Page:Brinkley - China - Volume 2.djvu/22

abounding in titles to consideration it should be possible to speak with accuracy and assurance. But, on the contrary, though the literature inspired by the subject would furnish a library, its language is often speculative and its statements do not pretend to be final. Even the origin of the name "China" is conjectural. It is supposed to have been derived from the fact that at the time when Western people began to make their way overland to that part of the Orient, their first place of arrival was the kingdom of Tsin, or Chin, by which name they consequently came to call the whole country. In later days the Tsin rulers rose from the position of feudal princes to the sovereignty of the entire Empire, so that the correctness of the appellation "Tsina" or "China" received confirmation in the eyes of foreigners. But the Chinese themselves never used any such term. They originally called their country by one of three names—Tien-hia (under the heavens), Sz-hai (within the four seas), or Chung-kwoh (middle country). All these designations have been cited as evidence of the conceit of their authors. The charge is scarcely just. Sz-hai is evidently a geographical derivation; the same term (Shi-kai) was commonly applied by the Japanese to their island Empire, though they can never have laboured under any false impression as to its magnitude and relative importance. Chung-kwoh, which came into use in the twelfth century before Christ, was originally employed to