Page:Brinkley - Japan - Volume 4.djvu/259

 powers often created situations in which the Liberals were able to pose as victims of official tyranny, so that they grew in popularity and the contagion of political agitation spread.

Three years later (1881), another split occurred in the ranks of the ruling oligarchy. Ōkuma Shigenobu seceded from the administration, and was followed by a number of able men who had owed their appointments to his patronage, or who, during his tenure of office as Minister of Finance, had passed under the influence of his powerful personality. If Itagaki be called the Rousseau of Japan, Ōkuma may be regarded as the Peel. To remarkable financial ability and a lucid, vigorous judgment, he adds the faculty of placing himself on the crest of any wave that a genuine aura popularis has begun to swell. He too inscribed on his banner of revolt against the oligarchy the motto "Constitutional Government," and it might have been expected that his followers would join hands with those of Itagaki, since the avowed political purpose of both was identical. They did nothing of the kind. Ōkuma organised an independent party, calling themselves "Progressists" (Shimpo-to), who not only stood aloof from the Liberals but even assumed an attitude hostile to them. This fact is eloquent. It shows that Japan's first political parties were grouped, not about principles, but about persons. Hence an inevitable lack of cohesion among their elements and a constant ten-