Page:Brinkley - Japan - Volume 5.djvu/161

 benevolent rule on the one side, and righteous and sincere submission on the other; the last, by the mutual desire of promoting virtue. Side by side with these and other equally noble bases of ethics, it laid down an axiom which never obtained open endorsement in Japan, but which any reader following the historical retrospect contained in previous chapters must have again and again detected underlying the conduct of prominent actors upon the political stage. Confucius and Mencius alike held that the Throne is an institution of heaven, but what the former's teaching only implied, the latter's boldly formulated, namely, that the claim of "divine right" ceases to be valid unless it inures to the people's good. The people were the most important element in the Chinese Sage's conception of a nation. If the sovereign's rule were injurious to them, he must be dethroned. No Japanese in any epoch would have subscribed such a doctrine in its naked outlines. Yet in practice it received constant, though limited obedience, and the methods of obedience show striking conformity with the sequence of Mencius' prescriptions. For that philosopher laid down that the task of removing an unworthy ruler should be undertaken, first, by a member of the ruler's family; secondly, by a high minister, acting purely with a view to the public weal; and thirdly, failing either of these, by some subordinate "instrument of heaven." Mencius did not inculcate sedition, regicide, or open violence; the