Part 20
The youth of China generally begin to study the language when they are about six years of age. Their first employment is to learn by name a certain number of easy characters, without any regard to the signification, or without understanding the meaning of one of them, consequently, without adding to the mind one single idea, for five or six years, except that of labour and difficulty. For the _name_ of a character, it may be recollected, has no reference whatsoever to its _meaning_. Thus fifty-one different characters, of as many distinct significations, have the same name of _ching_; and if ten or a dozen characters, bearing the sound of _ching_, should occur in the same page, the learner, in this stage of his education, is not instructed in the several meanings; his object is to acquire the sound, but to neglect the sense. I have been told, that a regular-bred scholar is required to get by heart a very large volume of the works of Confucius so perfectly, that he may be able to turn to any passage or sentence from hearing the sound of the characters only, without his having one single idea of their signification. The next step is to form the characters, commencing by tracing, or going over, a certain number that are faintly drawn in red ink. As soon as they are able to cover these with tolerable accuracy, without deviating from the lines of the original, they then endeavour to imitate them on fresh paper. These operations employ at least four years more of their life. Thus, a young man of fourteen or sixteen years of age, although he may be able to write a great number of characters, for each of which he can also give a name, yet, at the same time, he can affix no distinct idea to any one of them. The contrary method would appear advisable of teaching them first the signification of the simple roots, and the analysis of the compound characters, and afterwards the sounds, or, perhaps, to let the one accompany the other.
Objections of a similar nature to those now mentioned against the mode of Chinese education, have, it is true, been frequently stated with regard to the plan of educating youths in the public grammar schools of our own country; that some of the most precious years of their lives, when the faculties were in growing vigour, and the plastic mind most susceptible of receiving and retaining impressions, are wasted in poring over the metaphysics of a Latin Grammar, which they cannot possibly comprehend; and in learning by heart a number of declinations, conjugations, and syntax rules, which serve only to puzzle and disgust, instead of affording instruction or amusement: that the grammar, or philosophical part of a language, is useful only for the niceties and perfection of that language, and not a subject for boys. In all instances, perhaps, where the language to be learned is made the common colloquial language of the pupil, the objections stated against the use of the grammar may have some weight. But as this is not the case with regard to the Greek and Latin languages in Europe, nor to the written character in China, which differs widely from the colloquial, long experience may, perhaps, in both cases, have led to the adoption of the most eligible method[17].
[17] That the Chinese method, however, is defective, may be inferred from the circumstance of the present Sir George Staunton having not only acquired, in little more than twelve months, and at the age of twelve years, such a number of words and phraseology as to make himself understood, and to understand others on common topics of conversation, but he also learned to write the characters with such facility and accuracy, that all the diplomatic papers of the Embassy addressed to the Chinese government were copied by him (the Chinese themselves being afraid to let papers of so unusual a style appear in their own hand-writing) in so neat and expeditious a manner as to occasion great astonishment. It may be observed, however, that few youths of his age possess the talents, the attention, and the general information with which he was endowed.
But a youth of Europe has a very material advantage over one of China, during the time in which he is said to be poring over his Latin Grammar. He is in the daily habit of acquiring new ideas, from his knowledge of other languages. His mother-tongue supplies him with books, which he is able to comprehend, and from which he derives both entertainment and instruction. Without enumerating the great variety of these that daily engage his attention, I deem it sufficient to observe, that his Robinson Crusoe (the best book, with few exceptions, that can be put into a boy's hand) shews the numberless difficulties to which he is liable in the world, when the anxious cares of his parents have ceased to watch over him; it is there pointed out to him that, arduous as many undertakings may appear to be, few are insurmountable; that the body and the mind of man are furnished with resources which, by patience, diligence, prudence, and reflexion, will enable him to overcome the greatest difficulties, and escape the most imminent dangers. His Tom Jones, however exceptionable in those parts where human failings are represented under an amiable and alluring dress, leaves, upon the whole, a lively impression in favour of generosity and virtue, and seldom fails to excite an indignant glow against perfidy, selfishness, and brutality. The young Chinese has no such relief from his dry study of acquiring the names and representations of things that to him have as yet no meaning. He knows not a word of any language but his own.
The last step in the education of a Chinese is to analyse the characters, by the help of the dictionary, in the manner already mentioned, so that he now first begins to comprehend the use of the written character. Extracts from the works of their famous philosopher _Cong-foo-tse_ (the Confucius of the missionaries) are generally put into his hands; beginning with those that treat on moral subjects, in which are set forth, in short sentences, the praises of virtue, and the odiousness of vice, with rules of conduct to be observed in the world. The _eternal mean_, in the style and manner of the maxims of Seneca, next follows; and the art of government, with an abridgment of the laws, completes him for taking his first degree, which generally happens when he has attained his twentieth year; but in order to be qualified for any high employment, he must study at least ten years longer.
