There is no doubt that if the states known as the "Treaty Powers," namely, the United States, Belgium, Denmark, France, Great Britain, Holland, Italy, North Germany, Russia, Spain, and Sweden, will loyally abstain from aggression and interference in China and respect her independence, that this great Empire will step forth from her seclusion of fifty centuries, and enter the commonwealth of nations.
The treaty between the United States and China of July 28, 1868, includes provisions for the neutrality of the Chinese waters; for freedom of worship for United States citizens in China, and for the Chinese in the United States; for allowing voluntary emigration, and prohibiting the compulsory coolie trade; for freedom to travel in China and the United States by the citizens of either country; and for freedom to establish and attend schools in both countries.
We add to this chapter a Note, containing an interesting account, from Hue's "Christianity in China," of an inscribed stone, proving that Christian churches existed in China in the seventh century.

These churches were the result of the efforts of Nestorian missionaries, who were the Protestant Christians of their age.

Their success in China is another proof that the Christianity which is to be welcomed there must be presented in an intelligible and rational form.
* * * * * NOTE.
The Nestorian Inscription in China.[29] In 1625 some Chinese workmen, engaged in digging a foundation for a house, outside the walls of the city of Si-ngau-Fou, the capital of the province of Chen-si, found buried in the earth a large monumental stone resembling those which the Chinese are in the habit of raising to preserve to posterity the remembrance of remarkable events and illustrious men.

It was a dark-colored marble tablet, ten feet high and five broad, and bearing on one side an inscription in ancient Chinese, and also some other characters quite unknown in China.
* * * * * Several exact tracings from the stone were sent to Europe by the Jesuits who saw it.

The library of their house at Rome had one of the first, and it attracted numerous visitors; subsequently, another authentic copy of the dimensions of the tablet was sent to Paris, and deposited at the library in the Rue Richelieu, where it may still be seen in the gallery of manuscripts.
This monument, discovered by chance amidst rubbish in the environs of an ancient capital of the Chinese Empire, excited a great sensation; for on examining the stone, and endeavoring to interpret the inscription, it was with surprise discovered that the Christian religion had had numerous apostles in China at the beginning of the seventh century, and that it had for a long time flourished there.