might more easily gain the confidence of their good and influential foreign pastor, and then be favored by him with something or other. The simplehearted missionary, not in the least suspecting their meanness, has taken them for true Christians and helped them according to their needs, real or pretended; for they have been loud enough, be it remembered, in professing their earnest faith in the teaching of Christ. Again, there are some politicians who look at the life-and-death question of religious belief likewise from the worldly point of view, and say that nothing can be more politic for cultivating friendly intercourse with the Western powers than to adopt their established religion. Although we must admit that everything has its weak side, yet it is greatly to be deplored that the idea of accepting the truth of the religion of Christ merely for the sake of promoting worldly interests should be entertained by the educated.

The very idea is, in our opinion, not only good for nothing, but indescribably harmful to the possible formation of the Japanese Christianity in future, which ought to be built up, if at all, on the firm rock of its own intrinsic value; not, in any case, on the unstable sand of false professions. When we say, as we did before, that the Christianity to be adopted in future Japan will be quite different in form, though not in essence, from what has prevailed in Europe and America, we do not mean that the time-honored organiza-, tion and practices of the Christian Church which have lasted for twenty centuries should be superseded by some newly invented. Some of the experienced Christian teachers of note in Japan seem to advocate such a view; but we cannot but doubt its practicability and wisdom, for it runs rather to the extreme. The people of France, for example, once attempted in vain to VOL. XLI. 2168

LIVING AGE.

make away with the wise and well-established practice of observing the Sabbath day. It is to be kept in mind in this connection that the rules and practices of the Christian Church naturally divide themselves into two classesthose belonging to or originating in a particular place or time, and those essential to the religion itself. The former, it will be easily seen, admit of any change according to the circumstances, while the latter could hardly be altered without damage to the essence of Christianity. Various combinations of all these have given rise to as many forms or sects of the Christian religion, each of which has had its own prosperous days. The most important question about Christianity in a new country is, what sort of combination of form will be suited best to its healthy growth and activity? For much depends upon the selection of the best form, just as the construction of an electric machine determines the power of the light emitted. In newly establishing a form of Christianity peculiar to our country, we must not fail to avail ourselves of all those fundamental principles which have been causing it to emit its most powerful light for the very long period of two thousand years.

So much are we Japanese given to the circumspect observance of the rules of etiquette on all occasions, that the country has been called from ancient times a polite and ceremonious country. All, from the Emperor down to the lowest class of people, have to observe a certain number of forms in their everyday life. Congratulation or condolence, for instance, is always expressed according to form; presents are seldom sent or received unaccompanied by formal letters; and even making tea or arranging flowers in a vase has its particular rules. In every girls' school, etiquette forms one of the most important branches of study.

Then there are so many private and public meetings held in conformity to the established ceremonial rules that public men get tired out by being obliged constantly to attend them. Strange to say, the Japanese are a people naturally inclined either to be very strict in adhering to ceremonial rules or to be exceedingly unceremonious; they can hardly hold any social meeting in a way at once mirthful and polite, as is generally seen in Western countries. It is on this account that the people of Japan are glad not only to have their ceremonies celebrated at some sacred places, but to solemnify social meetings of all kinds. Even on such a merry occasion as Christmas, the ceremonial part of the celebration occupies half the time, which is then followed by entertainments and amusements. All the friendly or social meetings of Japan may be said to consist in a round of ceremonial forms, and the Japanese may properly be called a ceremonious nation.

We may safely infer from the above that there will be a comparatively large number of worshipping rites performed by the future Japanese Christian Church. We try to dispense now-adays with as much of the ceremonial part as possible in our Christian worship, only because we have an aversion to the Buddhists resorting too much to the ceremonial forms of worshipping. Thus we are running from one extremity to the other; but it is to be remembered that, though we are acting now against our nature in that way, yet the time of reaction will surely come, when we shall gladly have a certain number of rites and ceremonies best suited to the expression of our religious sense.

Now let us turn our attention to the home life of the people, and see, if possible, what change will take place there, in so far as ceremony is concerned, when Christianity has been generally

be

adopted. It seems not improbable that the Toko-no-ma (the part of a room raised a few inches above the floor), the centre of all the rules of etiquette observed in the household, may changed then to a kind of religious sanctuary. This is practically the case at present with the houses built in Japanese style and appropriated for preaching the gospel; and we see many a house of native Christians where the Toko-no-ma has some scroll of religious writing, such as the Beatitudes of the Sermon on the Mount and the Ten Commandments, instead of a picture or some other adornment, as is usual. There is good reason to suppose that the Buddhist and Shintoist shrines in private houses may also be Christianized, that the ihai (a wooden table with a Buddhist posthumous name inscribed, worshipped as representing the spirit of the dead) will be preserved in the form of cards inscribed with the names of the departed members of the Christian family, and that the mamori-fuda (amulets) will be made to serve as leaflets with some sacred words of God on them. In the far distant future, it will not be strange to see the family Bible and hymnal handed down from generation to generation, made much of, something like a rare treas

ure.

