Occasionally a popular writer makes something of an attempt in this direction, but with astonishingly slight results. A recent writer in the London Daily Mail has illustrated afresh the futility of all attempts to catalogue the distinguishing characteristics of the Oriental. He names the inferior position assigned to women, the licentiousness of men, licensed prostitution, lack of the play instinct among Oriental boys, scorn of Occidental civilization, and the rude treatment of foreigners. Many of his statements of facts are sadly at fault. But supposing them to be true, are they the differentiating characteristics of the Orient? Consider for a moment what was the position of woman in ancient times in the Occident, and what was the moral character of Occidental men? Is not prostitution licensed to-day in the leading cities of Europe? And is there not an unblushing prostitution in the larger cities of England and America which would put to shame the licensed prostitution of Japan? Are Orientals and their civilization universally esteemed and considerately treated in the Occident? Surely none of these are uniquely Oriental characteristics, distinguishing them from Occidental peoples as clearly as the anatomical characteristics of oblique eyes and yellow skin.

Mr. Percival Lowell has made a careful philosophical effort to discover the essential psychic nature of the Orient. He describes it, as we have seen, as "Impersonality." The failure of his effort we have sufficiently considered.

There remain a few other characterizations of the Orient that we may well examine briefly.

It has been stated that the characteristic psychic trait distinguishing the East from the West is that the former is intuitive, while the latter is logical. In olden times Oriental instruction relied on the intuitions of the student. No reliance was placed on the logical process. Religion, so far as it was not ceremony and magic, was intuitional, "Satori," "Enlightenment," was the keyword. Each man attains enlightenment by himself—through a flash of intuition. Moral instruction likewise was intuitional. Dogmatic statements were made whose truth the learner was to discover for himself; no effort was made to explain them. Teaching aimed to go direct to the point, not stopping to explain the way thither.

That this was and is a characteristic of the Orient cannot be disputed. The facts are abundant and clear. But the question is whether this is a racial psychic characteristic, such that it inevitably controls the entire thinking of an Oriental, whatever his education, and also whether the Occident is conspicuously deficient in this psychic characteristic. Thus stated, the question almost answers itself.

Orientals educated in Western methods of thought acquire logical methods of reasoning and teaching. The old educational methods of Japan are now obsolete. On the other hand, intuitionalism is not unknown in the West. Mystics in religion are all conspicuously intuitional. So too are Christian scientists, faith-healers, and spiritualists. Great preachers and poets are intuitionalists rather than logicians.

Furthermore, if we look to ancient times, we shall see that even Occidentals were dominated by intuitionalism. All primitive knowledge was dominated by intuitions, and was as absurd as many still prevalent Oriental conceptions of nature. The bane of ancient science and philosophy was its reliance on a priori considerations; that is, on intuition. Inductive, carefully logical methods of thought, of science, of philosophy, and even of religion, are relatively modern developments of the Occidental mind. We have learned to doubt intuitions unverified by investigation and experimental evidence. The wide adoption of the inductive method is a recent characteristic of the West.

Modern progress has consisted in no slight degree in the development of logical powers, and particularly in the power of doubting and examining intuitions. To say that the East is conspicuously intuitional and the West is conspicuously logical is fairly true, but this misses the real difference. The West is intuitional plus logical. It uses the intuitional method in every department of life, but it does not stop with it. An intuition is not accepted as truth until it has been subjected by the reason to the most thorough criticism possible. The West distrusts the unverified and unguided intuitive judgment. On the other hand, the East is not inherently deficient in logical power. When brought into contact with Occidental life, and especially when educated in Occidental methods of thought, the Oriental is not conspicuously deficient in logical ability.

This line of thought leads to the conclusion that the psychic characteristics distinguishing the East from the West, profound though they are, are sociological rather than biological. They are the characteristics of the civilization rather than of essential race nature.

A fact remarked by many thoughtful Occidentals is the astonishing difficulty—indeed the impossibility—of becoming genuinely and intimately acquainted with the Japanese. Said a professor of Harvard University to the writer some years ago: "Do you in Japan find it difficult to become truly acquainted with the Japanese? We see many students here, but we are unable to gain more than a superficial acquaintance. They seem to be incrusted in a shell that we are unable to pierce." The editor of the Japan Mail, speaking of the difficulty of securing "genuinely intimate intercourse with the Japanese people," says: "The language also is needed. Yet even when the language is added, something still remains to be achieved, and what that something is we have never been able to discover, though we have been considering the subject for thirty-three years. No foreigner has ever yet succeeded in being admitted into the inner circle of Japanese intercourse."

Is this a fact? If not, why is it so widespread a belief? If it is a fact, what is the interpretation? Like most generalizations it expresses both a truth and an error. As the statement of a general experience, I believe it to be true. As an assertion of universal application I believe it to be false. As a truth, how is it to be explained? Is it due to difference of race soul, and thus to racial antipathy, as some maintain? If so, it must be a universal fact. This, however, is an error, as we shall see. The explanation is not so hard to find as at first appears.

The difficulty under consideration is due to two classes of facts. The first is that the people have long been taught that Occidentals desire to seize and possess their land. Although the more enlightened have long since abandoned this fear and suspicion, the people still suspect the stranger; they do not propose to admit foreigners to any leading position in the political life of the land. They do not implicitly trust the foreigners, even when taken into their employ. That foreigners should not be admitted to the inner circle of Japanese political life, therefore, is not strange. Nor is it unique to Japan. It is not done in any land except the United States. Secondly, the diverse methods of social intercourse characterizing the East and the West make a deep chasm between individuals of these civilizations on coming into social relations. The Oriental bows low, utters conventional "aisatsu" salutations, listens respectfully, withholds his own opinion, agrees with his vis-a-vis, weighs every word uttered with a view to inferring the real meaning, for the genius of the language requires him to assume that the real meaning is not on the surface, and chooses his own language with the same circumspection. The Occidental extends his hand for a hearty shake—if he wishes to be friendly—looks his visitor straight in the eye, speaks directly from his heart, without suspicion or fear of being misunderstood, expresses his own opinions unreservedly. The Occidental, accustomed to this direct and open manner, spontaneously doubts the man who lacks it. It is impossible for the Occidental to feel genuinely acquainted with an Oriental who does not respond in Occidental style of frank open intercourse. Furthermore, it is not Japanese custom to open one's heart, to make friends with everyone who comes along. The hail-fellow-well-met characteristic of the Occident is a feature of its individualism, that could not come into being in a feudal civilization in which every respectable man carried two swords with which to take instant vengeance on whoever should malign or doubt him. Universal secretiveness and conventionality, polite forms and veiled expressions, were the necessary shields of a military feudalism. Both the social order and the language were fitted to develop to a high degree the power of attention to minutest details of manner and speech and of inferring important matters from slight indications. The whole social order served to develop the intuitional method in human relations. Reliance was placed more on what was not said than on what was clearly expressed. A doubting state of mind was the necessary psychological prerequisite for such an inferential system. And doubt was directly taught. "Hito wo mireba dorobo to omoye," "when you see a man, count him a robber," may be an exaggeration, but this ancient proverb throws much light on the Japanese chronic state of mind. Mutual suspicion—and especially suspicion of strangers—was the rule in Old Japan. Among themselves the Japanese make relatively few intimate friends. They remark on Occidental skill in making friends.

That the foreigner is not admitted to the inner social life of the Japanese is likewise not difficult of explanation, if we bear in mind the nature of that social life. Is it possible for one who keeps concubines, who takes pleasure in geisha, and who visits houses of prostitution, to converse freely and confidentially with those who condemn these practices? Can he who stands for a high-grade morality, who criticises in unsparing measure the current morality of Japanese society, expect to be admitted to its inner social circles? Impossible. However friendly the relations of Japanese and foreigners may be in business and in the diplomatic corps, the moral chasm separating the social life of the Occident from that of the Orient effectually prevents a foreigner from being admitted to its inner social life.

It might be thought that immoral Occidentals would be so admitted. Not so. The Japanese distinguish between Occidentals. They know well that immoral Occidentals are not worthy of trust. Although for a season they may hobnob together, the intimacy is shallow and short-lived; it rests on lust and not on profound sympathies of head and heart.

And this suggests the secret of genuine acquaintance. Men become profoundly acquainted in proportion as they hold in common serious views of life, and labor together for the achievement of great moral ends. Now a gulf separates the ordinary Japanese, even though educated, from the serious-minded Occidental. Their views of life are well-nigh antipodal. If their social intercourse is due only to the accident of business or of social functions, what true intimacy can possibly arise? The acquaintance can only be superficial. Nothing binds the two together beyond the temporary and accidental. Let them, however, become possessed of a common and a serious view of life; let them strive for the attainment of some great moral reform, which they feel of vital importance to the welfare of the nation and the age, and immediately a bond of connection and intercourse will be established which will ripen into real intimacy.

