[APPENDIX]
I give as an appendix the "Suruga Gobunsho," the letter of Iyéyasŭ to his daughter-in-law, in which he defines the position of Iyémitsŭ's brother. I have it at two removes from the original, so that, as a Japanese acquaintance remarks, "Recollecting the shadow of the original hanging in a corner of my memory, I hardly recognize the energetic style of the 'old badger'—Furu Danuki—as Iyéyasŭ was called by his antagonists." Notwithstanding, I give it with all these defects, there being nothing fixed in history but documents; and this document gives us the real mind of a great man, his make-believe appearance, his intimate resemblance to other great managers, and a statement of the correct ideas of his time, to which he gave a fixed form.
[LETTER OF IYÉYASŬ]
It is getting warmer daily, and life is again quite pleasant. How is it with you and your children? When last I had the pleasure of visiting you I was charmed by the friendly reception which was given to me, and I beg that you will present my thanks therefor to your lord. It pleases me much to hear that both my grandchildren—Take[14] and Kuni[15]—have grown. When I was with you I advised you to select a tutor for Take. Have you already done this? Kuni is really very clever; which is a thing to rejoice in, and you ought to hold him especially dear. I have had some experience, and therefore proceed to communicate to you my views as to how you can bring him up to be a good man.
If a child, however clever and gifted, be allowed to grow up entirely free and without discipline, it will become in riper age wilful and positive. Children are usually disobedient to their parents. If they are made to obey their parents they will yet still less accommodate themselves to their surrounding. But will they be able as men to rule over States? Not in the least, since they have not been able even to rule themselves. Considering how naïve is youth, a severe education does not seem at first sight to be fitting, but herein man resembles a plant. Of a tree, for instance, only a little sprig first shows; with careful attendance little by little the branches and leaves are developed; then a prop is given to the same that it may grow straight, and the poor growths are cut off. If each year one goes on carefully with this treatment one may obtain straight, beautiful trees. With man it is just the same. As the child comes to be four or five years a prop is given him in the person of a good tutor who shall remove the bad growths, shall subdue wilfulness, and make a fine man out of him. Often this foresight of care is neglected, allowing the child to grow up in freedom without protecting him against his own self-will. Only when the child can already think for itself do the elders begin their admonitions, but then it is quite too late: the branches of wilfulness are already too far grown, and the stem can no longer bring forth new branches. A good tree is no longer to be aimed at.
In this connection I have a lively recollection of Saburo.[16] When he was born I was still a young man, and I was enchanted by the first child. He was somewhat weakly, and on that account I thought that he should be especially protected and given the greatest liberty. I was not severe with him and allowed him all that he wished. After he had grown up I often found occasion to blame this and that in him, and to give him admonition and advice, but I had no success therein, because in his youth no one had taken trouble about his conduct and speech. He had never learned to treat his parents with thoughtfulness, and to respect them as filial duty ordered, but behaved toward them as if they were his equals, so that finally it had to come to a quarrel, and the results are that he hates them now, and is quite estranged from them. Warned by these evil experiences, I undertook other rules for the education of other children. For instance, I chose persons to attend the child who themselves had been brought up from youth with the greatest severity, and I ordered them to let me know at once when the slightest trace of wilfulness or other similar defect was discovered. And I called the child to me, gave him a rebuke, and extended to him some few strong words of advice. Through following this education the child grew to be as faultless as a straight grown tree; knew no self-will, because he considered the will of his parents as the highest law. He practised self-control and learned continually how one should best honor one's parents.
In the families of princes a child holds another standing, and is subjected to other influences than in the families of subjects. In provision of this and of the future position of the child, his education must be different in certain points. The parents should always oblige the child to follow the admonitions of those placed about him, otherwise after their death the child would succumb entirely to its own wilfulness, and at the end forfeit the throne, as many examples have taught us before this. Therefore, it is the duty of the educator to implant in his scholar from the earliest youth and before everything veneration for his parents, the yielding of the will to Providence, gentleness toward subjects, and high-mindedness; only so can he bring him up to be a real man.