Saw w&gxgm KMinr. • ..-w^kr »,«.-• »■*>..••• •!* 10001 SoS&wt ^•gSuSF ksoimh \V JAPAN AND KOREA All Protestant Mission Stations in Japan, Korea, and Formosa are included. COMPILED BY S. W. BOGGS Scale 1:10,000,000 •Statute Miles 100 0 50 I - L. COPYRIGHT 1923 BY THE MISSIONARY EDUCATION MOVEMENT OF THE U S. AND CAN A0 A 2,5, LIBRARY OF THE THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY PRINCETON. N. J. Purchased by the Hamill Missionary Fund. DS 821 . F5 1923 Fisher, Galen Merriam, 1873 1955. Creative forces in Japan ; 1 — Jap. IN THE HEART OF RURAL JAPAN. MT. ASAMA, A LIVING VOLCANO, IN THE BACKGROUND i I /.V k ’ ' v , & MOV )' \ /' ■ ^ -,y - Creative Forces in Japan / / Galen M. Fisher Missionary Education Movement of the United States and Canada New York and The Central Committee on the United Study of Foreign Missions West Medford, Mass. Copyright, 1923, by the Missionary Education Movement of the United States and Canada Printed in the United States of America This book, unworthy though it be, is reverently dedicated to the memory of three great Jap¬ anese personalities, each of whom enriched my own life, as well as rendered distinguished service to the Kingdom of God in Japan. To Doctor Niisima Jo, known to history as a dauntless pioneer in both education and evan¬ gelism, but to me his name recalls the shy stranger who stayed at our home when I was a lad and left on my mind an indelible impres¬ sion of a soul yearning for the redemption of his own people. To Bishop Honda Yoitsu, a great shepherd of souls, a wise master-builder, and to me a spiritual father during my inexperienced years in Japan. Id the Honorable Ebara Soroku, eminent as an educator, a publicist, and an international¬ ist, but humble withal, and always accessible to disciples like myself who sought his counsel and aid. CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE Foreword . vi I. Assets and Liabilities of the Japanese People . i II. Militarism, Reaction, and Liberalism 31 III. Social Problems and Christian Solu¬ tions . 66 IV. Religious Resources and Problems. . 107 V. Epochs and Achievements of the Christian Movement . 142 VI. The Challenge of Today and Tomorrow 178 Appendix I ( Supplemental Material ) . . 223 Appendix II ( Bibliography ) .... 241 Index . 246 IV ILLUSTRATIONS FACING PAGE A Glimpse of Rural Japan . . Frontispiece A Textile Mill . 24 Christian Helpfulness for Factory Workers . 25 Toyohiko Kagawa and His Little Friends . 56 A Christian Social Settlement . 57 A Buddhist Temple Ceremony . 88 A Buddhist “Sunday School” ..... 89 Dr. Uemura and Dr. Ibuka . 120 Pastor Hatanaka and His Family . . . .121 Preaching at a Temple Festival . 152 A Sewing Class of Bible Women . . . .153 A Church in Osaka . 184 New Building at Aoyama Jo Gakuin . . .185 Christian Leaders of the Younger Generation . 216 Christian Leaders of the Younger Generation . 217 v FOREWORD The Japanese people rather than the Japanese gov¬ ernment form the central interest of this book. Writ¬ ten as it is at the request of the missionary education agencies of North America and Great Britain, it natu¬ rally focusses attention on those forces which most vitally affect the moral and religious welfare of the people and which therefore concern the Christian mis¬ sionary enterprise. The ruling purpose is not to de¬ scribe political, industrial, or even religious conditions for their intrinsic interest, but rather to present suffi¬ cient facts to enable occidental readers to draw sound conclusions regarding the relation of Christianity to the life of the Japanese people. Because the work is so brief and is intended primarily for Christian readers, the author has not attempted to maintain a purely scientific attitude, but has frequently stated convictions which are based on a wider range of knowledge and experience than could here be given. He believes, however, that enough evidence is adduced to demon¬ strate that the strongest hope for counteracting the germs of decay and for fulfilling the high potentialities in the social heritage of Japan, lies in implanting more widely the spirit and principles of Christ. Gigantic forces are in conflict in New Japan. People and government alike appear to be swept along by tides beyond their control. Yet the facts herein re¬ corded tend to show that in the welter there are dis¬ cernible great directive and creative forces. Some of VI them are ideals and traditions preserved from Old japan, and they are precious and powerful. But even more precious, more indispensable is the quiet but penetrating and transforming power which Christ has begun to exert in the life of Japan. He is the supreme source of those creative forces which alone offer hope for either East or West. He is the veritable fulfilment of the visions of Japan's noblest prophets and sages. The author spent twenty happy years in Japan. He believes in the people as a whole, and numbers among them many trusted friends. But friendship has not prevented a frank statement of the weak and menacing as well as the strong and promising aspects of Japanese character and institutions. To compare small things with great, the attempt has been made to emulate the appreciative but honest kind of criticism exemplified in Lord Bryce’s “American Commonwealth." Al¬ though this book was written for occidental students of Japan, the writer has said nothing which he would not gladly say to a Japanese friend. Note on Pronunciation The vowels in Japanese are pronounced nearly like the vowels in the musical scale, a as in fa, e as in re, i as in mi, o as in do, and u like oo in boot. In the dipthongs ci and ai both vowels are pronounced, but very rapidly as one sound. There is no accent, each syllable having prac¬ tically the same value, except where certain vowels are prolonged. Long and short vowels in Japanese mean simply the length of time given to them, not a difference in sound. For instance, in Osaka, the O has about twice the length of each of the other syllables. An important point is that each syllable ends with a vowel, except when the letter n ends a word, or when there is a double consonant, as in “Hok-kaido.” Double consonants are always both given their full value. Consonants have nearly the same sounds as in English. Ch as in child. G is always hard. L and v are lacking. Creative Forces in Japan I Assets and Liabilities of the Japanese People The heroes of any people are perhaps the surest index of their character. So long and so crowded with notable characters is the history of Japan that the modern Japanese youth has, in consequence, a superabundance of heroes to emulate. Our plan is to choose just enough of them to show what qualities the Japanese people most admire and themselves exemplify. I. the roll of japan's heroes The old-school Japanese historian and most of the school textbooks represent the Empire as having been founded in 660 b. c. by Jimmu Tenno, direct descen¬ dant of the Sun Goddess. The tales which recount the exploits of Jimmu and his successors are about as historical as the myths and legends of Greece and Rome. Not till the fourth century of our era does legend give place to the solid ground of history. Then appears Emperor Nintoku, revered for his fatherly benevolence toward his people, as illustrated in this well-known story: One day when Nintoku looked from his palace tower far and wide over the country, he saw no smoke arising from the houses and at once inferred that his subjects were too poor even to cook 2 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN rice. Accordingly, he intermitted for three years the customary forced labor of the people. During that period the palace fell into such disrepair that the rain entered the cracks and soaked the coverlets. But when Nintoku again surveyed the land from his tower, he beheld wreaths of smoke rising from every cottage, and he rejoiced exceedingly, saying, “My people’s poverty is none other than Our poverty; but my people’s prosperity is verily Our prosperity.” This tradition of the fatherly solicitude of the Throne for the people has happily been true of many of the emperors, and today, when revolutionary ideas of popular rights are abroad in the land, the Throne still remains inviolate in the reverent affection of the people. With equal veneration do the Japanese honor Prince Shotoku, who lived three centuries after Nintoku. He has been called “the Constantine of Japanese Buddhism,” for when the foreign faith was struggling to gain a foothold, he gave it his powerful support. Some years ago I saw at Tennoji, Osaka, the largest bell in the country, weighing, perhaps, ten tons, being hung in honor of Shotoku’s thirteen hundredth anni¬ versary. It is a good sign that the Japanese today delight to do honor to one who was indeed a prince, an enlightened statesman, advocating close intercourse with China, a believer in religion, and a patron of art and letters. It is to the laws drawn up by Shotoku about 610 a. d. that the Japanese attribute the trans¬ formation of their government from the patriarchal system, when the sovereign was only the head of a ASSETS AND LIABILITIES OF THE JAPANESE 3 group of tribal chiefs, to the imperial system of auto¬ cratic authority, which lasted until 1159 when the Shoguns, or military regents, eclipsed the Throne and feudalism began. Buddhism has played so mighty a part in Japanese culture that one is not surprised to find that several of the popular heroes were founders of Buddhist sects. Three of them stand preeminent : Kobo Daishi in the eighth century, founder of the Shingon (True Word) Sect, who may be compared with the mystics of Chris¬ tian history; Shinran in the early thirteenth century, a Buddhist Luther, founder of the Shin Sect, who de¬ nounced reliance on good works and celibacy and exalted heart-belief in the merits of Amida; and Nichiren, in the late thirteenth century, who revolted against the older sects and may be compared in his bigotry, patriotism, and missionary zeal with St. Paul before his conversion. Kobo Daishi is equally honored for his genius in in¬ venting the running script form of the forty-seven syllables. Without this simple syllabary all books would have continued to be written in the complicated Chinese ideographs, which even today are “Greek” to the common folk. The appeal of the passive virtues to the Japanese heart is illustrated by the fact that three of the most venerated men of recent centuries were scholars and saints, all of them bred on Confucian rather than Buddhist teachings. The most famous of them all was Nakae Toju, the Sage of Omi, whose sincere and lofty teachings and character so impressed the peasants that 4 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN the whole countryside became noted for its honesty. When I visited his humble cottage, preserved as when he lived in it, with the gnarled old wisteria vine ( toju) that he loved still growing beside it, I gladly removed my shoes in reverence as well as in accord with custom. Toju’s disciple Banzan is likewise numbered among the sages, though he was a conservancy engineer and economist as well as a saintly teacher. But it was his heroic willingness to endure persecution and exile rather than to betray his convictions which has won for him the homage of later generations. Coming to the nineteenth century we find the “farmer saint/’ Ninomiya Sontoku, who preached the gospel of industry, thrift, arid gratitude toward the gods of the fruitful earth. His homely wisdom breathes in these words, so like certain verses in the Sermon on the Mount : “We Japanese think that when we die we become gods or Buddhas. But I am sure it is impossible for a man to become a god or a Buddha when he dies if he is not one when he is living. It is just as impossible for a mackerel to become a dried flounder when it is dead, or for a cedar tree to become a pine tree when it is cut down, as it is for a man to become a god or a Buddha when he dies, if he is not one when he is living.” More stirring is the character of another peasant saint, Sakura Sogoro, who unflinchingly suffered cru¬ cifixion because he had dared to appeal in behalf of his fellow-peasants to the Shogun against the oppression of the local feudal baron. But the most ardent enthusiasm of the people has ASSETS AND LIABILITIES OF THE JAPANESE 5 always gone out, not toward the saints or the states¬ men, but toward the red-blooded fighters and knights errant whose deeds blaze forth on every page of me¬ dieval Japanese history. There is no one key to the interpretation of Japanese character, but the nearest approach to it is the samurai , or knight, with his ideals of courage and self-control and selfless loyalty. How the blood of every Japanese lad leaps as he hears some story-teller depict the matchless loyalty of Masashige, or as he beholds the drama of the Forty-seven Ronin (lordless samurai), who, after plotting patiently for many years, avenged the murder of their lord and then committed suicide by hara-kiri, or disembowel¬ ling, in the glad consciousness of a supreme duty nobly accomplished. The modern beau ideal of Japanese youths is either the giant soldier Saigo Takamori, who headed the futile rebellion of 1878, or General Nogi, the hero of Port Arthur, who lost his two sons in the siege, and finally, in 1912, committed hara-kiri, partly from remorse over the thirtv thousand lives his conduct of J the siege had cost and partly as a protest against the luxury and corruption among army officers. Both Saigo and Nogi were incorruptible patriots, unspar¬ ing in self-discipline, haters of sham. Several Christians have won a place in the roll of heroes far beyond the Christian circle. Chief among them is Joseph Hardy Neesima,* who, at a time when to leave Japan was to invite the death penalty, ran * This is the spelling familiar to American readers, but a more accurate rendering of the Japanese name is “Niisima.” 6 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN away to America in search of the true God, and re¬ turned to become the founder of Doshisha University and a leader of the infant Protestant Church. It was he who said: “Let us advance upon our knees,” and who during his lingering last illness prayed for each of his hundreds of students. Our gallery of heroes would be very incomplete if we did not add a few of the occidental characters vdiom the Japanese most revere. The list is not unlike one which an American or British youth might make, vet there are differences. Besides Socrates and Col- umbus, Bismarck, Gladstone, Washington, Lincoln, and Roosevelt, many educated Japanese would place St. Francis, Tolstoy, Mazzini, Karl Marx, and Dar¬ win. Jesus they would nearly all put in the foremost place, even though they knew only fragments of his life. But Caesar and Napoleon and modern captains of industry would also have numerous admirers. Thus far we have only hinted at the character of present-day Japanese by describing some of their heroes. No doubt the resulting impression is too favor¬ able. In honesty we should examine both sides of the shield, for it is our purpose to gain a faithful concep¬ tion of the liabilities no less than the assets of the Jap¬ anese people. It would, of course, be more congenial to focus attention only on their strong points, but to do that would not enable us to forecast the kind of influence they are likely to exert on other nations or to discover the places where the power of Christ is especially needed. It is well to disabuse our minds at the outset of the ASSETS AND LIABILITIES OF THE JAPANESE 7 notion that the Japanese are either super-men or mys¬ tery-men, A Japanese thinker thus exploded this no¬ tion for me: “It makes me smile to hear Westerners talk about the uncanny sublety and ability of us Japanese as though we were demigods. The fact is we are very ordinary, fallible folk, eager to be in the front rank, but with little besides ambi¬ tion and grit and a fear of Western nations to put us there/ ■ ’ Differences of language, religion, and custom do set up a barrier, but it is no harder for us to under¬ stand the Japanese than for them to understand us. It is hard, but not at all impossible either way for any person who will pay the price in sympathy, im¬ agination, and effort, instead of being satisfied with the hearsay deck-chair opinions of casual travelers and sensational writers. The Japanese are admitted by everyone who is well acquainted with them and their history to have developed a brilliant culture and to possess today capacities of a high order. Ap¬ proaching the subject, then, with a fair mind, we shall attempt first to see the Japanese as they are, which re¬ quires sympathy as well as knowledge, and later we shall discuss how they are being made better. II. MENTAL CAPACITIES AND CHARACTERISTICS In mental ability the Japanese rank high. Like the Chinese, they have, until recently, been brought up to learn by rote, but with surprising speed they have in¬ troduced Western education and scientific method. The mental ability of the Japanese has recently been 8 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN strikingly confirmed by the investigations of Professor Terman of Stanford University.* The philosophical ability of the Japanese has been over-rated. It is true that the more advanced stu¬ dents read Western philosophers and enjoy abstract discussion, but the bent of the people as a whole is decidedly practical and concrete. The rank and file, even more than in occidental countries, are appealed to through sentiment, story, and immediate practical advantage. Yet, in the field of scientific research not a few Japanese have attained eminence. The best known instances are Dr. Kitasato and Dr. Noguchi, whose brilliant work in bacteriology culminated in the discovery of the bacilli of plague and yellow fever and the remedy for beri-beri. Intellectual capacity of a large creative sort has been exhibited most notably by the Japanese in the realm of government and statesmanship. The organization of Japan by Iyeyasu, the Charlemagne of seventeenth century Japan, was a masterpiece of political genius, for the structure he devised functioned successfully for over two hundred years. The world knows what saga¬ city and foresight certain Japanese statesmen have ex¬ hibited in modern times. Mr. Tyler Dennett in his Americans in Eastern Asia has shown how the Japa¬ nese policy towards Korea, which was formulated thirty-five years ago, was steadfastly adhered to until it resulted logically in the annexation of Korea in 1910. It is customary to speak of the Japanese as strong in imitation but weak in invention, and there is some * See page 60. ASSETS AND LIABILITIES OF THE JAPANESE 9 truth in this assumption. But while they cannot lay claim to many great inventions or creative achieve¬ ments, they have never adopted ideas or institutions from other countries without so modifying and adding to them as to create something new. Even in pottery and weaving designs Japanese craftsmen have been accustomed to give an original shade or twist to each new piece, as foreign buyers often discover when they wish to match a color or a pattern. Their power of selective discrimination in gathering the best in all realms from other nations has been brilliantly illus¬ trated during the last fifty years. They may be said to have skimmed the cream from both East and West. One factor in their capacity to assimilate ideas from all quarters is their marked inquisitiveness, always the sign of a growing mind. Another prominent trait, lying at the base of most of the nation’s recent progress, is the passion for ed¬ ucation. The common school system was founded by Viscount Mori, an early Minister to the United States — and a Christian. He was aided by foreign advisers. The school enrolment now is as high as in any but the most advanced European nations, being over ninety-eight per cent of both boys and girls. One result is that nearly every Japanese under thirty years of age can read and write, and it is common to see the jinrikisha pullers and navvies reading newspapers and novels. It is a very poor school that is not filled to overflowing. Five or even ten times as many men as can be admitted take the stiff entrance examinations for the higher schools. Apprentices and artisans who 10 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN rise at daybreak and work ten or twelve hours are enroled by the thousands in evening schools. One of the schools teaching English only, in Kanda Ward, that hive of students in Tokyo, numbers from five to eight thousand pupils. Correspondence schools flour¬ ish. Girls have sold their virtue in order to earn money wherewith to educate their brothers or them¬ selves. But there are defects in the educational system which reflect weaknesses in the people. As in every bureaucratic country, uniformity and system have be¬ come a fetish. The private schools, especially those conducted by Christians, have rendered a great service by standing for variation and freedom for individual initiative, but they have found it exceedingly hard to resist the steam-roller of State regulation. Of late, however, the government authorities seem to be awakening to the need of just the elements which the private schools can supply, including the character- building power of Christ. Another weakness is the tendency to1 over-value examinations, lecture-notes, and degrees. Many a student crams, drinks coffee, and manages to get by the dreaded examination ogre, but he may have crippled his health in the bargain. Superficiality is not peculiar to Japanese students, but the very fact that Japan is as full of new ideas and books as a switchboard is of wires tempts some eager students to dip into one after the other only long enough to acquire the catch- words. If it be suggested that fickleness is a Japanese trait, I would reply that it is rash to make the assertion. ASSETS AND LIABILITIES OF THE JAPANESE n Only fifty years ago the entire menu of Western civ¬ ilization was served in one promiscuous course to the Japanese people. They forthwith tried to eat it all, but finding that impossible, began to dip into this and that and the other dish like tea-tasters. Any student of old Japan would be more likely to accuse the people of being set and stolidly slow and conservative than of being fickle. It will require another generation for the new molds of custom and thought to harden. The momentary fickleness, if it be such, means plasticity, a trait most welcome to all who would like to see the people recast in a Christian mold. The Japanese are a nation of artists. Their aes¬ thetic sensibility and the delicate physique of their cul¬ tivated classes sometimes make them appear feminine to an occidental observer. There is some truth in this, and it is rather in their favor than otherwise. As Dr. Nitobe has happily put it, “A Japanese gentleman feels like a woman and acts like a man.” Artistically the only modern people who approach them are the Italians. In what other land do peasants uncover in reverent delight before a beautiful landscape or a full- orbed moon? And the color-prints now so eagerly sought by connoisseurs the world over were created, not by cultured aristocrats, but by plebeian artisans, who found in such works, inimitably beautiful and whimsical by turn, an outlet for their pent-up humor and love of beauty. The unfailing harmony of soft colors and the simplicity of line are revelations of the moral as well as of the intellectual traits of the people. In the weird No dramas, also, are depicted with almost 12 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN Grecian beauty and force, the mystery and the pathos of life. The No is original with the Japanese. But Japan has given to the world no works either in literature or in art — unless it be the giant bronze statues of Buddha — which can compare in grandeur of conception or masculine vigor of treatment with the masterpieces of Europe. How shall one reconcile aesthetic taste with the atrocious architecture of so many Western-styled structures in Japan? By the same principle that one accounts for the bad manners of some Japanese trav¬ elers in railway coaches. If the imported forms were not so radically different from anything in their old system, they could readily incorporate them, but as it is, they try to imitate the foreign style in toto and make a botch of it. The artistic genius of the Japanese is manifestly related to the rich and picturesque scenery that greets them on every hand. They love the outdoors and drink in the beauties of nature in all her changing moods. They revel in festivals and even in hard out¬ door work ; country girls at school in the city are often seen to grow restless and to pine at the rice planting time when they long to be at home with all their family and neighbors, wading in mud to their knees and chanting old ditties while they set out the tender rice shoots. One of the most attractive features of the school life in Japan is the scheme of excursions by which each year hundreds of thousands of boys and girls go off under the leadership of their teachers to visit spots ASSETS AND LIABILITIES OF THE JAPANESE 13 noted for their beauty or historic interest. If they are primary school children, they generally go only to near¬ by places. Each child will have his frugal luncheon of rice, pickle, and beans or stiff curds wrapped in a col¬ ored bandanna ( furoshiki ) and tied to his belt. They are more restrained and docile than occidental school¬ boys and rarely cause trouble either to their teacher- guides or to the farmers and townspeople whose prop¬ erty they pass. If they are high school boys, they may go on a trip of two or three hundred miles, their impedimenta limited to a tooth-brush, an extra pair of rice-straw sandals, a towel — that serves also as a hand¬ kerchief — and a diary that is religiously kept. A de¬ cade ago the boys and girls alike acted with the de¬ corum of adults, but with the influx of ideas like “self- determination” and “feminism,” they are evincing more of the freedom and self-assertion which charac¬ terize youth in the Occident. But even yet they retain a pronounced love of nature. On their excursions or at social gatherings it is not unusual for them to pen delicate little poems — of the standard thirty-one syl¬ lables — which they may tie, without a blush, to the branch of a cherry tree in bloom. This love of nature is intimately intertwined with religious sentiment. They have retained in a refined form the animism of a primitive age, which sees a god or spirit in every wondrous or powerful object. Hence polytheism and pantheism — many gods, or all is god — cling more tenaciously to the Japanese than to most modern peoples. In this sense, assuredly, the Japa¬ nese are very religious. The sacred ropes and fringes 14 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN of paper with which they deck every grand tree or rock or waterfall are instinct with a sense of the mystery and wonder of creation. It may be all vague and mingled with superstition, but it nourishes reverence and a sense of dependence on the higher powers. The Japanese are both emotional and self-controlled. Their soubriquet “the Frenchmen of the East” does not seem appropriate to the typical samurai or even to the Japanese traveler whom strangers find so un¬ communicative. Yet intimate acquaintance with the people or even casual observation of their public gath¬ erings reveals a strong strain of feeling, only awaiting the right touch of oratory or exciting event to express itself. The immobile features and the stiff, restrained demeanor are the social heritage of centuries of a stoical samurai tradition. Underneath the crust the volcanic fires are burning hot. Where logical appeals will move a small group of intellectuals, sentiment will sway the multitudes and the intellectuals alike. III. SOME MORAL QUALITIES As to the chief moral qualities of the Japanese peo¬ ple, if one asked any school-boy what they were, he would promptly answer, “Loyalty and filial piety.” And he would be right. From ancient times they have been the twin pillars of society. In every feudal order, loyalty was the cardinal virtue, for life depended upon it. And the persistence of feudalism, up to 1868, has left loyalty still in the first place. In olden times loy¬ alty meant chiefly devotion to a near-by feudal clan chieftain who protected his vassals, for the people had ASSETS AND LIABILITIES OF THE JAPANESE 15 but little thought of the far-away Emperor. But when, in the struggle between two groups of clans, the roy¬ alist clans, in 1868, restored the Emperor to full power and ended the Shogunate or military regency, the sagacious leaders in the new regime encouraged the people to concentrate upon the Emperor the loyalties which they had formerly shown toward their lords. So vehement has been the emphasis upon loyalty to the Emperor and its correlative, national patriotism, that other more homely virtues have been overshad¬ owed, and in many cases a blind nationalism has been generated which tends to be anti-foreign and jingo¬ istic. Yet despite such perversions, the spirit of loyal¬ ty remains a great asset of the Japanese people. In superiors and heroes, but increasingly it is being shown the past, it has been too much confined to individual toward causes and principles. The devotion which many a struggling church or school or labor union has called forth, is big with promise. Christianity, by its appeal to loyalty toward a Person who embodies in Himself both the heroic ideal and the principles of right and truth, builds upon and raises to a higher plane the old-time loyalties. Filial piety toward parents and ancestors has also survived in remarkable vigor in Japan, because the family system still maintains a central place. To a Westerner, the notion of the dictation of the family council to every individual member savors of tyranny. The preferences of the individual as to marriage or oc¬ cupation or residence or faith have, until recently, counted but little in comparison with the interests of 1 6 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN the “house*’ and the opinions of the elders. The most tragic situations in Japanese life have always arisen A from the conflict between individual and family will, or between the two loyalties — to the family and to the liege lord or Emperor. Here again the Christian revelation of the Heavenly Father, and of the all-in¬ clusive family, finds a prepared soil, and it tends to relieve the individual of the tyrannical dictation of the family council and put him under the liberating direc¬ tion of a conscience sensitive to the Father’s will. With the supremacy of the family and the impor¬ tance of sons to perpetuate it has gone the tendency to consider women as means rather than ends, persons not in their own right, but by virtue of bearing and rearing children. The urgency of keeping up the family line has encouraged concubinage, divorce, and adoption. Filial duty has required many a daughter to give herself uncomplainingly to a life of shame in order to earn money to support misguided parents. Yet the emancipation of woman and the loosening of the grip of family authority are both taking place rapidly nowadays, almost too rapidly. Christian in¬ fluence has had much to do with hastening these changes, but the trouble is that the Christian principles ' of self-control and of glad bondage to the service of family, self, and society for Christ's sake are spreading too slowly. Propriety, or doing the appropriate thing in the right way, is one of the leading virtues. It roots back in the Chinese teaching on “universal harmony,” embracing the proper conduct toward superiors and ASSETS AND LIABILITIES OE THE JAPANESE 17 inferiors. Hence, etiquette is an elaborate system, with prescriptions for all manner of situations. To a Japanese, propriety is a fine art ; to an American, it is the expression of a good heart. To the one, form is inseparable from morality ; to the other, right mo¬ tive covers a multitude of breaches of good form. To “save one’s face” takes rank with defending one’s integrity. Hence, great pains must be taken to admin¬ ister a rebuke or a punishment with proper regard to the “face” of the person affected. But if the humil¬ iation of the person is sought, the surest way is to expose him to ridicule. In the Japanese home and school-room ridicule is the most potent form of dis¬ cipline, whereas corporal punishment is almost never inflicted. In some parts of the Orient it is not unusual for an irate foreigner to use his cane on the shoulders of a jinrikisha puller or a coolie who has offended him, but in Japan such conduct would land the for¬ eigner in a police station. Are the Japanese truthful and honest? In other words, are they dependable? Yes and no. Propriety in the large and ethical sense just described still takes precedence with many Japanese over what we know as the abstract principles of right and wrong. An offense against the wishes of a superior is likely to seem more heinous than an offense against impersonal right or law. It is another vestige of the loyalty so deeply ingrained by feudalism. Hence, in everyday life a servant or a tradesman may prevaricate rather than displease you. Honesty in commercial affairs is, in every nation, a slow outgrowth of a commercial 1 8 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN order, such as the Chinese have had for many genera¬ tions, and is not deemed an important virtue in a feudal age, such as that from which the Japanese have but barely emerged. The merchant used to be tol¬ erated by the two-sworded samurai much as the Jewish money-lender was tolerated in the time of “Ivanhoe.” He ranked lowest in the social scale, below the fanner and the artisan, and only just above the outcast. Naturally he had to live by his wits and knew no law but self-preservation. But with the modern rise of trade and industry, the merchant has risen in society, and a long list of merchant princes have been created barons and viscounts. But someone asks, “How about the necessity of employing Chinese tellers in Japanese banks?'’ The simple answer is — it is a lie made out of whole cloth, but it has astounding vitality. There never has been a Chinese employed in any bank in Japan except in the British and other foreign banks, most of which have their main offices in China or India. In feudal times the samurai lived by their swords and scorned money, and one reason for the compara¬ tive honesty of the public services is that they are so largely officered by men of samurai ancestry. The emphasis laid upon loyalty has also done much to prevent cheating the government. Yet, even in the army and navy there have been shocking scandals through bribery and theft during the last decade, for it takes more than a proud ancestry to keep a man straight when he sees men all around him getting ASSETS AND LIABILITIES OF THE JAPANESE 19 rich by speculation and graft while he slaves away on meager pay. In unnumbered journeys in nearly every province 'of the Empire I have never lost a penny by theft, though I have lodged in inns where the noiseless sliding inner doors and partitions without locks made sneak-thievery by fellow-guests quite easy. Similar testimony would be borne by hundreds of other mis¬ sionaries. The peasants and the officials, as a whole, are remarkably punctilious about other people’s prop¬ erty, and the domestics in foreigners’ homes — most of whom come from the country — are rarely guilty of anything worse than taking small “squeezes” or commissions from tradesmen. In the hotels and the houses of foreign merchants in port cities I have heard of not a few dishonest servants, but among scores of missionary families that I have known, there have been only two or three cases. The trickery and rascality of many contractors and small merchants have doubtless done much to give japan a bad name. They have notoriously easy con¬ sciences, and even large merchants have canceled or¬ ders and stolen trademarks and shipped goods far be¬ low sample; but, speaking broadly, the Japanese people are trustworthy, especially where they feel account¬ able to some person who is himself just and straight. Self-confidence is a marked trait, even though the samurai code requires that it be veiled behind a dig¬ nified reserve. And who shall deny that the achieve¬ ments of the nation and of countless individuals have 20 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN given good warrant for the feeling? The quiet assur¬ ance with which an artisan will tackle the job of imitat¬ ing some foreign device on the basis of a woodcut in a mail-order catalog, or the readiness of any town poli¬ tician to step up higher even to taking a place in the cabinet, has its amusing as well as admirable side. It is all so much like the pluck and self-reliance and “self- made man” doctrine so popular in 'America, that Americans with a sense of humor would smile to see the mirror held up to themselves by their Japanese cousins. Many a Japanese sophomore has assured me, in all seriousness, that he felt impelled to carve out a great career in politics and save the Empire. And some of them are making their dreams come true. I know of more than one case like that of the lad who walked three hundred miles to enter high school, worked his way through, and is now a national force. But conceit lurks at the heels of self-confidence. It is probably the bumptious self-assertiveness of many of the Japanese in China and Siberia which has gone far to make them anathema to other nationalities. One can make allowances for the unlimited patriotic pride of some Japanese when the primary school teach¬ ing about the Land of the Gods is taken into account, but it is none the less irritating to foreigners, especially if, like Americans, they are gifted with a blind eye for their own country’s faults. Cheerfulness and pessimism have both been at¬ tributed to the Japanese. But my experience is that, while Buddhism has given a fatalistic and pessimistic tone to literature and thought, yet the ordinary people ASSETS AND LIABILITIES OF THE JAPANESE 21 take life as it comes with equanimity and a smile. To be sure, the smile is often a matter of etiquette, an evi¬ dence of that samurai control over the emotions which has become ingrained in all classes. But I have been struck by the imperturbable good nature and cheerful conversation of the average Japanese, of the jinrikisha man who pulls you over hard country roads, of the farmer resting on his mattock to pass the time of day, of the clerks and hotel servants, and even of the statuesque policeman, if you accost them graciously in their own tongue. Energy is the last characteristic to be mentioned. It finds outlet in unflagging industry among the farm¬ ers and artisans. To be sure, the pressure of necessity does not allow much loafing, but even the well-to-do classes exhibit an energy and a zest for life which impress the traveler fresh from easy-going tropical lands. No one would speak of “laziness” in the same breath with “Japanese.” In old Japan, industry was often a by-product of the accepted ethical code, but in new Japan a powerful new force supplies much of the drive — the ambition to excel, the thirst for progress, both individually and nationally. Everyone who has tried to enlist the Japanese in a new enterprise, like the Christian movement, has probably at some time been dismayed to have them dash off and set to work before they had half mastered the idea, but on second thought one has laughed and thanked God that they had so much energy and ambition ; for you can steer a moving ship, but there is small hope for a scow stuck in the mud. 22 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN IV. PHYSICAL STAMINA But what of the physical framework which supports the mental and moral qualities of the Japanese people? The phrase “a sound mind in a sound body’7 may not inappropriately be applied to them, for physical stamina they possess in good measure. Their racial stock has the advantage of combining the rugged brawn of the northern Mongols and abor¬ iginal hairy Ainu with the temperamental plasticity and sensitiveness of the Malays.* They have always produced good fighters as well as good artists. Count¬ less deeds of superhuman endurance and dash are re¬ counted in the old Japanese romances. And in our day, the build of the soldiers, drafted from every corner of the Empire, and the achievements of the school athletes in the Far Eastern Olympic Games give evidence that the race is holding its own. American tennis stars can testify that in Kumagae and Shimizu they have found foemen worthy of their best racquets. Japanese soldiers average five or six inches shorter than the American doughboy. But the difference is two thirds in length of leg, whereas, if seated they would appear nearly of a height. The infantry are rated among the best in the world, partly because their stocky, short-legged build makes them splendid march¬ ers. Just as in England the modern man often finds himself too large to get into the suit of mail worn by *The ancient legends which tell of the coming to Japan of demi-god conquerors from the northwest and from the south are confirmed by critical history. There are even some traces of an infusion of Aryan blood via the steppes of Siberia. ASSETS AND LIABILITIES OF THE JAPANESE 23 a famous mediaeval ancestor, so, in Japan, the ancient armor shows that on the average the race has not grown smaller. As a matter of fact, the army meas¬ urements indicate that the average height has increased at least half an inch during the last generation. This may be due to better food and sanitation or to giving the blood freer circulation by the wider use of chairs instead of squatting. The outdoor pursuits of the bulk of the people — for seventy-five per cent of them are still farmers or fishermen — and the temperate and fairly bracing climate account in large degree for the rugged physique of peasant Japanese. Vegetarians may find comfort in the fact that the Japanese have, for ages, eaten practically no meat except fish, and even today beef and milk are only slowy passing out of the category of luxuries. Japanese physicians are numerous and well trained, but the construction of dwellings and the habits of the people make proper sanitation and ventilation difficult. There are no underground sewers, and night-soil stands in cesspools and is removed now and then in tubs. The loose construction of the dwellings allows some ventilation in the daytime, but at night and in stormy weather when the wooden shutters are all closed, hardly a crevice is left open. The carbonic acid gas generated by the charcoal braziers used to heat houses in winter undoubtedly makes the people more susceptible to pulmonary diseases. Indeed, tuber¬ culosis is a serious menace, claiming more victims in Japan than in America or in any European nation. One of the causes of good-natured altercations be- 24 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN tween American guests and hotel managers is the strict rule against leaving even a crack open between the sliding outer doors which encase every hotel. Beside dreading night air, the people are afraid that thieves may take advantage of such cracks. Certain institutions and ideals have tended to lower physical vigor. Prolonged practice of concubinage by the upper classes has inevitably impoverished some of the ancient family lines, necessitating the ingrafting by adoption or marriage of virile middle-class stock. Then, too, the vacant, shut-in lives to which many of the upper-class women are condemned, even today, cannot but tend to physical as well as mental deteriora¬ tion. But a still more dangerous foe is disease caused by sexual vices, victims of which are said to fill at least a third of the hospital beds and temple graves. In¬ junctions to self-control and purity are not lacking in the Confucian and Shinto teachings, but the domi¬ nant influence of Buddhism, — with its low estimate of woman and its easy compromise with sin in ex¬ change for penance and pilgrimage, — has offered little barrier to prostitution, impurity, and self-indulgence. The pest-holes of illicit vice in the cities of America and Great Britain are a reproach, but is it not vastly 1 better for the morals and health of a people to main¬ tain a ceaseless warfare against immorality and put it under the ban of both law and public opinion than to give it, as in Japan, the guise of respectability by state license and protection, and the gloss of safety by an admittedly ineffective medical inspection? A- Jap WOMEN WORKERS IN ONE OF THE BEST TEXTILE MILLS A KNITTING CLASS OF WORKING WOMEN, SINGING AT A CHRISTMAS ENTERTAINMENT HELD AT MISS MACDONALD’S HOME AND ATTENDED BY FOUR HUNDRED WORKMEN AND EX-PRISONERS AND THEIR FAMI¬ LIES. BELOW, THE LABOR NIGHT SCHOOL OF THE OSAKA Y. M. C. A. ASSETS AND LIABILITIES OF THE JAPANESE 25 Equally menacing to physical stamina are the un¬ healthy conditions of life due to the growth of cities and the concomitant crowding of a growing proportion of the people into factories and offices and unwhole¬ some living quarters. Factory life is especially hard on women. The effect of mill work on the fertility of women has been proved to be bad, notably in Great Britain, for the birth-rate in textile areas where women work in the mills is only twenty-two per thousand, in contrast with forty in the Rhondda Valley, a mining area, where the women do not work in the mines. v. japan's pivotal location It is natural for us to turn now to the stage on whicn the Japanese people, with the endowments we have described, are called upon to play their part. We shall find that in Japan’s natural location and economic re¬ sources there are both assets and liabilities to be taken into account in forecasting the development and influence of the nation. The isolated location of the Island Empire, sur¬ rounded on all sides by stormy seas, has been a strong defense. Conquerors on the mainland have cast cove¬ tous eyes upon the Islands, but the only serious attempt at conquest ended in ignominious failure. No less a conqueror than Kublai Khan sent an armada to subdue them in the thirteenth century ; but the valor of the Japanese defense — and the timely breaking of a severe storm — wrecked the fleet and sent the survivors home in disgrace. It is partly to this immunity to outside B- Jap i 26 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN attack that the Japanese owe the fact that their royal line has continued unbroken for at least fifteen hundred years. Commercially and strategically, the location of Japan is unique. She stands like a door-keeper to all eastern Asia, where one third of the world’s inhabitants live, a population equaling that of all Europe and North America. In that same area are the world’s largest untapped stores of iron, coal, and precious minerals, timber, fish, furs, rubber, and lumber; besides wheat fields and pastures in Siberia and Mongolia comparable with those of Canada and the Mississippi Valley. A glance at the map shows the vantage point occupied by Japan : she is on the shortest, or great circle route, from the Pacific Coast of the United States and Canada to the ports of Asia, an inevitable coaling and watering station; her ice-free harbors are almost equidistant from China, Manila, Siberia, and Alaska. The Japanese feel flattered to have their country called the “England of the Orient,” and there are manifest resemblances : picturesque islands in a tem¬ perate climate, immune from conquest, yet command¬ ing the trade routes to a rich continent; blessed with the coal and harbors and sea-loving men required for a great shipping industry. Like England, too, Japan has a long start of her continental neighbors in the development of machine industry and of capitalistic enterprise. It might even be argued that greatness has been thrust upon Japan by virtue of her location as the middle term between two continents. Given peace and ASSETS AND LIABILITIES OF THE JAPANESE 27 reasonable enterprise, Japan's prosperity should con¬ tinue indefinitely as a by-product of the growth of the commerce and industry of her neighbors on both sides of the Pacific. No longer do the prophetic sentences uttered by Theodore Roosevelt twenty years ago1 sound like rhetoric: “The Mediterranean era died with the dis¬ covery of America. The Atlantic era is now at the, height of its development and must soon exhaust the resources at its command. The Pacific era, destined to be the greatest of all, is just at its dawn.” The economic aftermath of the World War has made this prophecy regarding the Pacific Basin seem more credi¬ ble. Continental Europe, chaotic and impoverished, may recover a measure of prosperity within a genera¬ tion, but her erstwhile preeminence in industry and trade is apparently being lost to America and Japan, who will, in time, be powerfully reinforced by China. They command an unparalleled combination of ad¬ vantages : easy access to raw materials and vast unde¬ veloped markets, technical skill, cheap labor, and abundant capital. A poet might call this combination the triumphal arch of economic supremacy, and in that arch, by virtue of her very location, Japan is destined to be an important stone. VI. LIMITED RAW MATERIALS But Japan has certain serious limitations. While she has easy access to raw materials, she is notably deficient in coal, iron, and cotton in her own territory. As Eckel points out, this will inevitably handicap the 28 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN Japanese in the industrial race.* Japan's known coal reserves are only eight billion tons, slightly less than Spain’s, and only one two-hundred-and-fiftieth of America’s, or one twenty- fourth of Great Britain’s. “Though sufficient for current Japanese uses, it does not seem to justify either in quality or quantity any hope that it will be the basis of a very extensive export trade, either in coal itself or in heavy manufactured commodities.” The small supply of iron ore in Japan is another handicap. In the light of these facts the strenuous efforts made by the Japanese to gain control of the large coal and iron deposits in Manchuria, Shantung, and Siberia are perfectly intelligible. In South Manchuria, the Fushun colliery is especially rich. On the Yangtse River the Japanese, in partnership with the Chinese, control the important Hanyehping Iron Mills. In 1921, raw cotton had to be imported from America and India to the value of $220,000,000, which was twenty-seven per cent of all imports. It has rightly been observed that Japan’s dependence on America for raw cotton and machinery would make even extreme militarists hesitate long before urging a war against America. The wealth of Japan increased fabulously during and just after the World War. In place of adding $90,000,000 a year to her debt, as she had been doing even in normal times, her sudden profits on foreign trade enabled her to redeem a large portion of her foreign loans and to increase her gold holdings to one billion dollars, a six-fold increase in six years. Her * Eckel, E. C. : Coal , Iron and War, p. 341. Henry Holt, 1920. ASSETS AND LIABILITIES OF THE JAPANESE 29 national wealth swelled from sixteen to forty-three billions between 1913 and 1921, while the national debt increased only about one billion — a striking con¬ trast to the trend in most Western nations.* The wide distribution of wealth is indicated by the Postal Savings Bank depositors, twenty-four million persons, with deposits aggregating nearly $500,000,- 000 in 1921, as compared with $96,000,000 in 1915. In 1920 the capitalization of new companies was $2,492,000,000, fourteen times greater than in 1913. But it is important to add that since April, 1920, Japan has been passing through a severe depression, due to a market glutted with goods turned out by manufac¬ turers who blindly ignored the fact that the wartime shortage in the Occident was being supplied by the Occident itself and that occidental manufacturers were again prepared to compete for the Chinese and South Asian markets. In 1917 her excess of exports over imports was $284,000,000, but in 1920 and 1921 the exports were less than imports by $180,000,000. The doubled cost of living caused wide distress, for wages lagged behind and all the efforts of the authorities were powerless to effect much improvement. Banks and companies failed by the score, and speculators who had become millionaire spendthrifts overnight went •<* bankrupt with equal speed. The only thing that saved the big silk industry from utter disaster was the Government’s loan of a large sum to a general holding company which limited output and kept up prices. Meanwhile the cotton goods trade also had slumped, * From Japan \ Advertiser , Feb. 23, 19 22. 