I dispute the correctness of the generalization above quoted, however, not only on theoretical considerations, but also as a matter of experience. Among Christians, the conditions are fulfilled for intimate relations between Occidentals and Orientals which result, as a matter of fact, in genuine and intimate friendship. The relations existing between many missionaries and the native Christians and pastors refute the assertion of the editor of the Japan Mail that, "no foreigner has ever yet succeeded in being admitted into the inner circle of Japanese intercourse." This assertion is doubtless true in regard to the relation of foreigners to non-Christian society. The reason, for the fact, however, is not because one is Occidental and the other Oriental in psychic nature, but solely because of diverse moral views, aims, and conduct.

It is not the contention of these pages, however, that intimate friendships between Occidental and Oriental Christians are as easily formed as between members of two Occidental nations. Although common views of life, and common moral aims and conduct may provide the requisite foundations for such intimate friendships, the diverse methods of thought and of social intercourse may still serve to hinder their formation. It is probably a fact that missionaries experience greater difficulty in making genuine intimate friendships with Japanese Christians than with any other race on the face of the globe. The reasons for this fact are manifold. The Japanese racial ambition manifests itself not only in the sphere of political life; it does not take kindly to foreign control in any line. The churches manifest this characteristic. It is a cause of suspicion of the foreign missionary and separation from him; it has broken up many a friendship. Intimacy between missionaries and leading native pastors and evangelists was more common in the earlier days of Christian work than more recently, because the Japanese church organization has recently developed a self-consciousness and an ambition for organic independence which have led to mutual criticisms.

Furthermore, Japanese Christians are still Japanese. Their methods of social intercourse are Oriental; they bow profoundly, they repeat formal salutations, they refrain from free expression of personal opinion and preference. The crust of polite etiquette remains. The foreigner must learn to appreciate it before he can penetrate to the kindly, sincere, earnest heart. This the foreigner does not easily do, much to the detriment of his work.

And on the other hand, before the Oriental can penetrate to the kindly, sincere, and earnest heart of the Occidental, he must abandon the inferential method; he must not judge the foreigner by what is left unsaid nor by slight turns of that which is said, but by the whole thought as fully expressed. In other words, as the Occidental must learn and must trust to Oriental methods of social intercourse, so the Oriental must learn and must trust to the corresponding Occidental methods. The difficulty is great in either case, though of an opposite nature. Which has the greater difficulty is a question I do not attempt to solve.

Another generalization as to the essential difference marking Oriental and Occidental psychic natures is that the former is meditative and appreciative, and the latter is active. This too is a characterization of no little truth. The easy-going, time-forgetting, dreaming characteristics of the Orient are in marked contrast to the rush, bustle, and hurry of the Occident. One of the first and most forcible impressions made on the Oriental visiting the West is the tremendous energy displayed even in the ordinary everyday business. In the home there is haste; on the streets men, women, and children are "always on the run." It must seem to be literally so, when the walk of the Occidental is compared with the slow, crawling rate at which the Oriental moves. Horse cars, electric cars, steam cars, run at high speed through crowded streets. Conversation is short and hurried. Visits are curtailed—hardly more than glimpses. Everyone is so nervously busy as to have no time for calm, undisturbed thought. So does the Orient criticise and characterize the Occident.

In the Orient, on the contrary, time is nothing. Walking is slow, business is deliberate, visiting is a fine art of bows and conventional phrases preliminary to the real purpose of the call; amusements even are long-drawn-out, theatrical performances requiring an entire day. In the home there is no hurry, on the street there is no rush. To the Occidental, the Oriental seems so absorbed in a dream life that the actual life is to him but a dream.

If the characterization we are considering is meant to signify that the Orient possesses a power of appreciation not possessed by the West, then it seems to me an error. The Occident is not deficient in appreciation. A better statement of the difference suggested by the above characterization is that Western civilization is an expression of Will, whereas Eastern civilization is an expression of subordination to the superior—to Fate. This feature of Oriental character is due to the fact that the Orient is still as a whole communal in its social order, whereas the Occident is individualistic. In the West each man makes his own fortune; his position in society rests on his own individual energy. He is free to exert it at will. Society praises him in proportion as he manifests energy, grit, independence, and persistence. The social order selects such men and advances them in political, in business, in social, and in academic life. The energetic, active characteristics of the West are due, then, to the high development of individualism. The entire Occidental civilization is an expression of free will.

The communal nature of the Orient has not systematically given room for individual progress. The independent, driving man has been condemned socially. Submission, absolute and perpetual, to parents, to lord, to ancestors, to Fate, has been the ruling idea of each man's life. Controlled by such ideas, the easy-going, time-ignoring, dreaming, contemplative life—if you so choose to call it—of the Orient is a necessary consequence.

But has this characteristic become congenital, or is it still only social? Is dreamy appreciation now an inborn racial characteristic of Oriental mind, while active driving energy is the corresponding essential trait of Occidental mind? Or may these characteristics change with the social order? I have no hesitancy whatever in advocating the latter position. The way in which Young Japan, clad in European clothing, using watches and running on "railroad time," has dropped the slow-going style of Old Japan and has acquired habits of rapid walking, direct clear-cut conversation, and punctuality in business and travel (comparatively speaking) proves conclusively the correctness of my contention. New Japan is entering into the hurry and bustle of Occidental life, because, in contact with the West, she has adopted in a large measure, though not yet completely, the individualism of the West.

As time goes on, Japanese civilization will increasingly manifest the phenomena of will, and will proportionally become assimilated to the civilization of the West. But the ultimate cause of this transformation in civilization will be the increasing introduction of individualism into the social order. And this is possible only because the so-called racial characteristics are sociological, and not biological. The transformation of "race soul" therefore does not depend on the intermarriage of diverse races, but only on the adoption of new ideas and practices through social intercourse.

We conclude, then, that the only thoroughgoing interpretation of the differences characterizing Eastern and Western psychic nature is a social one, and that social differences can be adequately expressed only by contrasting the fundamental ideas ruling their respective social orders, namely, communalism for the East and individualism for the West.

The unity that pervades the Orient, if it is not due to the inheritance of a common psychic nature, to what is it due? Surely to the possession of a common civilization and social order. It would be hard to prove that Japanese, Koreans, Chinese, Siamese, Burmese, Hindus (and how many distinct races does the ethnologist find in India), Persians, and Turks are all descendants from a common ancestry and are possessed therefore by physical heredity of a common racial psychic nature. Yet such is the requirement of the theory we are opposing. That the races inhabiting the Asiatic continent have had from ancient times mutual social intercourse, whereby the civilization, mental, moral, and spiritual, of the most developed has passed to the other nations, so that China has dominated Eastern Asia, and India has profoundly influenced all the races inhabiting Asia, is an indisputable fact. The psychic unity of the Orient is a civilizational, a social unity, as is also the psychic unity of the Occident. The reason why the Occident is so distinct from the Orient in social, in psychic, and in civilizational characteristics is because these two great branches of the human race have undergone isolated evolution. Isolated biological evolution has produced the diverse races. These are now fixed physical types, which can be modified only by intermarriage. But although isolated social evolution has produced diverse social and psychic characteristics these are not fixed and unalterable. To transform psychic and social characteristics, intimate social intercourse, under special conditions, is needful alone.

If the characteristics differentiating the Eastern from the Western peoples are only social, it might be supposed that the results of association would be mutual, the East influencing the West as much as the West influences the East, both at last finding a common level. Such a result, however, is impossible, from the laws regulating psychic and social intercourse. The less developed psychic nature can have no appreciable effect on the more highly developed, just as undeveloped art cannot influence highly developed art, nor crude science and philosophy highly developed science and philosophy. The law governing the relations of diverse civilizations when brought into contact is not like the law of hydrostatics, whereby two bodies of water of different levels, brought into free communication, finally find a common level, determined by the difference in level and their respective masses. In social intercourse the higher civilization is unaffected by the lower, in any important way, while the lower is mightily modified, and in sufficient time is lifted to the grade of the higher in all important respects. This is a law of great significance. The Orient is becoming Occidentalized to a degree and at a rate little realized by travelers and not fully appreciated by the Orientals themselves. They know that mighty changes have taken place, and are now taking place, but they do not fully recognize their nature, and the multitudes do not know the source of these changes. In so far as the East has surpassed the West in any important direction will the East influence the West.