We further believe that the rites and ceremonies of our future Church will prove not only beneficial to the moral and spiritual culture of the believers, but will influence to a considerable extent the formation of social etiquette. This is not without reason, for the marriage ceremony prevailing in these days amongst those who are not Christian has a marked tendency to approach nearer and nearer that of the Christians. Moreover, it is an undeniable fact that Christian believers are best qualified for successfully holding every kind of social meeting, for the relation of male and female in such a friendly

intercourse is most satisfactorily adjusted by Christian ideas.

Hence, we may conclude that the beautiful and harmonious relation of the future Christians with one another in their social intercourse, especially that between men and women, will serve as a model to society at large, and that the Church will give to unbelievers as well as believers a certain number of ceremonial forms of social intercourse, in harmony with the religious belief and moral sentiments of Christianity. From what has been said thus far, it will easily be understood that all the rites and ceremonies of the Church in future Japan may safely be trusted to the Japanese themselves, and that neither the overstrict rules and practices of the English Church in general nor the rather loose ones of the American will be just to the taste of the moderate Japanese.

The mind of the people of Japan is naturally religious rather than philosophical, constructive rather than critical, practical rather than contemplative. Though they themselves may The International.

believe to the contrary and be willing to have others believe so too, yet the fact is not to be denied that they are mystic, instinctive, and practical in all their doings and sayings. We do not hesitate, therefore, to conclude that there will appear, in future Japan, pious and truly religious men in large numbers, but few theologians, and that Japanese Christianity will undoubtedly meet with great success in all its attempts at ameliorating social condition, but will drop far behind the Germans and some other European nations in the development of theological doctrine.

In a word, Japan will adopt all the institutions conducive to human welfare according to Christian ideas and principles; the bulk of the people will come to believe in the religion of Jesus Christ; and the form of Christianity they will adopt will not lie buried in the jumble of theological theories and formulæ, but will stand prominently as a vital social force leading the souls of men into the path of righteousness.

Sakunoshin Motoda.

None of the English papers, so far as I know, has recorded the lamentably sudden death, which took place in London last month, of Mr. E. F. Fenollosa. Though his name is very well known on the other side of the Atlantic, it is familiar in Europe but to a small circle of special students. Mr. Fenollosa had published little, but he was recognized as the first authority in the West on the art of China and Japan. It is chiefly to him that Boston owes its magnificent collection of Japanese paintings a collection unsurpassed, it is said, by any single collection in Japan. And the other great collection of Oriental art in America, that of Mr.

In

Freer of Detroit, destined to become national property and to be housed in a museum at Washington, has been formed with the aid of Mr. Fenollosa's constant advice and suggestion. the United States the loss of a man of his remarkable acquirements will be deeply felt and deplored. But in Europe too there will be many who will grieve to hear of the sudden cutting-off of a life devoted to a study which no other non-Oriental was so competent to understand, before the work which was to embody the results of long years of studious labor had been completed. Mr. Fenollosa has however left, I understand, in manuscript a great body of

material for that comprehensive history of art in China, Corea and Japan, which was to be his magnum opus. I hope that this will prove to be sufficiently near its final form for publication.

More than twenty years ago, in a long and brilliant review of M. Gonse's "L'Art Japonais," Mr. Fenollosa wrote the first adequate survey of the development of Japanese art, in its true perspective and proportions, ever published in a European tongue. This essay was at the time nothing short of a revelation; for it was written by one who had not only studied under native teachers and seen for himself the masterpieces preserved in the temples and private collections of Japan, but who brought to the study an æsthetic perception trained by familiarity with the masterpieces of the art of Europe. We in England owe much to Dr. Anderson's labors in this field, but it must be admitted that his judgment was impaired by overmuch reliance on the academical standards of Western art. Mr. Fenollosa's writing was apt to indulge in exaggeration and rhetoric; but he gave a clue to the understanding of the ideas which inspired successive periods of production; he was never content merely to criticize from the outside. And this was a real service. The collectors of Europe had been enthusiastic over the art of eighteenthcentury Japan; they had ignored the grander achievements in painting and sculpture of its earlier ages; and for the Western world at large Japanese art is still associated with toy-like prettiness and a spirit expressive of nothing more than the gaiety of children. That the race which produced these things should prove itself capable of heroic effort and colossal undertakings was to most of Europe a great surprise. Yet to those who had chanced to arrive at some understanding of Japan's real achievement in art, the sustained and

