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oblivious of their appreciation of honour (I do not mean seppuku itself) which the fearful practice implied.

That inborn race instinct of honour is the only safeguard of our public morals, the sole imperative check on our private conduct, the one foundation of patriotism and Loyalty—Honour is the only tie that binds the Japanese to the ethical world; any other moral power is still feeble, either in its infancy or in its senility, though there is no denying that numerous and attractive panaceas are being advertised at every corner of the streets. Buddhism has lost its earnest strivings, busying itself with petty trifles among its small sects. The light of Confucius and Mencius has paled before the more taking, if more variegated, light of later philosophers. Christianity has wandered far from the teachings of its Divine Founder, and as too often preached is a farce and a caricature of the original. Diabolical Nietzsche and his shallow followers are gradually making their way, assuring to still shallower youths salvation through Hedonism, though it has not yet gained strong foothold, if ever it can. Unitarians present us with balance-sheets of pleasure and pain, assuring us that theirs is the only scientific system of moral book-keeping. Materialism is not slack in enlisting a large following, to which it doles out in well-tasting pills such comfort as the world can give. Reactionism has on its part tried hard to build a structure of its own, based on cant, bigotry, and hypocrisy, into which it would unite the whole Japanese race, and of course excluding foreigners. But all these systems and schools of ethics are mainly confined to lecture-rooms and to loud talkers. The heart of the nation is still swayed by Bushido. It commands and guides us, and, consciously or unconsciously, we follow. It is through the medium of Bushido that the best reverence of our fathers and the noblest lore of our mothers still spring, for our flesh and blood had been imbued with it. How could it be otherwise? ‘Bodykins, Master Page,’ says the country justice Shallow in the ‘Merry Wives of Windsor,’ ‘Bodykins, Master Page, though I now be old and of the peace, if I see a sword out my finger itches to make one. Though we are justices and doctors and churchmen, Master Page, we have some salt of our youth in us; we are the sons of women, Master Page.’ We can be but the children of our parents. And when I say so I am far from advocating on the one hand the revival of old feudalism, for it was not a trait inherent in our race; nor do I mean, on the other hand, that we should preserve obsolete political or social institutions, for institutions must of necessity be ever changing with the march of time. The spirit of Bushido is ever ready to listen to and to adopt whatever is good, pure, and of good repute. The transformation of