In saying, then, as we did in our first chapter, that the Japanese have already formed an Occidento-Oriental civilization, we meant that Japan has introduced not only the external and mechanical elements of Western civilization into her new social order, but also its inner and determinative principle—individualism. In saying that, as the Ethiopian cannot change his skin nor the leopard his spots, so Japan will never become thoroughly Occidentalized, we did not intend to say that she was so Oriental in her physiological nature, in her "race soul," that she could make no fundamental social transformation; but merely that she has a social heredity that will always and inevitably modify every Occidental custom and conception that may be brought to this land. Although in time Japan may completely individualize her social order, it will never be identical with that of the West. It will always bear the marks of her Oriental social heredity in innumerable details. The Occidental traveler will always be impressed with the Orientalisms of her civilization. Although the Oriental familiar with the details of the pre-Meiji social order will be impressed with what seems to him the complete Occidentalization of her new civilization and social order, although to-day communalism and individualism are the distinguishing characteristics respectively of the East and the West, they are not necessary characteristics due to inherent race nature. The Orient is sure to become increasingly individualistic. The future evolution of the great races of the earth is to be increasingly convergent in all the essentials of individual and racial prosperity, but in countless non-essential details the customs of the past will remain, to give each race and nation distinctive psychic and social characteristics.



XXXVII

GENERAL CONCLUSIONS

The aim of the present work has been to gain insight into the real nature of both Japanese character and its modern transformation.

In doing this we have necessarily entered the domain of social science, where we have been compelled to take issue with many, to us, defective conceptions. Our discussions of social principles have, however, been narrowly limited. We have confined our attention to the interpretation of those social and psychic characteristics differentiating the Japanese from other races. Our chief contention has been that these characteristics are due to the nature of the social order that has prevailed among them, and not to the inherent nature of the people; and that the evolution of the psychic characteristics of all races is due to social more than to biological evolution.

This position and the discussions offered to prove it imply more than has been explicitly stated. In this closing chapter it seems desirable to state concisely, and therefore with technical terminology, some of the more fundamental principles of social philosophy assumed or implied in this work. Brevity requires that this statement take the form of dogmatic propositions and unillustrated abstractions. The average reader will find little to interest him, and is accordingly advised to omit it entirely.

Let us first clearly see that we have made no effort to account for the origin or inherent nature of psychic life. That association or the social order is the original producing cause of psychic life is by no means our contention. Given the psychic nature as we find it in man, the problem is to account for its diverse manifestation in the different races and civilizations. This, and this alone, has been our problem.

Psychic nature is the sole and final cause of social life. Without psychic nature there could be no association. Personalized psychic nature is the sole and final cause of human social life. Numberless conditions determine by stimulation or imitation the manifestation of psychic life. These conditions differ for different lands, peoples, ages, and political relations, producing diverse social orders for each separated group. These diverse social orders determine the psychic characteristics differentiating the various groups. Social life and social order are objective expressions of a reality of which psychic nature is the subjective and therefore deeper reality. The two cannot be ruthlessly torn apart and remain complete, nor can they be understood, or completely interpreted, apart from each other. They are correlative and complementary expressions for the same reality.

Similarly physical and psychical life are to be conceived as profoundly interrelated, being respectively objective and subjective expressions of a reality incapable of separate interpretation. Yet each has markedly distinct characteristics and is the subject of distinct laws of activity and development.

Heredity is of two kinds, biological heredity, transmitting innate characters, and social heredity, transmitting acquired habits and their physiological results.

The innate characters transmitted by biological heredity are either physiological, anatomical, or psychical.

The acquired habits transmitted by social heredity are essentially psychical: but they may result in acquired physiological, or even anatomical, characters. Here belong the physiological effects of diet, housing, clothing, occupation, education, etc., which have not yet been taken up and incorporated into the innate physiological constitution by biological heredity. The physiological effects of social heredity are through the daily physical life and activity of each individual, in accordance with the requirements of the social order in which he is reared; and these are reached through its influence on the acquired psychical habits, which are transmitted through association, imitation, and the control of activities by language and education. In biological heredity the transmission is exclusively prior to birth, while in social heredity it is chiefly, if not entirely, after birth.

In social heredity the transmission is not determined by consanguinity, and therefore extends to members of alien races when they are incorporated in the social organization.

While the transmission of biological inheritance to each offspring is inevitable and complete, that of social inheritance is largely voluntary. It is also more or less complete, according to the knowledge, purpose, and effort of the individuals concerned. The transmission of acquired social and psychic characteristics even from parents to offspring depends on their association, and the imposition on their offspring by parents of their own modes of life. Sharing with parents their bodily activities, their language and their environment, both social and psychical, the offspring necessarily develop psychic and social characteristics similar to those of the parents.

Evolution takes place through the transformation of inheritance. The evolution of innate physiological, anatomical, and psychical characters takes place through the transformation of biological inheritance; and the evolution of society and of acquired characters chiefly through the transformation of social inheritance.

Nearly all biologists admit that change in the form of natural selection is one of the principles transforming biological inheritance; but whether the acquired characters of parents are even in the least degree inherited by the offspring, thus becoming innate characters, is one of the important biological problems of recent years. Into this problem we have not entered, though we recognize that it must have important bearings on sociological science. Briefly stated, it is this: Do social and psychic characteristics, acquired by individuals or by groups of individuals, affect the intrinsic inherited and transmissible psychic nature in such ways that offspring, by the mere fact of being offspring, necessarily manifest those characteristics, regardless of the particular social environment in which they may be reared? Into this problem, thus broadly stated, we do not enter. Limiting our view to those advanced races which manifest practically equal physiological development, we ask whether or not their differentiating psychic characteristics are due to modifications of their inherited and intrinsic psychic nature, such that those characteristics are necessarily transmitted to offspring through intrinsic biological heredity. Current popular and scientific sociology seems to give an affirmative answer to this question. The reply of this work emphasizes the negative. Although it is not maintained that there is absolutely no difference whatever in the psychic nature of the different races, or that the psychic differences distinguishing the races are entirely transmitted by social heredity, it is maintained that this is very largely the case—far more largely than is usually perceived or admitted. Such inherent differences, if they exist, are so vague and intangible as practically to defy discovery and clear statement, and may be practically ignored.

The only adequate disproof of the position here maintained would be about as follows. Let a Japanese infant be reared in an American home from infancy, not only fed and clothed as an American, but loved as a member of the family and trained as carefully and affectionately as one's own child. The full conditions require that not only the child himself, but everyone else, be ignorant of his parentage and race in order that he be thought to be, and be treated as though he were, a genuine member of his adopting home and people. What would be the psychic characteristics of that child when grown to manhood? If he should manifest psychic traits like those of his Japanese parents, if he should think in the Japanese order, if he should have a tendency to use prepositions as postpositions, if he should drop pronouns and should use honorific words in their place, if he should be markedly suspicious and inferential, if he should bow in making his salutations rather than shake hands, if he should show marked preference for sitting on the floor rather than on chairs, and for chopsticks to knives and forks, and if developing powers as an artist he should naturally paint Japanese pictures, Japanese landscapes, and Japanese faces, finding himself unable to draw according to the canons of Western art, if on developing poetic tastes he should find special pleasure in seventeen syllable or thirty-one syllable exclamatory poems, finding little interest in Longfellow or Shakespeare, if, in short, he should develop a predilection for any distinctive Japanese custom, habit of thought, method of speech, emotion or volition, it would evidently be due to his intrinsic heredity. If in all these matters, however, he should prove to be like an American, acquiring an American education like any American boy, and if on being brought to Japan, at, say, thirty years of age, still supposing himself to be an American, he should have equal difficulty with any American in mastering the language and adapting himself to and understanding the Japanese people, then it would follow that his psychic characteristics have been inherited socially and he is what he is, nationally, because of his social heritage. Such a result would show that the psychic traits differentiating races are social and not intrinsic.

We have limited our discussion to the advanced races because the problem is then relatively simple, the material abundant, and the issue clear. Much discussion in theology, psychology, and sociology is futile because it concerns that practically mythical being, the aboriginal man, about whose social and psychic life no one knows anything, and any theorizer can say what he chooses without fear of shipwreck on incontrovertible facts. Whether the lowest races known to-day are differentiated from the highest only by acquired social and psychic characteristics, or also by differences of psychic nature, may perhaps be an open question. However this may be, the case is fairly clear in regard to the higher races inhabiting the earth. Their differentiating psychic characteristics are, for the most part, not due to diverse psychic nature, but to diverse social orders, while the transmission of these characteristics takes place, as a matter of observation, through social heredity.

The discussions of this work are exclusively concerned with the evolution of society and of psychic characteristics. But even in this limited field we have not attempted to cover the whole ground. We have given our chief attention to the interdependence of social phenomena and psychic characteristics. The causes of evolution in the social order have not been the main subject under discussion.

