,,the ,,soul ,,of ,,the ,,far ,,east ,by ,percival ,lowell ,contents ,chapter #a4 ,individuality ,chapter #b4 ,family ,chapter #c4 ,adoption ,chapter #d4 ,language ,chapter #e4 ,nature and ,art ,chapter #f4 ,art ,chapter #g4 ,religion ,chapter #h4 ,imagination ,chapter #a4 ,individuality4 ,the boyish belief that on the other side of our globe all things are of necessity upside down is startlingly brought back to the man when he first sets foot at ,yokohama4 ,if his initial glance does not1 to be sure1 disclose the natives in the every-day feat of standing calmly on their heads1 an attitude which his youthful imagination conceived to be a necessary consequence of their geographical position1 it does at least reveal them looking at the world as if from the standpoint of that eccentric posture4 ,for they seem to him to see everything topsy-turvy4 ,whether it be that their antipodal situation has affected their brains1 or whether it is the mind of the observer himself that has hitherto been wrong in undertaking to rectify the inverted pictures presented by his retina1 the result1 at all events1 is undeniable4 ,the world stands reversed1 and1 taking for granted his own uprightness1 the stranger unhesitatingly imputes to them an obliquity of vision1 a state of mind outwardly typified by the cat-like obliqueness of their eyes4 ,if the inversion be not precisely of the kind he expected1 it is none the less striking1 and impressibly more real4 ,if personal experience has definitely convinced him that the inhabitants of that under side of our planet do not adhere to it head downwards1 like flies on a ceiling1--his early a priori deduction1--they still appear quite as antipodal1 mentally considered4 ,intellectually1 at least1 their attitude sets gravity at defiance4 ,for to the mind's eye their world is one huge1 comical antithesis of our own4 ,what we regard intuitively in one way from our standpoint1 they as intuitively observe in a diametrically opposite manner from theirs4 ,to speak backwards1 write backwards1 read backwards1 is but the a b c of their contrariety4 ,the inversion extends deeper than mere modes of expression1 down into the very matter of thought4 ,ideas of ours which we deemed innate find in them no home1 while methods which strike us as preposterously unnatural appear to be their birthright4 ,from the standing of a wet umbrella on its handle instead of its head to dry to the striking of a match away in place of toward one1 there seems to be no action of our daily lives1 however trivial1 but finds with them its appropriate reaction--equal but opposite4 ,indeed1 to one anxious of conforming to the manners and customs of the country1 the only road to right lies in following unswervingly that course which his inherited instincts assure him to be wrong4 ,yet these people are human beings2 with all their eccentricities they are men4 ,physically we cannot but be cognizant of the fact1 nor mentally but be conscious of it4 ,like us1 indeed1 and yet so unlike are they that we seem1 as we gaze at them1 to be viewing our own humanity in some mirth-provoking mirror of the mind1--a mirror that shows us our own familiar thoughts1 but all turned wrong side out4 ,humor holds the glass1 and we become the sport of our own reflections4 ,but is it otherwise at home8 ,do not our personal presentments mock each of us individually our lives long8 ,who but is the daily dupe of his dressing-glass1 and complacently conceives himself to be a very different appearing person from what he is1 forgetting that his right side has become his left1 and vice versa8 ,yet who1 when by chance he catches sight in like manner of the face of a friend1 can keep from smiling at the caricatures which the mirror's left-for-right reversal makes of the asymmetry of that friend's features1--caricatures all the more grotesque for being utterly unsuspected by their innocent original8 ,perhaps1 could we once see ourselves as others see us1 our surprise in the case of foreign peoples might be less pronounced4 ,regarding1 then1 the ,far ,oriental as a man1 and not simply as a phenomenon1 we discover in his peculiar point of view a new importance1--the possibility of using it stereoptically4 ,for his mind-photograph of the world can be placed side by side with ours1 and the two pictures combined will yield results beyond what either alone could possibly have afforded4 ,thus harmonized1 they will help us to realize humanity4 ,indeed it is only by such a combination of two different aspects that we ever perceive substance and distinguish reality from illusion4 ,what our two eyes make possible for material objects1 the earth's two hemispheres may enable us to do for mental traits4 ,only the superficial never changes its expression2 the appearance of the solid varies with the standpoint of the observer4 ,in dreamland alone does everything seem plain1 and there all is unsubstantial4 ,to say that the ,japanese are not a savage tribe is of course unnecessary2 to repeat the remark1 anything but superfluous1 on the principle that what is a matter of common notoriety is very apt to prove a matter about which uncommonly little is known4 ,at present we go halfway in recognition of these people by bestowing upon them a demi-diploma of mental development called semi-civilization1 neglecting1 however1 to specify in what the fractional qualification consists4 ,if the suggestion of a second moiety1 as of something directly complementary to them1 were not indirectly complimentary to ourselves1 the expression might pass2 but1 as it is1 the self-praise is rather too obvious to carry conviction4 ,for ,japan's claim to culture is not based solely upon the exports with which she supplements our art1 nor upon the paper1 china1 and bric-a-brac with which she adorns our rooms2 any more than ,western science is adequately represented in ,japan by our popular imports there of kerosene oil1 matches1 and beer4 ,only half civilized the ,far ,east presumably is1 but it is so rather in an absolute than a relative sense2 in the sense of what might have been1 not of what is4 ,it is so as compared1 not with us1 but with the eventual possibilities of humanity4 ,as yet1 neither system1 ,western nor ,eastern1 is perfect enough to serve in all things as standard for the other4 ,the light of truth has reached each hemisphere through the medium of its own mental crystallization1 and this has polarized it in opposite ways1 so that now the rays that are normal to the eyes of the one only produce darkness to those of the other4 ,for the ,japanese civilization in the sense of not being savagery is the equal of our own4 ,it is not in the polish that the real difference lies2 it is in the substance polished4 ,in politeness1 in delicacy1 they have as a people no peers4 ,art has been their mistress1 though science has never been their master4 ,perhaps for this very reason that art1 not science1 has been the ,muse they courted1 the result has been all the more widespread4 ,for culture there is not the attainment of the few1 but the common property of the people4 ,if the peaks of intellect rise less eminent1 the plateau of general elevation stands higher4 ,but little need be said to prove the civilization of a land where ordinary tea-house girls are models of refinement1 and common coolies1 when not at work1 play chess for pastime4 ,if ,japanese ways look odd at first sight1 they but look more odd on closer acquaintance4 ,in a land where1 to allow one's understanding the freer play of indoor life1 one begins1 not by taking off his hat1 but by removing his boots1 he gets at the very threshold a hint that humanity is to be approached the wrong end to4 ,when1 after thus entering a house1 he tries next to gain admittance to the mind of its occupant1 the suspicion becomes a certainty4 ,he discovers that this people talk1 so to speak1 backwards2 that before he can hope to comprehend them1 or make himself understood in return1 he must learn to present his thoughts arranged in inverse order from the one in which they naturally suggest themselves to his mind4 ,his sentences must all be turned inside out4 ,he finds himself lost in a labyrinth of language4 ,the same seems to be true of the thoughts it embodies4 ,the further he goes the more obscure the whole process becomes1 until1 after long groping about for some means of orienting himself1 he lights at last upon the clue4 ,this clue consists in the survival of the unfittest4 ,in the civilization of ,japan we have presented to us a most interesting case of partially arrested development2 or1 to speak esoterically1 we find ourselves placed face to face with a singular example of a completed race-life4 ,for though from our standpoint the evolution of these people seems suddenly to have come to an end in mid-career1 looked at more intimately it shows all the signs of having fully run its course4 ,development ceased1 not because of outward obstruction1 but from purely intrinsic inability to go on4 ,the intellectual machine was not shattered2 it simply ran down4 ,to this fact the phenomenon owes its peculiar interest4 ,for we behold here in the case of man the same spectacle that we see cosmically in the case of the moon1 the spectacle of a world that has died of old age4 ,no weak spot in their social organism destroyed them from within2 no epidemic1 in the shape of foreign hordes1 fell upon them from without4 ,for in spite of the fact that ,china offers the unique example of a country that has simply lived to be conquered1 mentally her masters have invariably become her pupils4 ,having ousted her from her throne as ruler1 they proceeded to sit at her feet as disciples4 ,thus they have rather helped than hindered her civilization4 ,whatever portion of the ,far ,east we examine we find its mental history to be the same story with variations4 ,however unlike ,china1 ,korea1 and ,japan are in some respects1 through the careers of all three we can trace the same life-spirit4 ,it is the career of the river ,jordan rising like any other stream from the springs among the mountains only to fall after a brief existence into the ,dead ,sea4 ,for their vital force had spent itself more than a millennium ago4 ,already1 then1 their civilization had in its deeper developments attained its stature1 and has simply been perfecting itself since4 ,we may liken it to some stunted tree1 that1 finding itself prevented from growth1 bastes the more luxuriantly to put forth flowers and fruit4 ,for not the final but the medial processes were skipped4 ,in those superficial amenities with which we more particularly link our idea of civilization1 these peoples continued to grow4 ,their refinement1 if failing to reach our standard in certain respects1 surpasses ours considering the bare barbaric basis upon which it rests4 ,for it is as true of the ,japanese as of the proverbial ,russian1 though in a more scientific sense1 that if you scratch him you will find the ancestral ,tartar4 ,but it is no less true that the descendants of this rude forefather have now taken on a polish of which their own exquisite lacquer gives but a faint reflection4 ,the surface was perfected after the substance was formed4 ,our word finish1 with its double meaning1 expresses both the process and the result4 ,there entered1 to heighten the bizarre effect1 a spirit common in minds that lack originality--the spirit of imitation4 ,though consequent enough upon a want of initiative1 the results of this trait appear anything but natural to people of a more progressive past4 ,the proverbial collar and pair of spurs look none the less odd to the stranger for being a mental instead of a bodily habit4 ,something akin to such a case of unnatural selection has there taken place4 ,the orderly procedure of natural evolution was disastrously supplemented by man4 ,for the fact that in the growth of their tree of knowledge the branches developed out of all proportion to the trunk is due to a practice of culture-grafting4 ,from before the time when they began to leave records of their actions the ,japanese have been a nation of importers1 not of merchandise1 but of ideas4 ,they have invariably shown the most advanced free-trade spirit in preferring to take somebody else's ready-made articles rather than to try to produce any brand-new conceptions themselves4 ,they continue to follow the same line of life4 ,a hearty appreciation of the things of others is still one of their most winning traits4 ,what they took they grafted bodily upon their ancestral tree1 which in consequence came to present a most unnaturally diversified appearance4 ,for though not unlike other nations in wishing to borrow1 if their zeal in the matter was slightly excessive1 they were peculiar in that they never assimilated what they took4 ,they simply inserted it upon the already existing growth4 ,there it remained1 and throve1 and blossomed1 nourished by that indigenous ,japanese sap1 taste4 ,but like grafts generally1 the foreign boughs were not much modified by their new life-blood1 nor was the tree in its turn at all affected by them4 ,connected with it only as separable parts of its structure1 the cuttings might have been lopped off again without influencing perceptibly the condition of the foster-parent stem4 ,the grafts in time grew to be great branches1 but the trunk remained through it all the trunk of a sapling4 ,in other words1 the nation grew up to man's estate1 keeping the mind of its childhood4 ,what is thus true of the ,japanese is true likewise of the ,koreans and of the ,chinese4 ,the three peoples1 indeed1 form so many links in one long chain of borrowing4 ,china took from ,india1 then ,korea copied ,china1 and lastly ,japan imitated ,korea4 ,in this simple manner they successively became possessed of a civilization which originally was not the property of any one of them4 ,in the eagerness they all evinced in purloining what was not theirs1 and in the perfect content with which they then proceeded to enjoy what they had taken1 they remind us forcibly of that happy-go-lucky class in the community which prefers to live on questionable loans rather than work itself for a living4 ,like those same individuals1 whatever interest the ,far ,eastern people may succeed in raising now1 ,nature will in the end make them pay dearly for their lack of principal4 ,the ,far ,eastern civilization resembles1 in fact1 more a mechanical mixture of social elements than a well differentiated chemical compound4 ,for in spite of the great variety of ingredients thrown into its caldron of destiny1 as no affinity existed between them1 no combination resulted4 ,the power to fuse was wanting4 ,capability to evolve anything is not one of the marked characteristics of the ,far ,east4 ,indeed1 the tendency to spontaneous variation1 ,nature's mode of making experiments1 would seem there to have been an enterprising faculty that was exhausted early4 ,sleepy1 no doubt1 from having got up betimes with the dawn1 these dwellers in the far lands of the morning began to look upon their day as already well spent before they had reached its noon4 ,they grew old young1 and have remained much the same age ever since4 ,what they were centuries ago1 that at bottom they are to-day4 ,take away the ,european influence of the last twenty years1 and each man might almost be his own great-grandfather4 ,in race characteristics he is yet essentially the same4 ,the traits that distinguished these peoples in the past have been gradually extinguishing them ever since4 ,of these traits1 stagnating influences upon their career1 perhaps the most important is the great quality of impersonality4 ,if we take1 through the earth's temperate zone1 a belt of country whose northern and southern edges are determined by certain limiting isotherms1 not more than half the width of the zone apart1 we shall find that we have included in a relatively small extent of surface almost all the nations of note in the world1 past or present4 ,now if we examine this belt1 and compare the different parts of it with one another1 we shall be struck by a remarkable fact4 ,the peoples inhabiting it grow steadily more personal as we go west4 ,so unmistakable is this gradation of spirit1 that one is tempted to ascribe it to cosmic rather than to human causes4 ,it is as marked as the change in color of the human complexion observable along any meridian1 which ranges from black at the equator to blonde toward the pole4 ,in like manner1 the sense of self grows more intense as we follow in the wake of the setting sun1 and fades steadily as we advance into the dawn4 ,america1 ,europe1 the ,levant1 ,india1 ,japan1 each is less personal than the one before4 ,we stand at the nearer end of the scale1 the ,far ,orientals at the other4 ,if with us the ,i seems to be of the very essence of the soul1 then the soul of the ,far ,east may be said to be ,impersonality4 ,curious as this characteristic is as a fact1 it is even more interesting as a factor4 ,for what it betokens of these peoples in particular may suggest much about man generally4 ,it may mark a stride in theory1 if a standstill in practice4 ,possibly it may help us to some understanding of ourselves4 ,not that it promises much aid to vexed metaphysical questions1 but as a study in sociology it may not prove so vain4 ,and for a thing which is always with us1 its discussion may be said to be peculiarly opportune just now4 ,for it lies at the bottom of the most pressing questions of the day4 ,of the two great problems that stare the ,western world in the face at the present moment1 both turn to it for solution4 ,agnosticism1 the foreboding silence of those who think1 socialism1 communism1 and nihilism1 the petulant cry of those who do not1 alike depend ultimately for the right to be upon the truth or the falsity of the sense of self4 ,for if there be no such actual thing as individuality1 if the feeling we call by that name be naught but the transient illusion the ,buddhists would have us believe it1 any faith founded upon it as basis vanishes as does the picture in a revolving kaleidoscope1--less enduring even than the flitting phantasmagoria of a dream4 ,if the ego be but the passing shadow of the material brain1 at the disintegration of the gray matter what will become of us8 ,shall we simply lapse into an indistinguishable part of the vast universe that compasses us round8 ,at the thought we seem to stand straining our gaze1 on the shore of the great sea of knowledge1 only to watch the fog roll in1 and hide from our view even those headlands of hope that1 like beseeching hands1 stretch out into the deep4 ,so more materially4 ,if individuality be a delusion of the mind1 what motive potent enough to excite endeavor in the breast of an ordinary mortal remains8 ,philosophers1 indeed1 might still work for the advancement of mankind1 but mankind itself would not continue long to labor energetically for what should profit only the common weal4 ,take away the stimulus of individuality1 and action is paralyzed at once4 ,for with most men the promptings of personal advantage only afford sufficient incentive to effort4 ,destroy this force1 then any consideration due it lapses1 and socialism is not only justified1 it is raised instantly into an axiom of life4 ,the community1 in that case1 becomes itself the unit1 the indivisible atom of existence4 ,socialism1 then communism1 then nihilism1 follow in inevitable sequence4 ,that even the ,far ,oriental1 with all his numbing impersonality1 has not touched this goal may at least suggest that individuality is a fact4 ,but first1 what do we know about its existence ourselves8 ,very early in the course of every thoughtful childhood an event takes place1 by the side of which1 to the child himself1 all other events sink into insignificance4 ,it is not one that is recognized and chronicled by the world1 for it is wholly unconnected with action4 ,no one but the child is aware of its occurrence1 and he never speaks of it to others4 ,yet to that child it marks an epoch4 ,so intensely individual does it seem that the boy is afraid to avow it1 while in reality so universal is it that probably no human being has escaped its influence4 ,though subjective purely1 it has more vividness than any external event2 and though strictly intrinsic to life1 it is more startling than any accident of fate or fortune4 ,this experience of the boy's1 at once so singular and yet so general1 is nothing less than the sudden revelation to him one day of the fact of his own personality4 ,somewhere about the time when sensation is giving place to sensitiveness as the great self-educator1 and the knowledge gained by the five bodily senses is being fused into the wisdom of that mental one we call common sense1 the boy makes a discovery akin to the act of waking up4 ,all at once he becomes conscious of himself2 and the consciousness has about it a touch of the uncanny4 ,hitherto he has been aware only of matter2 he now first realizes mind4 ,unwarned1 unprepared1 he is suddenly ushered before being1 and stands awe-struck in the presence of--himself4 ,if the introduction to his own identity was startling1 there is nothing reassuring in the feeling that this strange acquaintanceship must last4 ,for continue it does4 ,it becomes an unsought intimacy he cannot shake off4 ,like to his own shadow he cannot escape it4 ,to himself a man cannot but be at home4 ,for years this alter ego haunts him1 for he imagines it an idiosyncrasy of his own1 a morbid peculiarity he dare not confide to any one1 for fear of being thought a fool4 ,not till long afterwards1 when he has learned to live as a matter of course with his ever-present ghost1 does he discover that others have had like familiars themselves4 ,sometimes this dawn of consciousness is preceded by a long twilight of soul-awakening2 but sometimes1 upon more sensitive and subtler natures1 the light breaks with all the suddenness of a sunrise at the equator1 revealing to the mind's eye an unsuspected world of self within4 ,but in whatever way we may awake to it1 the sense of personality1 when first realized1 appears already1 like the fabled ,goddess of ,wisdom1 full grown in the brain4 ,from the moment when we first remember ourselves we seem to be as old as we ever seem to others afterwards to become4 ,we grow1 indeed1 in knowledge1 in wisdom1 in experience1 as our years increase1 but deep down in our heart of hearts we are still essentially the same4 ,to be sure1 people pay us more deference than they did1 which suggests a doubt at times whether we may not have changed2 small boys of a succeeding generation treat us with a respect that causes us inwardly to smile1 as we think how little we differ from them1 if they but knew it4 ,for at bottom we are not conscious of change from that morning1 long ago1 when first we realized ourselves4 ,we feel just as young now as we felt old then4 ,we are but amused at the world's discrimination where we can detect no difference4 ,every human being has been thus twice born3 once as matter1 once as mind4 ,nor is this second birth the birthright only of mankind4 ,all the higher animals probably1 possibly even the lower too1 have experienced some such realization of individual identity4 ,however that may be1 certainly to all races of men has come this revelation2 only the degree in which they have felt its force has differed immensely4 ,it is one thing to the apathetic1 fatalistic ,turk1 and quite another matter to an energetic1 nervous ,american4 ,facts1 fancies1 faiths1 all show how wide is the variance in feelings4 ,with them no introspective greekcnzhi seauton overexcites the consciousness of self4 ,but with us2 as with those of old possessed of devils1 it comes to startle and stays to distress4 ,too apt is it to prove an ever-present1 undesirable double4 ,too often does it play the part of uninvited spectre at the feast1 whose presence no one save its unfortunate victim suspects4 ,the haunting horror of his own identity is to natures far less eccentric than ,kenelm ,chillingly's only too common a curse4 ,to this companionship1 paradoxical though it sound1 is principally due the peculiar loneliness of childhood4 ,for nothing is so isolating as a persistent idea which one dares not confide4 ,and yet1--stranger paradox still1--was there ever any one willing to exchange his personality for another's8 ,who can imagine foregoing his own self8 ,nay1 do we not cling even to its outward appearance8 ,is there a man so poor in all that man holds dear that he does not keenly resent being accidentally mistaken for his neighbor8 ,surely there must be something more than mirage in this deep-implanted1 widespread instinct of human race4 ,but however strong the conviction now of one's individuality1 is there aught to assure him of its continuance beyond the confines of its present life8 ,will it awake on death's morrow and know itself1 or will it1 like the body that gave it lodgment1 disintegrate again into indistinguishable spirit dust8 ,close upon the heels of the existing consciousness of self treads the shadow-like doubt of its hereafter4 ,will analogy help to answer the grewsome riddle of the ,sphinx8 ,are the laws we have learned to be true for matter true also for mind8 ,matter we now know is indestructible2 yet the form of it with which we once were so fondly familiar vanishes never to return4 ,is a like fate to be the lot of the soul8 ,that mind should be capable of annihilation is as inconceivable as that matter should cease to be4 ,surely the spirit we feel existing round about us on every side now has been from ever1 and will be for ever to come4 ,but that portion of it which we each know as self1 is it not like to a drop of rain seen in its falling through the air8 ,indistinguishable the particle was in the cloud whence it came2 indistinguishable it will become again in the ocean whither it is bound4 ,its personality is but its passing phase from a vast impersonal on the one hand to an equally vast impersonal on the other4 ,thus seers preached in the past2 so modern science is hinting to-day4 ,with us the idea seems the bitter fruit of material philosophy2 by them it was looked upon as the fairest flower of their faith4 ,what is dreaded now as the impious suggestion of the godless four thousand years ago was reverenced as a sacred tenet of religion4 ,shorter even than his short threescore years and ten is that soul's life of which man is directly cognizant4 ,bounded by two seemingly impersonal states is the personal consciousness of which he is made aware3 the one the infantile existence that precedes his boyish discovery1 the other the gloom that grows with years1--two twilights that fringe the two borders of his day4 ,but with the ,far ,oriental1 life is all twilight4 ,for in ,japan and ,china both states are found together4 ,there1 side by side with the present unconsciousness of the babe exists the belief in a coming unconsciousness for the man4 ,so inseparably blended are the two that the known truth of the one seems1 for that very bond1 to carry with it the credentials of the other4 ,can it be that the personal1 progressive ,west is wrong1 and the impersonal1 impassive ,east right8 ,surely not4 ,is the other side of the world in advance of us in mind-development1 even as it precedes us in the time of day2 or just as our noon is its night1 may it not be far in our rear8 ,is not its seeming wisdom rather the precociousness of what is destined never to go far8 ,brought suddenly upon such a civilization1 after the blankness of a long ocean voyage1 one is reminded instinctively of the feelings of that bewildered individual who1 after a dinner at which he had eventually ceased to be himself1 was by way of pleasantry left out overnight in a graveyard1 on their way home1 by his humorously inclined companions2 and who1 on awaking alone1 in a still dubious condition1 looked around him in surprise1 rubbed his eyes two or three times to no purpose1 and finally muttered in a tone of awe-struck conviction1 ,well1 either ,i'm the first to rise1 or ,i'm a long way behind time6 ,whether their failure to follow the natural course of evolution results in bringing them in at the death just the same or not1 these people are now1 at any rate1 stationary not very far from the point at which we all set out4 ,they are still in that childish state of development before self-consciousness has spoiled the sweet simplicity of nature4 ,an impersonal race seems never to have fully grown up4 ,partly for its own sake1 partly for ours1 this most distinctive feature of the ,far ,east1 its marked impersonality1 is well worthy particular attention2 for while it collaterally suggests pregnant thoughts about ourselves1 it directly underlies the deeper oddities of a civilization which is the modern eighth wonder of the world4 ,we shall see this as we look at what these people are1 at what they were1 and at what they hope to become2 not historically1 but psychologically1 as one might perceive1 were he but wise enough1 in an acorn1 besides the nut itself1 two oaks1 that one from which it fell1 and that other which from it will rise4 ,these three states1 which we may call its potential past1 present1 and future1 may be observed and studied in three special outgrowths of a race's character3 in its language1 in its every-day thoughts1 and in its religion4 ,for in the language of a people we find embalmed the spirit of its past2 in its every-day thoughts1 be they of arts or sciences1 is wrapped up its present life2 in its religion lie enfolded its dreamings of a future4 ,from out each of these three subjects in the ,far ,east impersonality stares us in the face4 ,upon this quality as a foundation rests the ,far ,oriental character4 ,it is individually rather than nationally that ,i propose to scan it now4 ,it is the action of a particle in the wave of world-development ,i would watch1 rather than the propagation of the wave itself4 ,inferences about the movement of the whole will follow of themselves a knowledge of the motion of its parts4 ,but before we attack the subject esoterically1 let us look a moment at the man as he appears in his relation to the community4 ,such a glance will suggest the peculiar atmosphere of impersonality that pervades the people4 ,however lacking in cleverness1 in merit1 or in imagination a man may be1 there are in our ,western world1 if his existence there be so much as noticed at all1 three occasions on which he appears in print4 ,his birth1 his marriage1 and his death are all duly chronicled in type1 perhaps as sufficiently typical of the general unimportance of his life4 ,mention of one's birth1 it is true1 is an aristocratic privilege1 confined to the world of ,english society4 ,in democratic ,america1 no doubt because all men there are supposed to be born free and equal1 we ignore the first event1 and mention only the last two episodes1 about which our national astuteness asserts no such effacing equality4 ,accepting our newspaper record as a fair enough summary of the biography of an average man1 let us look at these three momentous occasions in the career of a ,far ,oriental4 ,chapter #b4 ,family4 ,in the first place1 then1 the poor little ,japanese baby is ushered into this world in a sadly impersonal manner1 for he is not even accorded the distinction of a birthday4 ,he is permitted instead only the much less special honor of a birth-year4 ,not that he begins his separate existence otherwise than is the custom of mortals generally1 at a definite instant of time1 but that very little subsequent notice is ever taken of the fact4 ,on the contrary1 from the moment he makes his appearance he is spoken of as a year old1 and this same age he continues to be considered in most simple ease of calculation1 till the beginning of the next calendar year4 ,when that epoch of general rejoicing arrives1 he is credited with another year himself4 ,so is everybody else4 ,new ,year's day is a common birthday for the community1 a sort of impersonal