Facing the new China he, while gladdened on the whole by the outlook, yet saw grave dangers in the way. Some of these are due, in his estimation, to characteristics that have rooted themselves very deeply in the spirit of the people at large. In his article on “Education in China” he said: It is a peculiarity of the Chinese character that they are very hard to convince of the utility of a new thing, and must always be doubly sure before they decide to act; but as soon as the decision is made, they at once grow recklessly impatient for the consummation. The old educational methods and ideals are now abolished and the government is rushing headlong into new and hitherto untried measures. They issue commands to their subordinates without providing the means of carrying them out. The result is a chaos of more or less futile effort, attended by burdensome taxes and illegal exactions that produce disaffection and rebellion. The lack of competent teachers handicaps the whole movement. To the eye of a western educator most of their primary and secondary schools are little short of a farce. Mission schools have trained a large number of competent teachers, but in most cases the prejudice against Christianity is so strong that heathen schools will not use them. This prejudice is much stronger in the secondary schools than it is in the provincial colleges and universities. The high officials generally take more liberal views, and they are free from the social ostracism that prevents a small official or a private gentleman from employing a Christian teacher. On account of the characteristics just described, while he rejoiced in the immense progress which Christianity was making both in the conversion of increasing thousands and also in its indirect influence over multitudes more, he had anxieties as to the near future of the church in that land. Writing to one of the secretaries of the American Bible Society, in January, 1906, he said: “If I understand the signs of the time in China, it will not be many years—I put it at ten to fifteen—until the Chinese church will declare her independence of the missionaries, pay her own expenses, and make her own creed.... What this creed will be, will depend very much on the kind and number of preachers we train in the meantime.” The speeches made at the Chinese Students’ Alliance, held at Hartford, August 24, 1910, both by the Chinese and by Americans, indicate a very strong tendency in this direction.