Segregation is the essential condition on which divergent evolution is dependent. Many forms of segregation may be specified, under each of which evolution proceeds on a different principle. In brief, it may be said that biological segregation prevents the swamping of incipient organic divergences, by preventing the intermarriage of those possessing such divergences, while social segregation prevents the swamping of incipient social divergences and their corresponding incipient psychic characteristics by preventing the inter-association of those having such tendencies.

Biologically segregated groups undergo divergent biological evolution through segregated marriage, producing distinct physiological unities or racial types. These racial types are now relatively fixed and can be appreciably modified only by the intermarriage of different races.

Socially segregated groups undergo divergent social evolution through the segregated social intercourse of the members of each group, producing distinct civilizational and psychic unities. The differences between these social or psychic groups are relatively plastic and are the subject of constant variation. The modification of the social and psychic characteristics of a group takes place through a change in the physical or social environment of the group, or through the rise of strong personalities within the group.

Biologically distinct groups may thus be unified biologically only by intermarriage, while socially physically distinct groups may be unified socially and psychically without intermarriage, but exclusively through association.

The psychic defects of the offspring of interracial marriages may be largely due to the defective social heredity transmitted by the parents, rather than to mixed intrinsic inheritance.

The term "race soul" is a convenient, though delusive, because highly figurative, expression for the psychic unity of a social group. The unity is due entirely to the more or less complete possession by the individual members of the group, of common ideas, ideals, methods of thought, emotions, volitions, customs, institutions, arts, and beliefs.

Each individual is molded psychically to the type of the social group in which he is reared. The "race soul" is thus imposed on the individual by conscious and unconscious education.

The psychic evolution of social groups is divergent so long as isolation is fairly complete, but becomes convergent in proportion to association. Perfect association produces complete psychic unity, though it should be noted that perfect association of geographically separated social groups is practically unattainable.

The essential elements constituting national unity are psychic and social, not biological. Racial unity is biological. The same race may accordingly separate into different social and psychic groups. And members of different races may belong to the same social psychic group.

The so-called "race soul" of many sociologists is, therefore, a fiction and indicates mental confusion. The term refers not to the racial unity of inherent psychic nature, but only to the social unity of socially inherited psychic characteristics. Groups thus socially unified may or may not be racially homogeneous. In point of fact no race is strictly homogeneous biologically, nor is any social group completely unified psychically.

In sociology as in biology function produces organism, that is to say, activity produces the organ or faculty fitted to perform the activity.[2] The psychic characteristics differentiating social groups are chiefly, and perhaps exclusively, due to diverse social activities. These activities are determined by innumerable causes, geographical, climatic, economic, political, intellectual, emotional, and personal.

The plasticity of a psychic group is due to the plasticity of the infant mind and brain, which is wonderfully capable of acquiring the language, thought forms, and differentiating characteristics of any group in which it may be reared. To what extent this plasticity extends only carefully conducted experiments can show. In the higher Asiatic and European races we find it to be much greater than is generally supposed to be the case, but it is not improbable that the lowest races possess it in a much lower degree.

The relative fixity of a psychic group is due to the fact that in full-grown adults, who form the majority of every group, function has produced structure. Body, brain, and mind have "set" or crystallized in the mold provided by the social order. Influences sufficiently powerful to transform the young have little effect on the adult. The relative fixity of a psychic group is also due to the difficulty—well-nigh impossibility—of bringing new psychic influences to bear on all members of the group simultaneously. The majority, being oblivious to the new psychic forces, maintain the old psychic regime. The difficulty of reform, of transforming a social order, is principally due to these two causes.

The "character" of a people (psychic group) consists of its more or less unconscious, because structuralized or incarnate, ideas, emotions, and volitions. Chief among them are those concerning the character of God, the nature and value of man and woman, the necessary relation of character to destiny, the nature and meaning of life and death, and the nature and the authority of moral law. In proportion as the social order incorporates high or low views on these vital subjects, is the character of the people elevated and strong, or debased and weak.

The destiny of a people, and the role it plays in history, are determined not by chance nor yet by environment, but in the last analysis by its own character. Yet this character is not something given it complete at the start, an intrinsic psychical inheritance, nor is it dependent for transmission on biological heredity, passing only from parents to offspring. Character belongs to the sphere of social psychic life and is the subject of social heredity. Through social intercourse the moral character dominating a psychic group may be transmitted to members of an alien psychic group. This usually takes place through missionary activity. The moral character of a psychic group may in this way be fundamentally transformed, and with character, destiny.

Floating ideas, not yet woven into the warp and woof of life, not yet incarnate in the individual or in the social order, have little influence on the character of the individual or the group, however beautiful, true, or elevating such ideas may be in themselves. The character of a people is to be judged, therefore, not by the beauty or elevation of every idea that may be found in its literature, but only by those ideas that have been assimilated, that have become incorporated into the social order. These determine a people's character and destiny. According as these ideas persist in the social order, is its character permanent.

Progress consists of expanding life, communal and individual, extensive and intensive, physical and psychical. True progress is balanced. High communal development, that is, highly organized society, is impossible without the wide attainment of highly developed individuals. Progressive mastery of nature likewise is impossible apart from growing psychic development in all its branches, emotional, intellectual and volitional, communal and individual.

Historically, communalism is the first principle to emerge in consciousness. To succeed, however, it must be accompanied by at least a certain degree of individualism, even though it be quite implicit. The full development of the communal principle is impossible apart from the correspondingly full development of the individual principle. These are complementary principles of progress. Each alone is impossible. In proportion as either is emphasized at the expense of the other, is progress impeded. Arrested civilizations are due to the disproportionate and excessive development of one or the other of these principles.

Personality, expressing and realizing itself in communal and individual life, in objective and subjective forms, is at once the cause and the goal of progress. Social and psychic evolution are, therefore, in the last analysis, personal processes. The irreducible and final factor in social evolution and in social science is personality; for personality is the determinative factor of a human being.

Progress in personal development consists of increasing extent and accuracy of knowledge, refinement and elevation of emotions, and nobility and reliability of volitions. Progress in personal development requires the individual to pass from objective heterocratic to subjective autocratic or self-regulative ethical life. He must pass from the traditional to the enlightened, from the communal to the individualistic stage in ethics and religion. He must feel with increasing force the binding nature of the supra-communal sanctions for communal and individual life, accepting the highest dictates of the enlightened moral consciousness as the laws of the universe. But this means that the individual must secure increasing insight into the immutable and eternal laws of spiritual being and must identify his personal interests, his very self with those laws, with the Heart of the. Universe, with God himself. Only so will he become completely autonomous, self-regulative. Only thus will the individual become and remain an altruistic communo-individual, fitted to meet and survive the relaxation of the historic communal and supra-communal sanctions for communal and individual life, a relaxation induced by growing political liberty and growing intellectual rejection of primitive or defective religious beliefs.

Progress in personality is thus at bottom an ethico-religious process. The wide attainment of developed personality permits the formation of enlarging highly organized psychic groups, accompanied by increasing specialization of its individual members. This communal expansion, ramifying organization and individual specialization, secures increasing extensive and intensive intellectual understanding of the universe, and this in turn active mastery of nature, with all the consequences of growing ease and richness of life.

Ethico-religious, autonomous personality is thus the tap-root of highly developed and permanently progressive civilizations. Personality is, therefore, the criterion of progress. Mere ease of physical life, freedom from anxiety, light-hearted, care-free happiness, mastery of nature, material civilization, highly developed art, literature, and music, or even refined culture, are partial and inadequate, if not positively false, criteria.

Personality, as a nature, is an inherent psychic heritage shared by all human beings. It is transmitted only from parents to offspring, and its transmission depends only on that relation. Personality, as a varying psychic characteristic, is a matter of social inheritance, and is profoundly dependent, therefore, on the nature of the social order and the social evolution.

Religion, as incorporated in life, is the most important single factor determining the personality and character of its adherents, either hindering or promoting their progress.

Japanese social and psychic evolution have in no respects violated the universal laws of evolution. Japanese personal and other psychic characteristics are the product not of essential, but of social inheritance and social evolution. Japan has recently entered into a new social inheritance from which she is joyfully accepting new conceptions and principles of communal and individual life. These she is working into her social organism.

Already these are producing profound, and we may believe permanent, transformations in her social order and correspondingly profound and permanent transformations of her character and destiny.



