celebrating Imperial official events.

But the schools are the great strongholds of the new propaganda. History
is so taught to the young as to focus everything upon Imperialism, and
to diminish as far as possible the contrast between ancient and modern
conditions. The same is true of the instruction given to army and navy
recruits. Thus, though Shinto is put in the forefront, little stress
is laid on its mythology, which would be apt to shock even the Japanese
mind at the present day. To this extent, where a purpose useful to
the ruling class is to be served, criticism is practised, though not
avowedly. Far different is the case with so-called "historical facts,"
such as the alleged foundation of the Monarchy in 660 B.C. and similar
statements paralleled only for absurdity by what passed for history in
mediaeval Europe, when King Lear, Brute, King of Britain, etc., etc.,
were accepted as authentic personages. For the truth, known to all
critical investigators, is that, instead of going back to a remote
antiquity, the origins of Japanese history are recent as compared
with that of European countries. The first glimmer of genuine Japanese
history dates from the fifth century AFTER Christ, and even the accounts
of what happened in the sixth century must be received with caution.
Japanese scholars know this as well as we do; it is one of the certain
results of investigation. But the Japanese bureaucracy does not desire
to have the light let in on this inconvenient circumstance. While
granting a dispensation re the national mythology, properly so called,
it exacts belief in every iota of the national historic legends. Woe to
the native professor who strays from the path of orthodoxy. His wife
and children (and in Japan every man, however young, has a wife and
children) will starve. From the late Prince Ito's grossly misleading
"Commentary on the Japanese Constitution" down to school compendiums,
the absurd dates are everywhere insisted upon. This despite the fact
that the mythology and the so-called early history are recorded in the
same works, and are characterised by like miraculous impossibilities;
that the chronology is palpably fraudulent; that the speeches put
into the mouths of ancient Mikados are centos culled from the Chinese
classics; that their names are in some cases derived from Chinese
sources; and that the earliest Japanese historical narratives, the
earliest known social usages, and even the centralised Impe