Page:The Spirit of Japanese Poetry (Noguchi).djvu/70

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She promised that she would dance the dance that makes the Palace of the Moon turn round, and would leave her dance behind as a token to mortal men, if her robe were restored to her. However, the fisherman doubted lest she might return home to heaven without dancing at all; then the fairy said:

As I said, the No is the creation of the age when, by virtue of sutra or the Buddha’s holy name, any straying ghosts or spirits in Hades were enabled to enter Nirvana; it is no wonder that most of the plays have to deal with those ghosts or Buddhism. That ghostliness appeals to the poetical thought and fancy even of the modern age, because it has no age. It is the essence of the Buddhistic belief, however fantastic, to stay poetical for ever. Although the No’s repertory does not change, our conception and understanding will be altered; it is thus that they can keep always fresh themselves. Here we have one play called “Yama Uba” or “Mountain Elf”; the author, undoubtedly a learned priest, attempts to express by the play that we are souls much troubled in a maze of