Excerpt from China, Japan and Korea IN a book published at the end Of the year of the abdication of the Manchu dynasty and the establish ment of the Chinese Republic, I endeavoured to trace the causes, and to predict some Of the results, of that upheaval. Before proceeding to discuss the history Of the eight years which have elapsed Since that book was written, I propose to revert briefly to some of the views which it expressed and to some of the opinions which it evoked, in China and abroad. Eight years are all too brief a space of time in the life of a nation to afford any conclusive evidence as to the direction Of its political evolution; nevertheless, the course of events since 1912, and the actual position of affairs at Peking and in the provinces afford, I think, good ground for certain useful conclusions in regard to questions upon which opinion has widely differed, and still differs, in England and America. Of these, the most important is, firstly, the general question of the fitness Of the Chinese people for 2self government and, secondly, the question of Young China's aspirations and achievements in the organisation and working of representative institutions. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.