THE END



INDEX

"Abdication": in church work, 84; due to past social conditions, 86; explains prominence of young men, 86, 161

AEsthetic characteristics: development unbalanced, 174; speech and conduct, 178; development of masses, 180; development, social not racial, 188

Adoption; family maintained, 215

Affection: post-marital, 102; its expression, 105

Agnosticism, old not new, 247

Alcock, Sir Rutherford: quotation misleading, 172; on untruthfulness, 255

Altruism, social or racial? 365

Ambition, 137

Ancestral worship and the importance of sons, 98

Apotheosis, 147; "Divine right of kings," 151; in Japan expresses unity, 152

Architectural development and social heredity, 188

Arisaka, Colonel, inventions, 207

Arnold, Sir Edwin, 16, 17

Art; simplicity its characteristic, 173; lacking the nude, 175-177; its ideal in representing gods and men, 174; defects, 184; original or imitative? 203; not "impersonal," 351

Artistic and inartistic contrasts, 184

Aston, Mr. W.G.: on poetic form, 187; intellectual inferiority of Japanese claimed, 218; "Japanese Literature," 228

Baelz, Dr. E., measurements of skull, 191

"Bakufu," "curtain government," 214

Bargaining, a personal experience, 212

Baths, public, 274; cleanliness, 316

Birthday festivals, 349; method of reckoning age, 350

Brain weights, comparative figures, 190

Brown, Rev. S.R., 90

Buckley, Prof. E., Phallic worship, 325

Buddhism: relation to the family, 112; suppression of emotion, 166; modified in Japan, 197; early influence, 204; teachings about woman, 259; lack of moral teachings, 269; religious ecstasy, 297; nature and history, 306, 307; terms "ingwa" and "mei," 319; "impersonal"? 377-388; introspection, 378; salvation through self, 379; consciousness of self, highly developed, 379-380; attributes no worth to self, 380; failure of its influence, 381; mercy to animals and shallow reasoning, 381; thought of self an intellectual abstraction, 383; not impersonal, but abstract, 384; doctrine of illusion, 384; failure of social order, 385; popular acceptance not philosophical, 386; not logically carried out, 389-390. appeal to personal activity, 390. conversion of a priest to Christianity, 394. conception of God, 398. the universe characterized, 400. Nirvana, 400. supplementary to Shintoism, 407. popularity explained, 408. individualism defective, 408. not exclusive in any land, 421.

Buddhistic doctrines and sociological consequences, 388.



Caricature in art: its prominence, 177.

Cary's, Rev. Otis, "Japan and Its Regeneration," 10.

Chamberlain, Prof. B.H., 17, 55, 159. quotation on imitation,—over-emphasis, 196. people irreligious, 287.

Character and destiny, 445. how judged, 446

Children: their festivals, 96. love for the young in Occident and Orient compared, 97. infanticide, 100.

Chinese characters and the common schools, 192.

Chinese philosophy not accepted without question, 200.

Christianity: relation to the family, 111-114. the support of new ideals, 112. fluctuating interest in, 162, 163. influence on woman, 168. criticised by a Japanese, 231. relation to new social order, 282. its growth in Japan, 308. monotheism, its attraction, 311. its view of the universe, 399. involving communalism and individualism, 415.

Civilization: two types in conflict, 13. social not racial, 28. its rapid modernization, 30.

Clark, Pres., 90

Cleanliness: exaggerated reputation, 315, 316.

Cocks of Tosa: the abnormal, 178.

Communalism: and human progress, 332, 333. defined, 361. its altruism, 367. throws light on religious history, 404. difficulty of combining it with individualistic religious elements, 414. Japan appreciates its spirit, 417

Comte, 22.

Conceit, 139. not the only conceited nation, 142.

Concubinage: children of the Emperor, 151. Buddhistic and Confucian teaching, 259. its sociological interpretation, 260. increase of, 278. statistics of, 279.

Confidence and suspicion, 120. feudal explanation, 121.

Confucian ethics: leave gods alone, 286, 287. antidote to Buddhism, 390.

Confucianism: its relation to the family, 112. modified in Japan, 197. metaphysical foundation of, 228. its relation to morality, 269. nature and history of, 307, 308. its doctrines restored, 409. its limitations, 410. not a religion, 411. cause of failure, 412.

Confucius and Lao-tse about returning good for evil, 128. influence opposed to progress, 204.

Constitution, authority from Emperor, 149.

Conversation: realistic baldness, 179.

Courtesy: conventional not racial, 182. phrases of, 211. not proof of "impersonality," 362, 363.

Culture: more apparent than real, 181.

Curiosity: real though concealed,—illustration, 166.

"Curtain government," its significance, 214.



Daimyo, a figurehead, 214.

Darwin, 22

Decoration of rooms, 171

Dening, Mr, Walter, lack of idealism, 233

De Quatrefages, African brains, 191

Deity: conception of, 310; monotheistic terms, 311; common people, 391

Disposition: apparently cheerful, 115; pessimists out of sight, 116

Divorce: grounds for, 56; frequency of, 99; Civil Code of 1898, 265; statistics, 267; divorce and "impersonality," 352, 355

Doshisha, endangered, 123, 124; American benefactors of, 281

Drama and novel: weakness explained, 187

Drummond, 22

Dwarfed plants,—delight in the abnormal, 177



Eastern and Western civilizations blending, 30-32

Educational Department and Imperial Edict, 328

Emotional nature, 82-84; due to social order, 169

Emperor: concubines and children of, 151

English study and methods of thinking, 212

Ethics: pivotal points, 283

Etiquette: superficial not radical requirements, 183; its collapse explained, 183; relation to imagination, 235

Evolution: real explanation of progress, 24-27, 33-34; national, 332-343; intellectual, 419; Involution one half the process, 425; defined, 440

Express train, "nominal" destination, 216



Fairbanks, Prof., 20

"Falling in love" not recognized, 102

Family life: false registration checks affection, 107

Far East: quotation from, adaptation of foreign systems, 208

Farmer, higher rank than merchant, 257 (note)

Fate: "Ingwa," in development of personality, 386

Feudal times: moderation, 118; courage cultivated, 153, 154; trade, 284

Fickleness: its manifestation, 159; a modern trait, 160; shown chiefly in methods, 160; among Christians, apparent not real, 161

Filial obedience: extreme application, 263; piety, moral ideal, 249; piety and religion, 322

Fiske, 22

Flexibility of mental constitution, 77-78

Flowering trees, 171

Forty-seven Ronin, 89, 250

Freedom: relation of belief to the fact, 387

Fukuzawa, Mr., on monogamy, 109, 112; condemning concubinage, 279; on religion, 287

Furniture; recent introduction, 181

Future life: Shinto, Confucian, 318; Buddhistic, 319



"Geisha," dancing girl, vivacity, 168

Generalization, capacity for, 220; use of philosophical terms, 221

Giddings, Prof., 19, 22

"Go-between," illustrations, 210; advantages, 211

God: Greek, Buddhist, Christian, 399; conceptions compared, 400

Governmental initiative: explains rapid reforms, 201

Gratitude: religious sentiment, 323; ingratitude shown 324

Greek universe characterized, 400

Green, T.H., 397 (note)

Greene, Dr. D.C., teaching of Shinto sect, 269

Griffis, W.E., on suicide, 155; on religions, 315

Gubbins, introduction to translation of New Civil Code of Japan, 86; on woman's position, 268



Harris, Townsend, quoted, 132; regulation by authority, 204; as to untruthfulness, 256

Hawaii, musical development, 185

Head, size of, 190

Hearn, Mr. Lafcadio, 16, 17, 68; mistaken contention, 263; privacy, 275; gratitude, 323

Hegel, 345; "Nothing" and Universal Soul of Buddhism, 383 (note)

Heredity: social and physiological contrasted, 21; defined and analyzed, 439

Heroes and hero-worship, 89-95; "The forty-seven Ronin" as heroes, 89; craving for modern heroes, 90-92; Omi Sajin, 93; Dr. Neesima, 375

Hirase, Mr., scientist, 207

History, research suppressed, 205; its claims, 206; apparent credulity of scholars due to social system, 207

"Holy towels," physical disease, 314

Honesty: decline of, 280; explanation, 282

"Honorifics," shades of courtesy, 179; indefiniteness of speech, 211

Houses, privacy impossible, 273

Housewife, simple requirements, 181



Idealizing tendency, 94, 236

Idols, imported feature of Japanese religion, 174

Ikeno, Mr., scientific discovery, 207

Illusion, 398

Imagination: is it lacking? 233; shown in etiquette, political life, ambition, self-conceit, etc., 235; seen in optimism, 240; related to fancy,—caricature, 241; not disproved by imitation, 242; sociological explanation, 243; constructive, 246; suppression of, 246