anniversary for his whole world4 ,a like reckoning is followed in ,china and ,korea4 ,upon the disadvantages of being considered from one's birth up at least one year and possibly two older than one really is1 it lies beyond our present purpose to expatiate4 ,it is quite evident that woman has had no voice in the framing of such a chronology4 ,one would hardly imagine that man had either1 so astronomic is the system4 ,a communistic age is however but an unavoidable detail of the general scheme whose most suggestive feature consists in the subordination of the actual birthday of the individual to the fictitious birthday of the community4 ,for it is not so much the want of commemoration shown the subject as the character of the commemoration which is significant4 ,some slight notice is indeed paid to birthdays during early childhood1 but even then their observance is quite secondary in importance to that of the great impersonal anniversaries of the third day of the third moon and the fifth day of the fifth moon4 ,these two occasions celebrated the coming of humanity into the world with an impersonality worthy of the ,french revolutionary calendar4 ,the first of them is called the festival of girls1 and commemorates the birth of girls generally1 the advent of the universal feminine1 as one may say4 ,the second is a corresponding anniversary for boys4 ,owing to its sex1 the latter is the greater event of the two1 and in consequence of its most conspicuous feature is styled the festival of fishes4 ,the fishes are hollow paper images of the tai from four to six feet in length1 tied to the top of a long pole planted in the ground and tipped with a gilded ball4 ,holes in the paper at the mouth and the tail enable the wind to inflate the body so that it floats about horizontally1 swaying hither and thither1 and tugging at the line after the manner of a living thing4 ,the fish are emblems of good luck1 and are set up in the courtyard of every house where a son has been born during the year4 ,on this auspicious day ,tokio is suddenly transformed into eighty square miles of aquarium4 ,for any more personal purpose ,new ,year's day eclipses all particular anniversaries4 ,then everybody congratulates everybody else upon everything in general1 and incidentally upon being alive4 ,such substitution of an abstract for a concrete birthday1 although exceedingly convenient for others1 must at least conduce to self-forgetfulness on the part of its proper possessor1 and tend inevitably to merge the identity of the individual in that of the community4 ,it fares hardly better with the ,far ,oriental in the matter of marriage4 ,although he is1 as we might think1 the person most interested in the result1 he is permitted no say in the affair whatever4 ,in fact1 it is not his affair at all1 but his father's4 ,his hand is simply made a cat's-paw of4 ,the matter is entirely a business transaction1 entered into by the parent and conducted through regular marriage brokers4 ,in it he plays only the part of a marionette4 ,his revenge for being thus bartered out of what might be the better half of his life1 he takes eventually on the next succeeding generation4 ,his death may be said to be the most important act of his whole life4 ,for then only can his personal existence be properly considered to begin4 ,by it he joins the great company of ancestors who are to these people of almost more consequence than living folk1 and of much more individual distinction4 ,particularly is this the case in ,china and ,korea1 but the same respect1 though in a somewhat less rigid form1 is paid the dead in ,japan4 ,then at last the individual receives that recognition which was denied him in the flesh4 ,in ,japan a mortuary tablet is set up to him in the house and duly worshipped2 on the continent the ancestors are given a dwelling of their own1 and even more devotedly reverenced4 ,but in both places the cult is anything but funereal4 ,for the ancestral tombs are temples and pleasure pavilions at the same time1 consecrated not simply to rites and ceremonies1 but to family gatherings and general jollification4 ,and the fortunate defunct must feel1 if he is still half as sentient as his dutiful descendants suppose1 that his earthly life1 like other approved comedies1 has ended well4 ,important1 however1 as these critical points in his career may be reckoned by his relatives1 they are scarcely calculated to prove equally epochal to the man himself4 ,in a community where next to no note is ever taken of the anniversary of his birth1 some doubt as to the special significance of that red-letter day may not unnaturally creep into his own mind4 ,while in regard to his death1 although it may be highly flattering for him to know that he will certainly become somebody when he shall have ceased1 practically1 to be anybody1 such tardy recognition is scarcely timely enough to be properly appreciated4 ,human nature is so earth-tied1 after all1 that a post-mundane existence is very apt to seem immaterial as well as be so4 ,with the old familiar landmarks of life obliterated in this wholesale manner1 it is to be doubted whether one of us1 placed in the midst of such a civilization1 would know himself4 ,he certainly would derive but scanty satisfaction from the recognition if he did4 ,even ,nirvana might seem a happy limbo by comparison4 ,with a communal1 not to say a cosmic1 birthday1 and a conventional wife1 he might well deem his separate existence the shadow of a shade and embrace ,buddhism from mere force of circumstances4 ,further investigation would not shake his opinion4 ,for a far-oriental career is thoroughly in keeping with these1 its typical turning-points4 ,from one end of its course to the other it is painfully impersonal4 ,in its regular routine as in its more salient junctures1 life presents itself to these races a totally different affair from what it seems to us4 ,the cause lies in what is taken to be the basis of socio-biology1 if one may so express it4 ,in the ,far ,east the social unit1 the ultimate molecule of existence1 is not the individual1 but the family4 ,we occidentals think we value family4 ,we even parade our pretensions so prominently as sometimes to tread on other people's prejudices of a like nature4 ,yet we scarcely seem to appreciate the inheritance4 ,for with a logic which does us questionable credit1 we are proud of our ancestors in direct proportion to their remoteness from ourselves1 thus permitting ,democracy to revenge its insignificance by smiling at our self-imposed satire4 ,to esteem a man in inverse ratio to the amount of remarkable blood he has inherited is1 to say the least1 bathetic4 ,others1 again1 make themselves objectionable by preferring their immediate relatives to all less connected companions1 and cling to their cousins so closely that affection often culminates in matrimony1 nature's remonstrances notwithstanding4 ,but with all the pride or pleasure which we take in the members of our particular clan1 our satisfaction really springs from viewing them on an autocentric theory of the social system4 ,in our own eyes we are the star about which1 as in ,joseph's dream1 our relatives revolve and upon which they help to shed an added lustre4 ,our ,ptolemaic theory of society is necessitated by our tenacity to the personal standpoint4 ,this fixed idea of ours causes all else seemingly to rotate about it4 ,such an egoistic conception is quite foreign to our longitudinal antipodes4 ,however much appearances may agree1 the fundamental principles upon which family consideration is based are widely different in the two hemispheres4 ,for the far-eastern social universe turns on a patricentric pivot4 ,upon the conception of the family as the social and political unit depends the whole constitution of ,china4 ,the same theory somewhat modified constitutes the life-principle of ,korea1 of ,japan1 and of their less advanced cousins who fill the vast centre of the ,asiatic continent4 ,from the emperor on his throne to the common coolie in his hovel it is the idea of kinship that knits the entire body politic together4 ,the ,empire is one great family2 the family is a little empire4 ,the one developed out of the other4 ,the patriarchal is1 as is well known1 probably the oldest political system in the world4 ,all nations may be said to have experienced such a paternal government1 but most nations outgrew it4 ,now the interesting fact about the yellow branch of the human race is1 not that they had so juvenile a constitution1 but that they have it2 that it has persisted practically unchanged from prehistoric ages4 ,it is certainly surprising in this kaleidoscopic world whose pattern is constantly changing as time merges one combination of its elements into another1 that on the other side of the globe this set should have remained the same4 ,yet in spite of the lapse of years1 in spite of the altered conditions of existence1 in spite of an immense advance in civilization1 such a primitive state of society has continued there to the present day1 in all its essentials what it was when as nomads the race forefathers wandered peacefully or otherwise over the plains of ,central ,asia4 ,the principle helped them to expand2 it has simply cramped them ever since4 ,for1 instead of dissolving like other antiquated views1 it has become1 what it was bound to become if it continued to last1 crystallized into an institution4 ,it had practically reached this condition when it received a theoretical1 not to say a theological recognition which gave it mundane immortality4 ,a couple of millenniums ago ,confucius consecrated filial duty by making it the basis of the ,chinese moral code4 ,his hand was the finishing touch of fossilification4 ,for since the sage set his seal upon the system no one has so much as dreamt of changing it4 ,the idea of confuting ,confucius would be an act of impiety such as no ,chinaman could possibly commit4 ,not that the inadmissibility of argument is due really to the authority of the philosopher1 but that it lies ingrained in the character of the people4 ,indeed the genius of the one may be said to have consisted in divining the genius of the other4 ,confucius formulated the prevailing practice1 and in so doing helped to make it perpetual4 ,he gave expression to the national feeling1 and like expressions1 generally his1 served to stamp the idea all the more indelibly upon the national consciousness4 ,in this manner the family from a natural relation grew into a highly unnatural social anachronism4 ,the loose ties of a roving life became fetters of a fixed conventionality4 ,bonds originally of mutual advantage hardened into restrictions by which the young were hopelessly tethered to the old4 ,midway in its course the race undertook to turn round and face backwards1 as it journeyed on4 ,its subsequent advance could be nothing but slow4 ,the head of a family is so now in something of a corporeal sense4 ,from him emanate all its actions2 to him are responsible all its parts4 ,any other member of it is as incapable of individual expression as is the hand1 or the foot1 or the eye of man4 ,indeed1 ,confucian doctors of divinity might appropriately administer psychically to the egoistic the rebuke of the ,western physician to the too self-analytic youth who1 finding that1 after eating1 his digestion failed to give him what he considered its proper sensations1 had come to consult the doctor as to how it ought to feel4 ,feel6 young man1 he was answered1 you ought not to be aware that you have a digestion4 ,so with them1 a normally constituted son knows not what it is to possess a spontaneity of his own4 ,indeed1 this very word own1 which so long ago in our own tongue took to itself the symbol of possession1 well exemplifies his dependent state4 ,china furnishes the most conspicuous instance of the want of individual rights4 ,a ,chinese son cannot properly be said to own anything4 ,the title to the land he tills is vested absolutely in the family1 of which he is an undivided thirtieth1 or what-not4 ,even the administration of the property is not his1 but resides in the family1 represented by its head4 ,the outward symbols of ownership testify to the fact4 ,the bourns that mark the boundaries of the fields bear the names of families1 not of individuals4 ,the family1 as such1 is the proprietor1 and its lands are cultivated and enjoyed in common by all the constituents of the clan4 ,in the tenure of its real estate1 the ,chinese family much resembles the ,russian ,mir4 ,but so far as his personal state is concerned1 the ,chinese son outslaves the ,slav4 ,for he lives at home1 under the immediate control of the paternal will--in the most complete of serfdoms1 a filial one4 ,even existence becomes a communal affair4 ,from the family mansion1 or set of mansions1 in which all its members dwell1 to the family mausoleum1 to which they will all eventually be borne1 a man makes his life journey in strict company with his kin4 ,a man's life is thus but an undivisible fraction of the family life4 ,how essentially so will appear from the following slight sketch of it4 ,to begin at the beginning1 his birth is a very important event--for the household1 at which no one fails to rejoice except the new-comer4 ,he cries4 ,the general joy1 however1 depends somewhat upon his sex4 ,if the baby chances to be a boy1 everybody is immensely pleased2 if a girl1 there is considerably less effusion shown4 ,in the latter case the more impulsive relatives are unmistakably sorry2 the more philosophic evidently hope for better luck next time4 ,both kinds make very pretty speeches1 which not even the speakers believe1 for in the babe lottery the family is considered to have drawn a blank4 ,a delight so engendered proves how little of the personal1 even in prospective1 attaches to its object4 ,the reason for the invidious distinction in the matter of sex lies of course in an inordinate desire for the perpetuation of the family line4 ,the unfortunate infant is regarded merely in the light of a possible progenitor4 ,a boy is already potentially a father2 whereas a girl1 if she marry at all1 is bound to marry out of her own family into another1 and is relatively lost4 ,the full force of the deprivation is1 however1 to some degree tempered by the almost infinite possibilities of adoption4 ,daughters are1 therefore1 not utterly unmitigable evils4 ,from the privacy of the domestic circle1 the infant's entrance into public life is performed pick-a-back4 ,strapped securely to the shoulders of a slightly older sister1 out he goes1 consigned to the tender mercies of a being who is scarcely more than a baby herself4 ,the diminutiveness of the nurse-perambulators is the most surprising part of the performance4 ,the tiniest of tots may be seen thus toddling round with burdens half their own size4 ,like the dot upon the little i1 the baby's head seems a natural part of their childish ego4 ,an economy of the kind in the matter of nurses is highly suggestive4 ,that it should be practicable thus to entrust one infant to another proves the precociousness of children4 ,but this surprising maturity of the young implies by a law too well known to need explanation1 the consequent immaturity of the race4 ,that which has less to grow up to1 naturally grows up to its limit sooner4 ,it may even be questioned whether it does not do so with the more haste2 on the same principle that a runner who has less distance to travel not only accomplishes his course quicker1 but moves with relatively greater speed1 or as a small planet grows old not simply sooner1 but comparatively faster than a larger one4 ,jupiter is still in his fiery youth1 while the moon is senile in decrepid old age1 and yet his separate existence began long before hers4 ,either hypothesis will explain the abnormally early development of the ,chinese race1 and its subsequent career of inactivity4 ,meanwhile the youthful nurse1 in blissful ignorance of the evidence which her present precocity affords against her future possibilities1 pursues her sports with intermittent attention to her charge1 whose poor little head lolls about1 now on one side and now on the other1 in a most distressingly loose manner1 an uninterested spectator of the proceedings4 ,as soon as the babe gets a trifle bigger he ceases to be ministered to and begins his long course of ministering to others4 ,his home life consists of attentive subordination4 ,the relation his obedience bears to that of children elsewhere is paralleled perhaps sufficiently by the comparative importance attached to precepts on the subject in the respective moral codes4 ,the commandment honor thy father forms a tithe of the ,mosaic law1 while the same injunction constitutes at least one half of the ,confucian precepts4 ,to the ,chinese child all the parental commands are not simply law to the letter1 they are to be anticipated in the spirit4 ,to do what he is told is but the merest fraction of his duty2 theoretically his only thought is how to serve his sire4 ,the pious ,aeneas escaping from ,troy exemplifies his conduct when it comes to a question of domestic precedence1--whose first care1 it will be remembered1 was for his father1 his next for his son1 and his last for his wife4 ,he lost his wife1 it may be noted in passing4 ,filial piety is the greatest of ,chinese virtues4 ,indeed1 an undutiful son is a monstrosity1 a case of moral deformity4 ,it could now hardly be otherwise4 ,for a father sums up in propria persona a whole pedigree of patriarchs whose superimposed weight of authority is practically divine4 ,this condition of servitude is never outgrown by the individual1 as it has never been outgrown by the race4 ,our boy now begins to go to school2 to a day school1 it need hardly be specified1 for a boarding school would be entirely out of keeping with the family life4 ,here1 he is given the ,trimetrical ,classic to start on1 that he may learn the characters by heart1 picking up incidentally what ideas he may4 ,this book is followed by the ,century of ,surnames1 a catalogue of all the clan names in ,china1 studied like the last for the sake of the characters1 although the suggestion of the importance of the family contained in it is probably not lost upon his youthful mind4 ,next comes the ,thousand ,character ,classic1 a wonderful epic as a feat of skill1 for of the thousand characters which it contains not a single one is repeated1 an absence of tautology not properly appreciated by the enforced reader4 ,reminiscences of our own school days vividly depict the consequent disgust1 instead of admiration1 of the boy4 ,three more books succeed these first volumes1 differing from one another in form1 but in substance singularly alike1 treating1 as they all do1 of history and ethics combined4 ,for tales and morals are inseparably associated by pious antiquity4 ,indeed1 the past would seem to have lived with special reference to the edification of the future4 ,chinamen were abnormally virtuous in those golden days1 barring the few unfortunates whom fate needed as warning examples of depravity for succeeding ages4 ,except for the fact that instruction as to a future life forms no part of the curriculum1 a far-eastern education may be said to consist of ,sunday-school every day in the week4 ,for no occasion is lost by the erudite authors1 even in the most worldly portions of their work1 for preaching a slight homily on the subject in hand4 ,the dictum of ,dionysius of ,halicarnassus that history is philosophy teaching by example would seem there to have become modified into history is filiosophy teaching by example4 ,for in the instructive anecdotes every other form of merit is depicted as second to that of being a dutiful son4 ,to the practice of that supreme virtue all other considerations are sacrificed4 ,the student's aim is thus kept single4 ,at every turn of the leaves1 paragons of filial piety shame the youthful reader to the pitch of emulation by the epitaphic records of their deeds4 ,portraits of the past1 possibly colored1 present that estimable trait in so exalted a type that to any less filial a people they would simply deter competition4 ,yet the boy implicitly believes and no doubt resolves to rival what he reads4 ,a specimen or two will amply suggest the rest4 ,in one tale the hero is held up to the unqualified admiration of posterity for having starved to death his son1 in an extreme case of family destitution1 for the sake of providing food enough for his aged father4 ,in another he unhesitatingly divorces his wife for having dared to poke fun1 in the shape of bodkins1 at some wooden effigies of his parents which he had had set up in the house for daily devotional contemplation4 ,finally another paragon actually sells himself in perpetuity as a slave that he may thus procure the wherewithal to bury with due honor his anything but worthy progenitor1 who had first cheated his neighbors and then squandered his ill-gotten gains in riotous living4 ,of these tales1 as of certain questionable novels in a slightly different line1 the eventual moral is considered quite competent to redeem the general immorality of the plot4 ,along such a curriculum the youthful ,chinaman is made to run4 ,a very similar system prevails in ,japan1 the difference between the two consisting in quantity rather than quality4 ,the books in the two cases are much the same1 and the amount read differs surprisingly little when we consider that in the one case it is his own classics the student is reading1 in the other the ,chinaman's4 ,if he belong to the middle class1 as soon as his schooling is over he is set to learn his father's trade4 ,to undertake to learn any trade but his father's would strike the family as simply preposterous4 ,why should he adopt another line of business8 ,and1 if he did1 what other business should he adopt8 ,is his father's occupation not already there1 a part of the existing order of things2 and is he not the son of his father and heir therefore of the paternal skill8 ,not that such inherited aptness is recognized scientifically2 it is simply taken for granted instinctively4 ,it is but a halfhearted intuition1 however1 for the possibility of an inheritance from the mother's side is as out of the question as if her severance from her own family had an ex post facto effect4 ,as for his individual predilection in the matter1 nature has considerately conformed to custom by giving him none4 ,he becomes a cabinet-maker1 for instance1 because his ancestors always have been cabinet-makers4 ,he inherits the family business as a necessary part of the family name4 ,he is born to his trade1 not naturally selected because of his fitness for it4 ,but he usually is amply qualified for the position1 for generations of practice1 if only on one side of the house1 accumulate a vast deal of technical skill4 ,the result of this system of clan guilds in all branches of industry is sufficiently noticeable4 ,the almost infinite superiority of ,japanese artisans over their ,european fellow-craftsmen is world-known4 ,on the other hand the tendency of the occupation in the abstract to swallow up the individual in the concrete is as evident to theory as it is patent in practice4 ,eventually the man is lost in the manner4 ,the very names of trades express the fact4 ,the ,japanese word for cabinet-maker1 for example1 means literally cutting-thing-house1 and is now applied as distinctively to the man as to his shop4 ,nominally as well as practically the youthful ,japanese artisan makes his introduction to the world1 much after the manner of the hero of ,lecocq's comic opera1 the son of the house of ,marasquin et ,cie4 ,if instead of belonging to the lower middle class our typical youth be born of bluer blood1 or if he be filled with the same desires as if he were so descended1 he becomes a student4 ,having failed to discover in the school-room the futility of his country's self-vaunted learning1 he proceeds to devote his life to its pursuit4 ,with an application which is eminently praiseworthy1 even if its object be not1 he sets to work to steep himself in the classics till he can perceive no merit in anything else4 ,as might be suspected1 he ends by discovering in the sayings of the past more meaning than the simple past ever dreamed of putting there4 ,he becomes more ,confucian than ,confucius4 ,indeed1 it is fortunate for the reputation of the sage that he cannot return to earth1 for he might disagree to his detriment with his own commentators4 ,such is the state of things in ,china and ,korea4 ,learning1 however1 is not dependent solely on individual interest for its wonderfully flourishing condition in the ,middle ,kingdom1 for the government abets the practice to its utmost4 ,it is itself the supreme sanction1 for its posts are the prizes of proficiency4 ,through the study of the classics lies the only entrance to political power4 ,to become a mandarin one must have passed a series of competitive examinations on these very subjects1 and competition in this impersonal field is most keen4 ,for while popular enthusiasm for philosophy for philosophy's sake might1 among any people1 eventually show symptoms of fatigue1 it is not likely to flag where the outcome of it is so substantial4 ,erudition carries there all earthly emoluments in its train4 ,for the man who can write the most scholastic essay on the classics is forthwith permitted to amass much honor and more wealth by wronging his less accomplished fellow-citizens4 ,china is a student's paradise where the possession of learning is instantly convertible into unlimited pelf4 ,in ,japan the study of the classics was never pursued professionally4 ,it was1 however1 prosecuted with much zeal en amateur4 ,the ,chinese bureaucratic system has been wanting4 ,for in spite of her students1 until within thirty years ,japan slumbered still in the ,knight-time of the ,middle ,ages1 and so long as a man carried about with him continually two beautiful swords he felt it incumbent upon him to use them4 ,the happy days of knight-errantry have passed4 ,these same cavaliers of ,samurai are now thankful to police the streets in spectacles necessitated by the too diligent study of ,german text1 and arrest chance disturbers of the public peace for a miserably small salary per month4 ,our youth has now reached the flowering season of life1 that brief ,may time when the whole world takes on the rose-tint1 and when by all dramatic laws he ought to fall in love4 ,he does nothing of the kind4 ,sad to say1 he is a stranger to the feeling4 ,love1 as we understand the word1 is a thing unknown to the ,far ,east2 fortunately1 indeed1 for the possession there of the tender passion would be worse than useless4 ,its indulgence would work no end of disturbance to the community at large1 beside entailing much misery upon its individual victim4 ,its exercise would probably be classed with kleptomania and other like excesses of purely personal consideration4 ,the community could never permit the practice1 for it strikes at the very root of their whole social system4 ,the immense loss in happiness to these people in consequence of the omission by the too parsimonious ,fates of that thread1 which1 with us1 spins the whole of woman's web of life1 and at least weaves the warp of man's1 is but incidental to the present subject2 the effect of the loss upon the individuality of the person himself is what concerns us now4 ,if there is one moment in a man's life when his interest for the world at large pales before the engrossing character of his own emotions1 it is assuredly when that man first falls in love4 ,then1 if never before1 the world within excludes the world without4 ,for of all our human passions none is so isolating as the tenderest4 ,to shut that one other being in1 we must of necessity shut all the rest of mankind out2 and we do so with a reckless trust in our own self-sufficiency which has about it a touch of the sublime4 ,the other millions are as though they were not1 and we two are alone in the earth1 which suddenly seems to have grown unprecedentedly beautiful4 ,indeed1 it only needs such judicious depopulation to make of any spot an ,eden4 ,perhaps the early ,jewish myth-makers had some such thought in mind when they wrote their idyl of the cosmogony4 ,the human traits are true to-day4 ,then at last our souls throw aside their conventional wrappings to stand revealed as they really are4 ,certain of comprehension1 the thoughts we have never dared breathe to any one before1 find a tongue for her who seems fore-destined to understand4 ,the long-closed floodgates of feeling are thrown wide1 and our personality1 pent up from the time of its inception for very mistrust1 sweeps forth in one uncontrollable rush4 ,for then the most reticent becomes confiding2 the most self-contained expands4 ,then every detail of our past lives assumes an importance which even we had not divined4 ,to her we tell them all1--our boyish beliefs1 our youthful fancies1 the foolish with the fine1 the witty with the wise1 the little with the great4 ,nothing then seems quite unworthy1 as nothing seems quite worthy enough4 ,flowers and weeds that we plucked upon our pathway1 we heap them in her lap1 certain that even the poorest will not be tossed aside4 ,small wonder that we bring as many as we may when she bends her head so lovingly to each4 ,as our past rises in reminiscence with all its oldtime reality1 no less clearly does our future stand out to us in mirage4 ,what we would be seems as realizable as what we were4 ,seen by another beside ourselves1 our castles in the air take on something of the substance of stereoscopic sight4 ,our airiest fancies seem solid facts for their reality to her1 and gilded by lovelight1 they glitter and sparkle like a true palace of the ,east4 ,for once all is possible2 nothing lies beyond our reach4 ,and as we talk1 and she listens1 we two seem to be floating off into an empyrean of our own like the summer clouds above our heads1 as they sail dreamily on into the far-away depths of the unfathomable sky4 ,it would be more than mortal not to believe in ourselves when another believes so absolutely in us4 ,our most secret thoughts are no longer things to be ashamed of1 for she has sanctioned them4 ,whatever doubt may have shadowed us as to our own imaginings disappears before the smile of her appreciation4 ,that her appreciation may be prejudiced is not a possibility we think of then4 ,she understands us1 or seems to do so to our own better understanding of ourselves4 ,happy the man who is thus understood6 ,happy even he who imagines that he is1 because of her eager wish to comprehend2 fortunate1 indeed1 if in this one respect he never comes to see too clearly4 ,no such blissful infatuation falls to the lot of the ,far ,oriental4 ,he never is the dupe of his own desire1 the willing victim of his self-illusion4 ,he is never tempted to reveal himself1 and by thus revealing1 realize4 ,no loving appreciation urges him on toward the attainment of his own ideal4 ,that incitement to be what he would seem to be1 to become what she deems becoming1 he fails to feel4 ,custom has so far fettered fancy that even the wish to communicate has vanished4 ,he has now nothing to tell2 she needs no ear to hear4 ,for she is not his love2 she is only his wife1--what is left of a romance when the romance is left out4 ,worse still1 she never was anything else4 ,he has not so much as a memory of her1 for he did not marry her for love2 he may not love of his own accord1 nor for the matter of that does he wish to do so4 ,if by some mischance he should so far forget to forget himself1 it were much better for him had he not done so1 for the choice of a bride is not his1 nor of a bridegroom hers4 ,marriage to a ,far ,oriental is the most important mercantile transaction of his whole life4 ,it is1 therefore1 far too weighty a matter to be entrusted to his youthful indiscretion2 for although the person herself is of lamentably little account