Commerce has forced the European tongues on many an Eastern port.Asiatic youths are flocking to Western colleges for the equipment of modern education.Our insight does not penetrate your culture deeply, but at least we are willing to learn.Some of my compatriots have adopted too much of your customs and too much of your etiquette, in the delusion that the acquisition of stiff collars and tall silk hats comprised the attainment of your civilisation.Pathetic and deplorable as such affectations are, they evince our willingness to approach the West on our knees.Unfortunately the Western attitude is unfavourable to the understanding of the East.The Christian missionary goes to impart, but not to receive.Your information is based on the meagre translations of our immense literature, if not on the unreliable anecdotes of passing travellers.It is rarely that the chivalrous pen of a Lafcadio Hearn or that of the author of "The Web of Indian Life" enlivens the Oriental darkness with the torch of our own sentiments.
Perhaps I betray my own ignorance of the Tea Cult by being so outspoken.Its very spirit of politeness exacts that you say what you are expected to say, and no more.But I am not to be a polite Teaist.So much harm has been done already by the mutual misunderstanding of the New World and the Old, that one need not apologise for contributing his tithe to the furtherance of a better understanding.The beginning of the twentieth century would have been spared the spectacle of sanguinary warfare if Russia had condescended to know Japan better.What dire consequences to humanity lie in the contemptuous ignoring of Eastern problems! European imperialism, which does not disdain to raise the absurd cry of the Yellow Peril, fails to realise that Asia may also awaken to the cruel sense of the White Disaster.You may laugh at us for having "too much tea," but may we not suspect that you of the West have "no tea" in your constitution?
Let us stop the continents from hurling epigrams at each other, and be sadder if not wiser by the mutual gain of half a hemisphere.We have developed along different lines, but there is no reason why one should not supplement the other.
You have gained expansion at the cost of restlessness; we have created a harmony which is weak against aggression.
Will you believe it?--the East is better off in some respects than the West!
Strangely enough humanity has so far met in the tea-cup.
It is the only Asiatic ceremonial which commands universal esteem.The white man has scoffed at our religion and our morals, but has accepted the brown beverage without hesitation.The afternoon tea is now an important function in Western society.In the delicate clatter of trays and saucers, in the soft rustle of feminine hospitality, in the common catechism about cream and sugar, we know that the Worship of Tea is established beyond question.The philosophic resignation of the guest to the fate awaiting him in the dubious decoction proclaims that in this single instance the Oriental spirit reigns supreme.