30 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN and in the opinion of Japanese capitalists like Baron Dan, the Japanese mills cannot hope much longer to compete, in the cheaper grades, with Chinese and British mills. Even so brief a survey of the economic resources of the Japanese people shows that their grave handicaps are not counterbalanced solely by virtue of nearness to the raw materials and markets of Asia. Hard work, skill, honest workmanship — -in other words, stamina, technique, and character — will be indispensable. Some discerning Japanese publicists and industrialists, real¬ izing that character will be the deciding factor, have advocated the Christian faith as a last resort. They acknowledge that the old faiths have been proved inad¬ equate and that many of the Christians whom they know have the character-assets which the situation demands. In this first chapter we have confined our attention to the simplest factors in the Japanese ensemble, the characteristics of the people and their natural and economic resources. These may be called the elemental “raw materials/'' Whether they shall provide the foundations of a powerful nation and whether they shall be used for worthy ends or not depends on those group purposes and activities which are to be described in the following chapters. Note — See Appendix I, for supplemental material to accompany each chapter of the book. Appendix II contains a brief bibliog¬ raphy of the more recent and the more readily obtainable books on Japan. Those books that might well be secured for a limited reference library are placed first in the respective lists. II Militarism, Reaction, and Liberalism “Japan is a second Prussia” is the verdict which trips from the tongue of the average Occidental who likes ready-made, clean-cut opinions. And if he is reminded of Burke's remark that it is preposterous to indict an entire nation, he will refer to the ex- Kaiser’s vision of Japan at the head of the “yellow peril” hordes of Asia or to shallow" works like The Rising Tide of Color and The Flower of Asia. Such books arrogantfy assume that the white races were born to have and to hold dominion over all lesser breeds, and that it is presumptuous for Japan to build up an army and resist the Caucasian with his own weapons. A good case can be made out to prove that militarism has been supreme in Japan in both ancient and recent times. But the point at issue is this : Is Japan becoming more militaristic or less militaristic and reactionary? In answering this question, full account must be taken of the steady thrust of the common people upward into the seats of power. In the first chapter we tried to take a cross-section of certain characteristics of the Japanese people; in this chapter we shall depict forces in action and showr how old characteristics and groupings and institutions are being, not only modified, but transformed as a result of the new conceptions of individual worth and obligation implanted by Christian and occidental thought. In Japan as in Western lands has broken out the struggle between the governing and dominant 32 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN few and the mass of the people, the governed but no longer submissive many, the long, hard fight to depose militarv ideals and enthrone liberal and humane ideals. l. THE BREAK WITH FEjJDALffSM AND ISOLATION* Japan came into the family of nations fifty years ago with a big handicap. For ages she had been brought up by the rod and the strait-jacket of feudal¬ ism, and she has had a hard time learning how to behave in a family where self-government is the rule. Under feudalism the samurai, or knights, held all the power and the common people did all the work, although they outnumbered the samurai nineteen to one. The common folk were very common indeed, for a samurai could with impunity abuse them and even cut them down with his broadsword for a fancied offence. There were no newspapers, no representative assem¬ blies, no schools for the common people except as some of the priests taught a fraction of the children in intermittent temple schools. Christianity was pro¬ scribed, and only one school of Confucianism could be publicly taught — that which justified the Tokugawa Shogunate* and frowned on revolution. Yet even such an autocracy had its merits : for two hundred and sixty years peace and security were maintained and justice was administered with an iron hand. * The Shoguns were originally generalissimos under the Em¬ peror, but gradually they usurped the actual functions of government and made the Emperor a figure-head. The Toku¬ gawa Shogunate (1600-1867) developed the system to such an extent that the early foreign representatives, like Commodore Perry, supposed the Shogun to be in fact the Emperor. MILITARISM, REACTION, AND LIBERALISM 33 Such was the situation when the Tokugawa regime and feudalism were overthrown and the Emperor was restored to actual power and the modernization of the nation was set about as impetuously as if to make up for the two centuries of marking time. The greatness of the task can be better realized if we try to imagine what England would have faced if she had been tight- sealed from the time of King James I to Queen Victoria, or what the United States would have be¬ come if America had been cut off from all contact with Europe from the landing at Plymouth Rock to the Civil War. But, nothing daunted, the Japanese girded up their loins and attempted the impossible, and the measure of their success is the most impressive evidence of their caliber and of their large potentialities for weal or woe. The most surprising thing about the comparatively bloodless Revolution or Restoration of 1867-8 was the sudden emergence of a group of young statesmen to guide the Empire into the new day. In place of the cautious, precedent-mongering aristocrats who had but lately predominated in the councils of the Tokugawa Regency, a band of unknown youths, most of them of lower samurai rank, sprang forth, and, having solidified the royalist clans behind them, boldly began to modernize and liberalize a fossilized autocracy. Fortunately, the -Emperor was young, inexperienced, and tractable, and the nobles around him, like Iwakura, San jo, and Kido, were either progressives themselves or shrewd enough to fall in line with the ruling party. 34 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN Ito and Inouye, among the younger leaders, had drunk deep of English liberalism, for they had run away to England in the early sixties, even though leaving Japan was prohibited on pain of death; and still others had studied the Bible with the first missionaries at Nagasaki, or had read Grotius, the Christian interna¬ tional jurist of Holland. Accordingly, they decided early in 1869 that the first step towards a liberal state was an Imperial Proclamation or Oath announcing that Japan had resolved to seek progress and pursue it. The chief articles of this “Charter Oath” were these : — 1. A representative deliberative assembly shall be formed and all measures decided by public opinion. »«•««« 4. All the absurd customs of former days shall be disregarded and the impartiality and justice mani¬ fested in the workings of nature shall be adopted as the basis of action. 5. Knowledge and ability shall be sought in all quarters of the world to the end that the foundations of the Empire may be more firmly established. The die was cast. The hermit nation, ruled by autocrats and their minions, had taken the first momen¬ tous step toward liberal political institutions at home and partnership with the progressive peoples of the earth abroad. Another formal step was taken with the promulgation of the constitution in 1889 and the actual opening of the first “deliberative assembly” in 1890. MILITARISM, REACTION, AND LIBERALISM 35 II. THE STRUGGLE BETWEEN LIBERALISM AND REACTION But for us, as we seek evidence that liberalism will ultimately prevail in Japan, the most significant facts are not the edicts of the government, but the voluntary activities of the people — the development of the press, the gradual creation of an intelligent public opinion, and the tireless fight for freedom of speech and for party government. It is easy for the tourist who visits a session of parliament to pronounce it “a plaything,” “a soothing-syrup to quiet popular demands,” but the careful student of the facts finds abundant reason for confidence. The test of progress is the difference between today and forty or fifty years ago: then, no provincial or national representative assemblies— now, both; then, but a handful of newspapers and magazines liable to suspension for any utterance dis¬ pleasing to the government — now, over two thousand newspapers and periodicals, which constitute an ever- swelling organ of public opinion, a veritable fourth estate; then, no political parties— now, and for twenty years past, national parties which with all their insta¬ bility, corruption, and poverty of principle yet can humble cabinets and make the bureaucrats tremble. Political liberalism has had a stormy career in modern Japan. It might be graphically portrayed by a double curve rising sharply between 1870 and 1888, then falling until about 1897, and then oscil¬ lating until the entry of America into the World War, when a furore for democracy broke out, the 36 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN clamor for universal manhood suffrage became in¬ sistent, and even woman suffrage began to be more than the fad of a few radicals. During the seventies and eighties works like Whalen’s International Law , Mill on Liberty , and Rousseau's Social Contract , and the study of English and American history made progressive Japanese youth ambitious to carry their country at one bound from feudalism to democracy. Count Itagaki, inflamed by French Revolutionary ideals, led a host of brave spirits in the struggle to graft liberty and equality upon the stubborn stock of an ancient conservatism, and when the inevitable reaction came, they gladly went to prison for their faith. Among those imprisoned was Kenkichi Kataoka, a fellow-provincial of Itagaki. While Kataoka was in prison, a missionary gave him a New Testament, with the result that he became a Christian. Years later, when he was Speaker of the House of Repre¬ sentatives, he was accustomed to open each session in silent but unaffected prayer and to invite the ten or fifteen Christians in the House to meet at his home for prayer and conference. It is not strange that, in his latter years, while President of Doshisha Univer¬ sity, his combination of fearless loyalty to conviction with saintly humility made an impression upon stu¬ dents and teachers comparable with that made years before by the similar character of the famous founder of Doshisha, Dr. Joseph Neesima. A point often overlooked, and indispensable in ex¬ plaining the slow and fitful progress of liberalism, is MILITARISM, REACTION, AND LIBERALISM 37 the influence upon Japanese policy of occidental na¬ tional policy. After the first flush of enthusiasm for everything occidental, the discerning Japanese leaders became convinced that unless the nation were armed and prepared to defend its rights, it was doomed to be pillaged like China, and sooner or later over¬ whelmed by the high-handed European powers. Ac¬ cordingly, with characteristic thoroughness they set about creating an army, a navy, and a subsidized mer¬ cantile marine, and developing the industries which would make the nation strong and respected. Imper¬ ceptibly, the group of young leaders who engineered the Restoration and held the helm of state for thirty years thereafter grew more conservative, the well- worn grooves of the ancient bureaucracy were used once more, only perfected along German lines, and the public school system became the pliable instrument for instilling an almost fanatical nationalism based on loyalty to the Imperial House. Two foreign wars — against China in 1894 and against Russia in 1904 — riveted more and more tightly the grip of the new military and bureaucratic machine in place of the painfully evicted Tokugawa regime. The process threatened to be carried still further by the World War. It was in the fall of 1914 that Japan drove the Germans out of Shantung (without the full consent of China) and seized and kept full control of ten times as much territory as Germany had ever controlled. Then in May, 1915, Marquis Okuma’s cabinet thrust the infamous Twenty-one Demands down China’s throat, though the worst of them were withdrawn 38 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN when the Chinese Government was stiffened by the indignant protests of its own people and of American and British sympathizers. The irony of the situation was that Premier Okuma, a lifelong exponent of liber¬ alism, had felt forced either to resign or to eat his words and yield to the tightening ring of military imperialistic influences around and above him. Then with the entry of America into the war, a veritable tidal wave of enthusiasm for democracy swept over Japan and compelled even reactionaries either to keep silent for the moment or to pay lip homage to the popular watchword. But it is no secret that up to the summer of 1918 the military clique in Japan felt sure Germany was invincible. Army officers openly proclaimed it in lectures given in public high schools. A revealing incident occurred in April, 1918. The Cabinet entertained the members of Parliament at a garden party, and one of the speeches, by the Vice- Minister of War, avowed the belief of the Minister of War and the General Staff in a German triumph. The substance of the speech was reported to me later by a Peer who heard and openly controverted its arguments. Such sentiments in the Cabinet explain the harsh repression of free speech which seemed so strangely inconsistent with Japan's alliance with England and with her official protestations of devotion to the liberal aims of America in the War. The moment that Germany had been defeated — to the surprise and chagrin of many Japanese mili¬ tarists — the glamour of the military career began to fade. Army officers could 110 longer count on having MILITARISM, REACTION, AND LIBERALISM 39 upper class parents offer their daughters in marriage. Soldiers returning home after completing the period of compulsory service were welcomed by banners reading, “Congratulations on Release from Prison,” and the perpetrators were sometimes arrested. The Imperial Military Academy which before the War had picked its students from among thousands of applicants, in 1919 could muster only no for the entering class, though the number sought was 200. For a generation the Army has been able to attract the brainiest youths, but today they pass it by and turn to business and the professions. The quick response of the Japanese militaristic barometer to foreign ex¬ ample and pressure was once more clearly shown in 1920, after the European powers had themselves be¬ trayed liberalism at Versailles, and America had eaten her words and imposed an inquisition on freedom of speech and assemblage. The reactionaries in Japan taunted the liberals with pinning their faith to painted gods, the screws of repression were again tightened, and the militarists were given a new lease of life. What desperate measures some of the extremists were willing to employ during 1920 and 1921 in order to recover their grip and stamp out liberalism can be judged from these remarks attributed to a liberal and labor leader, who, though a Christian and a pacifist, had incurred the suspicion of the police: “Some day I shall be assassinated. In my slums there are seven hundred gamblers who belong to the ancient Gamblers'’ Guild of old Japan. Hounded and abused by the police in the past, the government has now organized these 40 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN gamblers into a recognized fraternity, humorously called ‘The Flower of the Nation/ with the sole pur¬ pose of using them to combat the fight for democracy. Working now with the police, they are used to choke down unrest and check the growing power of the millions. The Old Order is desperate in Japan today.*’ Such methods as these may be winked at by the “higher-ups,” but they are generally resorted to by over-zealous lieutenants. III. THE MISCHIEVOUS “DUAL GOVERNMENT” In order to realize the enormous obstacles that block the progress of liberalism, it is important to make clear just how firmly entrenched behind political power the reactionaries and militarists have been until very lately. Their power has not been built up in a day. Nor has it been all evil, by any means. Ever since the Restoration of 1868 the masterful pilots of the ship of state have been the Elder Statesmen, a small group of brilliant, patriotic men who distrusted popular gov¬ ernment and labored incessantly to buttress the Throne behind an omnipresent bureaucracy on the one side and an omnipotent army on the other. No premier could be appointed or kept in power against their will. If the Parliament became obstreperous, it was dissolved by the Emperor at their behest. If popular protests against a minister or a government bill became over¬ whelming, they would advise a concession here or there, but never did they yield on the “grand strategy” of Imperial policy. Cabinets came and went — conser- MILITARISM, REACTION, AND LIBERALISM 41 vative, liberal, and even party-controlled — but the Elder Statesmen remained. Their power mystified the uninitiated Occidental, and few of the Japanese themselves tried to analyze it. But now that Prince Yamagata and the other giants among the Elder Statesmen have died, and the only two survivors of the original group are in their dotage, the secret of their power has become clear. It rested first upon their sagacity and patriotism. They served the Empire with unswerving devotion and superb skill. And it rested also upon their control of the General Staff and the powerful army behind it. The General Staff gradually became the super¬ government. No matter who was premier, the Min¬ isters of War and the Navy, as agents of the General Staff and the Elder Statesmen, controlled all major policies. After the victory over Russia in 1905, the General Staff waxed bolder than before. Its agents abroad, supported from the Army’s “Secret Fund,” repeatedly stood for policies diametrically opposed to the Foreign Office and its diplomatic representatives. Thus was developed what Japanese liberals have dubbed “the dual government” or the “super-govern¬ ment.” In 1909 the system was legalized by an Imperial Ordinance, instigated by the conservatives and militarists, providing that the Ministers of War and the Navy in the Cabinet should be responsible only to the Emperor and not, like the other ministers, to the Premier. The result is that if the General Staff sees fit it can prevent a cabinet being formed 42 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN or can cause its downfall by refusing to let any officer become or remain Minister of War. It seems to be emphatically clear that most of the acts of the Japanese Government during the past decade and more which have shocked and displeased Japanese liberals and Japan’s well-wishers in occi¬ dental lands, have been due to this anomalous “dual government.” The harsh regime in Korea, the ex¬ ploiting policy in China, the stupid interference in Siberia,* the diatribes against America in the jingo¬ istic press, can all be laid at its door. This dual system has been perceptibly weakened by various events during the last few years. But it cannot be ended until the annulment of the Ordinance of 1909 shall have been forced by such a growth of the progressive forces as shall overwhelm the forces of reaction, ultra-nationalism, and militarism. That day is coming more rapidly than the reactionary oligarchy thinks, for public opinion, the mind of the intelligent middle class, is steadily gaining in power. IV. THE PART PLAYED BY CHRISTIAN LEADERS AND THE RESPONSE OF THE PEOPLE In all lands the Christian movement has been the nurse of political as well as religious prophets. Japan is no exception. Every Christian congregation has been a training school in equality, parliamentary pro¬ cedure, and representative government. * It cost nearly a billion yen, over 2,500 Japanese lives, — and more Russian, — and hurt the foreign relations and internal morale of Japan. The value of a yen is normally fifty cents gold. MILITARISM, REACTION, AND LIBERALISM 43 In the creation of a liberal public opinion, a promi¬ nent part has been borne by Christians or men and women inspired by the Christian ideals of personality, liberty, and brotherhood. It was Professor Yoshino, elder in a Congregational Church and President of the Tokyo Imperial University Y. M. C. A., who, for several years, denounced in the metropolitan press and in his own monthly organ the iniquities of the Jap¬ anese military regime in Korea. It was he also who boldly exposed that tap-root of military imperialism, the “dual government.” Still another Christian leader in the fight against reaction is Hon. D. Tagawa, M. P., who, because of criticisms levelled against the very undemocratic Elder Statesmen (the unofficial advisors of the Emperor), was in 1918 convicted and imprisoned on a technical charge of lese majeste. But today he is back in Par¬ liament and is one of the leading spirits in the Japan League of Nations’ Association, at whose head is the eminently respected Prince Tokugawa, a son of the last Shogun and one of the three delegates to the Wash¬ ington Conference. The most influential liberal in Parliament is Hon. Yukio Ozaki, a lifelong admirer of British institutions and of Christian social ideals. His wife is a Christian. It was he who, when Minister of Education in 1898, raised a storm about his head by inadvertently drop¬ ping in an address words to the effect, “supposing by way of illustration that Japan were a republic.” He had to resign, but his lips were not sealed. In 1918 he published in Japanese the volume since translated 44 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN under the title, The Voice of Japanese Democracy, a bold argument on behalf of a democratized monarchy for Japan akin to England’s. In 1920 and ’21 he waged a platform campaign for disarmament which won extraordinary popular support. The genuineness of that support is confirmed by the action of the largest labor union in the Empire, the Yuaikai, demanding complete disarmament, although they were quite aware that eighty thousand of their comrades in the ship¬ yards might thereby be thrown out of work. A pic¬ turesque anecdote illustrates Mr. Ozaki’s courage and his powers of persuasion: During his speaking tour on behalf of disarmament, he was aroused from sleep one night by a flashlight held by a desperado who was also waving a sword above his head. He coolly and civilly accosted the intruder, turned on the elec¬ tric light, and then invited his astounded visitor to sit down. It seems that the desperado was a violent chauvinist and had intended to assassinate Ozaki for his “unpa¬ triotic” ideas on disarmament. After a two hours’ talk, the man left, a convert to Ozakrs views, begging to be pardoned for his intrusion. Another instance of the invariable response of the common people to liberal ideas, when they are clearly presented, occurred in 1920 at Osaka. A scholarly advocate of Shinto as a potentially universal religion, with the Emperor of Japan at its head, rented the public hall for a lecture in exposition of his doctrines. Though he was a safe and sane patriot and a professor in Tokyo Imperial University, only a paltry two MILITARISM, REACTION, AND LIBERALISM 45 hundred turned out to hear him. A fortnight later, Professors Yoshino and Onodzuka, of the same Uni¬ versity, rented the same hall, and, though they charged an admission fee, were greeted by five thousand enthusiastic auditors as they pleaded for democracy and international cooperation. V. THE SLOW, BUT IRRESISTIBLE, DEMOCRATIC ADVANCE But the men in the seats of the mighty in Japan were little more affected by these sentiments than a “horse's ear by the east wind," as the Japanese adage puts it. They felt that Japanese and American inter¬ ests clashed in China and Siberia and that force might have to decide the issue. Up to the very opening of the Washington Confer¬ ence relations between America and Japan were growing worse. Despite the interchange of friendly visits and the efforts of broad-minded groups in both countries, the feeling between the two nations grew more strained. The “bigger navy” advocates in America were in the ascendant and American espousal of China's part was pronounced. All this played into the hands of the Japanese military imperialists and neutralized the arguments and pleadings of the liberals. In both countries whispers that “war is inevitable" became more insistent. Then, like a giant parting two fractious boys, Secretary Hughes made his dra¬ matic, self-denying proposal to the Washington Con¬ ference. The thunders died away; the clouds were dispersed. The hands of liberals and Christians on 46 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN both sides of the Pacific were immediately strength¬ ened. The good faith of Japan in carrying out the Washington Agreement will be referred to later; but it is significant that even while those agreements were being debated and the outcome was in doubt, the liberal though repressed multitudes in Japan were seizing the occasion of Marquis Okuma’s funeral, in February, 1922, to give an imposing demonstration of their real sympathies. It is vividly described in this letter from a foreign observer: I want to answer the question, “Is Japan militaristic ?” Three weeks ago Marquis Okuma, the incarnation of pro¬ gress, died and was buried. A week ago Prince Yamagata, the incarnation of militarism, died and was also buried. They were both the same age, eighty-four. They had been young together. One kept progressive, the other turned reac¬ tionary and militaristic. When Okuma died, the papers were full of him for a week: his achievements, his sayings, his contribution toward education, his political career. There was a great public funeral— paid out of the people’s pockets, voluntarily, not by the State. Vast crowds attended the funoral which was held in Hibiya Park, and the whole city, it seemed, turned out on the line of march. Within three weeks, the great reactionary, Prince Yam¬ agata, was buried also. It was a State funeral this time, and cost 80,000 yen. Pie was President of the Privy Council and Field Marshal of the Army. The newspapers at best damned him with faint praise. They spoke of what he had done for his country in the early days, and if they spoke of the present at all, it was to say that he was beginning to see that his “militarism” was a mistake. The difference in the size of the crowds at his and Marquis Okuma’s funeral was conspicuous. Notwithstanding all the signs of the awakening of the long suppressed common people and their respon- MILITARISM, REACTION, AND LIBERALISM siveness to the guidance of liberal intellectuals, it is premature to expect their opinions to determine the national policy for two reasons. First, few of the com¬ mon people or the intellectuals have a vote, the total number of voters being* 3,000,000 out of 15,000,000 males of voting age. The franchise requires the pay¬ ment of a direct tax of at least $1.50 a year and few qualify. Secondly, the political parties are not yet able to determine major national policies, but must for the most part be content to worry and criticise the powers that be. The fact that it was not till 1918 that Mr. Hara formed what is termed “the first genuine party cabinet/’ suggests the stubborn inertia and active opposition against party government, for 1918 was nearly thirty years after the establishment of the na¬ tional parliament. Even the Iiara cabinet fell far short of party government-— and for these very vital reasons : the cabinet still remained solely responsible legally to the Emperor and only nominally to the dominant party in the Lower House; the Elder Statesmen, the General Staff, the Privy Council, and the Imperial Diplomatic Council all exercised more decisive influence in weighty matters than the cabinet ; the Army General Staff and the Navy General Council could break up the cabinet at any moment by ordering the resignation of the Min¬ ister of War or of the Navy and refusing to let any officer fill his place ; and finally, the Upper House was not controlled by the dominant party in the Lower House, and the Upper House could seriously obstruct the cabinet's policy. Furthermore, upon the assassina¬ tion early in 1922 of Premier Hara and the fall soon 48 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN afterward of the cabinet he had formed, the present non-party or “super-party cabinet/' under Premier Baron Kato, took its place, with the rather unprin¬ cipled acquiescence of the dominant party in the Lower House. Thus it will be oppressively evident that even after all the years of heroic struggle, only the rudiments of responsible party government have been attained. But the issue has been joined and will be fought through with samurai tenacity. VI. FORCES WHICH MAKE FOR FURTHER ADVANCE The extension of the suffrage, the rise of a free press, the democratizing of the Throne, and the pressure of liberal institutions and ideas from without — these four potent influences will unite to hasten the ultimate tri¬ umph of liberalism. Let us consider these influences briefly. i. Agitation for universal suffrage The cry for universal manhood suffrage used to be merely a political campaign catchword, but in recent years it has been taken up in earnest by intellectuals and labor leaders, so that in all probability the suffrage will be extended within a few years by lowering the financial qualification, thereby including many more of the urban population, artisans, and “white-collared poor" (clerks, professional men, and low-paid offi¬ cials), the very groups upon whom liberalism has the strongest hold. Then the admission of some of the women to the franchise will follow in due time. A straw showing how the wind is blowing was the MILITARISM, REACTION, AND LIBERALISM 49 removal in 1921 of the prohibition against the attend¬ ance of women upon political meetings. 2. Rising power of the press The non-partisan press is today more potent to shape government policy than the political parties, and on the whole its influence is being used to promote progressive policies.* When international problems arise it is more narrowly patriotic than the independent press of Eng¬ land and America, yet it has more than once rebuked the chauvinists and cheered the liberal forces. This has been true of a number of the great journals, for ex¬ ample, in their criticism of interference in China and Siberia, in their demand for reduction of the Army as well as of the Navy, in their advocacy of appointing civilians instead of military men to govern the colonies, and in their (belated) denunciation of oppression in Korea. And on domestic issues they are practically all aligned against the reactionaries. In Osaka, joining hands with the Christians, they op¬ posed the corrupt prefectural authorities and the rich vested interests who in 1913 were insisting upon allow¬ ing the rebuilding of the licensed vice quarters inside the city. They have agitated for the extension of the suffrage, for the ending of police persecution of labor unions, and for freedom of discussion even of “dan¬ gerous thoughts” like socialism, syndicalism, and democracy, which are anathema to standpatters and militarists. * See The Press and Politics in Japan, by Kisaburo Kawabe, Ph. D., University of Chicago Press, 1921. An interesting and authoritative presentation. So CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN 3. The unbending of the Mikado The Imperial House, the incarnation of conserva¬ tism, has kept pace with the people. The Prince Regent, who is now practically Emperor, not only permitted, but acknowledged the joyous shouts of the people — an unheard of license, and when the Prince of Wales visited Japan, the Prince Regent broke all the hoary precedents by accompanying him to a public theatrical performance. When two noted American Christian leaders were presented, the Prince Regent and the Princess asked them eager and in¬ telligent questions instead of uttering the stiff phrases prescribed by former imperial etiquette. It is evident that the Prince Regent was deeply affected by all that he saw during his European tour of 1921, especially by the simplicity and bonhomie of King George and the Prince of Wales. This responsiveness of the Imperial House to the example of the English Royal Family is illustrative of the sensitiveness of the entire nation to the pres¬ sure of liberalism from without. It has at times been positively startling to note the immediate rise or fall of the liberal barometer in Japan according as a liberal or a reactionary policy prevailed in America and England. 4. Influence of occidental example What an obligation this places on British and Amer¬ ican liberals, especially upon Christians ! I well re¬ member how crestfallen Japanese liberals were on MILITARISM, REACTION, AND LIBERALISM 51 several occasions when Western nations seemed bent on a selfish imperial policy toward the Far East and liberals in those countries seemed impotent to check it. This was the case in 1898 when England and America made no move to hinder Russia, Germany, and France in their seizure of Chinese territory, just after these three powers had hypocritically compelled Japan to give back Liaotung Peninsula on the pious plea of the integrity of China. On the contrary, England then seized the harbor of Wei-Hai-Wei in order to keep even with Russia and Germany. It was the case again in 1920 when the bigger navy advocates in the United States, even in the face of “the fourteen points” and the hardly finished fight against Prussian militarism, insisted that Japanese aggressions on China and other perils required the spending of hundreds of millions on battleships and on fortifications in Hawaii, Guam, and the Philip¬ pines. These policies immediately alarmed even friendly Japanese and gave the militarists an un¬ answerable argument for a bigger army and navy and an aggressive foreign policy. On the other hand, every victory won for liberty and the common people, every act of international unselfishness in the Oc¬ cident is immediately cabled to the Japanese press and read by millions. VII. LIVING UP TO THE WASHINGTON AGREEMENTS Thank God that the Washington Conference went far to neutralize these sinister tendencies and to give renewed power and courage to Japanese liberalism. 52 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN Like an electric storm it cleared the clouds from both sides of the Pacific. Secretary Hughes’ brave words substituted frankness for finesse, confidence for dis¬ trust. The difficulties and dangers have not all been dispelled, by any means, but the spirit necessary for their solution has been generated. Now it remains for the people of good-will in both hemispheres to see that the right spirit is maintained at all costs. What definite steps has Japan taken toward ful¬ filling the agreements signed at Washington and to¬ ward a more liberal policy at home and abroad? Favorable indications are not wanting. In the first place, Admiral Baron Kato, the chief representative at Washington, was made premier soon after his return home, and being a naval man he has been better able than a civilian premier to control the military groups. The fidelity with which he has insisted on living up to the Washington pacts has surprised and gratified liberal minded men on both sides of the Pacific. The Army as well as the Navy has been promptly reduced. The Japanese garrisons have been withdrawn from the Chinese interior points, where they had stayed several years against China’s protest; the Japanese troops in Siberia were all with¬ drawn on October 31, 1922, and in December the last Japanese soldier left Shantung. On January 1, 1923, Japan turned over to China the post-offices which for many years had given Japan points of vantage. Japan's record in Shantung has been bad, but not unlike the record of certain powers in Persia, Haiti, and Africa. It has seemed worse because it gave MILITARISM, REACTION, AND LIBERALISM 53 Japan a foothold for what bade fair to become a system of underground control of her great neighbor’s affairs. But the signing at Washington of the Shan¬ tung Agreement and the other self-denying ordinances regarding China marked a sharp change in Japanese policy and an opportunity for China to become master of her own fate. By the Shantung Agreement Japan promised to restore territorial and administrative rights, also the railways and mines, in return for a monetary com¬ pensation equivalent to the rights acquired and the investments made by Japan. This agreement is being carried out. It is a signal triumph for all the parties concerned. To be sure, valuable properties and busi¬ ness advantages, some of them morally questionable, were secured by Japanese interests during the five years of the occupation, and the compensation de¬ manded very likely^ was exorbitant; but China has become used to such tactics by foreigners, and has ample reason to rejoice over the main provisions of the Shantung settlement. An article by the English naval expert, C. Bywater, in the Atlantic Monthly * reveals how cleverly the Japanese naval authorities in 1921 rushed to completion the fortification of outlying islands in anticipation of the Washington Conference. It is not at all improbable, but it is just what military authorities would try to do in any country. That is their business. It does indicate that militarism has a stubborn and unregenerate heart everywhere, but it does not disprove or weaken the fact that the * February, 1923. 54 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN swelling volume of popular opinion in Japan is anti- militarist and bent on maintaining peace. VIII. REFORMS IN KOREA In Korea, likewise, Japan lias followed a more liberal policy since 1921, when a high-minded retired naval officer was made Governor-General. The torture of prisoners has practically ceased, the military gen¬ darmerie have been replaced by a civilian police, the number of Korean officials has been increased and their status raised, the spying interference with Chris¬ tians and other suspects has been somewhat abated. The Ordinance of 1915, which forbade religious instruction and worship in all schools enjoying any governmental privileges, was so modified in 1922 as to allow complete religious freedom in the higher Christian institutions. Then, as if to accentuate the friendliness of the Government General toward Chris¬ tianity and the desire to blot out the memory of the persecuting attitude of the preceding administration, a Christian Japanese was made Civil Governor. Late in 1922, an eminent American visitor summed up his impressions of conditions in Korea in these words: An impartial observer is struck by the outstanding changes and substantial gains here. There is a new security that Korea never knew under her own corrupt and grafting emperor and officials. There is a new material development, a new opportunity for advancement, a new sanitation, the introduction of more scientific farming, a new industrial development, the replanting of forests, bet¬ ter courts, much needed prison reforms, more honest official administration, and more material prosperity than Korea had known under her own government. No unprejudiced MILITARISM, REACTION, AND LIBERALISM 55 observer can deny that the material gains of the first decade of Japanese rule, from 1910 to 1920, are remarkable. The population has increased from some 13,000,000 to over 17,- 000,000. The trade has multiplied seven-fold. Over 500,000 pupils are in the over-crowded schools of all grades, while the children in the government schools have increased three¬ fold in the decade. The number of commercial companies has increased from 152 to 544; the factories show an eight¬ fold increase from 252 to some 1900. The mining of the country has increased fourfold. The Koreans are undeni¬ ably more prosperous today than they were ten years ago. They have lost a large measure of liberty, but they have gained a new discipline, a new patriotism, a new courage, and a new national spirit. The Koreans are a splendid people, hearty, courageous, independent, with their spirit tempered by much persecution and former injustice. The majority of the pastors and lay leaders with whom I talked had been in prison. They counted this a greater honor than any university diploma. This new courage, enterprise, and patriotism were unknown by the masses under their own government. Side by side a new and liberal Japan and a new Korea with free and courageous spirit are developing. There is an increased measure of liberty of thought, of speech, and of the press; the inauguration of local self- government; the participation of Koreans in the district and national government; a creditable increase in education; the abolition of whipping, and of the former forcible attempt to assimilate the Koreans; concessions to the national senti¬ ment of the people, and a manifest effort on the part of Japanese officials for conciliation and friendship . Full freedom was permitted for open-air meetings which were attended by from three to seven thousand people every night. I talked freely of world affairs, of recent revolutions and the new republics of Europe; of political, social, and in¬ dustrial advance, and of the rising demand for democracy, for social justice, and for liberty throughout the world. As these paragraphs are being penned early in 1923, the reports from Japan itself indicate that the 56 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN battle for freedom of speech and association has not yet been won. The police authorities, however, are far more tolerant than in the years 1919 to 1921, when several Christian friends of mine were imprisoned for patriotic words or acts misconstrued as “radical” or treasonable. Considering the recent hysterical measures against freedom of speech and of press even in the United States, one does not wonder greatly at the juggling of the Japanese police and courts with the much weaker guarantees of the Japanese Constitution. IX. DANGER POINTS STILL REMAINING The prospects of liberalism in Japan are of vital concern to peoples other than the Japanese themselves, for unless liberal ideas and policies continue to gain, the probability of difficulties and wars with ether na¬ tions is greatly heightened. Even with a powerful liberal trend in both Japan and America, for example, the danger of serious difference is by no means remote. Three of the roots of misunderstanding and possible trouble are China, Korea, and Japanese immigration into the United States and the British Dominions. Let us glance at each of these. 1. The Washington agreements cleared away most of the powder trains in the Chinese situation. They were of inestimable value for Japan, for they checked her before she had gone beyond recovery down the slippery path of aggression and imperialism toward China. But it would be folly to be blind to the pos¬ sible recurrence of danger in the not distant future. S':'' V? / ■ ■mmm- rnmm : ; TOYOHIKO KAGAWA AND HIS LITTLE “FLOWERS” IN THE SLUMS OF KOBE THE NEGISHI NEIGHBORHOOD HOUSE IN TOKYO. FROM LEFT TO RIGHT ARE MR. KOBAYASHI, MR. PRICE, THE SETTLEMENT DOCTOR, A TEACHER, A RELIEF WORKER, AND THE MANAGER. BELOW, IS ONE OF THE KIN¬ DERGARTENS OF THE SETTLEMENT MILITARISM, REACTION, AND LIBERALISM 57 Japan's population is certain to increase not less than 600,000 a year; and she may not he able to develop industries at home fast enough to absorb the surplus. Heretofore emigration has been slight — less than a million, all told, since 1880. But it may be expected to increase, toward China especially. The rich undevel¬ oped resources of China will inevitably attract Japan¬ ese capital and technical skill. Meanwhile occidental capital and technicians will be pouring into China. Clashes of interest may occur any time. China her¬ self will require decades to evolve a strong govern¬ ment and meanwhile will be poorly equipped to con¬ trol those clashes of interest and assertions of rights between foreign groups which so easily lead to war. Manifestly, self-control, respect for international law, and racial tolerance will all need to be strengthened among the Japanese and the other nationalities con¬ cerned if serious trouble is to be averted. These virtues do not thrive in the soil of commercialism and nationalism. They are engendered best by the Spirit of Christ. 2. Turning to Korea, we find that the danger of international trouble is negligible. The cruel meas¬ ures adopted by some of the officials to crush the Inde¬ pendence Uprising of 1919 rightly aroused indignation in foreign lands, and they only fanned the flame of Korean patriotism. But the more just and generous attitude which marks the present administration, if continued, will give satisfaction abroad and ensure tranquility in Korea. The Japanese also have an unsavory ancient record to live down in Korea, reach¬ es -.Tap 58 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN ing back to the invasion of 1587. The invaders are said to have cut off the ears of thousands of Korean captives and shipped them to Kyoto, where an “Ear Mound” stands to this day as presumptive evidence of the deed. To be sure, such barbarity was common in those days. It is an augury of a new public con¬ science that deputations of Kyoto citizens, led by Christians, have in recent years repeatedly urged the local authorities to open the “Ear Mound” and, after proving the truth or falsity of the tradition, to raze it level with the ground. The multitude of Americans and Britishers who are supporting missionary work in Korea will watch closely the trend of Japanese policy there, but will rejoice heartily if it shall stand for liberty and justice and shall recognize that Chris¬ tianity is the best ally of every good government. It may not be amiss to suggest that Americans and Britishers can understand the ordinary Japanese point of view about Korea if they will recall their own national attitude toward the Philippines and Ireland, for example. At the same time, it should be remem¬ bered that the deputation sent by the Japanese Federa¬ tion of Churches to investigate conditions during the Uprising publicly criticised the Government, and that scores of professors and publicists, not all of them Christians by any means, denounced the Government. Professor Yoshino has declared that ninety per cent of the students of Japan would vote to give Korea complete autonomy. This attitude toward a conquered people is not indig¬ enous to Japan. It is unquestionably the fruit, directly MILITARISM, REACTION, AND LIBERALISM 59 and indirectly, of Christian ideals, of the triumph of liberalism over military-imperialistic ideals. The Japanese are not the only race who have been slow to learn how to rule a conquered people. If, as seems likely, the large tolerance and sympathetic imagination which have made the British preeminent as colonial rulers are traceable partly to Christian influence, then the advance of Christianity among the Japanese may be expected to better their rule in Korea and Formosa. At any rate, it is significant that Christian officials in Korea, such as Chief Justice Watanabe, and Christian Americans in the Philippines, succeed where others fail. There appears to be a very close connection between their success and their Christian appreciation of the worth and dignity of every man of whatever race. 3. The last potential cause of international difficulty to be mentioned is immigration into occidental lands. To be specific, let us consider the “California Ques¬ tion.” Here again, the fair thing is to try to see the other side’s point of view. To the Japanese mind these are some of the facts in the case : Japan is densely populated, and it takes hard work to extract a living from the ever shrinking allotment of land available for growing numbers of people. California, with the same area as Japan, has only one sixteenth as many people; large tracts of land are undeveloped; and Japanese are able to enrich both themselves and their white neighbors by farming more intensively than white men will do. The Japanese immigrants are intelligent, industrious, law-abiding, and temperate. 6o CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN Their children go to school, and, according to the investigations of Professor Terman, the psychologist, of Stanford University, they show an intelligence superior to the average Portuguese immigrant's child, and not far below that of the average California white child of Nordic descent.