Japan: And the Last
Shall Be First
Wealthy we do not at all think [Japan] will ever become: the advantages con
ferred by nature, with the exception of climate, and the love of indolence and
pleasure of the people themselves, forbid it. The Japanese are a happy race,
and being content with little, are not likely to achieve much.nee in China, the Europeans would inevitably go on to the leg-
V^endary Cipangu (Japan). (Actually, the first Europeans to arrive
on Japanese soil, in 1543, were thrown up on shore by a storm.) They
had heard wonderful things about these islands: "inexhaustible" gold
in the greatest abundance, palace roofed and ceilinged with gold, ta
bles of pure gold "of considerable thickness"... gold, gold, gold.* To
say nothing of souls for saving.
The Japan they encountered was very different from the hearsay.
Gold there was, but not enough to arouse passions. As in China, the
people were ruled by an emperor, but more in principle than in fact,
for the land was divided into smaller kingdoms or domains (what the
Japanese called han), whose rulers seemed to enjoy absolute power
over their subjects. These kingdoms were then engaged in intermittent
wars with one another. Indeed, in that second half of the sixteenth cen
tury, Japan seemed awash in blood.
This favorably impressed European visitors, whose own behavior
gave them a well-founded respect for force and violence. As a Por-
- The picture is as given in Marco Polo's Travels, Book III, ch. 2. Polo himself never
visited Japan.
—Japan Herald, 9 April 18811