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| author | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-15 05:17:06 -0700 |
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| committer | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-15 05:17:06 -0700 |
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diff --git a/1409-h/1409-h.htm b/1409-h/1409-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..9119490 --- /dev/null +++ b/1409-h/1409-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,4373 @@ +<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> + +<!DOCTYPE html + PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd" > + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" lang="en"> + <head> + <title> + The Soul of the Far East, by Percival Lowell + </title> + <style type="text/css" xml:space="preserve"> + + body { margin:5%; background:#faebd0; text-align:justify} + P { text-indent: 1em; margin-top: .25em; margin-bottom: .25em; } + H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { text-align: center; margin-left: 15%; margin-right: 15%; } + hr { width: 50%; text-align: center;} + .foot { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; text-indent: -3em; font-size: 90%; } + blockquote {font-size: 97%; font-style: italic; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;} + .mynote {background-color: #DDE; color: #000; padding: .5em; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 95%;} + .toc { margin-left: 10%; margin-bottom: .75em;} + .toc2 { margin-left: 20%;} + div.fig { display:block; margin:0 auto; text-align:center; } + div.middle { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; } + .figleft {float: left; margin-left: 0%; margin-right: 1%;} + .figright {float: right; margin-right: 0%; margin-left: 1%;} + .pagenum {display:inline; font-size: 70%; font-style:normal; + margin: 0; padding: 0; position: absolute; right: 1%; + text-align: right;} + pre { font-style: italic; font-size: 90%; margin-left: 10%;} + +</style> + </head> + <body> +<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 1409 ***</div> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <h1> + THE SOUL OF THE FAR EAST + </h1> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <h2> + By Percival Lowell + </h2> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <h2> + Contents + </h2> + <table summary="" style="margin-right: auto; margin-left: auto"> + <tr> + <td> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0001"> Chapter 1. Individuality. </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0002"> Chapter 2. Family. </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0003"> Chapter 3. Adoption. </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0004"> Chapter 4. Language. </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0005"> Chapter 5. Nature and Art. </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0006"> Chapter 6. Art. </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0007"> Chapter 7. Religion. </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2HCH0008"> Chapter 8. Imagination. </a> + </p> + </td> + </tr> + </table> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> <a name="link2HCH0001" id="link2HCH0001"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <h2> + Chapter 1. Individuality. + </h2> + <p> + 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 Yokohama. If his initial glance does not, to be sure, + disclose the natives in the every-day feat of standing calmly on their + heads, an attitude which his youthful imagination conceived to be a + necessary consequence of their geographical position, it does at least + reveal them looking at the world as if from the standpoint of that + eccentric posture. For they seem to him to see everything topsy-turvy. + Whether it be that their antipodal situation has affected their brains, 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 + retina, the result, at all events, is undeniable. The world stands + reversed, and, taking for granted his own uprightness, the stranger + unhesitatingly imputes to them an obliquity of vision, a state of mind + outwardly typified by the cat-like obliqueness of their eyes. + </p> + <p> + If the inversion be not precisely of the kind he expected, it is none the + less striking, and impressibly more real. If personal experience has + definitely convinced him that the inhabitants of that under side of our + planet do not adhere to it head downwards, like flies on a ceiling,—his + early a priori deduction,—they still appear quite as antipodal, + mentally considered. Intellectually, at least, their attitude sets gravity + at defiance. For to the mind's eye their world is one huge, comical + antithesis of our own. What we regard intuitively in one way from our + standpoint, they as intuitively observe in a diametrically opposite manner + from theirs. To speak backwards, write backwards, read backwards, is but + the a b c of their contrariety. The inversion extends deeper than mere + modes of expression, down into the very matter of thought. Ideas of ours + which we deemed innate find in them no home, while methods which strike us + as preposterously unnatural appear to be their birthright. 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 one, there seems to be no + action of our daily lives, however trivial, but finds with them its + appropriate reaction—equal but opposite. Indeed, to one anxious of + conforming to the manners and customs of the country, the only road to + right lies in following unswervingly that course which his inherited + instincts assure him to be wrong. + </p> + <p> + Yet these people are human beings; with all their eccentricities they are + men. Physically we cannot but be cognizant of the fact, nor mentally but + be conscious of it. Like us, indeed, and yet so unlike are they that we + seem, as we gaze at them, to be viewing our own humanity in some + mirth-provoking mirror of the mind,—a mirror that shows us our own + familiar thoughts, but all turned wrong side out. Humor holds the glass, + and we become the sport of our own reflections. But is it otherwise at + home? Do not our personal presentments mock each of us individually our + lives long? Who but is the daily dupe of his dressing-glass, and + complacently conceives himself to be a very different appearing person + from what he is, forgetting that his right side has become his left, and + vice versa? Yet who, when by chance he catches sight in like manner of the + face of a friend, can keep from smiling at the caricatures which the + mirror's left-for-right reversal makes of the asymmetry of that friend's + features,—caricatures all the more grotesque for being utterly + unsuspected by their innocent original? Perhaps, could we once see + ourselves as others see us, our surprise in the case of foreign peoples + might be less pronounced. + </p> + <p> + Regarding, then, the Far Oriental as a man, and not simply as a + phenomenon, we discover in his peculiar point of view a new importance,—the + possibility of using it stereoptically. For his mind-photograph of the + world can be placed side by side with ours, and the two pictures combined + will yield results beyond what either alone could possibly have afforded. + Thus harmonized, they will help us to realize humanity. Indeed it is only + by such a combination of two different aspects that we ever perceive + substance and distinguish reality from illusion. What our two eyes make + possible for material objects, the earth's two hemispheres may enable us + to do for mental traits. Only the superficial never changes its + expression; the appearance of the solid varies with the standpoint of the + observer. In dreamland alone does everything seem plain, and there all is + unsubstantial. + </p> + <p> + To say that the Japanese are not a savage tribe is of course unnecessary; + to repeat the remark, anything but superfluous, on the principle that what + is a matter of common notoriety is very apt to prove a matter about which + uncommonly little is known. At present we go halfway in recognition of + these people by bestowing upon them a demi-diploma of mental development + called semi-civilization, neglecting, however, to specify in what the + fractional qualification consists. If the suggestion of a second moiety, + as of something directly complementary to them, were not indirectly + complimentary to ourselves, the expression might pass; but, as it is, the + self-praise is rather too obvious to carry conviction. For Japan's claim + to culture is not based solely upon the exports with which she supplements + our art, nor upon the paper, china, and bric-a-brac with which she adorns + our rooms; any more than Western science is adequately represented in + Japan by our popular imports there of kerosene oil, matches, and beer. + Only half civilized the Far East presumably is, but it is so rather in an + absolute than a relative sense; in the sense of what might have been, not + of what is. It is so as compared, not with us, but with the eventual + possibilities of humanity. As yet, neither system, Western nor Eastern, is + perfect enough to serve in all things as standard for the other. The light + of truth has reached each hemisphere through the medium of its own mental + crystallization, and this has polarized it in opposite ways, so that now + the rays that are normal to the eyes of the one only produce darkness to + those of the other. For the Japanese civilization in the sense of not + being savagery is the equal of our own. It is not in the polish that the + real difference lies; it is in the substance polished. In politeness, in + delicacy, they have as a people no peers. Art has been their mistress, + though science has never been their master. Perhaps for this very reason + that art, not science, has been the Muse they courted, the result has been + all the more widespread. For culture there is not the attainment of the + few, but the common property of the people. If the peaks of intellect rise + less eminent, the plateau of general elevation stands higher. But little + need be said to prove the civilization of a land where ordinary tea-house + girls are models of refinement, and common coolies, when not at work, play + chess for pastime. + </p> + <p> + If Japanese ways look odd at first sight, they but look more odd on closer + acquaintance. In a land where, to allow one's understanding the freer play + of indoor life, one begins, not by taking off his hat, but by removing his + boots, he gets at the very threshold a hint that humanity is to be + approached the wrong end to. When, after thus entering a house, he tries + next to gain admittance to the mind of its occupant, the suspicion becomes + a certainty. He discovers that this people talk, so to speak, backwards; + that before he can hope to comprehend them, or make himself understood in + return, he must learn to present his thoughts arranged in inverse order + from the one in which they naturally suggest themselves to his mind. His + sentences must all be turned inside out. He finds himself lost in a + labyrinth of language. The same seems to be true of the thoughts it + embodies. The further he goes the more obscure the whole process becomes, + until, after long groping about for some means of orienting himself, he + lights at last upon the clue. This clue consists in "the survival of the + unfittest." + </p> + <p> + In the civilization of Japan we have presented to us a most interesting + case of partially arrested development; or, to speak esoterically, we find + ourselves placed face to face with a singular example of a completed + race-life. For though from our standpoint the evolution of these people + seems suddenly to have come to an end in mid-career, looked at more + intimately it shows all the signs of having fully run its course. + Development ceased, not because of outward obstruction, but from purely + intrinsic inability to go on. The intellectual machine was not shattered; + it simply ran down. To this fact the phenomenon owes its peculiar + interest. For we behold here in the case of man the same spectacle that we + see cosmically in the case of the moon, the spectacle of a world that has + died of old age. No weak spot in their social organism destroyed them from + within; no epidemic, in the shape of foreign hordes, fell upon them from + without. For in spite of the fact that China offers the unique example of + a country that has simply lived to be conquered, mentally her masters have + invariably become her pupils. Having ousted her from her throne as ruler, + they proceeded to sit at her feet as disciples. Thus they have rather + helped than hindered her civilization. + </p> + <p> + Whatever portion of the Far East we examine we find its mental history to + be the same story with variations. However unlike China, Korea, and Japan + are in some respects, through the careers of all three we can trace the + same life-spirit. 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 Sea. For their vital force had spent itself + more than a millennium ago. Already, then, their civilization had in its + deeper developments attained its stature, and has simply been perfecting + itself since. We may liken it to some stunted tree, that, finding itself + prevented from growth, bastes the more luxuriantly to put forth flowers + and fruit. For not the final but the medial processes were skipped. In + those superficial amenities with which we more particularly link our idea + of civilization, these peoples continued to grow. Their refinement, if + failing to reach our standard in certain respects, surpasses ours + considering the bare barbaric basis upon which it rests. For it is as true + of the Japanese as of the proverbial Russian, though in a more scientific + sense, that if you scratch him you will find the ancestral Tartar. 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 + reflection. The surface was perfected after the substance was formed. Our + word finish, with its double meaning, expresses both the process and the + result. + </p> + <p> + There entered, to heighten the bizarre effect, a spirit common in minds + that lack originality—the spirit of imitation. Though consequent + enough upon a want of initiative, the results of this trait appear + anything but natural to people of a more progressive past. The proverbial + collar and pair of spurs look none the less odd to the stranger for being + a mental instead of a bodily habit. Something akin to such a case of + unnatural selection has there taken place. The orderly procedure of + natural evolution was disastrously supplemented by man. 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-grafting. + </p> + <p> + From before the time when they began to leave records of their actions the + Japanese have been a nation of importers, not of merchandise, but of + ideas. 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 themselves. They continue to follow + the same line of life. A hearty appreciation of the things of others is + still one of their most winning traits. What they took they grafted bodily + upon their ancestral tree, which in consequence came to present a most + unnaturally diversified appearance. For though not unlike other nations in + wishing to borrow, if their zeal in the matter was slightly excessive, + they were peculiar in that they never assimilated what they took. They + simply inserted it upon the already existing growth. There it remained, + and throve, and blossomed, nourished by that indigenous Japanese sap, + taste. But like grafts generally, the foreign boughs were not much + modified by their new life-blood, nor was the tree in its turn at all + affected by them. Connected with it only as separable parts of its + structure, the cuttings might have been lopped off again without + influencing perceptibly the condition of the foster-parent stem. The + grafts in time grew to be great branches, but the trunk remained through + it all the trunk of a sapling. In other words, the nation grew up to man's + estate, keeping the mind of its childhood. + </p> + <p> + What is thus true of the Japanese is true likewise of the Koreans and of + the Chinese. The three peoples, indeed, form so many links in one long + chain of borrowing. China took from India, then Korea copied China, and + lastly Japan imitated Korea. In this simple manner they successively + became possessed of a civilization which originally was not the property + of any one of them. In the eagerness they all evinced in purloining what + was not theirs, and in the perfect content with which they then proceeded + to enjoy what they had taken, 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 living. Like those same + individuals, whatever interest the Far Eastern people may succeed in + raising now, Nature will in the end make them pay dearly for their lack of + principal. + </p> + <p> + The Far Eastern civilization resembles, in fact, more a mechanical mixture + of social elements than a well differentiated chemical compound. For in + spite of the great variety of ingredients thrown into its caldron of + destiny, as no affinity existed between them, no combination resulted. The + power to fuse was wanting. Capability to evolve anything is not one of the + marked characteristics of the Far East. Indeed, the tendency to + spontaneous variation, Nature's mode of making experiments, would seem + there to have been an enterprising faculty that was exhausted early. + Sleepy, no doubt, from having got up betimes with the dawn, these dwellers + in the far lands of the morning began to look upon their day as already + well spent before they had reached its noon. They grew old young, and have + remained much the same age ever since. What they were centuries ago, that + at bottom they are to-day. Take away the European influence of the last + twenty years, and each man might almost be his own great-grandfather. In + race characteristics he is yet essentially the same. The traits that + distinguished these peoples in the past have been gradually extinguishing + them ever since. Of these traits, stagnating influences upon their career, + perhaps the most important is the great quality of impersonality. + </p> + <p> + If we take, through the earth's temperate zone, a belt of country whose + northern and southern edges are determined by certain limiting isotherms, + not more than half the width of the zone apart, we shall find that we have + included in a relatively small extent of surface almost all the nations of + note in the world, past or present. Now if we examine this belt, and + compare the different parts of it with one another, we shall be struck by + a remarkable fact. The peoples inhabiting it grow steadily more personal + as we go west. So unmistakable is this gradation of spirit, that one is + tempted to ascribe it to cosmic rather than to human causes. It is as + marked as the change in color of the human complexion observable along any + meridian, which ranges from black at the equator to blonde toward the + pole. In like manner, the sense of self grows more intense as we follow in + the wake of the setting sun, and fades steadily as we advance into the + dawn. America, Europe, the Levant, India, Japan, each is less personal + than the one before. We stand at the nearer end of the scale, the Far + Orientals at the other. If with us the I seems to be of the very essence + of the soul, then the soul of the Far East may be said to be + Impersonality. + </p> + <p> + Curious as this characteristic is as a fact, it is even more interesting + as a factor. For what it betokens of these peoples in particular may + suggest much about man generally. It may mark a stride in theory, if a + standstill in practice. Possibly it may help us to some understanding of + ourselves. Not that it promises much aid to vexed metaphysical questions, + but as a study in sociology it may not prove so vain. + </p> + <p> + And for a thing which is always with us, its discussion may be said to be + peculiarly opportune just now. For it lies at the bottom of the most + pressing questions of the day. Of the two great problems that stare the + Western world in the face at the present moment, both turn to it for + solution. Agnosticism, the foreboding silence of those who think, + socialism, communism, and nihilism, the petulant cry of those who do not, + alike depend ultimately for the right to be upon the truth or the falsity + of the sense of self. + </p> + <p> + For if there be no such actual thing as individuality, if the feeling we + call by that name be naught but the transient illusion the Buddhists would + have us believe it, any faith founded upon it as basis vanishes as does + the picture in a revolving kaleidoscope,—less enduring even than the + flitting phantasmagoria of a dream. If the ego be but the passing shadow + of the material brain, at the disintegration of the gray matter what will + become of us? Shall we simply lapse into an indistinguishable part of the + vast universe that compasses us round? At the thought we seem to stand + straining our gaze, on the shore of the great sea of knowledge, only to + watch the fog roll in, and hide from our view even those headlands of hope + that, like beseeching hands, stretch out into the deep. + </p> + <p> + So more materially. If individuality be a delusion of the mind, what + motive potent enough to excite endeavor in the breast of an ordinary + mortal remains? Philosophers, indeed, might still work for the advancement + of mankind, but mankind itself would not continue long to labor + energetically for what should profit only the common weal. Take away the + stimulus of individuality, and action is paralyzed at once. For with most + men the promptings of personal advantage only afford sufficient incentive + to effort. Destroy this force, then any consideration due it lapses, and + socialism is not only justified, it is raised instantly into an axiom of + life. The community, in that case, becomes itself the unit, the + indivisible atom of existence. Socialism, then communism, then nihilism, + follow in inevitable sequence. That even the Far Oriental, with all his + numbing impersonality, has not touched this goal may at least suggest that + individuality is a fact. + </p> + <p> + But first, what do we know about its existence ourselves? + </p> + <p> + Very early in the course of every thoughtful childhood an event takes + place, by the side of which, to the child himself, all other events sink + into insignificance. It is not one that is recognized and chronicled by + the world, for it is wholly unconnected with action. No one but the child + is aware of its occurrence, and he never speaks of it to others. Yet to + that child it marks an epoch. So intensely individual does it seem that + the boy is afraid to avow it, while in reality so universal is it that + probably no human being has escaped its influence. Though subjective + purely, it has more vividness than any external event; and though strictly + intrinsic to life, it is more startling than any accident of fate or + fortune. This experience of the boy's, at once so singular and yet so + general, is nothing less than the sudden revelation to him one day of the + fact of his own personality. + </p> + <p> + Somewhere about the time when sensation is giving place to sensitiveness + as the great self-educator, and the knowledge gained by the five bodily + senses is being fused into the wisdom of that mental one we call common + sense, the boy makes a discovery akin to the act of waking up. All at once + he becomes conscious of himself; and the consciousness has about it a + touch of the uncanny. Hitherto he has been aware only of matter; he now + first realizes mind. Unwarned, unprepared, he is suddenly ushered before + being, and stands awe-struck in the presence of—himself. + </p> + <p> + If the introduction to his own identity was startling, there is nothing + reassuring in the feeling that this strange acquaintanceship must last. + For continue it does. It becomes an unsought intimacy he cannot shake off. + Like to his own shadow he cannot escape it. To himself a man cannot but be + at home. For years this alter ego haunts him, for he imagines it an + idiosyncrasy of his own, a morbid peculiarity he dare not confide to any + one, for fear of being thought a fool. Not till long afterwards, when he + has learned to live as a matter of course with his ever-present ghost, + does he discover that others have had like familiars themselves. + </p> + <p> + Sometimes this dawn of consciousness is preceded by a long twilight of + soul-awakening; but sometimes, upon more sensitive and subtler natures, + the light breaks with all the suddenness of a sunrise at the equator, + revealing to the mind's eye an unsuspected world of self within. But in + whatever way we may awake to it, the sense of personality, when first + realized, appears already, like the fabled Goddess of Wisdom, full grown + in the brain. From the moment when we first remember ourselves we seem to + be as old as we ever seem to others afterwards to become. We grow, indeed, + in knowledge, in wisdom, in experience, as our years increase, but deep + down in our heart of hearts we are still essentially the same. To be sure, + people pay us more deference than they did, which suggests a doubt at + times whether we may not have changed; small boys of a succeeding + generation treat us with a respect that causes us inwardly to smile, as we + think how little we differ from them, if they but knew it. For at bottom + we are not conscious of change from that morning, long ago, when first we + realized ourselves. We feel just as young now as we felt old then. We are + but amused at the world's discrimination where we can detect no + difference. + </p> + <p> + Every human being has been thus "twice born": once as matter, once as + mind. Nor is this second birth the birthright only of mankind. All the + higher animals probably, possibly even the lower too, have experienced + some such realization of individual identity. However that may be, + certainly to all races of men has come this revelation; only the degree in + which they have felt its force has differed immensely. It is one thing to + the apathetic, fatalistic Turk, and quite another matter to an energetic, + nervous American. Facts, fancies, faiths, all show how wide is the + variance in feelings. With them no introspective [greek]cnzhi seauton + overexcites the consciousness of self. But with us; as with those of old + possessed of devils, it comes to startle and stays to distress. Too apt is + it to prove an ever-present, undesirable double. Too often does it play + the part of uninvited spectre at the feast, whose presence no one save its + unfortunate victim suspects. The haunting horror of his own identity is to + natures far less eccentric than Kenelm Chillingly's only too common a + curse. To this companionship, paradoxical though it sound, is principally + due the peculiar loneliness of childhood. For nothing is so isolating as a + persistent idea which one dares not confide. + </p> + <p> + And yet,—stranger paradox still,—was there ever any one + willing to exchange his personality for another's? Who can imagine + foregoing his own self? Nay, do we not cling even to its outward + appearance? Is there a man so poor in all that man holds dear that he does + not keenly resent being accidentally mistaken for his neighbor? Surely + there must be something more than mirage in this deep-implanted, + widespread instinct of human race. + </p> + <p> + But however strong the conviction now of one's individuality, is there + aught to assure him of its continuance beyond the confines of its present + life? Will it awake on death's morrow and know itself, or will it, like + the body that gave it lodgment, disintegrate again into indistinguishable + spirit dust? Close upon the heels of the existing consciousness of self + treads the shadow-like doubt of its hereafter. Will analogy help to answer + the grewsome riddle of the Sphinx? Are the laws we have learned to be true + for matter true also for mind? Matter we now know is indestructible; yet + the form of it with which we once were so fondly familiar vanishes never + to return. Is a like fate to be the lot of the soul? That mind should be + capable of annihilation is as inconceivable as that matter should cease to + be. Surely the spirit we feel existing round about us on every side now + has been from ever, and will be for ever to come. But that portion of it + which we each know as self, is it not like to a drop of rain seen in its + falling through the air? Indistinguishable the particle was in the cloud + whence it came; indistinguishable it will become again in the ocean + whither it is bound. Its personality is but its passing phase from a vast + impersonal on the one hand to an equally vast impersonal on the other. + Thus seers preached in the past; so modern science is hinting to-day. With + us the idea seems the bitter fruit of material philosophy; by them it was + looked upon as the fairest flower of their faith. What is dreaded now as + the impious suggestion of the godless four thousand years ago was + reverenced as a sacred tenet of religion. + </p> + <p> + Shorter even than his short threescore years and ten is that soul's life + of which man is directly cognizant. Bounded by two seemingly impersonal + states is the personal consciousness of which he is made aware: the one + the infantile existence that precedes his boyish discovery, the other the + gloom that grows with years,—two twilights that fringe the two + borders of his day. But with the Far Oriental, life is all twilight. For + in Japan and China both states are found together. There, side by side + with the present unconsciousness of the babe exists the belief in a coming + unconsciousness for the man. So inseparably blended are the two that the + known truth of the one seems, for that very bond, to carry with it the + credentials of the other. Can it be that the personal, progressive West is + wrong, and the impersonal, impassive East right? Surely not. Is the other + side of the world in advance of us in mind-development, even as it + precedes us in the time of day; or just as our noon is its night, may it + not be far in our rear? Is not its seeming wisdom rather the + precociousness of what is destined never to go far? + </p> + <p> + Brought suddenly upon such a civilization, after the blankness of a long + ocean voyage, one is reminded instinctively of the feelings of that + bewildered individual who, after a dinner at which he had eventually + ceased to be himself, was by way of pleasantry left out overnight in a + graveyard, on their way home, by his humorously inclined companions; and + who, on awaking alone, in a still dubious condition, looked around him in + surprise, rubbed his eyes two or three times to no purpose, and finally + muttered in a tone of awe-struck conviction, "Well, either I'm the first + to rise, or I'm a long way behind time!" + </p> + <p> + Whether their failure to follow the natural course of evolution results in + bringing them in at the death just the same or not, these people are now, + at any rate, stationary not very far from the point at which we all set + out. They are still in that childish state of development before + self-consciousness has spoiled the sweet simplicity of nature. An + impersonal race seems never to have fully grown up. + </p> + <p> + Partly for its own sake, partly for ours, this most distinctive feature of + the Far East, its marked impersonality, is well worthy particular + attention; for while it collaterally suggests pregnant thoughts about + ourselves, it directly underlies the deeper oddities of a civilization + which is the modern eighth wonder of the world. We shall see this as we + look at what these people are, at what they were, and at what they hope to + become; not historically, but psychologically, as one might perceive, were + he but wise enough, in an acorn, besides the nut itself, two oaks, that + one from which it fell, and that other which from it will rise. These + three states, which we may call its potential past, present, and future, + may be observed and studied in three special outgrowths of a race's + character: in its language, in its every-day thoughts, and in its + religion. For in the language of a people we find embalmed the spirit of + its past; in its every-day thoughts, be they of arts or sciences, is + wrapped up its present life; in its religion lie enfolded its dreamings of + a future. From out each of these three subjects in the Far East + impersonality stares us in the face. Upon this quality as a foundation + rests the Far Oriental character. It is individually rather than + nationally that I propose to scan it now. It is the action of a particle + in the wave of world-development I would watch, rather than the + propagation of the wave itself. Inferences about the movement of the whole + will follow of themselves a knowledge of the motion of its parts. + </p> + <p> + But before we attack the subject esoterically, let us look a moment at the + man as he appears in his relation to the community. Such a glance will + suggest the peculiar atmosphere of impersonality that pervades the people. + </p> + <p> + However lacking in cleverness, in merit, or in imagination a man may be, + there are in our Western world, if his existence there be so much as + noticed at all, three occasions on which he appears in print. His birth, + his marriage, and his death are all duly chronicled in type, perhaps as + sufficiently typical of the general unimportance of his life. Mention of + one's birth, it is true, is an aristocratic privilege, confined to the + world of English society. In democratic America, no doubt because all men + there are supposed to be born free and equal, we ignore the first event, + and mention only the last two episodes, about which our national + astuteness asserts no such effacing equality. + </p> + <p> + Accepting our newspaper record as a fair enough summary of the biography + of an average man, let us look at these three momentous occasions in the + career of a Far Oriental. