INTRODUCTORY DECLARATION.

...certainly among those who, through a remarkable and pride-filled ignorance, considered whatever lands lay outside their own borders to be unrefined barbarism. For this reason, it was necessary, besides the native language, to also learn their characters original: "literas"; here referring to the written Chinese script as opposed to the spoken language. thoroughly, and to heap labor upon labor. The language of the Chinese is, if any other in the whole world, the most difficult. It is contained in many grammatical rules; the people use monosyllabic words, and very few of them, which are affected by such a subtle inflection of the tongue, or a hiss, and even a tone original: "tono"; the author is describing the tonal nature of Chinese, where the pitch of a word changes its meaning. (almost musical). By being affected now this way, now that, words take on one meaning after another, and often of the most contrary things. Thus, it can hardly be said how much trouble this matter creates for foreigners.

Furthermore, such a scarcity of vocal sounds gave rise to a great abundance of written characters; for by the greatest variety of these, they distinguish the similarity and identity of their spoken words. Do you ask the number of these characters? It surpasses belief. Let it suffice to have said one thing: the number is so great that no one yet within the memory of the Chinese has been able to remember them all, even though many of them, beginning from the sixth year of their age, spend their whole life thereafter consumed in studying them. However, I would not wish to hide this: he who has learned to use five or six thousand characters appropriately can not only understand most of the books which the Chinese have written in great numbers regarding morals, duties, the State, and history; but he himself also, even though he be a European, will be able to write conveniently about any subject which must be debated between us and the Chinese.

Therefore, men of mature age—and not a few already advanced in years—who had long ago been endowed with a literary (if not a laurel) crown in their own native homes, became like children again among the Chinese for the love of Christ. Starting from the very elements of the language with incredible labor and constancy, within a few years—with the Divine Power original: "Numine"; a reference to God's providence. always breathing upon them—they attained such skill in both language and characters that they even published European sciences and the mysteries of the most holy Christian Religion in print. The amazed Chinese understood that these men were truly worthy of the name of Literati original: "literatorum"; the scholarly class that held high social and political status in China., since they could learn the Chinese script so quickly and were instructed in so many and so famous sciences and disciplines. They decided for themselves that the suspicions were by no means true (which, as is common in a highly political nation, had settled in many minds at the beginning) that we had come into their lands under the guise of promulgating a foreign law, but were in truth driven by a desire for profit or honors. This was especially clear when, having set out from such distant lands, we lived among them in such a way that we were a burden to none of the natives; rather, we constantly rejected money offered as a gift, freely professing that we lacked nothing of the things necessary for life.

In this manner, that first labor and industry of the Companions original: "Sociorum"; referring to the members of the Society of Jesus (Jesuits). had happily dispelled the first shadows and suspicions of the nation, and already concerning the fortification...