A study of the history of China would serve to reveal the fact that notwithstanding the great duration of Chinese political life there has been comparatively speaking little change in the political organization of the country. With the exception of the abolition of, to use a European expression, the “feudal system” which existed for several centuries before about 200 B. C., Chinese history presents no instance of any important change in political forms.

The character of the political organization which existed both prior and subsequent to the abolition of this “feudal system” was absolute monarchy, what is sometimes called autocracy. In this respect China differed little if any from other Asiatic peoples, whose great contribution to the political development of the human race has been the conception of an all powerful king or monarch in whom all the functions of government were concentrated.