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0002" id="link2HCH0002"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Chapter 2. Family. + </h2> + <p> + In the first place, then, the poor little Japanese baby is ushered into + this world in a sadly impersonal manner, for he is not even accorded the + distinction of a birthday. He is permitted instead only the much less + special honor of a birth-year. Not that he begins his separate existence + otherwise than is the custom of mortals generally, at a definite instant + of time, but that very little subsequent notice is ever taken of the fact. + On the contrary, from the moment he makes his appearance he is spoken of + as a year old, and this same age he continues to be considered in most + simple ease of calculation, till the beginning of the next calendar year. + When that epoch of general rejoicing arrives, he is credited with another + year himself. So is everybody else. New Year's day is a common birthday + for the community, a sort of impersonal anniversary for his whole world. A + like reckoning is followed in China and Korea. Upon the disadvantages of + being considered from one's birth up at least one year and possibly two + older than one really is, it lies beyond our present purpose to expatiate. + It is quite evident that woman has had no voice in the framing of such a + chronology. One would hardly imagine that man had either, so astronomic is + the system. 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 + community. For it is not so much the want of commemoration shown the + subject as the character of the commemoration which is significant. Some + slight notice is indeed paid to birthdays during early childhood, 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 moon. These two occasions celebrated the coming of + humanity into the world with an impersonality worthy of the French + revolutionary calendar. The first of them is called the festival of girls, + and commemorates the birth of girls generally, the advent of the universal + feminine, as one may say. The second is a corresponding anniversary for + boys. Owing to its sex, the latter is the greater event of the two, and in + consequence of its most conspicuous feature is styled the festival of + fishes. The fishes are hollow paper images of the "tai" from four to six + feet in length, tied to the top of a long pole planted in the ground and + tipped with a gilded ball. Holes in the paper at the mouth and the tail + enable the wind to inflate the body so that it floats about horizontally, + swaying hither and thither, and tugging at the line after the manner of a + living thing. The fish are emblems of good luck, and are set up in the + courtyard of every house where a son has been born during the year. On + this auspicious day Tokio is suddenly transformed into eighty square miles + of aquarium. + </p> + <p> + For any more personal purpose New Year's day eclipses all particular + anniversaries. Then everybody congratulates everybody else upon everything + in general, and incidentally upon being alive. Such substitution of an + abstract for a concrete birthday, although exceedingly convenient for + others, must at least conduce to self-forgetfulness on the part of its + proper possessor, and tend inevitably to merge the identity of the + individual in that of the community. + </p> + <p> + It fares hardly better with the Far Oriental in the matter of marriage. + Although he is, as we might think, the person most interested in the + result, he is permitted no say in the affair whatever. In fact, it is not + his affair at all, but his father's. His hand is simply made a cat's-paw + of. The matter is entirely a business transaction, entered into by the + parent and conducted through regular marriage brokers. In it he plays only + the part of a marionette. His revenge for being thus bartered out of what + might be the better half of his life, he takes eventually on the next + succeeding generation. + </p> + <p> + His death may be said to be the most important act of his whole life. For + then only can his personal existence be properly considered to begin. By + it he joins the great company of ancestors who are to these people of + almost more consequence than living folk, and of much more individual + distinction. Particularly is this the case in China and Korea, but the + same respect, though in a somewhat less rigid form, is paid the dead in + Japan. Then at last the individual receives that recognition which was + denied him in the flesh. In Japan a mortuary tablet is set up to him in + the house and duly worshipped; on the continent the ancestors are given a + dwelling of their own, and even more devotedly reverenced. But in both + places the cult is anything but funereal. For the ancestral tombs are + temples and pleasure pavilions at the same time, consecrated not simply to + rites and ceremonies, but to family gatherings and general jollification. + And the fortunate defunct must feel, if he is still half as sentient as + his dutiful descendants suppose, that his earthly life, like other + approved comedies, has ended well. + </p> + <p> + Important, however, as these critical points in his career may be reckoned + by his relatives, they are scarcely calculated to prove equally epochal to + the man himself. In a community where next to no note is ever taken of the + anniversary of his birth, some doubt as to the special significance of + that red-letter day may not unnaturally creep into his own mind. While in + regard to his death, although it may be highly flattering for him to know + that he will certainly become somebody when he shall have ceased, + practically, to be anybody, such tardy recognition is scarcely timely + enough to be properly appreciated. Human nature is so earth-tied, after + all, that a post-mundane existence is very apt to seem immaterial as well + as be so. + </p> + <p> + With the old familiar landmarks of life obliterated in this wholesale + manner, it is to be doubted whether one of us, placed in the midst of such + a civilization, would know himself. He certainly would derive but scanty + satisfaction from the recognition if he did. Even Nirvana might seem a + happy limbo by comparison. With a communal, not to say a cosmic, birthday, + and a conventional wife, he might well deem his separate existence the + shadow of a shade and embrace Buddhism from mere force of circumstances. + </p> + <p> + Further investigation would not shake his opinion. For a far-oriental + career is thoroughly in keeping with these, its typical turning-points. + From one end of its course to the other it is painfully impersonal. In its + regular routine as in its more salient junctures, life presents itself to + these races a totally different affair from what it seems to us. The cause + lies in what is taken to be the basis of socio-biology, if one may so + express it. + </p> + <p> + In the Far East the social unit, the ultimate molecule of existence, is + not the individual, but the family. + </p> + <p> + We occidentals think we value family. We even parade our pretensions so + prominently as sometimes to tread on other people's prejudices of a like + nature. Yet we scarcely seem to appreciate the inheritance. For with a + logic which does us questionable credit, we are proud of our ancestors in + direct proportion to their remoteness from ourselves, thus permitting + Democracy to revenge its insignificance by smiling at our self-imposed + satire. To esteem a man in inverse ratio to the amount of remarkable blood + he has inherited is, to say the least, bathetic. Others, again, make + themselves objectionable by preferring their immediate relatives to all + less connected companions, and cling to their cousins so closely that + affection often culminates in matrimony, nature's remonstrances + notwithstanding. But with all the pride or pleasure which we take in the + members of our particular clan, our satisfaction really springs from + viewing them on an autocentric theory of the social system. In our own + eyes we are the star about which, as in Joseph's dream, our relatives + revolve and upon which they help to shed an added lustre. Our Ptolemaic + theory of society is necessitated by our tenacity to the personal + standpoint. This fixed idea of ours causes all else seemingly to rotate + about it. Such an egoistic conception is quite foreign to our longitudinal + antipodes. However much appearances may agree, the fundamental principles + upon which family consideration is based are widely different in the two + hemispheres. For the far-eastern social universe turns on a patricentric + pivot. + </p> + <p> + Upon the conception of the family as the social and political unit depends + the whole constitution of China. The same theory somewhat modified + constitutes the life-principle of Korea, of Japan, and of their less + advanced cousins who fill the vast centre of the Asiatic continent. 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 together. The Empire is one + great family; the family is a little empire. + </p> + <p> + The one developed out of the other. The patriarchal is, as is well known, + probably the oldest political system in the world. All nations may be said + to have experienced such a paternal government, but most nations outgrew + it. + </p> + <p> + Now the interesting fact about the yellow branch of the human race is, not + that they had so juvenile a constitution, but that they have it; that it + has persisted practically unchanged from prehistoric ages. It is certainly + surprising in this kaleidoscopic world whose pattern is constantly + changing as time merges one combination of its elements into another, that + on the other side of the globe this set should have remained the same. Yet + in spite of the lapse of years, in spite of the altered conditions of + existence, in spite of an immense advance in civilization, such a + primitive state of society has continued there to the present day, in all + its essentials what it was when as nomads the race forefathers wandered + peacefully or otherwise over the plains of Central Asia. The principle + helped them to expand; it has simply cramped them ever since. For, instead + of dissolving like other antiquated views, it has become, what it was + bound to become if it continued to last, crystallized into an institution. + It had practically reached this condition when it received a theoretical, + not to say a theological recognition which gave it mundane immortality. A + couple of millenniums ago Confucius consecrated filial duty by making it + the basis of the Chinese moral code. His hand was the finishing touch of + fossilification. For since the sage set his seal upon the system no one + has so much as dreamt of changing it. The idea of confuting Confucius + would be an act of impiety such as no Chinaman could possibly commit. Not + that the inadmissibility of argument is due really to the authority of the + philosopher, but that it lies ingrained in the character of the people. + Indeed the genius of the one may be said to have consisted in divining the + genius of the other. Confucius formulated the prevailing practice, and in + so doing helped to make it perpetual. He gave expression to the national + feeling, and like expressions, generally his, served to stamp the idea all + the more indelibly upon the national consciousness. + </p> + <p> + In this manner the family from a natural relation grew into a highly + unnatural social anachronism. The loose ties of a roving life became + fetters of a fixed conventionality. Bonds originally of mutual advantage + hardened into restrictions by which the young were hopelessly tethered to + the old. Midway in its course the race undertook to turn round and face + backwards, as it journeyed on. Its subsequent advance could be nothing but + slow. + </p> + <p> + The head of a family is so now in something of a corporeal sense. From him + emanate all its actions; to him are responsible all its parts. Any other + member of it is as incapable of individual expression as is the hand, or + the foot, or the eye of man. Indeed, Confucian doctors of divinity might + appropriately administer psychically to the egoistic the rebuke of the + Western physician to the too self-analytic youth who, finding that, after + eating, his digestion failed to give him what he considered its proper + sensations, had come to consult the doctor as to how it ought to feel. + "Feel! young man," he was answered, "you ought not to be aware that you + have a digestion." So with them, a normally constituted son knows not what + it is to possess a spontaneity of his own. Indeed, this very word "own," + which so long ago in our own tongue took to itself the symbol of + possession, well exemplifies his dependent state. China furnishes the most + conspicuous instance of the want of individual rights. A Chinese son + cannot properly be said to own anything. The title to the land he tills is + vested absolutely in the family, of which he is an undivided thirtieth, or + what-not. Even the administration of the property is not his, but resides + in the family, represented by its head. The outward symbols of ownership + testify to the fact. The bourns that mark the boundaries of the fields + bear the names of families, not of individuals. The family, as such, is + the proprietor, and its lands are cultivated and enjoyed in common by all + the constituents of the clan. In the tenure of its real estate, the + Chinese family much resembles the Russian Mir. But so far as his personal + state is concerned, the Chinese son outslaves the Slav. For he lives at + home, under the immediate control of the paternal will—in the most + complete of serfdoms, a filial one. Even existence becomes a communal + affair. From the family mansion, or set of mansions, in which all its + members dwell, to the family mausoleum, to which they will all eventually + be borne, a man makes his life journey in strict company with his kin. + </p> + <p> + A man's life is thus but an undivisible fraction of the family life. How + essentially so will appear from the following slight sketch of it. + </p> + <p> + To begin at the beginning, his birth is a very important event—for + the household, at which no one fails to rejoice except the new-comer. He + cries. The general joy, however, depends somewhat upon his sex. If the + baby chances to be a boy, everybody is immensely pleased; if a girl, there + is considerably less effusion shown. In the latter case the more impulsive + relatives are unmistakably sorry; the more philosophic evidently hope for + better luck next time. Both kinds make very pretty speeches, which not + even the speakers believe, for in the babe lottery the family is + considered to have drawn a blank. A delight so engendered proves how + little of the personal, even in prospective, attaches to its object. The + reason for the invidious distinction in the matter of sex lies of course + in an inordinate desire for the perpetuation of the family line. The + unfortunate infant is regarded merely in the light of a possible + progenitor. A boy is already potentially a father; whereas a girl, if she + marry at all, is bound to marry out of her own family into another, and is + relatively lost. The full force of the deprivation is, however, to some + degree tempered by the almost infinite possibilities of adoption. + Daughters are, therefore, not utterly unmitigable evils. + </p> + <p> + From the privacy of the domestic circle, the infant's entrance into public + life is performed pick-a-back. Strapped securely to the shoulders of a + slightly older sister, out he goes, consigned to the tender mercies of a + being who is scarcely more than a baby herself. The diminutiveness of the + nurse-perambulators is the most surprising part of the performance. The + tiniest of tots may be seen thus toddling round with burdens half their + own size. Like the dot upon the little i, the baby's head seems a natural + part of their childish ego. + </p> + <p> + An economy of the kind in the matter of nurses is highly suggestive. That + it should be practicable thus to entrust one infant to another proves the + precociousness of children. But this surprising maturity of the young + implies by a law too well known to need explanation, the consequent + immaturity of the race. That which has less to grow up to, naturally grows + up to its limit sooner. It may even be questioned whether it does not do + so with the more haste; on the same principle that a runner who has less + distance to travel not only accomplishes his course quicker, but moves + with relatively greater speed, or as a small planet grows old not simply + sooner, but comparatively faster than a larger one. Jupiter is still in + his fiery youth, while the moon is senile in decrepid old age, and yet his + separate existence began long before hers. Either hypothesis will explain + the abnormally early development of the Chinese race, and its subsequent + career of inactivity. Meanwhile the youthful nurse, in blissful ignorance + of the evidence which her present precocity affords against her future + possibilities, pursues her sports with intermittent attention to her + charge, whose poor little head lolls about, now on one side and now on the + other, in a most distressingly loose manner, an uninterested spectator of + the proceedings. + </p> + <p> + As soon as the babe gets a trifle bigger he ceases to be ministered to and + begins his long course of ministering to others. His home life consists of + attentive subordination. 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 + codes. The commandment "honor thy father" forms a tithe of the Mosaic law, + while the same injunction constitutes at least one half of the Confucian + precepts. To the Chinese child all the parental commands are not simply + law to the letter, they are to be anticipated in the spirit. To do what he + is told is but the merest fraction of his duty; theoretically his only + thought is how to serve his sire. The pious Aeneas escaping from Troy + exemplifies his conduct when it comes to a question of domestic + precedence,—whose first care, it will be remembered, was for his + father, his next for his son, and his last for his wife. He lost his wife, + it may be noted in passing. Filial piety is the greatest of Chinese + virtues. Indeed, an undutiful son is a monstrosity, a case of moral + deformity. It could now hardly be otherwise. For a father sums up in + propria persona a whole pedigree of patriarchs whose superimposed weight + of authority is practically divine. This condition of servitude is never + outgrown by the individual, as it has never been outgrown by the race. + </p> + <p> + Our boy now begins to go to school; to a day school, it need hardly be + specified, for a boarding school would be entirely out of keeping with the + family life. Here, he is given the "Trimetrical Classic" to start on, that + he may learn the characters by heart, picking up incidentally what ideas + he may. This book is followed by the "Century of Surnames," a catalogue of + all the clan names in China, studied like the last for the sake of the + characters, although the suggestion of the importance of the family + contained in it is probably not lost upon his youthful mind. Next comes + the "Thousand Character Classic," a wonderful epic as a feat of skill, for + of the thousand characters which it contains not a single one is repeated, + an absence of tautology not properly appreciated by the enforced reader. + Reminiscences of our own school days vividly depict the consequent + disgust, instead of admiration, of the boy. Three more books succeed these + first volumes, differing from one another in form, but in substance + singularly alike, treating, as they all do, of history and ethics + combined. For tales and morals are inseparably associated by pious + antiquity. Indeed, the past would seem to have lived with special + reference to the edification of the future. Chinamen were abnormally + virtuous in those golden days, barring the few unfortunates whom fate + needed as warning examples of depravity for succeeding ages. Except for + the fact that instruction as to a future life forms no part of the + curriculum, a far-eastern education may be said to consist of + Sunday-school every day in the week. For no occasion is lost by the + erudite authors, even in the most worldly portions of their work, for + preaching a slight homily on the subject in hand. 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 + example." For in the instructive anecdotes every other form of merit is + depicted as second to that of being a dutiful son. To the practice of that + supreme virtue all other considerations are sacrificed. The student's aim + is thus kept single. At every turn of the leaves, paragons of filial piety + shame the youthful reader to the pitch of emulation by the epitaphic + records of their deeds. Portraits of the past, possibly colored, present + that estimable trait in so exalted a type that to any less filial a people + they would simply deter competition. Yet the boy implicitly believes and + no doubt resolves to rival what he reads. A specimen or two will amply + suggest the rest. In one tale the hero is held up to the unqualified + admiration of posterity for having starved to death his son, in an extreme + case of family destitution, for the sake of providing food enough for his + aged father. In another he unhesitatingly divorces his wife for having + dared to poke fun, in the shape of bodkins, at some wooden effigies of his + parents which he had had set up in the house for daily devotional + contemplation. 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 progenitor, who had first cheated + his neighbors and then squandered his ill-gotten gains in riotous living. + Of these tales, as of certain questionable novels in a slightly different + line, the eventual moral is considered quite competent to redeem the + general immorality of the plot. + </p> + <p> + Along such a curriculum the youthful Chinaman is made to run. A very + similar system prevails in Japan, the difference between the two + consisting in quantity rather than quality. The books in the two cases are + much the same, and the amount read differs surprisingly little when we + consider that in the one case it is his own classics the student is + reading, in the other the Chinaman's. + </p> + <p> + If he belong to the middle class, as soon as his schooling is over he is + set to learn his father's trade. To undertake to learn any trade but his + father's would strike the family as simply preposterous. Why should he + adopt another line of business? And, if he did, what other business should + he adopt? Is his father's occupation not already there, a part of the + existing order of things; and is he not the son of his father and heir + therefore of the paternal skill? Not that such inherited aptness is + recognized scientifically; it is simply taken for granted instinctively. + It is but a halfhearted intuition, however, 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 effect. As for his + individual predilection in the matter, nature has considerately conformed + to custom by giving him none. He becomes a cabinet-maker, for instance, + because his ancestors always have been cabinet-makers. He inherits the + family business as a necessary part of the family name. He is born to his + trade, not naturally selected because of his fitness for it. But he + usually is amply qualified for the position, for generations of practice, + if only on one side of the house, accumulate a vast deal of technical + skill. The result of this system of clan guilds in all branches of + industry is sufficiently noticeable. The almost infinite superiority of + Japanese artisans over their European fellow-craftsmen is world-known. 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 practice. Eventually the man is lost in the manner. The very names of + trades express the fact. The Japanese word for cabinet-maker, for example, + means literally cutting-thing-house, and is now applied as distinctively + to the man as to his shop. Nominally as well as practically the youthful + Japanese artisan makes his introduction to the world, much after the + manner of the hero of Lecocq's comic opera, the son of the house of + Marasquin et Cie. + </p> + <p> + If instead of belonging to the lower middle class our typical youth be + born of bluer blood, or if he be filled with the same desires as if he + were so descended, he becomes a student. Having failed to discover in the + school-room the futility of his country's self-vaunted learning, he + proceeds to devote his life to its pursuit. With an application which is + eminently praiseworthy, even if its object be not, he sets to work to + steep himself in the classics till he can perceive no merit in anything + else. As might be suspected, he ends by discovering in the sayings of the + past more meaning than the simple past ever dreamed of putting there. He + becomes more Confucian than Confucius. Indeed, it is fortunate for the + reputation of the sage that he cannot return to earth, for he might + disagree to his detriment with his own commentators. + </p> + <p> + Such is the state of things in China and Korea. Learning, however, is not + dependent solely on individual interest for its wonderfully flourishing + condition in the Middle Kingdom, for the government abets the practice to + its utmost. It is itself the supreme sanction, for its posts are the + prizes of proficiency. Through the study of the classics lies the only + entrance to political power. To become a mandarin one must have passed a + series of competitive examinations on these very subjects, and competition + in this impersonal field is most keen. For while popular enthusiasm for + philosophy for philosophy's sake might, among any people, eventually show + symptoms of fatigue, it is not likely to flag where the outcome of it is + so substantial. Erudition carries there all earthly emoluments in its + train. 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-citizens. China is a student's paradise where the + possession of learning is instantly convertible into unlimited pelf. + </p> + <p> + In Japan the study of the classics was never pursued professionally. It + was, however, prosecuted with much zeal en amateur. The Chinese + bureaucratic system has been wanting. For in spite of her students, until + within thirty years Japan slumbered still in the Knight-time of the Middle + Ages, and so long as a man carried about with him continually two + beautiful swords he felt it incumbent upon him to use them. The happy days + of knight-errantry have passed. These same cavaliers of Samurai are now + thankful to police the streets in spectacles necessitated by the too + diligent study of German text, and arrest chance disturbers of the public + peace for a miserably small salary per month. + </p> + <p> + Our youth has now reached the flowering season of life, that brief May + time when the whole world takes on the rose-tint, and when by all dramatic + laws he ought to fall in love. He does nothing of the kind. Sad to say, he + is a stranger to the feeling. Love, as we understand the word, is a thing + unknown to the Far East; fortunately, indeed, for the possession there of + the tender passion would be worse than useless. Its indulgence would work + no end of disturbance to the community at large, beside entailing much + misery upon its individual victim. Its exercise would probably be classed + with kleptomania and other like excesses of purely personal consideration. + The community could never permit the practice, for it strikes at the very + root of their whole social system. + </p> + <p> + The immense loss in happiness to these people in consequence of the + omission by the too parsimonious Fates of that thread, which, with us, + spins the whole of woman's web of life, and at least weaves the warp of + man's, is but incidental to the present subject; the effect of the loss + upon the individuality of the person himself is what concerns us now. + </p> + <p> + 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 emotions, it is + assuredly when that man first falls in love. Then, if never before, the + world within excludes the world without. For of all our human passions + none is so isolating as the tenderest. To shut that one other being in, we + must of necessity shut all the rest of mankind out; and we do so with a + reckless trust in our own self-sufficiency which has about it a touch of + the sublime. The other millions are as though they were not, and we two + are alone in the earth, which suddenly seems to have grown unprecedentedly + beautiful. Indeed, it only needs such judicious depopulation to make of + any spot an Eden. Perhaps the early Jewish myth-makers had some such + thought in mind when they wrote their idyl of the cosmogony. The human + traits are true to-day. Then at last our souls throw aside their + conventional wrappings to stand revealed as they really are. Certain of + comprehension, the thoughts we have never dared breathe to any one before, + find a tongue for her who seems fore-destined to understand. The + long-closed floodgates of feeling are thrown wide, and our personality, + pent up from the time of its inception for very mistrust, sweeps forth in + one uncontrollable rush. For then the most reticent becomes confiding; the + most self-contained expands. Then every detail of our past lives assumes + an importance which even we had not divined. To her we tell them all,—our + boyish beliefs, our youthful fancies, the foolish with the fine, the witty + with the wise, the little with the great. Nothing then seems quite + unworthy, as nothing seems quite worthy enough. Flowers and weeds that we + plucked upon our pathway, we heap them in her lap, certain that even the + poorest will not be tossed aside. Small wonder that we bring as many as we + may when she bends her head so lovingly to each. + </p> + <p> + As our past rises in reminiscence with all its oldtime reality, no less + clearly does our future stand out to us in mirage. What we would be seems + as realizable as what we were. Seen by another beside ourselves, our + castles in the air take on something of the substance of stereoscopic + sight. Our airiest fancies seem solid facts for their reality to her, and + gilded by lovelight, they glitter and sparkle like a true palace of the + East. For once all is possible; nothing lies beyond our reach. And as we + talk, and she listens, we two seem to be floating off into an empyrean of + our own like the summer clouds above our heads, as they sail dreamily on + into the far-away depths of the unfathomable sky. + </p> + <p> + It would be more than mortal not to believe in ourselves when another + believes so absolutely in us. Our most secret thoughts are no longer + things to be ashamed of, for she has sanctioned them. Whatever doubt may + have shadowed us as to our own imaginings disappears before the smile of + her appreciation. That her appreciation may be prejudiced is not a + possibility we think of then. She understands us, or seems to do so to our + own better understanding of ourselves. Happy the man who is thus + understood! Happy even he who imagines that he is, because of her eager + wish to comprehend; fortunate, indeed, if in this one respect he never + comes to see too clearly. + </p> + <p> + No such blissful infatuation falls to the lot of the Far Oriental. He + never is the dupe of his own desire, the willing victim of his + self-illusion. He is never tempted to reveal himself, and by thus + revealing, realize. No loving appreciation urges him on toward the + attainment of his own ideal. That incitement to be what he would seem to + be, to become what she deems becoming, he fails to feel. Custom has so far + fettered fancy that even the wish to communicate has vanished. He has now + nothing to tell; she needs no ear to hear. For she is not his love; she is + only his wife,—what is left of a romance when the romance is left + out. Worse still, she never was anything else. He has not so much as a + memory of her, for he did not marry her for love; he may not love of his + own accord, nor for the matter of that does he wish to do so. If by some + mischance he should so far forget to forget himself, it were much better + for him had he not done so, for the choice of a bride is not his, nor of a + bridegroom hers. Marriage to a Far Oriental is the most important + mercantile transaction of his whole life. It is, therefore, far too + weighty a matter to be entrusted to his youthful indiscretion; for + although the person herself is of lamentably little account in the + bargain, the character of her worldly circumstances is most material to + it. So she is contracted for with the same care one would exercise in the + choice of any staple business commodity. The particular sample is not + vital to the trade, but the grade of goods is. She is selected much as the + bride of the Vicar of Wakefield chose her wedding-gown, only that the one + was at least cut to suit, while the other is not. It is certainly easier, + if less fitting, to get a wife as some people do clothes, not to their own + order, but ready made; all the more reason when the bargain is for one's + son, not one's self. So the Far East, which looks at the thing from a + strictly paternal standpoint and ignores such trifles as personal + preferences, takes its boy to the broker's and fits him out. 