es of the Occidental nations (chiefly of Spain and
Portugal) were banished. The Christian religion (Roman Catholic),
which for over fifty years had enjoyed free access and had made great
progress, was forbidden and stamped out, not without much bloodshed.
Foreign travel and commerce were strictly interdicted. A particular
school of Confucian ethics was adopted and taught as the state
religion. Feudalism was systematically established and intentionally
developed. Each and every man had his assigned and recognized place in
the social fabric, and change was not easy. It is doubtful if any
European country has ever given feudalism so long and thorough a
trial. Never has feudalism attained so complete a development as it
did in Japan under the Tokugawa regime of over 250 years.

During this period no influences came from other lands to disturb the
natural development. With the exception of three ships a year from
Holland, an occasional stray ship from other lands, and from fifteen
to twenty Dutchmen isolated in a little island in the harbor of
Nagasaki, Japan had no communication with foreign lands or alien
peoples.

Of this period, extending to the middle of the present century, the
ordinary visitor and even the resident have but a superficial
knowledge. All the changes that have taken place in Japan, since the
coming of Perry in 1854, are attributed by the easy-going tourist to
the external pressure of foreign nations. But such travelers know
nothing of the internal preparations that had been making for
generations previous to the arrival of Perry. The tourist is quite
ignorant of the line of Japanese scholars that had been undermining
the authority of the military rulers, "the Tokugawa," in favor of the
Imperial line which they had practically supplanted.

The casual student of Japan has been equally ignorant of the real
mental and moral caliber of the Japanese. Dressed in clothing that
appeared to us fantastic, and armed with cumbersome armor and
old-fashioned guns, it was easy to jump to the conclusion that the
people were essentially uncivilized. We did not know the intellectual
discipline demanded of one, whether native or foreign, who would
master the native language or the native systems of thought. We forgot
that we appeared as grotesque and as barbarous to them as they to us,
and that mental ability and moral worth are qualities that do not show
on the surface of a nation's civilization. While they thought us t