From this view of the written character, and the mode of education, it will readily occur, that little progress is likely to be made in any of the speculative sciences; and more especially as their assistance is not necessary to obtain the most elevated situations in the government. The examinations to be passed for the attainment of office are principally confined to the knowledge of the language; and as far as this goes, they are rigid to the utmost degree. The candidates are put into separate apartments, having previously been searched, in order to ascertain that they have no writing of any kind about them. They are allowed nothing but pencils, ink, and paper, and within a given time they are each to produce a theme on the subject that shall be proposed to them. The excellence of the composition, which is submitted to the examining officers, or men of letters, depends chiefly on the following points.
That every character be neatly and accurately made.
That each character be well chosen, and not in vulgar use.
That the same character do not occur twice in the same composition.
The subject and the manner of treating it are of the least consideration, but those on morality, or history, are generally preferred. If the following story, as communicated by one of the missionaries, and related, I believe, by the Abbé Grozier, be true, there requires no further illustration of the state of literature in China. "A candidate for preferment having inadvertently made use of an abbreviation in writing the character _ma_ (which signifies a _horse_) had not only the mortification of seeing his composition, very good in every other respect, rejected solely on that account; but, at the same time, was severely rallied by the censor, who, among other things, asked him how he could possibly expect his horse to walk without having all his legs!"
The construction of the colloquial, or spoken language, is extremely simple. It admits of no inflexion of termination, either in the verb, or in the noun, each word being the same invariable monosyllable in number, in gender, in case, mood, and tense; and, as most of these monosyllables begin with a consonant and end with a vowel, except a few that terminate in _l_, _n_, or _ng_, the number of such sounds, or simple syllables, is very limited. To an European they do not exceed three hundred and fifty. But a Chinese, by early habit, has acquired greater power over the organs of speech, and can so modulate his voice as to give to the same monosyllable five or six distinct tones of sound; so that he can utter at least twelve or thirteen hundred radical words, which, with the compounds, are found to be fully sufficient for expressing all his wants.
On this curious subject I am enabled to speak with great accuracy, through the kindness of Sir George Staunton, to whom, indeed, I am indebted for more information in this work than I am allowed to acknowledge. From the best manuscript Chinese dictionary in his possession, he has obligingly taken the trouble to draw out the following abstract of all the simple sounds, or words, in the Chinese language, together with their inflexions or accentuations, by which they are extended as far as any tongue can possibly articulate, or the nicest ear discriminate. The first column shews all the initial letters, or their powers in the language; the second, the number of terminations, or the remaining part of the monosyllable beside the initial; and the third, expresses the number of monosyllabic sounds that may be given to each by inflexion, or modulation of voice, and by making use of aspirates.
| Initials. | Number of terminations| Number of inflexions | Power. | to each. | or accentuations. | | | --|--------------------|-----------------------|-------------------------- 1 | Ch. as in Child. | 20 | 131 including aspirates. 2 | F. | 10 | 30 no aspirates. 3 | G. | 11 | 32 no aspirates. 4 | between H. & S. | 36 | 114 all strong aspirates. 5 | Y. | 16 | 61 no aspirates. 6 | J as in French | | |_Jour_ | 14 | 34 no aspirates. 7 | K. | 37 | 206 including aspirates. 8 | L. | 25 | 66 no aspirates. 9 | M. | 22 | 58 no aspirates. 10| N. | 23 | 56 no aspirates. 11| O. | 1 | 2 no aspirates. 12| P. | 21 | 104 including aspirates. 13| S. | 29 | 86 no aspirates. 14| T. | 17 | 105 including aspirates. 15| Ts. | 28 | 147 including aspirates. 16| between V. and W. | 13 | 39 no aspirates. 17| Sh. | 19 | 60 no aspirates. --|--------------------|-----------------------|-------------------------- | | | 17| | 342 |1331
So that in the whole colloquial language of China, an European may make out 342 simple monosyllabic sounds, which by the help of aspirates, inflexions of voice, or accentuations, are capable of being increased by a Chinese to 1331 words. And as the written language is said to contain 80,000 characters, and each character has a name, it will follow, that, on an average, 60 characters, of so many different significations, must necessarily be called by the same monosyllabic name. Hence, a composition if read would be totally unintelligible to the ear, and must be seen to be understood. The monosyllabic sound assigned to each charter is applied to so many different meanings, that in its unconnected state it may be said to have no meaning at all.