in the bargain1 the character of her worldly circumstances is most material to it4 ,so she is contracted for with the same care one would exercise in the choice of any staple business commodity4 ,the particular sample is not vital to the trade1 but the grade of goods is4 ,she is selected much as the bride of the ,vicar of ,wakefield chose her wedding-gown1 only that the one was at least cut to suit1 while the other is not4 ,it is certainly easier1 if less fitting1 to get a wife as some people do clothes1 not to their own order1 but ready made2 all the more reason when the bargain is for one's son1 not one's self4 ,so the ,far ,east1 which looks at the thing from a strictly paternal standpoint and ignores such trifles as personal preferences1 takes its boy to the broker's and fits him out4 ,that the object of such parental care does not end by murdering his unfortunate spouse or making way with himself suggests how dead already is that individuality which we deem to be of the very essence of the thing4 ,marriage is thus a species of investment contracted by the existing family for the sake of the prospective one1 the actual participants being only lay figures in the affair4 ,sometimes the father decides the matter himself2 sometimes he or the relative who stands in loco parentis calls for a plebiscit on the subject2 for such an extension of the suffrage has gradually crept even into patriarchal institutions4 ,the family then assemble1 sit in solemn conclave on the question1 and decide it by vote4 ,of course the interested parties are not asked their opinion1 as it might be prejudiced4 ,the result of the conference must be highly gratifying4 ,to have one's wife chosen for one by vote of one's relatives cannot but be satisfactory--to the electors4 ,the outcome of this ballot1 like that of universal suffrage elsewhere1 is at the best unobjectionable mediocrity4 ,somehow such a result does not seem quite to fulfil one's ideal of a wife4 ,it is true that the upper classes of impersonal ,france practise this method of marital selection1 their conseils de famille furnishing in some sort a parallel4 ,but1 as is well known1 matrimony among these same upper classes is largely form devoid of substance4 ,it begins impressively with a dual ceremony1 the civil contract1 which amounts to a contract of civility between the parties1 and a religious rite to render the same perpetual1 and there it is too apt to end4 ,so much for the immediate influence on the man2 the eventual effect on the race remains to be considered4 ,now1 if the first result be anything1 the second must in the end be everything4 ,for however trifling it be in the individual instance1 it goes on accumulating with each successive generation1 like compound interest4 ,the choosing of a wife by family suffrage is not simply an exponent of the impersonal state of things1 it is a power toward bringing such a state of things about4 ,a hermit seldom develops to his full possibilities1 and the domestic variety is no exception to the rule4 ,a man who is linked to some one that toward him remains a cipher lacks surroundings inciting to psychological growth1 nor is he more favorably circumstanced because all his ancestors have been similarly circumscribed4 ,as if to make assurance doubly sure1 natural selection here steps in to further the process4 ,to prove this with all the rigidity of demonstration desirable is in the present state of erotics beyond our power4 ,until our family trees give us something more than mere skeletons of dead branches1 we must perforce continue ignorant of the science of grafts4 ,for the nonce we must be content to generalize from our own premises1 only rising above them sufficiently to get a bird's-eye view of our neighbor's estates4 ,such a survey has at least one advantage3 the whole field of view appears perfectly plain4 ,surveying the subject1 then1 from this ego-altruistic position1 we can perceive why matrimony1 as we practise it1 should result in increasing the personality of our race3 for the reason namely that psychical similarity determines the selection4 ,at first sight1 indeed1 such a natural affinity would seem to have little or nothing to do with marriage4 ,as far as outsiders are capable of judging1 unlikes appear to fancy one another quite as gratuitously as do likes4 ,connubial couples are often anything but twin souls4 ,yet our own dual use of the word like bears historic witness to the contrary4 ,for in this expression we have a record from early ,gothic times that men liked others for being like themselves4 ,since then1 our feelings have not changed materially1 although our mode of showing them is slightly less intense4 ,in those simple days stranger and enemy were synonymous terms1 and their objects were received in a corresponding spirit4 ,in our present refined civilization we hurl epithets instead of spears1 and content ourselves with branding as heterodox the opinions of another which do not happen to coincide with our own4 ,the instinct of self-development naturally begets this self-sided view4 ,we insensibly find those persons congenial whose ideas resemble ours1 and gravitate to them1 as leaves on a pond do to one another1 nearer and nearer till they touch4 ,is it likely1 then1 that in the most important case of all the rule should suddenly cease to hold8 ,is it to be presumed that even ,socrates chose ,xantippe for her remarkable contrariety to himself8 ,mere physical attraction is another matter4 ,corporeally considered1 men not infrequently fall in love with their opposites1 the phenomenally tall with the painfully short1 the unnecessarily stout with the distressingly slender4 ,but even such inartistic juxtapositions are much less common than we are apt at times to think4 ,for it must never be forgotten that the exceptional character of the phenomena renders them conspicuous1 the customary more consorted combinations failing to excite attention4 ,besides1 there exists a reason for physical incongruity which does not hold psychically4 ,nature sanctions the one while she discountenances the other4 ,instead of the forethought she once bestowed upon the body1 it receives at her hands now but the scantiest attention4 ,its development has ceased to be an object with her4 ,for some time past almost all her care has been devoted to the evolution of the soul4 ,the consequence is that physically man is much less specialized than many other animals4 ,in other words1 he is bodily less advanced in the race for competitive extermination4 ,he belongs to an antiquated1 inefficient type of mammal4 ,his organism is still of the jack-of-all-trades pattern1 such as prevailed generally in the more youthful stages of organic life--one not specially suited to any particular pursuit4 ,were it not for his cerebral convolutions he could not compete for an instant in the struggle for existence1 and even the monkey would reign in his stead4 ,but brain is more effective than biceps1 and a being who can kill his opponent farther off than he can see him evidently needs no great excellence of body to survive his foe4 ,the field of competition has thus been transferred from matter to mind1 but the fight has lost none of its keenness in consequence4 ,with the same zeal with which advantageous anatomical variations were seized upon and perpetuated1 psychical ones are now grasped and rendered hereditary4 ,now if opposites were to fancy and wed one another1 such fortunate improvements would soon be lost4 ,they would be scattered over the community at large even it they escaped entire neutralization4 ,to prevent so disastrous a result nature implants a desire for resemblance1 which desire man instinctively acts upon4 ,complete compatibility of temperament is of course a thing not to be expected nor indeed to be desired1 since it would defeat its own end by allowing no room for variation4 ,a fairly broad basis of agreement1 however1 exists even when least suspected4 ,this common ground of content consists of those qualities held to be most essential by the individuals concerned1 although not necessarily so appearing to other people4 ,sometimes1 indeed1 these qualities are still in the larvae state of desires4 ,they are none the less potent upon the man's personality on that account1 for the wish is always father to its own fulfilment4 ,the want of conjugal resemblance not only works mediately on the child1 it works mutually on the parents2 for companionship1 as is well recognized1 tends to similarity4 ,now companionship is the last thing to be looked for in a far-eastern couple4 ,where custom requires a wife to follow dutifully in the wake of her husband1 whenever the two go out together1 there is small opportunity for intercourse by the way1 even were there the slightest inclination to it1 which there is not4 ,the appearance of the pair on an excursion is a walking satire on sociability1 for the comicality of the connection is quite unperceived by the performers4 ,in the privacy of the domestic circle the separation1 if less humorous1 is no less complete4 ,each lives in a world of his own1 largely separate in fact in ,china and ,korea1 and none the less in fancy in ,japan4 ,on the continent a friend of the husband would see little or nothing of the wife1 and even in ,japan he would meet her much as we meet an upper servant in a friend's house4 ,such a semi-attached relationship does not conduce to much mutual understanding4 ,the remainder of our hero's uneventful existence calls for no particular comment4 ,as soon as he has children borne him he is raised ipso facto from the position of a common soldier to that of a subordinate officer in the family ranks4 ,but his opportunities for the expression of individuality are not one whit increased4 ,he has simply advanced a peg in a regular hierarchy of subjection4 ,from being looked after himself he proceeds to look after others4 ,such is the extent of the change4 ,even should he chance to be the eldest son of the eldest son1 and thus eventually end by becoming the head of the family1 he cannot consistently consider himself4 ,there is absolutely no place in his social cosmos for so particular a thing as the ego4 ,with a certain grim humor suggestive of metaphysics1 it may be said of his whole life that it is nothing but a relative affair after all4 ,chapter #c4 ,adoption4 ,but one may go a step farther in this matter of the family1 and by so doing fare still worse with respect to individuality4 ,there are certain customs in vogue among these peoples which would seem to indicate that even so generic a thing as the family is too personal to serve them for ultimate social atom1 and that in fact it is only the idea of the family that is really important1 a case of abstraction of an abstract4 ,these suggestive customs are the far-eastern practices of adoption and abdication4 ,adoption1 with us1 is a kind of domestic luxury1 akin to the keeping of any other pets1 such as lap-dogs and canaries4 ,it is a species of self-indulgence which those who can afford it give themselves when fortune has proved unpropitious1 an artificial method of counteracting the inequalities of fate4 ,that such is the plain unglamoured view of the procedure is shown by the age at which the object is adopted4 ,usually the future son or daughter enters the adoptive household as an infant1 intentionally so on the part of the would-be parents4 ,his ignorance of a previous relationship largely increases his relative value2 for the possibility of his making comparisons in his own mind between a former state of existence and the present one unfavorable to the latter is not pleasant for the adopters to contemplate4 ,he is therefore acquired young4 ,the amusement derived from his company is thus seen to be distinctly paramount to all other considerations4 ,no one cares so heartily to own a dog which has been the property of another2 a fortiori of a child4 ,it is clearly1 then1 not as a necessity that the babe is adopted4 ,if such were the case1 if like the ancient ,romans all a man wanted was the continuance of the family line1 he would naturally wait until the last practicable moment2 for he would thus save both care and expense4 ,in the ,far ,east adoption is quite a different affair4 ,there it is a genealogical necessity--like having a father or mother4 ,it is1 indeed1 of almost more importance4 ,for the great desideratum to these peoples is not ancestors but descendants4 ,pedigrees in the land of the universal opposite are not matters of bequest but of posthumous reversion4 ,a man is not beholden to the past1 he looks forward to the future for inherited honors4 ,no fame attaches to him for having had an illustrious grandfather4 ,on the contrary1 it is the illustrious grandson who reflects some of his own greatness back upon his grandfather4 ,if a man therefore fail to attain eminence himself1 he always has another chance in his descendants2 for he will of necessity be ennobled through the merits of those who succeed him4 ,such is the immemorial law of the land4 ,fame is retroactive4 ,this admirable system has only one objection3 it is posthumous in its effect4 ,an ambitious man who unfortunately lacks ability himself has to wait too long for vicarious recognition4 ,the objection is like that incident to the making of a country seat out of a treeless plain by planting the same with saplings4 ,about the time the trees begin to be worth having the proprietary landscape-gardener dies of old age4 ,however1 as custom permits a ,far ,oriental no ancestral growth of timber1 he is obliged to lay the seeds of his own family trees4 ,natural offspring are on the whole easier to get1 and more satisfactory when got4 ,hence the haste with which these peoples rush into matrimony4 ,if in despite of his precipitation fate perversely refuse to grant him children1 he must endeavor to make good the omission by artificial means4 ,he proceeds to adopt somebody4 ,true to instinct1 he chooses from preference a collateral relative4 ,in some far-eastern lands he must so restrict himself by law4 ,in ,korea1 for instance1 he can only adopt an agnate and one of a lower generation than his own4 ,but in ,japan his choice is not so limited4 ,in so praiseworthy an act as the perpetuation of his unimportant family line1 it is deemed unwise in that progressive land to hinder him from unconsciously bettering it by the way4 ,he is consequently permitted to adopt anybody4 ,as people are by no means averse to being adopted1 the power to adopt whom he will gives him more voice in the matter of his unnatural offspring than he ever had in the selection of a more natural one4 ,the adopted changes his name1 of course1 to take that of the family he enters4 ,as he is very frequently grown up and extensively known at the time the adoption takes place1 his change of cognomen occasions at first some slight confusion among his acquaintance4 ,this would be no worse1 however1 than the change with us from the maid to the matron1 and intercourse would soon proceed smoothly again if people would only rest content with one such domestic migration4 ,but they do not4 ,the fatal facility of the process tempts them to repeat it4 ,the result is bewildering3 a people as nomadic now in the property of their persons as their forefathers were in their real estate4 ,a man adopts another to-day to unadopt him to-morrow and replace him by somebody else the day after4 ,so profoundly unimportant to them is their social identity1 that they bandy it about with almost farcical freedom4 ,perhaps it is fitting that there should be some slight preparation in this world for a future transmigration of souls4 ,still one fails to conceive that the practice can be devoid of disadvantages even to its beneficiaries4 ,to foreigners it proves disastrously perplexing4 ,for if you chance upon a man whom you have not met for some time1 you can never be quite sure how to accost him4 ,if you begin1 ,well met1 ,green1 how goes it8 as likely as not he replies1 ,finely4 ,but ,i am no longer ,green2 ,i have become ,brown4 ,i was adopted last month by my maternal grandfather4 ,you of course apologize for your unfortunate mistake1 carefully note his change of hue for a future occasion1 and behold1 on meeting him the next time you find he has turned ,black4 ,such a chameleon-like cognomen is very unsettling to your idea of his identity1 and can hardly prove reassuring to his own4 ,the only persons who reap any benefit from the doubt are those1 with us unhappy1 individuals who possess the futile faculty of remembering faces without recalling their accompanying names4 ,girls1 as a rule1 are not adopted1 being valueless genealogically4 ,a niece or grandniece to whom one has taken a great fancy might of course be adopted there as elsewhere1 but it would be distinctly out of the every-day run1 as she could never be included in the household on strict business principles4 ,the practice of adopting is not confined to childless couples4 ,others may find themselves in quite as unfortunate a predicament4 ,a man may be the father of a large and thriving family and yet be as destitute patriarchally as if he had not a child to his name4 ,his offspring may be of the wrong sex2 they may all be girls4 ,in this untoward event the father has something more on his hands than merely a houseful of daughters to dispose of4 ,in addition to securing sons-in-law1 he must1 unless he would have his ancestral line become extinct1 provide himself with a son4 ,the simplest procedure in such a case is to combine relationships in a single individual1 and the most self-evident person to select for the dual capacity is the husband of the eldest daughter4 ,this is the course pursued4 ,some worthy young man is secured as spouse for the senior sister2 he is at the same time formally taken in as a son by the family whose cognomen he assumes1 and eventually becomes the head of the house4 ,strange to say1 this vista of gradually unfolding honors does not seem to prove inviting4 ,perhaps the new-comer objects to marrying the whole family1 a prejudice not without parallel elsewhere4 ,certainly the opportunity is not appreciated4 ,indeed1 to go out as a son-in-law1 as the ,japanese idiom hath it1 is considered demeaning to the matrimonial domestic4 ,like other household help he wears too patently the badge of servitude4 ,if you have three koku of rice to your name1 don't do it1 is the advice of the local proverb--a proverb whose warning against marrying for money is the more suggestive for being launched in a land where marrying for love is beyond the pale of respectability4 ,to barter one's name in this mercenary manner is looked upon as derogatory to one's self-respect1 although1 as we have seen1 to part with it for any less direct remuneration is not attended with the slightest loss of personal prestige4 ,as practically the unfortunate had none to lose in either event1 it would seem to be a case of taking away from a man that which he hath not4 ,so contumacious a thing is custom4 ,it is indeed lucky that popular prejudice interposes some limit to this fictitious method of acquiring children4 ,a trifling predilection for the real thing in sonships is absolutely vital1 even to the continuance of the artificial variety4 ,for if one generation ever went in exclusively for adoption1 there would be no subsequent generation to adopt4 ,as it to give the finishing touch to so conventional a system of society1 a man can leave it under certain circumstances with even greater ease than he entered it4 ,he can become as good as dead without the necessity of making way with himself4 ,theoretically1 he can cease to live while still practically existing2 for it is always open to the head of a family to abdicate4 ,the word abdicate has to our ears a certain regal sound4 ,we instinctively associate the act with a king4 ,even the more democratic expression resign suggests at once an office of public or quasi public character4 ,to talk of abdicating one's private relationships sounds absurd2 one might as well talk of electing his parents1 it would seem to us4 ,such misunderstanding of far-eastern social possibilities comes from our having indulged in digressions from our more simple nomadic habits4 ,if in imagination we will return to our ancestral muttons and the then existing order of things1 the idea will not strike us as so strange2 for in those early bucolic days every father was a king4 ,family economics were the only political questions in existence then4 ,the clan was the unit4 ,domestic disputes were state disturbances1 and clan-claims the only kind of international quarrels4 ,the patriarch was both father to his people and king4 ,as time widened the family circle it eventually reached a point where cohesion ceased to be possible4 ,the centrifugal tendency could no longer be controlled by the centripetal force4 ,it split up into separate bodies1 each of them a family by itself4 ,in their turn these again divided1 and so the process went on4 ,this principle has worked universally1 the only difference in its action among different races being the greater or less degree of the evolving motion4 ,with us the social system has been turning more and more rapidly with time4 ,in the ,far ,east its force1 instead of increasing1 would seem to have decreased1 enabling the nebula of its original condition to keep together as a single mass1 so that to-day a whole nation1 resembling a nebula indeed in homogeneity1 is swayed by a single patriarchal principle4 ,here1 on the contrary1 so rapid has the motion become that even brethren find themselves scattered to the four winds4 ,an ,occidental father and an ,oriental head of a family are no longer really correlative terms4 ,the latter more closely resembles a king in his duties1 responsibilities1 and functions generally4 ,now1 in the ,middle ,ages in ,europe1 when a king grew tired of affairs of state1 he abdicated4 ,so in the ,far ,east1 when the head of a family has had enough of active life1 he abdicates1 and his eldest son reigns in his stead4 ,from that moment he ceases to belong to the body politic in any active sense4 ,not that he is no longer a member of society nor unamenable to its general laws1 but that he has become a respectable declasse1 as it were4 ,he has entered1 so to speak1 the social nirvana1 a not unfitting first step1 as he regards it1 toward entering the eventual nirvana beyond4 ,such abdication now takes place without particular cause4 ,after a certain time of life1 and long before a man grows old1 it is the fashion thus to make one's bow4 ,chapter #d4 ,language4 ,a man's personal equation1 as astronomers call the effect of his individuality1 is kin1 for all its complexity1 to those simple algebraical problems which so puzzled us at school4 ,to solve either we must begin by knowing the values of the constants that enter into its expression4 ,upon the a b c's of the one1 as upon those of the other1 depend the possibilities of the individual x4 ,now the constants in any man's equation are the qualities that he has inherited from the past4 ,what a man does follows from what he is1 which in turn is mostly dependent upon what his ancestors have been2 and of all the links in the long chain of mind-evolution1 few are more important and more suggestive than language4 ,actions may at the moment speak louder than words1 but methods of expression have as tell-tale a tongue for bygone times as ways of doing things4 ,if it should ever fall to my lot to have to settle that exceedingly vexed ,eastern question1--not the emancipation of ancient ,greece from the bondage of the modern ,turk1 but the emancipation of the modern college student from the bond of ancient ,greek1--,i should propose1 as a solution of the dilemma1 the addition of a course in ,japanese to the college list of required studies4 ,it might look1 ,i admit1 like begging the question for the sake of giving its answer1 but the answer1 ,i think1 would justify itself4 ,it is from no desire to parade a fresh hobby-horse upon the university curriculum that ,i offer the suggestion1 but because ,i believe that a study of the ,japanese language would prove the most valuable of ponies in the academic pursuit of philology4 ,in the matter of literature1 indeed1 we should not be adding very much to our existing store1 but we should gain an insight into the genesis of speech that would put us at least one step nearer to being present at the beginnings of human conversation4 ,as it is now1 our linguistic learning is with most of us limited to a knowledge of ,aryan tongues1 and in consequence we not only fall into the mistake of thinking our way the only way1 which is bad enough1 but1 what is far worse1 by not perceiving the other possible paths we quite fail to appreciate the advantages or disadvantages of following our own4 ,we are the blind votaries of a species of ancestral language-worship1 which1 with all its erudition1 tends to narrow our linguistic scope4 ,a study of ,japanese would free us from the fetters of any such family infatuation4 ,the inviolable rules and regulations of our mother-tongue would be found to be of relative application only4 ,for we should discover that speech is a much less categorical matter than we had been led to suppose4 ,we should actually come to doubt the fundamental necessity of some of our most sacred grammatical constructions2 and even our reverenced ,latin grammars would lose that air of awful absoluteness which so impressed us in boyhood4 ,an encouraging estimate of a certain missionary puts the amount of study needed by the ,western student for the learning of ,japanese as sufficient1 if expended nearer home1 to equip him with any three modern ,european languages4 ,it is certainly true that a completely strange vocabulary1 an utter inversion of grammar1 and an elaborate system of honorifics combine to render its acquisition anything but easy4 ,in its fundamental principles1 however1 it is alluringly simple4 ,in the first place1 the ,japanese language is pleasingly destitute of personal pronouns4 ,not only is the obnoxious ,i conspicuous only by its absence2 the objectionable antagonistic you is also entirely suppressed1 while the intrusive he is evidently too much of a third person to be wanted4 ,such invidious distinctions of identity apparently never thrust their presence upon the simple early ,tartar minds4 ,i1 you1 and he1 not being differences due to nature1 demanded1 to their thinking1 no recognition of man4 ,there is about this vagueness of expression a freedom not without its charm4 ,it is certainly delightful to be able to speak of yourself as if you were somebody else1 choosing mentally for the occasion any one you may happen to fancy1 or1 it you prefer1 the possibility of soaring boldly forth into the realms of the unconditioned4 ,to us1 at first sight1 however1 such a lack of specification appears wofully incompatible with any intelligible transmission of ideas4 ,so communistic a want of discrimination between the meum and the tuum--to say nothing of the claims of a possible third party--would seem to be as fatal to the interchange of thoughts as it proves destructive to the trafficking in commodities4 ,such1 nevertheless1 is not the result4 ,on the contrary1 ,japanese is as easy and as certain of comprehension as is ,english4 ,on ninety occasions out of a hundred1 the context at once makes clear the person meant4 ,in the very few really ambiguous cases1 or those in which1 for the sake of emphasis1 a pronoun is wanted1 certain consecrated expressions are introduced for the purpose4 ,for eventually the more complex social relations of increasing civilization compelled some sort of distant recognition4 ,accordingly1 compromises with objectionable personality were effected by circumlocutions promoted to a pronoun's office1 becoming thus pro-pronouns1 as it were4 ,very noncommittal expressions they are1 most of them1 such as3 the augustness1 meaning you2 that honorable side1 or that corner1 denoting some third person1 the exact term employed in any given instance scrupulously betokening the relative respect in which the individual spoken of is held2 while with a candor1 an indefiniteness1 or a humility worthy so polite a people1 the ,i is known as selfishness1 or a certain person1 or the clumsy one4 ,pronominal adjectives are manufactured in the same way4 ,the stupid father1 the awkward son1 the broken-down firm1 are mine4 ,were they yours1 they would instantly become the august1 venerable father1 the honorable son1 the exalted firm4 #a ,even these lame substitutes for pronouns are paraded as sparingly as possible4 ,to the ,western student1 who brings to the subject a brain throbbing with personality1 hunting in a ,japanese sentence for personal references is dishearteningly like searching in the dark for a black hat which is n't there2 for the brevet pronouns are commonly not on duty4 ,to employ them with the reckless prodigality that characterizes our conversation would strike the ,tartar mind like interspersing his talk with unmeaning italics4 ,he would regard such discourse much as we do those effusive epistles of a certain type of young woman to her most intimate girl friends1 in which every other word is emphatically underlined4 ,for the most part1 the absolutely necessary personal references are introduced by honorifics2 that is1 by honorary or humble expressions4 ,such is a portion of the latter's duty4 ,they do a great deal of unnecessary work besides4 ,these honorifics are1 taken as a whole1 one of the most interesting peculiarities of ,japanese1 as also of ,korean1 just as1 taken in detail1 they are one of its most dangerous pitfalls4 ,for silence is indeed golden compared with the chagrin of discovering that a speech which you had meant for a compliment was1 in fact1 an insult1 or the vexation of learning that you have been industriously treating your servant with the deference due a superior1--two catastrophes sure to follow the attempts of even the most cautious of beginners4 ,the language is so thoroughly imbued with the honorific spirit that the exposure of truth in all its naked simplicity is highly improper4 ,every idea requires to be more or less clothed in courtesy before it is presentable2 and the garb demanded by etiquette is complex beyond conception4 ,to begin with1 there are certain preliminary particles which are simply honorific1 serving no other purpose whatsoever4 ,in addition to these there are for every action a small infinity of verbs1 each sacred to a different degree of respect4 ,for instance1 to our verb to give corresponds a complete social scale of ,japanese verbs1 each conveying the idea a shade more politely than its predecessor2 only the very lowest meaning anything so plebeian as simply to give4 ,sets of laudatory or depreciatory adjectives are employed in the same way4 ,lastly1 the word for is1 which strictly means exists1 expresses this existence under three different forms1--in a matter-of-fact1 a flowing1 or an inflated style2 the solid1 liquid1 and gaseous states of conversation1 so to speak1 to suit the person addressed4 ,but three forms being far too few for the needs of so elaborate a politeness1 these are supplemented by many interpolated grades4 ,terms of respect are applied not only to those mortals who are held in estimation higher than their fellows1 but to all men indiscriminately as well4 ,the grammatical attitude of the individual toward the speaker is of as much importance as his social standing1 ,i being beneath contempt1 and you above criticism4 ,honorifics are used not only on all possible occasions for courtesy1 but at times1 it would seem1 upon impossible ones2 for in some instances the most subtle diagnosis fails to reveal in them a relevancy to anybody4 ,that the commonest objects should bear titles because of their connection with some particular person is comprehensible1 but what excuse can be made for a phrase like the following1 ,it respectfully does that the august seat exists1 all