Evolution Of The Japanese, Social And Psychic

by Sidney Lewis Gulick

In response to my questions Japanese friends have uniformly assured me that they are not accustomed to think of the Japanese as possessed of better memories than the people of the West. They appear surprised that the question should be raised, and are specially surprised at our high estimate of Japanese ability in this direction.

If, however, we inquire about their powers of memory in connection with daily duties and the ordinary acquisition of knowledge and its retention, my own experience of twelve years, chiefly with the middle and lower classes of society, has left the impression that, while some learn easily and remember well, a large number are exceedingly slow. On the whole, I am inclined to believe that, although the Japanese may be said to have good memories, yet it can hardly be maintained that they conspicuously exceed Occidentals in this respect.

In comparing the Occidental with the Oriental, it is to be remembered that there is not among Occidental nations that attention to bare memorizing which is so conspicuous among the less civilized nations. The astonishing feats performed by the transmitters of ancient poems and religious teachings seem to us incredible. Professor Max Müller says that the voluminous Vedas have been handed down for centuries, unchanged, simply from mouth to mouth by the priesthood. Every progressive race, until it has attained a high development of the art of writing, has manifested similar power of memory. Such power is not, however, inherent; that is to say, it is not due to the innate peculiarity of brain structure, but rather to the nature of the social order which demands such expenditure of time and strength for the maintenance of its own higher life. Through the art of writing Occidental peoples have found a cheaper way of retaining their history and of preserving the products of their poets and religious teachers. Even for the transactions of daily life we have resorted to the constant use of pen and notebook and typewriter, by these devices saving time and strength for other things. As a result, our memories are developed in directions different from those of semi-civilized or primitive man. The differences of memory characterizing different races, then, are for the most part due to differences in the social order and to the nature of the civilization, rather than to the intrinsic and inherited structure of the brain itself.

Since memory is the foundation of all mental operations, we have given to it the first place in the present discussion. And that the Japanese have a fair degree of memory argues well for the prospect of high attainment in other directions. With this in mind, we naturally ask whether they show any unusual proficiency or deficiency in the acquisition of foreign languages? In view of her protracted separation from the languages of other peoples, should we not expect marked deficiency in this respect? On the contrary, however, we find that tens of thousands of Japanese students have acquired a fairly good reading knowledge of English, French, and German. Those few who have had good and sufficient teaching, or who have been abroad and lived in Occidental lands, have in addition secured ready conversational use of the various languages. Indeed, some have contended that since the Japanese learn foreign languages more easily than foreigners learn Japanese, they have greater linguistic powers than the foreigner. It should be borne in mind, however, that in such a comparison, not only are the time required and the proficiency; attained to be considered, but also the inherent difficulty of the language studied and the linguistic helps provided the student.

I have come gradually to the conclusion that the Japanese are neither particularly gifted nor particularly deficient in powers of language acquisition. They rank with Occidental peoples in this respect.

To my mind language affords one of the best possible proofs of the general contention of this volume that the characteristics which distinguish the races are social rather than biological. The reason why the languages of the different races differ is not because the brain-types of the races are different, but only because of the isolated social evolution which the races have experienced. Had it been possible for Japan to maintain throughout the ages perfect and continuous social intercourse with the ancestors of the Anglo-Saxon race, while still maintaining biological isolation, i.e., perfect freedom from intermarriage, there is no reason to think that two distinct languages so different as English and Japanese would have arisen. The fact that Japanese children can accurately acquire English, and that English or American children can accurately acquire Japanese, proves conclusively that diversities of language do not rest on brain differences and brain heredity, but exclusively on social differences and social heredity.

If this is true, then the argument can easily be extended to all the features that differentiate the civilizations of different races; for the language of any race is, in a sense, the epitome of the civilization of that race. All its ideas, customs, theologies, philosophies, sciences, mythologies; all its characteristic thoughts, conceptions, ideals; all its distinguishing social features, are represented in its language. Indeed, they enter into it as determining factors, and by means of it are transmitted from age to age. This argument is capable of much extension and illustration.

The charge that the Japanese are a nation of imitators has been repeated so often as to become trite, and the words are usually spoken with disdain. Yet, if the truth were fully told, it would be found that, from many points of view, this quality gives reason rather for congratulation. Surely that nation which can best discriminate and imitate has advantage over nations that are so fixed in their self-sufficiency as to be able neither to see that which is advantageous nor to imitate it. In referring to the imitative powers of the Japanese, then, I do not speak in terms of reproach, but rather in those of commendation. "Monkeyism" is not the sort of imitation that has transformed primitive Japan into the Japan of the early or later feudal ages, nor into the Japan of the twentieth century. Bare imitation, without thought, has been relatively slight in Japan. If it has been known at times, those times have been of short duration.

In his introduction to "The Classic Poetry of the Japanese" Professor Chamberlain has so stated the case for the imitative quality of the people that I quote the following:

"The current impression that the Japanese are a nation of imitators is in the main correct. As they copy us to-day, so did they copy the Chinese and Koreans a millennium and a half ago. Religion, philosophy, laws, administration, written characters, all arts but the very simplest, all science, or at least what then went by that name, everything was imported from the neighboring continent; so much so that of all that we are accustomed to term 'Old Japan' scarce one trait in a hundred is really and properly Japanese. Not only are their silk and lacquer not theirs by right of invention, nor their painting (albeit so often praised by European critics for its originality), nor their porcelain, nor their music, but even the larger part of their language consists of mispronounced Chinese; and from the Chinese they have drawn new names for already existing places, and new titles for their ancient Gods."