By the Golden Gate; Or, San Francisco, the Queen City of the Pacific Coast: With Scenes and Incidents Characteristic of its LifeCarey, Joseph
History
By the Golden Gate; Or, San Francisco, the Queen City of the Pacific Coast: With Scenes and Incidents Characteristic of its Life
Carey, Joseph
San Francisco (Calif.)
of the Church is properly rendered,--for it is the expansion of the
Lord's Prayer,--there will be no machine-praying, and the answer to
prayer will be rich and abundant. The contrast between the worship
of the Joss and the worship of the true God in a Christian Church is
striking and affords reflection. The former is of the earth earthy,
the latter transports the devout worshipper to the throne of the Most
High. There is no fear that the religion of the Joss-House will ever
usurp the religion of the Christian altar. Men have expressed the fear
that if the Chinese came in overwhelming numbers to America they would
endanger the Christian faith by their idolatry. But would this be
true? Has Christianity anything to dread? What impression has the
Joss-House made all these years on the life of San Francisco outside
of Chinatown? None whatever, except to make the reflecting man value
the Christian faith with its elevating influences and its blessed
hopes all the more. It is a mistake then to exclude Chinamen from our
shores on the ground that they will do harm to Christianity. On the
contrary the Church will do them good. The Gospel is the leaven which
will be the salvation of heathen men. Did it not go forth into the
Gentile world on its glorious mission, and did it not convert many
nations in the first ages? Has it lost its potency to-day? No! It is
as powerful as ever to win men from their idols and their evil lives.
The question of Chinese immigration is a large one. It has its social
and its political aspects. It is found all along the Pacific coast
that Chinamen make good and faithful servants. The outcry against them
as competing with white laborers and artisans is more the result of
political agitation for political purposes than good judgment. Where
they have been displaced on farms, in mills, in warehouses, in
domestic life, white men and women have not been found to take their
places and do the work which they can do so well. Under the Geary Act
immigration has been restricted and the numbers of the Chinese in the
United States have been gradually decreasing. In the year 1854 there
were only 3,000 Chinese in the City of San Francisco; but even then
there was agitation against them. It was Governor Bigler who called
them "coolies," and this term they repudiated with the same abhorrence
which the negro or black man has for the term "nigger." They kept on
increasing, however, until in 1875 there were in the whole State of
California 130,000. Of this number 30,000 were in San Francisco.
To-day there are only about 46,000 in California and there are not
more than thirty thousand of these in the City of San Francisco. There
are only 110,000 Chinese altogether in the United States proper. Even
the most ardent exclusionist can see from this that there is nothing
to dread as to an overwhelming influx that will threaten the integrity
and existence of our civilisation. The labour-question and the
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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