* During the World War, over 500 Japanese volunteers from Hawaii and the Pacific Coast states and provinces fought in the Ameri¬ can and Canadian armies. There are among the Japanese in California dull- witted, narrow-minded men interested only in acquir¬ ing a competence. Many of them came to the Pacific Coast from Hawaii, but Americans should remember that the first immigrants wanted in Hawaii from Japan were strong-backed laborers to work in the cane fields. They were rounded up in droves by emigration com¬ panies. Most of them had never gone beyond their A B C’s in Japan, and in Hawaii had enjoyed scant opportunities for self-improvement. It is true, the older people have clung to a crude Buddhist faith and have mingled little with white folk, but white folk have not made intercourse easy, and even Christian Californians have done little to give them true religion. As for the Japanese born in America, they rapidly desert Buddhism and ancestral customs. So much for the Japanese point of view. What may be called the “California point of view” is by no means shared by all Californians. It may be thus outlined. The Japanese are unassimilable because they are radically different in physique, in *The New Republic, Dec. 27, 1922. MILITARISM, REACTION, AND LIBERALISM 61 customs, religion, and political habits. They do not treat women as we do, but make them work in the fields like men. They own allegiance to a “second Prussia/’ and even the Japanese born in America would fight against the Stars and Stripes in case of war. They are clannish and form “colonies.” They do not often undercut white workmen, but they work longer hours and are so efficient that the average white man cannot compete. They are likely to break a contract if it goes against them. They are so thrifty and multiply so rapidly that in a few decades they will own a large part of the State. The South has one race problem; we don’t want another. Even though we admire many Japanese, we are convinced that they and we had better not intermarry or try to live together in large numbers. The Chinese we like better because they know their place and keep humble, while the Japanese know they are as good as white men and want to be treated accordingly. The Chinese have a passive government behind them, while the Japanese govern¬ ment is alert and aggressive and teaches every subject that he must make Japan the greatest power on earth. So our slogan is, respect the Japanese, but keep them far from us. Much has been said in rebuttal and in support of these points of view. But without going exhaustively into the question, attention should be drawn to a few important considerations. Granted that the Japanese are as objectionable as the bitterest “anti-Japanese” assert, has American treatment of them been worthy either of American or 6 2 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN Christian principles? President Roosevelt built on those principles when, in 1907, he made the “Gentle¬ men’s Agreement,” by which Japan consented to stop the emigration of laborers to the United States. This Agreement has been well observed, though partially neutralized by the influx of Japanese brides. But be¬ ginning with the passage of the Heney-Webb Land Bill in May, 1913, the California and other coast legislatures have passed discriminatory laws which have deeply offended Japanese feeling and have threat¬ ened to work hardship and injustice. The situation has been relieved by the fact that two of the California laws have been declared invalid by the federal Supreme Court. The net result of the agitation, legislation, and recrimination of the last ten years has been to irritate the relations between the two races on the Pacific Coast and to bring the two nations dangerously near to a rupture. Fortunately, the Washington Agreements have removed the bogey of Japan as a “second Prus¬ sia.” Few intelligent Americans now entertain fears of a Japanese invasion of America or of open conflict with Japan anywhere. Conditions today are more favorable than for ten years to start afresh and find a just solution of the question. What are some of the principles of such a solution: Both Japanese and American investigators are agreed that further immigration of laborers and near¬ laborers should be entirely prevented, and also that the influx of Japanese brides should be rapidly reduced, MILITARISM, REACTION, AND LIBERALISM 63 so as to lower greatly, if not to stop, the increase of the Japanese population. The Japanese already here should be treated, not only with justice, but with courtesy, and made to feel welcome. If the notion of buying or freezing them out is abandoned, then it is surely good policy to do everything possible to Americanize them. Americanization involves the implanting of new ideals and ways of living. The Japanese residents are as easy to Americanize as any South Europeans. Anyone who knows personally young Japanese born and educated in America laughs at the absurdity of the assertion “once a Japanese, always a Japanese/’ They can hardly be distinguished from breezy young Americans, for, like all first generation immigrant children, they tend to be more than “one hundred per cent Americans/’ Their parents often complain, just like immigrant parents from Europe, “We can’t hold our children loyal to the old ideas. They don’t care about their fatherland and dislike to speak their mother tongue.” The master-keys to Americanization are the Eng¬ lish language and Christianity. Whatever measures therefore, can be taken to these ends will directly further a spiritual assimilation which is real American¬ ization. It is commonly admitted that as soon as Japanese residents become Christians, the chasm be¬ tween them and the average American is bridged. The problem in its legal and political aspects is primarily national, and only secondarily state or prov- 64 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN incial. Accordingly, a new “Gentleman’s Agree¬ ment” might well be adopted, on the basis of a fresh and dispassionate inquiry into the situation. More energetic efforts should be made by the churches, Christian Associations, and other agencies of good-will to befriend and to Christianize the Japan¬ ese transient visitors as well as the Japanese residents. Every dollar spent on missionary work in Japan would have its “spiritual purchasing power” greatly increased if a Christian instead of a neutral or anti- Christian impression were made on Japanese visitors to our shores. X. THE RESPONSIBILITY OF OCCIDENTAL CHRISTIANS Our excursions into the Korean and immigration problems may seem to have been far afield, but those problems are intimately bound up with liberalism and reaction in Japan. For example, one of the stumbling blocks in the way of liberalism and of Christianity alike in Japan is the less than Christian attitude of Americans in the handling of the Japanese situation on the Pacific Coast. Nothing heartens and strength¬ ens militarists in Japan more than anti-Japanese leg¬ islation and un-Christian treatment of Japanese in America. This brings us, in conclusion, to a consideration of three other ways in which Christians in England and America can help to build up true liberalism in Japan. (i) They can strive more doggedly to make the life of the American and British peoples and the policies of their governments measure up to the high t MILITARISM, REACTION, AND LIBERALISM 65 requirements of a truly Christian liberalism at home and abroad.* (2) They can stop “knocking” Japan as entirely and incurably reactionary and treacherous and can recognize and encourage the growing forces of liberalism in Japan, exercising patience with its slow gains, in view of the heavy odds against it. (3) They can do all in their power to promote the Christianization of the Japanese people. Is it not as clear as day that no vital liberalism worthy of the name can long prevail in any land unless it is fed by the living springs of Christian conviction and char¬ acter? The ramifications of the Spirit of Jesus al¬ ready in Japanese life give proof that wherever it prevails, human personality, regardless of its trap¬ pings, is valued, liberty without license is enjoyed, and the sacrifice of self-interest for the good of the whole is exemplified. Jesus Christ was the world’s first great liberal and His increasing sway in Japan is the only sure guarantee of her becoming and remaining a liberal state. *Not a little has already been accomplished in the United States by the Federal Council’s Commission on Relations with the Orient, under the lead of Dr. Sidney Gulick. Ill Social Problems and Christian Solutions I. LIGHTS AND SHADOWS OF INDUSTRIAL EXPANSION The Japanese boast that their land has never been conquered. But though they know it not, industrial¬ ism has already subjugated half the nation. Old Japan had her troubles over food and wages, and there were occasional uprisings against hard masters, but com¬ pared with the welter of the strife today between the owners and the workers it was the difference between a mill-pond and the whirlpool rapids of Niagara. And this revolution has all happened within forty years. i. Industrializing a feudal nation As late as 1876 a host of samurai were still bitterly resenting the opening of Japan to “foreign bar¬ barians” and were rebelling against the passing of the good old times when they were fed and clothed by their lords and could while away their lives in honor¬ able idleness or in light administrative duties. They continued to breathe out threatening and slaughter against the “ foreign devils/7 on whom they laid much of the blame for upsetting the old order and causing their hard plight. Haughtily they declared, “An eagle will starve to death rather than become a seed- eater; so a two-sworded samurai will never stoop to work at a trade or in business.” But such boasts filled no rice-bowls, and the samurai soon followed the rest of the people in a feverish effort to master the SOCIAL PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS 67 technique of modern trade and machine industry in order at any cost to make money and catch up with the nations of the West. The race havS been going on now for forty years, and it is evident to the Japanese themselves as well as to outside observers at what a killing pace they have been running. The questions spontaneously come to one’s lips, “How much longer can they keep it up? Will the fierce struggle for wealth through industrialism set up an economic feudalism which will reverse the trend foward liberal political institutions and so divide and demoralize the people as to unfit them for playing a large and constructive part in the world’s life?” A strong case could be made for the contention that industrialism has been more of a curse than a blessing to Japan. It is not unnatural to wish that the quiet life of old Japan could be restored. Think of peaceful agricultural Japan in 1880, when the cities looked like swollen villages, with their smokeless air and low buildings, and then behold the great cities of today, with their forests of chimneys and the rushing trolley cars and automobiles and the gaunt, reinforced con¬ crete structures. The transformation is vividly reflected in that part of Osaka known as the “old concession” where foreigners lived. When I first saw it in 1898, it was like a section of some American residential town, but today the old dwellings have either been turned into offices or torn down to make way for factories, with smoke that makes the sun look like a red moon. Industrialism has come to stay. The actual growth in the number of industrial 68 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN plants in the country bears out this impression. In 1883 there were only 125 modern factories, employing 25,000 laborers. Today there are 30,000 plants and they employ over 2,000,000 men, women, and children. Shipping and railway transportation have also forged ahead with the vast industrial expansion. Japan has not only built the largest man-of-war afloat, dis¬ placing 40,000 tons, but is turning out merchantmen of 25,000 tons. Her merchant marine on August 1, 1922, numbered 791 steamers of more than 1,000 tons and their total tonnage was 2,779,837. The pennants of her chief steamship companies are to be seen in the ports of every continent. Most of the two billion dollars worth of goods which represent the total of Japan’s import and export trade is carried in Japa¬ nese bottoms. Despite all the engineering difficulties created by steep mountains, torrential floods, earth¬ quakes, and tidal waves, Japan has built 7,500 miles of steam and 1,400 miles of electric railways in an area less than California. In a word, the whole nation has risen up and, with breathless intensity, striven to obey the injunction of the modern economic and educational prophet, Fukuzawa, who for thirty years preached in trumpet tones this gospel: “Young men, poverty and ignorance are hobbling your country. Master Western science, make money, and free her!” 2. The cost in terms of life The abandon Avith which this counsel has been followed even by conservative nobles and stoical SOCIAL PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS 69 samurai, until lately contemptuous of wealth, has brought dismay to those who shudder to see the old handicrafts and the quaint charm of the landscape sacrificed to the god of industry. The cost of the industrial revolution in terms of human life and character has been even more stupendous than the cost in terms of beauty and simplicity. We may by picturing the contrast between a typical village visualize what the change is meaning to the masses girl of thirty or forty years ago, who, in the security of home, helped her mother at the loom and about the household work, and on the other hand, a present- day factory girl in one of the vast cotton mills. Even though we resist the temptation to idealize the past and to blacken the present, the antithesis is shocking. In the old-time village, girls could at least expect safe homes, nourishing food, fresh air, variety in work, visits with friends and relatives, the hilarious fun connected with festivals, the moral influences of village custom, shrine, and temple, the ancestor wor¬ ship in the home, early marriage, and simple domestic duties. On the other hand, the girls lured from country homes to the average spinning mill by stories of the pleasures and high wages of the city are generally doomed to a life of disillusionment, drudgery, and temptation. Three quarters of the girls in these mills are housed in barrack-like company dormitories. Each girl’s quarters consist of one mat (three by six feet) or at most two, in a room shared with many other girls, and in some cases the sharing extends even to the 70 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN bedding, so that the night shift will have hardly left their quilts when the day shift, exhausted, tumbles in under them. The air is laden with the dust of a thousand looms. Twice a month they have a day off, when they may be allowed to spend their slender surplus at the movies or theaters or in carousals or in wandering about the streets. The monotony and high pressure of factory work leave them so jaded that only highly spiced diversions will satisfy. The lack of play, outdoor exercise, and proper food, and the exposure to contagious diseases undermine stamina and leave them weakened for motherhood, if not chronic invalids. In place of the control of elders and the restraint of rigid customs, they are left too often to the mechanical supervision of a dormitory matron and the wiles of a designing foreman. They become sophisticated and blase. Coarse pleasures and hardened companions sear the conscience. The whole setting of life is dwarfing and demoralizing. Lest these statements be discounted as mere rhetoric, it is well to quote from a careful address made in 1921 before an association of upper class Japanese women, by Mr. Bunji Suzuki, an influential labor leader and an educated man of conservative temper. He said: The condition of young women employed in the spinning mills is particularly shocking. Of some 700,000 womer employed in them today over 75 per cent must live in dor¬ mitories furnished by the mill owners, in dark and dismal common-rooms without any ventilation. Bathing and toilet facilities are better imagined than described. They all sleep together in these huge, prison-like places. Two or three girls SOCIAL PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS 71 sleep together on one large mattress supplied by the factory, and in summer or winter only one thin inadequate covering is given them. The girls go to bed with their clothes on in winter in order to keep warm. In summer they lie around in varying stages of nakedness, in hot, ill-smelling rooms, with¬ out a breath of fresh, decent air. As they work in day and night shifts, these mattresses are in use without rest, day and night. j. Conditions in the mines When industrialism is mentioned, we think mostly of factories, but modern mines are almost as much a product of machine industry. Conditions in the Japanese mines are even worse than in the spinning mills. When the Rev. T. Kagawa, the pastor and social worker, investigated the coal mines of Kyusiu in 1918, his discoveries were so damaging both to the mine owners and to the government inspectors that he was forbidden to publish parts of his report. Not only men, but mothers with babies on their backs, plunge into the bowels of the earth and work in noisome shafts for a pittance barely sufficient to live on. Equally unwholesome are the moral and intel¬ lectual conditions under which they are compelled to live and under which their children are brought up. Ponder this arraignment by Mr. Suzuki of the treatment of women in the mines : In 1917, the number of women employed in the mines of Japan was 70,000. Today that number is greater by over 6o,ooo. Most of them are between sixteen and twenty years of age, and they work in the pits along with the men. Very few women are employed in gold, silver, and copper mines, but most of them in the coal mines. Twenty per cent of all the laborers in the coal mines today are women. They are 72 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN usually employed to carry baskets filled in the pits. They work in the bowels of the earth, naked like the men, wearing only a little breech clout. There is no ventilation and no discipline in their surroundings. They are so like animals that they can hardly be called human. There are other women who work outside the pits; their work too is very hard. But mines are usually far away from the villages, and as the laborers do not see many people from outside, they do not have much chance to complain where it will do any good. Mine-owners, therefore, have been successful in keep¬ ing stories of the ill-treatment of their women employees very quiet. But those who can read statistics realize from the number of still-born children and the appalling number of deaths of newly born children in mining communities, that working and living conditions in them must be awful. At the mines no one makes complaints ; but these statistics cry to heaven against conditions in mining districts. 4 . Some general effects of industrialism Even when all allowance is made for the welfare work undertaken by some of the larger companies and the kindly interest of some proprietors in their employees, the state of affairs brought on by the whirlwind expansion of industrialism is nothing less than appalling. This will be clearer if we turn from this depressing though typical picture of the immediate effect of factory and mine life on the workers to certain effects on the nation at large as shown by certain well-defined tendencies. The avalanche of migration from the country to the cities has been marked in modern Japan as in Western lands. While the population of the nation has been growing at the rate of i per cent a year, since 1900 the population of the larger cities has SOCIAL PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS 73 leaped forward at the rate of ten to fifteen per cent a year. Tokyo now numbers 2,300,000, and Osaka 1,400,000, while Yokohama, Nagoya, Kyoto and Kobe range from 500,000 to 700,000. As Mr. Merle Davis points out, the suburban expansion has been far more striking than that within the city limits. During the thirteen years, 1903-1916, Tokyo proper grew 29 per cent, but the industrial suburbs grew 415 per cent. '‘Extensive areas, which ten years ago were planted to rice and vegetables or were swept by the tides, are now built up in solid blocks of factories and tenements.” If the Greater Tokyo schemes of men like Mayor Baron Goto are carried out, the city will annex all these suburbs, which are already inextricably bound up with her life, and will then have a population of four million, surpassed only by New York and London. Obviously, these rapid shifts of population are affecting every aspect of Japanese life, breaking down old safeguards and creating new perils. The physical well-being of the nation is also being menaced by the abnormal conditions of life in factories and mines, despite the great strides made by scientific medicine in Japan. Hospitals are numerous and fairly well appointed, and there are thousands of trained physicians. The public school system and the press are seconding the efforts of the political authorities and the doctors to spread hygienic knowledge. But all these efforts are to a large degree counteracted by the undermining of health and the spread of disease by the conditions in the growing army of industrial 74 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN operatives. One of the most careful studies of this sort is Dr. Ishihara’s monograph on the Health of Women Factory Operatives. In it we find these rather startling facts: Night work by 1,350 girls who were studied showed an average loss of one and one- fifth to two and one-half pounds during the five day period of night labor and a net loss of two thirds of a pound even after the succeeding five day period of daytime labor. What wonder that they so readily fall victims to tubercular and nervous troubles! In 1913 the factories had to recruit 200,000 new girls from the country districts. The number of recruits required is said to have grown to more than 300,000 annually, a serious drain upon the nation's vital resources. One would have expected the General Staff of the army to have seen that the weakened physique of hundreds of thousands of potential mothers in the factories would lower the birth-rate and impair the stamina of future conscripts. Out of those annually recruited, over one third return home within a year, and one sixth of these because of serious illness. Tuberculosis heads the list, and the victims become the carriers of disease to their native villages. In one case a girl returning home with tuberculosis embedded the disease in her village so that thereafter every five years thirty persons died of it. In another village, out of thirty girls returning home, twenty were ill and all but four of these had tuber¬ culosis. Adding together the deaths of women in the factories and after they returned home, the ratio is nearly three times as high as the ordinary death- SOCIAL PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS 75 rate for women, and higher than for women in any other occupation. Social students and welfare workers agree that fac¬ tory life has been a fruitful cause of juvenile delin¬ quency and sexual immorality. In March, 1919, there were 220,222 child laborers under fourteen years of age (equivalent to thirteen in occidental countries) of whom 121,994 were girls. Laborers between fourteen and eighteen years old numbered 722,303, of whom nearly half were girls. Not a few of the girls who tire of the drudgery and low pay of factory life are easily lured into service as waitresses and then descend by easy steps into a life of crime or vice. In a volume on Industrial Education, Mr. R. Unno states that forty-nine per cent of the delinquent girls arrested in Osaka during a certain period had been factory workers. Many of them are ruined before they leave the factory. In still another direction machine industry has had far-reaching consequences. The artisans of Japan are still famous for their handiwork, but their skill is waning before the ubiquitous machine whose steel fingers weave and hammer and carve what used to be the product of human fingers and wonderfully sharp eyes and fine taste. If the psychologists are right in holding that the type of a person’s activity goes far to determine his character and conduct, then we may expect marked changes in the Japanese people because of the passing of craftsmanship with its stimulus to creative instinct, individual variation, pride in work, and artistic judgment. 76 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN Industrialism in Japan is like a stream with two forks, the one sparkling and gay, bearing gold and all the delights of modern convenience and luxury, the other putrid and dark with the wreckage of human beings. And they flow close together. Go with me to Kobe to look at the mansion of a ship-building mag¬ nate, the head of a plant employing 17,000 men. He is a gentleman of the best blood and breeding, graduated from a famous American University, a patron of arts and philanthropy. He is not a showy spendthrift. His huge profits from wartime contracts have been spent largely in assembling a choice collection of European art and in bringing back to Japan the un¬ surpassed Vever collection of Japanese prints. Now let us walk a mile away to that ante-room of hell, the slums of Shinkawa, where twelve thousand human beings swarm. Open sewers and germ-haunted ken¬ nels multiply disease. Criminals, beggars, gamblers, and abandoned women are the quarter’s leading citizens. Dirty children in droves play and fight and ape their elders up and down the goat-path alleys as though theirs was the normal kind of life. These slums represent, it is true, the cess-pool of Japanese industrialism, but it is a pool which is incessantly replenished by the men and women flung off like broken fragments from the fast flying wheels of the economic mill. The Shinkawa slums are duplicated in every large city of the country. In Old Japan there were small slums, but nowadavs the stream of social castaways, maimed and despairing, disfigures every industrial center. All the taxes spent by government SOCIAL PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS 77 and the gifts of philanthropists for the welfare and reform of the submerged tenth in the slums and back alleys are admittedly like plasters on a cancer — power¬ less to purify the poisoned blood of the system. Some of the submerged population are only the latest gen¬ eration of a long line of delinquents and incompetents, but others are of the sort who could play a humble, though useful, part in a simpler and kindlier social order, were they not crushed or shunted aside by the juggernaut of a pitilessly impersonal industrialism. Machine tending, mass production, and bestial con¬ ditions of labor and life are gradually dehumanizing segments of Japanese life. Some of those finer powers and sensibilities which formed a part of Japan’s aesthetic and moral heritage are being atrophied by disuse or destroyed by the intemperate rush for profits. Who can measure the intangible but very real loss caused to the nation and to the world? 5. The evolution of the labor movement The idea that a race has inborn traits and ideals which are practically unchangeable is sharply chal¬ lenged by the rapid changes brought about in the thoughts and habits of millions of the Japanese people as they have been suddenly transplanted from country to city. Old Japan may be said to have been rural- minded; New Japan is urban-minded. Old Japan was a paternalistic oligarchy; New Japan is becoming democratic overfast. Old Japan was ruled by tra¬ dition and loyalty; New Japan is dominated increas¬ ingly by science and the lust for money. Old Japan 78 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN was ruled by her upper classes— less than five per cent of the people-while the other ninety-five per cent plodded on submissively in the ways of their forefathers, not always happy, but living an uneventful life close to nature and marked by the homely virtues of a hard-working agricultural people. Their place in New Japan is being taken by a class-conscious, sophisticated, and aggressive working class who are learning, not only the shibboleths of socialism and the red international, but who are becoming adepts at direct action and mass pressure upon employers and rulers alike. The irrepressible Labor Movement is the salient embodiment of all these changes. It was in 1897 under the lead of Katayama and other socialists that the modern labor movement first began to take shape. The boom after the victory of Japan over China had been accompanied by high prices, and the workers, in straits, began to clamor for higher wages. In February, 1898, a successful strike was waged on the largest railway in the country. There were then no legal obstacles in the way of labor organ¬ izations, and several strong unions were started, some of them based on the century-old artisan guilds. So¬ cialism and the rights of the worker were discussed and applauded by many progressive intellectuals, in¬ cluding Marquis Okuma, who was always an “Athen¬ ian” and a good-natured patron of novel causes. But the infant labor movement was given a body blow in 1900 when the Public Order Police Law was passed. Article 17 of this lav/ has been freely invoked SOCIAL PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS ;g to prevent both industrial workers and tenant farmers from organizing unions or agitating against employ¬ ers or landlords. The police used their new weapon with such deadly effect that from 1903 until 1917 aggressive labor unions were well-nigh unknown. But the workers had tasted blood, and they continued spasmodically in mines or railways to rise up in their wrath and by strikes or destructive riots to wrest concessions from their employers. In 1905 the populace of Tokyo, indignant over the peace terms with Russia and the repression of popular freedom at home, ran wild until the city was placed under martial law. I well recall how a battalion of troops was billeted in the large Y. M. C. A, hall, sleeping on the benches and on the floor. Japanese miners have always been pretty much a law unto themselves, and so it was not sur¬ prising that in 1907, when they were being forced to work at the point of the rifle, they revolted en masse in two copper mines and caused enormous damage. 6. The labor movement becomes belligerent I11 the August of 1912 occurred a red-letter event for the Japanese laborer, for it was then that a young Christian lawyer, Bunji Suzuki, formed the Laborer’s Friendly Society (Yuai Kai). Mr. Katayama and his colleagues in the earlier labor movement had encum¬ bered the movement with Marxian socialism. Mr. Suzuki avoided that error and at first formed simply a mutual benefit society, not a labor movement. But 8o CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN from an early date he cherished the plan of transform¬ ing it into a labor union as soon as the members had been sufficiently trained and tested. This is exactly what has come to pass, but the pro¬ cess was hastened by the awakening of the common people under the lash of war-time exploitation, and the intolerable cost of rice, fuel, and clothing. Shipping speculators paid for a vessel in a single voyage. Mills declared one hundred per cent dividends and gave fat bonuses to directors so as to avoid the income tax, while wages were only grudgingly raised. The vul¬ gar newly-rich “sprang up like mushrooms after a spring rain — despised nankins who, lying back in pink upholstered foreign limousines, honk-honked com¬ mon millions out of the narrow streets. And with every new nankin the price of rice rose another notch.” And rice is bread and meat to the Japanese. Goaded to desperation by such heartless display and by the hoarding of rice by speculators and sake manu¬ facturers, the angry mobs set out to execute rude justice as they saw it. The “rice riots” in Kobe during those hot August days in 1918 set match to powder in scores of cities. Forthwith the Imperial Household itself started a conciliation and relief fund by a contribution of $1,500,000, and the victims and other wealthy men almost in a panic added $12,000,000. It was no doubt conscience money in many cases, disgorged lest a worse thing befall; but some of the donors were men bred on traditional standards, kind-hearted and fairly honest, who must have been pained and per- SOCIAL PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS 81 plexed by the high-handed demands of the populace. This huge largess was used to give immediate relief to the poor and to establish public markets, cheap restaurants, and other alleviating agencies. These miraculously effective riots whetted the fight¬ ing edge of the laborers. The great body of public opinion inclined to side with them; for the doctrine of self-determination and the half-understood but wonderfully stirring ideas of “democracy” popularized through translations of President Wilson’s utterances, found ready soil in the hearts alike of the intellectuals and of the common people. Historians will probably look back upon the years 1917 and 1918 as marking the emergence of the Japanese proletariat. The rapid increase in the number of strikes during the war is an unmistakable index of the revolutionary change in ideas which was going on. In 1914 there were only 50 strikes involving 7,904 workers; in 1917 the number had increased to 398 strikes involving 57,309 workers, and the peak was reached in 1918 with 417 strikes involving 66,457 workers. The sharp slump of 1920, bringing wide unemployment in its train, robbed the workers of much of their power to put organized pressure upon employers. This is regis¬ tered by the fact that in 1921 the number of strikes had fallen to 246, involving 58,225 workers. The employing class were at first dumbfounded by the effrontery of their erstwhile docile employees. They had flattered themselves that Japan would escape the labor struggles of the West because, forsooth, in old Japan the employer was a father and the 82 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN workers were his children. The ingrained relation of superior and inferior resulting from seven centuries of feudalism surely could not be destroyed in a few decades by the introduction of Western machinery and methods ! Even though the old intimacy between proprietor and worker which had prevailed in house¬ hold handicrafts would needs give place to a more impersonal relationship, yet the employer and the government by means of welfare work and paternal protection of the worker and his family would pre¬ serve much of the spirit of the old regime and forestall any danger of violent protests among his grateful employees. But this bright dream faded into thin air before the demands of the disillusioned workers who had tasted welfare work and found it a poor substitute for wages enough to feed their children and freedom enough to organize and express themselves like self- respecting citizens. After the employers had recovered from the first shock of aggrieved surprise they yielded in most cases to the demands of the workers, for labor was at a premium during the war and it was better to share a fraction of the profits than to lose them all. With each success the laborers gained confidence and skill, and though they had almost no accumulated funds to pay strike benefits, they showed marvelous tenacity and power of sticking together, forming firm groups out of what had been only a promiscuous aggregation of individual atoms. They developed mass singing for the first time and found it worked wonders in bracing courage and arousing devotion to the cause SOCIAL PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS S3 in the face of suffering and of police opposition. A typical song is the one printed below, which was sung by a procession of laborers formed to welcome Mr. Suzuki to Kobe during the labor struggles of 1919 ; Workers of Nippon, awake, awake! Old things are done with and passed away. Worlds that are new are for you to make. Strive, then, and fail not in this 3rour day. Farmers and weavers and shipwrights all, Miners who labor beneath the soil, You who drop sweat to get bread, we call. Honors are now for the sons of toil. Early to work though cold winds bite, Tired ere homeward their wa>r they take, Da>Tlight gone and the stars alight — So they toil for the whole world’s sake. Workers of Nippon, awake, awake ! Old things are done with and passed away. Worlds that are new are for you to make. Strive, then, and fail not in this your da)r. Hooray for the Yuai-kai! Hooray!* They organized cooperative markets and eating houses where they and their families could be sure of one meal a day. If they stayed on the job or went back to work before the companies yielded, they shrewdly practised the ca’canny or “go slow” tactics of occi- dental strikers, and !tJiU|S compel lbd the Kawasaki Dockyards to divide among them $1,875,000 out of the company’s huge surplus. Some of the leading *Japan Chronicle , August 14, 1919. S4 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN newspapers, like those in Osaka, eighteen miles away, gave outspoken backing to the strikers, and three thou¬ sand Osaka workmen crowded a special train in order to go to Kobe and join in a sympathetic demonstration. The story of the struggle in the great Kobe ship¬ yards in 1921 showed that the day of suppressing or hoodwinking the erstwhile bovine laborers has gone beyond recall. The upshot of the whole struggle was an apparent victory for the employers, for the strikers returned to work. But as the employers had refused to yield, so the workers made no terms, simply declaring that they would postpone a solution until a more favorable occasion. They had developed an esprit de corps. For the first time they had measured swords with their masters and discovered that they could almost worst them. Strikes have occurred, not only in the shipyards and mines, but in all the major industries and even in the chief government arsenals. These arsenals are under the stern hand of the War Department, but the omnipotent General Staff had to compromise with the strikers. On the occasion of a certain paper factory strike, three hundred men made an effigy of their employer, stuck long lances through it, and then bore it tauntingly up and down before his resi¬ dence. Even the stenographers in the national Par¬ liament struck for higher wages and stopped the wheels of Imperial affairs. SOCIAL PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS 85 7. The awakening of the tenant farmers Thus far we have dealt with the labor uprisings brought about by the exploitation of workers in factories and mines, but there has been a parallel uprising among the tenant farmers of the country which bids fair to have equally far-reaching and revolutionary results. Seventy per cent of the popu¬ lation are engaged in agricultural pursuits and of that number seventy per cent are tenants, each tilling an average of one and one half acres. In other words, forty-nine per cent of the 58,000,000 in Japan are not owners, but dependent tenants working on shares and exposed to all the uncertainties of drought and flood and storm. For hundreds of years they have patiently borne their hard lot, only breaking out here and there against particularly harsh masters and then going back to the old treadmill. But universal edu¬ cation has made eighty per cent of them able to read the papers, and the steady increase of population has so reduced the land area available to supply rice and barley for each new mouth that discontent has inev¬ itably developed. Even the remotest hamlets have been touched by the tidal wave of democracy and self-assertion created by the upheavals of war-time. 'There have been many examples of generosity on the part of wise and kindly landlords who have made their tenants’ sufferings their own, but there have been still more cases of grasping and heartless indif¬ ference. The result is that tenant farmer unions have sprung up all over the Empire until there are 86 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN now over five hundred. What the end will be no man dares predict, but it is recognized by wise ob¬ servers that it portends a radical readjustment in the very foundations of Japanese life. 8. Wise leaders needed The men and women on farms and in factories whose life-blood is being sucked out by the system of which they are so helpless a part and the working fathers and mothers who see their children doomed to grow up stunted in body and mind cry aloud for help, and when their cries come back to them from heaven like brass, it is small wonder that they feel driven to take matters into their own hands rather than wait for the slow: and hitherto temporizing measures of the privileged classes. But our account of the Kobe shipyard strikers indicates that the workers are like children playing with razors. They are surprised and intoxicated by their unsuspected power. Having been themselves held in check by force, they quickly resort to violence when peaceful and, to their thinking, reasonable demands are spurned bv employers. They have too often been their own worst enemies. Like undisciplined masses everywhere, they too readily follow the blatant leader who boasts that he will “beat the money barons to a frazzle/' What the workers and the employers both need is fair-minded, wise leadership. Without this the labor movement is in imminent danger of falling under the sway of self-seeking demagogues or hot¬ headed partisans. How real this danger is will be SOCIAL PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS 87 apparent in the report of a recent national labor conference sent to me bv Mr. Guy C. Converse, an eye-witness : I attended the National Trade Union Conference in Osaka on September 30, 1922. There were 106 delegates from 59 trade unions. Twice during the Conference the 300 police present broke up the meeting because of disorder. They also broke up a meeting of socialists, anarchists, and bolshevists, who were paralleling the Trade Union Conference. At the Conference the air was electric. Divergent ele¬ ments — police and spies, and the radicals in the gallery shout ¬ ing taunts continually — made it a very difficult situation. Every time a chair was tipped over or there was any stir, the crowd was on its feet. I saw a hundred men surge to the windows at a slight noise only to return rather sheep¬ ishly when they found nothing happening in the courtyard below. The Conference was entirely in the hands of the workers, all of whom revere Kagawa as the man who wakened them and who did the pioneer work, but many of them feel that he is too passive, not radical enough for today. Suzuki they consider a man of the past, an opportunist, who did good service in his day; but now they feel they need real laborers who are willing to fight if necessary. Russia exerts a great influence. The class struggle is very much a part of their philosophy. They are opposed to international war, all war being considered, of course, a “capitalists’ war.” With such a situation you can see that the Christianizing and educating of labor leaders is one of the most urgent needs. If it be asked, What relation has Christianity to these conditions in Japan? it must be promptly ad¬ mitted that America and England, though long under the influence of Christian teaching, have not solved their industrial problems; but the chief reason why they have escaped worse troubles is that so many 88 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN employers and employees are at least partially con¬ trolled by the Spirit of Jesus. But the Christian churches of the West, through foreign missions, have made a noteworthy contribution toward meeting the very similar problems in Japan. Most of the ablest leaders of the constructive labor and reform movements have been bred in Christian schools or vitally influenced by missionaries. Mr. Suzuki owes much to the Rev. Dr. Clay McCauley and Mr. Kagawa looks upon the Rev. Dr. H. W. Myers as more than a father. The same is true in varying degrees of scores of others, writers, business men, and publicists, who are the spear-head of the social advance. Just how indispensable a part must be taken by Christians in meeting the problems created by modern industry will become clearer as we turn now to the remedial forces at work. II. ATTEMPTED REMEDIES FOR SOCIAL ILLS The Japanese are a humane people. Buddhism has saturated them with tenderness and pity, but their long feudal training and the dominance of the family system predispose them to limit their sympathy to relatives or fellow-clansmen. Besides this, the pity engendered by Buddhism does not so quickly take shape in action as the more positive love engendered by Christ. It tends rather to beget the mild fatalism reflected in the everyday phrase “Shikata ga nai” — “It can't be helped.” Furthermore, the glamour of the wealth created by the industrial system has so A BUDDHIST TEMPLE CEREMONY A BUDDHIST “SUNDAY SCHOOL SOCIAL PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS 89 blinded many eyes that they cannot see the maimed victims of the process who lie all about their path. Like the man who went down from Jerusalem to Jericho and was left half-dead by the wayside, so great numbers of innocent men and women and children are lying along the rough highway of Jap¬ anese industry, and as yet the good Samaritans are all too few to bind up their wounds. And what is more, no force has appeared capable of ridding the highway of the robber bands. But I would not give a wrong impression; the government and hundreds of private employers and other men of good-will have tried hard to remedy the worst abuses growing out of the industrial revolution. 1. The National Factory Law First of all should be mentioned the National Fac¬ tory Law which was passed by the Imperial Diet in 1911 and was finally put into effect in September, 1916. The chief provisions are as follows: 1. Children under twelve years of age cannot be employed, except that, with the permission of the administrative authorities, children as young as ten may be employed on light work. 2. The employment of children under fifteen and women for more than twelve hours a day is prohibited. 3. Employment of children under fourteen and women between the hours of ten P. M. and four A. M. is pro¬ hibited. 4. At least two holidays a month shall be allowed women and children workers: four holidays for those employed alternately on day and night work. 5. At least thirty minutes of rest within the first six D-.lap 90 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN hours of work and sixty minutes if working in excess of ten hours must be allowed. 6. Operatives shall not work more than ten consecutive nights, y. Women and children are not to engage in dangerous work or to be employed where poisonous gases or other injurious substances are manufactured or generated. The first and third provisions were not to he put into operation for fifteen years in order to allow the factories time to adjust themselves! Furthermore, most of the provisions are so weakened by the dis¬ cretion given to administrative officers in permitting their suspension that they have been at best but a flimsy protection. Practically all safeguards were swept away during the war when the pressure for production was intense and both laborers and employers were keen after profits. Of late the government inspectors have insisted more strictly on obedience to the law and in many of the large factories conditions are fairly good. In the smaller plants, located in the towns and villages and often housed in dark unsanitary structures, inspection is infrequent and abuses are likely to escape detection. 2. Welfare work in private factories The welfare work conducted by scores of the larger spinning and weaving concerns will bear comparison with much of that done by occidental employers. There are doctors and nurses, playgrounds and enter¬ tainment halls, good ventilation and lighting, retiring allowances, and sick benefits; but unfortunately these SOCIAL PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS 91 features are found only in a small minority of the total number of plants. In Tokyo, for example, three hundred only out of the five thousand factories have anything deserving the name of welfare work. The outstanding weakness, however, even of these high-grade factories, is the lack of opportunity for self-expression and self-government by the employees. The habit of paternal direction, not to say domination, still persists, and it is to be feared that with the insist¬ ent demand of the workers for greater self-determina¬ tion, the employers may delay granting it too long. Indeed, the labor outbreaks, already recounted, are ample evidence of the peril of delay and repression. In 1910 the police unearthed what they declared to be a plot against the life of the Emperor. Many anarchists and other radicals were arrested, and from among them twelve were executed early in 1911. The trials were held in absolute secrecy, but the story went abroad that the cases against most of these so-called anarchists were police frame-ups. This rumor added fuel to the growing discontent of the dependent classes, and it is supposed that it was with the intent to allay unrest and forestall outbreaks that the Imperial Household started a national relief fund. The Cabinet immediately took up the matter and by pressure secured from men of wealth a total of $10,000,000. This Fund was put into the custody of a new organi¬ zation called the Saiseikai. With the income from this endowment, which amounts to about $325,000 a year, subsidies are granted to hospitals all over the 92 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN country, and new charity hospitals have been estab¬ lished. Medical relief is thus being- given to some 100,000 persons each year. j. Private and governmental institutions The severe labor troubles of war-time impelled some of the most eminent industrial leaders to establish what is called the Association of Harmonious Coop¬ eration (Kyo Cho Kai) for the promotion of good relations between labor and capital. There is no reason to doubt the sincerity and breadth of purpose of this Association, but inevitably it has incurred the distrust of laborers, being looked upon as a capitalistic agency for the maintenance of things as they are. Another enterprise indicative of the thorough methods which thoughtful Japanese are applying to industrial problems, is the Ohara Institute for Social Research, founded in 1919 by a munificent gift from a factory magnate who had been impregnated with the Christian spirit through the influence of Ishii Juji, the George Muller of Japan. The Institute is akin to the Russell Sage Foundation of New York and has already issued a number of valuable studies. The Social Welfare Bureau in the Imperial De¬ partment of Home Affairs and the corresponding bureaus in the chief provinces show how up-to-date the Japanese Government is in its attempt to mitigate the evils of modern civilization. It is noteworthy that a goodly number of the experts in these bureaus are Christian men and women, not a few of them trained in Japanese Christian schools and later in occidental SOCIAL PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS 93 universities. Recent years have seen a marvelous expansion of practical relief measures on the part of the chief municipalities. Cheap lodging houses, restaurants, baths, employment agencies, and night schools are now accessible to multitudes. In Osaka, for example, the Working Men’s Club is a spacious building, providing most of the facilities characteristic of a Y. M. C. A. building. The director, Mr. Shiga, is a university graduate who, for some time, was an “Association” secretary, and he is attempting to minister in the spirit of his Master to the swarms of working men who throng the building. 4. Tuberculosis , unemployment, housing shortage The spread of tuberculosis in Japan has been aggra¬ vated by the conditions in the factories and mines so that the ratio of tubercular patients is one of the highest among civilized nations, being one to every fifty-two persons. In 1916 there were 86,633 deaths from tuberculosis which is at the rate of 157 in 10,000. The government authorities were surprisingly slow in adopting* preventive measures, but now both gov¬ ernment and volunteer agencies are actively educating the people as to the prevention and cure of the disease. During the past few years five municipal sanitaria have been established. There are also five private sanitaria for tuberculosis, three of which are under Christian auspices. The phenomenal expansion of industry between 1914 and 1919 led to a huge mobilizing of labor in the larger cities, and when the sudden slump struck all 94 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN industry in 1920, there was a corresponding concen¬ tration of the unemployed. One of the chief relief measures adopted was the rapid extension of employ¬ ment exchanges by the cooperation of the national and local governments. An impetus in this direction was given by the resolutions of the International Labor Conference held at Washington in 1919. The result has been the increase in the number of employment exchanges from 23 in 1916 to 396 in 1921. The greater part of this increase is due to the establishment of municipal and village exchanges. Like every other country, since the War Japan has had an acute housing shortage due to the concentration of resources upon the manufacture of munitions. Finally, in 1919, the government made available to municipalities a loan of $11,500,000 to be used in the erection of dwellings, particularly for the laboring class. A total of 15,500 houses had been completed in accordance with this plan up to the end of 1921, but creditable as this result was, it supplied only one eighth of the number of dwellings needed. In some municipalities laborers’ lodging houses are operated at a cost charge of between six and ten cents a night. In addition to fairly clean beds, whole¬ some food, a bath, an employment office, and a small reading room are provided. These houses are a great boon to countrymen coming to the city to look for a job, and to the thousands of men thrown out of work whenever there is a business depression. An influential factor in the improvement of slum conditions is the schools for poor children such as SOCIAL PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS 95 those operated in the lower east side and other slum districts in Tokyo. In eight of these schools there are altogether 4,800 children. It is found that the children are pitifully lacking in physical stamina, and that, accordingly, ninety-five per cent of those entering one school were found to be afflicted with some form of nervous disease. Coming as they do from hovels where old and young are crowded together in sickness and health, with alternate carousing and quarreling going on and lack of normal opportunities for play and wholesome recreation, it is small wonder that the children are so abnormal. Many of the teachers in these poor schools are veritable missionaries of light and love to their own people. 