Page:Shinto, the Way of the Gods - Aston - 1905.djvu/382

372 If men will have upright hearts they must be neither foolish nor clever; they must indulge neither in grief nor in hate, but be as the flowers which unfold under the genial warmth of a vernal sun.

''If there be any who, having studied the books of China or practised the teachings of India, despise the instructions of the Gods of our own Japan, I will go to their houses and either slay their infant children or visit them with, sore disease, or turn away from them their followers, or by the God of Fire destroy their dwellings. This is not because I hate the doctrines of China or India, but because it is rejecting the root for the branches''.

Oracle of Itsukushima in Aki:—

''Of old the people of my country knew not my name. Therefore I was born into the visible world and endured a base existence. In highest Heaven I am the Deity of the Sun, in the mid-sky I show my doings. I hide in the great Earth and produce all things: in the midst of the Ocean I am the eight Dragon-kings, and my power pervades the four seas. If the poorest of mankind come here once for worship, show me their faces and declare their wishes, within seven days, fourteen days, twenty-one days, or it may be three years or seven years, according to the person and the importance of his prayer, I will surely grant their heart's desire. But the wicked of heart must not apply to me. Those who do not abandon mercy will not be abandoned by me''.

Revival of Pure Shinto.—The seventeenth century witnessed a great revival of Chinese learning in Japan. It embraced not only the renewed study of the ancient classics of Confucius and Mencius, but the philosophical writings of Chu-hi and other sceptical writers of the Sung Dynasty (960-1278). The Samurai, or governing caste of the nation, devoted themselves to these studies with amazing zeal and enthusiasm, to the great neglect of Buddhism, which from this time forward was left mainly to the common people.