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CHAPTER XX.CHRISTIAN PERIODICALS.1900 especially, the Chinese, as far as theirgeneral education will permit, have begun to be anation of newspaper-readers, and it is part of ourmission in China to supply them with reading matter injournalistic and magazine form. Indeed journalism inChina, apart from the Peking Gazette* was started bymissionaries, as we shall see. Since the founding of theShen Pao in 1872, the Sin Wan Pao in 1892, the ChungWai Jih Pao in 1898, and the fifty and more prominentnative papers in various parts of the land, althoughChristian journalism has been so vastly exceeded in bulkby native non-Christian journals,it still plays an important part in the education of China (i) by diffusingChristian thought and useful knowledge among theruling and literary classes, and (2) by nourishing theminds of native preachers and confirming the faith ofchurch members.Christian journalism and magazine-work havingthese two objects in view, has naturally had to beadapted, in language and literary material, to the particular class of readers a given periodical is intendedto reach. For scholarly non-Christians, its language hasto be that of the literature of China (wen-li), a language that never was spoken, but made merely for theeye ; anciently quite telegraphic in its terseness, butgradually expanding into a literary vehicle of greatdelicacy of expression and rhythmic refinement. Thosewho are versed in this difficult language will hardly* The Peking Gazette first 1appeared 91 A.D., coming out atirregular intervals until the year 1351, siu.ce when it has beenissued four times each Chinese moon.