5. Christian leaders in welfare activities To anyone who knows how vital a contribution Christianity is making to the solution of social prob¬ lems in the Far East, it will be no surprise to learn that the welfare work carried on in factories owned by Christians has been so uniquely successful as to constitute in itself an apologetic for the Christian life. Notable among these is the work carried on by Mr. T. Watanabe, whose remarkable story has been given me by his close friend, Mr. J. Merle Davis : Mr. T. Watanabe six years ago was the manager of one of the cotton spinning mills of the Fuji Gassed Cotton Spin¬ ning Co. situated at Oyama, on the Tokaido Railroad line near the foot of Mt. Fuji. He was not at that time a Christian. He began to notice the sweet devotion and kindly, self-sacrificing spirit of one of the nurses attached 9 6 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN to the Mill Hospital. Her conduct and personality stood out in sharp contrast with the other nurses and matrons of the mill. One day Mr. Watanabe asked the nurse why she took so much pains to be kind and thoughtful with her patients and why she seemed happy all the time amid rather depressing surroundings. She replied that she was a Christian and had the love of Christ in her heart; that it was Christ within her. Mr. Watanabe was deeply impressed and finally decided if Christ could so change this nurse that he needed him and would seek him. Not long after this he was baptized. Later Mr. Watanabe was transferred to the managership of one of the Company's Tokyo plants, and it was here that he began, about four and a half years ago, the remarkable Christian social welfare program which marks him as one of the outstanding pioneers in industrial betterment in Japan. He found the directors of his Company hard-headed, practi¬ cal men, opposed to appropriating adequate sums for welfare work and prejudiced against the Christian emphasis which Watanabe placed in his welfare program. They granted him an utterly inadequate sum with which to carry out his plans, and told him if he made good, they would put a larger sum in the budget of the next year. He was thus compelled to work practically without equipment. He organized Bible study groups meeting in the early morning, singing and social groups in the evening. The simple, fundamental principles of right living, of relationship to God and to fellow-men were taught, and soon hundreds of the girls went to their work singing Christian hymns. A joint Y. M. and Y. W. C. A. was organized, patterned after the Tokyo City Y. M. C. A., but open to both men and women. The full time help of a Christian Pastor was secured, and in the course of a few months a Christian (Presbyterian) Church was formed within the mill, with a membership of eighty-five. A new spirit of faithfulness, of efficiency, of happiness and interest in work soon became apparent to the manage¬ ment of the mill and with it came a noticeable increase in output. The result at the end of the first year was a very substantial increase in appropriation for Welfare Work and Mr. Watanabe was virtually given a free hand to do as he SOCIAL PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS 97 wished with the mill operatives. In time this branch of the Fuji "Corporation found itself the object of attention and study on the part of mill owners from all parts of Japan. He fearlessly told them that it was the method of Christ. At a notable convention of mill and factory owners and managers in 1918, Mr. Watanabe read the most important paper of the Conference, explaining the application of the spirit and teachings of Christ to the problems of management. About two years ago Mr. Watanabe resigned from the Fuji Company to organize a mill of his own. He is prosper¬ ing financially, and a year ago he gave twelve hundred yen to the building extension fund of the Tokyo Y. M. C. A. I have visited a half dozen other industrial enter¬ prises conducted by Christians and in every case have found material for a similar story. Let me sketch three of them. There is a rich silk-producing district not far from Kyoto, and at the center of it lies Ayabe, which has become famous through the life and achievements of a prodigal son named T. Hatano. Thirty years ago he was a physical and moral wreck, who had wasted his own and his family’s substance in riotous living. But one day in the midst of his despair he stumbled into a Christian preaching hall in Kobe, and forthwith light began to break upon his path. Eventually he became a firm Christian, returned to his native village, and was reconciled with his wife and family. It required a long period of hard work before he could regain the confidence of his fellow- townsmen. After a time he became convinced that the farmers of the district were making a mistake in trying to raise cotton, whereas the soil was well suited to raising silk cocoons, and he began to try to get enough 98 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN money to make a demonstration. One old farmer was at length convinced and lent him a small sum. With that meager start, Hatano entered upon the career which in a few years made him the leading silk expert of the county, the head of silk filatures employing three thousand workers, and the saintly leader of a Christian church which sprang out of his life and work. Another instance of the fruits of religion in industry is that of my friend, C. Nakatsu of Kumamoto. Twelve years ago he graduated from Kyoto Imperial University. Having inherited considerable property, he might, according to Japanese custom, have retired to respectable idleness in his native city, but instead he determined to make his wealth and his education count to the utmost for the Kingdom of God. Ac¬ cordingly, he organized a laundry and later an iron foundry. His interests have gradually multiplied, but he has continued to devote himself like a father to the scores of young men and boys in his foundry. He has drawn around him a number of associates who share his views, and together they have permeated the shops with the spirit of Christ until it has become a factory of character, no less than of pumps and engines. Every day for a few minutes the office and shop staffs gather in the shed which serves as a chapel and there, under the lead of Mr. Nakatsu, they have a session of singing, meditation, and exhortation, and of conference regarding the well-being of the whole force. His home is a most Christian place, a bene- SOCIAL PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS 99 diction to those who, like myself, have enjoyed its hospitality. In the local Episcopal church and the Young Men’s Christian Association he has been a successful teacher of Bible classes and a leader in the development of a choir, which is a rare feature in Japanese churches. His hobby is the study and teach¬ ing of the Gospel of John. Let me mention one more instance, the dyeing es¬ tablishment owned by a Christian family near Osaka. So ardent was the religious interest of the parents that they dedicated one of their boys at birth to the Christian ministry. In his maturity he fulfilled their hopes and is today one of the most devoted pastors in that vicinity. It is not strange, therefore, to see blazoned on the smoke-stack of the dye-works the sign of the Cross, so that all may be reminded when¬ ever they see it of the living Christ; and in the works below that sign, the life and policy of the management are such as to commend the gospel of Christ. The Christian Association in Tokyo Imperial University was for years content to confine its efforts to religious and .social work among the students, but the emphasis upon social problems at student confer¬ ences and in Bible classes awakened a number of medical members and graduates to their duty toward the innocent victims of the industrial system in the slums of East Tokyo. They resolved to establish a maternity hospital and visiting nurses’ center in one of the most needy wards of the city. The enter¬ prise was carried out entirely without foreign aid or funds. At its head is a retired professor of medicine. 100 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN Although for many years he had maintained only a loose connection with the church, he seemed to have been longing for some practical need which he was peculiarly fitted to meet, and gladly put his prestige and skill at the service of the hospital. Many other examples of the leadership of Christians in social enterprises could be given. To a practical people like the Japanese, who judge a religion chiefly by its fruits, these enterprises are more convincing than volumes of apologetics. One of their aphorisms is to the effect that an ounce of evidence outweighs a ton of argument. For generations the common people have associated religion with the shaven-headed Buddhist priests, who drone Sanskrit liturgies and officiate at funerals, while they give the multitudes sweating under the yoke of life exhortations on the unreality of evil and the compensations of a paradise hereafter. A learned comparison between Buddhism and Christianity is beyond their grasp, but a religion that incarnates itself in self-sacrificing service and that stoops in the spirit of Christ unto the very least of the drudges in mines and factories, and the unfor¬ tunates in the slums, will command their respect. 6. Relief or reconstruction' — Kagawas work Enough has been said of the relief and welfare work inaugurated by the Government and the pro¬ gressive employers to show that they are not without value. They should go far to allay discontent and promote general well-being. But the crucial defect in. the policy of all who have not caught the Christian SOCIAL PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS 101 purpose is that they accept the present industrial and social order as final and merely attempt to smooth down the rough corners, never thinking to inject such an altruistic spirit as shall ultimately reconstruct the present order more nearly after the pattern of the Kingdom of God. A social and economic system which is dooming increasing numbers to a hard, cramped, and even sub-human existence must eventually be made over, and whether it is to be remade by reasonable and gradual changes or by revolutionary violence, will depend in large measure upon the degree to which the working masses and the privileged class alike are saturated with the spirit of Christ. It is at this point that the romantic life and achieve¬ ments of Rev. T. Kagawa, of the Kobe slums, shed light and hope upon the whole troubled situation. It is easy to use superlatives about Kagawa, for although he is yet a young man, just turned thirty- four, he has achieved more than most men at sixty. His career is so illuminating that it will be recounted in some detail. Tradition says that St. Paul was small and unpre¬ possessing, and so Mr. Kagawa, who has been called the “Saint of the Shinkawa Slums,” weighs perhaps one hundred and ten pounds and has an undistin¬ guished face until it is lighted up by inward fires as he pleads with some throng of strikers for patience and restraint, or as he appeals to some audience of university men and women to follow him in Christ- like ministry to the under-man. CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN 102 Mr. Kagawa discloses much of his life-story in the guise of a novel entitled Crossing the Death-line, which has gone through three hundred editions (200.000 copies) within two years, a striking indication of his hold on the public and of the wide appeal of the idealist approach to social problems. But it is set forth in more orderly fashion in a sketch kindly written at my request by Kagawa’s second father, Rev. Dr. Harry W. Myers, which is here reproduced. Toyohiko Kagawa was born August 10, 1888, in Kobe. His father’s family was wealthy. His father’s legal wife had no children. I first met Toyohiko when he was a slender, precocious lad of thirteen, with a brilliant mind and an ambition to learn everything. He was converted while a member of my English Bible class and at once threw himself with all his energy into the work of the church and Sunday school to an extent that was at times embarrassing. On graduating from the middle school he told his uncle that he was going to become a Christian minister, and was promptly told to get out of the house if that was his plan. He came around to live in our home, as he had nowhere else to go, and we sent him up to study at Meiji Gakuin, the Presbyterian School in Tokyo. After finishing in Tokyo he came back to Kobe and entered our Theological School, but before long developed tuberculosis and had to withdraw and try to get back his health. Twice he was at the very point of death, and once I sat up all night with him in the hospital, because the doctor thought he might pass away before morning. He spent nearly a year in a little fisherman’s cottage on the sea-side at Gamagori, which he rented for fifty cents a month.- While there he learned to know and love the poor, as he wrote their letters, painted their names on their oiled paper umbrellas, smoothed out their family quarrels, and was big brother to all the children in the village. SOCIAL PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS 103 In his graduating year at the Theological School he began going down to preach in the slum section of Shinkawa in Kobe on the street corners, and before long he began to see results. He asked permission to leave the dormitory and rent a room down there that he might provide a place for the young men he was getting hold of where they would be free from the temptations of the slums. We tried to dis¬ suade him as we felt that with his weak physique this would be signing his death-warrant, but he had made up his mind, and go he would, regardless of consequences. He was living the Sermon on the Mount literally. He never possessed two coats, as he would give one away to the first man he saw shivering from the cold. For one living in such a quarter, an occasional change of clothing is a neces¬ sity, so we adopted the expedient of providing an extra outfit for him, and having him change at our house every two weeks. Often he would give away his food and live on two meals a day, so we tried to entice him up to eat a square meal as often as possible. During this time he wrote his great book on The Psychology of Poverty. He also wrote a little book of poems of the slums, Two Measures of Tears, which was quite successful. During those early years his activity was simply astonish¬ ing. He would get up at five o’clock and preach on the streets or down at the water front to the laborers about to go to their work, and again at dusk here and there in the slums. He was tireless in visiting, nursing the sick, and helping to bury the dead. Friends who saw his work gave him considerable sums of money which he used with a lavish hand,— reserving only about two dollars a month for his own support. He tried various plans to help the com¬ munity about him, such as a night school, a sewing school, a dormitory, a cheap eatinghouse, a brush factory, accompany¬ ing it all with much preaching, prayer, and Bible teaching. He set as his ideal a celibate life of service such as that of Origen or Francis of Assisi, but the Lord sent him an ideal wife, who was heart and soul in sympathy with him and his work, and Mrs. Kagawa is able to run his home efficiently for him and, at the same time, do a great deal of religious, social, and charitable work with him. io4 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN ( Shortly after his marriage, Mr. Kagawa arranged for his wife to take a coarse of study in a religious training- school in Yokohama, while he went to America to study at Princeton Seminary and University. After three years’ study he returned to Japan in 1918 and spent his first night in Japan down at his old home in the slums. He had not been spoiled in the least by his life abroad. While he was away, his work had been carried on by one of his young converts. After his return from America, Mr. Kagawa leaped into prominence. His book on Poverty had made him an authori¬ ty on social work, and he was invited to give lectures in schools and in public gatherings far and wide. He began to organize unions among the laborers, and soon earned a repu¬ tation in some quarters as an “agitator.” He was responsible for getting up many public meetings to agitate for prohibi¬ tion, for the abolition of the licensed quarters, for universal suffrage, for better streets, and similar reforms. Requests for magazine articles came pouring in on him. He was in great demand as a preacher, and hundreds were added to the churches as a result of his addresses. His most successful literary venture was almost accidental. During his illness in Gamagori years ago, he amused him¬ self by writing a biographical novel or fictitious auto¬ biography which he entitled Crossing the Death-line. The manuscript of this book lay for years untouched till two years ago, when he was casting around for additional means to finance his many ventures. This manuscript was hauled down, re-written, and sent to the publishers.* The book is deeply religious, and gives the picture of a young man pass¬ ing through temptation and mental struggle into a life of sacrifice and unselfish service. The book sold from the first as fast as it could be printed, and in two years from the date of its publication, it has nearly reached its three hundredth edition, and is now the best seller in the country. Its sequel has been published, and is only a little less *They are said to have given him $500 for it, but to have sent a check for $15,000 more when the hundreth edition had been reached. SOCIAL PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS 105 popular than the first volume. Crossing the Death-line has been published in English. For a long time Mr. Kagawa was feared and watched by the authorities as a dangerous radical. When members of the Imperial family passed through Kobe, detectives were detailed to watch him. Once he was called into court and fined because some reference he made to the form of gov¬ ernment in the new nations of Europe was interpreted to be a veiled attack upon the government here. All this was rather ludicrous in view of the fact that he is a pacifist of the Tolstoian type. Along with his activity as a labor organizer, he has done fine work as a peace-maker in numerous strikes. In con¬ nection with his activities in this line, he was arrested last year and spent several weeks in prison, but was treated with great consideration, and released at the direct com¬ mand of the Department of the Interior. The authorities are at last waking up to the fact that Mr. Kagawa rep¬ resents one of the strongest conservative forces among laborers in Japan. Neither fame nor weariness has ever weaned Kagawa and his wife away from their tiny home and their motley family in the heart of the disease-smitten slums. Criminals and dead-beats and demented wrecks of humanity have imposed upon their un¬ stinted charity and made unceasing drafts upon their sympathy. It is as the founder and leader of the Western Federation of Labor that Kagawa has rendered his most difficult and unique service to the cause of in¬ dustrial peace. When the Federation was being- launched, a deputation of working men waited upon him and his friend Mr. Hisatome and got them to edit the organ of the Federation. During the past four years of tempestuous labor strife, Kagawa has io 6 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN been a buttress against violence and vindictive measures to such a degree that the ultra-radical leaders have attempted to undercut his influence and elbow him out of the inner councils. But he is neither per¬ turbed nor swerved from the straight road of utterly unselfish service to laborer and employer alike. The founding of a Labor College by Mr. Kagawa, in Osaka, is one of his most far-sighted moves. It aims to train labor leaders, whereas the school opened by the Capital and Labor Harmonization Society aims to raise the efficiency of the workers. The enrolment of these schools is still less than two hundred for both. The labor school started last September by the Osaka Young Men’s Christian Association has enrolled two hundred and six. In all these schools the faculties would rank with the best, for not a few of the Imperial University and Christian college professors are enthusiastically giving their services. In the Y. M. C. A. school, for example, we find seven doctors of philosophy, medicine, and divinity. It would not be surprising a decade hence to find that the ablest labor leaders had been given ballast and dynamic in these labor colleges. A terse yet eloquent summary of Mr. Kagawa’s gospel is given in a message written for this book.* If the missionaries and the churches are rearing even a few apostles like Mr. Kagawa — and they are — the demons in the Japanese body politic can be cast out and even industry can be more and more impreg¬ nated by the Spirit of Christ. * See Append IKo IV Religious Resources and Problems “Not many years ago there was on exhibition in an art gallery of Tokyo a remarkable picture. It was not exactly a masterpiece, but its subject was exceedingly suggestive. In the center stood a child, and grouped around it were four men, each beckoning it to follow. On the face of the child was an ex¬ pression of bewilderment. The child was meant to rep¬ resent Japan, and the four men represented a Shinto priest, Confucius, Gautama Buddha, and Jesus.”* I. THE BLENDED STRATA OF JAPANESE RELIGION This painting symbolizes the Japanese people. But it is not quite accurate; for just as an American can be at once a member of the Republican Party and of the Associated Charities and of the Church, so a Japanese can be a supporter of Shinto as a patriotic ritual, a disciple of Confucius as a teacher of civic and family ethics, and an adherent of some sect of Buddhism, probably because his ancestors were. The three faiths have not always lived in perfect peace; orthodox Confucianists have at times opposed Buddhism, and at the Restoration of 1868 the loyalists frowned on Buddhism and exalted Shinto. But they have all been so interwoven in Japanese life and thought, that Dr. Harada was cpiite justified in calling his book “The Faith of Japan ” for it describes the religious ideas held in common by Japanese of * Reischauer, A. K. : Studies in Japanese Buddhism, p. r. io8 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN £ all faiths and of none. This blending process was given its great impetus in the ninth century when two brilliant priests, Gyogi and Kobo Daishi, in order to wean the mass of people from their stubborn adherence to their native Shinto, devised the clever theory that the myriad gods of the Shinto pantheon were simply the Japanese counterparts of the Buddhist deities. Tolerance for things foreign and new has always been a marked characteristic of the Japanese people. In the religious realm it made them ready to welcome Buddhism in the sixth century and Christianity in the sixteenth. The same tolerant open-mindedness is still one of their most charming and hopeful traits. In like manner assuredly, every follower of Him who said “The truth shall make you free” will be not less eager to discover all that is good and beautiful in the faiths of Japan. The true missionary takes as his mottoes, “I came not to destroy but to 1111111“ and “F am come that they might have life and have it abundantly.” He will therefore judge other faiths by their best rather than by their worst. He will unfeignedly rejoice over every evidence of their power to bless human life and bring forth the unmistakable fruits of the Spirit. Then having discovered where the older faiths leave the Japanese seeker groping or impotent, the Christian will leap to share with him the secret which he has himself tested, of Christ the Open Door, the perennial Fountain. Approached in this spirit, the history and the present state of Shinto and Confucianism and Buddhism in Japan are charged with a vivid, almost RELIGIOUS RESOURCES AND PROBLEMS 109 poignant interest. One feels that lie is not a cold student of “false” or outworn “systems,” but a witness of the very birth-throes of human souls, and of the age-long yearning of the Heavenly Father to impart his Light to bewildered men. Our purpose being to find what living Japanese need rather than to study the philosophy of religions, we shall merely touch the mountain peaks in the history of the older faiths and devote major attention to their present-day significance and to the voids they have left for Christianity to fill. II. THE CONTRIBUTION OF SHINTO Shinto, which means “The Way of the Gods,” is the original faith of the Japanese people and reflects more perfectly than any other institution their character and genius. It arose like so many other primitive faiths out of a belief in spirits on the one hand and an adoration of natural forces on the other. Even today the mass of the people wear amulets or tack up paper and wooden charms over the front doors of their dwellings. To one who has seen Mt. Fuji at sunrise or the Inland Sea under the full moon, it is small wonder that the Japanese early became nature worshipers. Like the Canaanites, the Japanese have erected shrines on every high hill, surrounded by magnificent cedar or camphor trees. At the foot of a crag or the approach to a waterfall or around a great tree, their reverent fingers have twined straw ropes in token of their worshipful reverence for the beautiful, the grand, and the extraordinary. In Japanese mythology the iio CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN \ sun goddess, Amaterasu, is exalted as the source of life and food as well as the ancestress of the Imperial House. Even a scientifically trained Christian is in¬ stinctively impelled to bow when, standing on the coast of Japan, he sees the mighty sun rise in all its majesty from the bosom of the Pacific. Amaterasu and other nature deities were called kami, which means something superior and awe¬ inspiring. It is even today applied by the common people to the government, and it has been adopted by Christians as one of the words to express the idea of God. It is, therefore, not strange that the Shinto worship of the nature gods or kami was also ex¬ tended to include departed tribal chieftains by whose prowess the tribe had been delivered. The next step was to worship the living chieftain or Mikado, who was the visible representative of the gods as well as the political ruler. This doctrine of the divinity of the Imperial line was resurrected after the long eclipse of the Imperial family, by loyalist scholars of the eighteenth century. Their writings gradually built up among the samurai such an ardent patriotism for the Emperor that when the pressure of America and other powers in the eighteen-fifties forced Japan to open her doors, the strongest clans rallied around the Emperor and made him the sacred center of national unity. Naturally, therefore, from the time of the Restoration this political type of Shinto has been systematically promoted by statesmen and con¬ servatives as a buttress against the invasion of both Christianity and democracy. RELIGIOUS RESOURCES AND PROBLEMS hi The lengths to which nationalistic Shintoists will carry their exaltation of the Emperor are well-nigh inconceivable to a prosaic Westerner. Tt was only a decade ago that a cabinet minister, Baron Oura, made this pronouncement: ‘‘That the majesty of our Imperial House towers high above everything to be found in the world, and that it is as durable as heaven and earth, is too well known to need dwelling on here. ... If our country needs a religious faith, then, I say, let it be converted to a belief in the religion of patriotism and loyalty, the religion of Imperialism, in other words, to Emperor- worship.”* We remarked above that Shinto reflects the genius of the Japanese people. It exalts simplicity, purity, racial unity, and nature worship. The shrines, with their shingled roofs, simple lines, and straight-grained natural woods, bare of ornament, foster a correspond¬ ing simplicity in the devout worshiper. Before each shrine there is a bowl of holy water into which the worshiper dips his fingers as a symbol of purifica¬ tion. On the other hand, Shinto is lacking in any clear idea of God, and therefore of moral responsi¬ bility, of either sin or salvation. Shinto teachers have been fond of asserting the native purity of the Japanese heart — that the only requisite for salva¬ tion was to follow one’s own instincts and be loyal to the Emperor. Shinto does not plumb the depths of the human heart or answer its longings and strug- * Millard: Democracy and the Eastern Question, p. 21. 1 12 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN gles. Like the exquisite shrines standing in groves apart, the Shinto faith seems to dwell apart from the bustle and strife of real life. Not an iota of its beauty, its mysticism, its reverence for nature and for past generations, should be lost. They all can be conserved and treasured by the Christian. And who shall deny that the Christian Church in Japan and elsewhere would be the gainer by incorporating the true and beautiful aspects of Shinto shorn of superstition and narrow nationalism? Two of the festivals connected with the old faiths are already being re-christened and given a Christian dress. One of them is the joyous Buddhist feast of all spirits, when torches and lanterns are set a-twinkling far and wide in the rice fields, and the candles are lighted indoors amid feasting and merriment. The change into a commemoration of All Saints, marked by a service of praise for departed relatives and friends, is being readily made by not a few churches. Another is the Shinto feast of first fruits, when the new rice is presented to the gods of fertility; it is found by Christians to be a natural occasion for a service of praise and thanksgiving to the Giver of all good. In recent years two professors in Tokyo Imperial University have made a daring attempt to rationalize Shinto, and give it a place alongside of Christianity and Buddhism. Indeed, preposterous as it may seem, these learned gentlemen, both of them acquainted with Western philosophy and the history of Chris¬ tianity, have assumed that Shinto could be transformed RELIGIOUS RESOURCES AND PROBLEMS 113 into a universal and credible religion, despite its evident origin as a crude nature worship blended later with veneration of the Imperial line. Although their works are too abstruse to reach a wide audience, they have had a temporary effect on a number of younger students to whom the notion of evolving a religion which would enthrone their own emperors as heredi¬ tary demigods and pontiffs makes a seductive appeal. Cabinet ministers like Mr. Tokonami have in one breath vigorously denied that patriotic Shinto was a religion, and in the next they have encouraged at Shinto shrines ceremonies and prayers which have all the earmarks of religion. The most striking em¬ bodiment of this two-faced cult is the imposing Meiji Shrine, erected in Tokyo two years ago at a cost of several million dollars, and visited already by millions of worshipers. It is evident that nationalistic Shinto will long hold a prominent place in popular affection, blocking the way for a higher faith. III. CONFUCIANISM AND CHINESE CULTURE IN JAPAN Chinese civilization came in the fifth century to the tribes of the Island Empire like some grand galleon of the Spanish Main, laden with all the treasures of a culture which was old when Moses was born. Chief among the treasures were the Chinese classics, including the ethical and political system summarized by Confucius and Mencius. They brought a sudden widening of horizon and enrichment of life to the Japanese, much as the revival of. Greek' learning did to medieval Europe. The entire system of IT4 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN government was recast after Chinese models. Codes of law were drafted, literature and the line arts arose. But in the long run perhaps the greatest gift of China to Japan was an ethical system. Confucianism is a system of ethics and civics inseparably combined. Underlying the whole system is an indefinite faith in the order or will of the universe which is called Heaven. Confucius once said, “Honor the gods, but keep far from them,” for his central interest was man; he ignored alike the physical world and the ultimate problems of theology. Right relations to parents, to superiors, to brothers, and to friends, in accordance with the principles of righteousness, benevolence, and reason, which are embedded in human nature and in the universe — these are the essence of Confucianism. But, like everything else that they touch, the Japanese were not content to accept Confucianism without adapting it to their own traditions and social demands. The result is that while in China filial piety was the cardinal virtue, in Japan loyalty took precedence. This was a natural accommodation to the requirements of a military and feudal stage of development. Furthermore, in the seventeenth and eighteenth * centuries Japanese scholars magnified the more mys¬ tical and spiritual elements in Confucianism. Promi¬ nent among these scholars were Toju, the Sage of Omi, his disciple Banzan, and Muro Kyuso. Perhaps the greatest need which Confucianism supplied was the idea of obligation, which like every- RELIGIOUS RESOURCES AND PROBLEMS 115 thing else was vague and unsystematic in Shinto. Confucianism also emphasized the sacredness of family and civic relationships, and thus tended to maintain a sane balance even when Buddhism with its ascetic and anti-social influence was in the ascendant. Confucianism, as it were, injected iron into the blood; it put re-enforced concrete in the social system. Bushido, or “The Way of the Knight; ” represented the result of the blending of Confucian Meals with the native warrior ideals of Japan known as Yamato- damashii, which means the “Spirit of Yamato,” or Japan, for Yamato was the name of the tribe which first subdued the greater part of the country and formed an empire. Bushido, like the English ideal of a gentlemen, was elusive, but it represented that fine combination of self-obliterating loyalty, of contempt of suffering and poverty and death, of love for lord and native land, which made the medieval Japanese knight a close rival of the flower of European chivalry. Being the ideal of the ruling class, Bushido was unconsciously imbibed by the mass of the people, and even now it influences the conduct of every loval Japanese. But Bushido, like Confucianism, was the flower of an earlier age, when society was organized on the basis of family and clan, and when farming and fighting were the two great industries. It exalts the clan and the family, but minimizes individuality. Even its apologists admit that it is a pitiful misfit in the complex life of modern Japan. It has no answers to the perplexing problems of an industrial, cosmo- 1 16 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN politan age, and leaves unmet the deep demand of the heart for a rational and powerful faith.* It will be evident that Confucianism is not, properly speaking, a religion. Hence it has never been a rival to Buddhism or Christianity. On the other hand, it supplies invaluable elements which Christianity can build upon. In fact, nearly all the early leaders of the Christian Church in Japan, and a large proportion of the Christian writers, preachers, and educators today were brought up on Confucianism. Acute observers believe that without a substructure of Con- fucian training the character of Japanese Christians is likely to lack the clean-cut ideals of duty and loyalty, and the delicate sense of honor which mark the finer Japanese personalities. IV. THE BLESSING AND BANE OF BUDDHISM Buddhism, from the first, stood sharply contrasted with Shinto. But the very fact that it was so different and professed to supplement and not to compete with or destroy Shinto had much to do with its rapid and complete triumph. Chinese literature had preceded Buddhism’s entry into Japan by a century and had *«* paved the way for it. When Buddhism came, by way of Korea in 552 a. d., it brought as its dowry not only a fresh access of Chinese culture, but also the arts of India and Korea, for in that age, Buddhism was as intimately bound up with all aspects of culture as was Christianity in medieval Europe. As every student of Japanese art knows, he cannot appreciate its subtler * Imai, J. : Bushido from the Christian Point of View . RELIGIOUS RESOURCES AND PROBLEMS 117 meanings without a considerable knowledge of Bud¬ dhism. Like the cathedrals of Europe, the most exquisite architectural creations in Japan were the temples erected for Buddhist worship. On their dec¬ oration artists lavished their lives, deriving many of their subjects from the literature and symbolism of Buddhism. Most of the pioneers of letters in Japan were Buddhist priests. Well-nigh the only schools for centuries were those conducted by priests in the temples and monasteries or those taught by them in the palaces of provincial lords. Bridge building and the control of river torrents were also introduced by the priests. Today Buddhism is the creed of half Japan, a palliative for aching but credulous hearts, and a bulwark against change. Any understanding, therefore, of Japanese character and any program for the future must reckon with Buddhism. 1. Changes in Buddhism Japanese Buddhism is different from that in China and still more different from original Buddhism in India, for, like a long river, Buddhism has taken its color and shape from the consistency of the banks through which it has flowed. Original Buddhism might be called the Protestantism of Brahminism ; it was a recoil against empty speculation, lifeless ceremonies, and priestly tyranny. Its Luther was Prince Siddartha, Gautama Buddha, the Enlightened One. The many gods of Hinduism and the Absolute of the Vedanta alike he rejected. He fled from his family and all social obligations and, as a wandering CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN 1 18 ascetic, tried to lighten the misery of existence by kindly ministry. At length, having found enlighten¬ ment by the expulsion of all desire, he preached this discovery to his fellows. He had not been long dead before his remarkable character and teachings led his disciples to exalt him into an object of worship-, notwithstanding he had himself cast away all faith in the gods and had preached salvation by self- conquest and good works. But with the passing of the centuries and the spread of Buddhism into Tibet and China there developed a polytheistic system, an ornate ritual, and a monkish hierarchy so intricate and so contradictory to Guatama's original teaching that he would have been shocked beyond words had he come back to earth and witnessed the amazing transformation. Only in the Southern Buddhism of Ceylon, idealized in Sir Edwin Arnold’s The Light of Asia , and represented by the Zen Sect of Japan, was the ethical agnosticism of Gautama measurably preserved. 2. Prominent Sects in Japan Buddhism as it was brought to Japan in the sixth and later centuries was identical with that in vogue in Korea and China. Its priests came armed with a vast library of divergent sutras and commentaries which became the bases of a number of rival sects. Most of these sects have persisted, and new ones original to Japan have developed, so that today there are twelve chief sects. They represent the extremes of the northern polytheistic and the southern atheistic RELIGIOUS RESOURCES AND PROBLEMS 119 and ethical school. The ethical school is represented by the Zen Sect which came from China in the eighth century. It exalts contemplation and intuition. It is akin to Stoicism in its superiority to hardship and its struggle for enlightenment by concentration of thought, especially by fixing the eyes on one spot, such as the end of the nose, until ecstasy and enlightenment are induced. Zen has appealed power¬ fully to soldiers. It exalts self-reliance and self- mastery, but has no gospel for men in the toils of sin nor does it impel men to spend themselves for the regeneration of society. Most of the other sects are dominated by the * doctrine of salvation by faith, which is preached in its most pronounced and aggressive form by the Jodo and Shin sects. They all maintain that Buddhism has two aspects : the esoteric, for people of critical intelligence, the other for simple minds dependent upon the sensuous appeal of reward and punishment. Instead of an absorption into the absolute, the glowing picture of a Western Paradise is held before their eyes. Instead of rigorous self-discipline indefinitely prolonged, they are offered salvation by the mere repetition of the magic name of Amida, the all-pitiful. The tradition is that ages ago Amida lived a perfect human life as a monk, and when he was about to return to his divine abode he was so smitten with pity for suffering humanity that he vowed not to abandon them until by infinite suffering he had heaped up merit sufficient to save all mankind. These Amida sects were established and elaborated T 20 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN by two men of remarkable character and ability who flourished in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, the first named Honen and the second, his disciple Shinran. In addition to magnifying reliance upon the merits of Amida, Shinran’s most original contribution to Buddhism was the insistence upon the right of priests to marry and to eat meat. He founded the sect called Shin Shu. Its tremendous hold upon the masses is symbolized by the two magnificent temples which first strike the eye of the visitor to Kyoto, known as Eastern and Western Honganji. When the newest of these temples was erected some thirty years ago at a cost of several million dollars, two of the cables used in the temple were braided from the hair of millions of devotees. Tenderness and mercy are among the chief virtues springing from Buddhism. They are embodied in the god Jizo, the companion and guardian of little chil¬ dren and the conqueror of the powers of death. He appears to represent much the same response to human longings as the worship of the Virgin Mary. A few years after Shinran, there arose another powerful personality, Nichiren, who founded the sect known by his name. He recoiled from the doctrine of Amidaism. It was too personal and theistic. With the intimate Japanese feeling for nature, he demanded a pantheistic explanation of the uni¬ verse; so that in his system beasts and inanimate objects were represented as capable of attaining Buddhahood or enlightenment after various trans¬ migrations. He also exalted the Sanscrit sutra called TWO VETERAN CHRISTIAN LEADERS TRAINED IN THE “YOKOHAMA BAND. AT THE LEFT, THE REV. MASAHISA UEMURA, D. D., PASTOR, PREACHER, EDITOR, AND EDUCATOR, AND CHAIRMAN OF THE STANDING COMMITTEE OF NIHON KIRISUTO KYOKAI. AT THE RIGHT, THE REV. KAJINOSUKE IBUKA, D. D., EDUCATOR AND ADMINIS¬ TRATOR AND NATIONAL CHAIRMAN OF THE Y. M. C. A. AND OF THE SUNDAY SCHOOL ASSOCIATION A JAPANESE PASTOR AND HIS FAMILY. THE REV. HIROSHI HATANAKA WAS EDUCATED IN AMERICA. HE WAS FORMERLY A BOYS’ WORKER, NOW PASTOR OF KYOTO KUMIAI CHURCH, ONE OF THE STRONGEST CHURCHES IN CENTRAL JAPAN RELIGIOUS RESOURCES AND PROBLEMS 121 Saddharma Pandarika and taught his followers to chant, “Hail ! O Sutra of the Lotus of the Wonderful Law/’ instead of the phrase endlessly repeated by Shin believers, “Hail ! Amida Buddha !” With respect to salvation, Nichiren taught, like the Southern School, that it could be attained by one’s own efforts if one reverenced the law and was strictly orthodox. From the first, Nichiren has been a crusading sect, waging uncompromising war against rivals. Nichiren himself was a fiery patriot with a deep faith in the common man and an intolerance of every¬ thing foreign. At the time of the attack by the Armada of Kublai Khan, he rallied the defenders like a Peter the Hermit or a John Knox, and the heroic statue erected in his honor among the pines on the coast near Fukuoka commemorates alike the protec¬ tion of the gods and the labors of Nichiren. With characteristic elasticity the Nichiren sect attached itself to the Shinto belief in the rice god Inari, who is supposed to punish those who offend him by inflicting fox-possession. The Nichiren priests claim power to exorcise these evil spirits, much like the soothsayers and medicine men of primitive tribes. Because of its intolerance and superstition ancl blind patriotism, Nichiren has been a stubborn obstacle in the way of Christianity. 3. Power of accommodation As already pointed out, Buddhism found Shinto in possession of the field upon its arrival from the continent, but instead of denouncing it, the shrewd E-Jap TOO CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN priests under the leadership of Kobo Daishi declared the Shinto gods to be merely manifestations of the Buddhist deities. So plausibly did they manipulate this idea that it was generally accepted. The result was the composite system called Ryobu- Shinto or “Two-fold Way of the Gods.” The effects of this combination are evident today in the overlaying of some of the Shinto shrines with Buddhist ornamenta¬ tion. But at the Restoration of 1868 with its revival of pure Shinto, Ryobu-Shinto fell under the ban and most of the Shinto shrines were restored to their pristine simplicity. Buddhism has always been like an enormous sponge capable of absorbing everything it touched and of conforming to every new environment. Its leaders in Japan, therefore, as Christianity has prospered, have set themselves to borrow Christian methods and ideas. Many temples now have Buddhist preaching services and Sunday schools. There are Young Men’s Buddhist Associations with dormitories similar to those started by the Y.M.C.A., and many of the sects have printed selections from their sacred writings in volumes bound in close imitation of the Christian Bible. Even the Zen Sect, which depends so much upon intuition and so little upon literature, has published such a book. More striking still are the Buddhist hymns modeled after Christian hymns, with slight changes, such as, “O, for a thousand tongues to sing my blessed Buddha’s praise/’ and “All hail the power of Buddha’s name!” Thus far the Shin and the Nichiren sects seem to be the only ones that RELIGIOUS RESOURCES AND PROBLEMS 123 are undertaking foreign missionary work, and for the most part their activities are confined to com¬ munities where there are Japanese colonies. The chameleon-like accommodation of Buddhism to its surroundings and to the vocabulary of each new day makes it comparatively easy for the Buddhist apologist to maintain that Buddhism, after all, contains the essential ideas of Christianity and that it has other ideas which adapt it better to the oriental mind. Let us remember that the adequacy and excellence of any religion will not be settled by argument, but by the try-out of real life; and that human nature at bottom is so nearly alike, East and West, that it will demand and respond to the same fundamental truths and appeals. Having laid down these principles, it will be illuminating to contrast the two faiths as fairly as may be in brief compass, even though words are admittedly inadequate to define life, and Chris¬ tianity is primarily a life rather than definitions or precepts. V. BUDDHIST AND CHRISTIAN TEACHING AND EFFECTS CONTRASTED Original Buddhism grew out of the life and teaching of a noble Indian prince, who loved men and made works of self-denying benevolence almost a religion, though he was an agnostic; but the Bud¬ dhism which has chiefly prevailed in East Asia has been a speculative philosophy with only slight his¬ torical connections, and with some borrowing from early Christian thought regarding salvation by faith. 124 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN Christianity in all its forms is based upon the historical fact of Jesus Christ, the ideal man, the revealer and incarnation of God. Original Buddhism offers a nebulous Absolute, absorption into which constitutes the goal of all existence. Christianity preaches the Holy Father and Saviour, harmony with whose will opens the door to fulness of life in this world and forever. Popular Buddhism points men to a paradise hereafter, and minimizes family and social obligations. Christ invites men of all races and conditions to enter the Kingdom of God and so to impregnate the family and other social institutions with the spirit of Jesus that they shall all be built into that Kingdom. Buddhism maintains that evil and sin are illusions to be explained away or escaped, either by mastering desire or by supinely trusting the merits of Amida. Christ shows that sin is a fact, but to be overcome by God working in men, and requiring effort by men themselves, as well as trust in Christ. Buddhism has emphasized asceticism and flight from evil instead of fighting to replace evil with good. This sentence of a Buddhist teacher is characteristic: “Religion is a device to bring peace of mind in the midst of things as they are.” Some of the temples have their funds invested in houses licensed for evil purposes, and social reforms have never secured the support of any considerable number of Buddhist leaders, but have generally been initiated by Christians and liberal- minded men bred in Confucian ethics. Buddhism minimizes personality, because it has no clear revela¬ tion of the Heavenly Father in whose image man has RELIGIOUS RESOURCES AND PROBLEMS 125 been made. Particularly does Buddhism degrade woman by denying her equality with man and requir¬ ing her to go through a longer process of rebirth in order that she may, by becoming a man, ultimately be saved. Buddhism promises salvation without effec¬ tive repentance because it has no clear doctrine of sin. It encourages vows and pilgrimages, formulas end¬ lessly repeated, and votive offerings in place of a new life dedicated to the will of God. As President Ebina has pointed out: “Buddhism and Confucianism give no impulse of service for outside peoples or of world responsibility, whereas Christianity has filled us with a sense of world stewardship.” In the most vital aspects of life Buddhism leaves an aching void. Girist brings the satisfying gospel of the universal Father suffering with and for his children. Instead of pessimistic condemnation of the world on the one hand or eas)r self-indulgence on the other, Christ brings the vision of the Kingdom of God, an inspiring ideal toward whose realization every disciple can make a contribution. The spirit of resignation under the hand of destiny, the tender pity toward suffering among animals and men alike, the consciousness of being knit into the intricate fabric of the universe, all these are beautiful legacies of Buddhism, by all means to be cherished, but sup¬ plemented and vitalized by the gospel of the Girist- Iike God. We have by no means said all that could be said to bring out the strength of Buddhism or the other faiths. But the fairness of our summary is confirmed 126 CREATIVE .FORCES IN JAPAN by these words used by the professor of the Science of Religion in Tokyo Imperial University, Dr. M. Anesaki :* “Confucianism is a humanitarian ethics, but being an elaboration of a patriarchal system of politics and morals, its teachings are peculiarly static and formal. Shinto, being a remnant of ancient nature worship and of the cult of the spirits, cannot hope to stand the pressure of science, while its com¬ munal ethics is struggling for life or death in face of the industrial regime. One religion that remains in the held with some hope is Buddhism. But it is hopelessly divided, its organizations are parochial, and its tenets too often metaphysical; ” These are the words of an exceptionally intelligent, fair-minded scholar who might be called a liberal scientific Buddhist with Christian leanings. VI. MODERN SECTS The inability of the old religions to satisfy the people has been strikingly shown by the appearance of numerous popular sects during the past few decades. They are nearly all offshoots of Shinto, with Buddhist and Taoist elements intertwined. Among the most prominent are: Tenrikyo, which has 3,000,000 adherents, and 21,000 teachers and preach¬ ers; Taiseikyo, which is reputed to have 400,000 adherents and 5,000 teachers; Konkokyo, which has nearly 600,000 adherents and 1,150 teachers; Ontake- kyo, which has 1,000,000 adherents, and 9,000 teach- *The Social and Religious Problems of the Orient. The Ear! Lectures for 1921, at Pacific School of Religion. RELIGIOUS RESOURCES AND PROBLEMS 127 ers. Most of them emphasize faith-healing and exalt national traditions. They have built up a miscellan¬ eous body of doctrine which is polytheistic and not of a high moral order. The most noted of the new sects is Omotokyo, which arose some thirty years ago at Ayabe, through the revelations which an unlettered old woman claimed to have received. Later her son-in-lawi supplied the brains to elaborate the doctrine and to organize the movement, until by 1921 it had attracted hundreds of thousands of believers, and had amassed considerable property. It had even gone so far as to establish a daily newspaper in Osaka, the editor of which was a retired general who had doubtless been attracted by the chauvinistic patriotism engen¬ dered by its leaders. It was a strange compound of superstition, mesmerism, faith-healing, and patriot¬ ism. When, however, the leaders went so far as to proclaim that the capital of Japan and the world would be at Ayabe, and that the high priests of the sect were the inspired guides of all men in every relation of life, the government authorities arrested the leaders and sentenced the chief high priest to five years in prison; and, not content with that, they had the chief shrine razed to the ground, so that the whole sect has been disrupted. The unquenchable thirst of the more intelligent young men and women for some satisfying faith is evident to anyone who talks with them. One writer, Ehara, who has let his imagination play freely on the stories of the Old and New Testament, has issued 128 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN three bulky volumes which have found a large reading public. He is not a Christian, and his books distort some of the facts and doctrines, but on the whole they may help to lead men to the light. The amazing popularity of Rev. T. Kagawa’s writings is another indication of the widespread demand, and still another is Kurata’s life of the great Buddhist leader of the twelfth century, Shinran. VII. PROPHETS AND GUIDES OF YOUNG JAPAN The dominant impression of the religious situation in Japan in these days is that it resembles the confluence of a multitude of streams; but one current flows clear in the midst of the turgid waters, that is, the life and teaching of Jesus. The appeal of Jesus to Japanese of a mystical turn of mind has been mediated most powerfully by men like St. Francis of Assisi and Count Leo Tolstoy. A number of the modern prophets who are officially connected with neither Buddhism nor Christianity acknowledge both Jesus of Nazareth and the historic Gautama as their masters. They recoil from the worship of mammon and the complex artificiality and irreverence of the feverish life around them. We cannot do better than glance at the character and teaching of some of these men, for they are symptomatic of the quest of the Holy Grail by multitudes of Japanese youth. One of them is R. Tsunashima, a mystical and unconventional Christian who died several years ago. From a book written on his death-bed, note these rapt sentences, as rendered by Professor Anesaki: RELIGIOUS RESOURCES AND PROBLEMS 129 How often has my heart beaten in joy facing a light — the light of finding my God seated in the innermost sanctuary of my sincere heart ! The God I have then seen was no more the old traditional idol or an abstract ideal . My former experience of seeing God was sure and significant, yet it was subtle and elusive. Now it is quite otherwise. My God, the God of heaven and earth, has now appeared face to face, like a fact of intense daylight, as a fact astonishing and thrilling. . . . Blessed is he who believes without seeing, and more blessed is he who believes by having seen with the inner eye. ... I am a son of God. and share the government of human life, of heaven and earth. ... I must live like a son of God, and be worthy of sonship.