which had fallen into discredit, was
taken out of its cupboard and dusted. The common people, it is true,
continued to place their affections on Buddhism, the popular festivals
were Buddhist, Buddhist also the temples where they buried their dead.
The governing class determined to change all this. They insisted on the
Shinto doctrine that the Mikado descends in direct succession from the
native Goddess of the Sun, and that He himself is a living God on earth
who justly claims the absolute fealty of his subjects. Such things as
laws and constitutions are but free gifts on His part, not in any sense
popular rights. Of course, the ministers and officials, high and low,
who carry on His government, are to be regarded not as public
servants, but rather as executants of supreme--one might say
supernatural--authority. Shinto, because connected with the Imperial
Family, is to be alone honoured. Therefore, the important right of
burial, never before possessed by it, was granted to its priests.
Later on, the right of marriage was granted likewise--an entirely novel
departure in a land where marriage had never been more than a civil
contract. Thus the Shinto priesthood was encouraged to penetrate into
the intimacy of family life, while in another direction it encroached on
the field of ethics by borrowing bits here and there from Confucian
and even from Christian sources. Under a regime of ostensible religious
toleration, the attendance of officials at certain Shinto services was
required, and the practice was established in all schools of bowing down
several times yearly before the Emperor's picture. Meanwhile Japanese
polities had prospered; her warriors had gained great victories.
Enormous was the prestige thus accruing to Imperialism and to the
rejuvenated Shinto cult. All military successes were ascribed to the
miraculous influence of the Emperor's virtue, and to the virtues of His
Imperial and divine ancestors--that is, of former Emperors and of Shinto
deities. Imperial envoys were regularly sent after each great victory
to carry the good tidings to the Sun Goddess at her great shrine at Ise.
Not there alone, but at the other principal Shinto shrines throughout
the land, the cannon captured from Chinese or Russian foes were
officially installed, with a view to identifying Imperialism, Shinto,
and national glory in the popular mind. The new legend is enforced
wherever feasible--for instance, by means of a new set of festivals