The history of civilization does not support the hypothesis that the same myths and religious practices [[388]]were of spontaneous generation in widely-separated countries. Culture complexes cannot be accounted for or explained away by the application of the principles of biological evolution. As has been shown in these pages, there are many culture complexes in China and Japan, and many links with more ancient civilizations.
Touching on the problem of culture mixing in China, Laufer writes:
“In opposition to the prevalent opinion of the day, it cannot be emphasized strongly enough on every occasion that Chinese civilization, as it appears now, is not a unit and not the exclusive production of the Chinese, but the final result of the cultural efforts of a vast conglomeration of the most varied tribes, an amalgamation of ideas accumulated from manifold quarters and widely differentiated in space and time; briefly stated, this means China is not a nation, but an empire, a political, but not an ethnical unit. No graver error can hence be committed than to attribute any culture idea at the outset to the Chinese, for no other reason than because it appears within the precincts of their empire.”[19] [[389]]
[2] This is his posthumous name. During his life he was Kamu-Yamato-Iware-Biko. [↑]
[3] The golden crow of the sun had three legs. In the moon was the jewelled hare. [↑]
[4] Transactions of the Asiatic Society of Japan, Vol. X (supplement), p. 199, n. 5. [↑]
[5] Chamberlain, Things Japanese, p. 57. [↑]
[6] Polynesian Researches (First Edition, 1829), p. 327. [↑]