* Another is Y. Miyazaki, a liberal Buddhist, who 111 1921 published a tribute to St. Francis, entitled, The Adoration of Holy Poverty , in which we find these penetrating comments on modern life: There can never be an end to conflicts in a society divided into classes as we see it today. There is never saturation in the claims of rights, just as in the calls of responsibilities, for human desires and demands expand indefinitely. The final solution lies nowhere else than in a total abnegation of self in an ecstasy, in “all or nothing.” ... St. Francis’s whole life was a realization of his gospel of love and toil. His life was pure poetry. He saw God, communed with Him, by serving the afflicted souls of human beings. How¬ ever obstinate a soul might be, it could not but be restored to its original purity on encountering his loving service, which fused everything it touched into the white heat of love. Therein was his life, his faith, grand and sublime, as shown in his deeds. Still another is Tenko Nishida, who, after long searching, dedicated himself to a life of renunciation. He knew almost nothing of St. Francis, but to a * Quoted from Social and Religious Problems of Asia Today. ISO CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN marked degree adopted his principles of love and uncal¬ culating service. Nishida’s career is so significant that I will quote from Professor Anesaki’s account of it: He was born and grew up a Buddhist, He had once been an industrial enterpriser; but his failure, due chiefly to the difficulties and pressure brought upon him by capitalists and workmen, plunged him into despair and vice. Even in the pit of despair he never ceased to meditate on the meaning of life, and particularly on the foundation of the existing economic system. In the depth of failure and agony he de¬ cided to renounce everything, his family and his own self, too. For a while he lived like a beggar or hermit, without paying heed as to how to feed himself; still he was able to keep alive somehow. One day he picked up the grains of rice strewn on the street and sustained life. Like a flash, an idea came to him, that man lives, not by the virtue of his own merit, but by the gift of Nature and that what he deemed to be his work and possession was not in fact his own, but a free gift of grace. Then he served a friend’s family by taking up menial work and demanded nothing in return but just a bare living. There he himself was almost amazed to see the profoundly edifying effect of his humble service upon himself as well as upon the whole family of his friend, including its servants, because his life inspired the whole circle with a bountiful spirit of ardor in mutual service. This, together with his meditation in solitude, accom¬ plished a revolutionary conversion in his spirit and life, and thereafter he has continued to live up to his principle of non-possession and service, going from one place to another. He does not know how to name his religion or his God, nor try to formulate his ideas. But he shows his Buddhist heritage in often calling the final resort of his life the ‘‘Universal Light, the Source of all being, the Giver of grace.” .... Nishida is now proceeding to the practical question of reforming the economic life of modern society in accordance with the principles of service and non-possession. He seems to have considerable organizing RELIGIOUS RESOURCES AND PROBLEMS 131 talent, and his operation of a mine started a few years ago is a matter of keen interest to all observers. Some of his fellows have organized factories, somewhat along the line of cooperative societies. They insist on non-possession and regard these properties as mandates entrusted to them for serving mankind. One-sided though men like Nishida may be, they are among the powerful upbuilding forces at work among the Japanese people. It is the part of the Christian not to decry, but to encourage them when¬ ever they are building on reality, and to share with them the larger truth. The last of the modern prophets to be mentioned is T. Arishima, who, though still a follower of Jesus, has left the Christian Church in disgust at its ineffici¬ ency and the hypocrisy of some of its members, but who preaches a life of individual development by virtue of complete love as exemplified by Jesus. In his volume on All-embracing Love he strikes this keynote : '‘Christ embraced into his supreme love all mankind, past, present, and future. He could not have done otherwise. That he has never ceased to give shows that he found great satisfaction in the endless expansion of his self. Did he not say, ‘Love thy neighbor as thyself’ ? He was the Man who experienced most fully the joy of loving self, and therefore loved others and embraced them all into himself. That he exhorted men to follow him shows that he was convinced of the possibility on the part of all men, mean and foolish like myself, of treading the same pathway.” Mr. Arishima has a considerable number of scattered followers. There are many other 132 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN similar informal brotherhoods of aspiring youth, some living together in simple communal fashion, others going about their studies or their work like other men, but cherishing a great hope or a great longing. These earnest strivings after the light fill any sympathetic student of Japan today with mingled joy and sorrow. The old faiths have manifestly left the people at best in a hazy twilight, at worst in darkness. Jesus Christ himself, through historic personalities like St. Francis and Luther, Wesley, and Livingstone, has begun to shine through the mists. In proportion as he is adequately represented among the Japanese by living ambassadors they will inevitably kneel and worship. Indeed, it is not fanciful to assume that if Confucius and Buddha, Shinran and Sontoku themselves, but knew Christ in all his glory, they would joyfully acclaim him as the Sun, beside whom they were but as stars. None are more ready than thoughtful Japanese to recognize the inadequacy of the old faiths, even when they have been revived and expanded by contact with the spirit and teaching of Jesus. I remember some years ago with what vehemence Baron Iiiroyuki Kato, himself a devotee of science and agnos¬ ticism, denounced the hollowness of Buddhism and the rottenness of its priests, and at the same time praised the noble character of Christians, although he maintained that Christianity itself was unpatriotic, because it exalted humanity above nationality. About the same time I heard the late Hon. S. Ebara, a samurai of the old school, and a princely Christian, RELIGIOUS RESOURCES AND PROBLEMS 133 declare that Japan needed Christianity above anything else, for although she had developed excellent systems of government, education, law, and industry, her systems of morals and religion were outgrown, and only Christianity could possibly meet the need. VIII. SPIRITUAL PILGRIMAGES OF SOME JAPANESE SEEKERS AFTER GOD Strange as it may seem to dilettante students of things Japanese, some of the most scholarly Japanese Christians have no love for Buddhism or Shinto. They understand well the sublime aspects of the speculative philosophy of Buddhism and its softening influence on Japanese life. They appreciate the naive simplicity of Shinto. But in addresses they rarely allude to either. Indeed, I have heard two of them, one a conservative, the other a liberal church leader, scout the idea that the old religions should be used as a stepping-stone into Christianity. To them Bud¬ dhism and Shinto suggest the smothering of all divine life and practical value under a blanket of corruption and formalism. But, on the contrary, one finds a few equally earnest Christians who, as Paul said of Judaism, have found Buddhism to be a “tutor-slave to lead us to Christ; ” Such a man is my friend, Mr. K. Yamamoto, secretary of the Tokyo Y. M. C. A., who thus sum¬ marizes his indebtedness to the older faiths: In my early schooling I was taught Confucian morality, and thus given a conception of universal brotherhood. Although different from and vaguer than the Christian 134 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN teaching, it. prepared me to believe in human brotherhood and divine Fatherhood. I was born in a Buddhist home, and thus imbibed a faint idea of the immortality of spirits, which tended to belief in eternal life. In such a strong Shinto district, we were all brought up to go on festival days to the shrjnes to worship the gods and goddesses, to make offerings, and to vow fealty to our rulers. Reverence toward the gods and loyalty to one’s sovereign seem to me essential preparations for the higher religious experiences Thus these three fundamental truths, universal brotherhood, the future life, and loyalty were all in me awaiting the germinating touch of Christianity. The heart pilgrimages of some modern Japanese seekers after God will be more convincing than anything I could say. Let me recount those of a man and a woman reared in old Japan, then of a young man and a woman of new Japan, all of them alike unable to find rest until they had found Christ. A Merchant Prince The first was Baron Morimura. When I first met him sixteen years ago he was a man of sixty with a crown of white hair and a white beard framing a placid, kindly face; but within was profound discontent for he had been reared a Confucianist, and as a wealthy merchant he had spent large sums in disseminating the Confucian morality among his employees. But he had become convinced that Confucianism alone was not enough. He had also delved into Buddhism, but had found in its maze-like contradictions and its negative attitude no gospel for men struggling with the realities of modern life. Then he had turned to Christianity in its ethical form, and had engaged a RELIGIOUS RESOURCES AND PROBLEMS 135 lecturer to preach a compound of Christianity and Confucianism to his hundreds of employees. But this too failed to satisfy him, and finally, twelve years ago, he turned full face toward Christ and spent the last decade of his life as a radiant and devoted Christian. c Merchant prince though he was, and created a peer of the realm for his pioneer contributions to the nation’s industry and foreign trade, he loved to stand before his fellow-countrymen and in unaffected sim¬ plicity bear testimony to the sufficiency of Christ, and Him alone. A Masterful Woman's Search Madam Hirooka was one of the most striking characters of her day. She was a veritable Amazon in business, in educational reform, and in Christian evangelism. Of all the Japanese women I have met she was the most racy and emphatic in her speech. Her convictions were unshakable, for they were based on an experience which was her very own. Born in the wealthy patrician family of Mitsui, in her girlhood she received the usual training in polite accomplish¬ ments, but she insisted upon reading solid books such as only boys were supposed to care for. Married at seventeen, she soon found that her husband was neglecting his business, and she, therefore, began, by studying late at night on arithmetic and commercial subjects, to equip herself to take his place. Five years after her marriage the crash came, and her husband was left nearly bankrupt. She separated from him and, single-handed, reorganized his firm, and devel- 136 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN oped a coal mine, a bank, a life insurance company, and agricultural lands in Korea. For nearly forty years she was one of the prominent business leaders of the Empire. When asked how she happened to become a Christian, she replied : I wanted women to be good and wanted to help them to improve their lot. I found that I could not accomplish what I desired without religion. That conclusion sent me to study religion from the woman's point of view. I found that there is no hope for women in any of the religions of the Orient. They teach that from the cradle to the grave women are evil and inferior to men. The Confucian system of ethics, for example, teaches that fools and women cannot be educated. A woman cannot be a “heavenly creature.” It teaches that it is better to see a snake than a woman, for the latter arouses passion.- Japanese women have been so long oppressed by this kind of teaching that they no longer stop to ask why. They are afraid, like slaves. Then I began to read the Bible. I did not like some parts of it any better than I liked the religions of the East. I did not see why any woman should call her husband, “Lord and Master.” Saint Paul made me very angry. He was an old bachelor — anyone can see that ! He didn’t know much about women. But Peter ! He was fine. He had a wife, he understood women. One can see that from his epistle. When I read the gospels I found that Jesus made no dis¬ tinction between the sexes. 1 liked that. We are all, women as well as men, children of God. I came to the conclusion that the only hope for the women of the Orient to attain their true position is through Christianity.* Madam Hirooka was one of the great Christian evangel¬ ists of Japan. In connection with the United Evangelistic Campaign she toured from north to south and south to north, making her thrilling, almost terrific, appeals for pure Christian living. One night at Shimonoseki she held a vast theater audience of two thousand for a solid hour with her * Quoted from The Democratic Movement in Asia , p. 141. RELIGIOUS RESOURCES AND PROBLEMS 137 virile gospel message. She always dressed in European clothes., which made her quickly recognized everywhere.* Many a time I have gone to Madam Hirooka’s home to consult her about some phase of Christian work. She always gave me good counsel, and was the very first Japanese Christian of eminence to support the plan of establishing a Japanese summer conference plant at the foot of Mt. Fuji. After my main question had been disposed of she would always engage in lively discussion of some social or religious problem, and with sweeping invective condemn the faint-hearted Christians who to her seemed to be compromising with evil. She waxed most eloquent in denouncing the slavery imposed upon women by law and tradition, and she saw no hope for freedom for either women or men except through the gospel of Christ. Buddhism and Confucianism alike, as she had known them, were powerless to break the shackles. A Buddhist Scholars Dilemma The most illuminating story of the spiritual pil¬ grimage of a modern educated Japanese that I have ever heard is that of my friend Ryoun Kumagai. Its freedom from all denunciation and cant and its clear witness to the supremacy of Christ are im¬ pressive. The following extracts are taken from his appeal to Buddhists to become Christians :* 1 I know little about Christianity yet, except that I have been won by the power of the love of Christ. I was born the eldest son in a Buddhist temple of the * What Shall I Think of Japan. 138 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN city of Toyama in the strongly Buddhist province of Etchu. Through the exertions of my parents and other be ievers, I succeeded in graduating from the Imperial University, specializing in religion. After entering the University I came strongly under the influence of Chikazumi Jokan. I owe it to him that I am able to go forward boldly now in my present convictions. He himself was a deeply religious, absolutely consistent man, who would not compromise, but go straight ahead. But though I listened to his sermons for four years, somehow I never could fully believe in Amida Buddha; on the contrary, Christianity began to sink in. I was powerfully attracted by the work of earnest saints like Bunyan and Luther and Augustine and St. Paul. The words of Yamamuro Gumpei, of the Salvation Army, too, seemed more precious than gold. Mr. Kumagai then tells of becoming a teacher in Otaru and of the coming to the city of the famous evangelist, Pastor Paul (Tsurin) Kanamori. He continues : I saw Mr. Kanamori in the distance, walking in quiet meditation along a road which ran into the hills, and I fol¬ lowed after him. It was in the depths of the peaceful mountains, lovely with autumn colouring, that I first spoke to this man of God. He listened to me as we walked, and gave me kindly answers. We turned homewards, but still there was much to say. Next day I laid all my deepest doubts before him, and he took up my problems and solved them one by one. But I did not then in the least intend to become a Christian. . . . When we came to the final parting, Mr. Kanamori prayed for me, and, strange to say, that prayer, full as it was of a boundless sympathy such as I had never heard since I was born, brought a great light and power into my life. After that came a period of great distress and doubt, because Christ was attracting my heart strongly, but it was not easy to cast away my old faith in Amida. Should I believe in Christ? Should I believe in Amida? ... I even dreamed of starting a new religion which should RELIGIOUS RESOURCES AND PROBLEMS 1.39 maintain that both were One Being. But I did not feel my strength adequate for such an enterprise. Soon after my return home, letters came from the head temple, appointing me chief priest. But after passing through a time of mental storm, I definitely determined to become a Christian. . . . But why did I cast away Buddhism like a worn-out sandal and put my trust in Christ alone? There was a deep reason for that. The age-long sufferings of Amida — one cannot believe them to have been actual fact. Of course there may be good effects from believing in them and deep philosophy in the doctrine; one may behave as if one be¬ lieved, and preach about the vows of Amida; and as I had hitherto studied the subject, I could argue to any extent about it, but still it was impossible to hold these things as historical truth. But the Cross of Christ is a fact. And when I read about the words and deeds of Christ, it became clear to me that these were not the words and deeds of a man; that Christ is God... .Then the love of Christ! That is beyond the power of the heart or of words to express. The more I knew of the things of Christ, the more I touched the source of fathomless depths of truth and discovered for the first time the way in which I could truly live. . . . The world became a radiant place, filled with love and life and powrer. By degrees, as I went on reading the Bible, I under¬ stood that the teaching of Christ is not only not inferior to any other religion, but that it is so far above them that they cannot be compared with it. Christianity includes everything good to be found in Shin Shu, Nichiren Shu, and Zen Shu, and is higher than all. . . . When I had made this decision, I was especially troubled about my mother. I could imagine how she would not only refuse her consent, but would for a time be full of qualms about its being unfilial to our ancestors. There was no way but to pray that my mother might herself be brought to see the love of Christ, and come to work with me in the Path of God. ... I cannot but believe that in time she will come to rejoice in the boundless loving-kindness of God. . . . I am not making light of Buddhism, but I believe that its purpose is realized best by Christianity. After the sun has 140 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN risen, it is not necessary to go on burning electric lights. If Shaka and Shinran could see that their aims of mercy and salvation for man can be attained completely by the more excellent religion of Christianity, I believe they would be perfectly satisfied.* Incidentally, this moving appeal illustrates the sort of Christian apologetic which is being developed to meet the needs of Buddhists, much as St. Paul in the Epistle to the Romans developed an apologetic primarily to meet the needs of Jews. From Shinto to the One God Almost as illuminating as Mr. Kumagai's con¬ version from Buddhism is the story of the conver¬ sion of Miss Michi Kawai and her father from Shinto, for he was a priest of Shinto, descended from forty generations of priests at the Imperial Shrines of Ise. Family pride, patriotic devotion, and professional interest all argued against this man fol¬ lowing Christ. Fie always rose at dawn to salute the rising sun and to pray reverently to the guardian deities of Great Nippon. But one day, when Michi-ko was about eleven years old, her father called the family together and solemnly told them he had found the true, living God. Till then the children had always prayed facing toward the Ise shrines, but forthwith he instructed them to pray turned away from the shrines, to impress the change of faith on their childish minds. Soon after her father’s conversion, Miss Kawai was sent to a Christian school for girls in Sapporo. * Christian Movement in Japan , 1922, pp. 80-87. RELIGIOUS RESOURCES AND PROBLEMS 141 It was when she was fourteen that Dr. I. Nitobe met her there and when he returned home said to his wife, “Today I have discovered the coming woman of Japan.” Commenting on this remark a few years ago, Miss Macdonald wrote, “She is not the coming woman any more, she has come!” But it required long years of preparation, including a college course at Bryn Mawr, eight years of teaching in Miss Tsuda’s fine girls’ school in Tokyo, and two years in Europe and America studying social and religious conditions and speaking to hundreds of gatherings. Since 1916 she has been National General Secre¬ tary of the Young Women's Christian Associations, but her influence has been potent among men as well as women in all parts of the Empire and in for¬ eign lands. Her clear-cut evangelistic appeals have carried conviction to students in Europe and North America no less than they have in Japan. Breaking over the bounds of ancient etiquette she has courage¬ ously urged Japanese men to deal chivalrously with womankind. She is an elder and an ardent worker in Dr. Uemura's church. By making a composite of the foregoing stories of Japanese converts to Christianity one can gain a fairly accurate reflection of the religious situation in [apan. It is such men and women who constitute the unanswerable argument for the adequacy of Jesus Christ and the sufficient justification for Christian missions to Japan. 1 42 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN V Epochs and Achievements of the Christian Movement Our survey of certain aspects of the social, political, and religious situation will have made it evident that the problems of the Japanese people demand the solvent power of the Christian gospel, but equally evident that the attempt to bring the people as a whole to faith in Jesus Christ is a task in some respects unparalleled in history. For Japan not only has, like China, an ancient and advanced political, intellectual, and religious civilization, but she has progressed much farther than China toward universal education, an omnipresent daily press, a cosmopoli¬ tan literature, and a national self-confidence based on repeated triumphs in war. In short, the messengers of Christ have never approached a people at once so civil¬ ized, so puissant and so proud, and so fully acquainted with the shortcomings of the peoples who are called Christian. As though all these factors did not make the situation sufficiently difficult, the first entry of Christianity into Japan in the sixteenth century, com¬ plicated as it was by the political designs of Spain and Portugal, left behind it a suspicion of the “evil sect” which has survived even to this day. Thus far in our study emphasis has been laid on the problems confronting the Japanese people and the indigenous character and resources available for their solution. Beyond referring to the work of a few individual Christians, we have reserved for ACHIEVEMENTS OF CHRISTIAN MOVEMENT 143 this and the concluding chapter a conspectus of the achievements and potentialities of the Christian movement as a whole. Any adequate appraisal of the capacity and promise of that movement must consider, not only its present-day leaves and fruit, but also its roots and trunk ; in other words, the slowly germinated seed and the buffeted young shoots. As we rapidly make this survey, it will be instructive to ask ourselves frequently: What mistakes were made? How might wiser policies have been adopted? 1. The tragic first coming of Christianity Christian missions in Japan have presented a dramatic mingling of triumph and tragedy. The entire story from the entry of the Jesuits nearly four centuries ago would furnish thrilling material for a scenario writer. The first scene would depict Francis Xavier, a pioneer member of the Society of Jesus, commonly called Jesuits, landing at the southern tip of Japan in 1549, accompanied by his first convert and interpreter, Anjiro, exultant at the thought of claiming this virgin kingdom for his Master. Xavier penetrated as far as Kyoto, the capital, meeting with poor success and dependent for the most part on the charity of a suspicious people. In the southern island of Kyusiu, however, he won some influential converts, including a prince who was so impressed by a picture of Mary and the Child Jesus that he fell on his knees and commanded all of his followers to do likewise. Xavier left within two years to evangelize China, but his successors reaped 144 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN where he had sown and at the end of thirty years claimed 150,000 converts and within fifty years, half a million.' The depth of the faith of many of the new converts was convincingly demonstrated a little later when thousands faced martyrdom rather than recant. The success of the Jesuits, however, was not entirely due to their zeal or their doctrines. Political motives had much to do with the support which some of the princes gave the missionaries, and in Japan, as among the Teuton tribes, it was common for the subjects to change their religion at the command of their ruler. Furthermore, the old religions were then at a low ebb, and the trappings and ceremonies of Roman Catholicism, bearing some resemblance to those of Buddhism, made it easier for the common folk to make the change. In 1583 one prince sent an embassy to Rome to declare allegiance to the Holy See, and at the same time the subjects of the prince were ordered to embrace Christianity or go into exile. Some Buddhist priests who refused were put to death and their monasteries were burned to the ground. But when certain of the princes who were nominally Christians tried to turn their religion to political account, it was inevitable that their enemies should exert themselves to check the foreign religion. The great military triumvirate who ruled Japan between 1570 and 1620 detected in the Jesuit missionaries the advance guard of Portuguese imperialism. This suspicion was based in part upon the remark of a Portuguese sea-captain who was reported to have ACHIEVEMENTS OF CHRISTIAN MOVEMENT 145 said, ‘‘The King, my master, begins by sending priests to win over the people; and when this is done, he despatches his troops to join the native Christians, and the conquest is easy and complete.” In 1587 a national decree ordered the expulsion of the foreign priests, but by closing their churches and working in secret in friendly provinces they were able for a time to evade the military authorities. A little later Franciscan monks came to Japan and competed with the Jesuits, notwithstanding that the Pope had given the Jesuits the exclusive privilege of evangelizing Japan. The military authorities were stirred to new persecution and in 1597 twenty-six persons, including six of the Franciscan fathers, were crucified at Nagasaki. A few years later came missionaries from two other orders, the Dominican and the Augustinian, and sharp quarrels broke out among the different orders. Finally, in 1614 the military ruler, Shogun Ieyasu, believing that he had discovered a plot of the Chris¬ tians and foreigners for his overthrow, issued a decree ordering all members of the religious orders, whether Japanese or foreign, to be expelled. Three hundred persons were deported to Macao and a number of Japanese Christians were sent to the Philippines where their descendants still live. The persecution waxed vehement, and hundreds of con¬ verts testified to the depth of their faith by submitting without a murmur, not only to being crucified and burned at the stake, but to being buried alive. As might be expected, considerable numbers recanted, 146 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN but multitudes remained unshaken to the end, com¬ parable in fortitude with the martyrs of ancient Rome. In Nagasaki harbor Pappenberg Island is still pointed out as the traditional cliff over which scores of the Christians were hurled to death. In 1638 a blending of religious and political motives led to the so-called Christian rebellion of Shimabara. In quelling it, thirty-seven thousand persons were massacred. Thereupon, the conquerors are said to have erected over the ruins of the castle a stone with this inscription: “So long as the sun shall warm the earth, let no Christian be so bold as to come to Japan; and let all know that the King of Spain himself, or the Christians' God, or the Great God of all, if he violate this command, shall pay for it with his head." II. BEGINNING THE MODERN CHRISTIAN MOVEMENT As soon as a few ports were accessible to foreign residence in 1859, the missionaries pressed in. They faced a formidable array of obstacles. None of them knew the Japanese language, — which is as difficult as the Chinese,— and there were then no textbooks, dictionaries, or teachers. Christianity was still a prohibited abomination. All Westerners were feared, for the European powers had for decades been despoil¬ ing China, and the Japanese feared that their turn would soon come. Internally, Japan was on the verge of civil war as the two parties, which stood, the one for keeping the country closed, the other for opening it to international intercourse, strove for the mastery. Ail during the sixties a little band of missionaries ACHIEVEMENTS OE CHRISTIAN MOVEMENT 147 numbering less than a score were concentrating every effort to gain a knowledge of the language and to win promising leaders among the progressive young men who dared to listen to them. Fortunately, the early Protestant missionaries included several men and women of eminent character and ability, and they were remarkably well diversified in their talents. The Rev. John Liggins and the Rev. C. M. Williams, after¬ wards Bishop Williams, came from the American Episcopal Church Mission in China and drew around them youths who have since become leaders in the Church. Dr. James Hepburn was not only a gifted physician, but a scholar whose Japanese-English dictionary remains his monument. The Rev. S. R. Brown and the Rev. D. B. Simmons of the Reformed Church in America both showed a talent for getting hold of bright young men. Dr. Guido Verbeck was a man of international training, and more than any other foreigner was trusted by high officials in affairs of state. The Rev. J. Goble, the pioneer Baptist mis¬ sionary, invented the jinrikisha which is now used all over southern Asia. In 1869 came Dr. D. C. Greene, a sage, eminent as a translator of the Bible and as a counsellor of influential Japanese. Later Dr. J. C. Berry, a physician, founded the Nurses’ Training School in Kyoto and aided in establishing a modern prison system. The first missionary from England, the Rev. G. Ensor, readied Nagasaki in 1869, and quietly influenced a group of bright youths. In the early seventies came Dr. Nathan Brown, of the American Baptists, who devoted himself to trails- 148 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN lating the New Testament, and Archdeacon Shaw, a saintly representative of the Society for the Propaga¬ tion of the Gospel ; also a magnetic group of Method¬ ists, Dr. R. S. Maclay and Dr. M. C. Harris (later Bishop) from the United States, and D. Macdonald, M. D., from Canada. All the missionaries who have been mentioned represented Western Christianity, but in 1861 there came to Japan a remarkable Russian, Father Nicolai, who afterward became Archbishop of the Eastern Orthodox Church in Japan. He stood in the front rank of modern missionary statesmen. For several years he devoted himself entirely to a study of the language, and only after five years did he baptize his first convert, a Buddhist priest, who had first ap¬ proached him to ridicule Christianity. In the trans¬ lation of the Bible, in the education of the clergy, and in preaching, he labored with such energy and wisdom that at his death the Eastern Orthodox Church in Japan numbered over thirty thousand communicants. His courage and devotion were strikingly shown during the Russo-Japanese War when he insisted upon remaining at his post even though the Japanese felt it necessary to shut him up in honorable imprisonment within the compound of the cathedral, where he had his residence. Nicolai's successor, Bishop Sergie, has emulated his generous spirit, as, for instance, by regular attendance upon the national interdenominational Christian conference of 1922. ACHIEVEMENTS OF CHRISTIAN MOVEMENT 149 Roman Catholic missionaries came back to Japan in 1862, the very year that the Pope proclaimed the canonization of the twenty-six martyrs who had been crucified at Nagasaki in 1597. Consideration for the sensibilities of the Japanese had led the Catholic authorities to send French priests rather than Spanish or Portuguese. To their great surprise and joy, after laboring quietly two or three years, the priests discovered that there were thousands of descendants of the ancient Christians, especially in Nagasaki, who after eight generations still remained loyal to the Christian faith. It was not long before the authorities took stringent steps to suppress these believers. The perse¬ cution reached its height in 1869. Thousands were sent into exile, and many were put at hard labor in the mines or were tortured and beaten. During the five years ending in 1873, at least six thousand Christians were thus maltreated. Two thousand of them died in prison. The United States Minister, Mr. Long, who had protested against such acts, re¬ ported to his government : “After all our arguments had been used we were finally told by Mr. Iwakura that this government rested upon the Shinto faith which taught the divinity of the Mikado, that the propa¬ gation of the Christian faith and religion tended to dispel that belief, and that consequently it was the resolve of this government to resist its propagation as they would resist the advance of an invading army.’' The continued protests of the foreign min- 150 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN isters, aided by the course of events, at last led to a cessation of these persecutions, and, in 1872, many of the prisoners were set at liberty. The first Protestant convert was Yano Riyu, a teacher of the language to one of the missionaries in Yokohama. The three who were next baptized had learned of Christ in a romantic fashion. One of them, named Wakasa, was an official of high rank, living a hundred miles from Nagasaki, who was sent with a force of men to patrol the port of Nagasaki while English and French men-of-war were anchored there in 1855, a few months after Perry had negotiated the American treaty. One day he noticed a book floating upon the water near the shore and ordered one of his men to get it. None of the party could identify the book. The curiosity of the nobleman was so excited that after the foreign ships had de¬ parted and he had returned home, he sent one of his retainers to Nagasaki to find out about the book, which proved to be a Dutch Bible. Learning that a Chinese version had been published in Shanghai, he secretly sent a man thither to purchase a copy. Wakasa, with his younger brother and some friends, commenced an earnest study of the volume. In 1862 the brother went to Nagasaki, hoping to get aid in understanding it, and he there made the acquaintance of Rev. Guido' Verbeck of the Dutch Reformed Mis¬ sion. Afterward Wakasa sent another relative to Nagasaki to study English and the Bible. This man carried questions and answers back and forth between the two places, and in this way the strange Bible class ACHIEVEMENTS OF CHRISTIAN MOVEMENT 151 was carried on for three years. In 1866 the two brothers, with the other relative, went to Nagasaki and were baptized. On returning home they reported to their feudal lord what they had done. He was inclined to permit them to do as they pleased, but his superiors ordered that they be punished. Little was done, however, except to burn some of the books. Wakasa died in 1874. The zeal that he had shown for the conversion of his children and friends was proved by fruits gathered in later years. Other isolated converts were gained from time to time, but up to the spring of 1872, nearly thirteen years after the arrival of the first Protestant mis¬ sionaries, only ten Japanese had received baptism at their hands. Parallel with the unwearied labors of the mission¬ aries, unique service was being rendered by certain Christian laymen. Among them was the Honorable Townsend Harris who negotiated the American treaty with Japan in 1858. The countless delays and pre¬ varications which he had to endure threw into bright relief the patience and unselfishness of his character. He set a high precedent for diplomatic intercourse with Japan. Most of the other laymen in Japan had been called as teachers in the schools or advisors to government; departments. Dr. David Murray in the Department of Education helped found the primary school system on the American model. Dr. 'W. E. ✓ Griffis taught in a provincial school and later in the University of Tokyo and had among his pupils many men who became prominent. President W. S. Clark 152 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN of Massachusetts was engaged to establish an Agri¬ cultural College at Sapporo in northern Japan, and during the eleven months of his stay in the country his fearless Christian character deeply impressed his pupils.. He was at first restrained from speaking about Christianity, but the restriction was removed when he insisted that he could not teach ethics satis¬ factorily without using the Bible. Among those whom he led into the Christian life are Dr. Sato, now Presi¬ dent of the Imperial University, which has developed from the old Agricultural College; Dr. Nitobe, the author of Bushido and other well-known works and one of the four Chief Secretaries of the League of Nations ; and Kanzo Uchimura, the independent Chris¬ tian leader. III. TRAINING JAPANESE LEADERS The early missionaries wisely focused their efforts upon the winning and training of leaders, and it is a striking fact that the men who have led the Church and Christian education from the beginning were almost all won in the early years by men and women who with rare wisdom and self-effacement invested their energies in small bands of disciples. There were five such bands which have become historical, at Ku¬ mamoto, Sapporo, Yokohama, Osaka, and Hirosaki. The most romantic story is that connected with the Kumamoto Band. In 1872 Captain Janes, formerly an instructor in the United States Military Academy at West Point and a man of soldierly bearing and courage, was employed to found a school in Kuma- MISSIONARIES TAKE ADVANTAGE OF THE CROWDS GATHERED FOR A TEMPLE FESTIVAL TO PREACH THE GOSPEL OF CHRIST ACHIEVEMENTS OF CHRISTIAN MOVEMENT 153 moto. He was a zealous Christian, and every Saturday he read the Bible with a band of his students. They came to study English and also to find “holes” in the Christian teaching. But one after another their scepti¬ cism was overcome, so' that in three years there were thirty believers. In that district the anti-foreign spirit was strong, and among the samurai were desperate men who longed for a chance to cut off Captain Janes’ head. They openly spat at him on the streets. When these fanatical patriots learned of the conversion of so many students to the hated foreign faith, they resolved to kill the converts on a certain night, but the plot was discovered just at dusk. With blanched face, one of the youths went to the Captain’s house crying, “We’re all to be killed tonight!” “Very well,” cheerfully replied the Captain, “then you’ll all be in heaven tonight, and I’ll be there with you! Get your swords and I’ll take my revolvers.” The director of the school was sent for and sternly asked why he had permitted the plot. The culprit denied his guilt, but the Captain decisively said: “I know it all, and you’re at the bottom of it. If a single hair of these boys’ heads is injured, off comes your head first of all.” The young men felt that it might be a fight to the death. Climbing Flowery Hill just outside the city, they gathered under a gnarled pine — still standing — and in their own blood signed a solemn covenant to stand fast and go forth to enlighten the darkness of the Empire with the gospel of Christ. A fierce perse¬ cution broke out, but most of the lads stood true. F-.lao 154 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN Among them, eight went to Kyoto to form the first class in Doshisha University which Dr. Neesima and the missionaries of the American Board were trying to establish. Some of the Band fell by the wayside in later years, but others have continued to this day in the forefront of the Christian movement. One of them, Dr. Ebina, is president of the Doshisha, which now enrols 2,500 students; another is Dr. Kosaki, long prominent as pastor, author, and Sunday School leader ; and still another is Pastor Paul Kanamori, who has become famous for the three- hour sermon which he has preached to hundreds of thousands. The Sapporo Band has already been referred to as an outgrowth of the remarkable influence of Presi¬ dent Clark. The Hirosaki Band developed from the work of little-known early Methodist missionaries, but so deep was the impress they made that a score of the leaders of the Methodist Church have come from that one district. The Osaka Band was the outgrowth, chiefly, of the quiet, personal influence of Bishop Williams, Arch¬ deacon Warren, and Dr. Tyng, and yielded several of the ablest leaders for the Nippon Sei Ko Kwai, — Japan Holy Catholic Church (Anglican). The Yokohama Band grew out of the labors of a group of Dutch Reformed and Presbyterian mis¬ sionaries, among whom were Dr. S. R. Brown, Dr, Hepburn, and Dr. James H. Ballagh. From their work came the Band that in 1872 founded the first church in Japan, known as Kaigan, or Seashore ACHIEVEMENTS OF CHRISTIAN MOVEMENT 155 Church, which is now in the Presbyterian family. Among them were the first Bishop of the Japan Methodist Church, the saintly Yoitsu Honda; Dr. K. Ibuka, educator and leader in all cooperative enter¬ prises; and the Rev. M. Oshikawa, former president of Northeastern College at Sendai. They were joined a year later by Pastor Uemura, equally eminent as author, pastor, educator, and administrator, whose theological library Dr. John Kelman declared to be the best selected he had ever seen in any pastor’s home. Eminent as Dr. Uemura is, he is so reticent that no sketch of his life has hitherto appeared, but he finally yielded to my entreaty and disclosed to a common friend some of the salient points in his career. Apart from its intrinsic interest, the sketch throws sidelights on the stuff of which Japanese Christian leaders are made. I will give it as he told it. I was born in 1857. My father was a samurai of high rank in the Tokugawa clan, but with the downfall of the clan at the Restoration, lie was reduced to penury. Fired with ambition to restore the family fortunes, at fifteen I entered Mr. (later Doctor) James Ballagh’s school in Yokohama. My family were Shintoists and I devoutly worshiped at the shrine of a blacksmith who had risen to be a great soldier and patriot, praying that I might rise in like manner. But my fellow-students ridiculed my piety, and I stopped my visits to the shrine. One day I learned from Mr. Ballagh that Westerners also worshiped, but only one God. This greatly impressed and astonished me. I immediately grasped and accepted the idea. Only later, after I began to study theology, did grave doubts occur to me. I found my ambitions radically changed. I no longer cared to become a high official, and in a short time I felt a deep desire to be a Christian minister. My parents objected to my 156 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN receiving baptism, and I postponed it for several months. But five years later they too were baptized. Even though the Edict boards against Christianity were still hanging, there was no official persecution. In 1878 I entered an English college opened by Dr. S. R. Brown. The tuition was ten yen a month, equivalent to fifty yen now. I did all sorts of work to earn expenses. My chief reliance was a school of my own where I taught fifty classes of one pupil each, from one until ten o'clock. I also raised pigs — then considered rather disgraceful. I know all about pigs. Their chief virtues are that they need to be fed only twice a day and they turn everything they eat into gold ! I studied everything and learned quickly — except the organ, which refused to yield to my awkward fingers. When the college was moved to Tokyo to become the forerunner of the present Meiji Gakuin, I went with it and finished the course. My first church was in a poor part of Tokyo. I earned my own living, so the church was self-supporting, a vital principle with me ! Then I began to preach in friends’ houses in the better residential quarter. In 1887 a chapel was built. There were only twenty members, so I continued to earn my living by translating for magazines and teaching theology at Meiji Gakuin. Finally, in 1903, some conserva¬ tive missionaries objected to my using W. N. Clarke’s Christian Theology , so I resigned and in 1904 started an independent Theological School. Three years later a con¬ verted stockbroker gave the school a site and building and a small endowment. It has continued ever since to have twenty < or thirty students. I started the Fukuin Shimpo (Gospel News) as a Japanese “British Weekly.” From the first I have been editor and business manager. It has never received a subsidy from anywhere, though I have had to put a good deal of my own income into it at times. Generally I look after the business end of it. In 1888 I went abroad, and, declining scholarships at Columbia and Princeton, I went to London and for five wonderful months heard Spurgeon and Joseph Parker, and James Martineau, and I read to my heart’s content. Dr. ACHIEVEMENTS OF CHRISTIAN MOVEMENT 157 Dykes, later principal of Westminster College, was especially kind to me. On a later visit to London, I and my companion, an M. P., got locked in ITyde Park, and had to throw away our dignity and climb the high iron palings. Dr. Uemura has long been the foremost figure in the Nihon Kirisuto Kyokai (Church of Christ in Japan). He is blunt and brusque, but absolutely sincere and loyal to the truth as he sees it. When the issue of the independence of the Church from the Missions was up, he led the assault and carried the day. Yet he highly values missionaries of the right sort and wishes more of them. His living monument is the Fujimicho Church, of which he has been pastor ever since its foundation, thirty-five years ago. It is worth going far to see, and still farther to be a part of it, as I was for several years. It pulses with outgoing life, for it is a mother of churches and a breeder of ministers. It embraces rich and poor, official and ex-convict, for a stream of released prisoners is brought to it through the work of Miss Macdonald and Miss West. It spends little on itself and much on extension. Its pulpit is life-building, for the sermons are expository and searching. Last year Pastor Uemura, as permanent chairman of the National Board of Missions of his denomina¬ tion, was sent to America and Scotland on the occasion of the fiftieth anniversary of the founding of the Nihon Kirisuto Kyokai, to express thanks to the churches abroad which had sent missionaries to plant the Church in Japan. In what other country, I wonder, can the man be found who has spanned the 158 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN entire history of a denomination, having been a lead¬ ing factor in its evangelistic, literary, educational, and administrative activities, and at sixty-six is still the most dynamic, sagacious personality in its ranks? There were no such clearly marked bands among Japanese women, but the influence of some of the early missionary women was just as remarkable as that of the men who have been mentioned. One thinks at once of Miss Russell of the Methodist School at Nagasaki ; of that remarkable Congrega¬ tional trio at Kobe — Miss Talcott, Miss Barrows, and Miss Dudley; of Miss Kidder and Mrs. Pruyn at Yokohama; of Miss Tristram at Osaka; and of many others who are still alive and rejoicing in the strong workers, men as well as women, whom they have helped to raise up. Slowly, but solidly, through all the trying early years, the foundations of the Church were being laid. Although the first Protestant congregation, Kaigan Church at Yokohama, celebrated its Jubilee in 1922, it was not org*anized until the missionaries had been there thirteen years. Even then the edict against Chris¬ tianity was still prominently exhibited and nominally in force. It took no little courage for the eleven young men who formed the Kaigan Church to commit them¬ selves irrevocably to the Christian cause in face of the opposition of friends and relatives, of the law of the land and of public opinion. This first church was in¬ tended to be undenominational, for its members saw no reason why they should perpetuate the divisions of the Church in Western lands. The constitution de- ACHIEVEMENTS OF CHRISTIAN MOVEMENT 159 dared: “Our Church does not belong to any sect whatever; it believes only in the name of Christ, in whom all are one; it believes that all who take the Bible as their guide and who diligently study it are the servants of Christ and our brethren. For this reason all believers on earth belong to the family of Christ in the bonds of brotherly love/'’ Ultimately this church became a part of what is now known as “The Church of Christ in Japan” which is Presby¬ terian in polity. Passengers who alight from the steamers in Yokohama naturally pass by the building which has housed it for the past forty years. In Osaka a remarkable early church was that founded by Paul Sawayama, the first Japanese to be ordained in Japan and the first to insist ©n self- support. It took truly apostolic faith and devotion for him to refuse all the attractions of lucrative Gov¬ ernment posts and live on the few dollars a month contributed by the eleven members of his church who had caught his unbounded faith. In his biography, A Modern Paul in Japan , the results are thus recorded : “The Naniwa Church grew very rapidly. At the end of five years it had increased its annual contri¬ butions from seventy to seven hundred dollars. It had started another independent church in Osaka, and had made a beginning in nine other places. It had also established a Christian girls’ school.’ ’ Hand in hand with the founding of the Church went the establishment of Christian schools. The first one to be founded in the interior, Doshisha College, was the result of the vision conceived by Joseph Neesima i6o CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN while he was still studying in the United States. Leav¬ ing Japan secretly in 1864 at the peril of his life, he was befriended by a Christian merchant in Boston, Alpheus S. Hardy, and was given the best education that New England afforded. In 1872, when the Japa¬ nese Embassy, under Prince Iwakura, was touring the world, young Neesima was asked to join them, and thus he became intimate with the most eminent states¬ men of the time, and they were attracted to him in spite of their aversion to his new religion. He was repeatedly offered high government positions, but he held fast to his one purpose ( Doshisha means “one purpose" ) to found a Christian college which would nurture leaders for the Christianizing of his people. The story of his struggles against fierce Buddhist and official opposition, and of his ultimate success in securing a tract of land in the very heart of Kyoto, the ancient religious and political capital, is one of the most thrilling stories in all modern biography. A missionary colleague, Dr. J. D. Davis, shared with him the struggles and the ultimate triumphs of those early years. Col. Davis feared God and nothing else. He trusted Neesima and they, together, strong in a common purpose, labored until, in 1875, Doshisha College was an accomplished fact, with eight pupils and two teachers who met in rented buildings and started with prayer, as Dr. Davis thus records: “We began our school this morning with a prayer-meeting in which all the scholars took part. I shall never forget Mr. Neesima’s tender, tearful, earnest prayer as we began school.” Thus they successfully defied ACHIEVEMENTS OF CHRISTIAN MOVEMENT 161 the prophecy of a Buddhist priest who had facetiously remarked, ‘‘You might as well try to remove yonder Mount Hiei into Lake Biwa as to start a Jesus school in the city of Kyoto.” The early missionaries and their energetic young converts worked indefatigably to create Christian literature. The first weekly paper in the country was started by Dr. Orramel Gulick, in 1875, being called “One in Seven News.” Apologetic works, original and translated, were issued, but the greatest achieve¬ ment of all was the cooperative translation of the Bible, of which the New Testament was completed in 1880 and the Old Testament in 1887. IV. THE PERIODS OF POPULARITY AND REACTION During the early eighties, the Christian movement gained such momentum that not a few leaders pre¬ dicted that Japan would become a Christian nation within a generation. Some of the young missionaries arriving in the country were advised that only a smattering of Japanese would suffice, since English was becoming widely understood, and the opportu¬ nities for work were so insistent that time could not be spared for a thorough study of the language. But about 1889 a sharp reaction set in. The acces¬ sions to the churches in a single year fell from 5,677 to 1,199, and during the following decade the defec¬ tions from the churches were so numerous and the antipathy to Christianity so strong that most of the churches barely held their own. The causes for this reaction are not far to seek. In the eighties everything 1 62 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN foreign, including Christianity, was enthusiastically welcomed, and Fukuzawa, an influential journalist, went so far as to argue that it would be well for the whole nation to become nominally Christian so as to hasten political equality with the West, which was the dearest ambition of the nation. The Japanese resented being classed with backward countries, like Turkey, and insisted that all foreigners should be placed under the jurisdiction of the Japanese courts. One fanatic, who thought Marquis Okuma, then Foreign Minister, was not aggressive enough in pressing Japan’s case, threw a bomb which cost the Marquis the loss of one leg. Finally, after a decade ' of insistent negotiation, extra-territoriality was ended in 1898. Meanwhile, everything foreign was disliked, and Christian work suffered accordingly. Another reason was the shallow nurture which most converts had received before entering the Church. Men and women were baptized by the score without a clear idea of the meaning of Christian discipleship. Further¬ more, the more extreme and untested theories of the German “higher criticism” swept like a wave over the unprepared Christian community, undermining the faith of many who had no depth of Biblical knowledge or of Christian experience. The decade of the nineties also brought another severe ordeal to the young Church in the form of the rather hot-headed demand of certain Japanese Church leaders for independence of the missionaries. This struggle was most marked between the vigorous Kumiai or Congregational churches and the corre- ACHIEVEMENTS OF CHRISTIAN MOVEMENT 163 spending American Board Mission. The bitterness of the struggle was aggravated by the so-called Doshisha trouble, when, after the death of Neesima, some of the Japanese alumni and faculty, yielding tQ' the prevalent anti-foreign feeling, strove to seize entire control of the institution and to weaken its Christian character. The same struggle broke out later in other denominations, especially in the Church of Christ in japan (Presbyterian). The very con¬ scientiousness and strength of character of the two parties to the struggle caused wounds which it took years to heal. In the light of today, it is clear that some of the Japanese leaders were contentious, and many of the churches were unprepared for all the burdens of self-government, and that, on the other hand, some of the missionaries were too slow in placing respon¬ sibility squarely on the shoulders of their spiritual children and letting them work out their own salvation by “trial and error.” Fortunately, to-day, even those who were in the very thick of the fight can link arms and work as equals on the great tasks that still remain. V. ON THE UPWARD TRAIL Attention should be called to one outstanding asset of Christianity in Japan; namely, freedom of belief and propaganda. In the very Constitution of the Empire (Article 28) we read: “Japanese subjects shall, within limits not prejudicial to peace and order, and not antagonistic to their duties as subjects, enjoy freedom of religious belief.” The value of this guar- 164 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN antee cannot be overestimated. A Japanese diplomat spoke almost the exact truth when he said in 1901, “The profession and the propagation of Christianity are as untrammeled in Japan as in any part of the world.” Such obstacles as there have been arose from prejudice and fear rather than from the law of the land. With the opening of the twentieth century the whole Christian movement seemed to turn a sharp corner and to enter upon a pathway of steady growth. In place of apologetic addresses, a campaign of direct evangelism was inaugurated. The Japanese Evan¬ gelical Alliance took the first step by deciding to raise a fund for the purpose. Soon after, in 1900, the cooperation of the missionaries was enlisted, and joint committees were appointed. This Forward Movement was signally blessed. Hundreds whose faith had been undermined during the decade of reaction were reestablished in the Church and hundreds of new converts of standing were won. At the height of the Movement Dr. John R. Mott conducted a fruitful series of meetings among students, Dr. R. A. Torrey spoke to large audiences in a few centers, and Dr. M. C. Harris, later made Bishop, returned to Japan and gave characteristically moving addresses. The revived enthusiasm thus engendered for evangelism and for cooperative effort has been maintained ever since and has helped remove the stigma of cold intel- lectualism which had begun to be fixed upon the Christian movement in Japan. In 1904-05 the min¬ istry of the Y. M. C. A. and the churches to the ACHIEVEMENTS OF CHRISTIAN MOVEMENT 165 soldiers during the war with Russia enabled the Christian message to be carried to thousands of the men and to their families, who belonged for the most part to the conservative peasant class. In 1907 came the first world gathering of any sort ever held in the Orient, the Convention of the World’s Student Christian Federation at Tokyo. It created a new respect for Christianity as a world force, and the accompanying evangelistic meetings held throughout the Empire focussed the attention of students upon Christ and resulted in many accessions to the churches. The most notable demonstration of the courage and zeal of the combined Christian forces was the nation-wide United Evangelistic Campaign which grew out of the national conference held in 1913 by Dr. Mott as chairman of the Edinburgh Continuation Committee. The campaign continued from 1914 to 1917 and was followed by a year of “conservation.” The campaign was engineered largely by the Japanese, but the cooperation of missionaries was everywhere sought and appreciated with a heartiness which be¬ tokened the final dying out of the earlier assertive spirit of independence. The Campaign Generals were four of the ablest pastors in the country, Doctors Uemura and Kosaki of Tokyo and Doctors Miyagawa and Naide of Osaka. Around them was a cohort of very able speakers. Lay and clerical, “liberal” and “con¬ servative,” vied with one another in bearing witness to the things they assuredly knew about Christ, the life- giving Saviour. There were 410,000 auditors, and of these, 14404 were enroled as seekers or new believers. CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN 1 66 Since 1918 the various denominations have con¬ ducted mutually supplementary Forward Movements which have brought gratifying results in largely increased contributions, as well as in evangelism. Among individual “evangelists,” the most prominent have been Rev. Paul Kanamori, Colonel Yamamuro, and the Rev. Seimatsu Kimura, at whose meetings thousands have taken the first step in the Christian life. The net growth in the membership of the Protestant churches by decades is interesting. From 1899 to 1909 the growth was 23,567; from 1909 to 1919, it was 34,076. An analysis of the membership drawn from different classes, in one fairly representative local church, belonging to the United Brethren, shows that thirty per cent were in commercial pursuits, twenty- eight per cent students, eight per cent government officials and soldiers, six per cent nurses and doctors, three per cent artists, and twenty-eight per cent unclassified. These percentages would not hold for all the churches, some of which are much stronger in the number of business and professional men. In general, the backbone of the whole Church is composed of the educated classes in cities and towns. Farmers are comparatively few and manual laborers barely represented.* The Christians of Japan are by no means all in the churches. One of the largest groups of unbap¬ tized believers has arisen from the work of Mr. Kanzo Uchimura. He is a Biblical teacher and writer of extraordinary power, but a pronounced independent, * See Appendix I, Chapter V, for Christian statistics. ACHIEVEMENTS OF CHRISTIAN MOVEMENT 167 opposed to all religious organizations and rites. His magazine, The Bible Study , founded a decade ago, is unique in its magnetic quality as well as in its circu¬ lation. Mr. Uchimura’s followers include farmers and students, officials and teachers. Many of them are earnest propagators of their faith. Movements like this are symptomatic; they represent a consid¬ erable, perhaps growing number of Christians and secret believers wlx> do not find satisfaction in the Church. „ The finances of Christian organizations are often an index of their spiritual condition. It is, therefore, gratifying to note that the amount raised by Japanese Christians for annual budgets has increased far more rapidly than church membership. Even after allow¬ ing for the lower purchasing power of money, the increase is striking. In 1910 they raised $150,000; in 1915, $290,000; and in 1920, $750,000. The amounts raised by various bodies in 1920 were as follows: Kumiai Church, $164,000; Methodist Church, $73,000 (in 1921 the Forward Movement swelled the total to $155,000) ; Nihon Kirisuto Kyokai, $124,000; Sei Ko Kwai (Anglican), $91,000; Salvation Army, $73,000; Baptist, $14,000; Young Mens Christian Associations, $148,000. The value of church prop¬ erty, including Christian Associations but not schools, increased from $692,000 in 1910 to $1,981,000 in 1915, and to $3,518,000 in 1920. Without belittling the importance of the missions, it is increasingly evident that the heart of the Christian movement is the self-supporting Japanese Church. CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN 1 68 The conflict between Mission and Church, so acute between 1890 and 1905, has subsided during the last ten years. The reason is that in the larger denomina¬ tions the battle was won, and now that the churches have proved themselves, there is only a dwindling minority of missionaries today who resist the transfer of authority and responsibility to the Japanese. A growing number would go so far as to abjure the revered tenet that “he who pays the fiddler calls the tune,'’ at least in so far as it would preclude the giving of grants to self-governing churches. The Sunday School movement has grown nearly threefold since 1905, when the enrolment was 64,910. In 1910 it had risen to 97,760: in 1915 to 148,333, and in 1921 to 170,169. Despite the impetus given by the prospect of having the World’s Sunday School Convention meet in Tokyo in 1920, the ratio of growth fell during the last five years. It is likely to take a new leap forward during the next period. The World’s Convention was an historic event not only for the Sunday School movement itself, but for the whole Christian cause in Japan. It received extensive notice in hundreds of secular papers. The fact that the Emperor and Empress contributed $25,000 to its expenses stopped the mouths of the conservatives who had been inciting public school teachers to discriminate against Sunday School pupils. The convention also gave a greatly needed impetus to more thorough-going programs of religious educa¬ tion and to the wider use of music and pageantry. The Young Men’s and Young Women’s Christian ACHIEVEMENTS OF CHRISTIAN MOVEMENT 169 Associations have made large gains. The combined membership is 30,434, which does not include the more than \i 0,000 students in their educational classes. The service rendered by the Associations to the soldiers in Siberia and France enlisted the cooperation of many missionaries and Japanese workers. Non-Chris¬ tians contributed the bulk of the $600,000 expended in this work. Tens of thousands of elementary school children drew or wrote post-card greetings to be sent through the Red Triangle secretaries to the soldiers. Relief funds for the students of Central Europe have been given by thousands of Japanese students, in response to the appeals of the Associations. Systematic physical education, which was introduced only in 1914, with the opening of the gymnasium in Tokyo, lias taken firm root and has drawn within the circle of Christian influence many boys and men otherwise inaccessible. The recently started special work for boys and for employed girls is full of promise. The beautiful summer conference grounds acquired in 1912 near Mt. Fuji have provided a long desired training and recreation center. The most significant achievement of the Christian Associations has been the finding of national secretaries of such caliber as Miss Mi chi Kawai and Mr. Soichi Saito. VI. CHRISTIAN EDUCATION AND THE GOVERNMENT SYSTEM In the nineties the Christian schools in common with the churches suffered severely, and in 1899 the reactionaries had secured the promulgation of an ordi- i/O CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN nance which seemed like a body blow. It provided that no school which desired for its pupils the same privileges as government school students with regard to the postponement of conscription and admittance to government colleges, should give religious instruc¬ tion, or hold religious exercises. But gradually the government was persuaded to modify this ordinance so far that Christian schools now stand practically on a par with government institutions. During the decade of opposition and eclipse, the missionary sup¬ porters in America and England had become somewhat discouraged and had failed to provide the funds needed for expansion. Meanwhile, the government institu¬ tions were forging rapidly ahead. Finally, about 1908, the missionary societies were fully aroused to the short-sightedness of neglecting the Christian schools whence they must derive their leaders, and since then there has been a notable increase in funds available both for buildings and for current budgets. Fortunately, Japanese alumni who have attained affluence are beginning to give generously to their alma maters. Doshisha has an endowment fund of $250,000 contributed mostly by Japanese. Aoyama Gakuin, the Methodist College, has received $150,000 from an alumnus made rich by war-time shipping for the erection of a handsome building. Kwansei Gakuin (Methodist South and Canadian), at Kobe, is con¬ stantly adding to its equipment, and St. Paul’s College in Tokyo (Episcopal) has spent about $250,000 on an impressive group of buildings. The eminent serv¬ ices rendered to education by Dr. Schneder and North- ACHIEVEMENTS OF CHRISTIAN MOVEMENT 171 western College at Sendei have moved a number of non-Christian Japanese to contribute generously to rebuild the academy building destroyed by fire. At the same time, Christian schools for girls have prospered. In the earlier period missionaries made one of their greatest contributions to Japan by pioneer¬ ing in the education of women. Until 1900 they had the field almost to themselves. Since then gov¬ ernment girls’ schools have sprung up by the hundreds, but in recent years the Christian women’s colleges, like those for men, have been making up for lost time by strengthening their equipment and faculties. Among them six may be mentioned : Kobe College (Congregational) enjoys the distinction of being the first woman's college to win a government license as a university; St. Agnes School (Episcopal), Kyoto, and Bishop Poole’s School (Anglican), Osaka, have trained a host of Christian women; Miss Tsuda’s College in Tokyo (Independent), has developed a number of outstanding leaders; the Presbyterian Girls’ School in Tokyo has been notable for the quality of its influence under the leadership of the venerable Madame Yajima. The Tokyo Women's Union College, in which six American Mission Boards are - cooperating, is a notably successful development. It has reached the limit of its present capacity — two hundred — but the special funds recently raised in the United States with the help of the Laura Spelman Rockefeller Memorial will make early expansion possible. There are nearly forty thousand enroled in Chris- 172 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN tian schools of all grades, beside ten thousand children in the kindergartens. The majority of them are in middle or high schools, at an age when the most vital choices are generally made. Of late, several of the Christian schools have opened com¬ mercial departments and the applicants for admission have been so numerous that it has required strenuous efforts to; maintain the Christian influence of the schools unimpaired. It is significant that as much money ($250,000) is derived from Japanese as from the Mission Boards for the annual maintenance of the schools. Their total property value is about six millions, exclusive of the Christian Association buildings. Notwithstanding their shortcomings, it would be hard to exaggerate the contribution which the Chris¬ tian schools have made to the Christian movement. Even though none of them yet equals in rank the highly equipped government colleges and universities, they have supplied the inspiration and the initial train¬ ing to a majority of the men and women dedicated to professional Christian service. But it is greatly to be regretted that the effort of a few years ago to establish a Central Union Christian University of the highest grade was not successful. This makes all the more urgent the improvement of existing institu¬ tions, and also the extension of Christian effort among the students of government and other non-Christian colleges. Their most insidious peril is the temptation to put size above quality, and thus to dilute their Chris¬ tian influence so markedly as to fail to supply the ACHIEVEMENTS OF CHRISTIAN MOVEMENT 173 consecrated leaders so greatly needed in Japan today. The state system of education in Japan has won high praise from foreign critics. But it is undoubt¬ edly too much of a system; it cramps originality and spontaneity in both pupils and teachers and tends to over-emphasize nationalism, on the one hand, and getting a living, on the other, to the neglect of the old ideal of culture and character. The govern¬ ment schools have multiplied by leaps and bounds. Twenty-five years ago there wras only one Imperial university. Today there are five, enroling 10,250 men, all of whom are over twenty-one and are doing professional or graduate work. It always solemnizes me to pass by Tokyo Imperial University with its imposing buildings and its still more imposing array of 5,500 students, who above any other group in Japan hold the keys of the future. One cannot help thinking of what a constant irre¬ ligious influence is brought to bear upon them in most of the lecture rooms. The need is great for strengthening the positive Christian influences which play upon them outside. It is, however, encouraging to know that there are not less than twenty Christian men on the University faculty, and that the churches and Christian student hostels in the vicinity are af¬ fecting several hundreds of the students in the Univer¬ sity and in the neighboring government college. The same is true of the other four Imperial Universities. Only second to the Imperial Universities in influence are the great private institutions, Waseda University, founded by the late Marquis Okuma, and Keio Uni- 174 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN versity founded by Fukuzawa, who might be called the Benjamin Franklin of Japan. Indispensable as the Christian schools are, the Christian movement can even less afford to overlook the government schools than the Christians in America could afford to ignore the public high schools and state and municipal universities. The total enrol¬ ment of the Christian schools is only fifty thousand, over against a total of eleven millions in the govern¬ ment schools, which is one half of one per cent. Even in the institutions of high school grade and above, the Christian school enrolment is only twenty- six thousand or eight per cent of the number in government institutions. Two or three of the Imperial Universities have capital investments and annual budgets as large as all the Christian schools in the Empire. In the next chapter we shall consider the bearing of these facts on the policy of Christian education. Here it is important to see that wise strategy justifies all the effort that has been made to exert a Christian influence on students in non- Christian schools. Who can estimate the good done by the long line of Christian teachers of English and other subjects in government schools, many of them self-supporting missionaries in spirit? The first systematic attempt to supply such teachers was in 1887 when Dr. Eby of the Canadian Methodists induced eleven men and one woman to go to Japan. Ultimately a number of them became regular missionaries. Dr. Eby himself laid siege to the students of Tokyo Imperial ACHIEVEMENTS OF CHRISTIAN MOVEMENT 175 University, especially by means of apologetic lectures. The Y. M. C. A., through the English Teacher Move¬ ment, since 1890 has placed over two hundred and fifty teachers, young college graduates, most of whom have persuasively presented Christ to lads otherwise inaccessible. Among a people so literate as the Japanese, litera¬ ture wields a potent influence, and it has not been neglected by Christian workers. One of the most effective ways of capturing the attention of students and teachers in the public schools has been the monthly magazine called Morning Star ( Myojo ), which is edited by the Christian Literature Society. No copies are distributed except with the permission of the principals. Strange as it may seem, it is wel¬ comed or tolerated in nearly every high school in the Empire. The monthly edition of seventy-five thou¬ sand goes to two thousand schools. The most effective literary ally of the Christian cause has been the increasing volume of books and magazines written, published, and distributed by Japanese, without a penny of foreign aid. From an early period zealous young converts found means by hook or crook to express their new-found con¬ victions on the printed page. Laughable reminiscences are told of how a group of youths (now venerable elder statesmen in the Church) used to slave away on copy and subscriptions for their magazine ( Rikugo Zasslii), debating heatedly over manuscripts, and after the last proof had been sent to the long-suffering printer, celebrating by a frugal, but hilarious mid- 176 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN \ night repast. The profitable business built up by several of the Christian firms who publish Japanese works is conclusive evidence of the wide demand for the products of Japanese Christian experience and scholarship. Another effective means of leavening the students in non-Christian schools is the hostel, which is simply a home and social center where a few Christian students live and to which other students are invited for Bible classes and socials. The plan was started thirty years ago by the College Y. M. C. A. at Kyoto, and recently when a visitor was examining a photo¬ graph of the charter members he was surprised to discover among them the face of the Civil Governor of Korea, the Hon. C. Ariyoshi. He exclaimed: “Now I understand the source of the splendid character of this great administrator and of his life-long interest in the Young Men’s Christian Association.” Many other men prominent in Church and State would join him in gratefully acknowledging their debt to the little hostel where they lived and worked for their fellows during college days. Several missionaries have found in such hostels their most effective approach to students. At Waseda University, Dr. Benninghoff of the Baptist Mission has made two hostels the center of a varied and fruitful activity. Near Tokyo Imperial University a hostel has been built by a Japanese Episcopalian with funds raised from American friends, and there he and some of the Episcopal missionaries find access to a picked group of men. When the hostel is expanded into a ACHIEVEMENTS OF CHRISTIAN MOVEMENT 177 club house and auditorium,, as it has been by the Christian Associations at Tokyo Imperial University and by the Baptists at Waseda University, it becomes a factor in the life of the whole student body. Who can survey the solid achievements of the Chris¬ tian movement among the Japanese people — in spite of all set-backs and defects — without recognizing the mighty hand of God ! As we look back over the pe¬ riods of popularity and reaction, we marvel at the undiscourageable patience and the solid achievements of the missionaries in the face of stupendous difficul¬ ties, but still we cannot help wishing that they might somehow7 have been lifted clear above the dust of the day and been able to see, as we can so easily, that they should have striven even harder to establish a few very strong and amply supported schools and colleges, that they should have softened the shock of “higher criti¬ cism'’ by wise use of the historical method themselves, that they should have shared and turned over respon¬ sibility more willingly to the Japanese and stood by to steady them in their plucky though over-confident efforts to walk alone. But now, as we look to the future, we ask, what of the towering unsolved problems, the neglected classes, the inadequate Japanese and missionary forces, the challenge of the days just ahead? 178 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN VI The Challenge of Today and Tomorrow As a laboratory in missionary science, Japan could hardly be surpassed. Within the short span of sixty years the missionary methods in Japan have passed through a gamut of changes comparable to the changes in the political world. The very fact that the Japanese churches have had to struggle, sometimes against governmental and secular opposition, some¬ times against foes of their own household, has strengthened them for the equally hard times ahead. If the six decades already past are considered the infancv and adolescence of the Christian movement, then the next few decades may be called its youth. Sinewy from its struggles, hopeful from its triumphs hitherto, it must expect in coming days to be tested at every joint more severely than ever before. Within, are the ever growing problems arising from rapid industrialization, from the awakening of the masses of the people, from the breakdown of old moral supports, and from the galvanizing into new life of half-reformed Buddhism; without, are the pressure of baleful tides of thought and the conflict of racial and national ambitions. If ever the Christian forces, missionary and Japanese alike, needed to summon their united energies and sharpen their weapons, it is today. It is important to realize in advance that the Christianizing of a people which possesses so highly developed religious and social systems as the Japanese CHALLENGE OF TODAY AND TOMORROW 179 will be a long, complex undertaking. Hitherto, the Christian movement has made its gains almost entirely among students and other groups most responsive to new ideas. To make headway among the conservative groups will call for siege-work. Although suspicion and bitter opposition toward Christianity have largely disappeared, other difficulties have arisen. Thirty 5 years ago Christian workers were acknowledged to be the bearers of superior ethical ideals, as represented by the hospitals and schools and reform movements which they introduced. Even outside the Christian circle, Japanese writers and publicists gradually accepted Christian standards by which to judge their institutions and ideas. The government adopted the programs of philanthropy and women's education, which had at first been the monopoly of the mis¬ sionaries. The newspapers, for example, nowadays criticize public men for personal immorality which would have been ignored a few decades ago. Thus, without recognizing its indebtedness to the missionary movement and the numerically insignificant Japanese churches, educated public opinion has become to a large degree ethically Christian. So far as it goes, this constitutes a triumph for Christianity. But it has deprived the Christian message of one of its chief grounds of appeal. Another difficulty is the aggressive competition of Shinto and Buddhism with Christianity. In so far as the old religions are being purified, every Christian will rejoice, but lie will be pardoned for fearing that the leopard can never entirely change his spots. CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN 180 Shinto can hardly get rid of its nationalistic bias. Buddhism can hardly escape entirely from its nega¬ tive pessimism. Yet the Shin Sect of Buddhism has gone a good way toward making its escape. Many of the old sects are borrowing without apology the methods and ideas of Christianity. That the results are generally pale imitations is to be expected. Ultimately, the impossibility of making a life-giving religion out of an eclectic combination of new and old wine will be apparent. But meanwhile, modernized Buddhism and glorified Shinto will seriously impede the progress of Christian truth. A still further stumbling-block is “Christian civili¬ zation/’ The era when the brilliance of occidental civilization cast a glamor upon the religion of the West has forever passed. The World War cast a lurid light on the “Christian nations.” Their religion was seen to be impotent to subdue political and financial ambi¬ tions. The messengers of Christ in Asia now find “Christian civilization” rather to be apologized for than an effective apologetic for their message. I. POLICIES AND EMPHASES REQUIRED Our cursory survey of these giants in the path of the Christian movement in Japan will have shown that the task ahead is no holiday parade. To make the Japanese people predominantly Christian will be a stupendous achievement. It is, therefore, fitting that we attempt to forecast some of the most important steps to that end. CHALLENGE OF TODAY AND TOMORROW 181 I. Cooperation and federation The first requisite is the better coordination and use of all the Christian forces. At various times prominent Japanese laymen have agitated for the organic union of the denominations, but they have lacked the knowledge of church history and the leadership to carry it through against the passive resistance of the rank and file and the active opposition of some of the clergy. An all-inclusive organic union is doubtless visionary for the present, but a further combination of kindred denominations would appear to be both practicable and desirable. Already the Japanese have gone far in that direction: the results of the labors of the four Presbyterian and Reformed missions have been included in the Nihon Kirisuto Kyokai ; the work of the two American and one Canadian Methodist missions has contributed to the formation of the single Japan Methodist Church ; the missionaries of the Church of England, the Church of England in Canada, and the American Episcopal Church are all connected with the Sei-ko- kwai ; a single Association of Baptist Churches has grown out of the work of two Baptist missions. The same process could well be carried further, especially by the union, respectively, of die Disciples, Christians, United Brethren, Methodist Protestant, and Evan¬ gelical Churches with congenial larger denominations. Then later a formula might be worked out for a still wider union, catholic enough to allow flexibility and variety, but close and vital enough to ensure the CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN 1 82 strength and daring that come from unity of purpose and of general policy. In hastening this consumma¬ tion the missionaries must play varying parts. On the union of the larger, independent bodies they can exert but slight influence. But on the union of the smaller denominations, which still depend largely on mission funds, they can exert a strong influence; indeed, hitherto they may have yielded too easily when Japanese leaders have objected to such combinations, ostensibly on principle, but often, it is to be feared, from partisan or personal motives. It may surprise occidental readers, but the fact is that sectarianism in recent years has been more obstinately perpetuated by the Japanese, especially the clergy, than by their missionary colleagues. The laity, on the contrary, would generally endorse plans for a considerable degree of church union. In the case, however, of the union or federation of Christian schools in order to pave the way for a union Christian university, it was the Japanese alumni rather than the missionary teachers who objected. Has not the day fully come when a more resolute effort should be made both in Japan and among the supporting home churches to present a united fighting front? Taking the situation as it is, the next important step toward the effective coordination of Christian forces is to make strong the recently created National Christian Council, which is composed of eighty-five representatives appointed by the various churches and missions, (exclusive of the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox) and fifteen others selected by these CHALLENGE OF TODAY AND TOMORROW 183 appointees. Some of the most far-sighted leaders hope it will not only have a Japanese majority — which the constitution ensures — but that in the course of time the missionary minority may give way so that the Council will become practically a federation of the Japanese churches. Otherwise the churches would need to perpetuate the present rather weak Federation of Churches, and unless a large majority in the Council were Japanese, there would be danger of the more aggressive and “committee-minded” missionary members exerting, in spite of themselves, a dominat¬ ing influence. There has been for twenty years a vigorous Federation of Christian Missions, which includes thirty-three mission bodies. It has promoted coopera¬ tion along many lines, especially in evangelism and in literature. It has published the monthly Japan Evangelist and the authoritative year-book called The Christian Movement in Japan , Korea , and Formosa and has established the Christian Literature Society, whose output during its first ten years has totalled 167,587,069 pages. Evidently there will be need for this Federation for a considerable time; but just as the individual missionary strives to magnify his Japanese associates and to pass over to them enter¬ prises which he has painfully developed, so it is natural to expect the Federation of Missions to plan and seize upon opportunities to entrust some of its functions and enterprises to the National Christian Council. A resolution declaring this to be the purpose of the Federation was adopted at its annual meeting CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN 184 in 1922. The question arises whether the time may not soon come when the Christian Literature Society should be transferred to the Council. In any case, the Missions should leave no stone unturned to give the Council the men and the means to be a powerful agent of the entire Christian Move¬ ment. An ample budget and an able Japanese Executive Secretary and a missionary associate would seem to be required, and the Missions will no doubt count it a privilege to make the sacrifices required to supply them. The need for such a National Council is even greater in japan than in most other countries, for the reason that all aspects of life — political, educational, economic, and religious — tend toward a national and centralized organization. The inherent democracy and local autonomy of the constituent denominational bodies may be trusted to prevent over-centralization. The Council will be a spokesman, a clearing-house, and an advisory general staff for all its members. It will put the strength of all at the disposal of each. 2. Rearing Japanese leaders But a more vital requisite for a victorious Christian movement is an adequate supply of competent Japanese leaders. The early Japanese converts, such as those in the Kumamoto and Yokohama bands, included a surprisingly high proportion of able leaders. Fortunately, many of them are still in harness and pulling more than their share. But several have already died, and those captains courageous who are OSAKA CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH ERECTED IN 1922, BY CONTRIBUTIONS FROM ITS MEMBERS. IT HAS HAD ONE PASTOR, THE VENERABLE REV. T. MIYAGAWA, FOR FORTY YEARS AND HAS BEEN A “MOTHER OF CHURCHES” NEW BUILDING AT AOYAMA GAKUIN, ERECTED AT A COST OF $ 1 50,000, CONTRIBUTED BY AN ALUMNUS. JAPANESE ALUMNI WHO HAVE ATTAINED AFFLUENCE ARE BEGINNING TO GIVE GENEROUSLY TO THEIR COLLEGES CHALLENGE OF TODAY AND TOMORROW 185 left must within a few years find successors. And besides, the new day with its more complex problems will call for even abler men than the past. As each ’ veteran has passed on, his place has somehow been filled, and among the middle-aged leaders are men of power. But speaking generally, it seems as though the decade of reaction — the ’nineties — had left a gap in the ranks. That cold decade chilled the earlv flush * of enthusiasm for the adventure of Christian service. The lure of political and commercial careers has proved stronger for many men than the rough, uncertain road' of Christian ministry, and not a few who had stilled conscience by resolving to devote to the advancement of the Kingdom the prestige and wealth they might win in secular pursuits, have drifted far from their early purpose. The net result is that all the Christian callings are short of men and women equal to the exacting demands of the times. And what of the remedy? It would be folly to pretend that there is any short and easy way. One rich source of supply, hitherto but slightly worked, is the student body of the government high schools and colleges. Of course the Christian schools will furnish many workers, especially if their supporters do not grow weary in giving the funds to raise their standards. But the government schools have twelve times as many men and women in them and, as a rule, the brightest in the land. Particular attention should be paid to the high schools and vocational schools, — well-nigh a thousand of them, — for students make the great decisions in their teens. Here is a G-Jap 1 86 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN field where many a missionary man or woman will find a fascinating opportunity. It might not be excessive if every tenth missionary were chosen with reference to such work — well-educated, attractive, willing to work quietly with small groups, and irradi¬ ated with the love of Christ for heart-hungry youths. Let such a man or woman settle near a school or two, keep open house and open heart, use the Bible and intimate talks, games and athletics, music and English conversation and literature and social science, all to light men’s way to the Master. The results might be slow, but they would be sure and cumulative, and out of it would come ministers and teachers and laymen of ability, anchored in faith against all storms. This is not a fine-spun theory: the early missionaries did something like it, and some are now doing it. Among them are women missionaries whose unheralded work among high school boys has been fruitful beyond computation. There are such missionaries in Sendai, and others in Okayama, Tokyo, and Sapporo, who, beside doing arduous work among women, have poured themselves into the lives of government school lads and have been rewarded by seeing man after man develop into stalwart Christian leadership. It should be said that their labors have been closely interwoven with the remarkable Bible classes for students con¬ ducted by Dr. K. Sasao and other Japanese professors. A glance over the Empire discloses a growing group of younger leaders who have resulted from just such quiet work. One thinks of such pastors as Rev. H. Hatanaka of Kyoto, who calls the missionary CHALLENGE OF TODAY AND TOMORROW 187 guide of his youth “Mother'’ ; Pastor Yanagihara of the Sei Ko Kwai in Osaka, who owes much to consecrated parents and also to missionary friends ; Rev. Z. Ono of the Methodist Church in Kofu, a flaming evangelist among schoolboys ; of such laymen, graduates of Imperial Universities, as Dr. S. Yoshino, professor in Tokyo Imperial University and leading exponent of liberalism and international cooperation; Dr. F. Usawa, member of the Imperial Educational Council as well as of Parliament; Motoi Kurihara, teacher, writer, and translator of Dr. Fosdick’s volumes; Soichi Saito, national general secretary of the Young Men’s Christian Associations; Takeshi Saito, professor in Tokyo Imperial University; Chikayoshi Nakatsu, manufacturer ; Setsuzo Sawada, diplomat and peace-maker; and of the noble cohort of younger women represented by Miss Michi Kawai, national general secretary of the Young Women’s Christian Associations, and Miss Yasui, dean of Tokyo Women’s Union College. All of these and many more pillars of the Church would gladly acknowledge their deep debt to some self-obscuring missionary or pastor or teacher, whose life, through them, has been multiplied a hundredfold. When one begins thus to run down the lengthening list, one feels new assur¬ ance for the future of the Christian movement. One is also encouraged to believe that these brilliant young leaders, at home in both Eastern and Western thought, will serve as channels through whom the Japanese will make their unique contribution toward the completer expression of the many-sided Christ. CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN 1 88 A second source of leaders, too little tapped as yet, is that reservoir of manhood, the village and small town. Japan is still a nation of peasants, for seventy- five per cent are tillers of the land and fishermen. The army and the factories go to the countryside for their recruits. Many of the sages and apostles and statesmen of Old Japan were bred there. But the Christian Church, in spite of all its valuation of the common man and the precedent of Jesus’ peasant disciples, has somehow found little time for getting hold of the sturdy Japanese peasant. The main reason has been a shortage of workers and funds, but there has also been a conviction that concentrating in the dominating centers, as St. Paul did, was wise strategy. And with some, perhaps, the obsession of numbers has been too strong. Some years ago I tried to persuade a Japanese pastor who had studied in America to take a country charge which his bishop was offering him. I pictured how he could become the guide and confidant of hundreds of farmers and their children and mold the civic and social as well as religious life of a county; how he would be dealing, not with the transients of a city church, but with the most stable group in the country. He couldn’t catch the vision, and has since lived a respectable but apparently humdrum life as a worker in a great city. The solemnizing fact is that four out of five of the country dwellers have never been reached by any Christian worker. Of late years a number of mis¬ sionaries have moved into the smaller cities so as to be in closer touch with their country fields. CHALLENGE OF TODAY AND TOMORROW 189 The most determined and resourceful effort to work the rural lode is Omi Mission on Lake Biwa. If anyone fancies that romance and novelty have faded out of missionary service in Japan, let him not fail to go to Hachiman and see with his own eyes a veritable miracle.* In 1905 William Merrell Vories was called as a “Y. M. C. A. English teacher” to the commercial high school at Hachiman. He accepted the call because he had early resolved to go somewhere to an unoccupied field and work as a self-supporting missionary. When the number of his student converts aroused opposition and cost him his post, he turned to architecture for support. Today he is surrounded by seventy men and women, mostly Japanese, an intensely happy, busy family, engaged not only in building goodly structures all over the Empire, but preeminently in building Christ into the lives of the farmers and village folk of a province. A student hostel, two railway men’s clubhouses, the steam launch “Galilee. Mam,” a tuber¬ culosis sanitarium, kindergartens and active churches have sprung up, one after another. The sanitorium was recently declared, by the head of the largest government pulmonary hospital, to be the best in Japan. In 19 22 Mr. Vories was requested by the * Far-sighted civil and military officials have done all in their power to develop the Young Men’s Associations, especially in the country districts. The Associations number 16,694, having 2,703,- 447 members, expenditures of 2,052,160 yen in 1920, and property valued at 5,789,300 yen. In some places they have done much to benefit their communities. They are supposed to be non -religious, but generally they are made media for strengthening State Shinto. (See pamphlet published by Home Department, 1922.) CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN 290 Minister of the Interior to serve as Counselor to the National Commission on Housing-. Equally remark¬ able is the fact that in an official textbook on ethics, Omi Mission is described as a bright example of com¬ munity helpfulness. The platform of Omi Mission is only twenty lines long, but it is notable for its daring originality : 1. To preach the gospel of Christ in the Province of Omi, Japan, without reference to denominations. There being no “Omi Mission Church,” converts to be organized into self-supporting congregations of the denominations of their own choice. 2. To practice the complete unifying of the work and fellowship of Japanese and foreign workers. 3. To evangelize communities unoccupied by any Protestant Mission, and under no circumstances to overlap with the work of such Missions. 4. To evangelize rural communities, as the most conservative element of the nation, and the most probable source of leadership. 5. To seek, enlist, and train leaders and workers. 