It is but natural that the philosophy of a nation developed from the life and experience of people should be deeply colored by their temperament. After having discussed the essential features of the Japanese disposition, it may be easy to anticipate the character of philosophy which rests on it. We shall now consider the outstanding features of Japanese thought, with a view to interpreting and evaluating the spiritual side of Japan’s civilization.
True to the characteristics of the Japanese, who lack initiative, the thought of the people also manifests a marked absence of originality. Until, in the early part of the sixth century, Buddhism and Confucianism came into the country, the Japanese seem to have had no system of religion or philosophy save fetichism and mythology. The advent of new doctrines of ethics and religion caused a rapid transformation of the life and ideas of the people, elevating them by one stroke from barbarian obscurity to civilized enlightenment. From this time on a childish admiration of mythological characters and stories began to be superseded by an earnest effort for the perfection of the individual character and the realization of social ideals; and crude superstitions were gradually replaced by the profound teachings of Gautama. Out of the religious zeal were developed admirable art and literature, and from the moral effort were born elaborate ethical codes, social order, and social etiquette. Thus, with raw materials imported, the Japanese worked diligently and carefully to turn out finished products well adapted to their tastes and needs. If the Japanese were people endowed with great originality, they would surely have given evidence of it during nearly three hundred years of national seclusion (1570-1868), when almost all conditions requisite for a creative impulse were present, including peace, prosperity, need, and encouragement. In fact, however, the people were interested and absorbed in stamping out the feeble hold of Christian influence, in assimilating the teachings of Wang Yang Ming, and in recasting the doctrines of Confucius and Buddha. When the flood gates of Japan were thrown open and the tides of Occidental learning swept in, the Japanese were almost overwhelmed, and found themselves too busy in coping with them to think of the original contribution.
Lack of ability to start new things is generally compensated by the capacity to borrow new things. In the point of borrowing new ideas and then working these to suit their own tastes, the Japanese are probably second to no nation on earth. Japan first borrowed Confucianism and Buddhism, and within a short time remodeled them in ways peculiar to her, rendering their identity with the original almost unrecognizable. Thus the stoic, pessimistic character of Buddhism was greatly modified, becoming more or less epicurean and optimistic in the hands of the Japanese. The casuistic, practical, individualistic ethics of Confucius were radically changed to general principles of ideal conduct, with the addition of æsthetic elements, and a strong emphasis laid on group loyalty rather than on filial piety. It is to this ability of the Japanese to assimilate new thought and new belief that the unexpected success of early Catholic propaganda was chiefly due. To this capacity of assimilation is also due the origin of Bushido, which is essentially an eclectic of Confucian, Taoist, and Buddhist doctrines. The later-day Shintoism, the so-called cult of ancestor worship, is also a product of the skillful combination of native mythology, Taoism, and Confucianism, with an infusion of certain of the Buddhist doctrines. That the present Japanese civilization is largely a product of assimilation by native genius of American, French, German, and English ideas and institutions is an established fact. It may be that therein lies the hope, as many Japanese thinkers cherish, of making Japan a modern Alexandria, where centuries of human achievements in Asia and Europe may be harmoniously woven together for the realization of a more perfect fabric of civilization.
In literature it is asserted that the creative period is uncritical and the critical period is barren. It seems that the critical tendency is the antithesis of creative effort. This applies to the Japanese, who do not create but who are keenly critical. Instinctively bent on absorbing new ideas, they immediately react to any new schools of thought—turning from Eucken to Bergson, again to Russell, now to Einstein—but they soon begin to analyze their doctrines and to find fault and fallacy here and there, and, finally, are ready to depreciate them wholesale. In so doing, of course, they assimilate some of the good points involved in various systems. The chief obstacle which Christianity, as interpreted by healthy-minded missionaries, encounters in Nippon is the sceptical temper of the Japanese intellectuals.
A strong appeal to emotionalism and to the sense of beauty rather than to cold reason and unpleasant realities is another common characteristic of Japanese philosophy. The Japanese have always taken pride in expressing great truths in a short verse form called Uta, with choice words and exquisite phrases. Until the advent of European learning, poetry and philosophy were never clearly distinguished in Japan. Love of emotionalism naturally leads Japanese thought to humanism rather than to metaphysical speculation.
