Now, if we divide this number by twenty-five, we shall find that twelve millions of extra-infants must perish annually in China, to support the doctrine of the Essay on Population.
This surely is a portentous sort of proposition to be built upon a theory, without a single foundation in the records of the country to support it. Mr. Malthus indeed says, that the exposing of children is a very common practice in China, and that about two thousand are annually exposed in the city of Pekin. Alas, what is this to the twelve millions of extra-infants that it is absolutely necessary should perish annually in that country ? What a scene of devastation does Mr. Malthus's doctrine lead us to see in China ! They must lie on heaps, like what we read of human bodies in the plague of Marseilles. As fast as a certain number of these infants waste away in the streets, an equal number supplies their place, so that the scene of putrescence and the noisomeness of the stench are made perpetual. Does any traveller relate that, he was witnessed this ? – And all this time the legislators of the country know nothing of the matter, and go on from century to century, giving extraordinary encouragements to marriage, and prohibiting the exposing of children.
But all this has no existence but in Mr. Malthus's book. It must be true, because in the United States 'the population has been found to double itself, for above a century and a half successively, in less than twenty-five years, and that from procreation only'. I shall hereafter proceed to consider the population of America. I have no doubt that one of these propositions is as true as the other.
I am well aware that we know nothing of the population of China, and almost as little of the of the United States. I have therefore taken these statements almost entirely from M. Malthus himself. It is for him and his disciples to explain and to reconcile them.
From all that has been said however it is perfectly clear, that the statesman and legislators of China, who have proceeded with a steady, and perhaps I may add an enlightened, attention to the subject for centuries, not only have no suspicion of the main principles taught in the Essay on Population, but are deeply impressed with the persuasion that, without encouragement and care to prevent it, the numbers of the human species have a perpetual tendency to decline.
Upon the whole therefore it is as certain, as any thing can be, from the sewing of Mr. Malthus himself, that the empire of China has never been subject to the operation of the geometrical ratio.

The New Hampshire Magazine ; Sept. (1793) published an outstanding tribute to Confucius and Chinese religion.

John Livingstone ist Arzt der East India Company in Macao und sammelt Pflanzen.

John Kendruck macht zwei weitere Handels-Reisen nach China.

José Manuel Pinto ist Gouverneur von Macao.

Vierte holländische Gesandtschaft zu Kaiser Qianlong in Beijing unter Isaac Titsingh und Andreas Everard van Braam Houckgeest. Joseph de Guignes nimmt daran teil.

Louis-François-Marie Lamiot wird Übersetzer am Kaiserhof in Beijing.

Christoph Gottlieb von Murr schickt seine deutsche Übersetzung Haoh Kjöh tschwen [ID D11114] an Friedrich von Schiller.

Kant, Immanuel. Das Ende aller Dinge [ID D17033].
Adrian Hsia : Das Wissen über Laozi war zu Kants Zeit mangelhaft. Kants Kommentare reflektieren sowohl diesen Wissensstand, wie auch eine gewisse Feindseligkeit, welche die Jesuiten Laozi gegenüber empfanden. Kant unterscheidet drei Arten vom Ende aller Dinge :
1. Das natürliche Ende, das in der Ordnung der moralischen Zwecke in Übereinstimmung mit der göttlich Weisheit ist. 2. Das mystische Ende, das schlechthin unverständiglich ist. 3. Das unnatürliche Ende, das von uns selbst herbeigeführt wird. Laozi gilt als Mystiker. Als solcher hat er nichts gemeinsam mit den intelligenten Erdenbewohner, die Kant schätzt. Es ist daher in der Natur der Dinge, dass Kant Laozis Lehre als monströs bezeichnet, weil beim chinesischen Weisen das höchste Gut das Nichts ist, d.h. im Gefühl eins mit der Unendlichkeit Gottes zu sein, indem man seine eigene Persönlichkeit zerstört und die Gottes annimmt. Um sich für dieses letzte Stadium vorzubereiten schlössen sich chinesische Philosophen in dunklen Räumen ein, wo sie sich mit geschlossenen Augen darauf konzentrieren, das Nichts zu fühlen. Kant meint, dass diese Praktik an den Pantheismus der Tibeter und anderer orientalischer Völker, d.h. der Buddhisten, erinnert. Der hebt hervor, dass das Stadium der ‚ewigen Stille’ keineswegs das Ende aller Dinge, sondern das Ende des Denkens sei. Für Kant ist es letzten Endes nur durch das Christentum erreichbar.

Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel exzerpiert Revision der Philosophie von Christoph Meiners und macht sich eine Notiz über die hieroglyphischen Schriften Chinas.

Jones, William. On the philosophy of the Asiaticks [ID D27059].
"Our divine religion, the truth of which (if any history be true) is abundantly proved by historical evidence, has no need of such aids as many are willing to give it, by asserting, that the wisest men of this world were ignorant of the two great maxims, that we must act in respect of others as we should wish them to act in respect of ourselves, and that, instead of returning evil for evil, we should confer benefits, even on those who injure us : but the first rule is implied in a speech of Lysias, and expressed in distinct phrases by Thales and Pittacus ; and I have even seen it, word for word, in the original of Confucius, which I carefully compared with the Latin translation. It has been usual with zealous men to ridicule and abuse all those who dare on this point to quote the Chinese philosopher ; but, instead of supporting their cause they would shake it, if it could be shaken, by their uncandid asperity ; for they ought to remember, that one great end of revelation, as it is most expressly declared, was not to instruct the wise and few, but the many and unenlightened."