serious production of many centuries, this was less a matter for astonishment. The exquisite lacquer, prints and ivories which fill the collections of Europe represent, in fact, the arts of a period when the canker of a long peace and an unnatural seclusion showed itself in a luxurious effeminacy of temper, strongly contrasting with the previous ages of perpetual struggle, warfare and response to ideas from without. In earlier times the male and martial spirit of the race had found expression in a host of dramatic painters and in sculptors of vehement power. And yet it must be added that the outlet for the heroic spirit of this race is often to be found where, from our point of view, we should least expect it. Periods of strenuous self-discipline delighted in slight sketches of landscape and birds in flight; and I fancy that the splendid pictures of battle and adventure were oftener the work of retrospective artists than of contemporaries.

Has it not been' the same in Europe? I wonder what sort of impression the art of France, say, or of England would make on an observer from another hemisphere seeking to find in it a reflection of national character? The enormous hiatus caused by the Hundred Years' War and the Wars of the Roses makes it difficult to find any continuous clue. Our modern painting and sculpture has not grown normally out of the painting and sculpture of the Middle Ages, though both in England and France instinct has driven groups of artists to go back to those medieval creators in quest of something which the Renaissance atmosphere had lost; they represent a new beginning in which a foreign element counts for much. Certainly it would be rather difficult to infer the historic character of the English race from English art. But then it may be that our art has but begun; new masters, new events, may give it a fresh turn, a different direc

tion; who knows? So far we have been dominated by the fact that our eighteenth-century classics were born of a time which idolized grace, elegance, leisure, an age of prose, too, which lacked creative ardor and dissuaded from enthusiasm. Had the growth of art in England been normal and continuous, without the shattering convulsions of outward events, we might have had earlier masters and severer models.

When we compare modern French painting with English, as we have all too imperfect means of doing in the Exhibition at Shepherd's Bush, it is easy, I think, to distinguish a difference of intellectual temper. What strikes one as absent from the English painters is the nervous edge of line, a character of expression pressed to a firm conclusion, which marks men like Ingres or Daumier. Even the strained intensity of Pre-Raphaelite drawing witnesses to a kind of timidity forcing itself to extremities. The English temper is by nature sensitive in its contact with reality, and gains no doubt compensating qualities of its own in art by virtue of the spirit which in practical afThe Saturday Review.

fairs makes for genial compromise rather than for logical rigidity of purpose. But, after all, the expression of intellectual temper is hardly the same as the expression of what I have called historic character, the fundamental springs of energy by which a nation leaves its mark on history. Of this surely much, and perhaps the greater part, has still to find expression at the hands of English painters and sculptors.

I wrote a few months ago of a picture by Géricault, exhibited this summer at Messrs. Obach's, and expressed the hope that it might be acquired for the National Gallery. There was a picture which, over and above its qualities of pictorial design, concentrated and expressed in itself a whole era of France, one of the great eras of the modern world, the storm and fire of the France of Napoleon. If the money demanded for the new Hals makes purchase impossible, cannot some lover of French art still be found to present the nation with this work, which would so finely fill one of the most glaring gaps in the collection?

Laurence Binyon.

"See me there," wrote Augustine on the book of his confessions, "and praise me not more than I deserve; there believe not others about me, but myself; there mark me, and see what I was in myself, by myself; and if aught in me pleases thee, then praise with me, Whom, and not myself, I wished to be praised for me." Lord Acton included this life history amongst the three greatest formative books of the world; historically it would be difficult to dispute his verdict. This sumptuous edition, "The Confessions of St. Augustine" (Seely & Co.), comes but in the intermediate stages of the book, whose

life is numbered not by years, but by centuries; which will live as long as the human heart is curious about the past, or in any ways troubled and inspired by longing to know the meaning of the world. It is the solid ground as much as the effort beyond the horizon which has given this work an earthly mortality. Visitors to. Pompeii are familiar with a sudden thrill of wonder-expected beforehand, discounted, and yet at the moment dominant-at the intimate revelation of the life of an age. It is excited not by the temples, the aqueducts, the civilization which has changed, but by the