From this it may be thought that English positivism would find great vogue in Japan. In fact, the influence of Adam Smith, Bentham, Mill, Malthus, and others was a considerable factor in shaping modern Japanese thought. But at bottom the Japanese are not utilitarians. They are by temper idealists. The magical power by which German idealism as propounded by Kant, Hegel, and Fichte, and more recently by Lotze and Eucken, controls the Japanese mind is astounding. Nearly all the prominent philosophers of the Meiji era may be classed under some branch of German idealism. The fact that of American thinkers Emerson is more widely read than any other, and that Royce is more popular than James, is no accident. If pragmatism appeals to the Japanese mind, it is not in the logical form of Professor Dewey but rather in the æsthetic presentation of Santayana.
New Turn in Thought.
Recently, however, or more particularly since the war, the trend of Japanese thought has began to follow a somewhat different path. Industrial revolution, which has been rapidly advancing during the past twenty years, reached its culmination during the war, when various forces accidently combined in bringing about universal recognition of the need for radical social reorganization. Capitalism, which had in the course of time grown to be a gigantic power, proved unable to adapt itself to the changing conditions of the day, and it thus obstructed the onward march of liberalism and democracy. Labor, however, shook off the dust of long humiliation, and began with united front to demand recognition of its rights and of humanity. The struggle naturally forced the attention of the people to the actual condition of society, where the poor majority are sadly left in destitution, where sins and crime are sapping the very vitality of the people, where the rich are abusing their fortunes for deplorable ends. Then came the European downfall of autocracy and the triumph (at least for a short time) of democracy. Liberty, equality, and fraternity became once more the slogan of the time. All these forces united and started a reform movement, upsetting to a certain degree the age-long social system of Nippon.
The three years of confusion did a lasting good. The German systems of government, diplomacy, education, military affairs, and philosophy, to which the Japanese had hitherto adhered too blindly, were, one after another, filtrated and purified, thereby removing much of the scum that was in them. It is, of course, impossible for hardened militarists and bureaucrats to get rid of the beliefs in which they were born and brought up and which have become endeared; but the old generations are gradually dying off, carrying with them to the grave the skeleton of systems which are now dead. In open rebellion against these falling autocrats there arose a great number of brilliant young people, bred and trained in the new school of liberty and democracy, with courage and foresight to complete the second Restoration—that of the rights of humanity belonging to the common masses. Already the status of the working classes is greatly improved through a persistent, costly struggle against the misused power of capital; wages have been increased, hours shortened, and, in the near future, we may expect the triumph of industrial democracy, a triumph which will secure for labor the deserved right of industrial copartnership. Already the status of the women has been greatly improved by their emancipation from the traditional and social bondage under which they suffered so long. Political rights have been greatly enlarged, and universal manhood suffrage is now within view. The educational system, too, has just been revised, rendering its spirit a great deal more liberal than ever before. In this way, though the road is yet long and uncertain, true liberalism in Nippon at last stands firmly on its ground, ready to march towards its ordained goal.
Such a great social innovation is but a concrete expression of changes that are taking place in the underlying currents of thought. It indicates the breaking up of classic systems of moral and political philosophy, which by dint of age-long prestige had never ceased to exercise a strong influence upon the minds of the people. It discloses the bankruptcy of that German idealism which so precisely fitted in with the à priori, passive, spiritual temper of the people but which proved hopeless in the face of vital problems of life and society. It means the exposure of the inadequacy of English utilitarianism, with its over-emphasis on individualism, to help the people effectually to solve many difficulties of society. The changes now taking place in Japanese thought imply the failure of those philosophies which belittle the value of the material, slight the position of mankind in the universe and fail to satisfy man’s inherent craving for ceaseless progress. The new direction of Japanese thought is decidedly towards pragmatic humanism at its best, with due emphasis on the importance of the practical and social phases of life, enriched with the spirit of a sentimental delicacy and an æsthetic proclivity singularly characteristic of the people.