In the midst of these alarms news arrived that the emperor had been seized with a sudden and violent sickness, apparently a dysentery, which, after two months’ struggles against it, brought him to his end. He died in September, 1598, at the age of sixty-four, retaining his absolute authority to the last. During his latter years two thoughts seem principally to have engrossed him,—the securing divine honors to himself, and the transmission of his authority to his infant son, Hideyori, not yet above three or four years old. With the first object in view, though really (at least, so the missionaries concluded) without any religion at all, he had rebuilt, in a magnificent manner, many temples and Buddhist monasteries destroyed by Nobunaga, by himself, or by the accidents of war. He also had erected, in a new quarter which he had added to Miyako, a splendid temple, which he caused to be consecrated to himself in the character of the new Hachiman, that being the title of a Kami celebrated for his conquests, and regarded as the god of war.
To secure the succession of his infant son, the expiring emperor established, on his death-bed, a council of regency, composed of nine persons, at the head of which he placed Tokugawa Iyeyasu, king of the Bandō, which, besides the five provinces of the Kwantō, in which were the great cities of Suruga and Yedo, embraced, also, three other kingdoms. Iyeyasu had been king of Mikawa, a more westerly province, which he had lost by adhering to the fortunes of the third son of Nobunaga, he being allied to that family by marriage. But afterwards, by some means, he had recovered the favor of Taikō-Sama, who had even bestowed upon him the newly conquered Bandō, and who, the better to secure his fidelity, had caused his infant son and destined successor to be married to a young granddaughter of Iyeyasu.
The strong castle of Ōsaka had been chosen by Taikō-Sama as the residence of his son during his minority, and there he dwelt with his baby wife, in charge of his mother, while the administration of affairs passed into the hands of Iyeyasu, who, as head of the regency, governed with the title of Daifu-Sama.
CHAPTER XIX
Evacuation of Corea—Return of the Converted Princes—Favorable Disposition of Daifu-Sama—Third Visit of Father Valignani—Civil War between Daifu-Sama and his Co-regents—His Triumph—Disgrace and Execution of Settsu-no-Kami—Daifu-Sama takes the Title of Ōgosho-Sama and still favors the Converts—Influx of Dominican and Franciscan Friars—Flourishing Condition of the Church—Local Persecutions—A. D. 1599-1609.
The first act of the regency was to put an end to the war in Corea. That country was abandoned,[63] and the return of so many converted princes greatly strengthened the lately suffering church. Father Rodriguez had always been on good terms with Daifu-Sama, with whom he had become acquainted at the court of the late emperor. This head of the regency was even thought to be well disposed to the new religion, and the converted princes, in conjunction with Father Valignani, who, just before the death of Taikō-Sama, had reached Japan for the third time, in company with a new bishop, proceeded gradually and unostentatiously to re-establish the missionaries, to rebuild the churches, and to set up again the college and seminaries, till soon the Catholic faith seemed to be replaced on almost as firm a basis as ever. For a time, indeed, things were thrown into confusion by a civil war which soon broke out between Daifu-Sama and his co-regents. Some of the Catholic princes lost their provinces as adherents of the defeated party, and among the rest, that distinguished pillar of the church, Konishi Settsu-no-Kami, the grand admiral, king of Higo and conqueror of Corea, who, for his share in this business, perished by the hand of the executioner,—his religious opinions not allowing him to adopt the Japanese alternative of cutting himself open. But the victorious regent, who presently took the title of Ōgosho-Sama, and with it the entire imperial authority (though the boy, Hideyori, still enjoyed the title of Kubō-Sama), showed himself so far favorable to the Jesuits (to the headship of whom Father Francis Pazio had lately succeeded as vice-provincial) as to permit their reëstablishment at Nagasaki, Miyako, and Ōsaka. Yet an edict of his, restraining the missionaries to their ancient seats, and forbidding the accession of new converts, though little regarded, showed the necessity of caution.
Pope Clement VIII, having promulgated a bull in December, 1600, by which all the mendicant orders were allowed to go as missionaries to Japan, provided they proceeded by way of Portugal, and not by the Philippines, Dominican and Franciscan friars took advantage of this favorable disposition of the emperor to enter that empire, the Franciscans reoccupying their old station at Miyako, and setting up a new one at Yedo, where the Jesuits had never been. This was the seat of the emperor’s son, whom, according to the Japanese custom, he had associated with him in the empire. He himself had his residence at Suruga, no great distance to the west. The young Hideyori, the titular Kubō-Sama, still dwelt in the castle of Ōsaka, Miyako being given up exclusively to the Dairi, or ecclesiastical emperor. The prohibition to pass from the Philippines to Japan was little regarded. As there was no civil arm to enforce it, the friars laughed at the excommunication denounced by the Pope’s bull. The Jesuits, on the other hand, did not submit to this invasion without loud complaints.
In the Tenza, or five provinces[64] nearest to Miyako, and including, also, the cities of Sakai and Ōsaka, the ancient imperial domain, the adherents of the new religion were seldom molested, and the governor of Miyako even built a magnificent church for the Jesuits in the upper city, in addition to one which they already possessed in the lower city. An observatory at Ōsaka had gained additional credit for their religion by displaying their scientific knowledge. A seminary for nobles was reopened at Nagasaki, and, by the special zeal of Father Gnecchi, hospitals for lepers, which had been from the first a favorite charity, were set up at Ōsaka and in several other cities. By the favor of particular princes, Jesuit missionaries even penetrated into the more remote and hitherto unvisited provinces. Persecution, however, still went on within the jurisdiction of several of the local rulers, especially in the island of Shimo; and some of the converted princes, having apostatized, became themselves persecutors. But the bishop, having made a journey to Miyako in 1606, was very favorably received by the Kubō-Sama,—a circumstance not without its influence in all the local courts.
Such was the state of things in Japan when the hold of the Portuguese and the Jesuits upon that country, already shaken by the consolidation of the empire under one head, and by the intrusion of Dominican and Franciscan friars and Spanish merchants and negotiators, encountered a still more alarming disturbance from the appearance of the Dutch flag in the eastern seas.[65]
