No account of Japanese religions can be complete without some mention of Bushidō, the religion of the warrior, as its name implies. A product of Japanese feudalism, round which a good deal of romantic sentiment, and still more philosophical literature, has grown up, it may be described as an unwritten rule of conduct to be observed by members of the military class. Its best known exponent is Yamaga Sokō, whose lectures and writings in the middle of the seventeenth century on Bushidō, Confucianism and military strategy, as understood in those days, gained for him a great reputation. Ōishi, the famous leader of the Forty-Seven rōnin, was one of his pupils. The virtues on which stress was laid in Bushidō ethics were chiefly feudal loyalty, self-sacrifice, filial piety and simple living, all of which might, perhaps, be summed up in the one word duty. The endeavour of the samurai who was true to Bushidō ideals was to live a life of self-restraint, so as to be ready to answer the call of duty at any moment. This explains the attraction for the adherents of Bushidō which lay in the Zen sect of Buddhism with its practice of silent meditation. It helped them to cultivate the austere and detached habit of mind that was supposed to be essential to the proper observance of the Spartan rules of Bushidō. At the same time the strong, though unacknowledged, influence of the Sung school of Confucianism on Zen doctrine indirectly affected Bushidō ideas, imparting to them a tinge of the abstruse philosophy of that school. The association of the Zen sect, moreover, with the quaint ceremonial of tea-drinking known as “Cha-no-yu,” resulted in the practice of this ceremonial being widely adopted in Bushidō circles. In no sense a religion in the strict meaning of the word, despite its connection with Buddhism and Confucianism, Bushidō in the course of its later development came to be identified with patriotism. It is this aspect of it which has been most conspicuous since the disappearance of feudalism. Constant reference is made by modern Japanese writers on the subject to the Yamato Damashii, or Japanese spirit, which it is considered to represent; and though much of what is said is far-fetched, and possibly meant for foreign consumption, the simple precepts of Bushidō have undoubtedly served a useful purpose in stimulating in all classes of the people the exercise of the virtues it inculcates. Quick to recognise the usefulness of its ethical teaching, the Japanese Government has availed itself of the services of Bushidō, in conjunction with Shintō, to strengthen the fabric of monarchy. Its action in this direction, due, apparently, to motives similar to those which influenced German policy before the Great War in encouraging a creed of State worship, was criticized shrewdly, though somewhat harshly, a few years ago in a magazine article entitled “The Invention of a new Religion.”
The Japanese people may, as has been suggested, be disposed to take religion less seriously than other nations. As to the great part, nevertheless, which it plays in the national life, in the shape of pilgrimages and religious festivals, there can be no question. At certain periods of the year, regulated by custom so as to cause the least interference with agricultural operations, thousands of pilgrims of both sexes, not content with visiting less remote shrines, make long journeys to noted shrines throughout the country. The pilgrim who has thus visited the Great Shrine at Isé, ascended one of Japan’s many sacred mountains, or worshipped at other distant shrines, not only “acquires virtue” thereby, but gains social prestige in his home circle in town, or village, much in the same way as the Mussulman hadji who has been to Mecca, or the Russian peasant who has seen the sacred places in the Holy Land. These pilgrimages also serve indirectly an educational purpose. Among the countless religious festivals which vary the monotony of daily life in Japan, the flower fairs are those which are most typically Japanese. On every evening of the year a flower fair, associated with the festival of a local shrine, takes place in some quarter of the city of Tōkiō. Nor are these fairs peculiar to the Capital. They are to be seen in most provincial towns of importance, though the smaller number of urban shrines precludes their daily occurrence. Neither pilgrimages nor religious festivals, it should be noted, are due entirely to religious sentiment. They appeal to the love of ceremonies, and the passion for sight-seeing, which distinguish the nation.
Before leaving the subject of religion it may be well to emphasize a point which has received only passing attention. In all the three religions which have had most to do with the moulding of Japanese character and thought, Buddhism, Shintō and Confucianism, the principle of ancestor-worship is imbedded. The result has been that a closer, a more intimate, association of the past with the present, of the dead with the living, is, perhaps, possible in Japan than elsewhere. The beautiful Buddhist festival of departed spirits; the simpler, if more primitive, services at Shintō shrines in memory of deceased relatives; the daily worship at family altars decorated with ancestral tablets; the careful keeping of the anniversaries of deaths; the religious care bestowed on graves; and the idea, not to say belief, in the participation of departed spirits in National Festivals—all tend not only to keep fresh in men’s minds the memory of their dead, but to encourage the feeling of their continued existence in spirit land. Thus the mischief wrought by time is lessened, while death is robbed of a part of its terrors.
CHAPTER XV
Political Unrest—The Press—Press Laws—Conciliation and Repression—Legal Reforms—Failure of Yezo Colonization Scheme—Ōkuma’s Withdrawal—Increased Political Agitation.