In the business of common life, the nice inflexions or modulations, that are required to make out these thirteen hundred words, may amply be expressed in about fifteen thousand characters, so that each monosyllabic sound will, in this case, on an average, admit of about twelve distinct significations. This recurrence of the same words must necessarily cause great ambiguity in conversation, and it frequently indeed leads to ridiculous mistakes, especially by foreigners. Thus, a sober missionary, intending to pass the night at a peasant's house, asked as he thought for a _mat_, but was very much surprised on seeing his host presenting him with a _young girl_; these two objects, so very different from one another, being signified by two words whose pronunciations are not distinguishable, and consequently one or the other requires to be used with an adjunct.
It was a source of daily amusement to our conductors, to hear the _equivoques_ we made in attempting to speak their language. A Chinese, when the sense is doubtful, will draw the character, or the root of it, in the air with his finger or fan, by which he makes himself at once understood.
But as some of these monosyllabic words, as I have observed of _ching_, have not less than fifty distinct significations, which the nicest tones and inflexions, even of a Chinese voice, are not able to discriminate, such words are generally converted into compounds, by adding a second syllable, bearing some relative sense to the first, by which the meaning is at once determined. Among the significations, for instance, of the monosyllable _foo_ is that of _father_, to which, for the sake of distinction, as _foo_ has many significations beside that of father, they add the syllable _chin_, implying _kindred_; thus, a Chinese in speaking of his parents invariably says _foo-chin_ for father, and _moo-chin_ for mother; but, in writing, the character of _chin_ would be considered as an unnecessary expletive, that of _foo_ being very differently made from any other called by the same name.
The grammar of this language may briefly be explained. The noun, as observed, is indeclinable; the particles _te_ or _tié_, mark the genitive, and always follow the noun; _eu_ the dative, which it precedes, and _tung_ or _tsung_ the ablative, before which they are also placed. As for example,
Nom. _gai_ love.
Gen. _gai-te_ of love.
Dat. _eu-gai_ to love.
Acc. _gai_ love.
Abl. _tung_ or _tsung gai_, from or by love. And the same in the plural.
Give me _your_ book,
_Keu go_ NE-TE _shoo_.
Dear _to_ men,
_Quei_ EU _jin_.
Come you _with_ him,
_Ne-lai_ TUNG _ta_.
The adjective is also formed from the genitive of the noun as _pai_, whiteness; _pai-tié_ white; _je_ heat; _je-tié_ hot; _lee_, reason; _lee-tié_, rational; _hau_ goodness; _hau tié_, good. But when the adjective precedes the noun, as it generally does, the particle _tié_ is omitted as,
_hau jin_, a good man.
_pai-ma_, a white horse.
_je-swee_, hot water.
The plural of nouns is expressed by prefixing some word signifying plurality, as _to-jin_, many men; _to-to jin_, a multitude of men; _chung jin_, all men; and sometimes by a repetition of the word as _jin-jin_, men.
Adjectives are compared by placing the particle _keng_ before the comparative, as
_yeou_, soft; _keng yeou_, softer.
_hau_, good; _keng hau_, better.
My book is _newer_ than yours,
_Go-te shoo_ KENG _sin ne-te_.
The superlative is marked by various particles, sometimes preceding, and sometimes following, the adjective, and it is also formed by repeating the positive, as
_hau, hau tié_, very good.
_whang-whang-tié_, very yellow.
The personal pronouns are,
_ngo_ (nasal) or _go, ne, ta, go-men, ne-men, ta-men._ I, thou, he, we, ye, they.
And they become possessives, in the same manner as nouns are changed into adjectives, by the addition of _te_ or _tié_, as
_go-te, ne-te, ta-te, go-men-te, ne-men-te, ta-men-te_. mine, thine, his, ours, yours, theirs.
The verb has likewise neither conjugation nor inflection; and the tenses, or times of action or passion, are limited to three; the present, the past, and the future. The present is signified simply by the verb, as _go lai_, I come; the past, is expressed by the particle _leo_, as _go lai leo_, I did come, or I have come; and the future is formed by placing the particle _yau_ before the verb, as _go yau lai_, I will come; or, when something very determined is meant to be expressed, the compound _yuen-y_ precedes the verb, as _go yuen-y-lai_, I am determined to come. It may be observed, however, that although these, and other particles signifying the time and mode of action, are necessary in common speech, yet, in fine writing, they are entirely omitted, which is another cause of the obscurity and difficulty that occur to strangers in the study of the Chinese character.
