ifferentiation between the three. The Emperor is the
Emperor, and God and country as well. The patriotism of the Japanese is
blind and unswerving loyalty to what is practically an absolutism. The
Emperor can do no wrong, nor can the five ambitious great men who have
his ear and control the destiny of Japan.

No great race adventure can go far nor endure long which has no deeper
foundation than material success, no higher prompting than conquest for
conquest's sake and mere race glorification. To go far and to endure, it
must have behind it an ethical impulse, a sincerely conceived
righteousness. But it must be taken into consideration that the above
postulate is itself a product of Western race-egotism, urged by our
belief in our own righteousness and fostered by a faith in ourselves
which may be as erroneous as are most fond race fancies. So be it. The
world is whirling faster to-day than ever before. It has gained impetus.
Affairs rush to conclusion. The Far East is the point of contact of the
adventuring Western people as well as of the Asiatic. We shall not have
to wait for our children's time nor our children's children. We shall
ourselves see and largely determine the adventure of the Yellow and the
Brown.

FENG-WANG-CHENG, MANCHURIA.
_June_ 1904,

WHAT LIFE MEANS TO ME

I was born in the working-class. Early I discovered enthusiasm,
ambition, and ideals; and to satisfy these became the problem of my
child-life. My environment was crude and rough and raw. I had no
outlook, but an uplook rather. My place in society was at the bottom.
Here life offered nothing but sordidness and wretchedness, both of the
flesh and the spirit; for here flesh and spirit were alike starved and
tormented.

Above me towered the colossal edifice of society, and to my mind the only
way out was up. Into this edifice I early resolved to climb. Up above,
men wore black clothes and boiled shirts, and women dressed in beautiful
gowns. Also, there were good things to eat, and there was plenty to eat.
This much for the flesh. Then there were the things of the spirit. Up
above me, I knew, were unselfishnesses of the spirit, clean and noble
thinking, keen intellectual living. I knew all this because I read
"Seaside Library" novels, in which, with the exception of the villains
and adventuresses, all men and women thought beautiful thoughts, spoke a
beautiful tongue, and performed glorious deeds. In short, as I acc