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 thing. + </p> + <p> + Marriage is thus a species of investment contracted by the existing family + for the sake of the prospective one, the actual participants being only + lay figures in the affair. Sometimes the father decides the matter + himself; sometimes he or the relative who stands in loco parentis calls + for a plebiscit on the subject; for such an extension of the suffrage has + gradually crept even into patriarchal institutions. The family then + assemble, sit in solemn conclave on the question, and decide it by vote. + Of course the interested parties are not asked their opinion, as it might + be prejudiced. The result of the conference must be highly gratifying. To + have one's wife chosen for one by vote of one's relatives cannot but be + satisfactory—to the electors. The outcome of this ballot, like that + of universal suffrage elsewhere, is at the best unobjectionable + mediocrity. Somehow such a result does not seem quite to fulfil one's + ideal of a wife. It is true that the upper classes of impersonal France + practise this method of marital selection, their conseils de famille + furnishing in some sort a parallel. But, as is well known, matrimony among + these same upper classes is largely form devoid of substance. It begins + impressively with a dual ceremony, the civil contract, which amounts to a + contract of civility between the parties, and a religious rite to render + the same perpetual, and there it is too apt to end. + </p> + <p> + So much for the immediate influence on the man; the eventual effect on the + race remains to be considered. Now, if the first result be anything, the + second must in the end be everything. For however trifling it be in the + individual instance, it goes on accumulating with each successive + generation, like compound interest. The choosing of a wife by family + suffrage is not simply an exponent of the impersonal state of things, it + is a power toward bringing such a state of things about. A hermit seldom + develops to his full possibilities, and the domestic variety is no + exception to the rule. A man who is linked to some one that toward him + remains a cipher lacks surroundings inciting to psychological growth, nor + is he more favorably circumstanced because all his ancestors have been + similarly circumscribed. + </p> + <p> + As if to make assurance doubly sure, natural selection here steps in to + further the process. To prove this with all the rigidity of demonstration + desirable is in the present state of erotics beyond our power. Until our + family trees give us something more than mere skeletons of dead branches, + we must perforce continue ignorant of the science of grafts. For the nonce + we must be content to generalize from our own premises, only rising above + them sufficiently to get a bird's-eye view of our neighbor's estates. Such + a survey has at least one advantage: the whole field of view appears + perfectly plain. + </p> + <p> + Surveying the subject, then, from this ego-altruistic position, we can + perceive why matrimony, as we practise it, should result in increasing the + personality of our race: for the reason namely that psychical similarity + determines the selection. At first sight, indeed, such a natural affinity + would seem to have little or nothing to do with marriage. As far as + outsiders are capable of judging, unlikes appear to fancy one another + quite as gratuitously as do likes. Connubial couples are often anything + but twin souls. Yet our own dual use of the word "like" bears historic + witness to the contrary. For in this expression we have a record from + early Gothic times that men liked others for being like themselves. Since + then, our feelings have not changed materially, although our mode of + showing them is slightly less intense. In those simple days stranger and + enemy were synonymous terms, and their objects were received in a + corresponding spirit. In our present refined civilization we hurl epithets + instead of spears, and content ourselves with branding as heterodox the + opinions of another which do not happen to coincide with our own. The + instinct of self-development naturally begets this self-sided view. We + insensibly find those persons congenial whose ideas resemble ours, and + gravitate to them, as leaves on a pond do to one another, nearer and + nearer till they touch. Is it likely, then, that in the most important + case of all the rule should suddenly cease to hold? Is it to be presumed + that even Socrates chose Xantippe for her remarkable contrariety to + himself? + </p> + <p> + Mere physical attraction is another matter. Corporeally considered, men + not infrequently fall in love with their opposites, the phenomenally tall + with the painfully short, the unnecessarily stout with the distressingly + slender. But even such inartistic juxtapositions are much less common than + we are apt at times to think. For it must never be forgotten that the + exceptional character of the phenomena renders them conspicuous, the + customary more consorted combinations failing to excite attention. + </p> + <p> + Besides, there exists a reason for physical incongruity which does not + hold psychically. Nature sanctions the one while she discountenances the + other. Instead of the forethought she once bestowed upon the body, it + receives at her hands now but the scantiest attention. Its development has + ceased to be an object with her. For some time past almost all her care + has been devoted to the evolution of the soul. The consequence is that + physically man is much less specialized than many other animals. In other + words, he is bodily less advanced in the race for competitive + extermination. He belongs to an antiquated, inefficient type of mammal. + His organism is still of the jack-of-all-trades pattern, such as prevailed + generally in the more youthful stages of organic life—one not + specially suited to any particular pursuit. Were it not for his cerebral + convolutions he could not compete for an instant in the struggle for + existence, and even the monkey would reign in his stead. But brain is more + effective than biceps, 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 foe. + </p> + <p> + The field of competition has thus been transferred from matter to mind, + but the fight has lost none of its keenness in consequence. With the same + zeal with which advantageous anatomical variations were seized upon and + perpetuated, psychical ones are now grasped and rendered hereditary. Now + if opposites were to fancy and wed one another, such fortunate + improvements would soon be lost. They would be scattered over the + community at large even it they escaped entire neutralization. To prevent + so disastrous a result nature implants a desire for resemblance, which + desire man instinctively acts upon. + </p> + <p> + Complete compatibility of temperament is of course a thing not to be + expected nor indeed to be desired, since it would defeat its own end by + allowing no room for variation. A fairly broad basis of agreement, + however, exists even when least suspected. This common ground of content + consists of those qualities held to be most essential by the individuals + concerned, although not necessarily so appearing to other people. + Sometimes, indeed, these qualities are still in the larvae state of + desires. They are none the less potent upon the man's personality on that + account, for the wish is always father to its own fulfilment. + </p> + <p> + The want of conjugal resemblance not only works mediately on the child, it + works mutually on the parents; for companionship, as is well recognized, + tends to similarity. Now companionship is the last thing to be looked for + in a far-eastern couple. Where custom requires a wife to follow dutifully + in the wake of her husband, whenever the two go out together, there is + small opportunity for intercourse by the way, even were there the + slightest inclination to it, which there is not. The appearance of the + pair on an excursion is a walking satire on sociability, for the + comicality of the connection is quite unperceived by the performers. In + the privacy of the domestic circle the separation, if less humorous, is no + less complete. Each lives in a world of his own, largely separate in fact + in China and Korea, and none the less in fancy in Japan. On the continent + a friend of the husband would see little or nothing of the wife, and even + in Japan he would meet her much as we meet an upper servant in a friend's + house. Such a semi-attached relationship does not conduce to much mutual + understanding. + </p> + <p> + The remainder of our hero's uneventful existence calls for no particular + comment. 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 ranks. But his opportunities for the expression of individuality + are not one whit increased. He has simply advanced a peg in a regular + hierarchy of subjection. From being looked after himself he proceeds to + look after others. Such is the extent of the change. Even should he chance + to be the eldest son of the eldest son, and thus eventually end by + becoming the head of the family, he cannot consistently consider himself. + There is absolutely no place in his social cosmos for so particular a + thing as the ego. + </p> + <p> + With a certain grim humor suggestive of metaphysics, it may be said of his + whole life that it is nothing but a relative affair after all. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0003" id="link2HCH0003"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Chapter 3. Adoption. + </h2> + <p> + But one may go a step farther in this matter of the family, and by so + doing fare still worse with respect to individuality. 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 atom, and that in fact it is only the idea of the family + that is really important, a case of abstraction of an abstract. These + suggestive customs are the far-eastern practices of adoption and + abdication. + </p> + <p> + Adoption, with us, is a kind of domestic luxury, akin to the keeping of + any other pets, such as lap-dogs and canaries. It is a species of + self-indulgence which those who can afford it give themselves when fortune + has proved unpropitious, an artificial method of counteracting the + inequalities of fate. That such is the plain unglamoured view of the + procedure is shown by the age at which the object is adopted. Usually the + future son or daughter enters the adoptive household as an infant, + intentionally so on the part of the would-be parents. His ignorance of a + previous relationship largely increases his relative value; 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 contemplate. He is therefore acquired young. + The amusement derived from his company is thus seen to be distinctly + paramount to all other considerations. No one cares so heartily to own a + dog which has been the property of another; a fortiori of a child. It is + clearly, then, not as a necessity that the babe is adopted. If such were + the case, if like the ancient Romans all a man wanted was the continuance + of the family line, he would naturally wait until the last practicable + moment; for he would thus save both care and expense. In the Far East + adoption is quite a different affair. There it is a genealogical necessity—like + having a father or mother. It is, indeed, of almost more importance. For + the great desideratum to these peoples is not ancestors but descendants. + Pedigrees in the land of the universal opposite are not matters of bequest + but of posthumous reversion. A man is not beholden to the past, he looks + forward to the future for inherited honors. No fame attaches to him for + having had an illustrious grandfather. On the contrary, it is the + illustrious grandson who reflects some of his own greatness back upon his + grandfather. If a man therefore fail to attain eminence himself, he always + has another chance in his descendants; for he will of necessity be + ennobled through the merits of those who succeed him. Such is the + immemorial law of the land. Fame is retroactive. This admirable system has + only one objection: it is posthumous in its effect. An ambitious man who + unfortunately lacks ability himself has to wait too long for vicarious + recognition. The objection is like that incident to the making of a + country seat out of a treeless plain by planting the same with saplings. + About the time the trees begin to be worth having the proprietary + landscape-gardener dies of old age. However, as custom permits a Far + Oriental no ancestral growth of timber, he is obliged to lay the seeds of + his own family trees. Natural offspring are on the whole easier to get, + and more satisfactory when got. Hence the haste with which these peoples + rush into matrimony. If in despite of his precipitation fate perversely + refuse to grant him children, he must endeavor to make good the omission + by artificial means. He proceeds to adopt somebody. True to instinct, he + chooses from preference a collateral relative. In some far-eastern lands + he must so restrict himself by law. In Korea, for instance, he can only + adopt an agnate and one of a lower generation than his own. But in Japan + his choice is not so limited. In so praiseworthy an act as the + perpetuation of his unimportant family line, it is deemed unwise in that + progressive land to hinder him from unconsciously bettering it by the way. + He is consequently permitted to adopt anybody. As people are by no means + averse to being adopted, 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 one. + </p> + <p> + The adopted changes his name, of course, to take that of the family he + enters. As he is very frequently grown up and extensively known at the + time the adoption takes place, his change of cognomen occasions at first + some slight confusion among his acquaintance. This would be no worse, + however, than the change with us from the maid to the matron, and + intercourse would soon proceed smoothly again if people would only rest + content with one such domestic migration. But they do not. The fatal + facility of the process tempts them to repeat it. The result is + bewildering: a people as nomadic now in the property of their persons as + their forefathers were in their real estate. A man adopts another to-day + to unadopt him to-morrow and replace him by somebody else the day after. + So profoundly unimportant to them is their social identity, that they + bandy it about with almost farcical freedom. Perhaps it is fitting that + there should be some slight preparation in this world for a future + transmigration of souls. Still one fails to conceive that the practice can + be devoid of disadvantages even to its beneficiaries. To foreigners it + proves disastrously perplexing. For if you chance upon a man whom you have + not met for some time, you can never be quite sure how to accost him. If + you begin, "Well met, Green, how goes it?" as likely as not he replies, + "Finely. But I am no longer Green; I have become Brown. I was adopted last + month by my maternal grandfather." You of course apologize for your + unfortunate mistake, carefully note his change of hue for a future + occasion, and behold, on meeting him the next time you find he has turned + Black. Such a chameleon-like cognomen is very unsettling to your idea of + his identity, and can hardly prove reassuring to his own. The only persons + who reap any benefit from the doubt are those, with us unhappy, + individuals who possess the futile faculty of remembering faces without + recalling their accompanying names. + </p> + <p> + Girls, as a rule, are not adopted, being valueless genealogically. A niece + or grandniece to whom one has taken a great fancy might of course be + adopted there as elsewhere, but it would be distinctly out of the + every-day run, as she could never be included in the household on strict + business principles. + </p> + <p> + The practice of adopting is not confined to childless couples. Others may + find themselves in quite as unfortunate a predicament. 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 name. His offspring may be + of the wrong sex; they may all be girls. In this untoward event the father + has something more on his hands than merely a houseful of daughters to + dispose of. In addition to securing sons-in-law, he must, unless he would + have his ancestral line become extinct, provide himself with a son. The + simplest procedure in such a case is to combine relationships in a single + individual, and the most self-evident person to select for the dual + capacity is the husband of the eldest daughter. This is the course + pursued. Some worthy young man is secured as spouse for the senior sister; + he is at the same time formally taken in as a son by the family whose + cognomen he assumes, and eventually becomes the head of the house. Strange + to say, this vista of gradually unfolding honors does not seem to prove + inviting. Perhaps the new-comer objects to marrying the whole family, a + prejudice not without parallel elsewhere. Certainly the opportunity is not + appreciated. Indeed, to "go out as a son-in-law," as the Japanese idiom + hath it, is considered demeaning to the matrimonial domestic. Like other + household help he wears too patently the badge of servitude. "If you have + three koku of rice to your name, don't do it," 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 respectability. To barter one's name in this mercenary + manner is looked upon as derogatory to one's self-respect, although, as we + have seen, to part with it for any less direct remuneration is not + attended with the slightest loss of personal prestige. As practically the + unfortunate had none to lose in either event, it would seem to be a case + of taking away from a man that which he hath not. So contumacious a thing + is custom. It is indeed lucky that popular prejudice interposes some limit + to this fictitious method of acquiring children. A trifling predilection + for the real thing in sonships is absolutely vital, even to the + continuance of the artificial variety. For if one generation ever went in + exclusively for adoption, there would be no subsequent generation to + adopt. + </p> + <p> + As it to give the finishing touch to so conventional a system of society, + a man can leave it under certain circumstances with even greater ease than + he entered it. He can become as good as dead without the necessity of + making way with himself. Theoretically, he can cease to live while still + practically existing; for it is always open to the head of a family to + abdicate. + </p> + <p> + The word abdicate has to our ears a certain regal sound. We instinctively + associate the act with a king. Even the more democratic expression resign + suggests at once an office of public or quasi public character. To talk of + abdicating one's private relationships sounds absurd; one might as well + talk of electing his parents, it would seem to us. Such misunderstanding + of far-eastern social possibilities comes from our having indulged in + digressions from our more simple nomadic habits. If in imagination we will + return to our ancestral muttons and the then existing order of things, the + idea will not strike us as so strange; for in those early bucolic days + every father was a king. Family economics were the only political + questions in existence then. The clan was the unit. Domestic disputes were + state disturbances, and clan-claims the only kind of international + quarrels. The patriarch was both father to his people and king. + </p> + <p> + As time widened the family circle it eventually reached a point where + cohesion ceased to be possible. The centrifugal tendency could no longer + be controlled by the centripetal force. It split up into separate bodies, + each of them a family by itself. In their turn these again divided, and so + the process went on. This principle has worked universally, the only + difference in its action among different races being the greater or less + degree of the evolving motion. With us the social system has been turning + more and more rapidly with time. In the Far East its force, instead of + increasing, would seem to have decreased, enabling the nebula of its + original condition to keep together as a single mass, so that to-day a + whole nation, resembling a nebula indeed in homogeneity, is swayed by a + single patriarchal principle. Here, on the contrary, so rapid has the + motion become that even brethren find themselves scattered to the four + winds. + </p> + <p> + An Occidental father and an Oriental head of a family are no longer really + correlative terms. The latter more closely resembles a king in his duties, + responsibilities, and functions generally. Now, in the Middle Ages in + Europe, when a king grew tired of affairs of state, he abdicated. So in + the Far East, when the head of a family has had enough of active life, he + abdicates, and his eldest son reigns in his stead. + </p> + <p> + From that moment he ceases to belong to the body politic in any active + sense. Not that he is no longer a member of society nor unamenable to its + general laws, but that he has become a respectable declasse, as it were. + He has entered, so to speak, the social nirvana, a not unfitting first + step, as he regards it, toward entering the eventual nirvana beyond. Such + abdication now takes place without particular cause. After a certain time + of life, and long before a man grows old, it is the fashion thus to make + one's bow. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0004" id="link2HCH0004"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Chapter 4. Language. + </h2> + <p> + A man's personal equation, as astronomers call the effect of his + individuality, is kin, for all its complexity, to those simple algebraical + problems which so puzzled us at school. To solve either we must begin by + knowing the values of the constants that enter into its expression. Upon + the a b c's of the one, as upon those of the other, depend the + possibilities of the individual x. + </p> + <p> + Now the constants in any man's equation are the qualities that he has + inherited from the past. What a man does follows from what he is, which in + turn is mostly dependent upon what his ancestors have been; and of all the + links in the long chain of mind-evolution, few are more important and more + suggestive than language. Actions may at the moment speak louder than + words, but methods of expression have as tell-tale a tongue for bygone + times as ways of doing things. + </p> + <p> + If it should ever fall to my lot to have to settle that exceedingly vexed + Eastern question,—not the emancipation of ancient Greece from the + bondage of the modern Turk, but the emancipation of the modern college + student from the bond of ancient Greek,—I should propose, as a + solution of the dilemma, the addition of a course in Japanese to the + college list of required studies. It might look, I admit, like begging the + question for the sake of giving its answer, but the answer, I think, would + justify itself. + </p> + <p> + It is from no desire to parade a fresh hobby-horse upon the university + curriculum that I offer the suggestion, but because I believe that a study + of the Japanese language would prove the most valuable of ponies in the + academic pursuit of philology. In the matter of literature, indeed, we + should not be adding very much to our existing store, 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 conversation. As it is + now, our linguistic learning is with most of us limited to a knowledge of + Aryan tongues, and in consequence we not only fall into the mistake of + thinking our way the only way, which is bad enough, but, what is far + worse, by not perceiving the other possible paths we quite fail to + appreciate the advantages or disadvantages of following our own. We are + the blind votaries of a species of ancestral language-worship, which, with + all its erudition, tends to narrow our linguistic scope. A study of + Japanese would free us from the fetters of any such family infatuation. + The inviolable rules and regulations of our mother-tongue would be found + to be of relative application only. For we should discover that speech is + a much less categorical matter than we had been led to suppose. We should + actually come to doubt the fundamental necessity of some of our most + sacred grammatical constructions; and even our reverenced Latin grammars + would lose that air of awful absoluteness which so impressed us in + boyhood. + </p> + <p> + An encouraging estimate of a certain missionary puts the amount of study + needed by the Western student for the learning of Japanese as sufficient, + if expended nearer home, to equip him with any three modern European + languages. It is certainly true that a completely strange vocabulary, an + utter inversion of grammar, and an elaborate system of honorifics combine + to render its acquisition anything but easy. In its fundamental + principles, however, it is alluringly simple. + </p> + <p> + In the first place, the Japanese language is pleasingly destitute of + personal pronouns. Not only is the obnoxious "I" conspicuous only by its + absence; the objectionable antagonistic "you" is also entirely suppressed, + while the intrusive "he" is evidently too much of a third person to be + wanted. Such invidious distinctions of identity apparently never thrust + their presence upon the simple early Tartar minds. I, you, and he, not + being differences due to nature, demanded, to their thinking, no + recognition of man. + </p> + <p> + There is about this vagueness of expression a freedom not without its + charm. It is certainly delightful to be able to speak of yourself as if + you were somebody else, choosing mentally for the occasion any one you may + happen to fancy, or, it you prefer, the possibility of soaring boldly + forth into the realms of the unconditioned. + </p> + <p> + To us, at first sight, however, such a lack of specification appears + wofully incompatible with any intelligible transmission of ideas. 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 commodities. Such, nevertheless, is not the result. On the + contrary, Japanese is as easy and as certain of comprehension as is + English. On ninety occasions out of a hundred, the context at once makes + clear the person meant. + </p> + <p> + In the very few really ambiguous cases, or those in which, for the sake of + emphasis, a pronoun is wanted, certain consecrated expressions are + introduced for the purpose. For eventually the more complex social + relations of increasing civilization compelled some sort of distant + recognition. Accordingly, compromises with objectionable personality were + effected by circumlocutions promoted to a pronoun's office, becoming thus + pro-pronouns, as it were. Very noncommittal expressions they are, most of + them, such as: "the augustness," meaning you; "that honorable side," or + "that corner," denoting some third person, the exact term employed in any + given instance scrupulously betokening the relative respect in which the + individual spoken of is held; while with a candor, an indefiniteness, or a + humility worthy so polite a people, the I is known as "selfishness," or "a + certain person," or "the clumsy one." + </p> + <p> + Pronominal adjectives are manufactured in the same way. "The stupid + father," "the awkward son," "the broken-down firm," are "mine." Were they + "yours," they would instantly become "the august, venerable father," "the + honorable son," "the exalted firm." + </p> + <p> + Even these lame substitutes for pronouns are paraded as sparingly as + possible. To the Western student, who brings to the subject a brain + throbbing with personality, hunting in a Japanese sentence for personal + references is dishearteningly like "searching in the dark for a black hat + which is n't there;" for the brevet pronouns are commonly not on duty. To + employ them with the reckless prodigality that characterizes our + conversation would strike the Tartar mind like interspersing his talk with + unmeaning italics. He would regard such discourse much as we do those + effusive epistles of a certain type of young woman to her most intimate + girl friends, in which every other word is emphatically underlined. + </p> + <p> + For the most part, the absolutely necessary personal references are + introduced by honorifics; that is, by honorary or humble expressions. Such + is a portion of the latter's duty. They do a great deal of unnecessary + work besides. + </p> + <p> + These honorifics are, taken as a whole, one of the most interesting + peculiarities of Japanese, as also of Korean, just as, taken in detail, + they are one of its most dangerous pitfalls. For silence is indeed golden + compared with the chagrin of discovering that a speech which you had meant + for a compliment was, in fact, an insult, or the vexation of learning that + you have been industriously treating your servant with the deference due a + superior,—two catastrophes sure to follow the attempts of even the + most cautious of beginners. The language is so thoroughly imbued with the + honorific spirit that the exposure of truth in all its naked simplicity is + highly improper. Every idea requires to be more or less clothed in + courtesy before it is presentable; and the garb demanded by etiquette is + complex beyond conception. To begin with, there are certain preliminary + particles which are simply honorific, serving no other purpose whatsoever. + In addition to these there are for every action a small infinity of verbs, + each sacred to a different degree of respect. For instance, to our verb + "to give" corresponds a complete social scale of Japanese verbs, each + conveying the idea a shade more politely than its predecessor; only the + very lowest meaning anything so plebeian as simply "to give." Sets of + laudatory or depreciatory adjectives are employed in the same way. Lastly, + the word for "is," which strictly means "exists," expresses this existence + under three different forms,—in a matter-of-fact, a flowing, or an + inflated style; the solid, liquid, and gaseous states of conversation, so + to speak, to suit the person addressed. But three forms being far too few + for the needs of so elaborate a politeness, these are supplemented by many + interpolated grades. + </p> + <p> + Terms of respect are applied not only to those mortals who are held in + estimation higher than their fellows, but to all men indiscriminately as + well. The grammatical attitude of the individual toward the speaker is of + as much importance as his social standing, I being beneath contempt, and + you above criticism. + </p> + <p> + Honorifics are used not only on all possible occasions for courtesy, but + at times, it would seem, upon impossible ones; for in some instances the + most subtle diagnosis fails to reveal in them a relevancy to anybody. That + the commonest objects should bear titles because of their connection with + some particular person is comprehensible, but what excuse can be made for + a phrase like the following, "It respectfully does that the august seat + exists," all of which simply means "is," and may be applied to anything, + being the common word—in Japanese it is all one word now—for + that apparently simple idea. It would seem a sad waste of valuable + material. 