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324 statesman is a favourite one with the Japanese. We have seen that Hakuseki and Kiusō were constantly consulted upon official matters by the Shōgun's Government. Motoöri was invited by the Daimio of Kishiu to place on record his views on the government of a Daimio's domain, and did so in a little work in two volumes entitled Tama Kushige ("The Precious Casket"). In this treatise he unbends from the severe purism of his other works, and sets an example of a simple, practical style well suited to the subjects discussed, and level to the meanest understanding. His position is that of a cautious reformer. He saw that one of the greatest abuses of the day was the excessive number of officials and retainers of all kinds, and urged earnestly that it should be diminished; gradually, however, so as to avoid injury to vested interests. The oppressed condition of the peasantry had his warmest sympathy. He thought that the ikki or agrarian risings, which had become common, were a disgrace to the Daimios in whose jurisdiction they occurred, rather than to the ignorant men who took part in them. The hara-kiri is another subject on which he had a strong opinion. In his view this form of suicide had become far too common. It was not for the public advantage, he considered, that honest and capable men should do away with themselves because they were responsible for some triffing official miscarriage, as was too often the case. He was in favour of prohibiting all hara-kiri without a formal order from the culprit's superior.

It is not by writing of this kind, however, that Motoöri's political influence is to be measured. His works helped materially to enfranchise the Japanese nation from their moral and intellectual servitude to China, and to produce