The two negatives _mo_ and _poo_, are of great use in the spoken language. The first is generally used with the verb _yeu_ to have, and always implies a want or deficiency, as, _mo yeu nai_, there is no milk; _mo yeu tcha_, you can have no tea, I have no tea, there is no tea, &c. _Poo_ is generally used to express qualities of an opposite nature, as, _hau_, good, _poo hau_, bad; _je_, hot; _poo je_, cold; _ta_, great; _poo ta_, little. The usual salutation between friends is _hau-poo-hau_, well, or not well?
The limits I have prescribed for the present work will not allow me to enter into a more detailed account of this singular language. What has been said may serve to convey a general idea of the written character, and the simple construction of the spoken language. I shall now endeavour, in a few words, to explain the nature and construction of the Mantchoo Tartar character, which, if the present family continue on the throne for a century longer, will, in all probability, supplant the Chinese, or will at least become the court language. In the enunciation it is full, sonorous, and far from being disagreeable, more like the Greek than any of the oriental languages; and it abounds with all those letters which the Chinese have rejected, particularly with the letters B and R. It is alphabetic, or, more properly speaking, syllabic, and the different parts of speech are susceptible of expressing number, case, gender, time, modes of action, passion, and other accidents, similar to those of European languages. This is effected either by change of termination, preposition, or interposition. The character is extremely beautiful, and it is written, like the Chinese, in perpendicular columns, but beginning on the left side of the paper instead of the right, as is the case in writing the former language.
The elements of the language are comprized in twelve classes of simple sounds or monosyllables, from the different combinations of which all the words of the Mantchoo language are formed.
These classes are distinguished by the terminations.
The first class ends in a, e, i, o, u, pronounced exactly as the Italian.
The second, in ai, ei, iei, oi, ui.
The third, in ar, er, ir, or, ur, air, &c.
The fourth, in an, en, in, &c.
The fifth, in ang, eng, ing, &c.
The sixth, in ak, ek, ik, &c.
The seventh, in as, es, is, &c.
The eighth, in at, et, it, &c.
The ninth, in ap, ep, ip, &c.
The tenth, in au, eu, iu, ou.
The eleventh, in al, el, il, &c.
The twelfth, in am, em, im, &c.
The initials are, A. E. F. H. I. K. L. M. N. O. P. R. S. T. U. Y.
To give some idea of the character, I subjoin the written elements.
1st Class. a e i o u
[Manchu letters]
2d Class. ai ei iei oi ui
[Manchu letters]
3d Class. ar er ir or ur
[Manchu letters]
4th Class. an en in on un
[Manchu letters]
5th Class. ang eng ing ong ung
[Manchu letters]
6th Class. ak ek ik ok uk
[Manchu letters]
7th Class. as es is os us
[Manchu letters]
8th Class. at et it ot ut
[Manchu letters]
9th Class. ap ep ip op up
[Manchu letters]
10th Class. au eu iu ou uu
[Manchu letters]
11th Class. al el il ol ul
[Manchu letters]
12th Class. am em im om um
[Manchu letters]
The initial characters are represented by respective marks, which being joined to these elementary terminations, generally at the upper extremity, give all the monosyllabic sounds, and the junction of these according to their various combinations all the words in the Mantchoo language. One example will be sufficient to shew the nature of such composition; thus the initials P. T. L. S. F. set before the 12th class of radicals, will stand as follows:
Pam Tem Lim Som Fum
[Manchu letters]
And if each of these syllables be respectively added to the 5th class, they will stand thus:
Pamang Temeng Liming Somong Fumung
[Manchu letters]
Of the state of their literature, and progress in science, I have little to observe. The nature of the language will almost itself determine these points. With respect to any branch of polite literature, or speculative science, little improvement seems to have been made in the last two thousand years. Indeed, there are no works in the whole empire, modern or ancient, that are so much esteemed, so much studied, and I may perhaps add, so little comprehended, as the five classical books collected and commented upon by their great philosopher _Cong-foo-tse_, who lived about 450 years before the Christian æra; and these certainly are very extraordinary productions for the time in which they were written. These works and a few writings of their favourite master, according to the annals of the country, escaped the general destruction of books, when the barbarous _She-whang-te_ ordered all the monuments of learning to be burnt, except such as treated of medicine and agriculture, about 200 years before Christ, for the absurd purpose, as they state, that he might be considered by posterity as the first civilized Emperor which had governed China, and that the records of its history might, by this mean artifice, appear to commence with his reign.