When Japan shut herself from the world

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Part of The American Chamber of Commerce Journal

Title: When Japan shut herself from the world
Language: English
Source: The American Chamber of Commerce Journal Volume 9 (No. 12) December 1929
Year: 1929
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Fulltext: 18 uecemoer, 19Z9 When Japan Shut Herself From The World When the three Portuguese adventurers, under the guidance of their Chinesc-junk captain —without any credentials, and all of doubtful antecedents—first made their appearance, driven by stress of weather, rather than their own good will, to an unknown coast, it proved to be that part of Japan owning the sovereignty of the Prince of Bungo; and we find the Japanese, though vigilant, manifested no reluctance to admit the strangers. They showed them much kindness even, and no obstacle was interposed to a free trade with the inhabitants, in the inter change of such commodities as they had with them. The natives and strangers were ulti mately so well pleased with each other that, by an arrangement with the Prince of Bungo, a Portuguese ship was to be sent annually, ‘laden with woolen cloths, furs, silks, taffetas, and other commodities needed by the Japanese.’ This was the commencement of European intercourse and trade, carrying us back to 1542-5. A few years later, Hansiro, a Japanese noble, fled his country for ‘an act of homicide’ (having run some fellow-subject through the body, no doubt), and took refuge in Goa. There he was converted and baptized. This proved the second link in the chain;for, being enterprising and shrewd, and animated probably with the hot zeal of a new convert, he soon persuaded the merchants of Goa, nothing loth we may imagine, that they might establish a profitable trade with Japan, while to the Jesuit fathers he promised a rich harvest of souls. He obviously preached to willing ears in both direc tions, and foremost among his listeners was the Jesuit apostle of the East, Francis Xavier, who had recently arrived. A ship was forthwith loaded with goods and presents wherewith to commence a permanent trade. For the accomplishment of spiritual objects, Francis Xavier himself embarked with the Japanese refugee, and a number of his order as missionaries. A goodly freight—Jesuit fathers, to win souls—merchants to make money: mer chandise for the people and their carnal wants— presents to propitiate the authorities—all were duly provided; and thus auspiciously began this second chapter. On arriving at Bungo they were received with open arms, and not tlie slightest opposition was made to the introduction of either trade or reli gion. No system of exclusion then existed; and such was the spirit of toleration, that the Govern ment made no objection to the open preaching of Christianity. Indeed, the Portuguese were freely permitted to go where they pleased in the empire, and to travel from one end of it to the The accompanying article is an excerpt from that book now very rare, The Capital of the Tycoon, by Britain’s first represen tative to Japan, Sir Rutherford Alcock, the editor’s copy being a Harper edition of 1863. The article shows how and why Japan was closed to commerce and com munication with the outside world for two centuries, save for the Dutch trading post of Decima, in Nagasaki harbor, where the Dutch lead lives of prisoners and their trade steadily declined. Now, of course, as ever since the international treaties were effected, Japan once again tolerates all religions; there may be 200,000 or 300,000 disciples of the Christian faith in Japan, including eminent men and women, but new creeds affect but little the deep philosophical bent of the country. Next month we shall have Alcock’s vivid description of the plight of the Dutch at Dccima, and in February his account of the manner in which Japan received the Perry treaties. This pre Mei ji period is a most instructive one.—Ed. other. ‘The people freely bought the goods of the traders, and listened to the teachings of the missionaries.’ And a little later we find it said that ‘if the feudal princes were ever at any time ready to quarrel with the merchant, it was because he would not come to their ports'. Passing on ward a few years, we find the Christianity of the Jesuit fathers spreading rapidly and universally; princes and rulers, nobles and plebeians, women and children, of all ranks and in large numbers, embraced the faith. Churches, Hospitals, Con vents, and Schools, were scattered over the country. Intermarriages between the Portu guese and wealthy Japanese were frequent. So little had Christianity to fear from the disposi tion of the governing powers, or the temper of the people, that the only' opposition they en countered in these early years of promise and fruitful labor came from the Bonzes or native priesthood; and they' seem to have been power less. For we read that, feeling their religion and influence discredited by the rapid adoption of a rival and hostile creed, they appealed to the emperor ‘to banish the Jesuit and Romish monks;' and it is related ‘that, annoyed by their impor tunities, he asked them how many' different religions there were in Japan.’ They answered ‘thirty-five.’ ‘Well,’ said the emperor, ‘when thirty-five religions can be tolerated, we can easily bear with thirty'-six: leave the strangers in peace.’ After forty years, the Roman Catholic faith was in such high esteem, and had such undisput ed possession of the field (no Protestant element having at that time appeared on the scene), that a Japanese embassy, composed of three princes, was sent to Rome to Pope Gregory XIII., with letters and valuable presents. Their reception at Rome was not only' magnificent, but their whole progress through Spain and Italy was one continued ovation. ‘A nation of thirty millions of civilized and intelligent people had been won from the heathen!’ Great indeed was the joy and triumph; and this was the culminating point of the Church’s success. In that same hour, while the artillery of St. “From the top of the Desk to the Waste-Basket” New Office Supplies for 1930 With the New Year you will want new supplies for your office. Let us furnish you from our big and modern stocks. Ink Wells Desk Sets Paper Envelopes Writing Fluids Paste Pencils Filing Supplies Blank Books Loose Leaf Systems Manila Gas Corporation Philippine Education Co., Inc. 101-103 Escolta Manila, P. I. IN RESPONDING TO ADVERTISEMENTS PLEASE MENTION THE AMERICAN CHAMBER OF COMMERCE JOURNAL December, 1929 THE AMERICAN CHAMBER OF COMMERCE JOURNAL 19 Angelo, answered by the guns of the Vatican, was thundering a welcome to the Japanese am bassadors, an edict had gone forth from the Kubo-sama, or sovereign lord of Japan, banish ing all Catholic missionaries within six months, on pain of death; and ordering all the crosses to be thrown down, and all the churches to be razed to the ground. When the Jesuit Superior, Pire Valignani, returned with the ambassadors, after an absence of eight years (so long had it taken to exchange amenities across distant seas and foreign lands in those days), he found this edict in force, and partially carried out. The old King of Bungo, the great protector of the Jesuits, was dead, his successor ill disposed. All their Christian com munities, schools, and hospitals had been sup pressed, and the missionaries dispersed, expelled, or forced into concealment. There are few more striking examples of the instability of human affairs; and it must have been a cruel blow to Valignani, as the Superior of the Order, so long happy and successful in all his efforts. We enter on the third and last phase of this eventful history. The first edict for the banish ment of the missionaries was published in June, 1587. All that follows is but a narrative of partially interrupted persecutions, the decay of trade, increasing restrictions, and at last the expulsion of all, amid scenes of martyrdom and sweeping destruction. In the year 1635, the Portuguese were shut up in Decima, and onlyallowed to trade there, amidst, it is said, the jeers and derisions of their Dutch rivals. A year or two later, the fall of the last Christian strong-hold, Simabara, battered in breach by the Dutch artillery, under Kockebecker, marked the final catastrophe, and the close of all rela tions but the miserable ones allowed to the Dutch factory, which an avenging Nemesis transferred to the prison bounds of their ruined rivals in Decima. Since that date until recent treaties were signed, no Japanese had been allow ed to leave his island home, nor foreigners to land. All who had been cast on shore, or made the attempt, had either been killed or imprison ed. Great must be the power wielded by the rulers of this strange country, thus, for two cen turies, to succeed in preventing the departure of a single Japanese subject! Yet such appears to be the fact, though before this edict they were enterprising sailors, and, if we may believe the records of the period, not only traded with the Indian archipelago, but even extended their voyages as far as South America. Thus briefly >ve have the whole history of European inter course (for the few attempts made by the British and French to take part were too feeble and inter rupted to be wortny of much note), and two questions press themselves on the attention of all who read. Whence the seemingly sudden and violent change in the policy of the Japanese? And, was it sudden in reality, or of slow and in sidious growth—which only came suddenly upon Europeans, because they blinded them selves to the signs of change and indications of danger, otherwise plainly enough to be dis cerned, had any one looked with clear and intel ligent eye? The accounts of the period are full of details of feuds between the different monastic orders; of the pride, avarice, and overbearing arrogance of the priests; the overreaching and insatiable cupidity of the Portuguese and Spanish mer chants, which latter charges are not even limited to the laymen. But, admitting all these causes to have been in operation, and exercising the influence which belongs to them, it is impossible to doubt that other and more profound causes of distrust and dissatisfaction chiefly moved Taiko-sama, when laying the foundation of his usurped empire, to irreconcilable enmity, direct ed more especially, if not altogether and ex clusively, against the Padres of every order, and their converts. One cause of such enmity lies, indeed, on the surface. The great success of the Jesuits and missiona ries of various monastic orders had been based, in part at least, on the shifting sands of political favor and influence with the feudatory princes in their several territories; a turbulent race, as was the same class in the days of the early French and English kings: not always at peace with each other, and often in league against their Suzerain. One of the most obvious conditions of strength to the latter was the abasement and weakening of the nobles. Taiko-sama, in order to strengthen and render hereditary his sovereign power, necessarily therefore set himself to this task, as did Louis XL, and, later, Richelieu and Louis XIV., in France. Whatever was identified with the Feudal chiefs could not fail to share the fate of an order doomed to destruction or humiliation. While the Jesuit, therefore, sought to promote the objects of his mission by favor of princes and court influence, and, for a time, reaped great fruit therefrom, these same Feudatory princes were looking to force and intrigue to advance their own interests, and uphold their cause against an ambitious and successful general, who had seized the quasi sceptre. That both the princes and their protdgds, the missionaries, should be involved in a common ruin, was in the nature of things to be expected, and indeed inevitable. If one feudatory prince protected Christianity, it was equally open to his successor or rival to attack and persecute it. The spiri tual guide who had put his trust in Princes and the Sword, found all the aid of man impotent to save when the hour of trial and persecution came. They had built upon a mundane foun dation with the aid of sword and