Imitation in Japanese progress, 78-81; creditable characteristic, 196

Immorality, increase of, 261

Impassiveness, "putty-face," 164

Imperial and popular sovereignty, conflict between, 152-153

Imperial Edict, 328

Imperialists during the Shogunate, 146

Imperial succession of Oriental type, 150

"Impersonality": Hegel, 345: definitions contradictory, 347, 348; related, to art, 351; family life, 352; divorce, 352; "falling in love," 354; definition, 359, 360; outcome of social order, 361; not proved by courtesy of people, 362, 363, nor by lack of personal pronouns, 368; arguments against, 377; diverse elements analyzed, 381; objection to term, 385

"Impersonality" and altruism, 365

Impractical idealism: claimed by Japanese, 236; illustrations, 237, 238

"In," and "Yo," significance of, 221

India and Japan contrasted, 32-34

Indirectness, 210

Individual, small value, 258

Individualism: expressed, 245, 246; changing social order and honesty, 282; importance of, 334; how possible, 335; defined, 361; easy acceptance explained, 413

Individualistic religion as a sociological factor in higher, human evolution, 418

Infanticide, 100-101

"Ingwa," fate, 386

Inouye, Dr. T., Japonicized Christianity, 39; claims for Japanese, 205; philosophical writer, 229

Intellectual characteristics, social, 244

Inventions: originality, 207

Irreligious phenomena explained, 302, 303

Ishii, Mr., father of orphan asylums in Japan, 94, 131, 145

Isolation of nations impossible, 71

Ito, Marquis, on religion, 288

Iyeyasu: his testament, 253; use of Confucian doctrines, 409



Japanese people: international responsibility, 13; need of understanding them, 15-20; change of opinion regarding, 23-25; defects, conscious of, 143; acquaintance with, 428; reasons for difficulty in, acquaintance with, 429, 430; secret of acquaintance, 431

Japan Mail: quotation, 130; originality of Japanese art, 203: on wealth, 277; on honesty, 280; on acquaintance, 428

Jealousy and women, 127-128



Kato, Mr. H., 229; on religion, 288; patriotism is loyalty to throne, 373

"Ki," defined, 221

Kidd, 22

Kissing unknown, 105

Kitazato, Dr., scientific research, 207

Knapp, Mr. A.M., 16

Knox, Dr. G.W., quotation, 199; "A Japanese Philosopher," 228; translator of Muro Kyuso, 249



Ladd, Prof. G.T., 94; sentimentality of Japanese, 234

Language: its acquirement and Japanese students, 194; diversities of, not due to diversities in brain type, 195

Lao-tse, on doing good in return for evil, 128

Le Bon's physiological theory of character inadequate, 13-20; quotation, 51; dissent from opinion, 168; quotation, 424

Le Conte, 22

Literature, ancient, its impurity, 253

Lowell, Mr. Percival, "The Soul of the Far East," 103, 344; Japanese unimaginative, 234; opinion criticised, 241; "sense and incense," 286; pilgrimages, 291; "impersonality," 359, 363, 374; teaching of philosophic Buddhism, 378

Loyalty and religion, 322; sentimental, 148, 149

Lunatics and lepers, cruel treatment, 130



Magic formulae, 320

Man and nature: differing artistic treatment of, 175

Manners; influenced by Western ways, 182

Marriage, Civil Code of 1898, 265

Marsh, Prof., size of Japanese brain, 190

"Matter-of-factness" explained, 245

Memorizing: mechanical, 222; defective method, 223; as related to higher mental powers, 223

Memory; power overrated, 192; in daily affairs not exceedng

Occidental, 193; characteristics sociological, not biological, 194

Mnemonic power and social selection, 193

Mencius, teaching, the "Way" of Heaven and Earth, 250

Mental faculties: are the Japanese deficient? 218; power of generalization, 221

Metaphysical tendencies, 227: denial of ability unjustifiable, 227

Metaphysics and ethics, 228

Monotheism, why attractive, 312

Morality: courage in persecucution, 156; illustration, 158; discrimination developed, 249; parents, children, patriots, 249; ideals communal, 255; standards differing for men and women, 263; teaching focused on rulers, 270; Imperial Edict, 271; standards of, and individualism, 275, 276; social, not racial, 283; on authority, 284; morality and Old Japan, 261, 264

Motora, Prof. Y., 229

Mueller, Prof. Max, statement about Vedas, 193

Murata rifle, invention of, 207

Muro Kyuso, philosopher, 249; ancient books condemned, 252; on immorality, 286; teachings, 299, 300

Music, Japanese deficiency, 185



Nakashima, Prof. Rikizo, 229

Nash, Prof. H.S., on Apotheosis in Rome, 153

National life, stimulus from the West, 43-48

Natural scenery in art, 173

Neesima, Dr., founder of the Doshisha, 94; monotheism, 311; his character, 375

"Netsuke," comical carvings, 241

New aeon, characterized, 14; the consequences, 15

Newton's, Rev. J.C.E., "Japan: Country, Court, and People" 10, 46

"Nichiren," a sect, 198

Nirvana characterized, 400

Nitobe's, Prof. J., "Bushido: The Soul of Japan," 10

"Nominal": Pedigree, 215; church contributions, 216; express train, 216

"Nominality": illustrated in history, 213; in family life, 214; in Christian work, 216; explained by old order, 217; giving way under Western influence, 217

Norman, Mr. Henry, 17; his "Real Japan," 46

Nude in art: its lack, 175-177



Obsequiousness, 140

Occident and Orient: conflict not unending, 13; social intercourse and mutual influence, 436

Occidental civilization; a defect in, 71

Ohashi, Junzo, opposed to Western thought, 254

Old Japan, 35-37; its oppression, 53, 54; emptiness of common life, 54; condition of woman, 54, 56; divorce, 56, 57; moral and legal maxims, 252, 253; its morality, 244, 261

"Omi Sajin," Sage of Omi, 93

Oriental characteristics: are they distinctive? 422; general opinion of, 423; view of author, 425; social, not racial, 425, 434

Originality in art, 203; judicious imitation, 209

Orphan asylums, 131

Oyomei, 228



Patriotism, 48-51; relation to apotheosis, 144, 158; to war, 145; Christian orphans, 145

Peasants, stolidity, 165

Pedigree, "nominal" not actual ancestry, 215

Peery, Dr., Japanese philosophical incompetence, 225

Personality: 21-22; importance of, 342; defined, 356-357; characteristics of, 358; "strong" and "weak," 374, 375; Confucian ethics, 390; Supreme Being, 391; gods of popular Buddhism, 391; idea grasped by Japanese, 393; sketch of development, 394; racial or social inheritance, 395; progress in ethico-religious process, 447; the criterion of progress, 447

Personality in conception of nationality, 373

Personal pronouns, their lack possible proof of personality, 369; "honorific" particles, 368; substitutes, 370, 371

Pfleiderer, Prof., religious deficiency of Japanese, 286

Phallicism: its suppression, 325; Western influence, 326

Philosophy: Occidental ignorance of its history in Japan, 200; terms used, 221; Japanese students of, 229; individuals interested, 229

Philosophical ability, 225-232; Japanese claims, 225; constructive power, 226; writers mentioned, 229; East and West compared, 231

Pilgrimages: statistics, 290-291; immorality, 326

Poetry characterized, 186

Powder, smokeless, invention of, 207

Pride, sociological explanation, 19, 21

Progress, modern characteristic, 52-60; defined, 57; light-heartedness no proof of, 59; its method, 61-71; recognition of individual worth, 63-67; knowledge of implements and methods, 67-70; imitation, 78-81; passion for it, 143

Psychic nature and social life, 439

Psychic evolution, 444

Psychic function and psychic organism, 445

Psychological similarities, Japanese and Anglo-Saxon, 189

Public speaking, fluency, 219

"Putty-face," 164



"Race-soul," 444

Ransome, Mr. Stanford, quoted, 51; "Japan in Transition," 46

Reforms, governmental initiative, 201

Religion: its characteristics social, not racial, 309; loyalty and filial piety, 322; liberty in belief, 327; the Imperial Edict, 328; forms determined by history, 329; the problem of to-day, 414; Religions classified, 421

Religious or not? appearances explained, 286; judged by phenomena, 288; prayer, shrines, charms, 292; Buddha-shelves, God-shelves, 293; emotion and social training, 296; emotion shown in abstraction, 297

Religious life, 404, 421; communal, 404; present difficulty in Japan, 420

Renaissance of Japan, 29-30

Revenge: the ancient law, 128; teachings of Confucius and Lao-tse, 128-129

Reverence, apparent lack of, 304

"Ri" defined, 221

Roman alphabet: adoption recommended by many, 192

"Roundaboutness": characteristic of speech and action, 211; recent improvement, 212



Sadness and isolation of many, 116

Sage of Omi, see "Omi Sajin."