Wakefield, Priscilla. The nature of true riches [ID D27202].
Persons
Ti-hoang, Emperor of China.
Kang-hi, a Mandarin.
Yang-ti, a Merchant.
Chiang, a Manufacturer.
Hio, a Farmer.

Ti-hoang, seated on a throne, attended by Mandarins, administering justice.
Kang-hi, (boring to the ground) Sacred emperor, true fountain of honour, your late proclamation, promising to bestow rewards upon those who can produce inventions that shall be useful, either in science or in art, has drawn many claimants, who boast of being entitled to your bounty, and are waiting without till you pleas to examine their pretentions.
Ti-hoang. The throne which supports us, is the seat of Mercy and Justice. We are entrusted with power, in order to do good. Can we perform that pious office more effectually, for the benefit of our people, than by encouraging industry and punishing idleness ? The man, of whatever rank, who devotes his time and talents to the improvement of those arts which contribute to the happiness and accommodation of the human race, may truly be called a benefactor to his species, and is entitled not only to the gratitude of his fellow-citizen, but to the rewards of royal munificence. Order these persons into our presence, that we may form a judgment of the merit of their claims, and appoint to each one a recompense proportioned to the utility of his discovery.
Kang-hi withdraws, and returns soon after, introducing Yang-ti, Chiang, and Hio.
Chiang. Mighty sovereign, the woollen manufactory is the employment in which I have been brought up. The property I inherited from my father has preserved me from the servility of manual labour, and has afforded me sufficient leisure to apply my mind to the improvement of the art by which I gain a livelihood. Stimulated by your patronage of useful inventions, I redoubled my efforts to facilitate the process of spinning and weaving wool into stuffs of the finest texture, and have succeeded, by the construction of a machine that produces yarn of more exquisite fineness than that spun by the most skilful hand. By this means I am enabled to excel my competitors in the same branch of business, both in the superior quality of my goods, and the reduction of my prices. The advantage resulting from the use of this machine is so evident, that I cannot entertain a doubt, that, as soon as it is made public, it will be universally adopted.
Ti-hoang. What is your profession, and the merit that urges you to make this application ?
Hio. Agriculture has been my occupation from my infancy, and continues to be my delight and amusement. The superfluities of my emoluments have been always applied to the perfecting my favourite study, by making experiments in husbandry ; and I have appropriated a certain portion of my land to the same purpose. After many expensive projects, I have discovered a method of artificially watering my rice-grounds, whenever I think them too dry, and of draining off the water again after they have received sufficient moisture. The success has repaid me with interest, by the fertility which crowns my fields. Smiling harvests mark the boundaries of my farm, whilst those of my neighbours are blasted by unpropitious seasons, and languish from continued drought.
Ti-hoang. Let the next claimant declare his title to our favour.
Yang-ti. My title, most powerful of monarchs, surpasses those that have preceded me. Their improvements have their value, but are employed upon gross commodities, and are more important to low manufacturers and peasants than to the great ; whilst my discovery will not only enrich myself, but will bring vast treasures into the public coffers.
The object of my researches is the hidden wealth of mines ; and I challenge any one to come forward, and prove himself superior in the art. Many veins of the inferior metals I have found out, that have produced large profits to their possessors, who have recompensed me liberally for my skill and perseverance ; but never did I raise my hopes so high as to suppose that fortune would direct me to so invaluable a source of riches. There is a certain mountain in one of the distant provinces, that I was exploring for gold ; but who can speak my raptures, upon discovering that it was filled with mines of diamonds of the finest water, the largest size, and the purest grain ! With full confidence in your majesty's approbation, I submit my pretensions to the highest prize, to your generous decision, not doubting that you will dispose of your bounty according to merit.
Ti-hoang. Come forward, Hio, and receive from our hand a reward, at once honourable and profitable. The utility of your pursuits elevates you above the rank of your equals : besides the prize destined to the most excellent invention, we shall ennoble you, by raising you to the order of Mandarins. Manufacturers are secondary to agriculture, therefore we adjudge the next prize to Chiang. Industry and ingenuity are not sufficient to render a man useful to his country, unless they are directed to objects that are of public benefit : if these talents are perverted to trifling or pernicious designs, they become baneful to the community they were intended to serve, as well as to the individual who is in possession of them. The finder of diamonds may depart, and close up those avenues to luxury and false wealth, the advantages of which he has so much boasted, tending only to corrupt the morals of the people, by converting that labour which should procure bread for the hungry, and clothes for the naked, into useless toil, for the glittering toys of pride and ambition. A mine of diamonds may amuse the curious, and gratify the taste of the opulent, but cannot supply a bushel of corn to alleviate the wants of a starving people.

Pavel Ivanovic Kamenskij ist Student der 8. Russischen Geistlichen Mission in Beijing.

Gründung der London Missionary Society, die erste protestantische Missionsgesellschaft in China.

Antoine Isaac Silvestre de Sacy ist Professeur d'arabe littéraire et vulgaire der Ecole des Langues orientales vivantes.

Gründung der Ecole spéciale des langues orientales (Ecole nationale des langues orientales vivantes) durch Antoine Isaac Silvestre de Sacy.