Page:Brinkley - Japan - Volume 1.djvu/188

 potence resulting from such anarchy encouraged the autochthons to vigorous revolt in the north.

These were the conditions with which Kwammu had to deal when he ascended the throne towards the close of the eighth century. The Taikwa and Taihō reforms had failed in certain important respects, and it is not difficult to detect the reason of their want of success. The system they introduced was, on the one hand, incompatible with the ends they were intended to compass, and, on the other, encouraged the tendencies they were designed to eradicate. The administrative principles of the Tang dynasty which the reformers copied, were so permeated with the spirit of pomp and ceremony; the functions of each office conferred such privileges and distinctions on its holder; the whole body of officialdom, wide as were the intervals between its various grades, was so far removed from the mass of the plebs, that irresistible forces became operative for the resurrection of the patriarchal rights which the fall of the Soga family had buried. Tenchi appreciated that his reforms could never be permanent unless he radically changed the status of the plebs. But the means he devised for that end—probably the only means within his power—were quite inadequate, and he does not seem to have perceived that the immense access of dignity and importance gained by the administrative class under the