buckler, and by the same was their ruin effected. But beneath all this lay other causes, wider and more penetrating, as well as more perma nent in their influence. Another and far more fatal element of destruction had been slowly but surely preparing the way for the final catas trophe from the beginning—undermining the very ground upon which the whole spiritual edifice was built, whether Jesuit or Augustinian, Franciscan or Dominican, Spaniard or Portu guese, fashioned the walls. The determining cause of the downfall and utter destruction of the Roman Church in Japan is to be sought in the pretension to a spiritual supremacy, which is but another name for the monopoly of power, since all that is political or secular must bow to God’s viceregent on earth, who claims the right to bind and to loosen, to absolve subjects of their oath and fealty, and dethrone kings by his edict. This preten sion to supremacy and papal infallibility—to a power as unlimited as it is irresponsible—has been woven into the very texture and fabric of the Church of Rome, and has long been consider ed inseparable from it. The Japanese rulers, who during nearly fifty years successively never relaxed in their policy to extirpate out of the land all trace of the mis sionaries and their teaching, and were deterred by no difficulties, no sacrifice of life or commer cial advantages, and never stopped until their object was finally accomplished, clearly saw that between them and such teachers there could be neither peace nor truce. The two systems were necessarily antagonistic and mutually destructive. The Siogun must veil his power to the higher pretensions of the Pope and the priests; hold it from their hands, liable to be dispossessed at their pleasure, or be engaged in interminable conflict, all the more dangerous that spiritual weapons could be brought to bear, as well as the arm of flesh, by his adver saries of the cowl and rosary. Taiko-sama, a man of no ordinary gifts apparently, who first engaged in a war to the death, and issued the edict of extermination, must indeed have been something more than dull not to have his doubts raised and his worst conclusions verified by the tenor of the letters to the Pope, given by the three Feudal princes to their ambassadors. Hear how they run. Thus writes the Prince of Bungo: ‘To him who ought to be adored and who holds the place of the King of Heaven, the great and very noly Pope’; and, in the body of the letter, he continues in the same strain: ‘Your holiness (who holds the place of God on earth.)’ The King of Arima addressed himself ‘to the very great and holy lord whom I adore, because he holds on earth the place of God himself.’ The Prince of Omara goes, if possible, farther: ‘With hands raised toward heaven, and senti ments of profound admiration, I adore the most holy Pope, who holds the place of God on earth.” With what feelings must Taiko-sama have spelled over these acts of homage to an alien sovereign by three of the leading feudatory princes of the empire, when the death of Nobunanga in 1582, the sovereign friend of the mis sionaries, threw the reins of power into his hands? There is an absurd story told of the Siogun’s jealousy having first been roused by the indiscreet answer of a Spaniard, who, on being asked how his master had managed to possess himself of half the world, replied: ‘He com* menced by sending priests, who win over the people, and, when this is done, his troops are dispatched to join the Christian, and the con quest is easy and complete.’ I say it is absurd, because, in the first place, the account of the process then in vogue is much too near the truth to have been openly told by one of the chief agents; and, next, it was too palpably calculated to lead to the expulsion of the narrator and all his race. Nor was any such plain-spoken traveler needed. Taiko-sama must have been blind not to have seen whither the Church of Rome was tending, and how irreconcilable were its pretensions and his own. Another law than that of the Japanese empire had been introduced, and other Rulers and ad ministrators than those nominated by either Mikado or Siogun (the titular and the effective rulers of Japan) were in full exercise of their functions, claiming from Japanese subjects, once become converts, fealty and implicit obed ience to the Church’s commands—an obedience which might at any time be turned against the authority and rule of the territorial Sovereign. There was nothing very far-fetched in the con clusion, or monstrous in the assumption that such was the tendency of the Church polity. That same sovereign of Spain, whose dominions, Taiko-sama heard, had been extended over half the world by priestly aid, had actually moved the Pope to issue a bull to dethrone the Queen of England in favor of another pretender to the crown, to raise up conspirators among her sub jects, and release them from all oaths or ties of allegiance. This and no other cause, it is impossible to doubt, led to the final expulsion of every Euro pean, the extermination of every Christian convert, and the closing of every port for two centuries. The annihilation of commerce and material interests was merely a necessary con sequence of the close connection that had sub sisted between the professors of religion and the traders, taken in connection with their common nationality. OH, BOLONY! O some aspire To homes up higher Among the angels, With starry crown To sit them down And chant evangels— Now I would not go far For Heaven’s sake, But tramp a continent Or swim a lake For the kind of good bolony like our butcher used to make. For riches some Would give a tome ’Neath desert bow With some girl friend, They count the end Of gain enow— Now 1 would not go far For money’s sake, But tramp a continent Or swim a lake For the kind of good bolony like our butcher used to make. Within the shops Among the chops They have some, yes, But not the kind That’s on my mind And yours, I guess— I surely 'd not go far For such a fake, Nor tramp a continent Nor swim a lake—• Ah, there ain’t no good bolony like our butcher used to moke! —W. R.