lafcadio hearn glimpses of unfamiliar japan

And this not only because he thoroughly understands that people, but because the class to which he belongs is still unreasoningly, though quite naturally, ashamed of its older beliefs. For him, superstitions are simply superstitions their relation to the emotional nature of the people interests him not at all. Rarely does his university training in modern philosophy impel him to attempt any independent study of relations, either sociological or psychological. But he is inclined to treat with undue contempt all conceptions of the supernatural and toward the great religious questions of the hour his attitude is one of perfect apathy.

Except as regards his characteristic indifference toward abstract ideas in general and metaphysical speculation in particular, the Occidentalised Japanese of to-day stands almost on the intellectual plane of the cultivated Parisian or Bostonian. The popular religious ideas–especially the ideas derived from Buddhism -and the curious superstitions touched upon in these sketches are little shared by the educated classes of New Japan. None can feel more than the author himself how little has been accomplished in these volumes, and how much remains to do.

The reader may, perhaps, be disappointed by their rarity for a residence of little more than four years among the people–even by one who tries to adopt their habits and customs–scarcely suffices to enable the foreigner to begin to feel at home in this world of strangeness. Mitford is the Unfamiliar Japan of which I have been able to obtain a few glimpses. Of the inner life of the Japanese the world at large knows but little: their religion, their superstitions, their ways of thought, the hidden springs by which they move–all these are as yet mysteries.’ ‘The books which have been written of late years about Japan have either been compiled from official records, or have contained the sketchy impressions of passing travellers. In the Introduction to his charming Tales of Old Japan, Mr. Emeritus Professor of Philology and Japanese in the Imperial University of Tokyoħ THE CHIEF CITY OF THE PROVINCE OF THE GODS 8 KITZUKI: THE MOST ANCIENT SHRINE IN JAPAN 9 IN THE CAVE OF THE CHILDREN’S GHOSTS 10ĚT MIONOSEKI WHOSE KINDNESS ALONE RENDERED POSSIBLE MY SOJOURN IN THE ORIENT,īASIL HALL CHAMBERLAIN, ESQ. GLIMPSES OF UNFAMILIAR JAPAN First Series

Lafcadio hearn glimpses of unfamiliar japan