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 addressed, and therefore becomes ipso facto + august. + </p> + <p> + Here is a still subtler example. You are, we will suppose, at a tea-house, + and you wish for sugar. The following almost stereotyped conversation is + pretty sure to take place. I translate it literally, simply prefacing that + every tea-house girl, usually in the first blush of youth, is generically + addressed as "elder sister,"—another honorific, at least so + considered in Japan. + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + You clap your hands. (Enter tea-house maiden.) + + You. Hai, elder sister, augustly exists there sugar? + + The T. H. M. The honorable sugar, augustly is it? + + You. So, augustly. + + The T. H. M. He (indescribable expression of assent). + (Exit tea-house maiden to fetch the sugar.) +</pre> + <p> + Now, the "augustlies" go almost without saying, but why is the sugar + honorable? Simply because it is eventually going to be offered to you. But + she would have spoken of it by precisely the same respectful title, if she + had been obliged to inform you that there was none, in which case it never + could have become yours. Such is politeness. We may note, in passing, that + all her remarks and all yours, barring your initial question, meant + absolutely nothing. She understood you perfectly from the first, and you + knew she did; but then, if all of us were to say only what were necessary, + the delightful art of conversation would soon be nothing but a science. + </p> + <p> + The average Far Oriental, indeed, talks as much to no purpose as his + Western cousin, only in his chit-chat politeness replaces personalities. + With him, self is suppressed, and an ever-present regard for others is + substituted in its stead. + </p> + <p> + A lack of personality is, as we have seen, the occasion of this courtesy; + it is also its cause. + </p> + <p> + That politeness should be one of the most marked results of impersonality + may appear surprising, yet a slight examination will show it to be a fact. + Looked at a posteriori, we find that where the one trait exists the other + is most developed, while an absence of the second seems to prevent the + full growth of the first. This is true both in general and in detail. + Courtesy increases, as we travel eastward round the world, coincidently + with a decrease in the sense of self. Asia is more courteous than Europe, + Europe than America. Particular races show the same concomitance of + characteristics. France, the most impersonal nation of Europe, is at the + same time the most polite. + </p> + <p> + Considered a priori, the connection between the two is not far to seek. + Impersonality, by lessening the interest in one's self, induces one to + take an interest in others. Introspection tends to make of man a solitary + animal, the absence of it a social one. The more impersonal the people, + the more will the community supplant the individual in the popular + estimation. The type becomes the interesting thing to man, as it always is + to nature. Then, as the social desires develop, politeness, being the + means to their enjoyment, develops also. + </p> + <p> + A second omission in Japanese etymology is that of gender. That words + should be credited with sex is a verbal anthropomorphism that would seem + to a Japanese exquisitely grotesque, if so be that it did not strike him + as actually immodest. For the absence of gender is simply symptomatic of a + much more vital failing, a disregard of sex. Originally, as their language + bears witness, the Japanese showed a childish reluctance to recognizing + sex at all. Usually a single sexless term was held sufficient for a given + species, and did duty collectively for both sexes. Only where a + consideration of sex thrust itself upon them, beyond the possibility of + evasion, did they employ for the male and the female distinctive + expressions. The more intimate the relation of the object to man, the more + imperative the discriminating name. Hence human beings possessed a fair + number of such special appellatives; for a man is a palpably different + sort of person from his grandmother, and a mother-in-law from a wife. But + it is noteworthy that the artificial affinities of society were as + carefully differentiated as the distinctions due to sex, while ancestral + relationships were deemed more important than either. + </p> + <p> + Animals, though treated individually most humanely, are vouchsafed but + scant recognition on the score of sex. With them, both sexes share one + common name, and commonly, indeed, this answers quite well enough. In + those few instances where sex enters into the question in a manner not to + be ignored, particles denoting "male" or "female" are prefixed to the + general term. How comparatively rare is the need of such specification can + be seen from the way in which, with us, in many species, the name of one + sex alone does duty indifferently for both. That of the male is the one + usually selected, as in the case of the dog or horse. If, however, it be + the female with which man has most to do, she is allowed to bestow her + name upon her male partner. Examples of the latter description occur in + the use of "cows" for "cattle," and "hens" for "fowls." A Japanese can say + only "fowl," defined, if absolutely necessary, as "he-fowl" or "she-fowl." + </p> + <p> + Now such a slighting of one of the most potent springs of human action, + sex, with all that the idea involves, is not due to a pronounced + misogynism on the part of these people, but to a much more effective + neglect, a great underlying impersonality. Indifference to woman is but + included in a much more general indifference to mankind. The fact becomes + all the more evident when we descend from sex to gender. That Father Ocean + does not, in their verbal imagery, embrace Mother Earth, with that subtle + suggestion of humanity which in Aryan speech the gender of the nouns hints + without expressing, is not due to any lack of poesy in the Far Oriental + speaker, but to the essential impersonality of his mind, embodied now in + the very character of the words he uses. A Japanese noun is a crystallized + concept, handed down unchanged from the childhood of the Japanese race. So + primitive a conception does it represent that it is neither a total nor a + partial symbol, but rather the outcome of a first vague generality. The + word "man," for instance, means to them not one man, still less mankind, + but that indefinite idea which struggles for embodiment in the utterance + of the infant. It represents not a person, but a thing, a material fact + quite innocent of gender. This early state of semi-consciousness the + Japanese never outgrew. The world continued to present itself to their + minds as a collection of things. Nor did their subsequent Chinese + education change their view. Buddhism simply infused all things with the + one universal spirit. + </p> + <p> + As to inanimate objects, the idea of supposing sex where there is not even + life is altogether too fanciful a notion for the Far Eastern mind. + </p> + <p> + Impersonality first fashioned the nouns, and then the nouns, by their very + impersonality, helped keep impersonal the thought and fettered fancy. All + those temptings to poesy which to the Aryan imagination lie latent in the + sex with which his forefathers humanized their words, never stir the + Tartar nor the Chinese soul. They feel the poetry of nature as much as, + indeed much more than, we; but it is a poetry unassociated with man. And + this, too, curiously enough, in spite of the fact that to explain the + cosmos the Chinamen invented, or perhaps only adapted, a singularly sexual + philosophy. For possibly, like some other portions of their intellectual + wealth, they stole it from India. The Chinese conception of the origin of + the world is based on the idea of sex. According to their notions the + earth was begotten. It is true that with them the cosmos started in an + abstract something, which self-produced two great principles; but this + pair once obtained, matters proceeded after the analogy of mankind. The + two principles at work were themselves abstract enough to have satisfied + the most unimpassioned of philosophers. They were simply a positive + essence and a negative one, correlated to sunshine and shadow, but also + correlated to male and female forces. Through their mutual action were + born the earth and the air and the water; from these, in turn, was + begotten man. The cosmical modus operandi was not creative nor + evolutionary, but sexual. The whole scheme suggests an attempt to wed + abstract philosophy with primitive concrete mythology. + </p> + <p> + The same sexuality distinguishes the Japanese demonology. Here the + physical replaces the philosophical; instead of principles we find + allegorical personages, but they show just the same pleasing propensity to + appear in pairs. + </p> + <p> + This attributing of sexes to the cosmos is not in the least incompatible + with an uninterested disregard of sex where it really exists. It is one + thing to admit the fact as a general law of the universe, and quite + another to dwell upon it as an important factor in every-day affairs. + </p> + <p> + How slight is the Tartar tendency to personification can be seen from a + glance at these same Japanese gods. They are a combination of defunct + ancestors and deified natural phenomena. The evolving of the first half + required little imagination, for fate furnished the material ready made; + while in conjuring up the second moiety, the spirit-evokers showed even + less originality. Their results were neither winsome nor sublime. The gods + whom they created they invested with very ordinary humanity, the usual + endowment of aboriginal deity, together with the customary superhuman + strength. If these demigods differed from others of their class, it was + only in being more commonplace, and in not meddling much with man. Even + such personification of natural forces, simple enough to be + self-suggested, quickly disappeared. The various awe-compelling phenomena + soon ceased to have any connection with the anthropomorphic noumena they + had begotten. For instance, the sun-goddess, we are informed, was one day + lured out of a cavern, where she was sulking in consequence of the + provoking behavior of her younger brother, by her curiosity at the sight + of her own face in a mirror, ingeniously placed before the entrance for + the purpose. But no Japanese would dream now of casting any such + reflections, however flattering, upon the face of the orb of day. The sun + has become not only quite sexless to him, but as devoid of personality as + it is to any Western materialist. Lesser deities suffered a like + unsubstantial transformation. The thunder-god, with his belt of drums, + upon which he beats a devil's tattoo until he is black in the face, is no + longer even indirectly associated with the storm. As for dryads and + nymphs, the beautiful creatures never inhabited Eastern Asia. Anthropoid + foxes and raccoons, wholly lacking in those engaging qualities that beget + love, and through love remembrance, take their place. Even Benten, the + naturalized Venus, who, like her Hellenic sister, is said to have risen + from the sea, is a person quite incapable of inspiring a reckless + infatuation. + </p> + <p> + Utterly unlike was this pantheon to the pantheon of the Greeks, the + personifying tendency of whose Aryan mind was forever peopling nature with + half-human inhabitants. Under its quickening fancy the very clods grew + sentient. Dumb earth awoke at the call of its desire, and the beings its + own poesy had begotten made merry companionship for man. Then a change + crept over the face of things. Faith began to flicker, for want of facts + to feed its flame. Little by little the fires of devotion burnt themselves + out. At last great Pan died. The body of the old belief was consumed. But + though it perished, its ashes preserved its form, an unsubstantial + presentment of the past, to crumble in a twinkling at the touch of + science, but keeping yet to the poet's eye the lifelike semblance of what + once had been. The dead gods still live in our language and our art. Even + to-day the earth about us seems semiconscious to the soul, for the + memories they have left. + </p> + <p> + But with the Far Oriental the exorcising feeling was fear. He never fell + in love with his own mythological creations, and so he never embalmed + their memories. They were to him but explanations of facts, and had no + claims upon his fancy. His ideal world remained as utterly impersonal as + if it had never been born. + </p> + <p> + The same impersonality reappears in the matter of number. Grammatically, + number with them is unrecognized. There exist no such things as plural + forms. This singularity would be only too welcome to the foreign student, + were it not that in avoiding the frying-pan the Tartars fell into the + fire. For what they invented in place of a plural was quite as difficult + to memorize, and even more cumbrous to express. Instead of inflecting the + noun and then prefixing a number, they keep the noun unchanged and add two + numerals; thus at times actually employing more words to express the + objects than there are objects to express. One of these numerals is a + simple number; the other is what is known as an auxiliary numeral, a word + as singular in form as in function. Thus, for instance, "two men" become + amplified verbally into "man two individual," or, as the Chinaman puts it, + in pidgin English, "two piecey man." For in this respect Chinese resembles + Japanese, though in very little else, and pidgin English is nothing but + the literal translation of the Chinese idiom into Anglo-Saxon words. The + necessity for such elaborate qualification arises from the excessive + simplicity of the Japanese nouns. As we have seen, the noun is so + indefinite a generality that simply to multiply it by a number cannot + possibly produce any definite result. No exact counterpart of these nouns + exists in English, but some idea of the impossibility of the process may + be got from our word "cattle," which, prolific though it may prove in + fact, remains obstinately incapable of verbal multiplication. All Japanese + nouns being of this indefinite description, all require auxiliary + numerals. But as each one has its own appropriate numeral, about which a + mistake is unpardonable, it takes some little study merely to master the + etiquette of these handles to the names of things. + </p> + <p> + Nouns are not inflected, their cases being expressed by postpositions, + which, as the name implies, follow, in becoming Japanese inversion, + instead of preceding the word they affect. To make up, nevertheless, for + any lack of perplexity due to an absence of inflections, adjectives, en + revanche, are most elaborately conjugated. Their protean shapes are as + long as they are numerous, representing not only times, but conditions. + There are, for instance, the root form, the adverbial form, the indefinite + form, the attributive form, and the conclusive form, the two last being + conjugated through all the various voices, moods, and tenses, to say + nothing of all the potential forms. As one change is superposed on + another, the adjective ends by becoming three or four times its original + length. The fact is, the adjective is either adjective, adverb, or verb, + according to occasion. In the root form it also helps to make nouns; so + that it is even more generally useful than as a journalistic epithet with + us. As a verb, it does duty as predicate and copula combined. For such an + unnecessary part of speech as a real copula does not exist in Japanese. In + spite of the shock to the prejudices of the old school of logicians, it + must be confessed that the Tartars get on very well without any such + couplings to their trains of thought. But then we should remember that in + their sentences the cart is always put before the horse, and so needs only + to be pushed, not pulled along. + </p> + <p> + The want of a copula is another instance of the primitive character of the + tongue. It has its counterpart in our own baby-talk, where a quality is + predicated of a thing simply by placing the adjective in apposition with + the noun. + </p> + <p> + That the Japanese word which is commonly translated "is" is in no sense a + copula, but an ordinary intransitive verb, referring to a natural state, + and not to a logical condition, is evident in two ways. In the first + place, it is never used to predicate a quality directly. A Japanese does + not say, "The scenery is fine," but simply, "Scenery, fine." Secondly, + wherever this verb is indirectly employed in such a manner, it is + followed, not by an adjective, but by an adverb. Not "She is beautiful," + but "She exists beautifully," would be the Japanese way of expressing his + admiration. What looks at first, therefore, like a copula turns out to be + merely an impersonal intransitive verb. + </p> + <p> + A negative noun is, of course, an impossibility in any language, just as a + negative substantive, another name for the same thing, is a direct + contradiction in terms. No matter how negative the idea to be given, it + must be conveyed by a positive expression. Even a void is grammatically + quite full of meaning, although unhappily empty in fact. So much is common + to all tongues, but Japanese carries its positivism yet further. Not only + has it no negative nouns, it has not even any negative pronouns nor + pronominal adjectives,—those convenient keepers of places for the + absent. "None" and "nothing" are unknown words in its vocabulary, because + the ideas they represent are not founded on observed facts, but upon + metaphysical abstractions. Such terms are human-born, not earth-begotten + concepts, and so to the Far Oriental, who looks at things from the point + of view of nature, not of man, negation takes another form. Usually it is + introduced by the verbs, because the verbs, for the most part, relate to + human actions, and it is man, not nature, who is responsible for the + omission in question. After all, it does seem more fitting to say, "I am + ignorant of everything," than "I know nothing." It is indeed you who are + wanting, not the thing. + </p> + <p> + The question of verbs leads us to another matter bearing on the subject of + impersonality; namely, the arrangement of the words in a Japanese + sentence. The Tartar mode of grammatical construction is very nearly the + inverse of our own. The fundamental rule of Japanese syntax is, that + qualifying words precede the words they qualify; that is, an idea is + elaborately modified before it is so much as expressed. This practice + places the hearer at some awkward preliminary disadvantage, inasmuch as + the story is nearly over before he has any notion what it is all about; + but really it puts the speaker to much more trouble, for he is obliged to + fashion his whole sentence complete in his brain before he starts to + speak. This is largely in consequence of two omissions in Tartar + etymology. There are in Japanese no relative pronouns and no temporal + conjunctions; conjunctions, that is, for connecting consecutive events. + The want of these words precludes the admission of afterthoughts. + Postscripts in speech are impossible. The functions of relatives are + performed by position, explanatory or continuative clauses being made to + precede directly the word they affect. Ludicrous anachronisms, not unlike + those experienced by Alice in her looking-glass journey, are occasioned by + this practice. For example, "The merry monarch who ended by falling a + victim to profound melancholia" becomes "To profound melancholia a victim + by falling ended merry monarch," and the sympathetic hearer weeps first + and laughs afterward, when chronologically he should be doing precisely + the opposite. + </p> + <p> + A like inversion of the natural order of things results from the absence + of temporal conjunctions. In Japanese, though nouns can be added, actions + cannot; you can say "hat and coat," but not "dressed and came." + Conjunctions are used only for space, never for time. Objects that exist + together can be joined in speech, but it is not allowable thus to connect + consecutive events. "Having dressed, came" is the Japanese idiom. To speak + otherwise would be to violate the unities. For a Japanese sentence is a + single rounded whole, not a bunch of facts loosely tied together. It is as + much a unit in its composition as a novel or a drama is with us. Such + artistic periods, however, are anything but convenient. In their nicely + contrived involution they strikingly resemble those curious nests of + Chinese boxes, where entire shells lie closely packed one within another,—a + very marvel of ingenious and perfectly unnecessary construction. One must + be antipodally comprehensive to entertain the idea; as it is, the idea + entertains us. + </p> + <p> + On the same general plan, the nouns precede the verbs in the sentence, and + are in every way the more important parts of speech. The consequence is + that in ordinary conversation the verbs come so late in the day that they + not infrequently get left out altogether. For the Japanese are much given + to docking their phrases, a custom the Germans might do well to adopt. + Now, nouns denote facts, while verbs express action, and action, as + considered in human speech, is mostly of human origin. In this precedence + accorded the impersonal element in language over the personal, we observe + again the comparative importance assigned the two. In Japanese estimation, + the first place belongs to nature, the second only to man. + </p> + <p> + As if to mark beyond a doubt the insignificance of the part man plays in + their thought, sentences are usually subjectless. Although it is a common + practice to begin a phrase with the central word of the idea, isolated + from what follows by the emphasizing particle "wa" (which means "as to," + the French "quant a"), the word thus singled out for distinction is far + more likely to be the object of the sentence than its subject. The habit + is analogous to the use of our phrase "speaking of,"—that is, simply + an emphatic mode of introducing a fresh thought; only that with them, the + practice being the rule and not the exception, no correspondingly abrupt + effect is produced by it. Ousted thus from the post of honor, the subject + is not even permitted the second place. Indeed, it usually fails to put in + an appearance anywhere. You may search through sentence after sentence + without meeting with the slightest suggestion of such a thing. When so + unusual an anomaly as a motive cause is directly adduced, it owes its + mention, not to the fact of being the subject, but because for other + reasons it happens to be the important word of the thought. The truth is, + the Japanese conception of events is only very vaguely subjective. An + action is looked upon more as happening than as being performed, as + impersonally rather than personally produced. The idea is due, however, to + anything but philosophic profundity. It springs from the most superficial + of childish conceptions. For the Japanese mind is quite the reverse of + abstract. Its consideration of things is concrete to a primitive degree. + The language reflects the fact. The few abstract ideas these people now + possess are not represented, for the most part, by pure Japanese, but by + imported Chinese expressions. The islanders got such general notions from + their foreign education, and they imported idea and word at the same time. + </p> + <p> + Summing up, as it were, in propria persona the impersonality of Japanese + speech, the word for "man," "hito," is identical with, and probably + originally the same word as "hito," the numeral "one;" a noun and a + numeral, from which Aryan languages have coined the only impersonal + pronoun they possess. On the one hand, we have the German "mann;" on the + other, the French "on". While as if to give the official seal to the + oneness of man with the universe, the word mono, thing, is applied, + without the faintest implication of insult, to men. + </p> + <p> + Such, then, is the mould into which, as children, these people learn to + cast their thought. What an influence it must exert upon their subsequent + views of life we have but to ask of our own memories to know. With each + one of us, if we are to advance beyond the steps of the last generation, + there comes a time when our growing ideas refuse any longer to fit the + childish grooves in which we were taught to let them run. How great the + wrench is when this supreme moment arrives we have all felt too keenly + ever to forget. We hesitate, we delay, to abandon the beliefs which, + dating from the dawn of our being, seem to us even as a part of our very + selves. From the religion of our mother to the birth of our boyish first + love, all our early associations send down roots so deep that long after + our minds have outgrown them our hearts refuse to give them up. Even when + reason conquers at last, sentiment still throbs at the voids they + necessarily have left. + </p> + <p> + In the Far East, this fondness for the old is further consecrated by + religion. The worship of ancestors sets its seal upon the traditions of + the past, to break which were impious as well as sad. The golden age, that + time when each man himself was young, has lingered on in the lands where + it is always morning, and where man has never passed to his prosaic noon. + Befitting the place is the mind we find there. As its language so clearly + shows, 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 + self. + </p> + <p> + Particularly potent with these people is their language, for a reason that + also lends it additional interest to us,—because it is their own. + Among the mass of foreign thought the Japanese imitativeness has caused + the nation to adopt, here is one thing which is indigenous. Half of the + present speech, it is true, is of Chinese importation, but conservatism + has kept the other half pure. 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 ago, and which it has since kept unchanged. The man's + mind has done likewise. + </p> + <p> + 1. Professor Basil Hall Chamberlain: The Japanese Language. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0005" id="link2HCH0005"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Chapter 5. Nature and Art. + </h2> + <p> + We have seen how impersonal is the form which Far Eastern thought assumes + when it crystallizes into words. Let us turn now to a consideration of the + thoughts themselves before they are thus stereotyped for transmission to + others, and scan them as they find expression unconsciously in the man's + doings, or seek it consciously in his deeds. + </p> + <p> + To the Far Oriental there is one subject which so permeates and pervades + his whole being as to be to him, not so much a conscious matter of thought + as an unconscious mode of thinking. For it is a thing which shapes all his + thoughts instead of constituting the substance of one particular set of + them. That subject is art. To it he is born as to a birthright. Artistic + perception is with him an instinct to which he intuitively conforms, and + for which he inherits the skill of countless generations. From the tips of + his fingers to the tips of his toes, in whose use he is surprisingly + proficient, he is the artist all over. Admirable, however, as is his + manual dexterity, his mental altitude is still more to be admired; for it + is artistic to perfection. His perception of beauty is as keen as his + comprehension of the cosmos is crude; for while with science he has not + even a speaking acquaintance, with art he is on terms of the most + affectionate intimacy. + </p> + <p> + To the whole Far Eastern world science is a stranger. Such nescience is + patent even in matters seemingly scientific. For although the Chinese + civilization, even in the so-called modern inventions, was already old + while ours lay still in the cradle, it was to no scientific spirit that + its discoveries were due. Notwithstanding the fact that Cathay was the + happy possessor of gunpowder, movable type, and the compass before such + things were dreamt of in Europe, she owed them to no knowledge of physics, + chemistry, or mechanics. It was as arts, not as sciences, they were + invented. And it speaks volumes for her civilization that she burnt her + powder for fireworks, not for firearms. To the West alone belongs the + credit of manufacturing that article for the sake of killing people + instead of merely killing time. + </p> + <p> + The scientific is not the Far Oriental point of view. To wish to know the + reasons of things, that irrepressible yearning of the Western spirit, is + no characteristic of the Chinaman's mind, nor is it a Tartar trait. + Metaphysics, a species of speculation that has usually proved peculiarly + attractive to mankind, probably from its not requiring any scientific + capital whatever, would seem the most likely place to seek it. But upon + such matters he has expended no imagination of his own, having quietly + taken on trust from India what he now professes. As for science proper, it + has reached at his hands only the quasimorphologic stage; that is, 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 man. Not only + is the spirit of the subject left out altogether, but the mere outward + semblance is misleading. For pseudo-scientific collections of facts which + never rise to be classifications of phenomena forms to his idea the acme + of erudition. His mathematics, for example, consists of a set of empiric + rules, of which no explanation is ever vouchsafed the taught for the + simple reason that it is quite unknown to the teacher. It is not even easy + to decide how much of what there is is Jesuitical. Of more recent sciences + he has still less notion, particularly of the natural ones. Physics, + chemistry, geology, and the like are matters that have never entered his + head. Even in studies more immediately connected with obvious everyday + life, such as language, history, customs, it is truly remarkable how + little he possesses the power of generalization and inference. His + elaborate lists of facts are imposing typographically, but are not even + formally important, while his reasoning about them is as exquisite a bit + of scientific satire as could well be imagined. + </p> + <p> + But with the arts it is quite another matter. While you will search in + vain, in his civilization, for explanations of even the most simple of + nature's laws, you will meet at every turn with devices for the + beautifying of life, which may stand not unworthily beside the products of + nature's own skill. Whatever these people fashion, from the toy of an hour + to the triumphs of all time, is touched by a taste unknown elsewhere. To + stroll down the Broadway of Tokio of an evening is a liberal education in + everyday art. As you enter it there opens out in front of you a fairy-like + vista of illumination. Two long lines of gayly lighted shops, stretching + off into the distance, look out across two equally endless rows of + torch-lit booths, the decorous yellow gleam of the one contrasting + strangely with the demoniacal red flare of the other. This perspective of + pleasure fulfils its promise. As your feet follow your eyes you find + yourself in a veritable shoppers' paradise, the galaxy of twinkle + resolving into worlds of delight. Nor do you long remain a mere spectator; + for the shops open their arms to you. No cold glass reveals their charms + only to shut you off. Their wares lie invitingly exposed to the public, + seeming to you already half your own. At the very first you come to you + stop involuntarily, lost in admiration over what you take to be + bric-a-brac. It is only afterwards you learn that the object of your + ecstasy was the commonest of kitchen crockery. Next door you halt again, + this time in front of some leathern pocket-books, 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 fill. If you do succeed in tearing + yourself away purse-whole, it is only to fall a victim to some painted + fans of so exquisite a make and decoration that escape short of possession + is impossible. Opposed as stubbornly as you may be to idle purchase at + home, here you will find yourself the prey of an acute case of shopping + fever before you know it. Nor will it be much consolation subsequently to + discover that you have squandered your patrimony upon the most ordinary + articles of every-day use. If in despair you turn for refuge to the + booths, you will but have delivered yourself into the embrace of still + more irresistible fascinations. For the nocturnal squatters are there for + the express purpose of catching the susceptible. The shops were modestly + attractive from their nature, but the booths deliberately make eyes at + you, and with telling effect. The very atmosphere is bewitching. The lurid + smurkiness of the torches lends an appropriate weirdness to the figure of + the uncouthly clad pedlar who, with the politeness of the arch-fiend + himself, displays to an eager group the fatal fascinations of some new + conceit. Here the latest thing in inventions, a gutta-percha rat, which, + for reasons best known to the vender, scampers about squeaking with a + mimicry to shame the original, holds an admiring crowd spellbound with + mingled trepidation and delight. There a native zoetrope, indefatigable + round of pleasure, 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 time, 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 box. Beyond this "wheel of life" lies + spread out on a mat a most happy family of curios, the whole of which you + are quite prepared to purchase en bloc. 