6. To work for social reforms, including temper¬ ance, social purity, marriage customs, physical and sanitary betterment, and definite efforts for the poor and the “out-casts.” It is a logical as well as romantic sequel to the tale that four years ago Mr. Vories was married to the daughter of Viscount Hitotsuyanagi. The family was very ancient and proud. It was opposed to Christianity, but the daughter had been converted in America, where she graduated from Bryn Mawr CHALLENGE OF TODAY AND TOMORROW 191 College. It was “the first case in history of a Japanese noble giving up rank and nationality in order to marry a foreigner of no rank,” a striking example of the superiority to race, rank, and worldly advantage which true Christian faith engenders and for which Omi Mission stands. The number of diamonds in the rough found by Mr. Vories and his colleagues among the yokels of Omi confirms the claim that the Christian movement can find many of its needed leaders in the country. At this point attention should be called to the respec¬ tive advantages of two contrasted types of church polity for the nurturing of Japanese leaders. The Con¬ gregational, Presbyterian, Baptist, Methodist, and various other missions have naturally magnified the independence and self-support of the Japanese Church. Each congregation and minister enjoys almost com¬ plete autonomy. The result has been to call forth initiative and self-reliance in the Japanese. Men of independent, aggressive character have been attracted to these denominations. The unfavorable side of the system was the tendency, during the ’nineties, when the entire nation was self-assertive and impatient of foreign control, for the missionary and Japanese workers to fall apart and hence to deprive the Japanese of the steadying and stimulating influence of the “thoroughbred Christian” missionary. The Anglican missions, on the other hand, have magnified the historic continuity and universal oneness of the Church and the necessity of a prolonged period of training and sub¬ ordination for the Japanese workers under an ordained 1 92 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN missionary superior. The local congregations, like¬ wise, are not granted autonomy and less stress is laid on self-support. The result has been to develop Japanese workers of less initiative but of deeper grounding in the faith and finer appreciation of the mystical elements in Christianity. Both of these systems manifestly have certain distinctive advan¬ tages, for both types of leaders are needed in the Church. There are certain obstacles to securing able Japanese leaders which missionaries can help remove. One of them lies in the quite wholesome dread on the part of a sensitive Japanese of being bossed or supported by a foreigner. He dreads it partly from samurai pride, perhaps, but equally because it degrades him and undercuts his influence with his own people. Other obstacles are the low salaries and precarious future of a Christian calling for a man with a growing family in a country where living expenses insist on rising and where men in civil and business life get generous bonuses and retiring allowances. The cases of self-sacrifice already referred to show that the Japanese Christian worker is not looking for luxury or honor, but there are limits to the compulsory heroism which an unimaginative superintendent may impose on a young Japanese dependent upon him. J. Sharing and transferring responsibility Many a foreign missionary has insisted too long upon disbursing all funds granted for evangelism by his home board. No rule can be laid down as to just CHALLENGE OF TODAY AND TOMORROW 193 when he should let go of them, but some men have wasted their own strength and impaired their finer influence by failing to entrust funds more fully to Japanese colleagues. To be sure, some of the dollars might possibly appear to go further if the missionary were handling them, but it is very doubtful if they would carry so much of the love and power of Christ with them. I do not doubt that scores of Japanese of the largest caliber have been repelled from Christian service by the domineering spirit and close financial control of a few missionaries whose reputations have hurt the entire missionary body. The equality of all clergymen, whether Japanese or missionaries in the Methodist Church, and the fact that the Bishop is a Japanese have reduced friction in this Church. De¬ cided steps in the right direction have recently been taken by several of the non-episcopal missions by giving control of evangelistic funds and of the assign¬ ment of missionaries to a board composed not less than half of Japanese. In the case of the American (Congregational) Board, it is composed of fifteen Japanese and only three foreign members. An increas¬ ing volume of missionary opinion supports the view that no new work should be undertaken without the approval of the Japanese Church concerned. 4 Christian educational institutions need strength¬ ening The strengthening of the Christian schools is one of the salient needs of the day. No one would deny the importance of laying siege to the government 194 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN school student body, but it is likewise vitally important to create a chain of Christian schools, of the highest quality, in every section of the Empire. In the long run, this would be one of the most highly multiplying uses of missionary men and money. Who prates of the competition between the evangelistic and the educational work? They are one and inseparable, interacting organs of one body. The schools work on the most plastic minds, not for a few minutes a week, but for months on end. They operate by peace¬ ful penetration, not by sudden attack; but in a true sense they are evangelistic. The Christian schools have been sharing with all other schools a remarkable rush of applicants. The commercial departments opened by several of them have proved so popular as to threaten to commercialize the institutions and weaken their decided Christian spirit. The increased income thus brought in becomes a subtle temptation. This phenomenon only throws into higher relief the need for larger funds from Christians abroad in order to enable the Christian schools to raise their faculties and equipments to such a pitch of excellence as to attract the best students and hold them to graduation. The achievements of the Christian schools are remarkable when con¬ trasted with their meager equipment and resources. * But if one may hazard a guess, a fifty per cent increase in the grants for maintenance and buildings made by the Mission Boards would double the net productivity of the schools. And the yield of every lower school would be much increased if, by a com- CHALLENGE OF TODAY AND TOMORROW 195 bination of Japanese and American resources, one Christian university of the highest grade could be established. It would form a much needed capstone to the whole Christian system and would go far to supply the present great deficiency of highly trained, thoroughly Christian teachers for the lower institu¬ tions. Besides strengthening the individual schools and planting some new ones, the Christian forces should set up a central educational bureau of research and service served by educational specialists. Thus by every possible means effort should be focussed upon making the Christian schools preeminent for quality, not for size. 5. The challenging opportunities for social work The menacing conditions created by the industrial upheaval have been described in an earlier chapter. The very foundations of the family and of the old religious and ethical standards are being pulverized by the shock. The principles and spirit of Christ are not the only factors at work to avert disaster, but it is safe to say that they are the most potent and deep. What a challenging opportunity for a few choice missionaries thoroughly trained in social and economic science and moved by a deep Christian purpose ! They would get close to working people and employers alike, making their own homes a trysting place for perplexed souls, calling into being neighborhood houses and laborers’ friendly societies, and interlocking groups of employers and employed. They would work shoulder to shoulder with brave 1 96 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN spirits like Mr. Kagawa of the Kobe slums, or Rev. S. Sugiura of the True Light Church in lower Tokyo, or Mr. Mikimoto, the “culture pearF’ manufacturer, among whose employees a group of one hundred believers has grown up, or with other Christian em¬ ployers who are striving to incorporate the Golden Rule into Japanese business. Keen American university men or women, filled with the Christian social passion -and ambitious to blaze new trails, will find plenty of chances in Japan. Let me give an illustration, just as striking in some ways as Omi Mission. A few years ago a young Toronto University man and his wife, the Rev. Mr. and Mrs. P. G. Price, came to Japan under the Can¬ adian Methodist Mission. For several years they studied the language and worked among the people in a bigoted Buddhist province on the northern coast. Meanwhile they were becoming versed in the life and thought of the common people and were making a study of the way in which industrialism is affecting the entire nation even out in the mountain hamlets. Then they were transferred to Tokyo, to carry on a neighborhood house already begun by Dr. Saunby, an older missionary, who had fallen ill. But the hero of the story is a Japanese, Mr. Yataro Kobayashi, whose interest was aroused by the missionaries. His career reads like a novel — yet I have known several others as remarkable. Mr. Kobayashi is the son of a millionaire sugar merchant. As a youth he was sent to Kobe to learn the business. While there, he found lodgings in the CHALLENGE OF TODAY AND TOMORROW 197 home of a fine Christian, Dr. Yoshioka, then president of Kwansei Methodist College. That home deeply impressed him. Later he went to America, still studying sugar. There he was led into the Christian life. A university course clouded his faith, and it was only after some years of distress that he recovered it and united with Central Tabernacle in Tokyo. Dr. Saunby was looking for a residence in the poorer quarter of - the city in order to start social work, when in Negishi, he came upon a large vacant house with a lovely garden. It transpired that Mr. Kobayashi owned it, and he insisted upon giving it outright to the mission for social and religious work. This is worth at least $25,000. Soon after this, Mr. and Mrs. Price came upon the scene, and found in Mr. Kobayashi an indefatigable team-mate. After study¬ ing all existing social work in the city, they made their own plans. Mr. Kobayashi volunteered to carry the entire budget for five years, arid besides, he bought in Nippon*, a slum district, an old factory and remodelled it so as to house a dav school, relief bureau, dispensary, and Japanese pastor’s residence. The staff of the settlement includes a pastor- manager, a doctor, a nurse and a midwife, two relief workers and four teachers. The day school has one hundred and thirty children, who are given a little industrial training besides the three R’s. It was illuminating to discover that there were six hundred children of school age in that one district (Nippon) not attending school, partly because so many of them had never been “registered.” The proportion of CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN 198 illegitimate unregistered children is high. One of the relief workers makes a specialty of getting both children and marriages registered — matters of unusual importance in Japan. Records of the settlement ac¬ tivities and of investigations are carefully kept, and the entire work is being run on scientific lines. Close contact is maintained between the settlement and the mother church, Central Tabernacle. Through Mr. Kobayashi's^ earnest personal work numbers of students have been drawn into the church, and they are being drafted for service at the settlement. In order the better to equip them, a Social Service Library has been opened in a quiet room at the Tabernacle, accessible to members of the group. A promising institutional church is being devel¬ oped in the house in Negishi, and still other centers are soon to be opened up. In all this fascinating game of Christian geometrical progression, Mr. and Mrs. Price have been the pathfinders and Mr. Kobayashi their loyal partner and financier. One is not surprised to have the missionary concerned pen these prophetic sentences : It seems to me that there is no more hopeful place for evangelism than in the suburbs of Tokyo at the present time. I know in the older sections Christian work is difficult, but in the newer sections where the families who have moved in are living away from temple or shrine influence, I think we have the most hopeful field in all Japan. I believe, for in¬ stance, that it would be possible to open up next year twenty new churches in the suburbs of Tokyo without any of these churches infringing upon any other. I expect that within a year we shall move to some other location and begin over again. CHALLENGE OF TODAY AND TOMORROW 199 6. Work among neglected groups But there are large sections and classes of the Japanese people who have thus far remained as little touched by Christianity as the industrial workers. Among them are the farmers (already mentioned), the nobility, the fishermen, the miners, the outcasts, and the lepers, all of them hitherto outside the main currents of Christian influence. Yet they are not impervious. The Jesuit missionaries in the sixteenth century won quite a following among the nobles, but in modern times converts have come from the middle classes. Both social extremes have been hard to reach. Now and then there has been a notable exception. Vis¬ count Arinori Mori, the eminent diplomat and Minister of Education, is said by his relatives to have been an earnest though unconfessed Christian. He certainly gave courageous backing to Neesima when he was struggling to found Doshisha, and today his son is a Christian minister and his widow is a faithful member of Dr. Uemura’s church. Another little known case was Mrs. Merrell Vories’ mother, Viscountess Hitotsuyanagi, who, in 1868, when there were only four or five baptized Protestant Christians, professed and held to her new-found faith in the face of bitter persecution. It would have been a misfortune if the modern Christian movement had been inflated by the adherence in the earlier years of a considerable number of the high nobility. The Church has needed testing and seasoning. But today for their own 200 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN sakes as well as for the general cause, it is high time that more effort were made to reach them. The unmistakably friendly interest of the Prince Regent and the Princess in things Christian is having a favorable effect. The Counselor to the Prince Regent, Viscount Chinda, is a product of Christian education both in Japan and in America. Viscount Fukuoka has long been identified with the Sei Ko Kwai and everything Christian, and several other members of the House of Peers were educated in Christian colleges. Yet, so conservative are the Im¬ perial Court and the nobility in general, and so powerfully intrenched are the forces of nationalistic conservatism in all the seats of power that the Christian forces will find ample exercise for all their faith before marked victories are won. At the other end of the social scale are the 903,022 former outcasts, Eta (much defiled) who are even yet ostracised by other classes. They are generally scavengers, butchers, or leather workers. The gov¬ ernment is striving to educate and help them, and individual Buddhists and Christians are carrying on relief and sanitary work in a few Eta villages. In Omi province one Christian physician found half of the population of a village of eight hundred suffer¬ ing from trachoma. He gave 4,500 treatments free of charge and practically eradicated the disease in that village. In order to follow up the improvement he had begun, he has since supported two social workers in the village. The churches and mission¬ aries as a whole, however, have neglected the Eta, CHALLENGE OF TODAY AND TOMORROW 201 leaving them to resort to mongrel superstitions and idolatry. Among the 50,000 lepers, Christian missionaries have been comparatively active. The first two leper hospitals in the Empire were established by mission¬ aries and were perhaps the chief means of arousing the government to enter the field. The Home of the Resurrection of Hope, as the hospital conducted by English lady missionaries is called, is at once a pathetic and a cheering place to visit, for the spirit of the Great Physician irradiates the whole place. The government makes modest grants-in-aid to the private leper hospitals, as to other philanthropic enterprises. The Union Christian Leper Hospital near Tokyo obtains half its support from govern¬ ment and other Japanese sources, and half from the International Mission for Lepers. Dr. William C. Sturgis calls Miss Cornwall-Legh’s work among the lepers at the Kasatsu hot-springs, “the most impres¬ sive evidence of God’s grace that I saw in Japan. There is no outstanding instance of evangelism or social ministry among the miners, whose harsh conditions of labor and isolation from the life of the outside world make a strong appeal to Christian sympathy. Although the fisher-folk form one twentieth of the population, there is comparatively little effort put forth to evangelize them. They are scattered like a fringe all around the indented coast, and like Norsemen they revel in the freedom of their hazard¬ ous trade. From among them are recruited a goodly 202 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN proportion of the hardy sailors who man Japan's men-of-war and merchantmen. Perhaps the most successful and picturesque foreign missionary enter¬ prise among seafarers anywhere is that started by Captain Luke Bickel in the Inland Sea, which will be described further on. It is another evidence that the day of surprising innovations is not past in Japan and that the most clannish and ossified groups will yield to a combination of ingenuity and self-giving love. /. Impregnating Japanese thought with Christian thought Only second in importance to raising up competent Japanese leaders is the problem of injecting a power¬ ful infusion of the spirit and principles of Jesus Christ into the turgid thought currents that are sweeping through the people. Although Christian ideas have widely permeated the literature and life of the nation, they are far from dominant. There is danger lest the little Christian minority — onty one in two hundred — will be swept into a side eddy and will not realize that they are not in the main current. The Church and its auxiliary agencies need to be on guard against getting set hard in the mold of programs and for¬ mulas which are not vitally responsive to the needs of each changing day. In Japan the Church as a whole shows no leaning toward such asceticism of other-worldliness as earned for the early Christians the epithet “third race/’ but there are some Japanese CHALLENGE OF TODAY AND TOMORROW 203 Christians and foreign missionaries who fail to appreciate and cooperate with the constructive new movements springing up all around them, or to enter into the travail of the souls struggling amid the conflict of new and old ideals. They only faintly realize that a stupendous upheaval is taking place, that New Japan is having a rebirth. At such a juncture an outstanding need is for more leaders, both foreigners and Japanese, who, like their Master, can ride the storm and still it. To do that demands both intellectual and spiritual power of a high order. Men of the requisite spiritual power are even rarer than those of large intellectual caliber. A few of the Japanese and missionary leaders possess both: they are of apostolic mold. The task of leavening the thought of Japan calls, not only for powerful Christian personalities, but for the more adequate use of literature. For all that has been achieved by the missionary publishing agencies and the Christian Japanese publishing firms, one may be unfeignedly grateful, but today, in face of the welter of unsettling and often debasing litera¬ ture that is being poured over the nation, no pica¬ yune, sentimental, or second-rate Christian output will get attention. The half mile of book stalls in Tokyo’s student quarter is filled with an astonishing variety of recent occidental books, and the magazines abound in half-digested and revolutionary ideas. The situation calls for the mobilizing of Christian talent, particularly of rising Japanese writers. Good work has been done by the Christian Literature Society of 204 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN the Federation of Missions, but its basis should be boldly revamped so as to allow equal if not majority Japanese membership, and funds in far more generous measure should be given to it by the missions and the churches. The same is true of the “newspaper evan¬ gelism/’ which missionaries have nursed through the period of testing to assured success. Without men¬ acing its evangelistic effectiveness, it could be made more appealing and be integrated more closely with the churches if full Japanese partnership were invited. II. THE FUNCTION OF MISSIONARIES IN JAPAN TODAY The Japanese Christians do not all answer alike when they are asked how many more missionaries are needed and what kinds. Some of them hold that while the missionary was indispensable in earlier stages, he should now leave everything to the Japanese churches, except for teaching in the Christian schools and in highly specialized activities. Even money from abroad in large amounts is not desirable, they hold. This view is held chiefly by laymen and by some of the more independent-minded pastors. They represent the left wing. On the right wing is another group of Japanese, fortunately few in number, who have become para¬ sitic. They have been so long used to depending on foreign missionary leadership and money that it is irksome to contemplate the necessity of standing on their own feet. Of course they favor more mission¬ aries and more money. In a sense these are “rice CHALLENGE OF TODAY AND TOMORROW 205 Christians,” although most of them really would hold fast to their faith whatever happened. 1. More missionaries of the right kind needed In the center are to be found the bulk of the Japanese Christians. They appreciate the great service of the missionary body nowadays as well as in the earlier stages. Still, they are not blind to the shortcomings of the missionaries individually or of the “system.” They would say, “Yes, a slight increase of the missionary force may be desirable, but far more to be desired is still more rigid selection of those who are sent, and the improvement of the working relations between them and the Japanese workers.” This view would also represent fairly well, I believe, the conviction of the most competent missionaries in Japan. The chief reasons for desiring that the present missionary force be maintained and slightly enlarged are these: the vast majority of the people have not been and cannot be effectively brought under Christian influence without reinforcements : the forces of the opposition — crass materialism, corrupt religions, and mercenary cults misleading the people, destructive moral and social ideas from abroad — all these and more call for a more aggressive advance by the Christian forces; the seasoned spiritual character and the specialized training possessed by the best type of missionary are invaluable to the Kingdom of God in Japan. 206 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN But invariably such appeals are coupled with two provisos. The first is that they be missionaries of the right kind. The specifications for the ‘Tight kind” have been partially brought out in description of various representative missionaries, but it will be well to state all of them together here. The missionaries needed will, of course, differ in many ways, but the attitudes and convictions which they all must have without exception are these : ( i ) An absolute loyalty to Christ Jesus as Lord and Savior and a growing experience of fellowship with God through Him. (2) A willingness to '‘play second fiddle” and be loyal, whether to Japanese or to fellow- missionaries. (3) A primary concern, not for any denomination, but for the Kingdom of God, and eagerness to cooperate with all other Christians and men of good-will in its realization. (4) A flexible mind and teachable spirit. (5) A firm grasp of the essentials of Christian truth and an earnest desire to bring men into the Christian life. (6) A sympathy superior to racial, creedal, and national distinctions. (7) A capacity to see the humorous and the hopeful sides of every situation. (8) A refined and appre¬ ciative spirit, capable of appealing to the romantic and aesthetic temper of the Japanese. (9) A char¬ acter that rings true. Surely these are not unattainable ideals. Besides all these minimal qualifications, the combinations and degrees of attainments are almost infinitely varied. There is need for intellectual giants and specialists able to master the Japanese language and the intri- CHALLENGE OF TODAY AND TOMORROW 207 cacics of oriental religious and social systems. But there is also need for technicians and executives, expe¬ rienced in social work and industrial problems, and able to organize and guide bodies of men. And there is always need for physicians of the heart, rich in sympathy and intuitive insight, glad to spend time on people, without thinking of schedules or reports. Sometimes in describing the kind of new missionaries desired, the Japanese hold the standard discouragingly high. But the verdict of the sainted Bishop Honda gives the true emphasis: “What Japan supremely needs from the West is missionaries who are satu¬ rated with Jesus Christ, who embody the fruits of generations of Christian breeding.1' To sum up the point : a welcome and a career in Japan are to be expected only by missionaries of rich personality, of large caliber. The second proviso is that missionary-Japanese relationships in church work be made right. That is, of course, a matter of making the heart right even more than the formal arrangement. Hundreds of missionaries are working smoothly and effectively with Japanese associates. But there is more maladjust¬ ment than appears on the surface. The Japanese are reticent and reluctant to complain, especially when they know their missionary associates mean well. The missionaries do mean well, but they are often, like occidentals generally, dull in intuitive perception, and are likely to take at face value the conventional and considerate assurances of the Japanese that all is well. A loving, unselfish heart, watchful to detect 20S CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN friction, is certainly the first requisite for a solution. But the system must also be set right, lest even the best of intentions be thwarted. Dr. Arthur D. Berry expressed the basic principle in these1 words: “The independence and self-government of the Church in Japan is a settled fact. The missionary who is not willing to recognize it and, if asked, willing to work under Japanese direction, should be recalled and sent to some other field.”* The polity and methods of control in the various churches will necessarily affect the application of this principle. Bishop Tucker points out its bearing upon the Anglican communion in these very frank, wise sentences : Foreign and Japanese clergy have exactly the same stand¬ ing ... in all legislation and formulation of policies. ... no distinction is made between “native” and for¬ eigner. The Japanese have practical control because of their numbers. In theory nothing could be more equitable or more conducive to genuine cooperation or provide more ample scope for Japanese initiative. In practice, however, the theory breaks down in two respects. The first is the authority of the Bishops, all of whom are foreigners. . . . The employment, dismissal, and locating of Japanese evangelistic workers is determined by him, except where their salaries are paid by the native congregations. . . . The second point is that the control of the support which comes from abroad is in foreign hands. ... As practically all evan¬ gelistic policies involve the expenditure of money, it is evi¬ dent that Japanese freedom and initiative are limited to the self-supporting portion of the work. . . . For equipment also the native pastor must either secure the interest of the * Address before the Foreign Missions Conference at Beth¬ lehem, Pa., January, 1923. CHALLENGE OF TODAY AND TOMORROW 209 Bishop or of some missionary, or else go without improve¬ ments needed to carry out his plans.* Such a relationship inevitably conduces to inequality and to real, though concealed, dissatisfaction. The installation of Japanese bishops will go far to remedy this situation. As Bishop Tucker observes: “The moral effect of a native bishop, both upon Christians and upon non-Christians would undoubtedly be great. He would naturally understand conditions better and be able to get into closer touch with the people than a foreigner.’’ The Japan Methodist Church has had a Japanese bishop ever since it was formed fifteen years ago (by the union of three bodies), and both mission¬ aries and Japanese clergy have worked harmoniously under him. The sum of the matter is that for the individual missionary, for the Mission Board, and for the Church, the supreme concern must be for the Kingdom of God in Japan. If that is verily sought first and fearlessly, all knotty questions of relationship can be solved. There is one more point which ought to be given more emphasis in the equipment of missionaries and in the program of the Christian movement in Japan. It is suggested by the now well-worn words “religious education.” Regardless of the type of his work, the modern missionary should realize that the only sound means for developing mature individual Christians or churches is through an educational process. There is nothing new or revolutionary about this, except that * Missionary Problems and Policies in Japan, 1921. 210 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN the “workman who needeth not to be ashamed” will study with all his might the latest and best results of pedagogy and psychology in order that he may by all means win and hold and establish men in the faith. This involves also a magnifying of work among chil¬ dren and youth, who alone are educable. In the bright light of the ideal, how pitiably small and ineffective appear the Bible schools and the young people’s work and the Associations! The chief essential for lifting them all nearer to the ideal is Japanese leadership, but the missionary must be competent to do his bit as a pioneer, a demonstrator and a trainer. 2. Nezv emphases and methods called fo r Originality in missionary methods has been as strikingly displayed in Japan since 1900 as in any other field : witness the interracial Omi Mission, the placing of English teachers in government schools, the newspaper evangelism, the student hostels, the work of Miss Macdonald among criminals, the Inland Sea Mission of Captain Bickel, and the inter¬ national relations ministry of men like Gilbert Bowles. Who can predict how many more ingenious and valu¬ able methods and emphases will be invented during the next decade? We cannot do better than dip into the story of some of these successful experiments. The Silent Messenger “Newspaper Evangelism” strikes strangely on the ear. Yet the strangest thing about it is that until a missionary in Japan hit upon the plan, twenty- CHALLENGE OF TODAY AND TOMORROW 211 five years ago, no one in the mission field had system¬ atically utilized paid space in the daily press to present Christian truth. Like most innovations it has had to win its way gradually, but it is now recognized to be one of the most telling and economical evangelistic methods, especially for the country districts where churches are few and the people are conservative. The plan in brief is to select the best papers to reach any desired population and then to publish once or twice a week a carefully prepared series of expositions of Christian truth, or passages from the Bible with simple explanations, and to offer to answer inquiries and supply literature and New Testaments. The foreign missionary and his Japanese associate conduct a central office where a varied assortment of Christian literature is kept on hand, and where callers from the outlying towns and villages are welcomed for inter¬ views. As the inquiries are followed up, man after man and family after family all over the district become interested and desire to spread the good news to their neighbors. As soon as a few persons in a place have become avowed believers, the central office sends out a carefully prepared order of service with a mimeographed sermon, so that the whole service can be conducted by the leader, who invites his neighbors in to what oftentimes develops, as in New Testament times, into the “church in the housed’ In addition to the headquarters office, the missionary and his Japa¬ nese colleagues visit as many of the outlying inquirers as possible, and gradually form the nuclei of perma¬ nent churches. There have been some dramatic con- 212 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN versions brought about by this long-distance or “corre¬ spondence” evangelism. One instance among many may be quoted : A man in jail received from a friend a present of some food wrapped up in half a page of an old newspaper. Having nothing to read, he proceeded to study it, when his eye caught an article entitled, “Which was first — the egg or the hen?” It was one sent out by the “Eternal Life Hail” at Oita, and was an argument for believing in a Creator. The man's interest was quickened, and he got in touch with the missionary. On his release, he made his way at once to the newspaper office and, after a period of instruction and probation, was baptized. Today he is an elder of the church to which he belongs.* Newspaper evangelism has now been so completely tested that the Federation of Missions, not only has endorsed it, but has voted to establish offices in Tokyo, Osaka, and other large cities, so as to utilize the metropolitan dailies which reach hundreds of thou¬ sands of both city and country dwellers. In this as in other literary enterprises, the chief part can most effectively be taken by Japanese, but there is a large and attractive opening also for foreigners who possess the right combination of gifts. The success of this plan in Japan has led to its adoption by one of the missions in China. Among Prisoners and Criminals It is always embarrassing to call attention to the work of persons still living, but in the case of those here mentioned I do not fear that it will turn their heads. One of the remarkable workers in Japan * The East and the West, April, 1922, p. 169. 4 CHALLENGE OF TODAY AND TOMORROW 213 today is Miss Macdonald, a tiny Canadian lady of Scotch ancestry, for whom, if need should arise, scores of the most notorious criminals in Japan would gladly give their lives. She was sent out to found the Young Women’s Christian Association, and after ten fruitful years turned over the responsibility to Miss Michi Kawai and gave her attention to work among prisoners and their families. This ministry had literally been thrust upon her by the fact that a member of her young men’s bible class had been sentenced to death for murder, and she went frequently to prison to see him. That opened the way to a constantly widening and inescapable ministry among other prisoners and their relatives, and gradually among prison officials and the neglected classes who constantly swell the ranks of crime. A dramatic outgrowth of her work is most vividly presented in the volume entitled A Gentleman in Prison , which is the autobiography of one Ishii, who for twenty years figured in police annals as a murderer and a defier of gods and men. Dr. John Kelman has compared this book with John Bunyan’s story for its moving power and its evidence of the undiminished potency of the gospel. The passage where Ishii tells of reading the New Testament given him by Miss Macdonald and her colleague, Miss West, and of the breaking open of his double-barred heart at the words of Jesus, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do,” is among the most touching in all biographical literature. But the work among prisoners has opened before Miss Macdonald such glimpses into the abyss of crime I 214 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN and vice and poverty in East Tokyo that she has been impelled to found a neighborhood house there which shall form a center for all the phases of the work, and shall become a training ground for Japanese workers and a clinic in the application of divine power to human life at its worst. Ten eminent Japanese Christians, who have been from the first closely associated with this work, have pledged themselves to secure $75,000 for the neighborhood house and have already raised part of it. In the districts where the work has been carried on for five years a group of Japanese associates has been raised up, some of them brands snatched from the burning; others, men and women from homes of privilege. Even this brief account of the work will add further evidence of the unexpected new opportunities that are waiting to be developed by resourceful missionaries. Fishing for Men in the Inland Sea Captain Luke Bickel, the Dr. Grenfell of Japan, lias already been alluded to, but his work is so sug¬ gestive that it deserves fuller mention. Captain Bickel was every inch of his six-feet-two a sailor and a Christian. A friend offered the American Baptist Missionary Society funds for a Gospel Ship to work among the neglected inhabitants of the Inland Sea, provided the Society would find a suitable skipper-missionary. At that time Captain Bickel was Executive Director of the London Baptist Publica¬ tion Society, but when the call came to this new venture, he said “yes,” although he and his good « CHALLENGE OF TODAY AND TOMORROW 215 wife knew it meant endless privation and difficulty. At length the ship was built. The first job was to find a Japanese crew. The men whom he finally had to engage were as tough and untutored a gang as even Captain Bickel had ever seen. But the Captain Considered the task of Christianizing the crew just as pressing as to preach among the million and a half stubborn and suspicious islanders who formed his larger parish. In the Captain’s biography the most thrilling incident is the almost unbelievable con¬ version of the most hardened member of the crew, Hirata. We quote from the Captain’s log.* Well, Hirata had one virtue at least, he was openly, cheerfully evil. He and the devil went watch and watch. He gambled, stole, and lied by preference. He drank heavily and loved to fight, for was he not a jiujitsu expert of seven years’ training? All this he did and worse. Man has a soul, they say. We tried to find his, tried for two years, but never got a glimpse. He came to the ship’s daily worship with the rest, bowed his head like a saint and looked out of his eight-point eyes at the rest of the crew with a wink to which they responded. When it was all over, they went away forward and laughed at the fun. Being of sailor build, we had seen a craft or two since we first sailed deep water, but for straight evil-doing the Mission Ship outsailed them all. Morally, spiritually, it was bedlam with the lid off, and our friend was the man who held the lid. This lasted two years and then something happened. One of the men fell overboard in a winter gale and was drowned. God used this to move our friend’s heart. He began to inquire, but how? Must he learn English? No. Would he not have to go to school and study before he could find any help from Christianity? So little impression had the two * Captain Bickel of the Inland Sea. C. K. Harrington. Fleming H. Revell Co., New York. I 21 6 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN years on the ship made ! Ignorant to the extent of not being able to read or write the simple Japanese Kana, or syllable alphabet, morally crooked in all his ways, was there any hope of his being changed. In deep disappointment, almost with disgust, we answered his inquiries. We did not believe him sincere then nor did we later on when he professed faith in Christ. We refused baptism, but there was a change, even we could not deny it; yes, a change at last, slight indeed, but growing in force continually until the old man became completely new. The upshot of it all was that Hirata became a crude but powerful evangelist, one of that procession of twice-born men which sprang up along Captain BickeT s path. The work so well started by Captain Bickel has gone forward since his death. There are several other groups of islands waiting for men of like vision to sail a ship among them bearing the Good News of peace and new life. Peace-makers Christian mediation between races and nations is becoming more and more urgent as the contacts and sources of friction between the East and West multiply. In this realm many missionaries in Japan have rendered distinctive service, but in recent years none more notably than a modest Quaker, Mr. Gilbert Bowles. Mild-mannered and unassuming, he has won the confidence of fair-minded Japanese from privy councilors down, and in , quiet ways has brought to bear the ideals of Christ upon the situations which threatened to lead to open rupture. Other Christian men of like mind, Japanese and missionaries and CHRISTIAN LEADERS OF THE YOUNGER GENERATION. JIRO HOSHIJIMA (upper left), member of parliament; miss michi kawai (upper right), national secretary of the Y. W. C. A. ; REV. SHOICHI imamura (lower left), religious education director, reinan ZAKA CHURCH; SHINATO SHIGA (LOWER RIGHT), EXECUTIVE SECRE¬ TARY, people’s CLUB, OSAKA I ■H MM s. saito (upper left), national secretary of the Y. M. c. a. ; SAKUZO YOSHINO (UPPER RIGHT), PROFESSOR IN TOKYO IMPERIAL university; isamu kawakami (lower left), secretary inter¬ national service bureau; rev. z. ono (lower right), pastor AT KOFU CHALLENGE OF TODAY AND TOMORROW 217 foreign merchants, have worked with him until there have arisen such powerful agencies as the Japanese League of Nations Association and the International Service Bureau, directed by a Christian graduate of Waseda and Princeton, Mr. Isamu Kawakami. An unheralded but dynamic development of this interracial friendliness has been the gathering to¬ gether of leading Chinese and Japanese Christians and a few missionaries from each of the two countries tO! talk and pray together confidentially. Twice they have met, once in China and once in Japan, and dis¬ cussed with utmost freedom the points of irritation between the two governments and peoples. In this and other ways, these modern peace-makers have affected the springs of action which statesmen cannot touch, and have proved that literally nothing human is foreign to the heart of Christ and His representa¬ tives. Lothrop Stoddard quotes with approval Madison Grant’s words, “It is quite another (thing) for the white man to share his blood with or entrust his ideals to brown, yellow, black, or red men.” (Italics are Grant’s.) Is it not high time for Christian white men to give the lie to such intolerant, pagan appeals to race arrogance by backing up without reserve the Christ-like service of men like Bowles? While there will doubtless continue to be need for more of the resourceful, much-enduring, evangelistic missionaries, and for the regular educational mis¬ sionaries, the strongest demand is likely to be for men and women of rounded training, but of superior ability and specialized training in one line. How many of H-Jap 2lS CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN them? If only they measure up fairly closely to the specifications already given, the Japanese churches and the broad-minded public will welcome a good many more. The number of such candidates available in all North America and Great Britain is so very limited that there is no danger of too many being sent. III. THE CONCLUSION OF THE WHOLE MATTER The issues at stake in the Far East are too great for the man in the street to grasp. Japan is so far away and the United States and Canada so mighty and self-sufficient that he may think it far-fetched to talk about Japan’s future determining to any percep¬ tible degree the destiny of North America. But Japan is the vanguard of Asia, and if Asia falls into the pit, Western nations can no more help being dragged in than America can escape the down-draft of Europe’s present debacle. An American scientist of interna¬ tional reputation after spending half of 1922 studying conditions on the Continent declared that European civilization would not recover for two generations and that Japan and China were bound to wield a corre¬ spondingly larger influence on the thought and destiny of both East and West. Americans now living are likely to behold them become as potent in world affairs as England and America have been for the past hun¬ dred years. Thank God, the Japanese people today are plastic and ready to be recast. From nobles to navvies they are conscious that things are wrong and that they need new power to put them right. Consider the CHALLENGE OF TODAY AND TOMORROW 219 appalling dash of forces amid which the Japanese people are struggling today — autocracy and demo- racy, feudalism and industrialism, family authority and individual freedom, superstitious faiths and New Testament revelation, — stout hearts may well quail and weak hearts despair. As Baron Kata, chief dele¬ gate to the Washington Conference, was returning to Japan he dropped this pregnant remark: “We did our best at Washington and will work hard to live up to the agreements, but we need the help of the teachers of religion to supplement what we did there.’’’ Now that the Baron is Premier he seems to be making an honest fight for a righteous policy toward China, Siberia, and the United States, and for greater popu¬ lar freedom at home. But he and other leaders of Japan confess that the one thing needful, an inward dynamic, they cannot supply. If the evidence arrayed in this book is accepted at face value, it would seem to indicate that Christ has proved to be the desired dynamic in Japanese hearts, as we know Him to be in our own. But before settling back comfortably on anyone else’s ready-made conclu¬ sions either on this point or on the whole question of the place and power of Christ and the Church in Japan today and tomorrow, it will be well to take a birdseye view of the ground we have traversed. Only a few segments of the entire complex situation in Japan today have been covered in this volume, yet they were intended to be the most significant and representative segments. If that is a reasonable as¬ sumption, one should be able to answer with some 220 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN confidence the question, What are the main conclusions to which the evidence points? No reader or study- group should accept another person’s answer ; but tak¬ ing the privilege of an author and assuming the atti¬ tude of a judge, I would, for myself at least, formulate some of the conclusions in the following paragraphs. The Japanese people are likely to exert a mighty influence upon the peoples of Asia and also upon the rest of the world. For a generation to come their influence in Asia may entitle them to be called “the rudder of the Orient.'’ The phenomenal expansion of industry and the land¬ slide of population into the cities, coupled with uni¬ versal education, the emergence of the common people, and the recognition of women’s rights have powerfully affected the character and life of the people. Ven¬ erable customs and ethical standards have lost their authority. The sway of the old faiths has waned as scientific education has advanced. Even the military career, typified by the sword (“soul of the samurai”), has lost its prestige, discredited by the excesses of the militarists in all lands since the World War and undermined by the cumulative effect of Christian teaching. The advance of liberalism and popular rights and the decline of repressive upper-class domi¬ nation have become irresistible. But unless the spirit and standards of Jesus become steadily more potent in Japanese society, all these emancipating tendencies will lead toward a refined but selfish materialism and toward exchange of upper-class for lower-class domination. CHALLENGE OF TODAY AND TOMORROW 221 The conflict between the old family authority and the new personal liberty presses hard on the younger generation. Many of them have run the gamut of naturalism, agnosticism, and cynicism, and when they come to themselves, they yearn for some sure word of life. Out of the depths of their bewilderment and need, shallow men and women are seizing upon strange travesties of religion, while the more serious-minded are taking refuge in the more spiritual elements of Buddhism and Shinto; and still other earnest souls, who know little about Christ, have become enamored of the character of St. Francis of Assisi, and by way of his footsteps are groping their way toward the light of Christ Himself. Were the Master to appear in Japan today, he would doubtless recognize many more friends and allies than our dull eyes can descry. We depend too much upon labels and definitions, while he “looketh on the heart.’ ’ But 1 fully believe that he would hail the folk in Japan who bear his name, — the Church con¬ ceived most broadly and in all its branches and auxil¬ iaries — despite their distorted representation of him, as the drivinr center of the forces that are to establish his Kingdom among the Japanese people. Their rein¬ forcement and upbuilding, therefore, is a para¬ mount duty. After his last visit to Japan Dr. Robert E. Speer wrote : “The present is the day of all days for the churches at home to support these churches and missions in Japan by enabling them to put forth the maximum of direct evangelistic effort 222 CREATIVE FORCES IN JAPAN and to use to the limit every opportunity of press and school.”