I Discover the
Seven Japanese Virtues
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By Gareth Jones
March 1935
In the fast
few years we have heard much of the vices, which beset Japan, of the
ruthlessness with which she seizes all that she desires, of the
intolerance which animates her super-patriots, of the unfair methods
which characterise a part of her business competition and of the
militarism which is drenching her youth. Is that, however, the whole
picture? Are there no redeeming features in the nation, which is
amazing the world?
There are many, and I have selected seven Japanese virtues
in order that our conception of Japan may be more balanced. I do not
deny that many accusations levelled against Japan are true. I merely
wish give some of my brighter impressions during a stay of five of weeks
in Tokyo, in the countryside near Fujiyama and in Kobe.
The first virtue I have chosen is courtesy. In the
most remote villages while I tramped though those rugged Japanese
mountains or along the magnificent coast of the Izu Peninsula, I was
received with a charming politeness. Fishermen who perhaps had never
seen a white man before would go out of their way to show
kindness to me, while the children, far from being terrified by the
appearance of a stranger with white skin and eyes, would approach me
with friendliness and a complete absence of fear.
It is not the average Japanese, but the pompous petty
official who has been guilty at treating foreigners with suspicion as
potential spies. I found more laughter than mistrust. Indeed. Japanese
girls seem to spend their time preparing to giggle, in the act of
giggling, or having giggled.
The
Bath-house
The second virtue is cleanliness, which for many Japanese is more
than godliness. During my first day in Tokyo I went walking through
some of the side streets when I saw a temple with curious gables. Men
and women in kimonos were entering its portals after taking off their
clattering wooden clogs. I approached the building, doffed my hat
reverently, sat down on the wooden stairway at the entrance, pulled off
my shoes and handed them to a temple servant. He gave me a stick, on
which were written Japanese letters: Ah! Obviously prayer-stick I said
to myself and expecting to see a great image of Buddha, I entered the
building.
There was no smell of incense, there was no holy image,
there were no dim lights; what I saw was a number of naked men splashing
about in great baths from which the steam soared upwards in clouds.
My ‘prayer-stick’ was merely the number of the locker for my
shoes; my temple was one of the thousands of bathhouses scattered
through out Japan.
“Cleanliness is a religion for the Japanese,” I concluded
after I had noticed everywhere the spotless of the homes and the love of
the people for hot waters. It is a boon to the traveller who after
walking all day may enter a Japanese inn and wallow for hours in the
luxurious warmth of the volcanic hot spring baths before squatting on
the floor to eat with chop sticks fish, prawns and bamboo, while in one
corner a delicately-arranged flower lights up the simplicity of the
surroundings.
Love of
Nature
This flower is a symbol of the-Japanese love of nature, the third
virtue, with which is closely linked the artistic richness of their
country. On holidays the railway stations of Japan resemble those of
Germany, for they are packed with ordinary folk who are going to spend a
day in the mountains or along the coast, or who are taking the boat to
the “Isle of Suicides,” where they may see someone in despair leaping
into the boiling cauldron of the crater. The beauty of views or the
glories of a garden easily move them.
When I went to see the former Foreign Minister of Japan,
Baron Shidehara whose life by the way, has been endangered many times by
fanatics, he asked me what had impressed me most in his country. I
replied immediately: “The fascinating trees with their grotesque and
poetic shapes.” As I enlarged upon the delight with which I had seen
the trees of Japan I noticed that his eyes become filled with tears and
that for some minutes he could not speak. Eventually he said: “I am
moved by that. If is curious also that Lord Grey said a similar thing
when he came to see me and when we looked out at those trees near this
lake.”
I learned later that tears of appreciation of nature come as
easily to sensitive Japanese as does laughter.
Loyalty
Loyalty to the State is the fourth virtue, and in
this the Japanese resembles the Prussian soldier. So far does this
virtue go that it sometimes degenerates into a vice, for the claims of
the nation are often followed at the expense of the family. “Duty knows
no family” is a Japanese proverb and a friend of mine who has lived for
years in Japan commented in striking terms upon this: "I have many
Japanese friends,” he declared to me, “but there is not a single one I
could trust if any motive of patriotism came between us. There is not
one of them who would not poison me if their country were at stake.
And, what is more they would poison their families for their nation’s
sake!”
Akin to loyalty is the fifth virtue, which I have chosen and
that is self-sacrifice. When I was in Tokyo a monument was
unveiled to the “Three Human Torpedoes”, the men who had sacrifice
themselves by placing themselves, during war operations, in torpedoes
which they guided until they were killed.
The Japanese will tolerate an exceedingly low standard of
living if they are thus serving the State. There is also strong
self-sacrifice among the Communists in Japan, who well-know that their
fate is a cruel one if caught, but who still go on propagating the ideas
of Karl Marx and know that they are braving an attack from merciless
patriotic societies
Courage
This spirit of self-sacrifice breeds the sixth virtue
physical courage. In the character of the Japanese there is a
strong element of dare-devilry. Aviators have been known to take mad
risks and even kill themselves by their daring in order that their
families might receive a posthumous medal. Is there, however, moral
courage, the courage to brave the militarists among the middle classes
and among the internationalist businessmen?
The seventh virtue, which is found among soldiers and among
many young idealists, but unfortunately not among a section of
politicians many of whom are corrupt - is a disdain for wealth, a
respect for poverty, a Spartan devotion to hardship.
When I visited the conqueror of Manchukuo, General Araki
former War Minister and a possible future Prime Minister. I found him
living in a simple cottage with a small garden at the end of an
insignificant side-lane. It was not the House of “His Excellency the
Minister of War"; it was the house of a simple soldier who despised the
goods of this world.
Perhaps that is the secret of Japan’s advance.
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