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 breeze. So one attraction fairly jostles + its neighbor for recognition from the gay thousands that like yourself + stroll past in holiday delight. Chattering children in brilliant colors, + voluble women and talkative men in quieter but no less picturesque + costumes, stream on in kaleidoscopic continuity. And you, carried along by + the current, wander thus for miles with the tide of pleasure-seekers, + till, late at night, when at last you turn reluctantly homeward, you feel + as one does when wakened from some too delightful dream. + </p> + <p> + Or instead of night, suppose it day and the place a temple. With those who + are entering you enter too through the outer gateway into the courtyard. + At the farther end rises a building the like of which for richness of + effect you have probably never beheld or even imagined. In front of you a + flight of white stone steps leads up to a terrace whose parapet, also of + stone, is diapered for half its height and open latticework the rest. This + piazza gives entrance to a building or set of buildings whose every detail + challenges the eye. Twelve pillars of snow-white wood sheathed in part + with bronze, arranged in four rows, make, as it were, the bones of the + structure. The space between the centre columns lies open. The other + triplets are webbed in the middle and connected, on the sides and front, + by grilles of wood and bronze forming on the outside a couple of + embrasures on either hand the entrance in which stand the guardian Nio, + two colossal demons, Gog and Magog. Instead of capitals, a frieze + bristling with Chinese lions protects the top of the pillars. Above this + in place of entablature rises tier upon tier of decoration, each tier + projecting beyond the one beneath, and the topmost of all terminating in a + balcony which encircles the whole second story. The parapet of this + balcony is one mass of ornament, and its cornice another row of lions, + brown instead of white. The second story is no less crowded with carving. + Twelve pillars make its ribs, the spaces between being filled with + elaborate woodwork, while on top rest more friezes, more cornices, + clustered with excrescences of all colors and kinds, and guarded by lions + innumerable. To begin to tell the details of so multi-faceted a gem were + artistically impossible. It is a jewel of a thousand rays, yet whose + beauties blend into one as the prismatic tints combine to white. And then, + after the first dazzle of admiration, when the spirit of curiosity urges + you to penetrate the centre aisle, lo and behold it is but a gate! The + dupe of unexpected splendor, you have been paying court to the means of + approach. It is only a portal after all. For as you pass through, you + catch a glimpse of a building beyond more gorgeous still. Like in general + to the first, unlike it in detail, resembling it only as the mistress may + the maid. But who shall convince of charm by enumerating the features of a + face! 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 folds, it is the very eastern princess of a building standing in the + majesty of her court to give you audience. + </p> + <p> + A pebbly path, a low flight of stone steps, a pause to leave your shoes + without the sill, and you tread in the twilight of reverence upon the + moss-like mats within. The richness of its outer ornament, so impressive + at first, is, you discover, but prelude to the lavish luxury of its + interior. Lacquer, bronze, pigments, deck its ceiling and its sides in + such profusion that it seems to you as if art had expanded, in the + congenial atmosphere, into a tropical luxuriance of decoration, and grew + here as naturally on temples as in the jungle creepers do on trees. Yet + all is but setting to what the place contains; objects of bigotry and + virtue that appeal to the artistic as much as to the religious instincts + of the devout. More sacred still are the things treasured in the sanctum + of the priests. There you will find gems of art for whose sake only the + most abnormal impersonality can prevent you from breaking the tenth + commandment. 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 kept. As + you gaze thus, amid the soul-satisfying repose of the spot, at some + masterpiece from the brush of Motonobu, you find yourself wondering, in a + fanciful sort of way, whether Buddhist contemplation is not after all only + another name for the contemplation of the beautiful, since devotees to the + one are ex officio such votaries of the other. + </p> + <p> + Dissimilar as are these two glimpses of Japanese existence, in one point + the bustling street and the hushed temple are alike,—in the nameless + grace that beautifies both. + </p> + <p> + This spirit is even more remarkable for its all-pervasiveness than for its + inherent excellence. Both objectively and subjectively its catholicity is + remarkable. It imbues everything, and affects everybody. 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 arts. The lowest artisan is essentially an artist. Modern + French nomenclature on the subject, in spite of the satire to which the + more prosaic Anglo-Saxon has subjected it, is peculiarly applicable there. + To call a Japanese cook, for instance, an artist would be but the barest + acknowledgment of fact, for Japanese food is far more beautiful to look at + than agreeable to eat; while Tokio tailors are certainly masters of + drapery, if they are sublimely oblivious to the natural modelings of the + male or female form. + </p> + <p> + On the other hand, art is sown, like the use of tobacco, broadcast among + the people. It is the birthright of the Far East, the talent it never + hides. Throughout the length and breadth of the land, and from the highest + prince to the humblest peasant, art reigns supreme. + </p> + <p> + Now such a prevalence of artistic feeling implies of itself impersonality + in the people. At first sight it might seem as if science did the same, + and that in this respect the one hemisphere offset the other, and that + consequently both should be equally impersonal. But in the first place, + our masses are not imbued with the scientific spirit, as theirs are with + artistic sensibility. Who would expect of a mason an impersonal interest + in the principles of the arch, or of a plumber a non-financial devotion to + hydraulics? Certainly one would be wrong in crediting the masses in + general or European waiters in particular with much abstract love of + mathematics, for example. In the second place, there is an essential + difference in the attitude of the two subjects upon personality. + Emotionally, science appeals to nobody, art to everybody. Now the emotions + constitute the larger part of that complex bundle of ideas which we know + as self. A thought which is not tinged to some extent with feeling is not + only not personal; properly speaking, it is not even distinctively human, + but cosmical. In its lofty superiority to man, science is unpersonal + rather than impersonal. Art, on the other hand, is a familiar spirit. + Through the windows of the senses she finds her way into the very soul of + man, and makes for herself a home there. But it is to his humanity, not to + his individuality, that she whispers, for she speaks in that universal + tongue which all can understand. + </p> + <p> + Examples are not wanting to substantiate theory. It is no mere coincidence + that the two most impersonal nations of Europe and Asia respectively, the + French and the Japanese, are at the same time the most artistic. Even + politeness, which, as we have seen, distinguishes both, is itself but a + form of art,—the social art of living agreeably with one's fellows. + </p> + <p> + 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 + art, and especially when we compare their spirit with our own. The + mainsprings of Far Eastern art may be said to be three: Nature, Religion, + and Humor. Incongruous collection that they are, all three witness to the + same trait. For the first typifies concrete impersonality, the second + abstract impersonality, while the province of the last is to ridicule + personality generally. Of the trio the first is altogether the most + important. Indeed, to a Far Oriental, 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 face. The Far Oriental lives in a long + day-dream of beauty. He muses rather than reasons, and all musing, so the + word itself confesses, springs from the inspiration of a Muse. But this + Muse appears not to him, as to the Greeks, after the fashion of a woman, + nor even more prosaically after the likeness of a man. Unnatural though it + seem to us, his inspiration seeks no human symbol. His Muse is not kin to + mankind. She is too impersonal for any personification, for she is Nature. + </p> + <p> + That poet whose name carries with it a certain presumption of + infallibility has told us that "the proper study of mankind is man;" and + if material advancement in consequence be any criterion of the fitness of + a particular mental pursuit, events have assuredly justified the saying. + Indeed, the Levant has helped antithetically to preach the same lesson, in + showing us by its own fatal example that the improper study of mankind is + woman, and that they who but follow the fair will inevitably degenerate. + </p> + <p> + The Far Oriental knows nothing of either study, and cares less. The + delight of self-exploration, or the possibly even greater delight of + losing one's self in trying to fathom femininity, is a sensation equally + foreign to his temperament. Neither the remarkable persistence of one's + own characteristics, not infrequently matter of deep regret to their + possessor, nor the charmingly unaccountable variability of the fairer sex, + at times quite as annoying, is a phenomenon sufficient to stir his + curiosity. Accepting, as he does, the existing state of things more as a + material fact than as a phase in a gradual process of development, he + regards humanity as but a small part of the great natural world, instead + of considering it the crowning glory of the whole. He recognizes man + merely as a fraction of the universe,—one might almost say as a + vulgar fraction of it, considering the low regard in which he is held,—and + accords him his proportionate share of attention, and no more. + </p> + <p> + In his thought, nature is not accessory to man. Worthy M. Perichon, of + prosaic, not to say philistinic fame, had, as we remember, his travels + immortalized in a painting where a colossal Perichon in front almost + completely eclipsed a tiny Mont Blanc behind. A Far Oriental thinks + poetry, which may possibly account for the fact that in his mind-pictures + the relative importance of man and mountain stands reversed. "The + matchless Fuji," first of motifs in his art, admits no pilgrim as its + peer. + </p> + <p> + Nor is it to woman that turn his thoughts. Mother Earth is fairer, in his + eyes, than are any of her daughters. To her is given the heart that should + be theirs. The Far Eastern love of Nature amounts almost to a passion. 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 recluse. Not that he worships in secret, however. His + passion is too genuine either to find disguise or seek display. With us, + unfortunately, the love of Nature is apt to be considered a mental + extravagance peculiar to poets, excusable in exact ratio to the ability to + give it expression. For an ordinary mortal to feel a fondness for Mother + Earth is a kind of folly, to be carefully concealed from his fellows. A + sort of shamefacedness prevents him from avowing it, as a boy at + boarding-school hides his homesickness, or a lad his love. He shrinks from + appearing less pachydermatous than the rest. Or else he flies to the other + extreme, and affects the odd; pretends, poses, parades, and at last + succeeds half in duping himself, half in deceiving other people. But with + Far Orientals the case is different. Their love has all the unostentatious + assurance of what has received the sanction of public opinion. Nor is it + still at that doubtful, hesitating stage when, by the instrumentality of a + third, its soul-harmony can suddenly be changed from the jubilant major + key into the despairing minor. No trace of sadness tinges his delight. He + has long since passed this melancholy phase of erotic misery, if so be + that the course of his true love did not always run smooth, and is now + well on in matrimonial bliss. The very look of the land is enough to + betray the fact. In Japan the landscape has an air of domesticity about + it, patent even to the most casual observer. Wherever the Japanese has + come in contact with the country he has made her unmistakably his own. He + has touched her to caress, not injure, and it seems as if Nature accepted + his fondness as a matter of course, and yielded him a wifely submission in + return. His garden is more human, even, than his house. Not only is + everything exquisitely in keeping with man, but natural features are + actually changed, plastic to the imprint of their lord and master's mind. + Bushes, shrubs, trees, forget to follow their original intent, and grow as + he wills them to; now expanding in wanton luxuriance, now contracting into + dwarf designs of their former selves, all to obey his caprice and please + his eye. Even stubborn rocks lose their wildness, and come to seem a part + of the almost sentient life around them. If the description of such + dutifulness seems fanciful, the thing itself surpasses all supposition. + Hedges and shrubbery, clipped into the most fantastic shapes, accept the + suggestion of the pruning-knife as if man's wishes were their own whims. + Manikin maples, Tom Thumb trees, a foot high and thirty years old, with + all the gnarls and knots and knuckles of their fellows of the forest, grow + in his parterres, their native vitality not a whit diminished. And they + are not regarded as monstrosities but only as the most natural of + artificialities; for they are a part of a horticultural whole. 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 + mirror, where all but the observer himself is transformed into a fantastic + miniature of the reality. In that quaint fairyland diminutive rivers flow + gracefully under tiny trees, past mole-hill mountains, till they fall at + last into lilliputian lakes, almost smothered for the flowers that grow + upon their banks; 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 it. + </p> + <p> + But besides the delights of domesticity which the Japanese enjoys daily in + Nature's company, he has his acces de tendresse, too. When he feels thus + specially stirred, he invites a chosen few of his friends, equally + infatuated, and together they repair to some spot noted for its scenery. + It may be a waterfall, or some dreamy pond overhung by trees, or the + distant glimpse of a mountain peak framed in picture-wise between the + nearer hills; or, at their appropriate seasons, the blossoming of the many + tree flowers, which in eastern Asia are beautiful beyond description. For + he appreciates not only places, but times. One spot is to be seen at + sunrise, another by moonlight; one to be visited in the spring-time, + another in the fall. But wherever or whenever it be, a tea-house, placed + to command the best view of the sight, stands ready to receive him. For + nature's beauties are too well recognized to remain the exclusive property + of the first chance lover. People flock to view nature as we do to see a + play, and privacy is as impossible as it is unsought. Indeed, the aversion + to publicity is simply a result of the sense of self, and therefore + necessarily not a feature of so impersonal a civilization. Aesthetic + guidebooks are written for the nature-enamoured, descriptive of these + views which the Japanese translator quaintly calls "Sceneries," and which + visitors come not only from near but from far to gaze upon. In front of + the tea-house proper are rows of summer pavilions, in one of which the + party make themselves at home, while gentle little tea-house girls toddle + forth to serve them the invariable preliminary tea and confections. Each + man then produces from up his sleeve, or from out his girdle, paper, ink, + and brush, and proceeds to compose a poem on the beauty of the spot and + the feelings it calls up, which he subsequently reads to his admiring + companions. Hot sake is next served, which is to them what beer is to a + German or absinthe to a blouse; and there they sit, sip, and poetize, + passing their couplets, as they do their cups, in honor to one another. At + last, after drinking in an hour or two of scenery and sake combined, the + symposium of poets breaks up. + </p> + <p> + Sometimes, instead of a company of friends, a man will take his family, + wife, babies, and all, on such an outing, but the details of his holiday + are much the same as before. For the scenery is still the centre of + attraction, and in the attendant creature comforts Far Eastern etiquette + permits an equal enjoyment to man, woman, and child. + </p> + <p> + This love of nature is quite irrespective of social condition. All classes + feel its force, and freely indulge the feeling. Poor as well as rich, low + as well as high, contrive to gratify their poetic instincts for natural + scenery. As for flowers, especially tree flowers, or those of the larger + plants, like the lotus or the iris, the Japanese appreciation of their + beauty is as phenomenal as is that beauty itself. Those who can afford the + luxury possess the shrubs in private; those who cannot, feast their eyes + on the public specimens. From a sprig in a vase to a park planted on + purpose, there is no part of them too small or too great to be excluded + from Far Oriental affection. And of the two "drawing-rooms" of the Mikado + held every year, in April and November, both are garden-parties: the one + given at the time and with the title of "the cherry blossoms," and the + other of "the chrysanthemum." + </p> + <p> + These same tree flowers deserve more than a passing notice, not simply + because of their amazing beauty, which would arrest attention anywhere, + but for the national attitude toward them. For no better example of the + Japanese passion for nature could well be cited. If the anniversaries of + people are slightingly treated in the land of the sunrise, the same cannot + be said of plants. The yearly birthdays of the vegetable world are + observed with more than botanic enthusiasm. The regard in which they are + held is truly emotional, and it not actually individual in its object, at + least personal to the species. Each kind of tree as its season brings it + into flower is made the occasion of a festival. For the beauty of the + blossoming receives the tribute of a national admiration. From peers to + populace mankind turns out to witness it. Nor are these occasions few. + Spring in the Far East is one long chain of flower fetes, and as spring + begins by the end of January and lasts till the middle of June, + opportunities for appreciating each in turn are not half spoiled by a + common contemporaneousness. People have not only occasion but time to + admire. Indeed, spring itself is suitably respected by being dated + conformably to fact. Far Orientals begin their year when Nature begins + hers, instead of starting anachronously as we do in the very middle of the + dead season, much as our colleges hold their commencements, on the last in + place at on the first day of the academic term. So previous has the haste + of Western civilization become. The result is that our rejoicing partakes + of the incongruity of humor. The new year exists only in name. In the Far + East, on the other band, the calendar is made to fit the time. Men begin + to reckon their year some three weeks later than the Western world, just + as the plum-tree opens its pink white petals, as it were, in rosy + reflection of the snow that lies yet upon the ground. But the coldness of + the weather does not in the least deter people from thronging the spot in + which the trees grow, where they spend hours in admiration, and end by + pinning appropriate poems on the twigs for later comers to peruse. + Fleeting as the flowers are in fact, they live forever in fancy. For they + constitute one of the commonest motifs of both painting and poetry. A + branch just breaking into bloom seen against the sunrise sky, or a bough + bending its blossoms to the bosom of a stream, is subject enough for their + greatest masters, who thus wed, as it were, two arts in one,—the + spirit of poesy with pictorial form. This plum-tree is but a blossom. + Precocious harbinger of a host of flowers, its gay heralding over, it + vanishes not to be recalled, for it bears no edible fruit. + </p> + <p> + The next event in the series might fairly be called phenomenal. Early in + April takes place what is perhaps as superb a sight as anything in this + world, the blossoming of the cherry-trees. Indeed, it is not easy to do + the thing justice in description. If the plum invited admiration, the + cherry commands it; for to see the sakura in flower for the first time is + to experience a new sensation. Familiar as a man may be with cherry + blossoms at home, the sight there bursts upon him with the dazzling effect + of a revelation. Such is the profusion of flowers that the tree seems to + have turned into a living mass of rosy light. No leaves break the + brilliance. The snowy-pink petals drape the branches entirely, yet so + delicately, one deems it all a veil donned for the tree's nuptials with + the spring. For nothing could more completely personify the spirit of the + spring-time. You can almost fancy it some dryad decked for her bridal, in + maidenly day-dreaming too lovely to last. For like the plum the cherry + fails in its fruit to fulfil the promise of its flower. + </p> + <p> + It would be strange indeed if so much beauty received no recognition, but + it is even more strange that recognition should be so complete and so + universal as it is. Appreciation is not confined to the cultivated few; it + is shown quite as enthusiastically by the masses. The popularity of the + plants is all-embracing. The common people are as sensitive to their + beauty as are the upper classes. Private gratification, roseate as it is, + pales beside the public delight. Indeed, not content with what revelation + Nature makes of herself of her own accord, man has multiplied her + manifestations. Spots suitable to their growth have been peopled by him + with trees. Sometimes they stand in groups like star-clusters, as in Oji, + crowning a hill; sometimes, as at Mukojima, they line an avenue for miles, + dividing the blue river on the one hand from the blue-green rice-fields on + the other,—a floral milky way of light. But wherever the trees may + be, there at their flowering season are to be found throngs of admirers. + For in crowds people go out to see the sight, multitudes streaming + incessantly to and fro beneath their blossoms as the time of day + determines the turn of the human tide. To the Occidental stranger such a + gathering suggests some social loadstone; but none exists. In the + cherry-trees alone lies the attraction. + </p> + <p> + For one week out of the fifty-two the cherry-tree stands thus glorified, a + vision of beauty prolonged somewhat by the want of synchronousness of the + different kinds. Then the petals fall. What was a nuptial veil becomes a + winding-sheet, covering the sod as with winter's winding-sheet of snow, + destined itself to disappear, and the tree is nothing but a common + cherry-tree once more. + </p> + <p> + But flowers are by no means over because the cherry blossoms are past. A + brief space, and the same crowds that flocked to the cherry turn to the + wistaria. Gardens are devoted to the plants, and the populace greatly + given to the gardens. 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 trellis, and grow daily down toward their own reflections in the + pond beneath, vying with one another in Narcissus-like endeavor. And the + people, as they sip their tea on the veranda opposite, behold a doubled + delight, the flower itself and its mirrored image stretching to kiss. + </p> + <p> + After the wistaria comes the tree-peony, and then the iris, with its + trefoil flowers broader than a man may span, and at all colors under the + sky. To one who has seen the great Japanese fleur-de-lis, France looks + ludicrously infelicitous in her choice of emblem. + </p> + <p> + But the list grows too long, limited as it is only by its own annual + repetition. We have as yet reached but the first week in June; the summer + and autumn are still to come, the first bringing the lotus for its crown, + and the second the chrysanthemum. And lazily grand the lotus is, itself + the embodiment of the spirit of the drowsy August air, the very essence of + Buddha-like repose. The castle moats are its special domain, which in this + its flowering season it wrests wholly from their more proper occupant—the + water. A dense growth of leather-like leaves, above which rise in majestic + isolation the solitary flowers, encircles the outer rampart, shutting the + castle in as it might be the palace of the Sleeping Beauty. In the + delightful dreaminess that creeps over one as he stands thus before some + old daimyo's former abode in the heart of Japan, he forgets all his + metaphysical difficulties about Nirvana, for he fancies he has found it, + one long Lotus afternoon. + </p> + <p> + And then last, but in some sort first, since it has been taken for the + imperial insignia, comes the chrysanthemum. The symmetry of its shape well + fits it to symbolize the completeness of perfection which the Mikado, the + son of heaven, mundanely represents. It typifies, too, the fullness of the + year; for it marks, as it were, the golden wedding of the spring, the + reminiscence in November of the nuptials of the May. Its own color, + however, is not confined to gold. It may be of almost any hue and within + the general limits of a circle of any form. Now it is a chariot wheel with + petals for spokes; now a ball of fire with lambent tongues of flame; while + another kind seems the button of some natural legion of honor, and still + another a pin-wheel in Nature's own day-fireworks. + </p> + <p> + Admired as a thing of beauty for its own sake, it is also used merely as a + material for artistic effects; for among the quaintest of such conceits + are the Japanese Jarley chrysanthemum works. 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 flowers. These effigies are quite worthy of comparison with + their London cousins, being sufficiently life-like to terrify children and + startle anybody. To come suddenly, on turning a corner, upon a colossal + warrior, deterrently uncouth and frightfully battle-clad, in the act of + dispatching a fallen foe, is a sensation not instantly dispelled by the + fact that he is made of flowers. The practice, at least, bears witness to + an artistic ingenuity of no mean merit, and to a horticulture ably carried + on, if somewhat eccentrically applied. + </p> + <p> + From the passing of the chrysanthemum dates the dead season. But it is + suitably short-lived. Sometimes as early as November, the plum-tree is + already blossoming again. + </p> + <p> + Even from so imperfectly gathered a garland it will be seen that the + Japanese do not lack for opportunities to admire, nor do they turn coldly + away from what they are given. Indeed, they may be said to live in a + chronic state of flower-fever; but in spite of the vast amount of + admiration which they bestow on plants, it is not so much the quantity of + that admiration as the quality of it which is remarkable. The intense + appreciation shown the subject by the Far Oriental is something whose very + character seems strange to us, and when in addition we consider that it + permeates the entire people from the commonest coolie to the most + aesthetic courtier, it becomes to our comprehension a state of things + little short of inexplicable. To call it artistic sensibility is to use + too limited a term, for it pervades the entire people; rather is it a + sixth sense of a natural, because national description; for the trait + differs from our corresponding feeling in degree, and especially in + universality enough to merit the distinction. Their care for tree flowers + is not confined to a cultivation, it is a cult. It approaches to a sort of + natural nature-worship, an adoration in which nothing is personified. For + the emotion aroused in the Far Oriental is just as truly an emotion as it + was to the Greek; but whereas the Greek personified its object, the + Japanese admires that object for what it is. To think of the cherry-tree, + for instance, as a woman, would be to his mind a conception transcending + even the limits of the ludicrous. