EASTERN IDEALS. REVIVAL OF NATIONAL SPIRIT.

Evening Post, Volume LXXXI, Issue 22, 27 January 1911, Page 7

EASTERN IDEALS. REVIVAL OF NATIONAL SPIRIT.

RESENTMENT AGAINST FOREIGNERS. THE COLOURED LABOUR QUESTION. ADDRESS BY LORD CURZON. By Telegraph.— Press Association.— Copyright. LONDON, 26th January. Lord Curzon, in delivering his rectorial address at Glasgow University, discussed the demand of the East for representative institutions. There had been an enormous change during the decade. The personal ruler still appeals to the Oriental, but where absolutism has been accompanied by a defiance of the national spirt the East- is willing to borrow Western methods. This was a symptom of tho reviving self-con-sciousness of the Orientel mind. Referring to the coloured labour objections of Australia, South Africa, Canada, and America. Lord Curzon said objections were not based on prejudice alone, but had an economic justification. There was a danger lest the friction should attain serious proportions. The British, with their liberal and humanitarian ideas, should be tho leaders against such a prejudice, especially as the coloured races within the Empire outnumbered the whites. The Eastern world seemed everywhere to be evolving a revived sense of'national pride, coupled with resentment against foreigners. Possibly if foreign capital and protective instruments were withdrawn the East would incontinently collapse, but the East was aspiring to walk alone, and behind that desiro was a certain feeling of injured self-respect. The East was unlikely to accept Christianity. lhe future oi China, continued the Lord Rector, depended mainly on whether Parliamentary Government) will have a dissolvent effect inside the Empire. If China is able to preserve her unity and organise her industry and commerce, she must become one of the greatest. Powers. The self-centred and unwarlike character of th 6 Chinese, however, rendered it improbable they would utilise their power for aggression. China contains enough unoccupied territory for double its present population. Japan's principal need was to preserve the national virtues of self-sacrificing patriotism and simplicity, which keen observers reported were in some jeopardy ; and also to check Socialistic doctrines _ among the industrial proletariat. Korea, Manchuria, and Saghalien\ would suffice Japan's surplus population for awhile, but if the present altitude of America and the British overseas Dominions, in prohibiting Asiatic immigration were maintained it might lead to a conflict. The Philippine Islands were perilously near Japan, but were within the tropics, where it was doubtful if the Japanese were able to settle and work.