THE JAPANESE AS PEERS OF WESTERN PEOPLES
EDMUND BUCKLEY The University of Chicago
The finest that is, the most rapid and complete adjust- ment to political environment ever made by a people was that achieved by the Japanese in their revolution, which was at the same time a restoration, culminating in 1868. Although fur- ther acquaintance with Japanese history reveals the fact that for over a century scholars and princes alike, though from different motives, had been working up that restoration of the imperial family to power, the same further acquaintance also reveals the astonishing depth and breadth of that revolution, so that wonder at the total achievement need not diminish. This marvel of statesmanship was generally perceived and generously acknowl- edged by the civilized powers that had proved useful as its excit- ing cause; but no proper inference was ever drawn as to what might be expected in other spheres of culture. Indeed, the favorite position for wiseacres, resident in Japan or elsewhere, was to query whether the Japanese had done more than don the garb of civilization, while its body and soul remained foreign to them. Probably no one would put this query now ; certainly no Russian would put it in respect to the science and art of warfare; and continuous and brilliant success $n this terrific branch of modern culture has so called universal attention to its authors that the query will probably never be put again in reference to any sphere whatsoever of human achievement. The Japanese learned from the fame they gained in the recent Chinese war that only by this sternest test of human endeavor could the full respect of western nations be won, and they are now taking a second object-lesson to the same effect.
But the Japanese are as great in the arts of peace as in that of war; and well will it be for western nations if, now that their attention is forcibly directed to this wonderful yellow race, they
326
