Jasper County Democrat, Volume 13, Number 20, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 15 June 1910 — SONGS TO AWAKE CHINA. [ARTICLE]

SONGS TO AWAKE CHINA.

Used by the Progressive Element to Spread Modern Ideas. The progressive element in China has seized upon the folk song as a vehicle for spreading modern ideas, says Albert May bon in * L’Opinion of Paris. The old Chinese notion of patriotism mainly resolved itself into a system of emperor worship, but the new generation is becoming imbued with more democratic ideas, veneration for the motherland taking the place of the cult of the son of heaven. The writer gives extracts from new popular song books, which he says are being distributed in native schools throughout, the length and breadth of the empire from Nanking to Mukden. Some of the folk songs are modernized adaptations from ancient epics, others deal with political and other questions of the day. Most noticeable is the fact that through all of them runs the martial spirit. To be respected China must be a nation in arms is the keynote. of the modern Chinese educator.

George Washington is the favorite example! df lofty and pure patriotism. Lord Byron also comes in for praise, and Greece’s struggle for liberty against Turkey furnishes a topic. Lessons drawn from Russia’s defeat by Japan are paramount in all these patriotic song books. . Another favorite_aong has for its theme the fate of dead nations, crushed under the conqueror's heel, such as Poland. Even the “Marseillaise” has been translated. Exhortations to loyalty toward the reigning dynasty are curiously scarce. One collection of songs entitled “The New China,” which is published in Shanghai, recounts the glorious deeds of Chinese warriors and legislators in past ages, and blames tjie present regime for defeats at home and unavenged humiliations abroad. The Manchus, it says, are doomed to decadence. • The beauties of suburban life In New Jersey seem to appeal to many persons having a plentitude of this world's goods, and in Morris County it is the beast of the inhabitants that 75 millionaires now make their homes there.