Page:Brinkley - Japan - Volume 5.djvu/99



NE of the most important reforms effected by the Meiji Government was in the field of education. The former rulers of Japan paid comparatively little attention to this matter, and never seem to have considered that any duty devolved on them to provide for the instruction of any section of the people except the samurai. But the statesmen of the Restoration saw that the nation could not be left to equip itself with machinery for studying the arts and sciences of the new civilisation, and saw further that if there was to be any radical progress the people must be compelled to extend their knowledge beyond the Chinese classics. Thus, without loss of time, an extensive system of schools was organised, and education was declared to be compulsory. Every child on attaining the age of six must now attend a Common Elementary School, where during a four years' course instruction is given in morals, reading, writing, arithmetic, the rudiments of technical work, gymnastics, and poetry. Year by year the attendance at these schools increases. In 1898,