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Now it is important to note that as early as 1874 that is six years after the Restoration of the Emperor Meiji these facts were attracting the widest notice in Japanese society, the agitation for a Constitution and a popular assembly being very vigorously pushed.
If he is broadminded, he will further recognize the fact that if no constitutional form of government is introduced, his policy will perish after his death. Therefore I say that before the adoption of the constitutional form of government, a monarchy should be established. William I of Germany and the Emperor Meiji of Japan both tried the constitutional form of government and found it a success.
Comparatively little attention had been directed to this subject by the rulers of medieval Japan, and the fact that the Meiji leaders appreciated the necessity of studying the arts and sciences of the new civilization simultaneously with the adoption of its products, bears strong testimony to the insight of these remarkable men.
"And this at the end?" "It means, Eveything always the same thing. Very bad translation I make. Very sad poem." "And this writing here?" "That is Japanese name Fujinami Katsundo and the date, twenty-fifth year of Meiji, twelfth month." Tanaka had turned over the photograph and was looking attentively at the portrait. "The honoured father of Ladyship, I think," he said. "Yes," said Asako.
*For minute information about party politics and parliamentary procedure see the "Oriental Series," Vol. The growth of agricultural and industrial enterprise is one of the most remarkable features of modern Japan. Up to the beginning of the Meiji era, agriculture almost monopolized attention, manufacturing industry being altogether of a domestic character.
Meanwhile the Government had been strenuously seeking to equip the people with the products of Western civilization. It has been shown that the men who sat in the seats of power during the first decade of the Meiji era owed their exalted position to their own intellectual superiority and far-seeing statesmanship. That such men should become the nation's teachers would have been natural anywhere.
The samurai were not racially distinct from the bulk of the nation. They had originally been mere farmers, possessing no special military aptitude. Nevertheless, among all the reforms introduced during the Meiji era, none was counted so hazardous as the substitution of a conscript army for the nation's traditional soldiers. The Satsuma rebellion disposed finally of the question.
Perhaps Japan will remember her foreign teachers more kindly in the twentieth century. But she will never feel toward the Occident, as she felt toward China before the Meiji era, the reverential respect due by ancient custom to a beloved, instructor; for the wisdom of China was voluntarily sought, while that of the West was thrust upon her by violence.
By sword and law the old Japanese society had been pruned and clipped, bent and bound, just like such a tree; and after the reconstructions of the Meiji period, after the abolition of the daimiates, and the suppression of the military class, it still maintained its former shape, just as the tree would continue to do when first abandoned by the gardener.
We have seen in the last two chapters how the Shogunate and feudalism fell, and how the Meiji government was inaugurated. We have also observed in the memorials of leading statesmen abundant proof of their willingness and zeal to introduce a representative system of government. We have also seen the Kogisho convened and dissolved.