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Page 31
Professor Pierson also points out the great error of assuming that the
black and yellow races will fade away before the white, and shows it to be
far more likely that with the increased security afforded by British and
Russian rule they will increase so rapidly as to industrially force the
white race back to the higher latitudes of the north temperate zone.
Industrial commonwealths will not dispense with great armies--at least not
for a long time--but China has passed the militant age, and reached the
purely industrial. It may be said that work is a pleasure to the Chinese,
as active sports are to Western people. Continuous toil is looked upon as
a matter of course. To them it does not seem a hardship that men should
work. As a measure of the possibilities of the Orient, consider what has
been done in the western world within half a century, where the population
is much less than one-half of that of the far East. Over four hundred
thousand miles of railroad have been constructed, together with a vast,
almost incalculable system of telegraphs, to say nothing of the great
cities and common roads, or the enormous mass of productive machinery,
which has even outrun the increase of population.
In round numbers, some forty thousand millions in capital have been
absorbed in railroads alone. Add the amount absorbed in telegraphs,
telephones, steamships, and electric plants, and a thousand and one
appliances of civilization, and the total is beyond comprehension. And all
these things have yet to be created and adopted in the Oriental countries.
How rapidly the development may go on there, and what an enormous mass of
capital will be absorbed, is clearly indicated by what has been done in a
very few recent years. And so far we have left Africa entirely out of the
account, a country with a vast population and richly dowered with natural
resources and with a capacity for rapid development.
Possibly the Orientals will not suddenly become progressive to the degree
here anticipated, though Russia's eastern march has fairly rivalled our
western march; and it must be borne in mind that to develop the appliances
of western civilization we had all the experiments to make, all the crude
preliminary work to do in creating the system, which the Orient will
receive from us in its present perfected form, and be able to go on
without any mistakes, and thus enable them to adopt within a very brief
time that which we gave the labors of several generations to discover,
develop, and apply.
How enormous, then, will be their absorption of western capital and gold.
Is it still maintained that the Orientals lack the capacity for such
development? Then look at their achievements in every country to which
they have emigrated, and especially in this. Their progress here in the
industrial arts, even while they were but a handful, was so rapid that the
government was called on to restrict them. Even now the papers contain
alarming statements to the effect that Japan is invading our markets with
those specialties in the making of which we, but a little while ago,
considered ourselves superior to all the rest of the world. And no tariff
is high enough to keep them out. It is observed by all travellers in China
and other Oriental countries that there exists in as great a degree as in
the West a desire for indulgence in those things classed as mere luxuries
which, in all nations, absorb so great a share of its total wealth. Every
one who travels through the eastern countries marvels at the extraordinary
richness and delicacy of those things adopted by them for ornamentation,
luxury, and convenience. And they are of such a character as, far more
than in the western world, involves the consumption of the precious
metals. Along with the national desire to adopt that which is useful and
ornamental, a highly mimetic nature prompts them to seize upon and adapt
with singular readiness that which is brought to their notice as being
useful and constituting a salient feature of western civilization.
To sum it all up, we have in Asia somewhere near 800,000,000 of people,
who are certainly increasing by 10,000,000 a year, probably many more, and
these people pressed on by Russia on the north and west, by Great Britain
and France on the south, as well as by the wonderful energy of the
Japanese on the east. How much gold will all these people absorb in the
future? And it should not be forgotten that not only is the present
population to be supplied, but an increase of population is to be allowed
for, which at ten dollars per capita would alone absorb the entire annual
gold production above the amount used in the arts. If any one thinks this
forecast fanciful, I only ask him to consider what has been done in the
last thirty years, and then make his estimate. For what the possible
absorption of the precious metals by the Asiatic people may be, we need
only to refer to what has been done by India. By reason of the development
of her industries and resources caused by her intercourse with western
nations she has imported in net excess of exports, from the years 1835 to
1893, $750,000,000 of gold and $1,750,000,000 of silver, or about
one-seventh of the entire world's output of gold and about one-half of the
world's output of silver during that time. Professor Shaw is authority for
the statement that her demand for the precious metals is yet unabated and
great as ever. When we remember that the average population of India
during this time was only about 200,000,000, and that there are about
three times as many people yet in Asia who have even greater latent powers
to absorb the precious metals, one can form some feeble estimate of what
an exhaustive drain upon the gold and silver supply of the world will
ensue when these nations awaken and develop their resources and energies
through the stimulating influences of western ideas and example.
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