Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 11.djvu/351

 THE JAPANESE AS PEERS OF WESTERN PEOPLES 335

groom and bride. In contrast with such looseness of the marital bond, the relation between father and son was and is exceedingly strong. Filial piety ranked next to loyalty in the scale of duties, and was carried even to excess ; whereas, according to competent observers of both Orient and Occident, we allow our children to fall short of duty in this particular.

In the realm of religion, the Japanese, like ourselves, adopted the faith of an alien race : we a reformed Judaism of the Semites, they a reformed Brahmanism of the Indo-Kelts. Position on the plane of human culture in this matter must be estimated by what Japanese did for this imported Buddhism; and that, at least, equals all that any European people ever did for Christianity, exceding much though it might be. There was the ardor of early faith, a development extending over a millennium of years, dogmatic interest resulting in the extant eight great sects with thirty-six subsects, provision of stately temples with their gor- geous cult, and the wide extension of monasticism. Nowhere in Japan can one travel ten miles without coming upon some tera or temple, devoted to this noble faith; but, still more, nowhere can one travel a single mile without coming upon some miya, or shrine, devoted to a primitive, native faith, that of Shintoism, faithful devotion to which, even in presence of the more imposing Buddhism, must be counted a service to religion over and above anything achieved in Europe, where only mere fragments what Professor E. B. Tylor calls " survivals " survived the incursion of the superior faith. This faithful preservation of their early religion has rendered Shintoism the most picturesque, complete, and ancient religion of the natural or tribal type now extant. This statement may seem open to challenge, but the writer is on familiar ground here, and is ready to defend his thesis against all comers.

It follows from this survey that the thesis stated at the outset is established : the Japanese do hold position upon the same plane of culture as western peoples, and are even rivals for pre- eminence in many respects. There can be no "yellow peril," therefore, in the Japanese leadership of a progressive Far Orient, but only an honorable rivalry, profitable alike to yellow and white.