y a man of obscure rank was sometimes included in the royal
collections, but the name of the author never. And indeed some of the
distinctive quality of Japanese poetry is undoubtedly due to the air
in which it flourished. It is never religious, and it is often
immoral, but it is always suffused with a certain hue of courtliness,
even gentleness. The language is of the most refined delicacy, the
thought is never boorish or rude; there is the self-collectedness
which we find in the poetry of France and Italy during the
Renaissance, and in England during the reign of Queen Anne. It
exhibits the most exquisite polish, allied with an avoidance of every
shocking or perturbing theme. It seems to combine the enduring lustre
of a precious metal with the tenuity of gold-leaf. Even the most vivid
emotions of grief and love, as well as the horrors of war, were
banished from the Japanese Parnassus, where the Muse of Tragedy
warbles, and the lyric Muse utters nothing but ditties of exquisite
and melting sweetness, which soothe the ear, but never stir the heart:
while their meaning is often so obscure as even to elude the
understanding.

Allied to this polite reserve of the courtly poets of Japan is the
simplicity of their style, which is, doubtless, in a large measure,
due to the meagre range of spiritual faculties which characterize the
Japanese mind. This intellectual poverty manifests itself in the
absence of all personification and reference to abstract ideas. The
narrow world of the poet is here a concrete and literal sphere of
experience. He never rises on wings above the earth his feet are
treading, and the things around him that his fingers touch. But within
this limited area he revels in a great variety of subjects. In the
present anthology will be found ballads, love-songs, elegies, as well
as short stanzas composed with the strictest economy of word and
phrase. These we must characterize as epigrams. They are gems,
polished with almost passionless nicety and fastidious care. They
remind us very much of Roman poetry under the later Empire, and many
of them might have been written by Martial, at the court of Domitian.
They contain references to court doings, compliments, and sentiments
couched in pointed language. The drama of Japan is represented by two
types, one of which may be called lyrical, and the other the comedy of
real life. Specimens of both are found in the present collection,
which will furnish English readers