CONTENT OF CHINESE EDUCATION 29 



THE CONTENT OF CHINESE EDUCATION 1 



BY CHARLES KEYSER EDMUNDS, Ph.D., 



CANTON CHRISTIAN COLLEGE 



1 1 THAT China is at present in a state of transition along all lines, 

 -*- but especially in educational matters, is patent to all observers. 

 To-day we should distinguish between the old China and the new 

 China. In order to understand the transition now under way we 

 must, of course, consider the forces that have made and characterize the 

 old China. Of these none has had greater influence than the system 

 of literary examinations by means of which civil servants have long 

 been selected. To place this examination system in proper perspec- 

 tive, it is necessary first to notice the characteristics and content of 

 elementary and preparatory education. 



It seems, though the records are sufficiently mythical, that as early 

 as 2400 B.C. there were family, town and county schools throughout 

 the empire, but then as now they bore no relation to either the national, 

 provincial or district government. The only national schools have 

 been those for Bannermen, originally on a liberal scale, but now 

 neglected. In various places provincial officers have from time to 

 time opened schools for military, naval or special purposes. Chinese 

 f colleges/ so-called, are merely advanced schools of grammar, rhetoric 

 and fine writing. 



In the primitive period books were few and the youth depended 

 on oral teaching, and the schools in eastern Asia as in western Asia 

 and Greece were ambulatory. Though at a great disadvantage in the 

 matter of libraries as compared with modern students, there were sev- 

 eral compensating circumstances which made the ancient schools su- 

 perior as formers of character, for practical morality was the great 

 object, and intellectual discipline ranked subordinate. In such work 

 the character of the teacher was the prime factor, and the question- 

 and-answer method forced on them by the lack of books excited inquiry 

 and fostered originality. Now only the forms and names of this 

 period remain without the reality. 



While there is not and practically never was a school system in 

 China, a method of instruction has prevailed, not only very ancient, 



1 Chinese education of the type described in this article has been abolished 

 by imperial edict of September 2, 1905; but as yet the actual transformation 

 has not progressed far enough to justify the use of the past tense. 



