JAPAN
the other the mainspring of benevolence, refinement, and magnanimity. In the good man these elements were blended harmoniously during life, and they survived in like proportions after the death of his body. But whatever had been the quality of the mortal tenement, the immortal tenant passed from the edge of the grave into the "sombre realm" (Yomotsu-kuni), which was separated from this world by a "broad slope" (Yomotsu-hirazaka), never recrossed by a spirit that had eaten anything cooked in the land of darkness. The offerings made at the tombs of the deceased had the purpose of providing against that disaster of eternal banishment, and, in another sense, were a mark of filial piety, the natural outcome of faith in the terrestrial interference of the departed.
In addition to the celestial and the terrestrial deities, the animal and vegetable kingdom supplied objects of worship. Monster snakes, supposed to destroy the crops, were propitiated by sacrifice, and giant trees, venerated as the abode of supernal beings, were fenced off with ropes carrying sacred pendants.[1] The folk-lore of the nation includes several stories of losses and sufferings caused by cutting down sacred trees, and the rituals show that herbs, rocks, and trees were supposed to have the power of speech prior to the descent of the deities, when dumbness fell upon all these objects.
- ↑ See Appendix, note 5.
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