_ it helped powerfully to develop it
as a fact in certain phases of activity. The stoicism of the Japanese
is one phase of developed personality. It shows the presence of a
powerful, disciplined will keeping the body in control, so that it
gives no sign of the thoughts and emotions going on in the mind,
however fierce they may be.

That in Japan, however, which has interfered most powerfully with the
spread and dominance of Buddhism has been the practical and prosaic
Confucian ethics. Apparently, Confucius never speculated. Metaphysics
and introspection alike had no charm for him. He was concerned with
conduct. His developed doctrine demanded of all men obedience to the
law of the five relations. In spite, therefore, of the fact that he
said nothing about individuality and personality, his system laid real
emphasis on personality and demanded its continuous activity. In all
of his teachings the idea of personality in the full and proper sense
of this word is always implicit, and sometimes is quite distinct.

The many strong and noble characters which glorify the feudal era are
the product of Japonicized Confucianism, "Bushido," and bear powerful
witness to its practical emphasis on personality. The loyalty, filial
piety, courage, rectitude, honor, self-control, and suicide which it
taught, defective though we must pronounce them from certain points of
view, were yet very lofty and noble, and depended for their
realization on the development of personality.

Advocates of the "impersonal" interpretation of the Orient have much
to say about pantheism. They assert the difficulty of conveying to the
Oriental mind the idea of the personality of the Supreme Being.
Although some form of pantheism is doubtless the belief of the
learned, the evidence that a personal conception of deity is
widespread among the people seems so manifest that I need hardly do
more than call attention to it. This belief has helped to neutralize
the paralyzing tendency of Buddhist fatalistic pantheism.

Shinto is personal from first to last. Every one of its myriads of
gods is a personal being, many of them deified men.

The most popular are the souls of men who became famous for some
particularly noble, brave, or admirable deed. Hero-worship is nothing
if not personal. Furthermore, in its doctrine of "San-shin-ittai,"
"three gods, one body," it curiously suggests the doctrine of the
Trinity.

Popular Buddhism holds an equally personal conceptio