In speaking of infanticide in Japan, let us not forget that every race and nation has been guilty of the same crime, and has continued to be guilty of it until delivered by Christianity.
Widespread infanticide proves a wide lack of natural affection. Poverty is, of course, the common plea. Yet infanticide has been practiced not so much by the desperately poor as by small land-holders. The amount of farming land possessed by each family was strictly limited and could feed only a given number of mouths. Should the family exceed that number, all would be involved in poverty, for the members beyond that limit did not have the liberty to travel in search of new occupation. Infanticide, therefore, bore direct relation to the rigid economic nature of the old social order.
Whatever, therefore, be the point of view from which we study the question of Japanese affection for children, we see that it was intimately connected with the nature of the social order. Whether we judge such affection or its lack to be a characteristic trait of Japanese nature, we must still maintain that it is not an inherent trait of the race nature, but only a characteristic depending for its greater or less development on the nature of the social order.
IX
MARITAL LOVE
If the Japanese are a conspicuously emotional race, as is commonly believed, we should naturally expect this characteristic to manifest itself in a marked degree in the relation of the sexes. Curiously enough, however, such does not seem to be the case. So slight a place does the emotion of sexual love have in Japanese family life that some have gone to the extreme of denying it altogether. In his brilliant but fallacious volume, entitled "The Soul of the Far East," Mr. Percival Lowell states that the Japanese do not "fall in love." The correctness of this statement we shall consider in connection with the argument for Japanese impersonality. That "falling in love" is not a recognized part of the family system, and that marriage is arranged regardless not only of love, but even of mutual acquaintance, are indisputable facts.
Let us confine our attention here to Japanese post-marital emotional characteristics. Do Japanese husbands love their wives and wives their husbands? We have already seen that in the text-book for Japanese women, the "Onna Daigaku," not one word is said about love. It may be stated at once that love between husband and wife is almost as conspicuously lacking in practice as in precept. In no regard, perhaps, is the contrast between the East and the West more striking than the respective ideas concerning woman and marriage. The one counts woman the equal, if not the superior of man; the other looks down upon her as man's inferior in every respect; the one considers profound love as the only true condition of marriage; the other thinks of love as essentially impure, beneath the dignity of a true man, and not to be taken into consideration when marriage is contemplated; in the one, the two persons most interested have most to say in the matter; in the other, they have the least to say; in the one, a long and intimate previous acquaintance is deemed important; in the other, the need for such an acquaintance does not receive a second thought; in the one, the wife at once takes her place as the queen of the home; in the other, she enters as the domestic for her husband and his parents; in the one, the children are hers as well as his; in the other, they are his rather than hers, and remain with him in case of divorce; in the one, divorce is rare and condemned; in the other, it is common in the extreme; in the one, it is as often the woman as the man who seeks the divorce; in the other, until most recent times, it is the man alone who divorces the wife; in the one, the reasons for divorce are grave; in the other, they are often trivial; in the one, the wife is the "helpmate"; in the other, she is the man's "plaything"; or, at most, the means for continuing the family lineage; in the one, the man is the "husband"; in the other, he is the "danna san" or "teishu" (the lord or master); in the ideal home of the one, the wife is the object of the husband's constant affection and solicitous care; in the ideal home of the other, she ever waits upon her lord, serves his food for him, and faithfully sits up for him at night, however late his return may be; in the one, the wife is justified in resenting any unfaithfulness or immorality on the part of her husband; in the other, she is commanded to accept with patience whatever he may do, however many concubines he may have in his home or elsewhere; and however immoral he may be, she must not be jealous. The following characterization of the women of Japan is presumably by one who would do them no injustice, having himself married a Japanese wife (the editor of the Japan Mail).
"The woman of Japan is a charming personage in many ways—gracious, refined, womanly before everything, sweet-tempered, unselfish, virtuous, a splendid mother, and an ideal wife from the point of view of the master. But she is virtually excluded from the whole intellectual life of the nation. Politics, art, literature, science, are closed books to her. She cannot think logically about any of these subjects, express herself clearly with reference to them, or take an intellectual part in conversations relating to them. She is, in fact, totally disqualified to be her husband's intellectual companion, and the inevitable result is that he despises her."[[J]]
In face of all these facts, it is evident that the emotional element of character which plays so large a part in the relation of the sexes in the West has little, if any, counterpart in the Far East. Where the emotional element does come in, it is under social condemnation. There are doubtless many happy marriages in Japan, if the wife is faithful in her place and fills it well; and if the master is honorable according to the accepted standards, steady in his business, not given to wine or women. But even then the affection must be different from that which prevails in the West. No Japanese wife ever dreams of receiving the loving care from her husband which is freely accorded her Western sister by her husband.[[K]]