of which simply means is1 and may be applied to anything1 being the common word--in ,japanese it is all one word now--for that apparently simple idea4 ,it would seem a sad waste of valuable material4 ,the real reason why so much distinguished consideration is shown the article in question lies in the fact that it is treated as existing with reference to the person addressed1 and therefore becomes ipso facto august4 ,here is a still subtler example4 ,you are1 we will suppose1 at a tea-house1 and you wish for sugar4 ,the following almost stereotyped conversation is pretty sure to take place4 ,i translate it literally1 simply prefacing that every tea-house girl1 usually in the first blush of youth1 is generically addressed as elder sister1--another honorific1 at least so considered in ,japan4 ,you clap your hands4 7,enter tea-house maiden47 ,you4 ,hai1 elder sister1 augustly exists there sugar8 ,the ,t4 ,h4 ,m4 ,the honorable sugar1 augustly is it8 ,you4 ,so1 augustly4 ,the ,t4 ,h4 ,m4 ,he 7indescribable expression of assent74 7,exit tea-house maiden to fetch the sugar47 ,now1 the augustlies go almost without saying1 but why is the sugar honorable8 ,simply because it is eventually going to be offered to you4 ,but she would have spoken of it by precisely the same respectful title1 if she had been obliged to inform you that there was none1 in which case it never could have become yours4 ,such is politeness4 ,we may note1 in passing1 that all her remarks and all yours1 barring your initial question1 meant absolutely nothing4 ,she understood you perfectly from the first1 and you knew she did2 but then1 if all of us were to say only what were necessary1 the delightful art of conversation would soon be nothing but a science4 ,the average ,far ,oriental1 indeed1 talks as much to no purpose as his ,western cousin1 only in his chit-chat politeness replaces personalities4 ,with him1 self is suppressed1 and an ever-present regard for others is substituted in its stead4 ,a lack of personality is1 as we have seen1 the occasion of this courtesy2 it is also its cause4 ,that politeness should be one of the most marked results of impersonality may appear surprising1 yet a slight examination will show it to be a fact4 ,looked at a posteriori1 we find that where the one trait exists the other is most developed1 while an absence of the second seems to prevent the full growth of the first4 ,this is true both in general and in detail4 ,courtesy increases1 as we travel eastward round the world1 coincidently with a decrease in the sense of self4 ,asia is more courteous than ,europe1 ,europe than ,america4 ,particular races show the same concomitance of characteristics4 ,france1 the most impersonal nation of ,europe1 is at the same time the most polite4 ,considered a priori1 the connection between the two is not far to seek4 ,impersonality1 by lessening the interest in one's self1 induces one to take an interest in others4 ,introspection tends to make of man a solitary animal1 the absence of it a social one4 ,the more impersonal the people1 the more will the community supplant the individual in the popular estimation4 ,the type becomes the interesting thing to man1 as it always is to nature4 ,then1 as the social desires develop1 politeness1 being the means to their enjoyment1 develops also4 ,a second omission in ,japanese etymology is that of gender4 ,that words should be credited with sex is a verbal anthropomorphism that would seem to a ,japanese exquisitely grotesque1 if so be that it did not strike him as actually immodest4 ,for the absence of gender is simply symptomatic of a much more vital failing1 a disregard of sex4 ,originally1 as their language bears witness1 the ,japanese showed a childish reluctance to recognizing sex at all4 ,usually a single sexless term was held sufficient for a given species1 and did duty collectively for both sexes4 ,only where a consideration of sex thrust itself upon them1 beyond the possibility of evasion1 did they employ for the male and the female distinctive expressions4 ,the more intimate the relation of the object to man1 the more imperative the discriminating name4 ,hence human beings possessed a fair number of such special appellatives2 for a man is a palpably different sort of person from his grandmother1 and a mother-in-law from a wife4 ,but it is noteworthy that the artificial affinities of society were as carefully differentiated as the distinctions due to sex1 while ancestral relationships were deemed more important than either4 ,animals1 though treated individually most humanely1 are vouchsafed but scant recognition on the score of sex4 ,with them1 both sexes share one common name1 and commonly1 indeed1 this answers quite well enough4 ,in those few instances where sex enters into the question in a manner not to be ignored1 particles denoting male or female are prefixed to the general term4 ,how comparatively rare is the need of such specification can be seen from the way in which1 with us1 in many species1 the name of one sex alone does duty indifferently for both4 ,that of the male is the one usually selected1 as in the case of the dog or horse4 ,if1 however1 it be the female with which man has most to do1 she is allowed to bestow her name upon her male partner4 ,examples of the latter description occur in the use of cows for cattle1 and hens for fowls4 ,a ,japanese can say only fowl1 defined1 if absolutely necessary1 as he-fowl or she-fowl4 ,now such a slighting of one of the most potent springs of human action1 sex1 with all that the idea involves1 is not due to a pronounced misogynism on the part of these people1 but to a much more effective neglect1 a great underlying impersonality4 ,indifference to woman is but included in a much more general indifference to mankind4 ,the fact becomes all the more evident when we descend from sex to gender4 ,that ,father ,ocean does not1 in their verbal imagery1 embrace ,mother ,earth1 with that subtle suggestion of humanity which in ,aryan speech the gender of the nouns hints without expressing1 is not due to any lack of poesy in the ,far ,oriental speaker1 but to the essential impersonality of his mind1 embodied now in the very character of the words he uses4 ,a ,japanese noun is a crystallized concept1 handed down unchanged from the childhood of the ,japanese race4 ,so primitive a conception does it represent that it is neither a total nor a partial symbol1 but rather the outcome of a first vague generality4 ,the word man1 for instance1 means to them not one man1 still less mankind1 but that indefinite idea which struggles for embodiment in the utterance of the infant4 ,it represents not a person1 but a thing1 a material fact quite innocent of gender4 ,this early state of semi-consciousness the ,japanese never outgrew4 ,the world continued to present itself to their minds as a collection of things4 ,nor did their subsequent ,chinese education change their view4 ,buddhism simply infused all things with the one universal spirit4 ,as to inanimate objects1 the idea of supposing sex where there is not even life is altogether too fanciful a notion for the ,far ,eastern mind4 ,impersonality first fashioned the nouns1 and then the nouns1 by their very impersonality1 helped keep impersonal the thought and fettered fancy4 ,all those temptings to poesy which to the ,aryan imagination lie latent in the sex with which his forefathers humanized their words1 never stir the ,tartar nor the ,chinese soul4 ,they feel the poetry of nature as much as1 indeed much more than1 we2 but it is a poetry unassociated with man4 ,and this1 too1 curiously enough1 in spite of the fact that to explain the cosmos the ,chinamen invented1 or perhaps only adapted1 a singularly sexual philosophy4 ,for possibly1 like some other portions of their intellectual wealth1 they stole it from ,india4 ,the ,chinese conception of the origin of the world is based on the idea of sex4 ,according to their notions the earth was begotten4 ,it is true that with them the cosmos started in an abstract something1 which self-produced two great principles2 but this pair once obtained1 matters proceeded after the analogy of mankind4 ,the two principles at work were themselves abstract enough to have satisfied the most unimpassioned of philosophers4 ,they were simply a positive essence and a negative one1 correlated to sunshine and shadow1 but also correlated to male and female forces4 ,through their mutual action were born the earth and the air and the water2 from these1 in turn1 was begotten man4 ,the cosmical modus operandi was not creative nor evolutionary1 but sexual4 ,the whole scheme suggests an attempt to wed abstract philosophy with primitive concrete mythology4 ,the same sexuality distinguishes the ,japanese demonology4 ,here the physical replaces the philosophical2 instead of principles we find allegorical personages1 but they show just the same pleasing propensity to appear in pairs4 ,this attributing of sexes to the cosmos is not in the least incompatible with an uninterested disregard of sex where it really exists4 ,it is one thing to admit the fact as a general law of the universe1 and quite another to dwell upon it as an important factor in every-day affairs4 ,how slight is the ,tartar tendency to personification can be seen from a glance at these same ,japanese gods4 ,they are a combination of defunct ancestors and deified natural phenomena4 ,the evolving of the first half required little imagination1 for fate furnished the material ready made2 while in conjuring up the second moiety1 the spirit-evokers showed even less originality4 ,their results were neither winsome nor sublime4 ,the gods whom they created they invested with very ordinary humanity1 the usual endowment of aboriginal deity1 together with the customary superhuman strength4 ,if these demigods differed from others of their class1 it was only in being more commonplace1 and in not meddling much with man4 ,even such personification of natural forces1 simple enough to be self-suggested1 quickly disappeared4 ,the various awe-compelling phenomena soon ceased to have any connection with the anthropomorphic noumena they had begotten4 ,for instance1 the sun-goddess1 we are informed1 was one day lured out of a cavern1 where she was sulking in consequence of the provoking behavior of her younger brother1 by her curiosity at the sight of her own face in a mirror1 ingeniously placed before the entrance for the purpose4 ,but no ,japanese would dream now of casting any such reflections1 however flattering1 upon the face of the orb of day4 ,the sun has become not only quite sexless to him1 but as devoid of personality as it is to any ,western materialist4 ,lesser deities suffered a like unsubstantial transformation4 ,the thunder-god1 with his belt of drums1 upon which he beats a devil's tattoo until he is black in the face1 is no longer even indirectly associated with the storm4 ,as for dryads and nymphs1 the beautiful creatures never inhabited ,eastern ,asia4 ,anthropoid foxes and raccoons1 wholly lacking in those engaging qualities that beget love1 and through love remembrance1 take their place4 ,even ,benten1 the naturalized ,venus1 who1 like her ,hellenic sister1 is said to have risen from the sea1 is a person quite incapable of inspiring a reckless infatuation4 ,utterly unlike was this pantheon to the pantheon of the ,greeks1 the personifying tendency of whose ,aryan mind was forever peopling nature with half-human inhabitants4 ,under its quickening fancy the very clods grew sentient4 ,dumb earth awoke at the call of its desire1 and the beings its own poesy had begotten made merry companionship for man4 ,then a change crept over the face of things4 ,faith began to flicker1 for want of facts to feed its flame4 ,little by little the fires of devotion burnt themselves out4 ,at last great ,pan died4 ,the body of the old belief was consumed4 ,but though it perished1 its ashes preserved its form1 an unsubstantial presentment of the past1 to crumble in a twinkling at the touch of science1 but keeping yet to the poet's eye the lifelike semblance of what once had been4 ,the dead gods still live in our language and our art4 ,even to-day the earth about us seems semiconscious to the soul1 for the memories they have left4 ,but with the ,far ,oriental the exorcising feeling was fear4 ,he never fell in love with his own mythological creations1 and so he never embalmed their memories4 ,they were to him but explanations of facts1 and had no claims upon his fancy4 ,his ideal world remained as utterly impersonal as if it had never been born4 ,the same impersonality reappears in the matter of number4 ,grammatically1 number with them is unrecognized4 ,there exist no such things as plural forms4 ,this singularity would be only too welcome to the foreign student1 were it not that in avoiding the frying-pan the ,tartars fell into the fire4 ,for what they invented in place of a plural was quite as difficult to memorize1 and even more cumbrous to express4 ,instead of inflecting the noun and then prefixing a number1 they keep the noun unchanged and add two numerals2 thus at times actually employing more words to express the objects than there are objects to express4 ,one of these numerals is a simple number2 the other is what is known as an auxiliary numeral1 a word as singular in form as in function4 ,thus1 for instance1 two men become amplified verbally into man two individual1 or1 as the ,chinaman puts it1 in pidgin ,english1 two piecey man4 ,for in this respect ,chinese resembles ,japanese1 though in very little else1 and pidgin ,english is nothing but the literal translation of the ,chinese idiom into ,anglo-,saxon words4 ,the necessity for such elaborate qualification arises from the excessive simplicity of the ,japanese nouns4 ,as we have seen1 the noun is so indefinite a generality that simply to multiply it by a number cannot possibly produce any definite result4 ,no exact counterpart of these nouns exists in ,english1 but some idea of the impossibility of the process may be got from our word cattle1 which1 prolific though it may prove in fact1 remains obstinately incapable of verbal multiplication4 ,all ,japanese nouns being of this indefinite description1 all require auxiliary numerals4 ,but as each one has its own appropriate numeral1 about which a mistake is unpardonable1 it takes some little study merely to master the etiquette of these handles to the names of things4 ,nouns are not inflected1 their cases being expressed by postpositions1 which1 as the name implies1 follow1 in becoming ,japanese inversion1 instead of preceding the word they affect4 ,to make up1 nevertheless1 for any lack of perplexity due to an absence of inflections1 adjectives1 en revanche1 are most elaborately conjugated4 ,their protean shapes are as long as they are numerous1 representing not only times1 but conditions4 ,there are1 for instance1 the root form1 the adverbial form1 the indefinite form1 the attributive form1 and the conclusive form1 the two last being conjugated through all the various voices1 moods1 and tenses1 to say nothing of all the potential forms4 ,as one change is superposed on another1 the adjective ends by becoming three or four times its original length4 ,the fact is1 the adjective is either adjective1 adverb1 or verb1 according to occasion4 ,in the root form it also helps to make nouns2 so that it is even more generally useful than as a journalistic epithet with us4 ,as a verb1 it does duty as predicate and copula combined4 ,for such an unnecessary part of speech as a real copula does not exist in ,japanese4 ,in spite of the shock to the prejudices of the old school of logicians1 it must be confessed that the ,tartars get on very well without any such couplings to their trains of thought4 ,but then we should remember that in their sentences the cart is always put before the horse1 and so needs only to be pushed1 not pulled along4 ,the want of a copula is another instance of the primitive character of the tongue4 ,it has its counterpart in our own baby-talk1 where a quality is predicated of a thing simply by placing the adjective in apposition with the noun4 ,that the ,japanese word which is commonly translated is is in no sense a copula1 but an ordinary intransitive verb1 referring to a natural state1 and not to a logical condition1 is evident in two ways4 ,in the first place1 it is never used to predicate a quality directly4 ,a ,japanese does not say1 ,the scenery is fine1 but simply1 ,scenery1 fine4 ,secondly1 wherever this verb is indirectly employed in such a manner1 it is followed1 not by an adjective1 but by an adverb4 ,not ,she is beautiful1 but ,she exists beautifully1 would be the ,japanese way of expressing his admiration4 ,what looks at first1 therefore1 like a copula turns out to be merely an impersonal intransitive verb4 ,a negative noun is1 of course1 an impossibility in any language1 just as a negative substantive1 another name for the same thing1 is a direct contradiction in terms4 ,no matter how negative the idea to be given1 it must be conveyed by a positive expression4 ,even a void is grammatically quite full of meaning1 although unhappily empty in fact4 ,so much is common to all tongues1 but ,japanese carries its positivism yet further4 ,not only has it no negative nouns1 it has not even any negative pronouns nor pronominal adjectives1--those convenient keepers of places for the absent4 ,none and nothing are unknown words in its vocabulary1 because the ideas they represent are not founded on observed facts1 but upon metaphysical abstractions4 ,such terms are human-born1 not earth-begotten concepts1 and so to the ,far ,oriental1 who looks at things from the point of view of nature1 not of man1 negation takes another form4 ,usually it is introduced by the verbs1 because the verbs1 for the most part1 relate to human actions1 and it is man1 not nature1 who is responsible for the omission in question4 ,after all1 it does seem more fitting to say1 ,i am ignorant of everything1 than ,i know nothing4 ,it is indeed you who are wanting1 not the thing4 ,the question of verbs leads us to another matter bearing on the subject of impersonality2 namely1 the arrangement of the words in a ,japanese sentence4 ,the ,tartar mode of grammatical construction is very nearly the inverse of our own4 ,the fundamental rule of ,japanese syntax is1 that qualifying words precede the words they qualify2 that is1 an idea is elaborately modified before it is so much as expressed4 ,this practice places the hearer at some awkward preliminary disadvantage1 inasmuch as the story is nearly over before he has any notion what it is all about2 but really it puts the speaker to much more trouble1 for he is obliged to fashion his whole sentence complete in his brain before he starts to speak4 ,this is largely in consequence of two omissions in ,tartar etymology4 ,there are in ,japanese no relative pronouns and no temporal conjunctions2 conjunctions1 that is1 for connecting consecutive events4 ,the want of these words precludes the admission of afterthoughts4 ,postscripts in speech are impossible4 ,the functions of relatives are performed by position1 explanatory or continuative clauses being made to precede directly the word they affect4 ,ludicrous anachronisms1 not unlike those experienced by ,alice in her looking-glass journey1 are occasioned by this practice4 ,for example1 ,the merry monarch who ended by falling a victim to profound melancholia becomes ,to profound melancholia a victim by falling ended merry monarch1 and the sympathetic hearer weeps first and laughs afterward1 when chronologically he should be doing precisely the opposite4 ,a like inversion of the natural order of things results from the absence of temporal conjunctions4 ,in ,japanese1 though nouns can be added1 actions cannot2 you can say hat and coat1 but not dressed and came4 ,conjunctions are used only for space1 never for time4 ,objects that exist together can be joined in speech1 but it is not allowable thus to connect consecutive events4 ,having dressed1 came is the ,japanese idiom4 ,to speak otherwise would be to violate the unities4 ,for a ,japanese sentence is a single rounded whole1 not a bunch of facts loosely tied together4 ,it is as much a unit in its composition as a novel or a drama is with us4 ,such artistic periods1 however1 are anything but convenient4 ,in their nicely contrived involution they strikingly resemble those curious nests of ,chinese boxes1 where entire shells lie closely packed one within another1--a very marvel of ingenious and perfectly unnecessary construction4 ,one must be antipodally comprehensive to entertain the idea2 as it is1 the idea entertains us4 ,on the same general plan1 the nouns precede the verbs in the sentence1 and are in every way the more important parts of speech4 ,the consequence is that in ordinary conversation the verbs come so late in the day that they not infrequently get left out altogether4 ,for the ,japanese are much given to docking their phrases1 a custom the ,germans might do well to adopt4 ,now1 nouns denote facts1 while verbs express action1 and action1 as considered in human speech1 is mostly of human origin4 ,in this precedence accorded the impersonal element in language over the personal1 we observe again the comparative importance assigned the two4 ,in ,japanese estimation1 the first place belongs to nature1 the second only to man4 ,as if to mark beyond a doubt the insignificance of the part man plays in their thought1 sentences are usually subjectless4 ,although it is a common practice to begin a phrase with the central word of the idea1 isolated from what follows by the emphasizing particle wa 7which means as to1 the ,french quant a71 the word thus singled out for distinction is far more likely to be the object of the sentence than its subject4 ,the habit is analogous to the use of our phrase speaking of1--that is1 simply an emphatic mode of introducing a fresh thought2 only that with them1 the practice being the rule and not the exception1 no correspondingly abrupt effect is produced by it4 ,ousted thus from the post of honor1 the subject is not even permitted the second place4 ,indeed1 it usually fails to put in an appearance anywhere4 ,you may search through sentence after sentence without meeting with the slightest suggestion of such a thing4 ,when so unusual an anomaly as a motive cause is directly adduced1 it owes its mention1 not to the fact of being the subject1 but because for other reasons it happens to be the important word of the thought4 ,the truth is1 the ,japanese conception of events is only very vaguely subjective4 ,an action is looked upon more as happening than as being performed1 as impersonally rather than personally produced4 ,the idea is due1 however1 to anything but philosophic profundity4 ,it springs from the most superficial of childish conceptions4 ,for the ,japanese mind is quite the reverse of abstract4 ,its consideration of things is concrete to a primitive degree4 ,the language reflects the fact4 ,the few abstract ideas these people now possess are not represented1 for the most part1 by pure ,japanese1 but by imported ,chinese expressions4 ,the islanders got such general notions from their foreign education1 and they imported idea and word at the same time4 ,summing up1 as it were1 in propria persona the impersonality of ,japanese speech1 the word for man1 hito1 is identical with1 and probably originally the same word as hito1 the numeral one2 a noun and a numeral1 from which ,aryan languages have coined the only impersonal pronoun they possess4 ,on the one hand1 we have the ,german mann2 on the other1 the ,french on4 ,while as if to give the official seal to the oneness of man with the universe1 the word mono1 thing1 is applied1 without the faintest implication of insult1 to men4 ,such1 then1 is the mould into which1 as children1 these people learn to cast their thought4 ,what an influence it must exert upon their subsequent views of life we have but to ask of our own memories to know4 ,with each one of us1 if we are to advance beyond the steps of the last generation1 there comes a time when our growing ideas refuse any longer to fit the childish grooves in which we were taught to let them run4 ,how great the wrench is when this supreme moment arrives we have all felt too keenly ever to forget4 ,we hesitate1 we delay1 to abandon the beliefs which1 dating from the dawn of our being1 seem to us even as a part of our very selves4 ,from the religion of our mother to the birth of our boyish first love1 all our early associations send down roots so deep that long after our minds have outgrown them our hearts refuse to give them up4 ,even when reason conquers at last1 sentiment still throbs at the voids they necessarily have left4 ,in the ,far ,east1 this fondness for the old is further consecrated by religion4 ,the worship of ancestors sets its seal upon the traditions of the past1 to break which were impious as well as sad4 ,the golden age1 that time when each man himself was young1 has lingered on in the lands where it is always morning1 and where man has never passed to his prosaic noon4 ,befitting the place is the mind we find there4 ,as its language so clearly shows1 it still is in that early impersonal state to which we all awake first before we become aware of that something we later know so well as self4 ,particularly potent with these people is their language1 for a reason that also lends it additional interest to us1--because it is their own4 ,among the mass of foreign thought the ,japanese imitativeness has caused the nation to adopt1 here is one thing which is indigenous4 ,half of the present speech1 it is true1 is of ,chinese importation1 but conservatism has kept the other half pure4 ,from what it reveals we can see how each man starts to-day with the same impersonal outlook upon life the race had reached centuries ago1 and which it has since kept unchanged4 ,the man's mind has done likewise4 #a ,professor ,basil ,hall ,chamberlain3 ,the ,japanese ,language4 ,chapter #e4 ,nature and ,art4 ,we have seen how impersonal is the form which ,far ,eastern thought assumes when it crystallizes into words4 ,let us turn now to a consideration of the thoughts themselves before they are thus stereotyped for transmission to others1 and scan them as they find expression unconsciously in the man's doings1 or seek it consciously in his deeds4 ,to the ,far ,oriental there is one subject which so permeates and pervades his whole being as to be to him1 not so much a conscious matter of thought as an unconscious mode of thinking4 ,for it is a thing which shapes all his thoughts instead of constituting the substance of one particular set of them4 ,that subject is art4 ,to it he is born as to a birthright4 ,artistic perception is with him an instinct to which he intuitively conforms1 and for which he inherits the skill of countless generations4 ,from the tips of his fingers to the tips of his toes1 in whose use he is surprisingly proficient1 he is the artist all over4 ,admirable1 however1 as is his manual dexterity1 his mental altitude is still more to be admired2 for it is artistic to perfection4 ,his perception of beauty is as keen as his comprehension of the cosmos is crude2 for while with science he has not even a speaking acquaintance1 with art he is on terms of the most affectionate intimacy4 ,to the whole ,far ,eastern world science is a stranger4 ,such nescience is patent even in matters seemingly scientific4 ,for although the ,chinese civilization1 even in the so-called modern inventions1 was already old while ours lay still in the cradle1 it was to no scientific spirit that its discoveries were due4 ,notwithstanding the fact that ,cathay was the happy possessor of gunpowder1 movable type1 and the compass before such things were dreamt of in ,europe1 she owed them to no knowledge of physics1 chemistry1 or mechanics4 ,it was as arts1 not as sciences1 they were invented4 ,and it speaks volumes for her civilization that she burnt her powder for fireworks1 not for firearms4 ,to the ,west alone belongs the credit of manufacturing that article for the sake of killing people instead of merely killing time4 ,the scientific is not the ,far ,oriental point of view4 ,to wish to know the reasons of things1 that irrepressible yearning of the ,western spirit1 is no characteristic of the ,chinaman's mind1 nor is it a ,tartar trait4 ,metaphysics1 a species of speculation that has usually proved peculiarly attractive to mankind1 probably from its not requiring any scientific capital whatever1 would seem the most likely place to seek it4 ,but upon such matters he has expended no imagination of his own1 having quietly taken on trust from ,india what he now professes4 ,as for science proper1 it has reached at his hands only the quasimorphologic stage2 that is1 it consists of catalogues concocted according to the ingenuity of the individual and resembles the real thing about as much as a haphazard arrangement of human bones might be expected to resemble a man4 ,not only is the spirit of the subject left out altogether1 but the mere outward semblance is misleading4 ,for pseudo-scientific collections of facts which never rise to be classifications of phenomena forms to his idea the acme of erudition4 ,his mathematics1 for example1 consists of a set of empiric rules1 of which no explanation is ever vouchsafed the taught for the simple reason that it is quite unknown to the teacher4 ,it is not even easy to decide how much of what there is is ,jesuitical4 ,of more recent sciences he has still less notion1 particularly of the natural ones4 ,physics1 chemistry1 geology1 and the like are matters that have never entered his head4 ,even in studies more immediately connected with obvious everyday life1 such as language1 history1 customs1 it is truly remarkable how little he possesses the power of generalization and inference4 ,his elaborate lists of facts are imposing typographically1 but are not even formally important1 while his reasoning about them is as exquisite a bit of scientific satire as could well be imagined4 ,but with the arts it is quite another matter4 ,while you will search in vain1 in his civilization1 for explanations of even the most simple of nature's laws1 you will meet at every turn with devices for the beautifying of life1 which may stand not unworthily beside the products of nature's own skill4 ,whatever these people fashion1 from the toy of an hour to the triumphs of all time1 is touched by a taste unknown elsewhere4 ,to stroll down the ,broadway of ,tokio of an evening is a liberal education in everyday art4 ,as you enter it there opens out in front of you a fairy-like vista of illumination4 ,two long lines of gayly lighted shops1 stretching off into the distance1 look out across two equally endless rows of torch-lit booths1 the decorous yellow gleam of the one contrasting strangely with the demoniacal red flare of the other4 ,this perspective of pleasure fulfils its promise4 ,as your feet follow your eyes you find yourself in a veritable shoppers' paradise1 the galaxy of twinkle resolving into worlds of delight4 ,nor do you long remain a mere spectator2 for the shops open their arms to you4 ,no cold glass reveals their charms only to shut you off4 ,their wares lie invitingly exposed to the public1 seeming to you already half your own4 ,at the very first you come to you stop involuntarily1 lost in admiration over what you take to be bric-a-brac4 ,it is only afterwards you learn that the object of your ecstasy was the commonest of kitchen crockery4 ,next door you halt again1 this time in front of some leathern pocket-books1 stamped with designs in color to tempt you instantly to empty your wallet for more new ones than you will ever have the means to fill4 ,if you do succeed in tearing yourself away purse-whole1 it is only to fall a victim to some painted fans of so exquisite a make and decoration that escape short of