REVIEWS
Japan: An Attempt at Interpretation. By LAFCADIO HEARN. New York: The Macmillan Co., 1904.
On p. 160 of W. E. Griffis' The Mikado's Empire is textual evi- dence that, so late as 1876, intelligent men, and theologians at that rather in sooth because they were theologians could harbor such atrocious notions about Shintoism, the ethnic faith of the Japanese, as the following : " Shinto is in no proper sense of the term a religion In its lower forms it is blind obedience to govern- mental and priestly dictates." The present reviewer bears these Christian apologists and heathen defamers " witness that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge." They wrote in the days when hierology (comparative religion) was still inchoate, for C. P. Tide's Elements did not appear in its English dress until 1877 ; and when Japan's abasement before the " Christian " powers was complete, and therefore everything Japanese assumed to be worth- less. But the reaction came, of course, and is now pretty well com- pleted. Japan's novel yet glorious art conquered the world ; Japan's new yet ever-victorious army has conquered Russia's imposing array ; and now Mr. Hearn completely routs the contemners of a great people's sincere faith. The consensus of hierologists that no people was ever found without a religion had already been given ; and the creed, cult, and ethics of Shintoism had been correctly described; but it remained for Mr. Hearn to give a more complete and intimate account than had previously been done of the ancestorism in Shinto and of its profound influence upon politics and morality.
It will surprise no one to learn that Mr. Hearn overdid his con- tention, just because such excess is the well-nigh inevitable reaction from the underestimate that he found current and sought to correct. As he states the case on p. 4: "Hitherto the subject of Japanese religion has been written of chiefly by the sworn enemies of that religion ; by others it has been almost entirely ignored." But now that "see-saw" has followed "see," we may hope to win a final equilibrium of correct appreciation. To this end several corrections are called for ; but, before they are made, clearness will be secured by
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