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0006" id="link2HCH0006"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Chapter 6. Art. + </h2> + <p> + That nature, not man, is their beau ideal, the source of inspiration to + them, is evident again on looking at their art. The same spirit that makes + of them such wonderful landscape gardeners and such wonder-full landscape + gazers shows itself unmistakably in their paintings. + </p> + <p> + The current impression that Japanese pictorial ambition, and consequent + skill, is confined to the representation of birds and flowers, though + entirely erroneous as it stands, has a grain of truth behind it. This idea + is due to the attitude of the foreign observers, and was in fact a tribute + to Japanese technique rather than an appreciation of Far Eastern artistic + feeling. The truth is, the foreigners brought to the subject their own + Western criteria of merit, and judged everything by these standards. Such + works naturally commended themselves most as had least occasion to deviate + from their canons. The simplest pictures, therefore, were pronounced the + best. Paintings of birds and flowers were thus admitted to be fine, + because their realism spoke for itself. Of the exquisite poetic feeling of + their landscape paintings the foreign critics were not at first conscious, + because it was not expressed in terms with which they were familiar. + </p> + <p> + But first impressions, here as elsewhere, are valuable. One is very apt to + turn to them again from the reasoning of his second thoughts. Flora and + fauna are a conspicuous feature of Far Asiatic art, because they enter as + details of the subject-matter of the artist's thoughts and day-dreams. + These birds and flowers are his sujets de genre. Where we should select a + phase of human life for effective isolation, they choose instead a bit of + nature. A spray of grass or a twig of cherry-blossoms is motif enough for + them. To their thought its beauty is amply suggestive. For to the Far + Oriental all nature is sympathetically sentient. His admiration, instead + of being centred on man, embraces the universe. His art reflects it. + </p> + <p> + Leaving out of consideration, for the moment, minor though still important + distinctions in tone, treatment, and technique, the great fundamental + difference between Western and Far Eastern art lies in its attitude toward + humanity. + </p> + <p> + With us, from the time of the Greeks to the present day, man has been the + cynosure of artistic eyes; with them he has never been vouchsafed more + than a casual, not to say a cursory glance, even woman failing to rivet + his attention. One of our own writers has said that, without passing the + bounds of due respect, a man is permitted two looks at any woman he may + meet, one to recognize, one to admire. A Japanese ordinarily never dreams + of taking but one,—if indeed he goes so far as that,—the + first. It is the omitting to take that second look that has left him what + he is. Not that Fortune has been unpropitious; only blind. Fate has + offered him opportunity enough; too much, perhaps. For in Japan the + exposure of the female form is without a parallel in latitude. Never nude, + it is frequently naked. The result artistically is much the same, though + the cause be different. For it is a fatal mistake to suppose the Japanese + an immodest people. According to their own standards, they are exceedingly + modest. No respectable Japanese woman would, for instance, ever for a + moment turn out her toes in walking. It is considered immodest to do so. + Their code is, however, not so whimsical as this bit of etiquette might + suggest. The intent is with them the touchstone of propriety. In their + eyes a state of nature is not a state of indecency. Whatever exposure is + required for convenience is right; whatever unnecessary, wrong. 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 in. And + yet it is just that study of the nude which has from immemorial antiquity + been entirely neglected in the Far East. An ancient Greek, to say nothing + of a modern Parisian, would have shocked a Japanese. Yet we are shocked by + them. We are astounded at the sights we see in their country villages, + while they in their turn marvel at the exhibitions they witness in our + city theatres. At their watering-places the two sexes bathe promiscuously + together in all the simplicity of nature; but for a Japanese woman to + appear on the stage in any character, however proper, would be deemed + indecent. The difference between the two hemispheres may be said to + consist in an artless liberty on the one hand, and artistic license on the + other. Their unwritten code of propriety on the subject seems to be, "You + must see, but you may not observe." + </p> + <p> + These people live more in accordance with their code of propriety than we + do with ours. All classes alike conform to it. The adjective + "respectable," used above as a distinction in speaking of woman, was in + reality superfluous, for all women there, as far as appearance goes, are + respectable. Even the most abandoned creature does not betray her status + by her behavior. The reason of this uniformity and its psychological + importance I shall discuss later. + </p> + <p> + This form of modesty, a sort of want of modesty of form, has no connection + whatever with sex. It applies with equal force to the male figure, which + is even more exposed than the female, and offers anatomical suggestions + invaluable alike to the artistic and medical professions,—suggestions + that are equally ignored by both. The coolies are frequently possessed of + physiques which would have delighted Michael Angelo; and as for the + phenomenal corpulency of the wrestlers, it would have made of the place a + very paradise for Rubens. In regard to the doctors,—for to call them + surgeons would be to give a name to what does not exist,—a lack of + scientific zeal has been the cause of their not investigating what tempts + too seductively, we should imagine, to be ignored. Acupuncture, or the + practice of sticking long pins into any part of the patient's body that + may happen to be paining him, pretty much irrespective of anatomical + position, is the nearest approach to surgery of which they are guilty, and + proclaims of itself the in corpore vili character of the thing operated + upon. + </p> + <p> + Nor does the painter owe anything to science. He represents humanity + simply as he sees it in its every-day costume; and it betokens the highest + powers of generalized observation that he produces the results he does. In + his drawings, man is shown, not as he might look in the primitive, or + privitive, simplicity of his ancestral Garden of Eden, but as he does look + in the ordinary wear and tear of his present garments. Civilization has + furnished him with clothes, and he prefers, when he has his picture taken, + to keep them on. + </p> + <p> + In dealing with man, the Far Oriental artist is emphatically a realist; it + is when he turns to nature that he becomes ideal. But by ideal is not + meant here conventional. That term of reproach is a misnomer, founded upon + a mistake. His idealism is simply the outcome of his love, which, like all + human love, transfigures its object. The Far Oriental has plenty of this, + which, if sometimes a delusion, seems also second sight, but it is + peculiarly impersonal. His color-blindness to the warm, 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 nature. To their poetry he is ever + sensitive. His appreciation of them is something phenomenal, and his power + of presentation worthy his appreciation. + </p> + <p> + A Japanese painting is a poem rather than a picture. It portrays an + emotion called up by a scene, and not the scene itself in all its + elaborate complexity. It undertakes to give only so much of it as is vital + to that particular feeling, and intentionally omits all irrelevant + details. It is the expression caught from a glimpse of the soul of nature + by the soul of man; the mirror of a mood, passing, perhaps, in fact, but + perpetuated thus to fancy. Being an emotion, its intensity is directly + proportional to the singleness with which it possesses the thoughts. The + Far Oriental fully realizes the power of simplicity. This principle is his + fundamental canon of pictorial art. To understand his paintings, it is + from this standpoint they must be regarded; not as soulless photographs of + scenery, but as poetic presentations of the spirit of the scenes. The very + charter of painting depends upon its not giving us charts. And if with us + a long poem be a contradiction in terms, a full picture is with them as + self-condemnatory a production. From the contemplation of such works of + art as we call finished, one is apt, after he has once appreciated Far + Eastern taste, to rise with an unpleasant feeling of satiety, as if he has + eaten too much at the feast. + </p> + <p> + Their paintings, by comparison, we call sketches. Is not our would-be + slight unwittingly the reverse? Is not a sketch, after all, fuller of + meaning, to one who knows how to read it, than a finished affair, which is + very apt to end with itself, barren of fruit? Does not one's own + imagination elude one's power to portray it? Is it not forever flitting + will-o'-the-wisp-like ahead of us just beyond exact definition? For the + soul of art lies in what art can suggest, and nothing is half so + suggestive as the half expressed, not even a double entente. To hint a + great deal by displaying a little is more vital to effect than the + cleverest representation of the whole. The art of partially revealing is + more telling, even, than the ars celare artem. Who has not suspected + through a veil a fairer face than veil ever hid? Who has not been + delightedly duped by the semi-disclosures of a dress? 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 another. Yet who but has thus + felt its force? 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 heart? Portraits of people, pictures of places, he does not know, and + yet which purport to be his! 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 woes, be it never so entrancingly, to an admiring house. + It almost seems as if the garish publicity of using her name for operatic + title were a special intervention of the Muse, that we might the less + connect song with story,—two sensations that, like two lights, + destroy one another by mutual interference. + </p> + <p> + 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 painter. But the ability to appreciate a thing when expressed is but + half that necessary to express it. Some understanding must exist in the + observer for any work to be intelligible. It is only a question of degree. + The greater the art-sense in the person addressed, the more had better be + left to it. Now in Japan the public is singularly artistic. In fact, the + artistic appreciation of the masses there is something astonishing to us, + accustomed to our immense intellectual differences between man and man. + Sketches are thus peculiarly fitting to such a land. + </p> + <p> + Besides, there is a quiet modesty about the sketch which is itself taking. + To attempt the complete even in a fractional bit of the cosmos, like a + picture, has in it a difficulty akin to the logical one of proving a + universal negative. The possibilities of failure are enormously increased, + and failure is less forgiven for the assumption. Art might perhaps not + unwisely follow the example of science in such matters where an exhaustive + work, which takes the better part of a lifetime to produce, is invariably + entitled by its erudite author an Elementary Treatise on the subject in + hand. + </p> + <p> + To aid the effect due to simplicity of conception steps in the Far + Oriental's wonderful technique. His brush-strokes are very few in number, + but each one tells. They are laid on with a touch which is little short of + marvelous, and requires heredity to explain its skill. For in his method + there is no emending, no super-position, no change possible. What he does + is done once and for all. The force of it grows on you as you gaze. Each + stroke expresses surprisingly much, and suggests more. Even omissions are + made significant. In his painting it is visibly true that objects can be + rendered conspicuous by their very absence. You are quite sure you see + what on scrutiny you discover to be only the illusion of inevitable + inference. The Far Oriental artist understands the power of suggestion + well; for imagination always fills in the picture better than the brush, + however perfect be its skill. + </p> + <p> + Even the neglect of certain general principles which we consider vital to + effect, such as the absence of shadows and the lack of perspective, proves + not to be of the importance we imagine. We discover in these paintings how + immaterial, artistically, was Peter Schlimmel's sad loss, and how + perfectly possible it is to make bits of discontinuous distance take the + place effectively of continuous space. + </p> + <p> + Far Eastern pictures are epigrams rather than descriptions. They present a + bit of nature with the terseness of a maxim of La Rochefoucault, and they + delight as aphorisms do by their insight and the happy conciseness of its + expression. Few aphorisms are absolutely true, but then boldness more than + makes up for what they lack in verity. So complex a subject is life that + to state a truth with all its accompanying limitations is to weaken it at + once. Exceptions, while demonstrating the rule, do not tend to emphasize + it. And though the whole truth is essential to science, such + exhaustiveness is by no means a canon of art. + </p> + <p> + Parallels are not wanting at home. What they do with space in their + paintings do we not with time in the case of our comedies, those acted + pictures of life? Should we not refuse to tolerate a play that insisted on + furnishing us with a full perspective of its characters' past? And yet of + the two, it is far perferable, artistically, to be given too much in + sequence than too much at once. The Chinese, who put much less into a + painting than what we deem indispensable, delight in dramas that last six + weeks. + </p> + <p> + To give a concluding touch of life to my necessarily skeleton-like + generalities, memory pictures me a certain painting of Okio's which I fell + in love with at first sight. It is of a sunrise on the coast of Japan. A + long line of surf is seen tumbling in to you from out a bank of mist, just + piercing which shows the blood-red disk of the rising sun, while over the + narrow strip of breaking rollers three cranes are slowly sailing north. + And that is all you see. You do not see the shore; you do not see the + main; you are looking but at the border-land of that great unknown, the + heaving ocean still slumbering beneath its chilly coverlid of mist, out of + which come the breakers, and the sun, and the cranes. + </p> + <p> + So much for the more serious side of Japanese fancy; a look at the lighter + leads to the same conclusion. + </p> + <p> + Hand in hand with his keen poetic sensibility goes a vivid sense of humor,—two + traits that commonly, indeed, are found Maying together over the meadows + of imagination. For, as it might be put, + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "The heart that is soonest awake to the flowers + Is also the first to be touched by the fun." +</pre> + <p> + The Far Oriental well exemplifies this fact. His art, wherever fun is + possible, fairly bubbles over with laughter. From the oldest masters down + to Hokusai, it is constantly welling up in the drollest conceits. It is of + all descriptions, too. Now it lurks in merry ambush, like the faint + suggestion of a smile on an otherwise serious face, so subtile that the + observer is left wondering whether the artist could have meant what seems + more like one's own ingenious discovery; now it breaks out into the + broadest of grins, absurd juxtapositions of singularly happy + incongruities. For Hokusai's caricatures and Hendschel's sketches might be + twins. If there is a difference, it lies not so much in the artist's work + as in the greater generality of its appreciation. Humor flits easily there + at the sea-level of the multitude. For the Japanese temperament is ever on + the verge of a smile which breaks out with catching naivete at the first + provocation. The language abounds in puns which are not suffered to lie + idle, and even poetry often hinges on certain consecrated plays on words. + From the very constitution of the people there is of course nothing + selfish in the national enjoyment. A man is quite as ready to laugh at his + own expense as at his neighbor's, a courtesy which his neighbor cordially + returns. + </p> + <p> + Now the ludicrous is essentially human in its application. The principle + of the synthesis of contradictories, popularly known by the name of humor, + is necessarily limited in its field to man. For whether it have to do + wholly with actions, or partly with the words that express them, whether + it be presented in the shape of a pun or a pleasantry, it is in + incongruous contrasts that its virtue lies. It is the unexpected that + provokes the smile. Now no such incongruity exists in nature; man enjoys a + monopoly of the power of making himself ridiculous. So pleasant is + pleasantry that we do indeed cultivate it beyond its proper pale. But it + is only by personifying Nature, and gratuitously attributing to her errors + of which she is incapable, that we can make fun of her; as, for instance, + when we hold the weather up to ridicule by way of impotent revenge. But + satires upon the clown-like character of our climate, which, after the + lamest sort of a spring, somehow manages a capital fall, would in the Far + East be as out of keeping with fancy as with fact. To a Japanese, who + never personifies anything, such innocent irony is unmeaning. Besides, it + would be also untrue. For his May carries no suggestion of unfulfilment in + its name. + </p> + <p> + Those Far Eastern paintings which have to do with man fall for the most + part under one of two heads, the facetious and the historical. The latter + implies no particularly intimate concern for man in himself, for the past + has very little personality for the present. As for the former, its + attention is, if anything, derogatory to him, for we are always shy of + making fun of what we feel to be too closely a part of ourselves. But + impersonality has prevented the Far Oriental from having much amour + propre. He has no particular aversion to caricaturing himself. Few + Europeans, perhaps, would have cared to perpetrate a self-portrait like + one painted by the potter Kinsei, which was sold me one day as an amusing + tour de force by a facetious picture-dealer. It is a composite picture of + a new kind, a Japanese variety of type face. The great potter, who was + also apparently no mean painter, has combined three aspects of himself in + a single representation. At first sight the portrait appears to be simply + a full front view of a somewhat moon-faced citizen; but as you continue to + gaze, it suddenly dawns on you that there are two other individuals, one + on either side, hob-nobbing in profile with the first, the lines of the + features being ingeniously made to do double duty; and when this aspect of + the thing has once struck you, you cannot look at the picture without + seeing all three citizens simultaneously. The result is doubtless more + effective as a composition than flattering as a likeness. + </p> + <p> + Far Eastern sculpture, by its secondary importance among Far Eastern arts, + witnesses again to the secondary importance assigned to man at our mental + antipodes. In this art, owing to its necessary limitations, the + representation of nature in its broader sense is impossible. For in the + first place, whatever the subject, it must be such as it is possible to + present in one continuous piece; disconnected adjuncts, as, for instance, + a flock of birds flying, which might be introduced with great effect in + painting, being here practically beyond the artist's reach. Secondly, the + material being of uniform appearance, as a rule, color, or even shading, + vital points in landscape portrayal, is out of the question, unless the + piece were subsequently painted, as in Grecian sculptures, a custom which + is not practised in China or Japan. Lastly, another fact fatal to the + representation of landscape is the size. The reduced scale of the + reproduction suggests falsity at once, a falsity whose belittlement the + mind can neither forget nor forgive. Plain sculpture is therefore + practically limited to statuary, either of men or animals. The result is + that in their art, where landscape counts for so much, sculpture plays a + very minor part. In what little there is, Nature's place is taken by + Buddha. For there are two classes of statues, divided the one from the + other by that step which separates the sublime from the ridiculous, + namely, the colossal and the diminutive. There is no happy human mean. Of + the first kind are the beautiful bronze figures of the Buddha, like the + Kamakura Buddha, fifty feet high and ninety-seven feet round, in whose + face all that is grand and noble lies sleeping, the living representation + of Nirvana; and of the second, those odd little ornaments known as + netsuke, comical carvings for the most part, grotesque figures of men and + monkeys, saints and sinners, gods and devils. Appealing bits of ivory, + bone, or wood they are, in which the dumb animals are as speaking + likenesses as their human fellows. + </p> + <p> + The other arts show the same motif in their decorations. Pottery and + lacquer alike witness the respective positions assigned to the serious and + the comic in Far Eastern feeling. + </p> + <p> + The Far Oriental makes fun of man and makes love to Nature; and it almost + seems as if Nature heard his silent prayer, and smiled upon him in + acceptance; as if the love-light lent her face the added beauty that it + lends the maid's. For nowhere in this world, probably, is she lovelier + than in Japan: a climate of long, happy means and short extremes, months + of spring and months of autumn, with but a few weeks of winter in between; + a land of flowers, where the lotus and the cherry, the plum and wistaria, + grow wantonly side by side; a land where the bamboo embosoms the maple, + where the pine at last has found its palm-tree, and the tropic and the + temperate zones forget their separate identity in one long + self-obliterating kiss. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0007" id="link2HCH0007"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Chapter 7. Religion. + </h2> + <p> + In regard to their religion, nations, like individuals, seem singularly + averse to practising what they have preached. Whether it be that his + self-constructed idols prove to the maker too suggestive of his own + intellectual chisel to deceive him for long, or whether sacred soil, like + less hallowed ground, becomes after a time incapable of responding to + repeated sowings of the same seed, certain it is that in spiritual matters + most peoples have grown out of conceit with their own conceptions. An + individual may cling with a certain sentiment to the religion of his + mother, but nations have shown anything but a foolish fondness for the + sacred superstitions of their great-grandfathers. To the charm of creation + succeeds invariably the bitter-sweet after-taste of criticism, and man + would not be the progressive animal he is if he long remained in love with + his own productions. + </p> + <p> + What his future will be is too engrossing a subject, and one too deeply + shrouded in mystery, not to be constantly pictured anew. 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 are. Few people but have laid out skeleton tours + through its ideal regions, and perhaps, as in the mapping beforehand of + merely mundane travels, one element of attraction has always consisted in + the possible revision of one's routes. + </p> + <p> + Besides, there is a fascination about the foreign merely because it is + such. Distance lends enchantment to the views of others, and never more so + than when those views are religious visions. An enthusiast has certainly a + greater chance of being taken for a god among a people who do not know him + intimately as a man. So with his doctrines. The imported is apt to seem + more important than the home-made; as the far-off bewitches more easily + than the near. But just as castles in the air do not commonly become the + property of their builders, so mansions in the skies almost as frequently + have failed of direct inheritance. Rather strikingly has this proved the + case with what are to-day the two most powerful religions of the world,—Buddhism + and Christianity. Neither is now the belief of its founder's people. What + was Aryan-born has become Turanian-bred, and what was Semitic by + conception is at present Aryan by adoption. The possibilities of another's + hereafter look so much rosier than the limitations of one's own present! + </p> + <p> + Few pastimes are more delightful than tossing pebbles into some still, + dark pool, and watching the ripples that rise responsive, as they run in + ever widening circles to the shore. Most of us have felt its fascination + second only to that of the dotted spiral of the skipping-stone, a + fascination not outgrown with years. There is something singularly + attractive in the subtle force that for a moment sways each particle only + to pass on to the next, a motion mysterious in its immateriality. Some + such pleasure must be theirs who have thrown their thoughts into the + hearts of men, and seen them spread in waves of feeling, whose sphere time + widens through the world. For like the mobile water is the mind of man,—quick + to catch emotions, quick to transmit them. Of all waves of feeling, this + is not the least true of religious ones, that, starting from their + birthplace, pass out to stir others, who have but humanity in common with + those who professed them first. Like the ripples in the pool, they leave + their initial converts to sink back again into comparative quiescence, as + they advance to throw into sudden tremors hordes of outer barbarians. In + both of the great religions in question this wave propagation has been + most marked, only the direction it took differed. Christianity went + westward; Buddhism travelled east. Proselytes in Asia Minor, Greece, and + Italy find counterparts in Eastern India, Burmah, and Thibet. Eventually + the taught surpassed their teachers both in zeal and numbers. Jerusalem + and Benares at last gave place to Rome and Lassa as sacerdotal centres. + Still the movement journeyed on. Popes and Lhamas remained where their + predecessors had founded sees, but the tide of belief surged past them in + its irresistible advance. Farther yet from where each faith began are to + be found to-day the greater part of its adherents. The home that the + Western hemisphere seems to promise to the one, the extreme Orient affords + the other. As Roman Catholicism now looks to America for its strength, so + Buddhism to-day finds its worshippers chiefly in China and Japan. + </p> + <p> + But though the Japanese may be said to be all Buddhists, Buddhist is by no + means all that they are. At the time of their adoption of the great Indian + faith, the Japanese were already in possession of a system of superstition + which has held its own to this day. In fact, as the state religion of the + land, it has just experienced a revival, a regalvanizing of its old-time + energy, at the hands of some of the native archaeologists. Its sacred + mirror, held up to Nature, has been burnished anew. Formerly this body of + belief was the national faith, the Mikado, the direct descendant of the + early gods, being its head on earth. His reinstatement to temporal power + formed a very fitting first step toward reinvesting the cult with its + former prestige; a curious instance, indeed, of a religious revival due to + archaeological, not to religious zeal. + </p> + <p> + This cult is the mythological inheritance of the whole eastern seaboard of + Asia, from Siam to Kamtchatka. In Japan it is called Shintoism. The word + "Shinto" means literally "the way of the gods," and the letter of its name + is a true exponent of the spirit of the belief. For its scriptures are + rather an itinerary of the gods' lives than a guide to that road by which + man himself may attain to immortality. Thus with a certain fitness + pilgrimages are its most noticeable rites. One cannot journey anywhere in + the heart of Japan without meeting multitudes of these pilgrims, with + their neat white leggings and their mushroom-like hats, nor rest at night + at any inn that is not hung with countless little banners of the pilgrim + associations, of which they all are members. Being a pilgrim there is + equivalent to being a tourist here, only that to the excitement of doing + the country is added a sustaining sense of the meritoriousness of the + deed. Oftener than not the objective point of the devout is the summit of + some noted mountain. For peaks are peculiarly sacred spots in the Shinto + faith. The fact is perhaps an expression of man's instinctive desire to + rise, as if the bodily act in some wise betokened the mental action. The + shrine in so exalted a position is of the simplest: a rude hut, with or + without the only distinctive emblems of the cult, a mirror typical of the + god and the pendent gohei, or zigzag strips of paper, permanent votive + offerings of man. As for the belief itself, it is but the deification of + those natural elements which aboriginal man instinctively wonders at or + fears, the sun, the moon, the thunder, the lightning, and the wind; all, + in short, that he sees, hears, and feels, yet cannot comprehend. He + clothes his terrors with forms which resemble the human, because he can + conceive of nothing else that could cause the unexpected. But the awful + shapes he conjures up have naught in common with himself. They are far too + fearful to be followed. Their way is the "highway of the gods," but no + Jacob's ladder for wayward man. + </p> + <p> + In this externality to the human lies the reason that Shintoism and + Buddhism can agree so well, 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 capability. It is not simply that the two contrive to + live peaceably together; they are actually both of them implicitly + believed by the same individual. Millions of Japanese are good Buddhists + and good Shintoists at the same time. That such a combination should be + possible is due to the essential difference in the character of the two + beliefs. The one is extrinsic, the other intrinsic, in its relations to + the human soul. Shintoism tells man but little about himself and his + hereafter; Buddhism, little but about himself and what he may become. In + examining Far Eastern religion, therefore, for personality, or the + reverse, we may dismiss Shintoism as having no particular bearing upon the + subject. The only effect it has is indirect in furthering the natural + propensity of these people to an adoration of nature. + </p> + <p> + In Korea and in China, again, Confucianism is the great moral law, as by + reflection it is to a certain extent in Japan. But that in its turn may be + omitted in the present argument; inasmuch as Confucius taught confessedly + and designedly only a system of morals, and religiously abstained from + pronouncing any opinion whatever upon the character or the career of the + human soul. + </p> + <p> + Taouism, the third great religion of China, resembles Shintoism to this + extent, that it is a body of superstition, and not a form of philosophy. + It undertakes to provide nostrums for spiritual ills, but is dumb as to + the constitution of the soul for which it professes to prescribe. Its + pills are to be swallowed unquestioningly by the patient, and are + warranted to cure; and owing to the two great human frailties, fear and + credulity, its practice is very large. Possessing, however, no philosophic + diploma, it is without the pale of the present discussion. + </p> + <p> + The demon-worship of Korea is a mild form of the same thing with the + hierarchy left out, every man there being his own spiritual adviser. An + ordinary Korean is born with an innate belief in malevolent spirits, whom + he accordingly propitiates from time to time. One of nobler birth + propitiates only the spirits of his own ancestors. + </p> + <p> + We come, then, by a process of elimination to a consideration of Buddhism, + the great philosophic faith of the whole Far East. + </p> + <p> + Not uncommonly in the courtyard of a Japanese temple, in the solemn + half-light of the sombre firs, there stands a large stone basin, cut from + a single block, and filled to the brim with water. The trees, the basin, + and a few stone lanterns—so