possession is impossible4 ,opposed as stubbornly as you may be to idle purchase at home1 here you will find yourself the prey of an acute case of shopping fever before you know it4 ,nor will it be much consolation subsequently to discover that you have squandered your patrimony upon the most ordinary articles of every-day use4 ,if in despair you turn for refuge to the booths1 you will but have delivered yourself into the embrace of still more irresistible fascinations4 ,for the nocturnal squatters are there for the express purpose of catching the susceptible4 ,the shops were modestly attractive from their nature1 but the booths deliberately make eyes at you1 and with telling effect4 ,the very atmosphere is bewitching4 ,the lurid smurkiness of the torches lends an appropriate weirdness to the figure of the uncouthly clad pedlar who1 with the politeness of the arch-fiend himself1 displays to an eager group the fatal fascinations of some new conceit4 ,here the latest thing in inventions1 a gutta-percha rat1 which1 for reasons best known to the vender1 scampers about squeaking with a mimicry to shame the original1 holds an admiring crowd spellbound with mingled trepidation and delight4 ,there a native zoetrope1 indefatigable round of pleasure1 whose top fashioned after the type of a turbine wheel enables a candle at the centre ingeniously to supply both illumination and motive power at the same time1 affords to as many as can find room on its circumference a peep at the composite antics of a consecutively pictured monkey in the act of jumping a box4 ,beyond this wheel of life lies spread out on a mat a most happy family of curios1 the whole of which you are quite prepared to purchase en bloc4 ,while a little farther on stands a flower show which seems to be coyly beckoning to you as the blossoms nod their heads to an imperceptible breeze4 ,so one attraction fairly jostles its neighbor for recognition from the gay thousands that like yourself stroll past in holiday delight4 ,chattering children in brilliant colors1 voluble women and talkative men in quieter but no less picturesque costumes1 stream on in kaleidoscopic continuity4 ,and you1 carried along by the current1 wander thus for miles with the tide of pleasure-seekers1 till1 late at night1 when at last you turn reluctantly homeward1 you feel as one does when wakened from some too delightful dream4 ,or instead of night1 suppose it day and the place a temple4 ,with those who are entering you enter too through the outer gateway into the courtyard4 ,at the farther end rises a building the like of which for richness of effect you have probably never beheld or even imagined4 ,in front of you a flight of white stone steps leads up to a terrace whose parapet1 also of stone1 is diapered for half its height and open latticework the rest4 ,this piazza gives entrance to a building or set of buildings whose every detail challenges the eye4 ,twelve pillars of snow-white wood sheathed in part with bronze1 arranged in four rows1 make1 as it were1 the bones of the structure4 ,the space between the centre columns lies open4 ,the other triplets are webbed in the middle and connected1 on the sides and front1 by grilles of wood and bronze forming on the outside a couple of embrasures on either hand the entrance in which stand the guardian ,nio1 two colossal demons1 ,gog and ,magog4 ,instead of capitals1 a frieze bristling with ,chinese lions protects the top of the pillars4 ,above this in place of entablature rises tier upon tier of decoration1 each tier projecting beyond the one beneath1 and the topmost of all terminating in a balcony which encircles the whole second story4 ,the parapet of this balcony is one mass of ornament1 and its cornice another row of lions1 brown instead of white4 ,the second story is no less crowded with carving4 ,twelve pillars make its ribs1 the spaces between being filled with elaborate woodwork1 while on top rest more friezes1 more cornices1 clustered with excrescences of all colors and kinds1 and guarded by lions innumerable4 ,to begin to tell the details of so multi-faceted a gem were artistically impossible4 ,it is a jewel of a thousand rays1 yet whose beauties blend into one as the prismatic tints combine to white4 ,and then1 after the first dazzle of admiration1 when the spirit of curiosity urges you to penetrate the centre aisle1 lo and behold it is but a gate6 ,the dupe of unexpected splendor1 you have been paying court to the means of approach4 ,it is only a portal after all4 ,for as you pass through1 you catch a glimpse of a building beyond more gorgeous still4 ,like in general to the first1 unlike it in detail1 resembling it only as the mistress may the maid4 ,but who shall convince of charm by enumerating the features of a face6 ,from the tiles of its terrace to the encrusted gables that drape it as with some rich bejewelled mantle falling about it in the most graceful of folds1 it is the very eastern princess of a building standing in the majesty of her court to give you audience4 ,a pebbly path1 a low flight of stone steps1 a pause to leave your shoes without the sill1 and you tread in the twilight of reverence upon the moss-like mats within4 ,the richness of its outer ornament1 so impressive at first1 is1 you discover1 but prelude to the lavish luxury of its interior4 ,lacquer1 bronze1 pigments1 deck its ceiling and its sides in such profusion that it seems to you as if art had expanded1 in the congenial atmosphere1 into a tropical luxuriance of decoration1 and grew here as naturally on temples as in the jungle creepers do on trees4 ,yet all is but setting to what the place contains2 objects of bigotry and virtue that appeal to the artistic as much as to the religious instincts of the devout4 ,more sacred still are the things treasured in the sanctum of the priests4 ,there you will find gems of art for whose sake only the most abnormal impersonality can prevent you from breaking the tenth commandment4 ,of the value set upon them you can form a distant approximation from the exceeding richness and the amazing number of the silk cloths and lacquered boxes in which they are so religiously kept4 ,as you gaze thus1 amid the soul-satisfying repose of the spot1 at some masterpiece from the brush of ,motonobu1 you find yourself wondering1 in a fanciful sort of way1 whether ,buddhist contemplation is not after all only another name for the contemplation of the beautiful1 since devotees to the one are ex officio such votaries of the other4 ,dissimilar as are these two glimpses of ,japanese existence1 in one point the bustling street and the hushed temple are alike1--in the nameless grace that beautifies both4 ,this spirit is even more remarkable for its all-pervasiveness than for its inherent excellence4 ,both objectively and subjectively its catholicity is remarkable4 ,it imbues everything1 and affects everybody4 ,so universally is it applied to the daily affairs of life that there may be said to be no mechanical arts in ,japan simply because all such have been raised to the position of fine arts4 ,the lowest artisan is essentially an artist4 ,modern ,french nomenclature on the subject1 in spite of the satire to which the more prosaic ,anglo-,saxon has subjected it1 is peculiarly applicable there4 ,to call a ,japanese cook1 for instance1 an artist would be but the barest acknowledgment of fact1 for ,japanese food is far more beautiful to look at than agreeable to eat2 while ,tokio tailors are certainly masters of drapery1 if they are sublimely oblivious to the natural modelings of the male or female form4 ,on the other hand1 art is sown1 like the use of tobacco1 broadcast among the people4 ,it is the birthright of the ,far ,east1 the talent it never hides4 ,throughout the length and breadth of the land1 and from the highest prince to the humblest peasant1 art reigns supreme4 ,now such a prevalence of artistic feeling implies of itself impersonality in the people4 ,at first sight it might seem as if science did the same1 and that in this respect the one hemisphere offset the other1 and that consequently both should be equally impersonal4 ,but in the first place1 our masses are not imbued with the scientific spirit1 as theirs are with artistic sensibility4 ,who would expect of a mason an impersonal interest in the principles of the arch1 or of a plumber a non-financial devotion to hydraulics8 ,certainly one would be wrong in crediting the masses in general or ,european waiters in particular with much abstract love of mathematics1 for example4 ,in the second place1 there is an essential difference in the attitude of the two subjects upon personality4 ,emotionally1 science appeals to nobody1 art to everybody4 ,now the emotions constitute the larger part of that complex bundle of ideas which we know as self4 ,a thought which is not tinged to some extent with feeling is not only not personal2 properly speaking1 it is not even distinctively human1 but cosmical4 ,in its lofty superiority to man1 science is unpersonal rather than impersonal4 ,art1 on the other hand1 is a familiar spirit4 ,through the windows of the senses she finds her way into the very soul of man1 and makes for herself a home there4 ,but it is to his humanity1 not to his individuality1 that she whispers1 for she speaks in that universal tongue which all can understand4 ,examples are not wanting to substantiate theory4 ,it is no mere coincidence that the two most impersonal nations of ,europe and ,asia respectively1 the ,french and the ,japanese1 are at the same time the most artistic4 ,even politeness1 which1 as we have seen1 distinguishes both1 is itself but a form of art1--the social art of living agreeably with one's fellows4 ,this impersonality comes out with all the more prominence when we pass from the consideration of art in itself to the spirit which actuates that art1 and especially when we compare their spirit with our own4 ,the mainsprings of ,far ,eastern art may be said to be three3 ,nature1 ,religion1 and ,humor4 ,incongruous collection that they are1 all three witness to the same trait4 ,for the first typifies concrete impersonality1 the second abstract impersonality1 while the province of the last is to ridicule personality generally4 ,of the trio the first is altogether the most important4 ,indeed1 to a ,far ,oriental1 so fundamental a part of himself is his love of ,nature that before we view its mirrored image it will be well to look the emotion itself in the face4 ,the ,far ,oriental lives in a long day-dream of beauty4 ,he muses rather than reasons1 and all musing1 so the word itself confesses1 springs from the inspiration of a ,muse4 ,but this ,muse appears not to him1 as to the ,greeks1 after the fashion of a woman1 nor even more prosaically after the likeness of a man4 ,unnatural though it seem to us1 his inspiration seeks no human symbol4 ,his ,muse is not kin to mankind4 ,she is too impersonal for any personification1 for she is ,nature4 ,that poet whose name carries with it a certain presumption of infallibility has told us that the proper study of mankind is man2 and if material advancement in consequence be any criterion of the fitness of a particular mental pursuit1 events have assuredly justified the saying4 ,indeed1 the ,levant has helped antithetically to preach the same lesson1 in showing us by its own fatal example that the improper study of mankind is woman1 and that they who but follow the fair will inevitably degenerate4 ,the ,far ,oriental knows nothing of either study1 and cares less4 ,the delight of self-exploration1 or the possibly even greater delight of losing one's self in trying to fathom femininity1 is a sensation equally foreign to his temperament4 ,neither the remarkable persistence of one's own characteristics1 not infrequently matter of deep regret to their possessor1 nor the charmingly unaccountable variability of the fairer sex1 at times quite as annoying1 is a phenomenon sufficient to stir his curiosity4 ,accepting1 as he does1 the existing state of things more as a material fact than as a phase in a gradual process of development1 he regards humanity as but a small part of the great natural world1 instead of considering it the crowning glory of the whole4 ,he recognizes man merely as a fraction of the universe1--one might almost say as a vulgar fraction of it1 considering the low regard in which he is held1--and accords him his proportionate share of attention1 and no more4 ,in his thought1 nature is not accessory to man4 ,worthy ,m4 ,perichon1 of prosaic1 not to say philistinic fame1 had1 as we remember1 his travels immortalized in a painting where a colossal ,perichon in front almost completely eclipsed a tiny ,mont ,blanc behind4 ,a ,far ,oriental thinks poetry1 which may possibly account for the fact that in his mind-pictures the relative importance of man and mountain stands reversed4 ,the matchless ,fuji1 first of motifs in his art1 admits no pilgrim as its peer4 ,nor is it to woman that turn his thoughts4 ,mother ,earth is fairer1 in his eyes1 than are any of her daughters4 ,to her is given the heart that should be theirs4 ,the ,far ,eastern love of ,nature amounts almost to a passion4 ,to the study of her ever varying moods her ,japanese admirer brings an impersonal adoration that combines oddly the aestheticism of a poet with the asceticism of a recluse4 ,not that he worships in secret1 however4 ,his passion is too genuine either to find disguise or seek display4 ,with us1 unfortunately1 the love of ,nature is apt to be considered a mental extravagance peculiar to poets1 excusable in exact ratio to the ability to give it expression4 ,for an ordinary mortal to feel a fondness for ,mother ,earth is a kind of folly1 to be carefully concealed from his fellows4 ,a sort of shamefacedness prevents him from avowing it1 as a boy at boarding-school hides his homesickness1 or a lad his love4 ,he shrinks from appearing less pachydermatous than the rest4 ,or else he flies to the other extreme1 and affects the odd2 pretends1 poses1 parades1 and at last succeeds half in duping himself1 half in deceiving other people4 ,but with ,far ,orientals the case is different4 ,their love has all the unostentatious assurance of what has received the sanction of public opinion4 ,nor is it still at that doubtful1 hesitating stage when1 by the instrumentality of a third1 its soul-harmony can suddenly be changed from the jubilant major key into the despairing minor4 ,no trace of sadness tinges his delight4 ,he has long since passed this melancholy phase of erotic misery1 if so be that the course of his true love did not always run smooth1 and is now well on in matrimonial bliss4 ,the very look of the land is enough to betray the fact4 ,in ,japan the landscape has an air of domesticity about it1 patent even to the most casual observer4 ,wherever the ,japanese has come in contact with the country he has made her unmistakably his own4 ,he has touched her to caress1 not injure1 and it seems as if ,nature accepted his fondness as a matter of course1 and yielded him a wifely submission in return4 ,his garden is more human1 even1 than his house4 ,not only is everything exquisitely in keeping with man1 but natural features are actually changed1 plastic to the imprint of their lord and master's mind4 ,bushes1 shrubs1 trees1 forget to follow their original intent1 and grow as he wills them to2 now expanding in wanton luxuriance1 now contracting into dwarf designs of their former selves1 all to obey his caprice and please his eye4 ,even stubborn rocks lose their wildness1 and come to seem a part of the almost sentient life around them4 ,if the description of such dutifulness seems fanciful1 the thing itself surpasses all supposition4 ,hedges and shrubbery1 clipped into the most fantastic shapes1 accept the suggestion of the pruning-knife as if man's wishes were their own whims4 ,manikin maples1 ,tom ,thumb trees1 a foot high and thirty years old1 with all the gnarls and knots and knuckles of their fellows of the forest1 grow in his parterres1 their native vitality not a whit diminished4 ,and they are not regarded as monstrosities but only as the most natural of artificialities2 for they are a part of a horticultural whole4 ,to walk into a ,japanese garden is like wandering of a sudden into one of those strange worlds we see reflected in the polished surface of a concave mirror1 where all but the observer himself is transformed into a fantastic miniature of the reality4 ,in that quaint fairyland diminutive rivers flow gracefully under tiny trees1 past mole-hill mountains1 till they fall at last into lilliputian lakes1 almost smothered for the flowers that grow upon their banks2 while in the extreme distance of a couple of rods the cone of a ,fuji ten feet high looks approvingly down upon a scene which would be nationally incomplete without it4 ,but besides the delights of domesticity which the ,japanese enjoys daily in ,nature's company1 he has his acces de tendresse1 too4 ,when he feels thus specially stirred1 he invites a chosen few of his friends1 equally infatuated1 and together they repair to some spot noted for its scenery4 ,it may be a waterfall1 or some dreamy pond overhung by trees1 or the distant glimpse of a mountain peak framed in picture-wise between the nearer hills2 or1 at their appropriate seasons1 the blossoming of the many tree flowers1 which in eastern ,asia are beautiful beyond description4 ,for he appreciates not only places1 but times4 ,one spot is to be seen at sunrise1 another by moonlight2 one to be visited in the spring-time1 another in the fall4 ,but wherever or whenever it be1 a tea-house1 placed to command the best view of the sight1 stands ready to receive him4 ,for nature's beauties are too well recognized to remain the exclusive property of the first chance lover4 ,people flock to view nature as we do to see a play1 and privacy is as impossible as it is unsought4 ,indeed1 the aversion to publicity is simply a result of the sense of self1 and therefore necessarily not a feature of so impersonal a civilization4 ,aesthetic guidebooks are written for the nature-enamoured1 descriptive of these views which the ,japanese translator quaintly calls ,sceneries1 and which visitors come not only from near but from far to gaze upon4 ,in front of the tea-house proper are rows of summer pavilions1 in one of which the party make themselves at home1 while gentle little tea-house girls toddle forth to serve them the invariable preliminary tea and confections4 ,each man then produces from up his sleeve1 or from out his girdle1 paper1 ink1 and brush1 and proceeds to compose a poem on the beauty of the spot and the feelings it calls up1 which he subsequently reads to his admiring companions4 ,hot sake is next served1 which is to them what beer is to a ,german or absinthe to a blouse2 and there they sit1 sip1 and poetize1 passing their couplets1 as they do their cups1 in honor to one another4 ,at last1 after drinking in an hour or two of scenery and sake combined1 the symposium of poets breaks up4 ,sometimes1 instead of a company of friends1 a man will take his family1 wife1 babies1 and all1 on such an outing1 but the details of his holiday are much the same as before4 ,for the scenery is still the centre of attraction1 and in the attendant creature comforts ,far ,eastern etiquette permits an equal enjoyment to man1 woman1 and child4 ,this love of nature is quite irrespective of social condition4 ,all classes feel its force1 and freely indulge the feeling4 ,poor as well as rich1 low as well as high1 contrive to gratify their poetic instincts for natural scenery4 ,as for flowers1 especially tree flowers1 or those of the larger plants1 like the lotus or the iris1 the ,japanese appreciation of their beauty is as phenomenal as is that beauty itself4 ,those who can afford the luxury possess the shrubs in private2 those who cannot1 feast their eyes on the public specimens4 ,from a sprig in a vase to a park planted on purpose1 there is no part of them too small or too great to be excluded from ,far ,oriental affection4 ,and of the two drawing-rooms of the ,mikado held every year1 in ,april and ,november1 both are garden-parties3 the one given at the time and with the title of the cherry blossoms1 and the other of the chrysanthemum4 ,these same tree flowers deserve more than a passing notice1 not simply because of their amazing beauty1 which would arrest attention anywhere1 but for the national attitude toward them4 ,for no better example of the ,japanese passion for nature could well be cited4 ,if the anniversaries of people are slightingly treated in the land of the sunrise1 the same cannot be said of plants4 ,the yearly birthdays of the vegetable world are observed with more than botanic enthusiasm4 ,the regard in which they are held is truly emotional1 and it not actually individual in its object1 at least personal to the species4 ,each kind of tree as its season brings it into flower is made the occasion of a festival4 ,for the beauty of the blossoming receives the tribute of a national admiration4 ,from peers to populace mankind turns out to witness it4 ,nor are these occasions few4 ,spring in the ,far ,east is one long chain of flower fetes1 and as spring begins by the end of ,january and lasts till the middle of ,june1 opportunities for appreciating each in turn are not half spoiled by a common contemporaneousness4 ,people have not only occasion but time to admire4 ,indeed1 spring itself is suitably respected by being dated conformably to fact4 ,far ,orientals begin their year when ,nature begins hers1 instead of starting anachronously as we do in the very middle of the dead season1 much as our colleges hold their commencements1 on the last in place at on the first day of the academic term4 ,so previous has the haste of ,western civilization become4 ,the result is that our rejoicing partakes of the incongruity of humor4 ,the new year exists only in name4 ,in the ,far ,east1 on the other band1 the calendar is made to fit the time4 ,men begin to reckon their year some three weeks later than the ,western world1 just as the plum-tree opens its pink white petals1 as it were1 in rosy reflection of the snow that lies yet upon the ground4 ,but the coldness of the weather does not in the least deter people from thronging the spot in which the trees grow1 where they spend hours in admiration1 and end by pinning appropriate poems on the twigs for later comers to peruse4 ,fleeting as the flowers are in fact1 they live forever in fancy4 ,for they constitute one of the commonest motifs of both painting and poetry4 ,a branch just breaking into bloom seen against the sunrise sky1 or a bough bending its blossoms to the bosom of a stream1 is subject enough for their greatest masters1 who thus wed1 as it were1 two arts in one1--the spirit of poesy with pictorial form4 ,this plum-tree is but a blossom4 ,precocious harbinger of a host of flowers1 its gay heralding over1 it vanishes not to be recalled1 for it bears no edible fruit4 ,the next event in the series might fairly be called phenomenal4 ,early in ,april takes place what is perhaps as superb a sight as anything in this world1 the blossoming of the cherry-trees4 ,indeed1 it is not easy to do the thing justice in description4 ,if the plum invited admiration1 the cherry commands it2 for to see the sakura in flower for the first time is to experience a new sensation4 ,familiar as a man may be with cherry blossoms at home1 the sight there bursts upon him with the dazzling effect of a revelation4 ,such is the profusion of flowers that the tree seems to have turned into a living mass of rosy light4 ,no leaves break the brilliance4 ,the snowy-pink petals drape the branches entirely1 yet so delicately1 one deems it all a veil donned for the tree's nuptials with the spring4 ,for nothing could more completely personify the spirit of the spring-time4 ,you can almost fancy it some dryad decked for her bridal1 in maidenly day-dreaming too lovely to last4 ,for like the plum the cherry fails in its fruit to fulfil the promise of its flower4 ,it would be strange indeed if so much beauty received no recognition1 but it is even more strange that recognition should be so complete and so universal as it is4 ,appreciation is not confined to the cultivated few2 it is shown quite as enthusiastically by the masses4 ,the popularity of the plants is all-embracing4 ,the common people are as sensitive to their beauty as are the upper classes4 ,private gratification1 roseate as it is1 pales beside the public delight4 ,indeed1 not content with what revelation ,nature makes of herself of her own accord1 man has multiplied her manifestations4 ,spots suitable to their growth have been peopled by him with trees4 ,sometimes they stand in groups like star-clusters1 as in ,oji1 crowning a hill2 sometimes1 as at ,mukojima1 they line an avenue for miles1 dividing the blue river on the one hand from the blue-green rice-fields on the other1--a floral milky way of light4 ,but wherever the trees may be1 there at their flowering season are to be found throngs of admirers4 ,for in crowds people go out to see the sight1 multitudes streaming incessantly to and fro beneath their blossoms as the time of day determines the turn of the human tide4 ,to the ,occidental stranger such a gathering suggests some social loadstone2 but none exists4 ,in the cherry-trees alone lies the attraction4 ,for one week out of the fifty-two the cherry-tree stands thus glorified1 a vision of beauty prolonged somewhat by the want of synchronousness of the different kinds4 ,then the petals fall4 ,what was a nuptial veil becomes a winding-sheet1 covering the sod as with winter's winding-sheet of snow1 destined itself to disappear1 and the tree is nothing but a common cherry-tree once more4 ,but flowers are by no means over because the cherry blossoms are past4 ,a brief space1 and the same crowds that flocked to the cherry turn to the wistaria4 ,gardens are devoted to the plants1 and the populace greatly given to the gardens4 ,there they go to sit and gaze at the grape-like clusters of pale purple flowers that hang more than a cubit long over the wooden trellis1 and grow daily down toward their own reflections in the pond beneath1 vying with one another in ,narcissus-like endeavor4 ,and the people1 as they sip their tea on the veranda opposite1 behold a doubled delight1 the flower itself and its mirrored image stretching to kiss4 ,after the wistaria comes the tree-peony1 and then the iris1 with its trefoil flowers broader than a man may span1 and at all colors under the sky4 ,to one who has seen the great ,japanese fleur-de-lis1 ,france looks ludicrously infelicitous in her choice of emblem4 ,but the list grows too long1 limited as it is only by its own annual repetition4 ,we have as yet reached but the first week in ,june2 the summer and autumn are still to come1 the first bringing the lotus for its crown1 and the second the chrysanthemum4 ,and lazily grand the lotus is1 itself the embodiment of the spirit of the drowsy ,august air1 the very essence of ,buddha-like repose4 ,the castle moats are its special domain1 which in this its flowering season it wrests wholly from their more proper occupant--the water4 ,a dense growth of leather-like leaves1 above which rise in majestic isolation the solitary flowers1 encircles the outer rampart1 shutting the castle in as it might be the palace of the ,sleeping ,beauty4 ,in the delightful dreaminess that creeps over one as he stands thus before some old daimyo's former abode in the heart of ,japan1 he forgets all his metaphysical difficulties about ,nirvana1 for he fancies he has found it1 one long ,lotus afternoon4 ,and then last1 but in some sort first1 since it has been taken for the imperial insignia1 comes the chrysanthemum4 ,the symmetry of its shape well fits it to symbolize the completeness of perfection which the ,mikado1 the son of heaven1 mundanely represents4 ,it typifies1 too1 the fullness of the year2 for it marks1 as it were1 the golden wedding of the spring1 the reminiscence in ,november of the nuptials of the ,may4 ,its own color1 however1 is not confined to gold4 ,it may be of almost any hue and within the general limits of a circle of any form4 ,now it is a chariot wheel with petals for spokes2 now a ball of fire with lambent tongues of flame2 while another kind seems the button of some natural legion of honor1 and still another a pin-wheel in ,nature's own day-fireworks4 ,admired as a thing of beauty for its own sake1 it is also used merely as a material for artistic effects2 for among the quaintest of such conceits are the ,japanese ,jarley chrysanthemum works4 ,every ,november in the florists' gardens that share the temple grounds at ,asakusa may be seen groups of historical and mythological figures composed entirely of chrysanthemum flowers4 ,these effigies are quite worthy of comparison with their ,london cousins1 being sufficiently life-like to terrify children and startle anybody4 ,to come suddenly1 on turning a corner1 upon a colossal warrior1 deterrently uncouth and frightfully battle-clad1 in the act of dispatching a fallen foe1 is a sensation not instantly dispelled by the fact that he is made of flowers4 ,the practice1 at least1 bears witness to an artistic ingenuity of no mean merit1 and to a horticulture ably carried on1 if somewhat eccentrically applied4 ,from the passing of the chrysanthemum dates the dead season4 ,but it is suitably short-lived4 ,sometimes as early as ,november1 the plum-tree is already blossoming again4 ,even from so imperfectly gathered a garland it will be seen that the ,japanese do not lack for opportunities to admire1 nor do they turn coldly away from what they are given4 ,indeed1 they may be said to live in a chronic state of flower-fever2 but in spite of the vast amount of admiration which they bestow on plants1 it is not so much the quantity of that admiration as the quality of it which is remarkable4 ,the intense appreciation shown the subject by the ,far ,oriental is something whose very character seems strange to us1 and when in addition we consider that it permeates the entire people from the commonest coolie to the most aesthetic courtier1 it becomes to our comprehension a state of things little short of inexplicable4 ,to call it artistic sensibility is to use too limited a term1 for it pervades the entire people2 rather is it a sixth sense of a natural1 because national description2 for the trait differs from our corresponding feeling in degree1 and especially in universality enough to merit the distinction4 ,their care for tree flowers is not confined to a cultivation1 it is a cult4 ,it approaches to a sort of natural nature-worship1 an adoration in which nothing is personified4 ,for the emotion aroused in the ,far ,oriental is just as truly an emotion as it was to the ,greek2 but whereas the ,greek personified its object1 the ,japanese admires that object for what it is4 ,to think of the cherry-tree1 for instance1 as a woman1 would be to his mind a conception transcending even the limits of the ludicrous4 ,chapter #f4 ,art4 ,that nature1 not man1 is their beau ideal1 the source of inspiration to them1 is evident again on looking at their art4 ,the same spirit that makes of them such wonderful landscape gardeners and such wonder-full landscape gazers shows itself unmistakably in their paintings4 ,the current impression that ,japanese pictorial ambition1 and consequent skill1 is confined to the representation of birds and flowers1 though entirely erroneous as it stands1 has a grain of truth behind it4 ,this idea is due to the attitude of the foreign observers1 and was in fact a tribute to ,japanese technique rather than an appreciation of ,far ,eastern artistic feeling4 ,the truth is1 the foreigners brought to the subject their own ,western criteria of merit1 and judged everything by these standards4 ,such works naturally commended themselves most as had least occasion to deviate from their