Salvation and sin, 314; Buddhist and Christian, 379

Samurai: high mental power, social leaders, impractical, 244; their relation to trade, 252; new ideals, 256; revolt from religious forms, 298

Segregation and divergent evolution, 443

Self-confidence not without grounds, 141, 143; reorganization by young men, 141-142

Self-control: moral teaching, 250; Kujuro, the self-controlled, 251

Sensitiveness to environment, 72, 81; illustrated by students abroad, 73, by life in Japan, 73-77

Shimose, Mr., invention, smokeless powder, 207

"Shinshu," "Reformed" Buddhism, 198

Shinto: nature and history, 305, 306; personal gods, 391; communal, 405; no longer a religion, 405; world view, 406; religious sanction for social order, 407; revived, 412

Sin, terminology, 313; consciousness of, 317; instance of conversion, 318

Shusi, 228

Social evil, the, 261 (note)

Social segregation and social divergence, 21

Social and racial unity distinguished, 443

Social evolution convergent, 14; principle revealed, 15; personal process, 446

Social heredity, transmitting results of toil, 71

Social intercourse of Occident and Orient, 436

Social order from the West, 413; the parting of the ways, 414

Sociological theory of: character, 14, 446; pride, 30; fear of ridicule, 73; cruelty, 135; kindness, 136; stolidity, 163; power of generalization, 222; philosophical development, 231; apparent deficiency in imagination, 236; differences characterizing Eastern and Western psychic nature, 247, 435; untruthfulness, 256; concubinage, 260; religious characteristics, 309, 321; the suppression of Phallicism, 327; religious tolerance, 329; divorce and "falling in love," 355; courtesy, 363, 364; the personal pronoun, 372; the failure of Buddhism, 385; the conception of Fate, 387

Sociology and individual religion, 405; and Shintoism, 407

Southerland, 23

"Soul of Japan," the, 144

"Soul of the Far East," quotation, 234

Spencer, 22

Stolidity: easily distinguished from stoicism, 164, 165; the peasants, 165; social, not racial, 167; cultivated, 168

Students: testimony of foreign teachers, 218; at home and abroad, 219

Suicide, a matter of honor, 154-156

Sutra, translation of, 402

Suspiciousness and military feudalism, 125-126



Taguchi, Dr., brain statistics, 190

Tai-ku Reform, epoch-making period, 201

Takahashi, Mr. G., 229; the monks and consciousness of sin, 317

Taste and lack of taste in woman's dress, 182

Temples, statistics, 296

Tokugawa Shogunate, 38-40; how overthrown, 40-43; prohibitive of progress, 204; last of "Curtain governments," 214

Torture, in Japan, 132; in Europe, 133

Toys and toy-stores, 96

Trade estimates, 256; Old Japan, the Greeks, the Jews compared, 257, note; trade and the feudal order, 284

Transmigration, 319; theory illogical, but helpful, 389

Truthfulness, undeveloped, 255

Tyranny and Western wives 106



Unaesthetic phenomena, 179



Verbeck, Dr. G.F., 91

Visionary tendency, 236, 237

Vivacity, Geisha girl, 168

Wallace, 22

Ward, 22

"Way," see Muro Kyuso, 250; reference to, 287

Wealth increasing, 277

Wedding, Prince Imperial, 268; Imperial silver wedding, 268

Woman: obedience, 55, 56; estimates of East and West contrasted, 102-103; Western estimates, recent growth, 111, 113 (note); Buddhist and Confucian teaching, 112, 259; jealousy, 127; her position, 258; influenced by Hindu philosophy, 258; improvement, 268

Writing, a fine art, 173



Xavier, Francis, 308



Yamaguchi, Mr., quotation, 149; the Imperial throne, 373

"Yamato Damashii," see "The Soul of Japan."

"Yumei-mujitsu," see "Nominality."



FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote A: "Things Japanese," p. 156.]

[Footnote B: Let not the reader gather from the very brief glance at the attainments of New Japan, that she has overtaken the nations of Christendom in all important respects; for such is far from the case. He needs to be on his guard not to overestimate what has been accomplished.]

[Footnote C: Prof. B.H. Chamberlain.]

[Footnote D: Only since the coming of the new period has it become possible for a woman to gain a divorce from her husband.]

[Footnote E: Chapter xxix. Some may care to read this chapter at this point.]

[Footnote F: Cf. chapter ii.]

[Footnote G: "Kokoro," by L. Hearn, p. 31.]

[Footnote H: Japan Mail, September 30, 1899.]

[Footnote I: Part II. p. xxxii.]

[Footnote J: Japan Mail, June 4, 1898, p. 586.]

[Footnote K: If all that has been said above as to the relative lack of affection between husband and wife is true, it will help to make more credible, because more intelligible, the preceding chapter as to the relative lack of love for children. Where the relation between husband and wife is what we have depicted it, where the children are systematically taught to feel for their father respect rather than love, the relation between the father and the children, or the mother and the children, cannot be the same as in lands where all these customs are reversed.]

[Footnote L: The effect of Christian missions cannot be measured by the numbers of those who are to be counted on the church rolls; almost unconsciously the nation is absorbing Christian ideals from the hundreds of Christian missionaries and tens of thousands of Christian natives. The necessities of the new social order make their teachings intelligible and acceptable as the older social order did not and could not. This accounts for the astonishing change in the anti-Christian spirit of the Japanese. This spirit did not cease at once on the introduction of the new social order, nor indeed is it now entirely gone. But the change from the Japan of thirty years ago to the Japan of to-day, in its attitude toward Christianity, is more marked than that of any great nation in history. A similar change in the Roman Empire took place, but it required three hundred years. This change in Japan may accordingly be called truly miraculous, not in the sense, however, of a result without a cause, for the causes are well understood.

Among the Christians, especially, the old order is rapidly giving way to the new. Christianity has brought a new conception of woman and her place in the home and her relation to her husband. Japanese Christian girls, and recently non-Christian girls, are seeking an education which shall fit them for their enlarging life. Many of the more Christian young men do not want heathen wives, with their low estimate of themselves and their duties, and they are increasingly unwilling to marry those of whom they know nothing and for whom they care not at all. Already the idea that love is the only safe foundation for the home is beginning to take root in Japan. This changing ideal is bringing marked social changes. In some churches an introduction committee is appointed whose special function is to introduce marriageable persons and to hold social meetings where the young people may become acquainted. Here an important evolution in the social order is taking place before our eyes, but not a few of the world's wise men are too exalted to see it. Love and demonstrative affection between husband and wife will doubtless become as characteristic of Japan in the future as their absence has been characteristic in the past. To recapitulate: these distinctive characteristics of the emotional life of the Japanese might at first seem to be so deep-rooted as to be inherent, yet they are really due to the ideas and customs of the social order, and are liable to change with any new system of ideas and customs that may arise. The higher development of the emotional life of the Japanese waits now on the reorganization of the family life; this rests on a new idea as to the place and value of woman as such and as a human being; this in turn rests on the wide acceptance of Christian ideals as to God and their mutual relations. It involves, likewise, new ideals as to man's final destiny. In Japan's need of these Christian ideals we find one main ground and justification, if justification be needed, for missionary enterprise among this Eastern people.]

[Footnote M: Chapter v. p. 82.]

[Footnote N: P. 133]

[Footnote O: "Resume Statistique l'Empire du Japan," published by the Imperial Cabinet, 1897.]

[Footnote P: As illustrating the point under discussion see portions of addresses reported in "The World's Parliament of Religions," vol. ii. pp. 1014, 1283.]

[Footnote Q: Japan Mail, December 10, 1898.]

[Footnote R: I have found it difficult to secure exact information on the subject of the Imperial concubines (who, by the way, have a special name of honor), partly for the reason that this is not a matter of general information, and partly because of the unwillingness to impart information to a foreigner which is felt to tarnish the luster of the Imperial glory. A librarian of a public library refused to lend a book containing the desired facts, saying that foreigners might be freely informed of that which reveals the good, the true, and the beautiful of Japanese history, customs, and character, but nothing else. By the educated and more earnest members of the nation much sensitiveness is felt, especially in the presence of the Occidental, on the subject of the Imperial concubinage. It is felt to be a blot on Japan's fair name, a relic of her less civilized days, and is, accordingly, kept in the background as much as possible. The statements given in the text in regard to the number of the concubines and children are correct so far as they go. A full statement might require an increase in the figures given.]

[Footnote S: P. 59.]

[Footnote T: P. 119.]

[Footnote U: Aston's "Japanese Literature," p. 29.]

[Footnote V: "Japanese Literature," p. 24.]