called from their form, and not their + function, for they have votive pebbles where we should look for wicks—are + the sole occupants of the place. Sheltered from the wind, withdrawn from + sound, and only piously approached by man, this antechamber of the god + seems the very abode of silence and rest. It might be Nirvana itself, + human entrance to an immortality like the god's within, so peaceful, so + pervasive is its calm; and in its midst is the moss-covered monolith, + holding in its embrace the little imprisoned pool of water. So still is + the spot and so clear the liquid that you know the one only as the + reflection of the other. Mirrored in its glassy surface appears everything + around it. As you peer in, far down you see a tiny bit of sky, as deep as + the blue is high above, across which slowly sail the passing clouds; then + nearer stand the trees, arching overhead, as if bending to catch glimpses + of themselves in that other world below; and then, nearer yet—yourself. + </p> + <p> + Emblem of the spirit of man is this little pool to Far Oriental eyes. + Subtile as the soul is the incomprehensible water; so responsive to light + that it remains itself invisible; so clear that it seems illusion! Though + portrayer so perfect of forms about it, all we know of the thing itself is + that it is. Through none of the five senses do we perceive it. Neither + sight, nor hearing, nor taste, nor smell, nor touch can tell us it exists; + we feel it to be by the muscular sense alone, that blind and dumb analogue + for the body of what consciousness is for the soul. Only when disturbed, + troubled, does the water itself become visible, and then it is but the + surface that we see. So to the Far Oriental this still little lake + typifies the soul, the eventual purification of his own; a something lost + in reflection, self-effaced, only the alter ego of the outer world. + </p> + <p> + For contemplation, not action, is the Far Oriental's ideal of life. The + repose of self-adjustment like that to which our whole solar system is + slowly tending as its death,—this to him appears, though from no + scientific deduction, the end of all existence. So he sits and ponders, + abstractly, vaguely, upon everything in general,—synonym, alas, to + man's finite mind, for nothing in particular,—till even the sense of + self seems to vanish, and through the mist-like portal of unconsciousness + he floats out into the vast indistinguishable sameness of Nirvana's sea. + </p> + <p> + At first sight Buddhism is much more like Christianity than those of us + who stay at home and speculate upon it commonly appreciate. As a system of + philosophy it sounds exceedingly foreign, but it looks unexpectedly + familiar as a faith. Indeed, the one religion might well pass for the + counterfeit presentment of the other. The resemblance so struck the early + Catholic missionaries that they felt obliged to explain the remarkable + similarity between the two. With them ingenuous surprise instantly begot + ingenious sophistry. Externally, 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 faith. Finding, + however, that no known human agency had acted in the matter, they + bethought them of introducing, to account for things, a deus ex machina in + the shape of the devil. They were so pleased with this solution of the + difficulty that they imparted it at once with much pride to the natives. + You have indeed got, they graciously if somewhat gratuitously informed + them, the outward semblance of the true faith, but you are in fact the + miserable victims of an impious fraud. Satan has stolen the insignia of + divinity, and is now masquerading before you as the deity; your god is + really our devil,—a recognition of antipodal inversion truly worthy + the Jesuitical mind! + </p> + <p> + Perhaps it is not matter for great surprise that they converted but few of + their hearers. The suggestion was hardly so diplomatic as might have been + expected from so generally astute a body; for it could not make much + difference what the all-presiding deity was called, if his actions were + the same, since his motives were beyond human observation. Besides, the + bare idea of a foreign bogus was not very terrifying. The Chinese + possessed too many familiar devils of their own. But there was another and + a much deeper reason, which we shall come to later, why Christianity made + but little headway in the Far East. + </p> + <p> + But it is by no means in externals only that the two religions are alike. + If the first glance at them awakens that peculiar sensation which most of + us have felt at some time or other, a sense of having seen all this + before, further scrutiny reveals a deeper agreement than merely in + appearances. + </p> + <p> + In passing from the surface into the substance, it may be mentioned + incidentally that the codes of morality of the two are about on a level. I + say incidentally, for so far as its practice, certainly, is concerned, it + not its preaching, morality has no more intimate connection with religion + than it has with art or politics. If we doubt this, we have but to examine + the facts. Are the most religious peoples the most moral? It needs no + prolonged investigation to convince us that they are not. If proof of the + want of a bond were required, the matter of truth-telling might be adduced + in point. As this is a subject upon which a slight misconception exists in + the minds of some evangelically persuaded persons, and because, what is + more generally relevant, the presence of this quality, honesty in word and + deed, has more than almost any other one characteristic helped to put us + in the van of the world's advance to-day, it may not unfittingly be cited + here. + </p> + <p> + The argument in the case may be put thus. Have specially religious races + been proportionally truth-telling ones? If not, has there been any other + cause at work in the development of mankind tending to increase veracity? + The answer to the first question has all the simplicity of a plain + negative. No such pleasing concomitance of characteristics is observable + to-day, or has been presented in the past. Permitting, however, the dead + past to bury its shortcomings in oblivion, let us look at the world as we + find it. We observe, then, that the religious spirit is quite as strong in + Asia as it is in Europe; if anything, that at the present time it is + rather stronger. The average Brahman, Mahometan, or Buddhist is quite as + devout as the ordinary Roman Catholic or Presbyterian. If he is somewhat + less given to propagandism, he is not a whit less regardful of his own + salvation. Yet throughout the Orient truth is a thing unknown, lies of + courtesy being de rigueur and lies of convenience de raison; while with + us, fortunately, mendacity is generally discredited. But we need not + travel so far for proof. The same is evident in less antipodal relations. + Have the least religious nations of Europe been any less truthful than the + most bigoted? Was fanatic Spain remarkable for veracity? Was Loyola a + gentleman whose assertions carried conviction other than to the stake? + Were the eminently mundane burghers whom he persecuted noted for a pious + superiority to fact? Or, to narrow the field still further, and scan the + circle of one's own acquaintance, are the most believing individuals among + them worthy of the most belief? Assuredly not. + </p> + <p> + We come, then, to the second point. Has there been any influence at work + to differentiate us in this respect from Far Orientals? There has. Two + separate causes, in fact, have conduced to the same result. The one is the + development of physical science; the other, the extension of trade. The + sole object of science being to discover truth, truth-telling is a + necessity of its existence. Professionally, scientists are obliged to be + truthful. Aliter of a Jesuit. + </p> + <p> + So long as science was of the closet, its influence upon mankind generally + was indirect and slight; but so soon as it proceeded to stalk into the + street and earn its own living, its veracious character began to tell. + When out of its theories sprang inventions and discoveries that + revolutionized every-day affairs and changed the very face of things, + society insensibly caught its spirit. Man awoke to the inestimable value + of exactness. From scientists proper, the spirit filtered down through + every stratum of education, till to-day the average man is born exact to a + degree which his forefathers never dreamed of becoming. To-day, as a rule, + the more intelligent the individual, the more truthful he is, because the + more innately exact in thought, and thence in word and action. With us, to + lie is a sign of a want of cleverness, not of an excess of it. + </p> + <p> + The second cause, the extension of trade, has inculcated the same regard + for veracity through the pocket. For with the increase of business + transactions in both time and space, the telling of the truth has become a + financial necessity. Without it, trade would come to a standstill at once. + Our whole mercantile system, a modern piece of mechanism unknown to the + East till we imported it thither, turns on an implicit belief in the word + of one's neighbor. Our legal safeguards would snap like red tape were the + great bond of mutual trust once broken. Western civilization has to be + truthful, or perish. + </p> + <p> + And now for the spirits of the two beliefs. + </p> + <p> + The soul of any religion realizes in one respect the Brahman idea of the + individual soul of man, namely, that it exists much after the manner of an + onion, in many concentric envelopes. Man, they tell us, is composed not of + a single body simply, but of several layers of body, each shell as it were + respectively inclosing another. The outermost is the merely material body, + of which we are so directly cognizant. This encases a second, more + spiritual, but yet not wholly free from earthly affinities. This contains + another, still more refined; till finally, inside of all is that + immaterial something which they conceive to constitute the soul. This + eventual residuum exemplifies the Franciscan notion of pure substance, for + it is a thing delightfully devoid of any attributes whatever. + </p> + <p> + We may, perhaps, not be aware of the existence of such an elaborate set of + encasings to our own heart of hearts, nor of a something so very + indefinite within, but the most casual glance at any religion will reveal + its truth as regards the soul of a belief. We recognize the fact outwardly + in the buildings erected to celebrate its worship. Not among the Jews + alone was the holy of holies kept veiled, to temper the divine radiance to + man's benighted understanding. Nor is the chancel-rail of Christianity the + sole survivor of the more exclusive barriers of olden times, even in the + Western world. In the Far East, where difficulty of access is deemed + indispensable to dignity, the material approaches are still manifold and + imposing. Court within court, building after building, isolate the shrine + itself from the profane familiarity of the passers-by. But though the + material encasings vary in number and in exclusiveness, according to the + temperament of the particular race concerned, the mental envelopes exist, + and must exist, in both hemispheres alike, so long as society resembles + the crust of the earth on which it dwells,—a crust composed of + strata that grow denser as one descends. What is clear to those on top + seems obscure to those below; what are weighty arguments to the second + have no force at all upon the first. There must necessarily be grades of + elevation in individual beliefs, suited to the needs and cravings of each + individual soul. A creed that fills the shallow with satisfaction leaves + but an aching void in the deep. It is not of the slightest consequence how + the belief starts; differentiated it is bound to become. The higher minds + alone can rest content with abstract imaginings; the lower must have + concrete realities on which to pin their faith. With them, inevitably, + ideals degenerate into idols. In all religions this unavoidable debasement + has taken place. 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 Butzu. All that the common people are capable of seeing is + the soul-envelope, for the soul itself they are unable to appreciate. + Spiritually they are undiscerning, because imaginatively they are blind. + </p> + <p> + Now the grosser soul-envelopes of the two great European and Asiatic + faiths, though differing in detail, are in general parallel in structure. + Each boasts its full complement of saints, whose congruent catalogues are + equally wearisome in length. Each tells its circle of beads to help it + keep count of similarly endless prayers. For in both, in the popular + estimation, quantity is more effective to salvation than quality. In both + the believer practically pictures his heaven for himself, while in each + his hell, with a vividness that does like credit to its religious + imagination, is painted for him by those of the cult who are themselves + confident of escaping it. Into the lap of each mother church the pious + believer drops his little votive offering with the same affectionate zeal, + and in Asia, as in Europe, the mites of the many make the might of the + mass. + </p> + <p> + But behind all this is the religion of the few,—of those to whom + sensuous forms cannot suffice to represent super-sensuous cravings; whose + god is something more than an anthropomorphic creation; to whom worship + means not the cramping of the body, but the expansion of the soul. + </p> + <p> + The rays of the truth, like the rays of the sun, which universally seems + to have been man's first adoration, have two properties equally inherent + in their essence, warmth and light. And as for the life of all things on + this globe both attributes of sunshine are necessary, so to the + development of that something which constitutes the ego both qualities of + the truth are vital. We sometimes speak of character as if it were a thing + wholly apart from mind; but, in fact, the two things are so interwoven + that to perceive the right course is the strongest possible of incentives + to pursue it. In the end the two are one. Now, while clearness of head is + all-important, kindness of heart is none the less so. The first, perhaps, + is more needed in our communings with ourselves, the second in our + commerce with others. For, dark and dense bodies that we are, we can + radiate affection much more effectively than we can reflect views. + </p> + <p> + That Christianity is a religion of love needs no mention; that Buddhism is + equally such is perhaps not so generally appreciated. 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 world, so none the less + surely could the Light of Asia but be also its warmth. Half of the + teachings of Buddhism are spent in inculcating charity. Not only to men is + man enjoined to show kindliness, but to all other animals as well. The + people practise what their scriptures preach. The effect indirectly on the + condition of the brutes is almost as marked as its more direct effect on + the character of mankind. In heart, at least, Buddhism and Christianity + are very close. + </p> + <p> + But here the two paths to a something beyond an earthly life diverge. Up + to this point the two religions are alike, 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 weird, life-counterfeiting shadow of + the first. As in a silhouette, externally the contours are all there, but + within is one vast blank. In relation to one's neighbor the two beliefs + are kin, but as regards one's self, as far apart as the West is from the + East. For here, at this idea of self, we are suddenly aware of standing on + the brink of a fathomless abyss, gazing giddily down into that great gulf + which divides Buddhism from Christianity. We cannot see the bottom. It is + a separation more profound than death; it seems to necessitate + annihilation. To cross it we must bury in its depths all we know as + ourselves. + </p> + <p> + Christianity is a personal religion; Buddhism, an impersonal one. In this + fundamental difference lies the world-wide opposition of the two beliefs. + Christianity tells us to purify ourselves that we may enjoy countless + aeons of that bettered self hereafter; Buddhism would have us purify + ourselves that we may lose all sense of self for evermore. + </p> + <p> + For all that it preaches the essential vileness of the natural man, + Christianity is a gospel of optimism. While it affirms that at present you + are bad, it also affirms that this depravity is no intrinsic part of + yourself. It unquestioningly asserts that it is something foreign to your + true being. It even believes that in a more or less spiritual manner your + very body will survive. It essentially clings to the ego. What it + inculcates is really present endeavor sanctioned by the prospect of future + bliss. It tacitly takes for granted the desirability of personal + existence, and promises the certainty of personal immortality,—a + terror to evildoers, and a sustaining sense of coming unalloyed happiness + to the good. Through and through its teachings runs the feeling of the + fullness of life, that desire which will not die, 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 ten. + </p> + <p> + Buddhism, on the contrary, is the cri du coeur of pessimism. This life, it + says, is but a chain of sorrows. To multiply days is only to multiply + evil. These desires that urge us on are really cause of all our woe. We + think they are ourselves. We are mistaken. They are all illusion, and we + are victims of a mirage. This personality, this sense of self, is a cruel + deception and a snare. Realize once the true soul behind it, devoid of + attributes, therefore without this capacity for suffering, an indivisible + part of the great impersonal soul of nature: then, and then only, will you + have found happiness in the blissful quiescence of Nirvana. + </p> + <p> + With a certain poetic fitness, misery and impersonality were both present + in the occasion that gave the belief birth. Many have turned to the + consolations of religion by reason of their own wretchedness; Gautama + sought its help touched by the woes of others whom, in his own happy life + journey, he chanced one day to come across. Shocked by the sight of human + disease, old age, and death, sad facts to which hitherto he had been + sedulously kept a stranger, he renounced the world that he might find for + it an escape from its ills. But bliss, as he conceived it, lay not in + wanting to be something he was not, but in actual want of being. His quest + for mankind was immunity from suffering, not the active enjoyment of life. + In this negative way of looking at happiness, he acted in strict + conformity with the spirit of his world. For the doctrine of pessimism had + already been preached. It underlay the whole Brahman philosophy, and + everybody believed it implicitly. Already the East looked at this life as + an evil, and had affirmed for the individual spirit extinction to be + happier than existence. The wish for an end to the ego, the hope to be + eventually nothing, Gautama accepted for a truism as undeniably as the + Brahmans did. What he pronounced false was the Brahman prospectus of the + way to reach this desirable impersonal state. Their road, be said, could + not possibly land the traveller where it professed, since it began wrong, + and ended nowhere. The way, he asserted, is within a man. He has but to + realize the truth, and from that moment he will see his goal and the road + that leads there. There is no panacea for human ills, of external + application. The Brahman homoeopathic treatment of sin is folly. The + slaughtering of men and bulls cannot possibly bring life to the soul. To + mortify the body for the sins of the flesh is palpably futile, for in + desire alone lies all the ill. Quench the desire, and the deeds will die + of inanition. Man himself is sole cause of his own misery. Get rid, then, + said the Buddha, of these passions, these strivings for the sake of self, + that hold the true soul a prisoner. They have to do with things which we + know are transitory: how can they be immortal themselves? We recognize + them as subject to our will; they are, then, not the I. + </p> + <p> + As a man, he taught, becomes conscious that he himself is something + distinct from his body, so, if he reflect and ponder, he will come to see + that in like manner his appetites, ambitions, hopes, are really extrinsic + to the spirit proper. Neither heart nor head is truly the man, for he is + conscious of something that stands behind both. Behind desire, behind even + the will, lies the soul, the same for all men, one with the soul of the + universe. When he has once realized this eternal truth, the man has + entered Nirvana. For Nirvana is not an absorption of the individual soul + into the soul of all things, since the one has always been a part of the + other. Still less is it utter annihilation. It is simply the recognition + of the eternal oneness of the two, back through an everlasting past on + through an everlasting future. + </p> + <p> + Such is the belief which the Japanese adopted, and which they profess + to-day. Such to them is to be the dawn of death's to-morrow; a blessed + impersonal immortality, in which all sense of self, illusion that it is, + shall itself have ceased to be; a long dreamless sleep, a beatified rest, + which no awakening shall ever disturb. + </p> + <p> + Among such a people personal Christianity converts but few. They accept + our material civilization, but they reject our creeds. To preach a + prolongation of life appears to them like preaching an extension of + sorrow. At most, Christianity succeeds only in making them doubters of + what lies beyond this life. But though professing agnosticism while they + live, they turn, when the shadows of death's night come on, to the bosom + of that faith which teaches that, whatever may have been one's earthly + share of happiness, "'tis something better not to be." + </p> + <p> + 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 + life, 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 world. Perhaps the light, by its + very rising, checks the desire to pursue; in its setting it lures one on + to follow. + </p> + <p> + Though this religion of impersonality is not their child, it is their + choice. They embraced it with the rest that India taught them, centuries + ago. But though just as eager to learn of us now as of India then, + Christianity fails to commend itself. This is not due to the fact that the + Buddhist missionaries came by invitation, and ours do not. Nor is it due + to any want of personal character in these latter, but simply to an excess + of it in their doctrines. + </p> + <p> + For to-day the Far East is even more impersonal in its religion than are + those from whom that religion originally came. India has returned again to + its worship of Brahma, which, though impersonal enough, is less so than is + the gospel of Gautama. For it is passively instead of actively impersonal. + </p> + <p> + Buddhism bears to Brahmanism something like the relation that + Protestantism does to Roman Catholicism. Both bishops and Brahmans + undertake to save all who shall blindly commit themselves to professional + guidance, while Buddhists and Protestants alike believe that a man's + salvation must be brought about by the action of the man himself. The + result is, that in the matter of individuality the two reformed beliefs + are further apart than those against which they severally protested. For + by the change the personal became more personal, and the impersonal more + impersonal than before. The Protestant, from having tamely allowed himself + to be led, began to take a lively interest in his own self-improvement; + while the Buddhist, from a former apathetic acquiescence in the doctrine + of the universally illusive, set to work energetically towards + self-extinction. Curious labor for a mind, that of devoting all its + strength to the thinking itself out of existence! Not content with being + born impersonal, a Far Oriental is constantly striving to make himself + more so. + </p> + <p> + We have seen, then, how in trying to understand these peoples we are + brought face to face with impersonality in each of those three expressions + of the human soul, speech, thought, yearning. We have looked at them first + from a social standpoint. We have seen how singularly little regard is + paid the individual from his birth to his death. 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 up. How he practises a + wholesale system of adoption sufficient of itself to destroy any surviving + regard for the ego his other relations might have left. How in his daily + life he gives the minimum of thought to the bettering himself in any + worldly sense, and the maximum of polite consideration to his neighbor. + How, in short, he acts toward himself as much as possible as if he were + another, and to that other as if he were himself. Then, not content with + standing stranger like upon the threshold, we have sought to see the soul + of their civilization in its intrinsic manifestations. We have pushed our + inquiry, as it were, one step nearer its home. And the same trait that was + apparent sociologically has been exposed in this our antipodal phase of + psychical research. We have seen how impersonal is his language, the + principal medium of communication between one soul and another; how + impersonal are the communings of his soul with itself. How the man turns + to nature instead of to his fellowman in silent sympathy. And how, when he + speculates upon his coming castles in the air, 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 space. + </p> + <p> + Now what does this strange impersonality betoken? Why are these peoples so + different from us in this most fundamental of considerations to any + people, the consideration of themselves? The answer leads to some + interesting conclusions. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0008" id="link2HCH0008"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + Chapter 8. Imagination. + </h2> + <p> + If, as is the case with the moon, the earth, as she travelled round her + orbit turned always the same face inward, we might expect to find, between + the thoughts of that hemisphere which looked continually to the sun, and + those of the other peering eternally out at the stars, some such + difference as actually exists between ourselves and our longitudinal + antipodes. For our conception of the cosmos is of a sunlit world throbbing + with life, while their Nirvana finds not unfit expression in the still, + cold, fathomless awe of the midnight sky. That we cannot thus directly + account for the difference in local coloring serves but to make that + difference of more human interest. The dissimilarity between the Western + and the Far Eastern attitude of mind has in it something beyond the effect + of environment. For it points to the importance of the part which the + principle of individuality plays in the great drama daily enacting before + our eyes, and which we know as evolution. It shows, as I shall hope to + prove, that individuality bears the same relation to the development of + mind that the differentiation of species does to the evolution of organic + life: that the degree of individualization of a people is the + self-recorded measure of its place in the great march of mind. + </p> + <p> + All life, whether organic or inorganic, consists, as we know, in a change + from a state of simple homogeneity to one of complex heterogeneity. The + process is apparently the same in a nebula or a brachiopod, although much + more intricate in the latter. The immediate force which works this change, + the life principle of things, is, in the case of organic beings, a subtle + something which we call spontaneous variation. What this mysterious + impulse may be is beyond our present powers of recognition. As yet, the + ultimates of all things lie hidden in the womb of the vast unknown. But + just as in the case of a man we can tell what organs are vital, though we + are ignorant what the vital spark may be, so in our great cosmical laws we + can say in what their power resides, though we know not really what they + are. Whether mind be but a sublimated form of matter, or, what amounts to + the same thing, matter a menial kind of mind, or whether, which seems less + likely, it be a something incomparable with substance, of one thing we are + sure, the same laws of heredity govern both. In each a like chain of + continuity leads from the present to the dim past, a connecting clue which + we can follow backward in imagination. Now what spontaneous variation is + to the material organism, imagination, apparently, is to the mental one. + Just as spontaneous variation is constantly pushing the animal or the + plant to push out, as a vine its tendrils, in all directions, while + natural conditions are as constantly exercising over it a sort of + unconscious pruning power, so imagination is ever at work urging man's + mind out and on, while the sentiment of the community, commonly called + common sense, which simply means the point already reached by the average, + is as steadily tending to keep it at its own level. The environment helps, + in the one case as in the other, to the shaping of the development. Purely + physical in the first, it is both physical and psychical in the second, + the two reacting on each other. But in either case it is only a + constraining condition, not the divine impulse itself. Precisely, then, as + in the organism, this subtle spirit checked in one direction finds a way + to advance in another, and produces in consequence among an originally + similar set of bodies a gradual separation into species which grow wider + with time, so in brain evolution a like force for like reasons tends + inevitably to an ever-increasing individualization. + </p> + <p> + Now what evidence have we that this analogy holds? Let us look at the + facts, first as they present themselves subjectively. + </p> + <p> + The instinct of self-preservation, that guardian angel so persistent to + appear when needed, owes its summons to another instinct no less strong, + which we may call the instinct of individuality; for with the same innate + tenacity with which we severally cling to life do we hold to the idea of + our own identity. It is not for the philosophic desire of preserving a + very small fraction of humanity at large that we take such pains to avoid + destruction; it is that we insensibly regard death as threatening to the + continuance of the ego, in spite of the theories of a future life which we + have so elaborately developed. Indeed, the psychical shrinking is really + the quintessence of the physical fear. We cleave to the abstract idea + closer even than to its concrete embodiment. Sooner would we forego this + earthly existence than surrender that something we know as self. For + sufficient cause we can imagine courting death; we cannot conceive of so + much as exchanging our individuality for another's, still less of + abandoning it altogether; for gradually a man, as he grows older, comes to + regard his body as, after all, separable from himself. It is the soul's + covering, rendered indispensable by the climatic conditions of our present + existence, one without which we could no longer continue to live here. To + forego it does not necessarily negative, so far as we yet know, the + possibility of living elsewhere. Some more congenial tropic may be the + wandering spirit's fate. But to part with the sense of self seems to be + like taking an eternal farewell of the soul. The Western mind shrinks + before the bare idea of such a thought. + </p> + <p> + The clinging to one's own identity, then, is now an instinct, whatever it + may originally have been. It is a something we inherited from our + ancestors and which we shall transmit more or less modified to our + descendants. How far back this consciousness has been felt passes the + possibilities of history to determine, since the recording of it + necessarily followed the fact. All we know is that its mention is coeval + with chronicle, and its origin lost in allegory. The Bible, one of the + oldest written records in the world, begins with a bit