canons4 ,the simplest pictures1 therefore1 were pronounced the best4 ,paintings of birds and flowers were thus admitted to be fine1 because their realism spoke for itself4 ,of the exquisite poetic feeling of their landscape paintings the foreign critics were not at first conscious1 because it was not expressed in terms with which they were familiar4 ,but first impressions1 here as elsewhere1 are valuable4 ,one is very apt to turn to them again from the reasoning of his second thoughts4 ,flora and fauna are a conspicuous feature of ,far ,asiatic art1 because they enter as details of the subject-matter of the artist's thoughts and day-dreams4 ,these birds and flowers are his sujets de genre4 ,where we should select a phase of human life for effective isolation1 they choose instead a bit of nature4 ,a spray of grass or a twig of cherry-blossoms is motif enough for them4 ,to their thought its beauty is amply suggestive4 ,for to the ,far ,oriental all nature is sympathetically sentient4 ,his admiration1 instead of being centred on man1 embraces the universe4 ,his art reflects it4 ,leaving out of consideration1 for the moment1 minor though still important distinctions in tone1 treatment1 and technique1 the great fundamental difference between ,western and ,far ,eastern art lies in its attitude toward humanity4 ,with us1 from the time of the ,greeks to the present day1 man has been the cynosure of artistic eyes2 with them he has never been vouchsafed more than a casual1 not to say a cursory glance1 even woman failing to rivet his attention4 ,one of our own writers has said that1 without passing the bounds of due respect1 a man is permitted two looks at any woman he may meet1 one to recognize1 one to admire4 ,a ,japanese ordinarily never dreams of taking but one1--if indeed he goes so far as that1--the first4 ,it is the omitting to take that second look that has left him what he is4 ,not that ,fortune has been unpropitious2 only blind4 ,fate has offered him opportunity enough2 too much1 perhaps4 ,for in ,japan the exposure of the female form is without a parallel in latitude4 ,never nude1 it is frequently naked4 ,the result artistically is much the same1 though the cause be different4 ,for it is a fatal mistake to suppose the ,japanese an immodest people4 ,according to their own standards1 they are exceedingly modest4 ,no respectable ,japanese woman would1 for instance1 ever for a moment turn out her toes in walking4 ,it is considered immodest to do so4 ,their code is1 however1 not so whimsical as this bit of etiquette might suggest4 ,the intent is with them the touchstone of propriety4 ,in their eyes a state of nature is not a state of indecency4 ,whatever exposure is required for convenience is right2 whatever unnecessary1 wrong4 ,such an ,eden-like condition of society would seem to be the very spot for a something like the modern ,french school of art to have developed in4 ,and yet it is just that study of the nude which has from immemorial antiquity been entirely neglected in the ,far ,east4 ,an ancient ,greek1 to say nothing of a modern ,parisian1 would have shocked a ,japanese4 ,yet we are shocked by them4 ,we are astounded at the sights we see in their country villages1 while they in their turn marvel at the exhibitions they witness in our city theatres4 ,at their watering-places the two sexes bathe promiscuously together in all the simplicity of nature2 but for a ,japanese woman to appear on the stage in any character1 however proper1 would be deemed indecent4 ,the difference between the two hemispheres may be said to consist in an artless liberty on the one hand1 and artistic license on the other4 ,their unwritten code of propriety on the subject seems to be1 ,you must see1 but you may not observe4 ,these people live more in accordance with their code of propriety than we do with ours4 ,all classes alike conform to it4 ,the adjective respectable1 used above as a distinction in speaking of woman1 was in reality superfluous1 for all women there1 as far as appearance goes1 are respectable4 ,even the most abandoned creature does not betray her status by her behavior4 ,the reason of this uniformity and its psychological importance ,i shall discuss later4 ,this form of modesty1 a sort of want of modesty of form1 has no connection whatever with sex4 ,it applies with equal force to the male figure1 which is even more exposed than the female1 and offers anatomical suggestions invaluable alike to the artistic and medical professions1--suggestions that are equally ignored by both4 ,the coolies are frequently possessed of physiques which would have delighted ,michael ,angelo2 and as for the phenomenal corpulency of the wrestlers1 it would have made of the place a very paradise for ,rubens4 ,in regard to the doctors1--for to call them surgeons would be to give a name to what does not exist1--a lack of scientific zeal has been the cause of their not investigating what tempts too seductively1 we should imagine1 to be ignored4 ,acupuncture1 or the practice of sticking long pins into any part of the patient's body that may happen to be paining him1 pretty much irrespective of anatomical position1 is the nearest approach to surgery of which they are guilty1 and proclaims of itself the in corpore vili character of the thing operated upon4 ,nor does the painter owe anything to science4 ,he represents humanity simply as he sees it in its every-day costume2 and it betokens the highest powers of generalized observation that he produces the results he does4 ,in his drawings1 man is shown1 not as he might look in the primitive1 or privitive1 simplicity of his ancestral ,garden of ,eden1 but as he does look in the ordinary wear and tear of his present garments4 ,civilization has furnished him with clothes1 and he prefers1 when he has his picture taken1 to keep them on4 ,in dealing with man1 the ,far ,oriental artist is emphatically a realist2 it is when he turns to nature that he becomes ideal4 ,but by ideal is not meant here conventional4 ,that term of reproach is a misnomer1 founded upon a mistake4 ,his idealism is simply the outcome of his love1 which1 like all human love1 transfigures its object4 ,the ,far ,oriental has plenty of this1 which1 if sometimes a delusion1 seems also second sight1 but it is peculiarly impersonal4 ,his color-blindness to the warm1 blood-red end of the spectrum of life in no wise affects his perception of the colder beauty of the great blues and greens of nature4 ,to their poetry he is ever sensitive4 ,his appreciation of them is something phenomenal1 and his power of presentation worthy his appreciation4 ,a ,japanese painting is a poem rather than a picture4 ,it portrays an emotion called up by a scene1 and not the scene itself in all its elaborate complexity4 ,it undertakes to give only so much of it as is vital to that particular feeling1 and intentionally omits all irrelevant details4 ,it is the expression caught from a glimpse of the soul of nature by the soul of man2 the mirror of a mood1 passing1 perhaps1 in fact1 but perpetuated thus to fancy4 ,being an emotion1 its intensity is directly proportional to the singleness with which it possesses the thoughts4 ,the ,far ,oriental fully realizes the power of simplicity4 ,this principle is his fundamental canon of pictorial art4 ,to understand his paintings1 it is from this standpoint they must be regarded2 not as soulless photographs of scenery1 but as poetic presentations of the spirit of the scenes4 ,the very charter of painting depends upon its not giving us charts4 ,and if with us a long poem be a contradiction in terms1 a full picture is with them as self-condemnatory a production4 ,from the contemplation of such works of art as we call finished1 one is apt1 after he has once appreciated ,far ,eastern taste1 to rise with an unpleasant feeling of satiety1 as if he has eaten too much at the feast4 ,their paintings1 by comparison1 we call sketches4 ,is not our would-be slight unwittingly the reverse8 ,is not a sketch1 after all1 fuller of meaning1 to one who knows how to read it1 than a finished affair1 which is very apt to end with itself1 barren of fruit8 ,does not one's own imagination elude one's power to portray it8 ,is it not forever flitting will-o'-the-wisp-like ahead of us just beyond exact definition8 ,for the soul of art lies in what art can suggest1 and nothing is half so suggestive as the half expressed1 not even a double entente4 ,to hint a great deal by displaying a little is more vital to effect than the cleverest representation of the whole4 ,the art of partially revealing is more telling1 even1 than the ars celare artem4 ,who has not suspected through a veil a fairer face than veil ever hid8 ,who has not been delightedly duped by the semi-disclosures of a dress8 ,the principle is just as true in any one branch of art as it is of the attempted developments by one of the suggestions of another4 ,yet who but has thus felt its force8 ,who has not had a shock of day-dream desecration on chancing upon an illustrated edition of some book whose story he had lain to heart8 ,portraits of people1 pictures of places1 he does not know1 and yet which purport to be his6 ,and ,i venture to believe that to more than one of us the exquisite pathos of the ,bride of ,lammermoor is gone when ,lucia warbles her woes1 be it never so entrancingly1 to an admiring house4 ,it almost seems as if the garish publicity of using her name for operatic title were a special intervention of the ,muse1 that we might the less connect song with story1--two sensations that1 like two lights1 destroy one another by mutual interference4 ,against this preference shown the sketch it may be urged that to appreciate such suggestions presupposes as much art in the public as in the painter4 ,but the ability to appreciate a thing when expressed is but half that necessary to express it4 ,some understanding must exist in the observer for any work to be intelligible4 ,it is only a question of degree4 ,the greater the art-sense in the person addressed1 the more had better be left to it4 ,now in ,japan the public is singularly artistic4 ,in fact1 the artistic appreciation of the masses there is something astonishing to us1 accustomed to our immense intellectual differences between man and man4 ,sketches are thus peculiarly fitting to such a land4 ,besides1 there is a quiet modesty about the sketch which is itself taking4 ,to attempt the complete even in a fractional bit of the cosmos1 like a picture1 has in it a difficulty akin to the logical one of proving a universal negative4 ,the possibilities of failure are enormously increased1 and failure is less forgiven for the assumption4 ,art might perhaps not unwisely follow the example of science in such matters where an exhaustive work1 which takes the better part of a lifetime to produce1 is invariably entitled by its erudite author an ,elementary ,treatise on the subject in hand4 ,to aid the effect due to simplicity of conception steps in the ,far ,oriental's wonderful technique4 ,his brush-strokes are very few in number1 but each one tells4 ,they are laid on with a touch which is little short of marvelous1 and requires heredity to explain its skill4 ,for in his method there is no emending1 no super-position1 no change possible4 ,what he does is done once and for all4 ,the force of it grows on you as you gaze4 ,each stroke expresses surprisingly much1 and suggests more4 ,even omissions are made significant4 ,in his painting it is visibly true that objects can be rendered conspicuous by their very absence4 ,you are quite sure you see what on scrutiny you discover to be only the illusion of inevitable inference4 ,the ,far ,oriental artist understands the power of suggestion well2 for imagination always fills in the picture better than the brush1 however perfect be its skill4 ,even the neglect of certain general principles which we consider vital to effect1 such as the absence of shadows and the lack of perspective1 proves not to be of the importance we imagine4 ,we discover in these paintings how immaterial1 artistically1 was ,peter ,schlimmel's sad loss1 and how perfectly possible it is to make bits of discontinuous distance take the place effectively of continuous space4 ,far ,eastern pictures are epigrams rather than descriptions4 ,they present a bit of nature with the terseness of a maxim of ,la ,rochefoucault1 and they delight as aphorisms do by their insight and the happy conciseness of its expression4 ,few aphorisms are absolutely true1 but then boldness more than makes up for what they lack in verity4 ,so complex a subject is life that to state a truth with all its accompanying limitations is to weaken it at once4 ,exceptions1 while demonstrating the rule1 do not tend to emphasize it4 ,and though the whole truth is essential to science1 such exhaustiveness is by no means a canon of art4 ,parallels are not wanting at home4 ,what they do with space in their paintings do we not with time in the case of our comedies1 those acted pictures of life8 ,should we not refuse to tolerate a play that insisted on furnishing us with a full perspective of its characters' past8 ,and yet of the two1 it is far perferable1 artistically1 to be given too much in sequence than too much at once4 ,the ,chinese1 who put much less into a painting than what we deem indispensable1 delight in dramas that last six weeks4 ,to give a concluding touch of life to my necessarily skeleton-like generalities1 memory pictures me a certain painting of ,okio's which ,i fell in love with at first sight4 ,it is of a sunrise on the coast of ,japan4 ,a long line of surf is seen tumbling in to you from out a bank of mist1 just piercing which shows the blood-red disk of the rising sun1 while over the narrow strip of breaking rollers three cranes are slowly sailing north4 ,and that is all you see4 ,you do not see the shore2 you do not see the main2 you are looking but at the border-land of that great unknown1 the heaving ocean still slumbering beneath its chilly coverlid of mist1 out of which come the breakers1 and the sun1 and the cranes4 ,so much for the more serious side of ,japanese fancy2 a look at the lighter leads to the same conclusion4 ,hand in hand with his keen poetic sensibility goes a vivid sense of humor1--two traits that commonly1 indeed1 are found ,maying together over the meadows of imagination4 ,for1 as it might be put1 ,the heart that is soonest awake to the flowers ,is also the first to be touched by the fun4 ,the ,far ,oriental well exemplifies this fact4 ,his art1 wherever fun is possible1 fairly bubbles over with laughter4 ,from the oldest masters down to ,hokusai1 it is constantly welling up in the drollest conceits4 ,it is of all descriptions1 too4 ,now it lurks in merry ambush1 like the faint suggestion of a smile on an otherwise serious face1 so subtile that the observer is left wondering whether the artist could have meant what seems more like one's own ingenious discovery2 now it breaks out into the broadest of grins1 absurd juxtapositions of singularly happy incongruities4 ,for ,hokusai's caricatures and ,hendschel's sketches might be twins4 ,if there is a difference1 it lies not so much in the artist's work as in the greater generality of its appreciation4 ,humor flits easily there at the sea-level of the multitude4 ,for the ,japanese temperament is ever on the verge of a smile which breaks out with catching naivete at the first provocation4 ,the language abounds in puns which are not suffered to lie idle1 and even poetry often hinges on certain consecrated plays on words4 ,from the very constitution of the people there is of course nothing selfish in the national enjoyment4 ,a man is quite as ready to laugh at his own expense as at his neighbor's1 a courtesy which his neighbor cordially returns4 ,now the ludicrous is essentially human in its application4 ,the principle of the synthesis of contradictories1 popularly known by the name of humor1 is necessarily limited in its field to man4 ,for whether it have to do wholly with actions1 or partly with the words that express them1 whether it be presented in the shape of a pun or a pleasantry1 it is in incongruous contrasts that its virtue lies4 ,it is the unexpected that provokes the smile4 ,now no such incongruity exists in nature2 man enjoys a monopoly of the power of making himself ridiculous4 ,so pleasant is pleasantry that we do indeed cultivate it beyond its proper pale4 ,but it is only by personifying ,nature1 and gratuitously attributing to her errors of which she is incapable1 that we can make fun of her2 as1 for instance1 when we hold the weather up to ridicule by way of impotent revenge4 ,but satires upon the clown-like character of our climate1 which1 after the lamest sort of a spring1 somehow manages a capital fall1 would in the ,far ,east be as out of keeping with fancy as with fact4 ,to a ,japanese1 who never personifies anything1 such innocent irony is unmeaning4 ,besides1 it would be also untrue4 ,for his ,may carries no suggestion of unfulfilment in its name4 ,those ,far ,eastern paintings which have to do with man fall for the most part under one of two heads1 the facetious and the historical4 ,the latter implies no particularly intimate concern for man in himself1 for the past has very little personality for the present4 ,as for the former1 its attention is1 if anything1 derogatory to him1 for we are always shy of making fun of what we feel to be too closely a part of ourselves4 ,but impersonality has prevented the ,far ,oriental from having much amour propre4 ,he has no particular aversion to caricaturing himself4 ,few ,europeans1 perhaps1 would have cared to perpetrate a self-portrait like one painted by the potter ,kinsei1 which was sold me one day as an amusing tour de force by a facetious picture-dealer4 ,it is a composite picture of a new kind1 a ,japanese variety of type face4 ,the great potter1 who was also apparently no mean painter1 has combined three aspects of himself in a single representation4 ,at first sight the portrait appears to be simply a full front view of a somewhat moon-faced citizen2 but as you continue to gaze1 it suddenly dawns on you that there are two other individuals1 one on either side1 hob-nobbing in profile with the first1 the lines of the features being ingeniously made to do double duty2 and when this aspect of the thing has once struck you1 you cannot look at the picture without seeing all three citizens simultaneously4 ,the result is doubtless more effective as a composition than flattering as a likeness4 ,far ,eastern sculpture1 by its secondary importance among ,far ,eastern arts1 witnesses again to the secondary importance assigned to man at our mental antipodes4 ,in this art1 owing to its necessary limitations1 the representation of nature in its broader sense is impossible4 ,for in the first place1 whatever the subject1 it must be such as it is possible to present in one continuous piece2 disconnected adjuncts1 as1 for instance1 a flock of birds flying1 which might be introduced with great effect in painting1 being here practically beyond the artist's reach4 ,secondly1 the material being of uniform appearance1 as a rule1 color1 or even shading1 vital points in landscape portrayal1 is out of the question1 unless the piece were subsequently painted1 as in ,grecian sculptures1 a custom which is not practised in ,china or ,japan4 ,lastly1 another fact fatal to the representation of landscape is the size4 ,the reduced scale of the reproduction suggests falsity at once1 a falsity whose belittlement the mind can neither forget nor forgive4 ,plain sculpture is therefore practically limited to statuary1 either of men or animals4 ,the result is that in their art1 where landscape counts for so much1 sculpture plays a very minor part4 ,in what little there is1 ,nature's place is taken by ,buddha4 ,for there are two classes of statues1 divided the one from the other by that step which separates the sublime from the ridiculous1 namely1 the colossal and the diminutive4 ,there is no happy human mean4 ,of the first kind are the beautiful bronze figures of the ,buddha1 like the ,kamakura ,buddha1 fifty feet high and ninety-seven feet round1 in whose face all that is grand and noble lies sleeping1 the living representation of ,nirvana2 and of the second1 those odd little ornaments known as netsuke1 comical carvings for the most part1 grotesque figures of men and monkeys1 saints and sinners1 gods and devils4 ,appealing bits of ivory1 bone1 or wood they are1 in which the dumb animals are as speaking likenesses as their human fellows4 ,the other arts show the same motif in their decorations4 ,pottery and lacquer alike witness the respective positions assigned to the serious and the comic in ,far ,eastern feeling4 ,the ,far ,oriental makes fun of man and makes love to ,nature2 and it almost seems as if ,nature heard his silent prayer1 and smiled upon him in acceptance2 as if the love-light lent her face the added beauty that it lends the maid's4 ,for nowhere in this world1 probably1 is she lovelier than in ,japan3 a climate of long1 happy means and short extremes1 months of spring and months of autumn1 with but a few weeks of winter in between2 a land of flowers1 where the lotus and the cherry1 the plum and wistaria1 grow wantonly side by side2 a land where the bamboo embosoms the maple1 where the pine at last has found its palm-tree1 and the tropic and the temperate zones forget their separate identity in one long self-obliterating kiss4 ,chapter #g4 ,religion4 ,in regard to their religion1 nations1 like individuals1 seem singularly averse to practising what they have preached4 ,whether it be that his self-constructed idols prove to the maker too suggestive of his own intellectual chisel to deceive him for long1 or whether sacred soil1 like less hallowed ground1 becomes after a time incapable of responding to repeated sowings of the same seed1 certain it is that in spiritual matters most peoples have grown out of conceit with their own conceptions4 ,an individual may cling with a certain sentiment to the religion of his mother1 but nations have shown anything but a foolish fondness for the sacred superstitions of their great-grandfathers4 ,to the charm of creation succeeds invariably the bitter-sweet after-taste of criticism1 and man would not be the progressive animal he is if he long remained in love with his own productions4 ,what his future will be is too engrossing a subject1 and one too deeply shrouded in mystery1 not to be constantly pictured anew4 ,no wonder that the consideration at that country toward which mankind is ever being hastened should prove as absorbing to fancy as contemplated earthly journeys proverbially are4 ,few people but have laid out skeleton tours through its ideal regions1 and perhaps1 as in the mapping beforehand of merely mundane travels1 one element of attraction has always consisted in the possible revision of one's routes4 ,besides1 there is a fascination about the foreign merely because it is such4 ,distance lends enchantment to the views of others1 and never more so than when those views are religious visions4 ,an enthusiast has certainly a greater chance of being taken for a god among a people who do not know him intimately as a man4 ,so with his doctrines4 ,the imported is apt to seem more important than the home-made2 as the far-off bewitches more easily than the near4 ,but just as castles in the air do not commonly become the property of their builders1 so mansions in the skies almost as frequently have failed of direct inheritance4 ,rather strikingly has this proved the case with what are to-day the two most powerful religions of the world1--,buddhism and ,christianity4 ,neither is now the belief of its founder's people4 ,what was ,aryan-born has become ,turanian-bred1 and what was ,semitic by conception is at present ,aryan by adoption4 ,the possibilities of another's hereafter look so much rosier than the limitations of one's own present6 ,few pastimes are more delightful than tossing pebbles into some still1 dark pool1 and watching the ripples that rise responsive1 as they run in ever widening circles to the shore4 ,most of us have felt its fascination second only to that of the dotted spiral of the skipping-stone1 a fascination not outgrown with years4 ,there is something singularly attractive in the subtle force that for a moment sways each particle only to pass on to the next1 a motion mysterious in its immateriality4 ,some such pleasure must be theirs who have thrown their thoughts into the hearts of men1 and seen them spread in waves of feeling1 whose sphere time widens through the world4 ,for like the mobile water is the mind of man1--quick to catch emotions1 quick to transmit them4 ,of all waves of feeling1 this is not the least true of religious ones1 that1 starting from their birthplace1 pass out to stir others1 who have but humanity in common with those who professed them first4 ,like the ripples in the pool1 they leave their initial converts to sink back again into comparative quiescence1 as they advance to throw into sudden tremors hordes of outer barbarians4 ,in both of the great religions in question this wave propagation has been most marked1 only the direction it took differed4 ,christianity went westward2 ,buddhism travelled east4 ,proselytes in ,asia ,minor1 ,greece1 and ,italy find counterparts in ,eastern ,india1 ,burmah1 and ,thibet4 ,eventually the taught surpassed their teachers both in zeal and numbers4 ,jerusalem and ,benares at last gave place to ,rome and ,lassa as sacerdotal centres4 ,still the movement journeyed on4 ,popes and ,lhamas remained where their predecessors had founded sees1 but the tide of belief surged past them in its irresistible advance4 ,farther yet from where each faith began are to be found to-day the greater part of its adherents4 ,the home that the ,western hemisphere seems to promise to the one1 the extreme ,orient affords the other4 ,as ,roman ,catholicism now looks to ,america for its strength1 so ,buddhism to-day finds its worshippers chiefly in ,china and ,japan4 ,but though the ,japanese may be said to be all ,buddhists1 ,buddhist is by no means all that they are4 ,at the time of their adoption of the great ,indian faith1 the ,japanese were already in possession of a system of superstition which has held its own to this day4 ,in fact1 as the state religion of the land1 it has just experienced a revival1 a regalvanizing of its old-time energy1 at the hands of some of the native archaeologists4 ,its sacred mirror1 held up to ,nature1 has been burnished anew4 ,formerly this body of belief was the national faith1 the ,mikado1 the direct descendant of the early gods1 being its head on earth4 ,his reinstatement to temporal power formed a very fitting first step toward reinvesting the cult with its former prestige2 a curious instance1 indeed1 of a religious revival due to archaeological1 not to religious zeal4 ,this cult is the mythological inheritance of the whole eastern seaboard of ,asia1 from ,siam to ,kamtchatka4 ,in ,japan it is called ,shintoism4 ,the word ,shinto means literally the way of the gods1 and the letter of its name is a true exponent of the spirit of the belief4 ,for its scriptures are rather an itinerary of the gods' lives than a guide to that road by which man himself may attain to immortality4 ,thus with a certain fitness pilgrimages are its most noticeable rites4 ,one cannot journey anywhere in the heart of ,japan without meeting multitudes of these pilgrims1 with their neat white leggings and their mushroom-like hats1 nor rest at night at any inn that is not hung with countless little banners of the pilgrim associations1 of which they all are members4 ,being a pilgrim there is equivalent to being a tourist here1 only that to the excitement of doing the country is added a sustaining sense of the meritoriousness of the deed4 ,oftener than not the objective point of the devout is the summit of some noted mountain4 ,for peaks are peculiarly sacred spots in the ,shinto faith4 ,the fact is perhaps an expression of man's instinctive desire to rise1 as if the bodily act in some wise betokened the mental action4 ,the shrine in so exalted a position is of the simplest3 a rude hut1 with or without the only distinctive emblems of the cult1 a mirror typical of the god and the pendent gohei1 or zigzag strips of paper1 permanent votive offerings of man4 ,as for the belief itself1 it is but the deification of those natural elements which aboriginal man instinctively wonders at or fears1 the sun1 the moon1 the thunder1 the lightning1 and the wind2 all1 in short1 that he sees1 hears1 and feels1 yet cannot comprehend4 ,he clothes his terrors with forms which resemble the human1 because he can conceive of nothing else that could cause the unexpected4 ,but the awful shapes he conjures up have naught in common with himself4 ,they are far too fearful to be followed4 ,their way is the highway of the gods1 but no ,jacob's ladder for wayward man4 ,in this externality to the human lies the reason that ,shintoism and ,buddhism can agree so well1 and can both join with ,confucianism in helping to form that happy family of faith which is so singular a feature of ,far ,eastern religious capability4 ,it is not simply that the two contrive to live peaceably together2 they are actually both of them implicitly believed by the same individual4 ,millions of ,japanese are good ,buddhists and good ,shintoists at the same time4 ,that such a combination should be possible is due to the essential difference in the character of the two beliefs4 ,the one is extrinsic1 the other intrinsic1 in its relations to the human soul4 ,shintoism tells man but little about himself and his hereafter2 ,buddhism1 little but about himself and what he may become4 ,in examining ,far ,eastern religion1 therefore1 for personality1 or the reverse1 we may dismiss ,shintoism as having no particular bearing upon the subject4 ,the only effect it has is indirect in furthering the natural propensity of these people to an adoration of nature4 ,in ,korea and in ,china1 again1 ,confucianism is the great moral law1 as by reflection it is to a certain extent in ,japan4 ,but that in its turn may be omitted in the present argument2 inasmuch as ,confucius taught confessedly and designedly only a system of morals1 and religiously abstained from pronouncing any opinion whatever upon the character or the career of the human soul4 ,taouism1 the third great religion of ,china1 resembles ,shintoism to this extent1 that it is a body of superstition1 and not a form of philosophy4 ,it undertakes to provide nostrums for spiritual ills1 but is dumb as to the constitution of the soul for which it professes to prescribe4 ,its pills are to be swallowed unquestioningly by the patient1 and are warranted to cure2 and owing to the two great human frailties1 fear and credulity1 its practice is very large4 ,possessing1 however1 no philosophic diploma1 it is without the pale of the present discussion4 ,the demon-worship of ,korea is a mild form of the same thing with the hierarchy left out1 every man there being his own spiritual adviser4 ,an ordinary ,korean is born with an innate belief in malevolent spirits1 whom he accordingly propitiates from time to time4 ,one of nobler birth propitiates only the spirits of his own ancestors4 ,we come1 then1 by a process of elimination to a consideration of ,buddhism1 the great philosophic faith of the whole ,far ,east4 ,not uncommonly in the courtyard of a ,japanese temple1 in the solemn half-light of the sombre firs1 there stands a large stone basin1 cut from a single block1 and filled to the brim with water4 ,the trees1 the basin1 and a few stone lanterns--so called from their form1 and not their function1 for they have votive pebbles where we should look for wicks--are the sole occupants of the place4 ,sheltered from the wind1 withdrawn from sound1 and only piously approached by man1 this antechamber of the god