Child of the self-same God,
He hath but stumbled in the path
We have in weakness trod.''


Ruskin reminds us that the filthy mud from the street of a
manufacturing town is composed of clay, sand, soot and water;
that the clay may be purified into the radiance of the sapphire;
that the sand may be developed into the beauty of the opal; that
the soot may be crystallized into the glory of the diamond and
that the water may be changed into a star of snow. So man in
Asia as well as in America may, by the transforming power of
God's Spirit, be ennobled into the kingly dignity of divine
sonship. We shall get along best with the Chinese if we remember
that he is a human being like ourselves, responsive to kindness,
appreciative of justice and capable of moral transformation
under the influence of the Gospel. He differs from us not
in the fundamental things that make for manhood, but only in
the superficial things that are the result of environment. From
this view-point, we can say with Shakespeare:--

``There is some sort of goodness in things evil,
Would men observingly distil it out.''


Those who are wont to refer so contemptuously to the Chinese
might profitably recall that when, in Dickens' ``Christmas
Carol,'' the misanthropic Scrooge says of the poor and suffering:
``If he be like to die, he had better do it and decrease
the surplus population,''--the Ghost sternly replies:--