of mythology of a + very significant kind. When the Jews undertook to trace back their family + tree to an idyllic garden of Eden, they mentioned as growing there beside + the tree of life, another tree called the tree of knowledge. Of what + character this knowledge was is inferable from the sudden + self-consciousness that followed the partaking of it. So that if we please + we may attribute directly to Eve's indiscretion the many evils of our + morbid self-consciousness of the present day. But without indulging in + unchivalrous reflections we may draw certain morals from it of both + immediate and ultimate applicability. + </p> + <p> + To begin with, it is a most salutary warning to the introspective, and in + the second place it is a striking instance of a myth which is not a sun + myth; for it is essentially of human regard, an attempt on man's part to + explain that most peculiar attribute of his constitution, the + all-possessing sense of self. It looks certainly as if he was not + over-proud of his person that he should have deemed its recognition + occasion for the primal curse, and among early races the person is for a + good deal of the personality. What he lamented was not life but the + unavoidable exertion necessary to getting his daily bread, for the + question whether life were worth while was as futile then as now, and as + inconceivable really as 4-dimensional space. + </p> + <p> + We are then conscious of individuality as a force within ourselves. But + our knowledge by no means ends there; for we are aware of it in the case + of others as well. + </p> + <p> + About certain people there exists a subtle something which leaves its + impress indelibly upon the consciousness of all who come in contact with + them. This something is a power, but a power of so indefinable a + description that we beg definition by calling it simply the personality of + the man. It is not a matter of subsequent reasoning, but of direct + perception. We feel it. Sometimes it charms us; sometimes it repels. But + we can no more be oblivious to it than we can to the temperature of the + air. Its possessor has but to enter the room, and insensibly we are + conscious of a presence. It is as if we had suddenly been placed in the + field of a magnetic force. + </p> + <p> + On the other hand there are people who produce no effect upon us whatever. + They come and go with a like indifference. They are as unimportant + psychically as if they were any other portion of the furniture. They never + stir us. We might live with them for fifty years and be hardly able to + tell, for any influence upon ourselves, whether they existed or not. They + remind us of that neutral drab which certain religious sects assume to + show their own irrelevancy to the world. They are often most estimable + folk, but they are no more capable of inspiring a strong emotion than the + other kind are incapable of doing so. And we say the difference is due to + the personality or want of personality of the man. Now, in what does this + so-called personality consist? Not in bodily presence simply, for men + quite destitute of it possess the force in question; not in character + only, for we often disapprove of a character whose attraction we are + powerless to resist; not in intellect alone, for men more rational fail of + stirring us as these unconsciously do. In what, then? In life itself; not + that modicum of it, indeed, which suffices simply to keep the machine + moving, but in the life principle, the power which causes psychical + change; which makes the individual something distinct from all other + individuals, a being capable of proving sufficient, if need be, unto + himself; which shows itself, in short, as individuality. This is not a + mere restatement of the case, for individuality is an objective fact + capable of being treated by physical science. And as we know much more at + present about physical facts than we do of psychological problems, we may + be able to arrive the sooner at solution. + </p> + <p> + Individuality, personality, and the sense of self are only three different + aspects of one and the same thing. They are so many various views of the + soul according as we regard it from an intrinsic, an altruistic, or an + egoistic standpoint. For by individuality is not meant simply the + isolation in a corporeal casing of a small portion of the universal soul + of mankind. So far as mind goes, this would not be individuality at all, + but the reverse. By individuality we mean that bundle of ideas, thoughts, + and daydreams which constitute our separate identity, and by virtue of + which we feel each one of us at home within himself. Now man in his + mind-development is bound to become more and more distinct from his + neighbor. We can hardly conceive a progress so uniform as not to + necessitate this. It would be contrary to all we know of natural law, + besides contradicting daily experience. For each successive generation + bears unmistakable testimony to the fact. Children of the same parents are + never exactly like either their parents or one another, and they often + differ amazingly from both. In such instances they revert to type, as we + say; but inasmuch as the race is steadily advancing in development, such + reversion must resemble that of an estate which has been greatly improved + since its previous possession. The appearance of the quality is really the + sprouting of a seed whose original germ was in some sense coeval with the + beginning of things. This mind-seed takes root in some cases and not in + others, according to the soil it finds. And as certain traits develop and + others do not, one man turns out very differently from his neighbor. Such + inevitable distinction implies furthermore that the man shall be sensible + of it. Consciousness is the necessary attribute of mental action. Not only + is it the sole way we have of knowing mind; without it there would be no + mind to know. Not to be conscious of one's self is, mentally speaking, not + to be. This complex entity, this little cosmos of a world, the "I," has + for its very law of existence self-consciousness, while personality is the + effect it produces upon the consciousness of others. + </p> + <p> + But we may push our inquiry a step further, and find in imagination the + cause of this strange force. For imagination, or the image-making faculty, + may in a certain sense be said to be the creator of the world within. The + separate senses furnish it with material, but to it alone is due the + building of our castles, on premises of fact or in the air. For there is + no impassable gulf between the two. Coleridge's distinction that + imagination drew possible pictures and fancy impossible ones, is itself, + except as a classification, an impossible distinction to draw; for it is + only the inconceivable that can never be. All else is purely a matter of + relation. We may instance dreams which are usually considered to rank + among the most fanciful creations of the mind. Who has not in his dreams + fallen repeatedly from giddy heights and invariably escaped unhurt? If he + had attempted the feat in his waking moments he would assuredly have been + dashed to pieces at the bottom. And so we say the thing is impossible. But + is it? Only under the relative conditions of his mass and the earth's. If + the world he happens to inhabit were not its present size, but the size of + one of the tinier asteroids, no such disastrous results would follow a + chance misstep. 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 impunity. The bear could do likewise, + unfortunately. We should have arrived at our conclusion even quicker had + we decreased the size both of the man and his world. He would not then + have had to tumble actually so far, and would therefore have arrived yet + more gently at the foot. This turns out, then, to be a mere question of + size. Decrease the scale of the picture, and the impossible becomes + possible at once. All fancies are not so easily reducible to actual facts + as the one we have taken, but all, perhaps, eventually may be explicable + in the same general way. At present we certainly cannot affirm that + anything may not be thus explained. For the actual is widening its field + every day. Even in this little world of our own we are daily discovering + to be fact what we should have thought fiction, like the sailor's mother + the tale of the flying fish. Beyond it our ken is widening still more. + Gulliver's travels may turn out truer than we think. Could we traverse the + inter-planetary ocean of ether, we might eventually find in Jupiter the + land of Lilliput or in Ceres some old-time country of the Brobdignagians. + For men constituted muscularly like ourselves would have to be + proportionately small in the big planet and big in the small one. Still + stranger things may exist around other suns. 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 know. To our + groping speculations of the night they almost seem, as we gaze on them in + their twinkling, to be winking us a sort of comprehension. Conditions may + exist there under which our wildest fancies may be commonplace facts. + There may be + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "Some Xanadu where Kublai can + a stately pleasure dome decree," +</pre> + <p> + and carry out his conceptions to his own disillusionment, perhaps. For if + the embodiment of a fancy, however complete, left nothing further to be + wished, imagination would have no incentive to work. Coleridge's + distinction does very well to separate, empirically, certain kinds of + imaginative concepts from certain others; but it has no real foundation in + fact. Nor presumably did he mean it to have. But it serves, not inaptly, + as a text to point out an important scientific truth, namely, that there + are not two such qualities of the mind, but only one. For otherwise we + might have supposed the fact too evident to need mention. Imagination is + the single source of the new, the one mainspring of psychical advance; + reason, like a balance-wheel, only keeping the action regular. For reason + is but the touchstone of experience, our own, inherited, or acquired from + others. It compares what we imagine with what we know, and gives us answer + in terms of the here and the now, which we call the actual. But the actual + is really nothing but the local. It does not mark the limits of the + possible. + </p> + <p> + That imagination has been the moving spirit of the psychical world is + evident, whatever branch of human thought we are pleased to examine. We + are in the habit, in common parlance, of making a distinction between the + search after truth and the search after beauty, calling the one science + and the other art. Now while we are not slow to impute imagination to art, + we are by no means so ready to appreciate its connection with science. Yet + contrary, perhaps, to exogeric ideas on the subject, it is science rather + than art that demands imagination of her votaries. Not that art may not + involve the quality to a high degree, but that a high degree of art is + quite compatible with a very small amount of imagination. On the one side + we may instance painting. Now painting begins its career in the humble + capacity of copyist, a pretty poor copyist at that. At first so slight was + its skill that the rudest symbols sufficed. "This is a man" was + conventionally implied by a few scratches bearing a very distant + relationship to the real thing. Gradually, owing to human vanity and a + growing taste, pictures improved. Combinations were tried, a bit from one + place with a piece from another; a sort of mosaic requiring but a slight + amount of imagination. Not that imagination of a higher order has not been + called into play, although even now pictures are often happy adaptations + rather than creations proper. Some masters have been imaginative; others, + unfortunately for themselves and still more for the public, have not. For + that the art may attain a high degree of excellence for itself and much + distinction for its professors, without calling in the aid of imagination, + is evident enough on this side of the globe, without travelling to the + other. + </p> + <p> + Take, on the other hand, a branch of science which, to the average layman, + seems peculiarly unimaginative, the science of mathematics. Yet at the + risk of appearing to cast doubts upon the validity of its conclusions, it + might be called the most imaginative product of human thought; for it is + simply one vast imagination based upon a few so-called axioms, which are + nothing more nor less than the results of experience. It is none the less + imaginative because its discoveries always accord subsequently with fact, + since man was not aware of them beforehand. Nor are its inevitable + conclusions inevitable to any save those possessed of the mathematician's + prophetic sight. Once discovered, it requires much less imagination to + understand them. With the light coming from in front, it is an easy matter + to see what lies behind one. + </p> + <p> + So with other fabrics of human thought, imagination has been spinning and + weaving them all. From the most concrete of inventions to the most + abstract of conceptions the same force reveals itself upon examination; + for there is no gulf between what we call practical and what we consider + theoretical. Everything abstract is ultimately of practical use, and even + the most immediately utilitarian has an abstract principle at its core. We + are too prone to regard the present age of the world as preeminently + practical, much as a middle-aged man laments the witching fancies of his + boyhood. But, and there is more in the parallel than analogy, if the man + be truly imaginative he is none the less so at forty-five than he was at + twenty, if his imagination have taken on a more critical form; for this + latter half of the nineteenth century is perhaps the most imaginative + period the world's history has ever known. While with one hand we are + contriving means of transit for our ideas, and even our very voices, + compared to which Puck's girdle is anything but talismanic, with the other + we are stretching out to grasp the action of mind on mind, pushing our way + into the very realm of mind itself. + </p> + <p> + History tells the same story in detail; for the history of mankind, + imperfectly as we know it, discloses the fact that imagination, and not + the power of observation nor the kindred capability of perception, has + been the cause of soul-evolution. + </p> + <p> + The savage is but little of an imaginative being. We are tempted, at + times, to imagine him more so than he is, for his fanciful folk-lore. The + proof of which overestimation is that we find no difficulty in imagining + what he does, and even of imagining what he probably imagined, and finding + our suppositions verified by discovery. Yet his powers of observation may + be marvellously developed. The North American Indian tracks his foe + through the forest by signs unrecognizable to a white man, and he reasons + most astutely upon them, and still that very man turns out to be a mere + child when put before problems a trifle out of his beaten path. And all + because his forefathers had not the power to imagine something beyond what + they actually saw. The very essence of the force of imagination lies in + its ability to change a man's habitat for him. Without it, man would + forever have remained, not a mollusk, to be sure, but an animal simply. A + plant cannot change its place, an animal cannot alter its conditions of + existence except within very narrow bounds; man is free in the sense + nothing else in the world is. + </p> + <p> + What is true of individuals has been true of races. The most imaginative + races have proved the greatest factors in the world's advance. + </p> + <p> + Now after this look at our own side of the world, let us turn to the + other; for it is this very psychological fact that mental progression + implies an ever-increasing individualization, and that imagination is the + force at work in the process which Far Eastern civilization, taken in + connection with our own, reveals. In doing this, it explains incidentally + its own seeming anomalies, the most unaccountable of which, apparently, is + its existence. + </p> + <p> + We have seen how impressively impersonal the Far East is. Now if + individuality be the natural measure of the height of civilization which a + nation has reached, impersonality should betoken a relatively laggard + position in the race. We ought, therefore, to find among these people + certain other characteristics corroborative of a less advanced state of + development. In the first place, if imagination be the impulse of which + increase in individuality is the resulting motion, that quality should be + at a minimum there. The Far Orientals ought to be a particularly + unimaginative set of people. Such is precisely what they are. Their lack + of imagination is a well-recognized fact. All who have been brought in + contact with them have observed it, merchants as strikingly as students. + Indeed, the slightest intercourse with them could not fail to make it + evident. Their matter-of-fact way of looking at things is truly + distressing, coming as it does from so artistic a people. One notices it + all the more for the shock. To get a prosaic answer from a man whose + appearance and surroundings betoken better things is not calculated to + dull that answer's effect. Aston, in a pamphlet on the Altaic tongues, + cites an instance which is so much to the point that I venture to repeat + it here. He was a true Chinaman, he says, who, when his English master + asked him what he thought of + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + "That orbed maiden + With white fires laden + Whom mortals call the moon," +</pre> + <p> + replied, "My thinkee all same lamp pidgin" (pidgin meaning thing in the + mongrel speech, Chinese in form and English in diction, which goes by the + name of pidgin English). + </p> + <p> + Their own tongues show the same prosaic character, picturesque as they + appear to us at first sight. That effect is due simply to the novelty to + us of their expressions. To talk of a pass as an "up-down" has a + refreshing turn to our unused ear, but it is a much more descriptive than + imaginative figure of speech. Nor is the phrase "the being (so) is + difficult," in place of "thank you," a surprisingly beautiful bit of + imagery, delightful as it sounds for a change. Our own tongue has, in its + daily vocabulary, far more suggestive expressions, only familiarity has + rendered us callous to their use. We employ at every instant words which, + could we but stop to think of them, would strike us as poetic in the ideas + they call up. As has been well said, they were once happy thoughts of some + bright particular genius bequeathed to posterity without so much as an + accompanying name, and which proved so popular that they soon became but + symbols themselves. + </p> + <p> + Their languages are paralleled by their whole life. A lack of any fanciful + ideas is one of the most salient traits of all Far Eastern races, if + indeed a sad dearth of anything can properly be spoken of as salient. + Indirectly their want of imagination betrays itself in their every-day + sayings and doings, and more directly in every branch of thought. + Originality is not their strong point. Their utter ignorance of science + shows this, and paradoxical as it may seem, their art, in spite of its + merit and its universality, does the same. That art and imagination are + necessarily bound together receives no very forcible confirmation from a + land where, nationally speaking, at any rate, the first is easily first + and the last easily last, as nations go. It is to quite another quality + that their artistic excellence must be ascribed. That the Chinese and + later the Japanese have accomplished results at which the rest of the + world will yet live to marvel, is due to their—taste. But taste or + delicacy of perception has absolutely nothing to do with imagination. That + certain of the senses of Far Orientals are wonderfully keen, as also those + parts of the brain that directly respond to them, is beyond question; but + such sensitiveness does not in the least involve the less earth-tied + portions of the intellect. A peculiar responsiveness to natural beauty, a + sort of mental agreement with its earthly environment, is a marked feature + of the Japanese mind. But appreciation, however intimate, is a very + different thing from originality. The one is commonly the handmaid of the + other, but the other by no means always accompanies the one. + </p> + <p> + So much for the cause; now for the effect which we might expect to find if + our diagnosis be correct. + </p> + <p> + If the evolving force be less active in one race than in another, three + relative results should follow. In the first place, the race in question + will at any given moment be less advanced than its fellow; secondly, its + rate of progress will be less rapid; and lastly, its individual members + will all be nearer together, just as a stream, in falling from a cliff, + starts one compact mass, then gradually increasing in speed, divides into + drops, which, growing finer and finer and farther and farther apart, + descend at last as spray. All three of these consequences are visible in + the career of the Far Eastern peoples. The first result scarcely needs to + be proved to us, who are only too ready to believe it without proof. It + is, nevertheless, a fact. Viewed unprejudicedly, their civilization is not + so advanced a one as our own. Although they are certainly our superiors in + some very desirable particulars, their whole scheme is distinctly more + aboriginal fundamentally. It is more finished, as far as it goes, but it + does not go so far. Less rude, it is more rudimentary. Indeed, as we have + seen, its surface-perfection really shows that nature has given less + thought to its substance. One may say of it that it is the adult form of a + lower type of mind-specification. + </p> + <p> + The second effect is scarcely less patent. How slow their progress has + been, if for centuries now it can be called progress at all, is + world-known. Chinese conservatism has passed into a proverb. The pendulum + of pulsation in the Middle Kingdom long since came to a stop at the medial + point of rest. Centre of civilization, as they call themselves, one would + imagine that their mind-machinery had got caught on their own dead centre, + and now could not be made to move. Life, which elsewhere is a condition of + unstable equilibrium, there is of a fatally stable kind. For the + Chinaman's disinclination to progress is something more than vis inertiae; + it has become an ardent devotion to the status quo. Jostled, he at once + settles back to his previous condition again; much as more materially, + after a lifetime spent in California, at his death his body is + punctiliously embalmed and sent home across five thousand miles of sea for + burial. With the Japanese the condition of affairs is somewhat different. + Their tendency to stand still is of a purely passive kind. It is a state + of neutral equilibrium, stationary of itself but perfectly responsive to + an impulse from without. Left to their own devices, they are conservative + enough, but they instantly copy a more advanced civilization the moment + they get a chance. This proclivity on their part is not out of keeping + with our theory. On the contrary, it is precisely what was to have been + expected; for we see the very same apparent contradiction in characters we + are thrown with every day. Imitation is the natural substitute for + originality. The less strong a man's personality the more prone is he to + adopt the ideas of others, on the same principle that a void more easily + admits a foreign body than does space that is already occupied; or as a + blank piece of paper takes a dye more brilliantly for not being already + tinted itself. + </p> + <p> + The third result, the remarkable homogeneity of the people, is not, + perhaps, so universally appreciated, but it is equally evident on + inspection, and no less weighty in proof. Indeed, the Far Eastern state of + things is a kind of charade on the word; for humanity there is singularly + uniform. The distance between the extremes of mind-development in Japan is + much less than with us. This lack of divergence exists not simply in + certain lines of thought, but in all those characteristics by which man is + parted from the brutes. In reasoning power, in artistic sensibility, in + delicacy of perception, it is the same story. If this were simply the + impression at first sight, no deductions could be drawn from it, for an + impression of racial similarity invariably marks the first stage of + acquaintance of one people by another. Even in outward appearance it is + so. We find it at first impossible to tell the Japanese apart; they find + it equally impossible to differentiate us. But the present resemblance is + not a matter of first impressions. The fact is patent historically. The + men whom Japan reveres are much less removed from the common herd than is + the case in any Western land. And this has been so from the earliest + times. Shakspeares and Newtons have never existed there. Japanese humanity + is not the soil to grow them. The comparative absence of genius is fully + paralleled by the want of its opposite. Not only are the paths of + preeminence untrodden; the purlieus of brutish ignorance are likewise + unfrequented. On neither side of the great medial line is the departure of + individuals far or frequent. All men there are more alike;—so much + alike, indeed, that the place would seem to offer a sort of forlorn hope + for disappointed socialists. Although religious missionaries have not met + with any marked success among the natives, this less deserving class of + enthusiastic disseminators of an all-possessing belief might do well to + attempt it. They would find there a very virgin field of a most + promisingly dead level. It is true, human opposition would undoubtedly + prevent their tilling it, but Nature, at least, would not present quite + such constitutional obstacles as she wisely does with us. + </p> + <p> + The individual's mind is, as it were, an isolated bit of the race mind. + The same set of traits will be found in each. Mental characteristics there + are a sort of common property, of which a certain undifferentiated portion + is indiscriminately allotted to every man at birth. One soul resembles + another so much, that in view of the patriarchal system under which they + all exist, there seems to the stranger a peculiar appropriateness in so + strong a family likeness of mind. An idea of how little one man's brain + differs from his neighbor's may be gathered from the fact, that while a + common coolie in Japan spends his spare time in playing a chess twice as + complicated as ours, the most advanced philosopher is still on the + blissfully ignorant side of the pons asinorum. + </p> + <p> + We find, then, that in all three points the Far East fulfils what our + theory demanded. + </p> + <p> + There is one more consideration worthy of notice. We said that the + environment had not been the deus ex materia in the matter; but that the + soul itself possessed the germ of its own evolution. This fact does not, + however, preclude another, that the environment has helped in the process. + Change of scene is beneficial to others besides invalids. How stimulating + to growth a different habitat can prove, when at all favorable, is perhaps + sufficiently shown in the case of the marguerite, which, as an emigrant + called white-weed, has usurped our fields. The same has been no less true + of peoples. Now these Far Eastern peoples, in comparison with our own + forefathers, have travelled very little. A race in its travels gains two + things: first it acquires directly a great deal from both places and + peoples that it meets, and secondly it is constantly put to its own + resources in its struggle for existence, and becomes more personal as the + outcome of such strife. The changed conditions, the hostile forces it + finds, necessitate mental ingenuity to adapt them and influence it + unconsciously. To see how potent these influences prove we have but to + look at the two great branches of the Aryan family, the one that for so + long now has stayed at home, and the one that went abroad. Destitute of + stimulus from without, 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-day. The inevitable numbness of + monotony crept over the stay-at-homes. The deadly sameness of their + surroundings produced its unavoidable effect. The torpor of the East, like + some paralyzing poison, stole into their souls, and they fell into a + drowsy slumber only to dream in the land they had formerly wrested from + its possessors. Their birthright passed with their cousins into the West. + </p> + <p> + In the case of the Altaic races which we are considering, cause and effect + mutually strengthened each other. That they did not travel more is due + primarily to a lack of enterprise consequent upon a lack of imagination, + and then their want of travel told upon their imagination. They were also + unfortunate in their journeying. Their travels were prematurely brought to + an end by that vast geographical Nirvana the Pacific Ocean, the great + peaceful sea as they call it themselves. That they would have journeyed + further is shown by the way their dreams went eastward still. They + themselves could not for the preventing ocean, and the lapping of its + waters proved a nation's lullaby. + </p> + <p> + One thing, I think, then, our glance at Far Eastern civilization has more + than suggested. The soul, in its progress through the world, tends + inevitably to individualization. Yet the more we perceive of the cosmos + the more do we recognize an all-pervading unity in it. Its soul must be + one, not many. The divine power that made all things is not itself + multifold. How to reconcile the ever-increasing divergence with an + eventual similarity is a problem at present transcending our + generalizations. What we know would seem to be opposed to what we must + infer. But perception of how we shall merge the personal in the universal, + though at present hidden from sight, may sometime come to us, and the + seemingly irreconcilable will then turn out to involve no contradiction at + all. For this much is certain: grand as is the great conception of + Buddhism, majestic as is the idea of the stately rest it would lead us to, + the road here below is not one the life of the world can follow. If + earthly existence be an evil, then Buddhism will help us ignore it; but if + by an impulse we cannot explain we instinctively crave activity of mind, + then the great gospel of Gautama touches us not; for to abandon self—egoism, + that is, not selfishness is the true vacuum which nature abhors. As for + Far Orientals, they themselves furnish proof against themselves. That + impersonality is not man's earthly goal they unwittingly bear witness; for + they are not of those who will survive. Artistic attractive people that + they are, their civilization is like their own tree flowers, beautiful + blossoms destined never to bear fruit; for whatever we may conceive the + far future of another life to be, the immediate effect of impersonality + cannot but be annihilating. If these people continue in their old course, + their earthly career is closed. Just as surely as morning passes into + afternoon, so surely are these races of the Far East, if unchanged, + destined to disappear before the advancing nations of the West. Vanish + they will off the face of the earth and leave our planet the eventual + possession of the dwellers where the day declines. Unless their newly + imported ideas really take root, it is from this whole world that Japanese + and Koreans, as well as Chinese, will inevitably be excluded. Their + Nirvana is already being realized; already it has wrapped Far Eastern Asia + in its winding-sheet, the shroud of those whose day was but a dawn, as if + in prophetic keeping with the names they gave their homes,—the Land + of the Day's Beginning, and the Land of the Morning Calm. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </p> + <div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 1409 ***</div> +</body> +</html> |