seems the very abode of silence and rest4 ,it might be ,nirvana itself1 human entrance to an immortality like the god's within1 so peaceful1 so pervasive is its calm2 and in its midst is the moss-covered monolith1 holding in its embrace the little imprisoned pool of water4 ,so still is the spot and so clear the liquid that you know the one only as the reflection of the other4 ,mirrored in its glassy surface appears everything around it4 ,as you peer in1 far down you see a tiny bit of sky1 as deep as the blue is high above1 across which slowly sail the passing clouds2 then nearer stand the trees1 arching overhead1 as if bending to catch glimpses of themselves in that other world below2 and then1 nearer yet--yourself4 ,emblem of the spirit of man is this little pool to ,far ,oriental eyes4 ,subtile as the soul is the incomprehensible water2 so responsive to light that it remains itself invisible2 so clear that it seems illusion6 ,though portrayer so perfect of forms about it1 all we know of the thing itself is that it is4 ,through none of the five senses do we perceive it4 ,neither sight1 nor hearing1 nor taste1 nor smell1 nor touch can tell us it exists2 we feel it to be by the muscular sense alone1 that blind and dumb analogue for the body of what consciousness is for the soul4 ,only when disturbed1 troubled1 does the water itself become visible1 and then it is but the surface that we see4 ,so to the ,far ,oriental this still little lake typifies the soul1 the eventual purification of his own2 a something lost in reflection1 self-effaced1 only the alter ego of the outer world4 ,for contemplation1 not action1 is the ,far ,oriental's ideal of life4 ,the repose of self-adjustment like that to which our whole solar system is slowly tending as its death1--this to him appears1 though from no scientific deduction1 the end of all existence4 ,so he sits and ponders1 abstractly1 vaguely1 upon everything in general1--synonym1 alas1 to man's finite mind1 for nothing in particular1--till even the sense of self seems to vanish1 and through the mist-like portal of unconsciousness he floats out into the vast indistinguishable sameness of ,nirvana's sea4 ,at first sight ,buddhism is much more like ,christianity than those of us who stay at home and speculate upon it commonly appreciate4 ,as a system of philosophy it sounds exceedingly foreign1 but it looks unexpectedly familiar as a faith4 ,indeed1 the one religion might well pass for the counterfeit presentment of the other4 ,the resemblance so struck the early ,catholic missionaries that they felt obliged to explain the remarkable similarity between the two4 ,with them ingenuous surprise instantly begot ingenious sophistry4 ,externally1 the likeness was so exact that at first they could not bring themselves to believe that the ,buddhist ceremonials had not been filched bodily from the practices of the true faith4 ,finding1 however1 that no known human agency had acted in the matter1 they bethought them of introducing1 to account for things1 a deus ex machina in the shape of the devil4 ,they were so pleased with this solution of the difficulty that they imparted it at once with much pride to the natives4 ,you have indeed got1 they graciously if somewhat gratuitously informed them1 the outward semblance of the true faith1 but you are in fact the miserable victims of an impious fraud4 ,satan has stolen the insignia of divinity1 and is now masquerading before you as the deity2 your god is really our devil1--a recognition of antipodal inversion truly worthy the ,jesuitical mind6 ,perhaps it is not matter for great surprise that they converted but few of their hearers4 ,the suggestion was hardly so diplomatic as might have been expected from so generally astute a body2 for it could not make much difference what the all-presiding deity was called1 if his actions were the same1 since his motives were beyond human observation4 ,besides1 the bare idea of a foreign bogus was not very terrifying4 ,the ,chinese possessed too many familiar devils of their own4 ,but there was another and a much deeper reason1 which we shall come to later1 why ,christianity made but little headway in the ,far ,east4 ,but it is by no means in externals only that the two religions are alike4 ,if the first glance at them awakens that peculiar sensation which most of us have felt at some time or other1 a sense of having seen all this before1 further scrutiny reveals a deeper agreement than merely in appearances4 ,in passing from the surface into the substance1 it may be mentioned incidentally that the codes of morality of the two are about on a level4 ,i say incidentally1 for so far as its practice1 certainly1 is concerned1 it not its preaching1 morality has no more intimate connection with religion than it has with art or politics4 ,if we doubt this1 we have but to examine the facts4 ,are the most religious peoples the most moral8 ,it needs no prolonged investigation to convince us that they are not4 ,if proof of the want of a bond were required1 the matter of truth-telling might be adduced in point4 ,as this is a subject upon which a slight misconception exists in the minds of some evangelically persuaded persons1 and because1 what is more generally relevant1 the presence of this quality1 honesty in word and deed1 has more than almost any other one characteristic helped to put us in the van of the world's advance to-day1 it may not unfittingly be cited here4 ,the argument in the case may be put thus4 ,have specially religious races been proportionally truth-telling ones8 ,if not1 has there been any other cause at work in the development of mankind tending to increase veracity8 ,the answer to the first question has all the simplicity of a plain negative4 ,no such pleasing concomitance of characteristics is observable to-day1 or has been presented in the past4 ,permitting1 however1 the dead past to bury its shortcomings in oblivion1 let us look at the world as we find it4 ,we observe1 then1 that the religious spirit is quite as strong in ,asia as it is in ,europe2 if anything1 that at the present time it is rather stronger4 ,the average ,brahman1 ,mahometan1 or ,buddhist is quite as devout as the ordinary ,roman ,catholic or ,presbyterian4 ,if he is somewhat less given to propagandism1 he is not a whit less regardful of his own salvation4 ,yet throughout the ,orient truth is a thing unknown1 lies of courtesy being de rigueur and lies of convenience de raison2 while with us1 fortunately1 mendacity is generally discredited4 ,but we need not travel so far for proof4 ,the same is evident in less antipodal relations4 ,have the least religious nations of ,europe been any less truthful than the most bigoted8 ,was fanatic ,spain remarkable for veracity8 ,was ,loyola a gentleman whose assertions carried conviction other than to the stake8 ,were the eminently mundane burghers whom he persecuted noted for a pious superiority to fact8 ,or1 to narrow the field still further1 and scan the circle of one's own acquaintance1 are the most believing individuals among them worthy of the most belief8 ,assuredly not4 ,we come1 then1 to the second point4 ,has there been any influence at work to differentiate us in this respect from ,far ,orientals8 ,there has4 ,two separate causes1 in fact1 have conduced to the same result4 ,the one is the development of physical science2 the other1 the extension of trade4 ,the sole object of science being to discover truth1 truth-telling is a necessity of its existence4 ,professionally1 scientists are obliged to be truthful4 ,aliter of a ,jesuit4 ,so long as science was of the closet1 its influence upon mankind generally was indirect and slight2 but so soon as it proceeded to stalk into the street and earn its own living1 its veracious character began to tell4 ,when out of its theories sprang inventions and discoveries that revolutionized every-day affairs and changed the very face of things1 society insensibly caught its spirit4 ,man awoke to the inestimable value of exactness4 ,from scientists proper1 the spirit filtered down through every stratum of education1 till to-day the average man is born exact to a degree which his forefathers never dreamed of becoming4 ,to-day1 as a rule1 the more intelligent the individual1 the more truthful he is1 because the more innately exact in thought1 and thence in word and action4 ,with us1 to lie is a sign of a want of cleverness1 not of an excess of it4 ,the second cause1 the extension of trade1 has inculcated the same regard for veracity through the pocket4 ,for with the increase of business transactions in both time and space1 the telling of the truth has become a financial necessity4 ,without it1 trade would come to a standstill at once4 ,our whole mercantile system1 a modern piece of mechanism unknown to the ,east till we imported it thither1 turns on an implicit belief in the word of one's neighbor4 ,our legal safeguards would snap like red tape were the great bond of mutual trust once broken4 ,western civilization has to be truthful1 or perish4 ,and now for the spirits of the two beliefs4 ,the soul of any religion realizes in one respect the ,brahman idea of the individual soul of man1 namely1 that it exists much after the manner of an onion1 in many concentric envelopes4 ,man1 they tell us1 is composed not of a single body simply1 but of several layers of body1 each shell as it were respectively inclosing another4 ,the outermost is the merely material body1 of which we are so directly cognizant4 ,this encases a second1 more spiritual1 but yet not wholly free from earthly affinities4 ,this contains another1 still more refined2 till finally1 inside of all is that immaterial something which they conceive to constitute the soul4 ,this eventual residuum exemplifies the ,franciscan notion of pure substance1 for it is a thing delightfully devoid of any attributes whatever4 ,we may1 perhaps1 not be aware of the existence of such an elaborate set of encasings to our own heart of hearts1 nor of a something so very indefinite within1 but the most casual glance at any religion will reveal its truth as regards the soul of a belief4 ,we recognize the fact outwardly in the buildings erected to celebrate its worship4 ,not among the ,jews alone was the holy of holies kept veiled1 to temper the divine radiance to man's benighted understanding4 ,nor is the chancel-rail of ,christianity the sole survivor of the more exclusive barriers of olden times1 even in the ,western world4 ,in the ,far ,east1 where difficulty of access is deemed indispensable to dignity1 the material approaches are still manifold and imposing4 ,court within court1 building after building1 isolate the shrine itself from the profane familiarity of the passers-by4 ,but though the material encasings vary in number and in exclusiveness1 according to the temperament of the particular race concerned1 the mental envelopes exist1 and must exist1 in both hemispheres alike1 so long as society resembles the crust of the earth on which it dwells1--a crust composed of strata that grow denser as one descends4 ,what is clear to those on top seems obscure to those below2 what are weighty arguments to the second have no force at all upon the first4 ,there must necessarily be grades of elevation in individual beliefs1 suited to the needs and cravings of each individual soul4 ,a creed that fills the shallow with satisfaction leaves but an aching void in the deep4 ,it is not of the slightest consequence how the belief starts2 differentiated it is bound to become4 ,the higher minds alone can rest content with abstract imaginings2 the lower must have concrete realities on which to pin their faith4 ,with them1 inevitably1 ideals degenerate into idols4 ,in all religions this unavoidable debasement has taken place4 ,the ,roman ,catholic who prays to a wooden image of ,christ is not one whit less idolatrous than the ,buddhist who worships a bronze statue of ,amida ,butzu4 ,all that the common people are capable of seeing is the soul-envelope1 for the soul itself they are unable to appreciate4 ,spiritually they are undiscerning1 because imaginatively they are blind4 ,now the grosser soul-envelopes of the two great ,european and ,asiatic faiths1 though differing in detail1 are in general parallel in structure4 ,each boasts its full complement of saints1 whose congruent catalogues are equally wearisome in length4 ,each tells its circle of beads to help it keep count of similarly endless prayers4 ,for in both1 in the popular estimation1 quantity is more effective to salvation than quality4 ,in both the believer practically pictures his heaven for himself1 while in each his hell1 with a vividness that does like credit to its religious imagination1 is painted for him by those of the cult who are themselves confident of escaping it4 ,into the lap of each mother church the pious believer drops his little votive offering with the same affectionate zeal1 and in ,asia1 as in ,europe1 the mites of the many make the might of the mass4 ,but behind all this is the religion of the few1--of those to whom sensuous forms cannot suffice to represent super-sensuous cravings2 whose god is something more than an anthropomorphic creation2 to whom worship means not the cramping of the body1 but the expansion of the soul4 ,the rays of the truth1 like the rays of the sun1 which universally seems to have been man's first adoration1 have two properties equally inherent in their essence1 warmth and light4 ,and as for the life of all things on this globe both attributes of sunshine are necessary1 so to the development of that something which constitutes the ego both qualities of the truth are vital4 ,we sometimes speak of character as if it were a thing wholly apart from mind2 but1 in fact1 the two things are so interwoven that to perceive the right course is the strongest possible of incentives to pursue it4 ,in the end the two are one4 ,now1 while clearness of head is all-important1 kindness of heart is none the less so4 ,the first1 perhaps1 is more needed in our communings with ourselves1 the second in our commerce with others4 ,for1 dark and dense bodies that we are1 we can radiate affection much more effectively than we can reflect views4 ,that ,christianity is a religion of love needs no mention2 that ,buddhism is equally such is perhaps not so generally appreciated4 ,but just as the gospel of the disciple who loved and was loved the most begins its story by telling us of the ,light that came into the world1 so none the less surely could the ,light of ,asia but be also its warmth4 ,half of the teachings of ,buddhism are spent in inculcating charity4 ,not only to men is man enjoined to show kindliness1 but to all other animals as well4 ,the people practise what their scriptures preach4 ,the effect indirectly on the condition of the brutes is almost as marked as its more direct effect on the character of mankind4 ,in heart1 at least1 ,buddhism and ,christianity are very close4 ,but here the two paths to a something beyond an earthly life diverge4 ,up to this point the two religions are alike1 but from this point on they are so utterly unlike that the very similarity of all that went before only suffices to make of the second the weird1 life-counterfeiting shadow of the first4 ,as in a silhouette1 externally the contours are all there1 but within is one vast blank4 ,in relation to one's neighbor the two beliefs are kin1 but as regards one's self1 as far apart as the ,west is from the ,east4 ,for here1 at this idea of self1 we are suddenly aware of standing on the brink of a fathomless abyss1 gazing giddily down into that great gulf which divides ,buddhism from ,christianity4 ,we cannot see the bottom4 ,it is a separation more profound than death2 it seems to necessitate annihilation4 ,to cross it we must bury in its depths all we know as ourselves4 ,christianity is a personal religion2 ,buddhism1 an impersonal one4 ,in this fundamental difference lies the world-wide opposition of the two beliefs4 ,christianity tells us to purify ourselves that we may enjoy countless aeons of that bettered self hereafter2 ,buddhism would have us purify ourselves that we may lose all sense of self for evermore4 ,for all that it preaches the essential vileness of the natural man1 ,christianity is a gospel of optimism4 ,while it affirms that at present you are bad1 it also affirms that this depravity is no intrinsic part of yourself4 ,it unquestioningly asserts that it is something foreign to your true being4 ,it even believes that in a more or less spiritual manner your very body will survive4 ,it essentially clings to the ego4 ,what it inculcates is really present endeavor sanctioned by the prospect of future bliss4 ,it tacitly takes for granted the desirability of personal existence1 and promises the certainty of personal immortality1--a terror to evildoers1 and a sustaining sense of coming unalloyed happiness to the good4 ,through and through its teachings runs the feeling of the fullness of life1 that desire which will not die1 that wish of the soul which beats its wings against its earthly casement in its longing for expansion beyond the narrow confines of threescore years and ten4 ,buddhism1 on the contrary1 is the cri du coeur of pessimism4 ,this life1 it says1 is but a chain of sorrows4 ,to multiply days is only to multiply evil4 ,these desires that urge us on are really cause of all our woe4 ,we think they are ourselves4 ,we are mistaken4 ,they are all illusion1 and we are victims of a mirage4 ,this personality1 this sense of self1 is a cruel deception and a snare4 ,realize once the true soul behind it1 devoid of attributes1 therefore without this capacity for suffering1 an indivisible part of the great impersonal soul of nature3 then1 and then only1 will you have found happiness in the blissful quiescence of ,nirvana4 ,with a certain poetic fitness1 misery and impersonality were both present in the occasion that gave the belief birth4 ,many have turned to the consolations of religion by reason of their own wretchedness2 ,gautama sought its help touched by the woes of others whom1 in his own happy life journey1 he chanced one day to come across4 ,shocked by the sight of human disease1 old age1 and death1 sad facts to which hitherto he had been sedulously kept a stranger1 he renounced the world that he might find for it an escape from its ills4 ,but bliss1 as he conceived it1 lay not in wanting to be something he was not1 but in actual want of being4 ,his quest for mankind was immunity from suffering1 not the active enjoyment of life4 ,in this negative way of looking at happiness1 he acted in strict conformity with the spirit of his world4 ,for the doctrine of pessimism had already been preached4 ,it underlay the whole ,brahman philosophy1 and everybody believed it implicitly4 ,already the ,east looked at this life as an evil1 and had affirmed for the individual spirit extinction to be happier than existence4 ,the wish for an end to the ego1 the hope to be eventually nothing1 ,gautama accepted for a truism as undeniably as the ,brahmans did4 ,what he pronounced false was the ,brahman prospectus of the way to reach this desirable impersonal state4 ,their road1 be said1 could not possibly land the traveller where it professed1 since it began wrong1 and ended nowhere4 ,the way1 he asserted1 is within a man4 ,he has but to realize the truth1 and from that moment he will see his goal and the road that leads there4 ,there is no panacea for human ills1 of external application4 ,the ,brahman homoeopathic treatment of sin is folly4 ,the slaughtering of men and bulls cannot possibly bring life to the soul4 ,to mortify the body for the sins of the flesh is palpably futile1 for in desire alone lies all the ill4 ,quench the desire1 and the deeds will die of inanition4 ,man himself is sole cause of his own misery4 ,get rid1 then1 said the ,buddha1 of these passions1 these strivings for the sake of self1 that hold the true soul a prisoner4 ,they have to do with things which we know are transitory3 how can they be immortal themselves8 ,we recognize them as subject to our will2 they are1 then1 not the ,i4 ,as a man1 he taught1 becomes conscious that he himself is something distinct from his body1 so1 if he reflect and ponder1 he will come to see that in like manner his appetites1 ambitions1 hopes1 are really extrinsic to the spirit proper4 ,neither heart nor head is truly the man1 for he is conscious of something that stands behind both4 ,behind desire1 behind even the will1 lies the soul1 the same for all men1 one with the soul of the universe4 ,when he has once realized this eternal truth1 the man has entered ,nirvana4 ,for ,nirvana is not an absorption of the individual soul into the soul of all things1 since the one has always been a part of the other4 ,still less is it utter annihilation4 ,it is simply the recognition of the eternal oneness of the two1 back through an everlasting past on through an everlasting future4 ,such is the belief which the ,japanese adopted1 and which they profess to-day4 ,such to them is to be the dawn of death's to-morrow2 a blessed impersonal immortality1 in which all sense of self1 illusion that it is1 shall itself have ceased to be2 a long dreamless sleep1 a beatified rest1 which no awakening shall ever disturb4 ,among such a people personal ,christianity converts but few4 ,they accept our material civilization1 but they reject our creeds4 ,to preach a prolongation of life appears to them like preaching an extension of sorrow4 ,at most1 ,christianity succeeds only in making them doubters of what lies beyond this life4 ,but though professing agnosticism while they live1 they turn1 when the shadows of death's night come on1 to the bosom of that faith which teaches that1 whatever may have been one's earthly share of happiness1 'tis something better not to be4 ,strange it seems at first that those who have looked so long to the rising sun for inspiration should be they who live only in a sort of lethargy of life1 while those who for so many centuries have turned their faces steadily to the fading glory of the sunset should be the ones who have embodied the spirit of progress of the world4 ,perhaps the light1 by its very rising1 checks the desire to pursue2 in its setting it lures one on to follow4 ,though this religion of impersonality is not their child1 it is their choice4 ,they embraced it with the rest that ,india taught them1 centuries ago4 ,but though just as eager to learn of us now as of ,india then1 ,christianity fails to commend itself4 ,this is not due to the fact that the ,buddhist missionaries came by invitation1 and ours do not4 ,nor is it due to any want of personal character in these latter1 but simply to an excess of it in their doctrines4 ,for to-day the ,far ,east is even more impersonal in its religion than are those from whom that religion originally came4 ,india has returned again to its worship of ,brahma1 which1 though impersonal enough1 is less so than is the gospel of ,gautama4 ,for it is passively instead of actively impersonal4 ,buddhism bears to ,brahmanism something like the relation that ,protestantism does to ,roman ,catholicism4 ,both bishops and ,brahmans undertake to save all who shall blindly commit themselves to professional guidance1 while ,buddhists and ,protestants alike believe that a man's salvation must be brought about by the action of the man himself4 ,the result is1 that in the matter of individuality the two reformed beliefs are further apart than those against which they severally protested4 ,for by the change the personal became more personal1 and the impersonal more impersonal than before4 ,the ,protestant1 from having tamely allowed himself to be led1 began to take a lively interest in his own self-improvement2 while the ,buddhist1 from a former apathetic acquiescence in the doctrine of the universally illusive1 set to work energetically towards self-extinction4 ,curious labor for a mind1 that of devoting all its strength to the thinking itself out of existence6 ,not content with being born impersonal1 a ,far ,oriental is constantly striving to make himself more so4 ,we have seen1 then1 how in trying to understand these peoples we are brought face to face with impersonality in each of those three expressions of the human soul1 speech1 thought1 yearning4 ,we have looked at them first from a social standpoint4 ,we have seen how singularly little regard is paid the individual from his birth to his death4 ,how he lives his life long the slave of patriarchal customs of so puerile a tendency as to be practically impossible to a people really grown up4 ,how he practises a wholesale system of adoption sufficient of itself to destroy any surviving regard for the ego his other relations might have left4 ,how in his daily life he gives the minimum of thought to the bettering himself in any worldly sense1 and the maximum of polite consideration to his neighbor4 ,how1 in short1 he acts toward himself as much as possible as if he were another1 and to that other as if he were himself4 ,then1 not content with standing stranger like upon the threshold1 we have sought to see the soul of their civilization in its intrinsic manifestations4 ,we have pushed our inquiry1 as it were1 one step nearer its home4 ,and the same trait that was apparent sociologically has been exposed in this our antipodal phase of psychical research4 ,we have seen how impersonal is his language1 the principal medium of communication between one soul and another2 how impersonal are the communings of his soul with itself4 ,how the man turns to nature instead of to his fellowman in silent sympathy4 ,and how1 when he speculates upon his coming castles in the air1 his most roseate desire is to be but an indistinguishable particle of the sunset clouds and vanish invisible as they into the starry stillness of all-embracing space4 ,now what does this strange impersonality betoken8 ,why are these peoples so different from us in this most fundamental of considerations to any people1 the consideration of themselves8 ,the answer leads to some interesting conclusions4 ,chapter #h4 ,imagination4 ,if1 as is the case with the moon1 the earth1 as she travelled round her orbit turned always the same face inward1 we might expect to find1 between the thoughts of that hemisphere which looked continually to the sun1 and those of the other peering eternally out at the stars1 some such difference as actually exists between ourselves and our longitudinal antipodes4 ,for our conception of the cosmos is of a sunlit world throbbing with life1 while their ,nirvana finds not unfit expression in the still1 cold1 fathomless awe of the midnight sky4 ,that we cannot thus directly account for the difference in local coloring serves but to make that difference of more human interest4 ,the dissimilarity between the ,western and the ,far ,eastern attitude of mind has in it something beyond the effect of environment4 ,for it points to the importance of the part which the principle of individuality plays in the great drama daily enacting before our eyes1 and which we know as evolution4 ,it shows1 as ,i shall hope to prove1 that individuality bears the same relation to the development of mind that the differentiation of species does to the evolution of organic life3 that the degree of individualization of a people is the self-recorded measure of its place in the great march of mind4 ,all life1 whether organic or inorganic1 consists1 as we know1 in a change from a state of simple homogeneity to one of complex heterogeneity4 ,the process is apparently the same in a nebula or a brachiopod1 although much more intricate in the latter4 ,the immediate force which works this change1 the life principle of things1 is1 in the case of organic beings1 a subtle something which we call spontaneous variation4 ,what this mysterious impulse may be is beyond our present powers of recognition4 ,as yet1 the ultimates of all things lie hidden in the womb of the vast unknown4 ,but just as in the case of a man we can tell what organs are vital1 though we are ignorant what the vital spark may be1 so in our great cosmical laws we can say in what their power resides1 though we know not really what they are4 ,whether mind be but a sublimated form of matter1 or1 what amounts to the same thing1 matter a menial kind of mind1 or whether1 which seems less likely1 it be a something incomparable with substance1 of one thing we are sure1 the same laws of heredity govern both4 ,in each a like chain of continuity leads from the present to the dim past1 a connecting clue which we can follow backward in imagination4 ,now what spontaneous variation is to the material organism1 imagination1 apparently1 is to the mental one4 ,just as spontaneous variation is constantly pushing the animal or the plant to push out1 as a vine its tendrils1 in all directions1 while natural conditions are as constantly exercising over it a sort of unconscious pruning power1 so imagination is ever at work urging man's mind out and on1 while the sentiment of the community1 commonly called common sense1 which simply means the point already reached by the average1 is as steadily tending to keep it at its own level4 ,the environment helps1 in the one case as in the other1 to the shaping of the development4 ,purely physical in the first1 it is both physical and psychical in the second1 the two reacting on each other4 ,but in either case it is only a constraining condition1 not the divine impulse itself4 ,precisely1 then1 as in the organism1 this subtle spirit checked in one direction finds a way to advance in another1 and produces in consequence among an originally similar set of bodies a gradual separation into species which grow wider with time1 so in brain evolution a like force for like reasons tends inevitably to an ever-increasing individualization4 ,now what evidence have we that this analogy holds8 ,let us look at the facts1 first as they present themselves subjectively4 ,the instinct of self-preservation1 that guardian angel so persistent to appear when needed1 owes its summons to another instinct no less strong1 which we may call the instinct of individuality2 for with the same innate tenacity with which we severally cling to life do we hold to the idea of our own identity4 ,it is not for the philosophic desire of preserving a very small fraction of humanity at large that we take such pains to avoid destruction2 it is that we insensibly regard death as threatening to the continuance of the ego1 in spite of the theories of a future life which we have so elaborately developed4 ,indeed1 the psychical shrinking is really the quintessence of the physical fear4 ,we cleave to the abstract idea closer even than to its concrete embodiment4 ,sooner would we forego this earthly existence than surrender that something we know as self4 ,for sufficient cause we can imagine courting death2 we cannot conceive of so much as exchanging our individuality for another's1 still less of abandoning it altogether2 for gradually a man1 as he grows older1 comes to regard his body as1 after all1 separable from himself4 ,it is the soul's covering1 rendered indispensable by the climatic conditions of our present existence1 one without which we could no longer continue to live here4 ,to forego it does not necessarily negative1 so far as we yet know1 the possibility of living elsewhere4 ,some more congenial tropic may be the wandering spirit's fate4 ,but to part with the sense of self seems to be like taking an eternal farewell of the soul4 ,the ,western mind shrinks before the bare idea of such a thought4 ,the clinging to one's own identity1 then1 is now an instinct1 whatever it may originally have been4 ,it is a something we inherited from our ancestors and which we shall transmit more or less modified to our descendants4 ,how far back this consciousness has been felt passes the possibilities of history to determine1 since the recording of it necessarily followed the fact4 ,all we