The spectacle of suffering does not of itself rouse any sympathetic pain
in the average Chinaman; in fact, he seems to find it mildly agreeable.
Their history, and their penal code before the revolution of 1911, show
that they are by no means destitute of the impulse of active cruelty;
but of this I did not myself come across any instances. And it must be
said that active cruelty is practised by all the great nations, to an
extent concealed from us only by our hypocrisy.

Cowardice is prima facie a fault of the Chinese; but I am not sure that
they are really lacking in courage. It is true that, in battles between
rival tuchuns, both sides run away, and victory rests with the side that
first discovers the flight of the other. But this proves only that the
Chinese soldier is a rational man. No cause of any importance is
involved, and the armies consist of mere mercenaries. When there is a
serious issue, as, for instance, in the Tai-Ping rebellion, the Chinese
are said to fight well, particularly if they have good officers.
Nevertheless, I do not think that, in comparison with the Anglo-Saxons,
the French, or the Germans, the Chinese can be considered a courageous
people, except in the matter of passive endurance. They will endure
torture, and even death, for motives which men of more pugnacious races
would find insufficient--for example, to conceal the hiding-place of
stolen plunder. In spite of their comparative lack of _active_ courage,
they have less fear of death than we have, as is shown by their
readiness to commit suicide.

Avarice is, I should say, the gravest defect of the Chinese. Life is
hard, and money is not easily obtained. For the sake of money, all
except a very few foreign-educated Chinese will be guilty of corruption.
For the sake of a few pence, almost any coolie will run an imminent risk
of death. The difficulty of combating Japan has arisen mainly from the
fact that hardly any Chinese politician can resist Japanese bribes. I
think this defect is probably due to the fact that, for many ages, an
honest living has been hard to get; in which case it will be lessened as
economic conditions improve. I doubt if it is any worse now in China
than it was in Europe in the eighteenth century. I have not heard of any
Chinese general more corrupt than Marlborough, or of any politician more
corrupt than Cardinal Dubois. It is, therefore, quite likely that
changed industrial conditions will make the Chinese as honest