When the main thread of our narrative was interrupted in order to enable the reader to form some idea of Japanese religions, and their relation to the modern progress of the country, the train of events which resulted in the concentration of authority in the hands of the Satsuma and Chōshiū clans, and the formation of a regular opposition party of advanced reformers, had been briefly described. At this time, as was pointed out, there was no great difference of principle, so far as domestic reforms were concerned, between progressive politicians in the Government and those outside. Both were agreed on the importance of widening the basis of administration and of associating the people in the work of government. The idea, also, of what was meant by the people had grown so as to include all classes of the nation. The point of disagreement was simply the rate at which progress in the shape of reform on Western lines should proceed. As between moderate and advanced reformers, therefore, matters should have been open to compromise. But the situation was not so simple as it appeared to be. One circumstance that stood in the way of compromise between the two sections of reformers was the large number of disbanded samurai which the abolition of feudalism had thrown upon the country, and for the absorption of which in other occupations under the new order of things there had not yet been time. Many men of this class had really nothing in common with the advanced reformers save in the matter of discontent. Idle and impecunious, they were ready for mischief of any kind, and joined eagerly in an agitation for things of which they were mostly ignorant. Moved by the mere desire to fish in troubled waters, these people did much harm to the cause they espoused, giving to it a character of turbulence which excited the apprehension of the authorities. A further consideration which may have influenced the situation was the reaction following upon the troubled period through which the country had passed. Fully alive to the serious nature of the crisis it had successfully surmounted, and, at the same time, conscious of its newly found strength, the Government was probably in no mood to brook any opposition, however well-intentioned, to its now settled policy of gradual reform. The fact, too, that the Ministry was now one of two clans, and not, as originally, of four, sharpened the line of cleavage between those who directed affairs and those who, perforce, looked on from outside. Clan feeling embittered the movement set on foot by the advanced reformers not only at the outset, but throughout its whole course. Much of the sympathy and support they received from many quarters, as the agitation progressed, had little connection with their declared objects, being due largely to dislike and jealousy of the continued predominance of men of these two clans in the Ministry, which was nicknamed the “Satchō Government.”
The final withdrawal of Itagaki from the Government in the spring of 1876 has been mentioned as the moment from which the organized agitation for representative government may be considered to have commenced. It is difficult to assign exact dates for political movements of this kind. It may with equal correctness be considered as having begun in 1873, when the Tosa leader first resigned office, which is the view taken by Mr. Uyéhara in The Political Development of Japan. The point is of small importance, but it seems permissible to regard the agitation as not having assumed the form of an organized movement until after Itagaki’s final secession from the Ministry.
Before that happened the Government, doubtless well informed of the intentions of the advanced reformers, had taken the first step in a series of repressive measures designed to check the agitation. This was the Press law promulgated in July, 1875. It is difficult to see how the Government could at this time have done otherwise, and remained in power. The attempted assassination of Iwakura by Tosa malcontents had revealed the danger to be feared from extremists of a dangerous class, whose dissatisfaction at the pacific settlement of the Korean difficulty had, it was known, been shared by the Tosa leader. The disturbed condition of the country had also been shown by the abortive provincial risings, and was to be demonstrated still more clearly by the Satsuma rebellion.
Up to that time there had been little interference with the Press. The first newspapers had appeared in the late ’sixties. These were of an ephemeral kind, but a few years later the press in its more developed and permanent form came into existence. It increased very rapidly, while its vitality may be gauged by the fact that some of the papers which then made their appearance are in circulation to-day. In the Capital alone there were soon six or seven daily papers of some standing, all of which, with one exception, lent their aid to the agitation. Into the crusade for popular rights the young Press flung itself with enthusiasm, finding its advantage in the very circumstances which were embarrassing to the Government. Amongst the former military class—the educated section of the nation—which the abolition of feudalism had left stranded with but scanty means of subsistence, there were many men of literary attainments, as such were understood in those days. From these the Press could draw an ample supply of writers, all with real or fancied grievances, some with a bias in favour of popular reforms, others again with a veneer of Western knowledge which did duty for learning. The political articles which appeared in the newspapers of that time were hardly of the quality noticeable to-day. They were full of quotations from European writers on the subject of equality and the rights of man, interspersed with phrases from the Chinese classics, which were the stock-in-trade of all journalists; and, strange as was the contrast presented by materials culled from sources so different, they were all equally effective for the purpose intended, which was to denounce what was described as the tyrannical policy of the Government.
Educational influences, other than those working through the medium of the Press, lent force to the agitation. The fusion of classes, one of the first results of the Restoration, had the effect of opening public and private schools alike to all sections of the people, thus bringing within reach of everyone the education which before had been the privilege only of the military class and Buddhist clergy. By teachers in these schools, by educationalists writing for the express purpose of disseminating Western ideas, and by lecturers, the work of educating the nation proceeded apace.
By none were greater services rendered in this direction than by Fukuzawa Yūkichi. Conspicuous in each of these rôles, as schoolmaster, author and lecturer, as well as in the double capacity of founder of a school, which has attained the dimensions of a university, and chief teacher therein; and as the proprietor and editor of one of the best Japanese newspapers, the Jiji Shimpō, his name will always be famous in the history of his time. The “Sage of Mita,” as he was called from the quarter of the city in which he lived, will be remembered as one who, besides helping the cause of education, strove from the first to give effect to the fusion of classes by encouraging a spirit of independence in those sections of the people whose self-respect had been weakened by centuries of feudalism. For purely party politics Fukuzawa had little taste, owing perhaps to the fact that he had no clan connection with political affairs, nor was his newspaper ever identified with any political association. But it was an active champion of popular rights, and his voluminous writings, the popularity of which was so great that of one book more than three million copies were printed, gave much indirect encouragement to the agitation for popular reforms.