[Footnote W: Cf. chapter xxxiii.]

[Footnote X: Gustave Le Bon maintains, in his brilliant, but sophistical, work on "The Psychology of Peoples," that the "soul of a race" unalterably determines even its art. He states that a Hindu artist, in copying an European model several times, gradually eliminates the European characteristics, so that, "the second or third copy ... will have become exclusively Hindu." His entire argument is of this nature; I must confess that I do not in the least feel its force. The reason the Hindu artist transforms a Western picture in copying it is because he has been trained in Hindu art, not because he is a Hindu physiologically. If that same Hindu artist, taken in infancy to Europe and raised as a European and trained in European art, should still persist in replacing European by Hindu art characteristics, then the argument would have some force, and his contention that the "soul of races" can be modified only by intermarriage of races would seem more reasonable.]

[Footnote Y: "The Human Species," p. 283.]

[Footnote Z: Ibid., p. 282.]

[Footnote AA: Ibid., p. 384.]

[Footnote AB: The manuscript of this work was largely prepared in 1897 and 1898. Since writing the above lines, a vigorous discussion has been carried on in the Japanese press as to the advantages and disadvantages of the present system of writing. Many have advocated boldly the entire abandonment of the Chinese character and the exclusive use of the Roman alphabet. The difficulties of such a step are enormous and cannot be appreciated by anyone not familiar with the written language of Japan. One or the strongest arguments for such a course, however, has been the obstacle placed by the Chinese in the way of popular education, due to the time required for its mastery and the mechanical nature of the mind it tends to produce. In August of 1900 the Educational Department enacted some regulations that have great significance in this connection. Perhaps the most important is the requirement that not more than one thousand two hundred Chinese characters are to be taught to the common-school children, and the form of the character is not to be taught independently of the meaning. The remarks in the text above are directed chiefly to the ancient methods of education.]

[Footnote AC: Griffis' "Religions of Japan," p. 272.]

[Footnote AD: P. 24.]

[Footnote AE: Far East for January, 1898.]

[Footnote AF: January 20, 1900.]

[Footnote AG: Japan Mail, November 12, 1898.]

[Footnote AH: P. 17.]

[Footnote AI: P. 18.]

[Footnote AJ: P. 18.]

[Footnote AK: "History of the Empire of Japan," compiled and translated for the Imperial Japanese Commission of the World's Columbian Exposition.]

[Footnote AL: "Japanese Literature," p. 4.]

[Footnote AM: Cf. chapter xvi. p. 199.]

[Footnote AN: Cf. chapter xvii.]

[Footnote AO: Quotations from "A Japanese Philosopher" will be found in chapters xxiv. and xxvi.]

[Footnote AP: "Things Japanese," p. 133.]

[Footnote AQ: P. 213.]

[Footnote AR: P. 30.]

[Footnote AS: Cf. chapter vii.]

[Footnote AT: Cf. chapter xv. pp. 186, 187.]

[Footnote AU: Cf. chapters xvi. and xvii.]

[Footnote AV: Chapter xv.]

[Footnote AW: Chapters xix. and xx.]

[Footnote AX: P. 39.]

[Footnote AY: P. 36.]

[Footnote AZ: Pp. 42, 43.]

[Footnote BA: P. 45.]

[Footnote BB: P. 61.]

[Footnote BC: P. 120.]

[Footnote BD: P. 129.]

[Footnote BE: P. 130.]

[Footnote BF: Dickenson's "Japan," chapter vii.]

[Footnote BG: Cf. chapter xxi.]

[Footnote BH: P. 163.]

[Footnote BI: P. 169.]

[Footnote BJ: It is interesting to observe that the contempt of Old Japan for trade, and the feeling that interest and profit by commerce were in their nature immoral, are in close accord with the old Greek and Jewish ideas regarding property profits and interest. Aristotle held, for instance, that only the gains of agriculture, of fishing, and of hunting are natural gains. Plato, in the Laws, forbids the taking of interest. Cato says that lending money on interest is dishonorable, is as bad as murder. The Old Testament, likewise, forbids the taking of interest from a Jew. The reason for this universal feeling of antiquity, both Oriental and Occidental, lies in the fact that trade and money were not yet essential parts of the social order. Positive production, such as hunting and farming, seemed the natural method of making a living, while trade seemed unnatural—living upon the labor of others. That Japan ranked the farmer higher in the social scale than the merchant is, thus, natural. In moral character, too, it is altogether probable that they were much higher.]

[Footnote BK: Cf. chapter ix. p. 103.]

[Footnote BL: Chapter vi.]

[Footnote BM: Chapter xxix. p. 339.]

[Footnote BN: An anonymous writer, in a pamphlet entitled "How the Social Evil is Regulated in Japan," gives some valuable facts on this subject. He describes the early history of the "Social Evil," and the various classes of prostitutes. He distinguishes between the "jigoku" (unlicensed prostitutes), the "shogi" (licensed prostitutes), and the "geisha" (singing and dancing girls). He gives translations of the various documents in actual use at present, and finally attempts to estimate the number of women engaged in the business. The method of reaching his conclusions does not commend itself to the present writer and his results seem absurdly wide of the mark, when compared with more carefully gathered figures. They are hardly worth quoting, yet they serve to show what exaggerated views are held by some in regard to the numbers of prostitutes in Japan. He tells us that a moderate estimate for licensed prostitutes and for geisha is 500,000 each, while the unlicensed number at least a million, making a total of 2,000,000 or 10 per cent. of the total female population of Japan! A careful statistical inquiry on this subject has been recently made by Rev. U.G. Murphy. His figures were chiefly secured from provincial officers. According to these returns the number of licensed prostitutes is 50,553 and of dancing girls is 30,386. Mr. Murphy's figures cannot be far astray, and furnish us something of a basis for comparison with European countries. Statistics regarding unlicensed prostitutes are naturally not to be had.]

[Footnote BO: P. 148.]

[Footnote BP: June 25, 1898.]

[Footnote BQ: The last line of figures, those for 1897, is taken from Rev. U.G. Murphy's statistical pamphlet on "The Social Evil in Japan."]

[Footnote BR: It is stated that Mill's work on "Representative Government," which, translated, fills a volume of five hundred pages in Japanese, has reached its third edition.]

[Footnote BS: The Japan Mail for February 5, 1896; quoting from the Jiji Shimpo.]

[Footnote BT: The best summary of this discussion which I have seen in English is found in the Japan Mail for February 4, 1899.]

[Footnote BU: Japan Mail, January 14, 1899.]

[Footnote BV: Japan Mail, June 24, 1898.]

[Footnote BW: The constituency of the Doshisha consists principally of Kumiai Christians.]

[Footnote BX: "Occult Japan," p. 23.]

[Footnote BY: Cf. chapter xxiv.]

[Footnote BZ: "A Japanese Philosopher," p. 120.]

[Footnote CA: In immediate connection with this oft-quoted statement, however, I would put the following, as much more recent, and probably representing more correctly the Marquis's matured opinion. Mr. Kakehi, for some time one of the editors of the Osaka Mainichi Shinbun (Daily News), after an interview with the illustrious statesman in which many matters of national importance were discussed, was asked by the Marquis where he had been educated. On learning that he was a graduate of the Doshisha, the Marquis remarked: "The only true civilization is that which rests on Christian principles, and that consequently, as Japan must attain her civilization on these principles, those young men who receive Christian education will be the main factors in the development of future Japan."]

[Footnote CB: Chamberlain's "Things Japanese," p. 358.]

[Footnote CC: "Things Japanese," p. 70, and Murray's "Hand-book for Japan," p. 37.]

[Footnote CD: "Things Japanese," p. 93.]

[Footnote CE: P. 85.]

[Footnote CF: Cf. chapter xxiii. p. 271.]

[Footnote CG: By the term "centralization" I mean personal centralization. Political centralization is the gathering of all the lines of governmental authority to a single head or point. Personal centralization, on the contrary, is the development in the individual of enlarging and joyous consciousness of his relations with his fellow-countrymen, and the bringing of the individual into increasingly immediate relations of interdependence with ever-increasing numbers of his fellow-men, economically, intellectually, and spiritually. These enlarging relations and the consciousness of them must be loyally and joyfully accepted. They should arouse enthusiasm. The real unity of society, true national centralization, includes both the political and the personal phase. The more conscious the process and the relation, the more real is the unity. By this process each individual becomes of more importance to the entire body, as well as more dependent upon it. While each individual becomes with increasing industrial development more specialized in economic function, if his personal development has been properly carried on, he also becomes in mind and in character a micro-community, summing up in his individual person the national unity with all its main interests, knowledge, and character.]