Page:Path of Vision; pocket essays of East and West.djvu/127

 Japan, we all have our distinct deities, which we invest with our own personality. In this sense, we are all self-worshippers: the gods of our allegiance, our devotion, are the gods of our pride. Else why should we be so attached to the soil, the plants, the flowers, the cliffs of our native land? There is something even in a familiar fern that leaves in the soul the impress of its own locality.

In my own country the flowers are the toys of our childhood; they are nature's precious presents, which she never fails to bring us on every holiday. Even on Christmas she calls the children to her snow-crowned heights to surprise them with her wild violets. And these they bring to the altar of the local Saint, who promises to fulfill all their desires if they pray for them while picking the flowers in his name. Once I remember, in a fit of envy and anger I prayed for the death of a boy who got ahead of me to a favorite spot under a sheltering rock, where the violets bloomed in abundance. A week later there was an