know is that its mention is coeval with chronicle1 and its origin lost in allegory4 ,the ,bible1 one of the oldest written records in the world1 begins with a bit of mythology of a very significant kind4 ,when the ,jews undertook to trace back their family tree to an idyllic garden of ,eden1 they mentioned as growing there beside the tree of life1 another tree called the tree of knowledge4 ,of what character this knowledge was is inferable from the sudden self-consciousness that followed the partaking of it4 ,so that if we please we may attribute directly to ,eve's indiscretion the many evils of our morbid self-consciousness of the present day4 ,but without indulging in unchivalrous reflections we may draw certain morals from it of both immediate and ultimate applicability4 ,to begin with1 it is a most salutary warning to the introspective1 and in the second place it is a striking instance of a myth which is not a sun myth2 for it is essentially of human regard1 an attempt on man's part to explain that most peculiar attribute of his constitution1 the all-possessing sense of self4 ,it looks certainly as if he was not over-proud of his person that he should have deemed its recognition occasion for the primal curse1 and among early races the person is for a good deal of the personality4 ,what he lamented was not life but the unavoidable exertion necessary to getting his daily bread1 for the question whether life were worth while was as futile then as now1 and as inconceivable really as #d-;dimensional space4 ,we are then conscious of individuality as a force within ourselves4 ,but our knowledge by no means ends there2 for we are aware of it in the case of others as well4 ,about certain people there exists a subtle something which leaves its impress indelibly upon the consciousness of all who come in contact with them4 ,this something is a power1 but a power of so indefinable a description that we beg definition by calling it simply the personality of the man4 ,it is not a matter of subsequent reasoning1 but of direct perception4 ,we feel it4 ,sometimes it charms us2 sometimes it repels4 ,but we can no more be oblivious to it than we can to the temperature of the air4 ,its possessor has but to enter the room1 and insensibly we are conscious of a presence4 ,it is as if we had suddenly been placed in the field of a magnetic force4 ,on the other hand there are people who produce no effect upon us whatever4 ,they come and go with a like indifference4 ,they are as unimportant psychically as if they were any other portion of the furniture4 ,they never stir us4 ,we might live with them for fifty years and be hardly able to tell1 for any influence upon ourselves1 whether they existed or not4 ,they remind us of that neutral drab which certain religious sects assume to show their own irrelevancy to the world4 ,they are often most estimable folk1 but they are no more capable of inspiring a strong emotion than the other kind are incapable of doing so4 ,and we say the difference is due to the personality or want of personality of the man4 ,now1 in what does this so-called personality consist8 ,not in bodily presence simply1 for men quite destitute of it possess the force in question2 not in character only1 for we often disapprove of a character whose attraction we are powerless to resist2 not in intellect alone1 for men more rational fail of stirring us as these unconsciously do4 ,in what1 then8 ,in life itself2 not that modicum of it1 indeed1 which suffices simply to keep the machine moving1 but in the life principle1 the power which causes psychical change2 which makes the individual something distinct from all other individuals1 a being capable of proving sufficient1 if need be1 unto himself2 which shows itself1 in short1 as individuality4 ,this is not a mere restatement of the case1 for individuality is an objective fact capable of being treated by physical science4 ,and as we know much more at present about physical facts than we do of psychological problems1 we may be able to arrive the sooner at solution4 ,individuality1 personality1 and the sense of self are only three different aspects of one and the same thing4 ,they are so many various views of the soul according as we regard it from an intrinsic1 an altruistic1 or an egoistic standpoint4 ,for by individuality is not meant simply the isolation in a corporeal casing of a small portion of the universal soul of mankind4 ,so far as mind goes1 this would not be individuality at all1 but the reverse4 ,by individuality we mean that bundle of ideas1 thoughts1 and daydreams which constitute our separate identity1 and by virtue of which we feel each one of us at home within himself4 ,now man in his mind-development is bound to become more and more distinct from his neighbor4 ,we can hardly conceive a progress so uniform as not to necessitate this4 ,it would be contrary to all we know of natural law1 besides contradicting daily experience4 ,for each successive generation bears unmistakable testimony to the fact4 ,children of the same parents are never exactly like either their parents or one another1 and they often differ amazingly from both4 ,in such instances they revert to type1 as we say2 but inasmuch as the race is steadily advancing in development1 such reversion must resemble that of an estate which has been greatly improved since its previous possession4 ,the appearance of the quality is really the sprouting of a seed whose original germ was in some sense coeval with the beginning of things4 ,this mind-seed takes root in some cases and not in others1 according to the soil it finds4 ,and as certain traits develop and others do not1 one man turns out very differently from his neighbor4 ,such inevitable distinction implies furthermore that the man shall be sensible of it4 ,consciousness is the necessary attribute of mental action4 ,not only is it the sole way we have of knowing mind2 without it there would be no mind to know4 ,not to be conscious of one's self is1 mentally speaking1 not to be4 ,this complex entity1 this little cosmos of a world1 the ,i1 has for its very law of existence self-consciousness1 while personality is the effect it produces upon the consciousness of others4 ,but we may push our inquiry a step further1 and find in imagination the cause of this strange force4 ,for imagination1 or the image-making faculty1 may in a certain sense be said to be the creator of the world within4 ,the separate senses furnish it with material1 but to it alone is due the building of our castles1 on premises of fact or in the air4 ,for there is no impassable gulf between the two4 ,coleridge's distinction that imagination drew possible pictures and fancy impossible ones1 is itself1 except as a classification1 an impossible distinction to draw2 for it is only the inconceivable that can never be4 ,all else is purely a matter of relation4 ,we may instance dreams which are usually considered to rank among the most fanciful creations of the mind4 ,who has not in his dreams fallen repeatedly from giddy heights and invariably escaped unhurt8 ,if he had attempted the feat in his waking moments he would assuredly have been dashed to pieces at the bottom4 ,and so we say the thing is impossible4 ,but is it8 ,only under the relative conditions of his mass and the earth's4 ,if the world he happens to inhabit were not its present size1 but the size of one of the tinier asteroids1 no such disastrous results would follow a chance misstep4 ,he could there walk off precipices when too closely pursued by bears--if ,i remember rightly the usual childish cause of the same--with perfect impunity4 ,the bear could do likewise1 unfortunately4 ,we should have arrived at our conclusion even quicker had we decreased the size both of the man and his world4 ,he would not then have had to tumble actually so far1 and would therefore have arrived yet more gently at the foot4 ,this turns out1 then1 to be a mere question of size4 ,decrease the scale of the picture1 and the impossible becomes possible at once4 ,all fancies are not so easily reducible to actual facts as the one we have taken1 but all1 perhaps1 eventually may be explicable in the same general way4 ,at present we certainly cannot affirm that anything may not be thus explained4 ,for the actual is widening its field every day4 ,even in this little world of our own we are daily discovering to be fact what we should have thought fiction1 like the sailor's mother the tale of the flying fish4 ,beyond it our ken is widening still more4 ,gulliver's travels may turn out truer than we think4 ,could we traverse the inter-planetary ocean of ether1 we might eventually find in ,jupiter the land of ,lilliput or in ,ceres some old-time country of the ,brobdignagians4 ,for men constituted muscularly like ourselves would have to be proportionately small in the big planet and big in the small one4 ,still stranger things may exist around other suns4 ,in those bright particular stars--which the little girl thought pinholes in the dark canopy of the sky to let the glory beyond shine through--we are finding conditions of existence like yet unlike those we already know4 ,to our groping speculations of the night they almost seem1 as we gaze on them in their twinkling1 to be winking us a sort of comprehension4 ,conditions may exist there under which our wildest fancies may be commonplace facts4 ,there may be ,some ,xanadu where ,kublai can a stately pleasure dome decree1 and carry out his conceptions to his own disillusionment1 perhaps4 ,for if the embodiment of a fancy1 however complete1 left nothing further to be wished1 imagination would have no incentive to work4 ,coleridge's distinction does very well to separate1 empirically1 certain kinds of imaginative concepts from certain others2 but it has no real foundation in fact4 ,nor presumably did he mean it to have4 ,but it serves1 not inaptly1 as a text to point out an important scientific truth1 namely1 that there are not two such qualities of the mind1 but only one4 ,for otherwise we might have supposed the fact too evident to need mention4 ,imagination is the single source of the new1 the one mainspring of psychical advance2 reason1 like a balance-wheel1 only keeping the action regular4 ,for reason is but the touchstone of experience1 our own1 inherited1 or acquired from others4 ,it compares what we imagine with what we know1 and gives us answer in terms of the here and the now1 which we call the actual4 ,but the actual is really nothing but the local4 ,it does not mark the limits of the possible4 ,that imagination has been the moving spirit of the psychical world is evident1 whatever branch of human thought we are pleased to examine4 ,we are in the habit1 in common parlance1 of making a distinction between the search after truth and the search after beauty1 calling the one science and the other art4 ,now while we are not slow to impute imagination to art1 we are by no means so ready to appreciate its connection with science4 ,yet contrary1 perhaps1 to exogeric ideas on the subject1 it is science rather than art that demands imagination of her votaries4 ,not that art may not involve the quality to a high degree1 but that a high degree of art is quite compatible with a very small amount of imagination4 ,on the one side we may instance painting4 ,now painting begins its career in the humble capacity of copyist1 a pretty poor copyist at that4 ,at first so slight was its skill that the rudest symbols sufficed4 ,this is a man was conventionally implied by a few scratches bearing a very distant relationship to the real thing4 ,gradually1 owing to human vanity and a growing taste1 pictures improved4 ,combinations were tried1 a bit from one place with a piece from another2 a sort of mosaic requiring but a slight amount of imagination4 ,not that imagination of a higher order has not been called into play1 although even now pictures are often happy adaptations rather than creations proper4 ,some masters have been imaginative2 others1 unfortunately for themselves and still more for the public1 have not4 ,for that the art may attain a high degree of excellence for itself and much distinction for its professors1 without calling in the aid of imagination1 is evident enough on this side of the globe1 without travelling to the other4 ,take1 on the other hand1 a branch of science which1 to the average layman1 seems peculiarly unimaginative1 the science of mathematics4 ,yet at the risk of appearing to cast doubts upon the validity of its conclusions1 it might be called the most imaginative product of human thought2 for it is simply one vast imagination based upon a few so-called axioms1 which are nothing more nor less than the results of experience4 ,it is none the less imaginative because its discoveries always accord subsequently with fact1 since man was not aware of them beforehand4 ,nor are its inevitable conclusions inevitable to any save those possessed of the mathematician's prophetic sight4 ,once discovered1 it requires much less imagination to understand them4 ,with the light coming from in front1 it is an easy matter to see what lies behind one4 ,so with other fabrics of human thought1 imagination has been spinning and weaving them all4 ,from the most concrete of inventions to the most abstract of conceptions the same force reveals itself upon examination2 for there is no gulf between what we call practical and what we consider theoretical4 ,everything abstract is ultimately of practical use1 and even the most immediately utilitarian has an abstract principle at its core4 ,we are too prone to regard the present age of the world as preeminently practical1 much as a middle-aged man laments the witching fancies of his boyhood4 ,but1 and there is more in the parallel than analogy1 if the man be truly imaginative he is none the less so at forty-five than he was at twenty1 if his imagination have taken on a more critical form2 for this latter half of the nineteenth century is perhaps the most imaginative period the world's history has ever known4 ,while with one hand we are contriving means of transit for our ideas1 and even our very voices1 compared to which ,puck's girdle is anything but talismanic1 with the other we are stretching out to grasp the action of mind on mind1 pushing our way into the very realm of mind itself4 ,history tells the same story in detail2 for the history of mankind1 imperfectly as we know it1 discloses the fact that imagination1 and not the power of observation nor the kindred capability of perception1 has been the cause of soul-evolution4 ,the savage is but little of an imaginative being4 ,we are tempted1 at times1 to imagine him more so than he is1 for his fanciful folk-lore4 ,the proof of which overestimation is that we find no difficulty in imagining what he does1 and even of imagining what he probably imagined1 and finding our suppositions verified by discovery4 ,yet his powers of observation may be marvellously developed4 ,the ,north ,american ,indian tracks his foe through the forest by signs unrecognizable to a white man1 and he reasons most astutely upon them1 and still that very man turns out to be a mere child when put before problems a trifle out of his beaten path4 ,and all because his forefathers had not the power to imagine something beyond what they actually saw4 ,the very essence of the force of imagination lies in its ability to change a man's habitat for him4 ,without it1 man would forever have remained1 not a mollusk1 to be sure1 but an animal simply4 ,a plant cannot change its place1 an animal cannot alter its conditions of existence except within very narrow bounds2 man is free in the sense nothing else in the world is4 ,what is true of individuals has been true of races4 ,the most imaginative races have proved the greatest factors in the world's advance4 ,now after this look at our own side of the world1 let us turn to the other2 for it is this very psychological fact that mental progression implies an ever-increasing individualization1 and that imagination is the force at work in the process which ,far ,eastern civilization1 taken in connection with our own1 reveals4 ,in doing this1 it explains incidentally its own seeming anomalies1 the most unaccountable of which1 apparently1 is its existence4 ,we have seen how impressively impersonal the ,far ,east is4 ,now if individuality be the natural measure of the height of civilization which a nation has reached1 impersonality should betoken a relatively laggard position in the race4 ,we ought1 therefore1 to find among these people certain other characteristics corroborative of a less advanced state of development4 ,in the first place1 if imagination be the impulse of which increase in individuality is the resulting motion1 that quality should be at a minimum there4 ,the ,far ,orientals ought to be a particularly unimaginative set of people4 ,such is precisely what they are4 ,their lack of imagination is a well-recognized fact4 ,all who have been brought in contact with them have observed it1 merchants as strikingly as students4 ,indeed1 the slightest intercourse with them could not fail to make it evident4 ,their matter-of-fact way of looking at things is truly distressing1 coming as it does from so artistic a people4 ,one notices it all the more for the shock4 ,to get a prosaic answer from a man whose appearance and surroundings betoken better things is not calculated to dull that answer's effect4 ,aston1 in a pamphlet on the ,altaic tongues1 cites an instance which is so much to the point that ,i venture to repeat it here4 ,he was a true ,chinaman1 he says1 who1 when his ,english master asked him what he thought of ,that orbed maiden ,with white fires laden ,whom mortals call the moon1 replied1 ,my thinkee all same lamp pidgin 7pidgin meaning thing in the mongrel speech1 ,chinese in form and ,english in diction1 which goes by the name of pidgin ,english74 ,their own tongues show the same prosaic character1 picturesque as they appear to us at first sight4 ,that effect is due simply to the novelty to us of their expressions4 ,to talk of a pass as an up-down has a refreshing turn to our unused ear1 but it is a much more descriptive than imaginative figure of speech4 ,nor is the phrase the being 7so7 is difficult1 in place of thank you1 a surprisingly beautiful bit of imagery1 delightful as it sounds for a change4 ,our own tongue has1 in its daily vocabulary1 far more suggestive expressions1 only familiarity has rendered us callous to their use4 ,we employ at every instant words which1 could we but stop to think of them1 would strike us as poetic in the ideas they call up4 ,as has been well said1 they were once happy thoughts of some bright particular genius bequeathed to posterity without so much as an accompanying name1 and which proved so popular that they soon became but symbols themselves4 ,their languages are paralleled by their whole life4 ,a lack of any fanciful ideas is one of the most salient traits of all ,far ,eastern races1 if indeed a sad dearth of anything can properly be spoken of as salient4 ,indirectly their want of imagination betrays itself in their every-day sayings and doings1 and more directly in every branch of thought4 ,originality is not their strong point4 ,their utter ignorance of science shows this1 and paradoxical as it may seem1 their art1 in spite of its merit and its universality1 does the same4 ,that art and imagination are necessarily bound together receives no very forcible confirmation from a land where1 nationally speaking1 at any rate1 the first is easily first and the last easily last1 as nations go4 ,it is to quite another quality that their artistic excellence must be ascribed4 ,that the ,chinese and later the ,japanese have accomplished results at which the rest of the world will yet live to marvel1 is due to their--taste4 ,but taste or delicacy of perception has absolutely nothing to do with imagination4 ,that certain of the senses of ,far ,orientals are wonderfully keen1 as also those parts of the brain that directly respond to them1 is beyond question2 but such sensitiveness does not in the least involve the less earth-tied portions of the intellect4 ,a peculiar responsiveness to natural beauty1 a sort of mental agreement with its earthly environment1 is a marked feature of the ,japanese mind4 ,but appreciation1 however intimate1 is a very different thing from originality4 ,the one is commonly the handmaid of the other1 but the other by no means always accompanies the one4 ,so much for the cause2 now for the effect which we might expect to find if our diagnosis be correct4 ,if the evolving force be less active in one race than in another1 three relative results should follow4 ,in the first place1 the race in question will at any given moment be less advanced than its fellow2 secondly1 its rate of progress will be less rapid2 and lastly1 its individual members will all be nearer together1 just as a stream1 in falling from a cliff1 starts one compact mass1 then gradually increasing in speed1 divides into drops1 which1 growing finer and finer and farther and farther apart1 descend at last as spray4 ,all three of these consequences are visible in the career of the ,far ,eastern peoples4 ,the first result scarcely needs to be proved to us1 who are only too ready to believe it without proof4 ,it is1 nevertheless1 a fact4 ,viewed unprejudicedly1 their civilization is not so advanced a one as our own4 ,although they are certainly our superiors in some very desirable particulars1 their whole scheme is distinctly more aboriginal fundamentally4 ,it is more finished1 as far as it goes1 but it does not go so far4 ,less rude1 it is more rudimentary4 ,indeed1 as we have seen1 its surface-perfection really shows that nature has given less thought to its substance4 ,one may say of it that it is the adult form of a lower type of mind-specification4 ,the second effect is scarcely less patent4 ,how slow their progress has been1 if for centuries now it can be called progress at all1 is world-known4 ,chinese conservatism has passed into a proverb4 ,the pendulum of pulsation in the ,middle ,kingdom long since came to a stop at the medial point of rest4 ,centre of civilization1 as they call themselves1 one would imagine that their mind-machinery had got caught on their own dead centre1 and now could not be made to move4 ,life1 which elsewhere is a condition of unstable equilibrium1 there is of a fatally stable kind4 ,for the ,chinaman's disinclination to progress is something more than vis inertiae2 it has become an ardent devotion to the status quo4 ,jostled1 he at once settles back to his previous condition again2 much as more materially1 after a lifetime spent in ,california1 at his death his body is punctiliously embalmed and sent home across five thousand miles of sea for burial4 ,with the ,japanese the condition of affairs is somewhat different4 ,their tendency to stand still is of a purely passive kind4 ,it is a state of neutral equilibrium1 stationary of itself but perfectly responsive to an impulse from without4 ,left to their own devices1 they are conservative enough1 but they instantly copy a more advanced civilization the moment they get a chance4 ,this proclivity on their part is not out of keeping with our theory4 ,on the contrary1 it is precisely what was to have been expected2 for we see the very same apparent contradiction in characters we are thrown with every day4 ,imitation is the natural substitute for originality4 ,the less strong a man's personality the more prone is he to adopt the ideas of others1 on the same principle that a void more easily admits a foreign body than does space that is already occupied2 or as a blank piece of paper takes a dye more brilliantly for not being already tinted itself4 ,the third result1 the remarkable homogeneity of the people1 is not1 perhaps1 so universally appreciated1 but it is equally evident on inspection1 and no less weighty in proof4 ,indeed1 the ,far ,eastern state of things is a kind of charade on the word2 for humanity there is singularly uniform4 ,the distance between the extremes of mind-development in ,japan is much less than with us4 ,this lack of divergence exists not simply in certain lines of thought1 but in all those characteristics by which man is parted from the brutes4 ,in reasoning power1 in artistic sensibility1 in delicacy of perception1 it is the same story4 ,if this were simply the impression at first sight1 no deductions could be drawn from it1 for an impression of racial similarity invariably marks the first stage of acquaintance of one people by another4 ,even in outward appearance it is so4 ,we find it at first impossible to tell the ,japanese apart2 they find it equally impossible to differentiate us4 ,but the present resemblance is not a matter of first impressions4 ,the fact is patent historically4 ,the men whom ,japan reveres are much less removed from the common herd than is the case in any ,western land4 ,and this has been so from the earliest times4 ,shakspeares and ,newtons have never existed there4 ,japanese humanity is not the soil to grow them4 ,the comparative absence of genius is fully paralleled by the want of its opposite4 ,not only are the paths of preeminence untrodden2 the purlieus of brutish ignorance are likewise unfrequented4 ,on neither side of the great medial line is the departure of individuals far or frequent4 ,all men there are more alike2--so much alike1 indeed1 that the place would seem to offer a sort of forlorn hope for disappointed socialists4 ,although religious missionaries have not met with any marked success among the natives1 this less deserving class of enthusiastic disseminators of an all-possessing belief might do well to attempt it4 ,they would find there a very virgin field of a most promisingly dead level4 ,it is true1 human opposition would undoubtedly prevent their tilling it1 but ,nature1 at least1 would not present quite such constitutional obstacles as she wisely does with us4 ,the individual's mind is1 as it were1 an isolated bit of the race mind4 ,the same set of traits will be found in each4 ,mental characteristics there are a sort of common property1 of which a certain undifferentiated portion is indiscriminately allotted to every man at birth4 ,one soul resembles another so much1 that in view of the patriarchal system under which they all exist1 there seems to the stranger a peculiar appropriateness in so strong a family likeness of mind4 ,an idea of how little one man's brain differs from his neighbor's may be gathered from the fact1 that while a common coolie in ,japan spends his spare time in playing a chess twice as complicated as ours1 the most advanced philosopher is still on the blissfully ignorant side of the pons asinorum4 ,we find1 then1 that in all three points the ,far ,east fulfils what our theory demanded4 ,there is one more consideration worthy of notice4 ,we said that the environment had not been the deus ex materia in the matter2 but that the soul itself possessed the germ of its own evolution4 ,this fact does not1 however1 preclude another1 that the environment has helped in the process4 ,change of scene is beneficial to others besides invalids4 ,how stimulating to growth a different habitat can prove1 when at all favorable1 is perhaps sufficiently shown in the case of the marguerite1 which1 as an emigrant called white-weed1 has usurped our fields4 ,the same has been no less true of peoples4 ,now these ,far ,eastern peoples1 in comparison with our own forefathers1 have travelled very little4 ,a race in its travels gains two things3 first it acquires directly a great deal from both places and peoples that it meets1 and secondly it is constantly put to its own resources in its struggle for existence1 and becomes more personal as the outcome of such strife4 ,the changed conditions1 the hostile forces it finds1 necessitate mental ingenuity to adapt them and influence it unconsciously4 ,to see how potent these influences prove we have but to look at the two great branches of the ,aryan family1 the one that for so long now has stayed at home1 and the one that went abroad4 ,destitute of stimulus from without1 the ,indo-,aryan mind turned upon itself and consumed in dreamy metaphysics the imagination which has made its cousins the leaders in the world's progress to-day4 ,the inevitable numbness of monotony crept over the stay-at-homes4 ,the deadly sameness of their surroundings produced its unavoidable effect4 ,the torpor of the ,east1 like some paralyzing poison1 stole into their souls1 and they fell into a drowsy slumber only to dream in the land they had formerly wrested from its possessors4 ,their birthright passed with their cousins into the ,west4 ,in the case of the ,altaic races which we are considering1 cause and effect mutually strengthened each other4 ,that they did not travel more is due primarily to a lack of enterprise consequent upon a lack of imagination1 and then their want of travel told upon their imagination4 ,they were also unfortunate in their journeying4 ,their travels were prematurely brought to an end by that vast geographical ,nirvana the ,pacific ,ocean1 the great peaceful sea as they call it themselves4 ,that they would have journeyed further is shown by the way their dreams went eastward still4 ,they themselves could not for the preventing ocean1 and the lapping of its waters proved a nation's lullaby4 ,one thing1 ,i think1 then1 our glance at ,far ,eastern civilization has more than suggested4 ,the soul1 in its progress through the world1 tends inevitably to individualization4 ,yet the more we perceive of the cosmos the more do we recognize an all-pervading unity in it4 ,its soul must be one1 not many4 ,the divine power that made all things is not itself multifold4 ,how to reconcile the ever-increasing divergence with an eventual similarity is a problem at present transcending our generalizations4 ,what we know would seem to be opposed to what we must infer4 ,but perception of how we shall merge the personal in the universal1 though at present hidden from sight1 may sometime come to us1 and the seemingly irreconcilable will then turn out to involve no contradiction at all4 ,for this much is certain3 grand as is the great conception of ,buddhism1 majestic as is the idea of the stately rest it would lead us to1 the road here below is not one the life of the world can follow4 ,if earthly existence be an evil1 then ,buddhism will help us ignore it2 but if by an impulse we cannot explain we instinctively crave activity of mind1 then the great gospel of ,gautama touches us not2 for to abandon self--egoism1 that is1 not selfishness is the true vacuum which nature abhors4 ,as for ,far ,orientals1 they themselves furnish proof against themselves4 ,that impersonality is not man's earthly goal they unwittingly bear witness2 for they are not of those who will survive4 ,artistic attractive people that they are1 their civilization is like their own tree flowers1 beautiful blossoms destined never to bear fruit2 for whatever we may conceive the far future of another life to be1 the immediate effect of impersonality cannot but be annihilating4 ,if these people continue in their old course1 their earthly career is closed4 ,just as surely as morning passes into afternoon1 so surely are these races of the ,far ,east1 if unchanged1 destined to disappear before the advancing nations of the ,west4 ,vanish they will off the face of the earth and leave our planet the eventual possession of the dwellers where the day declines4 ,unless their newly imported ideas really take root1 it is from this whole world that ,japanese and ,koreans1 as well as ,chinese1 will inevitably be excluded4 ,their ,nirvana is already being realized2 already it has wrapped ,far ,eastern ,asia in its winding-sheet1 the shroud of those whose day was but a dawn1 as if in prophetic keeping with the names they gave their homes1--the ,land of the ,day's ,beginning1 and the ,land of the ,morning ,calm4