* What poignant grief must Christ feel over the dis¬ loyalty and niggardliness and timidity of many of his followers in North America and Great Britain, as they sit supine before Japan’s urgent need! What unsuspected powers and graces may He call forth in the yet unevangelized Japanese people! But to many of them His liberating touch will only go as we stand by the meager Christian forces now in Japan. Three years ago at the World’s Sunday School Convention in Tokyo occurred a scene full of sym¬ bolic meaning. It vividly represented the forces which are playing a leading part in re-creating Japan. A great chorus of young Japanese Christians, reinforced by a hundred missionaries, made the galleries of the Imperial Theater resound to the thrilling harmonies of the ‘‘Hallelujah Chorus.” All distinctions of Orient and Occident, of foreigner and Japanese, were fused into one mighty ensemble. In the heart of the capital, within sight of the Imperial Palace, rang forth the prophetic words: “The Lord God Omnipotent reigneth! The Kingdoms of this world are become the Kingdom of Our Lord and of His Christ. And He shall reign forever and ever!” * Report on India and Persia, 192 2, p. 15. APPENDIX I Supplemental Material and Quotations Chapter I Illumin a tin g Q uo tatio ns The Japanese, like (yourselves, are human beings — subject to the wants and frailties of our common humanity — loving and courting love — aspiring and falling — sinning and being sinned against — but knit together by a few underlying principles of far-reaching worth, among which are loyalty, the capacity for self-sacrifice, and the enthronement of knightly honor as the supreme rule of life. — Viscount Kikujiro Ishii, Japan Review, Nov., 1919, pp. 9, 10. Their moral sense is low, they are not industrious, their in¬ telligence is imitative but not initiative, while their ambition is blended with an unfortunate aggressiveness and a deplorable sensitiveness. — Andrew M. Pooley, Japan at the Cross Roads, p. 20. The net judgment with which we returned to America, after three visits during seven months, is a judgment of increased respect for Japan and what she has achieved, and a deepened confidence in the worthy and better elements of Japanese life and character. — Robert E. Speer, Missionary Review of the World, July, 1916, p. 517. For seventeen years, I have been associating intimately with Japanese of literally every class, and especially with those in rural parts. I have consistently treated them as if their psy¬ chology were the same as that of other brother men, and those who have failed to respond to such an approach with like atti¬ tude have been the exceptions. Precisely what Mr. Marcosson proclaims impossible — for a foreigner to slap a Japanese on the shoulder and talk to him as he would to an Occidental crony — I have never found to be at all resented. In fact the response has been in kind. — William Merrell Vories, The Omi Mustard Seed, Dec. 1922, p. 160. I had read in books of learned “globe-trotters” that the Japanese were a stoical race, never displaying their feelings in public. Imagine my surprise, then, at witnessing a whole room- 223 224 APPENDIX I ful of young men, at the very age when one is least willing to show emotion, so deeply moved by these simple incidents and parables from the life of Christ, that tears and even audible sobs were not infrequent. — W. M. Vories, A Mustard Seed in Japan, p. 13. Chapter II Illuminating Quotations The governments of Europe she saw organized on a basis of force rather than of right . . . This discovery brought a horrible chill to every thoughtful Japanese. Not her intrinsic civilization, nor her attainments in appreciating the moral, intellectual, and political achievements of the most advanced nations of the West, would of themselves alone protect her from the engulfing swirl of European militaristic domination. Only by her own military might could she hope to confront their military might and main¬ tain her independent life. Even most of those who through the 70’s or 8o’s had been liberal leaders, since 1890 had at least acquiesced in the rise of the new militarism of Japan. They said that “preparedness” was essential to safety in such a world as Europe had created. — Tasuku Harada, Ex-President of Doshisha University, Japan Review, February, 1920, p. 105. The Prussian monarchy is a result of fierce racial struggles. Without the wars of aggrandizement Prussia could never have attained its unity and expansion. On the other side, Japan at¬ tained her unity and solidarity in the peaceful isolation of an insular nation of which its time-honored monarchy is the emblem. This is not a mere geographical difference, but it has created a marked difference in the temperament of the two peoples, and in the relationship between the rulers and the ruled. — Profes¬ sor Masaharu Anesaki, What Japan Thinks, p. 151. Sober-minded Japanese, however, will tell you today that the moment the United States entered the World War the jingo bubble burst. The spectacle of the stupendous economic machine that we reared so swiftly to bulwark the men at the front, to¬ gether with a corresponding realization that such an effort was absolutely beyond the resources of Japan, did the business . . . Although possibly a sacrilege to Japanese reactionaries, it is not unlikely that what might be called a commercial Genro (Elder APPENDIX 1 225 Statesmen) will succeed that other and well-nigh extinct politi¬ cal Genro which ruled the country for years. — Isaac F. Marcos- son, Saturday Evening Post, June 24, 1922, pp. 89, 90. Whatever develops in China, one thing seems certain, the likelihood of international war in the Orient has been removed [by the Washington Conference] for at least ten years, and by that time peace may have become a habit. — Isaac F. Marcosson, Saturday Evening Post, June 24, 19 22, p. 97. Race is a fetish with the Japanese. Moreover, it is a valuable asset. The whole immigration problem in connection with America is an instrument — “ a potential weapon in her political arsenal,” as it has been so well termed. . . Whenever the Elder Statesmen, particularly Prince Yamagata, wanted in¬ creased military appropriations, it was only necessary to ex¬ pose the issue of race discrimination against the Japanese to get them over. . . Any foreigner may become a Japanese sub¬ ject if he has been domiciled in the country for at least five years continuously; if he is twenty years of age; if he possesses property or the means to support himself; if he has no nation¬ ality, as the technical phrase goes, or is willing to lose the one he has. When he becomes a subject of the Mikado by marry¬ ing a Japanese woman on condition of being adopted into her family and assuming the family name of the wife, only one year’s residence is required. — Isaac F. Marcosson, Saturday Evening Post , Sept. 30, 1922, pp. 28, 30. Even Christianity has abruptly stopped and struck its standard before the racial wall, and has no courage to advance. A Western nation may declare a Monroe Doctrine, but is re¬ luctant to accord an Asiatic nation a similar privilege. The West expects the East to open its doors to the exploitation of the white race, but reserves the right to slam its own doors in the faces of Orientals. — K. K. Kawakami, Japan in World Politics, pp. 10-12. The military party in Japan is at present in control, it can act without accountability to parliament or cabinet; it can over¬ ride the decisions of the civil government or circumvent them by duplicity; it can send soldiers where it will and mold the foreign policy of the Empire beyond the power of any other party to prevent ; and it does all these things ruthlessly. If that were the real and only Japan, what hope would there 2 26 APPENDIX I be for peace? But I come back with another Japan as the center of my hope. This new Japan is pictured in a Buddhist business man telling me with deep emotion of the fact that of all the boys who wish a high school education only one in three can have one because there are not schools enough. ‘‘See,” he said, “the millions we spend on armaments ! A great cry goes out of the heart of Japan, ‘Have done with these armies and navies and give us schools !’ ” In the midst of a conversation with a group of the Empire’s leaders, one of them, pointing out the window, said, “Do you see that red building there? That is the Department of Justice. And that square building beyond is the headquarters of our [Army] General Staff, and that is our great enemy.” So President Bbina, that venerable leader of Christian Japan, put it : “Like a chick within the shell, struggling to be born, young liberal Japan is growing up inside the strong, encrusted tradi¬ tions of her militaristic state, and she wants help from without as well as power from within to burst through.” See, then, where the real alignment is! It is not between japan as a whole and America as a whole. It is between the forward-looking, liberal, humane-spirited people of America and Japan together on the one side and the militaristic and reactionary cliques in both countries on the other. When I talk with a hard-hearted, visionless, militaristic American, I will not acknowledge him a member of my spiritual country. When I talk with a liberal, forward-looking, Christian-minded Japanese, I know I have met a citizen of my fatherland. — Harry Emer¬ son Fosdick, “Do We Want War in the Far East?” Sermon published Oct., 1921. The only hope for more assistance to education from the national treasury is to economize in armaments. Therefore, the very teachers who have been filling their pupils with im¬ perialistic ideas are now ready to demand disarmament. Militarists agree that though navies are being reduced, the same does not apply to armies. They say that the nations of the world are teaching military science in their colleges, and in America the flag is used everywhere for what is called “Americanization,” but what they believe to be narrow nationalism. They insist that the conditions in Siberia and China present a continual danger to Japan. APPENDIX I 227 The liberal-minded people of Japan are sometimes hindered by the narrow nationalism of other peoples, yet they are also stimulated by it. Even the most narrow nationalists of Japan are anxious to keep abreast of other nations and will follow whatever they believe to be the world tendency, whether it be imperialism, or justice and good-will. If another Washington Conference can decide upon reduction of the army, there is good reason for believing that Japan will be glad to follow.— Isamu Kawakami, “International Morality and Japanese Na¬ tionalism,” pamphlet published Nov., ig22. These are spacious days for all of us, days when we are seeing realized before our eyes things that most of us had not the faith to expect inside the next twenty years. Those of you who have worked and prayed for the Washington Con¬ ference did not pin your faith to a fancy. That Conference has meant worlds to the progress of the liberal movement in Japan. — A Canadian Resident in Japan, Extract from a letter of January 2, 1923. We have observed the apparent determination of the govern¬ ment to follow the path of democratic Britain with an open safety valve of free speech rather than the discredited methods of militaristic Russia with its resultant volcanic upheaval of revolu¬ tion. We have seen professors, writers, and leaders of the Diet who are demanding immediate universal manhood suffrage, a cabinet and Diet responsible only to the people, the abolition of militarism and of Dual government, the reduction of the army, the policy of the open door in China, the withdrawal of the Japanese troops from all disputed areas, justice for labor, rights for the new woman, and numerous other reforms. — Sherwood Eddy, Letter of September, 1922. In the mission school, and in their experiments with ecclesiasti¬ cal organizations the Christians acquire self-confidence. . . The Christian missions of Asia are cradles of patriotism. . . The missionary has been the carrier of the democratic ideal to the four corners of the earth. . . When the missionary makes a convert, he makes a radical. — Tyler Dennett, The Democratic Movement in Asia, pp. 189, 242-3. 228 APPENDIX I Chapter III Supplemental Text The following is Mr. Kagawa’s message dictated in English to Dr. Myers at Kobe, Oct. 6, 1922. Except for recasting an awk¬ ward sentence here and there, Dr. Myers says that these are Mr. Kagawa’s very words : “My chief work is the building and the re-building of the Hu¬ man Temple. It is the Carpenter Jesus alone who is able to do this work. I am helper and servant to Him. The material for this building is Life, Labor, and Liberty. Hitherto, religious teachers have confined their efforts too much to doctrine and emotion, and men of the world have emphasized matter and money. They must all learn to worship God through life, not merely through doctrine or emotion or matter or money. I am strongly opposed to the Marxian materialistic conception of history. Economics and religion are not separate but one. To live a life, and to live up to life is economics and it is religion. Without God there is no economics and there is no life, for God is Life Eternal. The action of life is Labor; therefore man must enjoy labor. I am opposed to the system which makes a mere “human ma¬ chine” of labor and laborers. Labor is not a commodity to be bought and sold, it is a gift of God to be respected and honored. But labor without God is useless effort, a tread-mill that brings man to no goal. Labor expended, for instance, at a brewery or in making munitions at the arsenal, is destructive, and does not accord with God’s purpose of Life for mankind. Unemployment is not in accord with God’s will, for we must get a realization of life through labor. The exploitation of labor for selfish purposes is one of the worst of evils. Paul says, “If any will not work, neither let him eat.” The third material in the Human Temple is Liberty. This does not mean equality. God has given to every man a different de¬ gree of ability. If a man is allowed to realize and employ all the powers that God has given him, that is liberty. No man has a right to hinder this liberty in any other man. The principle of equality lies in the fact that God has given life equally to all. Men must have liberty to be educated, liberty to marry, liberty APPENDIX I 229 to vote, liberty to organize, liberty to migrate, liberty to think and speak, liberty to worship. Just now. Life, Labor, and Liberty are all three being de¬ stroyed. Class hatred and revolution are being emphasized from the side of the oppressed. The leaders are preaching revolution with a promise of bread. The real demand and need are not for bread alone, but for Life, Labor, and Liberty. Violence and revolution will never bring men these three. Souls must be redeemed first. The wounds have pierced too deeply into the souls of men. Without regeneration and rejuvenation of the souls of men from within, men can never see the Kingdom of God. We cannot redeem ourselves; we must believe in the power of God to redeem. The work of Christ is to supply our defi¬ ciency, and the mission of the followers of Christ is to go out in the power of the Spirit of God to save the suffering, armed, not with a sword, but with love. Christians must glorify God in the flesh as Christ glorified God in the flesh. This is the building of the Human Temple and the Gospel of the Incarnation. To live a Life is a fine art, it, is to glorify God in our bodies. This is where art and religion meet. Economics is a part of art ; it is the art of making life enjoyable and happy. Art without God is nothing. To live a religious life, a man cannot withdraw to some desert cave or mountain temple. lie must bear his cross in the flesh and live a life of service among men. That is the art of art, the economics of economics, and the religion of religion. That is the Gospel of Christ.” — Signed Toyohiko Kagawa. Illuminating Quotations Sooner or later Japan must undergo an industrial revolution. It is the only agency that can clear up the situation. Wages are still too low and most of the profits now go to the rich families, who pay a trifling income tax. The worker does not get his just share and he proposes to get it. The Japanese worker has been a long-suffering individual and has never asserted his rights, but now he is beginning to put fear into the heart of the employer. ‘‘Will Japanese labor ever go Bolshevik?” I asked. “It is not impossible,” he answered; “but we Japanese would never go to an extreme that would menace the security of our 230 APPENDIX I Emperor. His place must always be secure. I believe in the doctrines of Karl Marx, and many of my colleagues think the same way. . . — B. Suzuki. From an article by Isaac Marcosson, published in Saturday Evening Poet, Aug. 12, 1922, page 86. In Osaka there are 50,000 people living and working on the cargo-boats which ply up and down the rivers and canals. In the congested districts there are some 50,000 Eta. In the mint, the arsenal, and iron works of the city about 50,000 people are employed. There is no Christian worker set apart for any of these. . . . There is an increasing demand for Christians to act as matrons and teachers and superintendents in factories and municipal lodging houses, nurseries, etc., for there is a growing feeling that unless love is at the center, the whole scheme falls to the ground. — L. L. Shaw, Japan in Transition, pp. 99, 100, 101. Chapter IV Illuminating Q notations To the alternative Christianity or materialism we must add a third term, modernized and Christianized Buddhism . . . Patriot¬ ism is not, as is sometimes said, the only religion of the Japanese, but no religion which does not give satisfaction to their patriotic feeling will be likely to win their allegiance. . . . We must make plain the capacity of Chritianity to be a New Testament, not only to Hebraism and to Greek Philosophy, but also to Buddhism, Shintoism, and Confucianism. We must recognize that God in time past spoke at sundry times and in divers manners to the Oriental as well as to the Hebrew and to the Greek. Should we not also expect that the. fullness of the Godhead which dwells in Christ cannot be perfectly revealed until He has had the oppor¬ tunity to bring to its consummation those aspects of the truth that were entrusted to the prophets of the East? . In 1882 Mr. Fukuzawa, the eminent editor and educator, wrote: “That Christianity is a danger to our national power is evident. Unless Buddhism is assisted by the influence of the upper classes nothing can obstruct the intrusion of Christianity. Buddhist priests are immoral and shameless, and without energy of spirit. It is very unsafe to trust this weighty cause to them APPENDIX I 231 alone. We do not believe in Buddhism nor do we respect the priest. Our concern is for the national power, in the conserva¬ tion of which that religion must be utilized.” — Bishop H. St. George Tucker, Missionary Problems and Policies , pp. 10, 1 1, 13, 14? 19- The doctrine of transmigration naturally creates superstition, making it possible to worship all manner of living creatures, real and imaginary. . . The Neo-Platonist explained Egyptian animal worship by the doctrine of transmigration. In the same way the Buddhist custom of holding mass for animals can be accounted for. For instance, the Young Men’s Buddhist As¬ sociation in Kyusiu recently held memorial services for 34,000 frogs, 7,000 rats, 1,000 hares, 500 dogs, 500 cats, 500 hens, and 500 doves dissected in the study of anatomy in Kyusiu Uni¬ versity. — Robert C. Armstrong, Christian Movement in Japan , 1922, p. 94. In September, 1911, the Department of Education issued an order which reads: "The sentiment of reverence ( keishin ) is correlative with the feeling of respect for ancestors and is most important in establishing the foundations of national morality. Accordingly, on the occasion of the festivals of the local shrines of the districts . . . the teachers must conduct the children to the shrines and give expression to the true spirit of reverence.”— D. C. Holtom, Christian Movement in Japan , 1922, p. 123. Christianity has brought a widening of ideas, the feelings of internationalism and brotherhood. Commerce is self-seeking. Christianity has been unselfish. . . The Buddhism in Japan is far better and purer than that in India. We take the best, and we shall be glad to take the best out of Christianity.— Baron Sakatani, The Democratic Movement in Asia, p. 55. Viscount Shibusawa said to Dr. L. L. Wirt of the Near East Relief: "The Buddhists of Japan will adopt a thousand orphans from your Holy Land, only, please don’t call us ’heathen’ any more.” . . As a religion of power, Buddhism cannot successfully corn pete with Christianity, when both are confronted equally with the problems of a modern world. But time is required to prove this to be true. — William C. Sturgis, Report to Department of Missions, Protestant Episcopal Church, August, 1921. We have seen the great audiences of students and young 232 APPENDIX I men in Tokyo, Osaka, Kobe, and Moji listening, no longer with a blind exclusive patriotism, but with a new interest in interna¬ tional, racial, and industrial problems, and with a new heart hunger for vital religion. Many have turned from the material¬ ism and agnosticism of the last decade and are seeking with new eagerness for the truth which alone can satisfy. Never have I seen such an encouraging situation in Japan nor such an opportunity for the forces of vital religion. — Sherwood Eddy. Letter of September, 1922. K Christianity has already spread its roots deep in Japanese soil; it has become a Japanese religion, in the same sense that Buddh¬ ism became a Japanese religion centuries ago. It is notable also that independent Japanese Christianity is really independent, receiving no foreign assistance. — Kanzo Uchimura, What Japan Thinks, p. 213. The truth, it seems to us, is that Buddhism, which is too often represented to be dying, is really reviving, and thus presents an almost insurmountable obstacle in the path of Christian propa¬ ganda. — M. Zumoto, What Japan Thinks, pp. 210-11. Abstract talk about the Christian life was largely uncotnpre- hended through lack of concrete examples. I could not point to a single member of the faculty as an illustration fit for emulation. I could not find a priest in the town — although there were some sixteen temples and shrines of Buddhism and Shintoism in our midst — who was a tit example for young men. — W. M. Vories, A Mustard Seed in Japan, p. 15. Chapter V Christian Strength in the Japanese Empire in 1921 Church membership (Communicants) : Protestant (Including Roman Eastern Anglican) Catholic Orthodox Japan proper . 120,017 75,983 37,104 Korea . 91,818 Formosa 7,809 Sunday School Enrolment (Japan proper — Protestant) — 170,169 APPENDIX I 233 Japanese Workers: Men Women Evangelistic . 601 Educational . 967 Medical . • • 37 67 Literary . • • 5 9 Others . 75 2,724 L7I9 Missionaries : Evangelistic - . 218 Educational . . . 98 182 Medical ....... 4 Literary . 7 Others . 68 Wives . 244 394 723 Christian Schools’ Enrolment : Kindergarten . • a 9 ® e 9,910 Day Nurseries . «€»•«« 39 Primary Schools .... • O • • • 2,946 Sunday Schools .... . 170,169 English Schools .... 4,584 Middle Schools .... 9T5I Girls’ Schools . 11,322 Higher Department of Schools 3,045 Normal Department of Schools 90 Theological Schools • • • • • 667 Industrial Schools . . . 1,222 2I3J45 Young Men’s Christian Association membership: 22,434. Young Women’s Christian Association membership: 8,000. Some Facts regarding the Larger Churches Notwithstanding the serious limitations under which they have struggled, the self-governing denominations have taken long strides forward. 234 APPENDIX I The Kumiai (Congregational) Churches and the American Board The Kumiai Churches were the first to attain their independence and form a strong national body. Their growth is indicated by these figures : Number of Annual Churches Members Pastors Budget Property 1910 .... 1 16 14,631 108 $44,700 $116,000 1920 .... 156 23,490 136 139, 5<*> 705>ooo The curve of accessions to the churches was 1,000 in 1911-12, and 1,517 in 1921. Doshisha University is now united and grow¬ ing under President Ebina. There are 75 missionaries cooperating with the Kumiai Churches, 23 men and 52 women. The Kumiai Churches have conducted vigorous missionary work among Koreans and more recently in the South Sea Islands, which are under Japanese mandate. The work in Korea was started in 1910, when there were 35 churches and 1,758 members. In 1920 the number of churches had increased to 143 and the members to 14,951. Among the sixty-five pastors only four are Japanese. In 1922 the Koreans w'ere given self-government, with a subsidy in 1921 of $25,000 from the Japanese churches. The Presbyterian and Reformed Churches and Missions The Nihon Kirisuto Kyokai corresponds to the Presbyterian and Reformed denominations in the Occident. Its member¬ ship and 336 ordained clergy are characterized by steadfastness and devotion. Among its veteran leaders are Dr. Ibuka, the administrator, and Pastors Uemura and Tada. Its growth dur¬ ing the decade was from 18,460 in 1910 to 31,673 in 1920. It has a vigorous home mission society which conducts work in Man¬ churia, North China, and Formosa as well as in Japan proper. The Fukuin Shimpo, a weekly founded and edited by Mr. Uemura, supplies spiritual meat to readers in all the denominations. It has always been self-supporting. A five year Forward Move¬ ment is now in progress, and is especially vigorous in the North. One layman has given $5,000 toward its expenses. There are 224 missionaries cooperating with the Church, 79 men and 145 women. APPENDIX I 235 The Methodist Church and Missions The Japan Methodist Church was richly blessed in its first Bishop, the late Dr. Honda. It cost a hard struggle under Bishops Honda and Hiraiwa to amalgamate the three constituent denominations into a living unity and to reduce to small propor¬ tions the financial dependence on the mission boards. How successfully these difficulties have been surmounted is seen in the splendid “Forward Movement” which has been in progress for two years under the leadership of Bishop Usaki. It has already attained its financial goal of $300,000, to be used for evangelism, ministerial retirement, church building, and the education of ministers and their children. Steady progress has been made toward doubling the membership by 1923. This has been in good measure the work of laymen, whose growing affluence is indicated by the fact that six men have pledged $5,000 each to the fund. The Church membership has in¬ creased from 13,135 in 1911 to 22,130 in 1920. The Methodist Colleges at Tokyo and Kobe have expanded rapidly since 1915. The number of missionaries, from U. S. A. and Canada, is 246, 65 men and 181 women. The Anglican Church and Missions The Nippon Sei Ko Kwai [Anglican] growth has been as follows: in 1910 ordained Japanese 76, members 15,314, con¬ tributions $17,800. I11 1920 ordained Japanese 145, members 28,267, contributions $70,800. The per capita annual giving rose from $1.14 to $3.61. There is no Japanese Bishop in the Sei Ko Kwai as yet, one of the strongest candidates, the scholarly Dr. J. T. Imai, having passed away in 1919. An advance in theological education was made in 1913 under the lead of Bishop Awdry, by combining all theological education under English and American Episcopal auspices into the Central Theological College of Tokyo. From 1913 to 1919 this college enjoyed the help of Father Herbert Kelly of Kelham. St. Paul’s University, under American control, has developed rapidly and will soon realize its hopes for the addition of a medical department. The American Episcopal Mission has well- equippQd hospitals in Tokyo and Osaka, which are considered a 236 APPENDIX I valuable phase of the work. There are 199 missionaries cooperat¬ ing with the Sei Ko Kwai, 59 men and 140 women. The Baptist Churches and Missions The membership in 45 churches was 5,162 and the amount raised by them in the year was $23,330. There were 259 Japanese employed in the religious and educational work, 137 of them men and 122 women. The missionary force numbered 98, of whom 32 were men and 66 women, connected with the American Baptist Foreign Mission Society (69) and the South¬ ern Baptist Convention (29). One of the noteworthy churches is Misaki Tabernacle in Tokyo, the most comprehensive “institutional” church in Japan. The institutional features are in large measure financed by the Mission. Among the activities are: day and evening schools, in¬ cluding classes for apprentices, day nursery, kindergarten, work¬ ing men’s society, clinic, playground, and lectures; also daily preaching and other religious gatherings. Methodist Protestant Churches and Missions There were 1,984 members in 18 churches which raised $5,196; 1 18 Japanese employed, of whom 81 were men and 37 women. The missionary force numbered 3 men and 12 women. The boys’ school at Nagoya is nourishing. United Brethren Churches and Mission There were 1,756 members in 20 churches; 32 Japanese em¬ ployed, of whom 18 were men and 14 women. Missionary force: 4 men and 3 women. United Lutheran Churceies and Missions There were eleven churches with 1,233 members; 43 Japanese men and 9 women; 36 missionaries, of whom 16 were men and 20 women. Kyusiu Gakuin, their boys’ high school, has had a u rapid and substantial development. APPENDIX I 237 American Christian Convention Churches and Mission There were 1,557 members in 14 churches; $22,447 raised; Japanese employed 23, of whom 14 were men, 9 women; mis¬ sionaries 4 men and 5 women. United Christian Missionary Society Churches and Mission There were 1,439 members in 14 churches; Japanese employed 120, of whom 72 were men, 48 women; missionaries 10 men and 23 women. Evangelical Association Churches and Mission There were 1,456 members in 11 churches; $5,000 raised; Japanese employed 87, of whom 36 were men, 51 women; mis¬ sionaries 3 men and 13 women. Salvation Army Although the Salvation Army is not nominally a church, it functions like one, and sometimes crosses the wires of the churches ; but it is prized for its evangelistic and social work. It has grown even more rapidly than the churches during the decade. It has no educational work, except the Officers’ Train¬ ing School, but in addition to street preaching, has established fourteen social institutions including girls’ rescue homes, a hospital, a tuberculosis sanitarium, and slum stations. The War Cry circulation increased from 216,000 in 1911 to 500,000 in 1920. The self-denial collection which is pressed with much the same fearlessness on Tokyo streets as in London or New York netted $16,000 in 1920. There are now 112 corps, manned by 310 officers and cadets and 850 local officers. Among the officers are 15 missionaries, 8 men and 7 women. The moving spirit in the Army and one of the great assets in the Christian movement in Japan is Colonel Yamamuro, who was won to Christ while studying in Doshisha College. The Army’s Counsel Bureau has deterred many despondent persons from suicide. APPENDIX I 238 I Hit mi) rat in g Quotatio n s It has been just fifty years since the first Protestant Church was organized in Yokohama. I was in Yokohama at the time, a young man, not a charter member, but I was among the first. I have just been thinking of how the church has grown. It seems to me nothing less than a miracle. In the beginning there were only eleven young men studying the English Bible with the missionaries. They were finally organized into the first Christian Church. Soon after, the famous edict banning Christianity was removed, but prejudice was still strong and persecution was general. Dr. Sato, president of the Imperial University of Hokkaido, was one of the eleven. He wields a strong force for Christian principles. Now it is the usual thing to find Christian jurists, editors, army and navy men, govern¬ ment officials, and business men. There are churches and chapels in almost every town and large village. The Japanese people have organized churches in Manchuria, in Korea, in China, and in Singapore. Probably there will be one soon in Hongkong. That the gospel is spreading in outward form is evident. It is not only growing as the grain of mustard seed grew, it is growing inwardly as the leaven leavened the whole lump. Christianity is molding the thoughts and ideals of our people. The Japanese language is changing in order to be a suitable vehicle to convey Christian ideas. We have 160,000 members on the rolls. There are many more whom we may call hidden Christians. Even beyond these there is a large number of people who are friendly to Christianity. Secretly they are in accord with our ideas. The great present task of the Japanese Church is that of the finding, training and thrust¬ ing forth into the whitening harvest field, capable, efficient leaders. — Dr. K. Ibuka. Extract from Address of Sept . 1922. The prevailing popular conceptions of mankind, humanity, labor, etc., to say nothing of love and liberty, are all traceable, directly or indirectly, to Christianity. It is at least obvious that they have come neither from Confucianism nor from Buddh¬ ism. There is no refuting the fact that Japan is learning and adopting Christian ideas and ideals, not only through loyal Christians, but also through those who were once Christians, for “backsliders/’ as the latter may be, they can never com- APPENDIX I 239 pletely shake off the spiritual and intellectual influences to which they once yielded. Take, for instance, such sayings as ‘'man does not live by bread alone,” “happier is it to give than to receive/’ “God is love,” or the word “gospel,” which are on everybody’s lips nowadays. — K. Uchimura, What Japan Thinks, p. 214 Hitherto in the East personality has received very little em¬ phasis. We have thought in terms of the group. Probably most men would assert that personality is entirely masculine. Women, they would say, have none. Their place in our economy has been entirely derivative^ never independent. . . Christianity cuts directly across this idea, laying stress upon individual re¬ sponsibility and freedom, Christianity has, therefore, given us a new valuation of women. — Professor Inazo Nitobe. Quoted in The Democratic Movement in Ash, p. 143. Dr. Mott’s intense earnestness and the fine interpretation of Mr. Rinshiro Ishikawa, then a student in the University, stimu¬ lated young men to organize branches of the Y. M. C. A. where- ever the speakers went (in 1901). Dr. Mott’s work, concen¬ trating and organizing scattered energies and supplying to Christian young men centers for every kind of activity, effected a great revolution, by means of which the present development of Christianity among the young has been pushed forward. — Professor Sakuzo Yoshino. Christian Movement in Japan, 1922, p. 161. The feeble-minded, the blind, the lepers, the slum-dwellers — these were formerly the sunken classes, to be noticed only to be pushed down and out. Then comes a Christian priest or scientist; he sees the need, and henceforth devotes his life to it. Japan looks on; wakes up, receives an inspiration, and, presently, a whole new feature begins to characterize the Gov¬ ernment system of education and social service. The tourist notes this and says, “How wonderful are the Japanese! Why should we presume to send missionaries to them?” Yet Japan owes it all to the Church. . . I went to Japan with my mind not prepared to consider the kindergarten system seriously; I came away convinced that it is one of the most powerful agencies that the Church has in Japan. This is evidenced, not so much by the effect upon the children themselves, as upon their elders. — William C. Sturgis. From Report previously quoted. 240 APPENDIX I Chapter VI Illu min ating Q no ta lio ns Here [in Japan] the church is standing at the parting of the ways. Is it to utter the prophetic note of social justice for the downtrodden masses or “Keep Out” of industry, politics, and moral issues and become the comfortable club of a small, respectable middle class of privilege? No organization has larger access or greater opportunity for moral leadership here than the Young Men’s Christian Association if it will wisely press its advantage at once for a great spiritual advance. Now is the nick of time for the New Japan which, more than any other nation, may dominate the destiny of Asia. — Sherwood Eddy. Letter of Sept., 1922. The miracle of the burning bush is ever re-enacted, for the Christian Church in Japan is ever sustained by the prayer life of the whole body of Christ throughout the world. Every movement of thought or work anywhere in the Christian Church is sooner or later reflected in the Church in Japan, and, through the little group of Christians, is projected into the life of the nation. And its power and momentum are determined by the number of men and women in the homelands, as well as in Japan, who are ready to yield themselves to the operation of the Holy Spirit who guides and presides over all. The com¬ munion of saints is a living reality. — Loretta L. Shaw, Japan in Transition. A Church able to maintain itself and a Church competent to give Christianity to the nation are two different things. The fundamental question, therefore, in determining future mis¬ sionary policy is whether the independent Church, which is now in process of formation, is competent to carry forward, unaided, the evangelization of Japan. . . . Above all, the principle that he who pays the piper calls the tune, must be laid aside, for the very purpose of this policy is to enable Japanese freedom and initiative to operate on a wider scale. — Bishop H. St. George Tucker. Missionary Problems and Policies , pp. 23, 25. APPENDIX II Bibliography Chapter I Clement, Ernest W. A Short History bf Japan. University of Chicago Press, Chicago. 1915. Concise and readable. $1.50. Clarke, Joseph I. C. Japan at First Hand. Dodd, Mead, and Co., New York. 1921. Entertaining and appreciative description of the- people and institutions. Not scholarly. $3.50. Gulick, Sidney L. Evolution of the Japanese , Social and Psychic. Fleming H. Revell Co., New York. 1904. Pene¬ trating and scholarly analysis of Japanese character and insti¬ tutions. $2.00. See especially chapters 5 to 24. Chamberlain, B. H. Things Japanese. Charles Scribner’s Sons, New York. A fascinating miniature encyclopedia of many subjects. $6.00. Robertson- Scott, J. W. Foundations of Japan. D. Appleton and Co., New York. 1922. Unique description of rural Japanese life and thought. $6.00. See especially chapters 3, 5, 11, 1 2, 36. Brinkley, Frank. “Japan.” To be found in Encyclopedia Britan- nica. Comprehensive and authoritative. Dennett, Tyler. Americans in Eastern Asia. The Macmillan Co., New York. 1922. A critical study of the policy of the United States with reference to China, Japan, and Korea in the nine¬ teenth century. $5.00. Eckel, Edwin Clarence. Coal , Iron and War. Henry Holt and Co., New York. 1920. A study in industrialism, past and future. $3.00. Chapter II Gleason, George, What Shall I Think of Japan? The Macmillan Co., New York. 1921. A fair presentation of some phases of the struggle between militarism and liberalism. $2.25. See especially chapters 6, 10, 11,. Dennett, Tyler. The Democratic Movement in Asia. The Association Press, New York. 1918. $2.00. 241 APPENDIX II 242 Marcos son, Isaac F. The Changing East. Three articles that appeared in the Saturday Evening Post , June 24, August 1 2, and September 30, 1922. A capable journalist’s picture of the situation, vivid and dependable on the political issues. Kawabe, Kisaburo. Press and Politics in Japan. The Uni¬ versity of Chicago Press, Chicago. 1921. Valuable for re¬ flection of spirit and influence of the press and of the growth of public opinion. $2.00. See especially chapters ii, 12. Iyenaga and Sato. Japan and the California Problem. G. P. Putnam’s Sons, New York. 1921. A dispassionate, sug¬ gestive treatment. $2.50. See especially chapters 6, 7, 8» “Present-Day Immigration, with special reference to the Japanese.” Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, January, 1921, Part I. A valuable symposium by American and Japanese authorities. McLaren, W. W. A Political History of Japan During the Meiji Era. A thorough and interesting presentation. Griffis, William Elliot. The Hope of Japan. Envelope Series. American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, 14 Beacon Street, Boston. April, 1922. Part I is a vivid, brief sketch of trends in Japanese political and moral life. 10 cents. Kawakami, K. K. What Japan Thinks. The Macmillan Co., New York. 1921. A well selected series of articles by representative Japanese, on current issues. $2.00. See es¬ pecially chapters 4, 5, 9, 12, 13. Chapter III Christian Movement in Japan , Korea and Formosa. Committee of Reference and Counsel, 25 Madison Avenue, New York. 1919, Chapter 17; 1921, Chapters 19, 21; 1922, Chapter 19. This annual volume is the best source on social and re¬ ligious conditions. $2.00. Gulick, Sidney L. Working Women of Japan. Missionary Edu¬ cation Movement. 191 5* A well-drawn picture which is still substantially true to life. 50 cents. See especially chapter 9. Order through your denominational board. Kagawa, Toyohiko. Crossing the Death-Line. Japan Chronicle, APPENDIX II M3 Kobe, 1922. An autobiographical novel by a Christian social worker, depicting problems and possible solutions. 3 yen. Hunt, Frazier. The Rising Temper of the East. Bobbs - Mer¬ rill Co., Indianapolis. 1921. Full of dramatic touches and human interest. $2.50. See especially pp. 94-1 11 and chapter 5. Katayama, Sen. The Labor Movement in Japan. Charles H. Kerr and Co., Chicago. 1918. Written by a leader in the early stages of the movement when official opposition was severe. $1.00. uThe Japanese Labor Movement.” By an American Sociologist. Japan Chronicle, 1921. Gleason, George. What Shall I Think of Japan ? Already noted. See pp. 105-114. Godwin, Frank. “The Rise of the Japanese Labor Conscious¬ ness/’ The Nation, October 26, 1921. Chapter IV Harada, Tasuku. The Faith of Japan, The Macmillan Com¬ pany, New York. 1914. Describes the ideals and assump¬ tions pervading Japanese thought regardless of formal re¬ ligious affiliation. Plartford-Samson lectures on the re¬ ligions of the world. $1.25. Christian Movement in Japan , 19 22. Already noted. See chapters 6, 9, 10, 11. Soper, Edmund Davison. The Faiths of Mankind. Association Press, New York. 1920. Includes a brief outline of Japanese religions. 60 cents. Reischauer, August K. Studies in Japanese Buddhism. The Macmillan Co., New York. 1917. The standard work on the subject. Rather detailed for the average reader. $2.00. Saunders, Kenneth J. Buddhism in the Modern World. S. P. C. K., London, 1922. Pages 30-42, 54-56. Concise, fresh, appreciative account of Buddhism today. 3s. Lloyd, Arthur S. The Creed of Half Japan. E. P. Dutton & Co., New York. 1912. Interesting and dependable de¬ scription of Buddhism, with emphasis on points of contact with Christianity. $2.50. Anesaki, Masaharu. Social and Religious Problems of the Orient. The Macmillan Co., New York. 1923. Earl Lee- 244 APPENDIX II tures. Fresh and penetrating discussions by an authority on oriental religious and social conditions. $1.00 Holtom, D. C. The Political Philosophy of Modern Shinto, the State Religion of Japan. Transactions of the Asiatic Society of Japan. Vol. 49, Pt. 2. 1922. 5 yen. Hearn, Lafcadio. Japan; An Interpretation. Grosset and Dun¬ lap. 1904. An able exposition of the family and ancestor- worship, by a noted writer who tends to idealize. 75 cents. See chapters 2, 5, 8, 9, 14. Robertson- Scott, J. W. Foundations of Japan . Already noted. Chapters 6, 7, 10, 23. Chapter V Clement, Ernest Wilson. Christianity in Modern Japan. American Baptist Publication Society, Philadelphia. In¬ forming, popular account, up to 1905. Fisher, Galen M. “The Missionary Significance of the Last Ten Years in Japan.” International Review of Missions. April, 1922. Davis, J. D. A Maker of the New Japan. Fleming H. Revell Co., New York. Life of the great pioneer, Dr. Neesima. $1.00. Gleason, George. What Shall I Think of Japan. Already noted- See Chapter 12: “Can Japanese be Christians?” Christian Movement in Japan , Korea, and Formosa. Already noted. See 1919: Chapters 2, 4; 1922: Chapters 2, 5. Shaw, Loretta. Japan in Transition. George H. Doran Co., New York. 1923. Well written accounts of Christian work. $1.25. See Chapters 7, 8. Ishii, Tokichi. A Gentleman in Prison. George H. Doran Co., New York. 1922. The conversion of a confessed mur¬ derer, simply, but movingly told by himself. $1.75. Cary, Otis. History of Christianity in Japan. Fleming H. Revell Co., New York. 1909. 2 volumes. The standard work; detailed, but not heavy. $2.50. Griffis, William Elliot. Verbeck of Japan. Fleming H. Revell Co., New York. 1900. $1.50. De Forest, Charlotte B. The Evolution of a Missionary. A biography of John Hyde De Forest. Fleming H. Revell Co,, New York. 1914. APPENDIX II 245 Harrington, Charles Kendall. Captain Bickel of the Inland Sea . Fleming H. Revell Co., New York. 1919. $1.75. Noss, Christopher. Tohoku, the Scotland of Japan. Board of Foreign Missions, Reformed Church in the United States, Fifteenth and Race Streets, Philadelphia. 1918, 50 cents. Chapter VI Christian Movement in Japan, Korea, and Formosa. Already noted. Chapters 4, 5, 7, 14, 35, 36, 37. Tucker, H. St. George. Missionary Problems and Policies in Japan. Department of Missions, Protestant Episcopal Church, New York. 1921. A masterly discussion by an experienced missionary Bishop. 20 cents. Vories, William Merrell. A Mustard-Seed in Japan. Omi Mission publication. 1922. A thrilling story of an original mission in rural Japan, told by the founder. Can be pur¬ chased through Mrs. W. G. Chapin, 436 Putnam Avenue, Brooklyn, N. Y. Cloth, $1.00; paper, 75 cents. The Kingdom of God in Japan. Report of the Deputation sent by the A. B. C. F. M., 14 Beacon Street, Boston. Most of it is applicable to all missions. INDEX Amida, 1 19-120. Anesaki, Dr. M., quoted, 126, 128- 129, 130-131. Aoyama Gakuin, 170. Arishima, T., 13 1. Art, 11-12. Association of Harmonious Coopera¬ tion, 92. Ballagh, Dr. James H., 154, 155. Banzan, 4, 114.^ Berry, Dr. J. C., 147. Bickel, Captain Luke, 202, 2 io, 214- 2x6. Brown, Dr. Nathan, 147. Brown, Rev. S. R., 147, i54> 156. Buddhism, 2, 3, 4, 24, 88, 107, 108, 1x6-126, 179-180. Bushido, “The Way of the Knight,” 115* “California Question,” the, 59-64. Children, excursions among school, 12-13; effect of labor conditions on, 75; improvement in slum condi¬ tions of, 94*95- China, Japan’s differences with, 56- 58. Christianity, 30, 32, 87-88; effects of. on social problems, 95 ff. : appeal of, to Young Japan, 128 ff.; Jap¬ anese seekers after, 1 33-141; de¬ velopment of, in Japan, 163 ff. ; problems of, 178 ff., policies and emphases required, 180 ff. Christian Literature Society, 183, Christian Movement in Japan, the, 42 ff.; 1 61 ff. ; 178 ff. ; coming of Christianity, 1 43-1 45; beginning of modern Christian Movement, 146 ff., 1 61 ff. ; 178 ff. ; first Protestant convert, 150; the Christian Church in Japan, 154-155. I57‘i 59, 161- 168; founding Christian schools, 159-161; developing Christian lit¬ erature, 161, 174-175, 183; growth of Christian churches, 1 61-168; con¬ flict between Church and missions, 162-163, 167-168, 1 92-1 93; Sunday School movement, 168-169; devel¬ opment of Y. M. and Y. W. C. A., 168-169; Christian education, 169 ff-, 1 93- 1 95; Christian opportuni¬ ties for social service, 176-177, 195 ff. ; sectarianism, 181 ff.; work among neglected groups, 198-202; leavening the thought of, with Christianity, 202 ff. ; issues at stake, 2 : 8 ff. Christian Movement in Japan , Korea , and Formosa, The, 183. Confucianism, 24, 32, 107, 108, 113- 1 16. Criminals, work among, 212-214. Daishi, Kobo, 3, 108, 122. Davis, J. Merle, cited, 73, 95. Dennett, Tyler, cited, 8. Doshisha University, 6, 36, 154, 159- 161, 163, 170, 199. “Dual Government,” 40-42. Eastern Orthodox Church in Japan, x 48. Ebina, President, cited, 125, 154. Education, 9-10, 12-13, 159-161, 169 ff., 193-195. Ensor, Rev. G., 147. Eta, need for work among the, 200. Farmers, awakening of tenant, 85 ff. Fisher-folk, need for work among the, 201, 214-216. Forward Movement in Japan, 164 ff. Goble, Rev. J., 147. Greene, Dr. D. C., 147. Hachiman, Omi Mission at, 189. Harris, Bishop M. C., T48, 164. Hatanaka, Rev. H., 186. Hatano, T., 97-98. Health, conditions unfavorable to, 23-25; effects of industrialism on, 73 ff- Hepburn, Dr. James, 147, 154. Hirooka, Madam, 135-137. Hirosaki Band, the, 154. Home of the Resurrection of Hope, 201. Honda, Bishop Yoitsu, 155. Hostels, development of, 176-177. Ibuka, Dr, K., 155. Industrialism, expansion of, 66 ff. ; effect of, on life of women, 68-75 1 on handcraft, 75; on slum condi¬ tions, 76. Industrial workers, need for work among, 198. Janes, Captain, 152-1^4. Japan, religious sentiment in, 13-14, 53, 107, 108, 163 ff. ; pivotal loca¬ tion of, 25-27; raw materials of, 27-28; wealth of, 28-30; govern¬ ment in, 31 ff. ; break with feudal¬ ism and isolation of, 32-34; strug¬ gle between political liberalism and reaction in, 35-40; “dual govern¬ ment” in, 40-42; Christian leaders in, 42-45: democratic advance in, 45 ff.; reforms in Korea, 54-56, 57- INDEX 59; tlie “California Question,” 59- 64; industrial expansion, 66 If.; labor movement in, 77 ff. ; awaken¬ ing of the tenant farmers, 85 ft.; wise leaders needed in, 86-88; at¬ tempted remedies for social ills, 88 ff. ; religious sects in, 118-121, 126- 128. Japanese, the, 6-21; mental ability of, 7; philosophical ability of, 8; intel¬ lectual capacity of, 8; imitative and inventive qualities of, 8-9; passion for education of, 9-10; plasticity of, 10-11; artistic genius of, 11-12; love of nature of, 12-13; emotional nature of, 13-14; moral qualities of, 14-21; loyalty of, 15; filial piety of, 15-16; propriety of, 16-17; de¬ pendability of, 17-19; self-confi¬ dence of, 19-20; cheerfulness of, 20-21; energ;y of, 21; racial stock of, 22; physique of, 22-23; physical vigor of, 23-25; militarism of, 31, 37-40, 45 ; in California, 59-64; Christian leaders among the, 95- 106; religious tolerance among, 108; religions of, 109-126; modern sects among, 126-127; prophets and guides of young, 128-133; seekers after God among, 133-141; training Christian leaders among, 152-161, 184 if. Japanese Evangelical Alliance, the, 164. Japan Evangelist , 183. Japan League of Nations Associa¬ tion 43. Jugi, lshii, 92. juvenile delinquency, 75. Kagawa, Rev. T., 88, 101-106, 128, 195. Kaigan, first church in Japan, 154- 155, 158-159. Kanamori, Pastor Paul, 138, 154, 166. Kataoka, Kenkichi, 36. Katayama, 78. Kato,^ Admiral Baron, 52, 132. Kawai, Miss Michi, 140-141, 169, 187. Keio University, 173. Kimura, Rev. Seimatsu, 166. Kitasato, Dr.. 8. Kobayaslii, Yataro, 196-198. Kobe, Social Settlement work in, 101-105. Konkokyo, religious sect, 126. Korea, reforms in, 53-56; dangers of situation in, 57-59. Kosaki, Dr., 154, 165. Kumagai, Ryoun, 13 7- 140. Kumamoto Band, the, 152- 154. Kurihara, Motoi, 187. Kwansei Gakuin, 170. Kyoto, Y. M. C. A. hostel in, 177. Labor movement, the,^ 77 ff. Leadership, Japanese Christian, 42-45, , 247 59, S6-88, 95 ff., 152-161, 1S4, 185- 187, 188-191, 192. Lepers, need for work among the, 201. Liberalism, in Japan, 35-40, 45 ff., .56 ff. Higgins, Rev. John, 147. Literature, developing Christian, 161, I74-I7S. Macdonald, Miss, 141, 210, 212-214. Mikomoto, Mr., 195. Militarism, 31, 37*40, 45, 5L S3- Mines, condition in the, 71-72. Missionaries, women, 158; function of, in Japan today, 204; need for more, 205-209; new emphases and methods called for among, 210; as peacemakers, 216-217. Miyagawa, 165. Miyazaki, Y., quoted, 12 9. Mori, Viscount Arinori, 9, 199. Morimura, Baron, 134-13 5. Mott, Dr. John R., 164, 165. Myers, Rev. Dr. H. W., 88, 102, Naide, Dr., 165. Nakatsu, Chikayoshi, 98, 187. Naniwa Church, the, 159. National Christian Council, 182, 183, 184. National Factory Law, the, 89. Neesima, Joseph Hardy, 5-6, 36, 154, 159-161, 163, 199. Negishi Settlement, 197-198. “Newspaper Evangelism/' 210-21 1. Nichiren, 3, 120, 121. Nicolai, jFather, 148. Nilion Kirisuto Kyokai, 15 7. Nippon Sei Ko Kwai, 154. Nishida, Tenko, 129-131. Nitobe, Dr. 1., cited, 140, 152. No Dramas, 11-12. Nogi, General, 5. Noguchi, Dr., 8. Northwestern College at Sendei, 170- 171. Ohara Institute for Social Research, 92. Okuma,. Marquis, 37, 38, 46, 162, 173. Omi Mission, 189, 196-198. Omotokyo, religious sect, 127. “One in Seven News,” 161. Ono, Rev. Z., 187. Onodzuka, Professor, 45. Ontakekyo, religious sect, 126-127. Osaka, Working Men’s Club in, 93; Labor College in, 106; early church in, 159. Osaka Band, the, 154. Oshikawa, Bev. M., 155. Ozaki, the Hon. Yukio, 43-44. Press, rising power of the. 49, Price, Rev. and Mrs. P. G., 196-1 98. INDEX 248 Riyu, Yano, 150. Roman Catholic missions, 149. Ryobu-Shinto, the Two-fold Way of the Gods, 122. Saito, Soichi, 169, 187. Saito, Takeshi, 187. Samurai, 5, 32, 66. Sapporo Band, the, 154. Sasao, Dr. K., 186. Sawada, Setsuzo, 187. Sawayama, Paul, 159. Schneder, Dr., 170. Scriptures, translation of, 161, 210 21 1. Shantung, 28, 37, 52-53- Shantung Agreement, the, 53. Shaw, Archdeacon, 148. Shiga, Mr., 93. Shin Sect, 3. Shinzon Sect, 3. Shinkawa slums, the, 76. Shinran, 3, 120. Shinto, 24, 44, 107, 108, 109-113, 126, 179-180. Simmons, Rev. D. B., 147. Slum conditions, 76, 94-95. Socialism, 77 ff. Social Settlements, 99 ff. Social Welfare Bureau in the Impe rial Department of Home Affairs, 92. Sturgis, Dr. William C., cited, 201. Suffrage, agitation for universal, 48. Sugiura, Rev. S., 195. Sunday School Movement, 168-169. Suzuki, Mr., 88. Tagawa, Hon. D., 43. Taiseikyo, religious sect, 126. Tenrikyo, religious sect, 126. Terman, Lewis, M., cited, 8, 60. Toju, the Sage of Omi, 3-4, 114. Tokugawa, Prince, 33, 43. Tokyo Imperial University, 99, 112, i73, 175, 177- Tokyo Women’s Union College, Tsunashirna, R., 128. ^71- Tuberculosis, 22, 74, 93. Twenty-one Demands, the, 37. Tyng, Dr., 154. Uchimura, Kanzo, 152, 166-167. Uemura, Pastor, 155-158, 165, 199. Unemployment, 93-94. Union Christian Leper Hospital, 20 r. United Evangelistic Campaign, 165. Usawa, Dr. F., 187. Verbeck, Dr. Guido, 147, 150. Vories, William Merrell, 189-191. Wakasa, 150. Waseda University, 173, 177. Warren, Archdeacon, 154. Washington Agreement, the, 46, 51* 53, 56. Watanabe, T., 95-97. Welfare work in factories, 90-91. Williams, Bishop, C. M., 147, 154. Women, effect of industrial expan¬ sion on, 68-72, 74-75. World’s Student Christian Federa¬ tion at Tokyo, Convention of the, 165. World’s Sunday School Convention in Tokyo, 168. Yajima, Madame, 171. Yamagata, Prince, 41. Yamamoto, K., 133-134.^ Yamamuro, Colonel, 166. Yanagihara, Pastor, 187. Yasui, Miss, 187. Yokohama, first church in, 154-155, 158-159. Yokohama Band, the, 154. Yoshino, Dr. S., 43, 45, 187. Yosbiokn, Dr., 197. Young Men’s Buddhist Association, 1 22. Young Men’s Christian Association, 164, 168-169, 175, 1 77. _ Young Women’s Christian Associa¬ tion, 168-169. Zen Sect, 118, 119, 122. Date Due 3? r> - ' 1 *■** w 3tf m il / i ! MAR 1 'S8 1 a., tAfe - ? i iiiiiiiiiii r r ■ ' i nil iiitTMimr ♦ i i f>