Page:Brinkley - Japan - Volume 2.djvu/21

 ITS HISTORY ARTS AND LITERATURE

HISTORY OF THE MILITARY EPOCH

AD the conditions existing in the Heian epoch prevailed throughout the whole country, Japan would doubtless have paid the penalty never escaped by a demoralised nation. But in proportion as the Court, the principal officials, and the noblemen in the capital, abandoned themselves to pleasure and neglected the functions of government, the provincial families acquired strength. The members of these families differed essentially from the aristocrats of Kyōtō. They had no sympathy with the enervating luxury of city life, and if they chanced to visit the capital, they could not fail to detect the effeminacy and incompetence of the Court nobles. These latter, on the other hand, sought to win the friendship of the rustic captains in order to gain their protection against the priests, who defied the 1