Volume II Part 10 (2/2)

Your criticisht you ht, and to believe ourselves, capable of doing vast haroodness perhaps on account of that belief But I don't agree with you in thinking the remark uncomplimentary I think it was true, and in the sense I take it, beautiful Ask yourself could you really do anything you knew to be terribly cruel under any personal provocation,--at least after the first burst of sudden anger was over? And you will find you _could not_ Any nature sincerely sympathetic--with a co at least as ives I believe you could kill a man, under just provocation; but that is not bad, or cruel--indeed, it ht be a duty The terriblein cold blood, icily, with calculation, infinite patience, and infinite pleasure But the capacity to be thus dangerous ive sweetness to character and amiability to life,--and chivalry to a man's soul

Now here is the very iressive and selfish, the hard, cold qualities of character are being prodigiously developed by it The eest, are also indirectly developed by the suffering the others inflict;--there is action and reaction Yes, that is true But the terrible er--represent not only a constantly increasing class, but a leading one--the class whose name is Power Noer multiplies In wealth and luxury multiplication is rapid and facile They are less fertile comparatively than other classes; but the cost of their individuality is infinitely greater, and one type can outlive, outwork, outplan a hundred of the eeneral rule The ultimate tendency is to settle all power in the hands of those without moral scruple It may take another few centuries to do this; but the tendency is obvious, and the danger is steadily growing I think the West can never become as moral as the Orient But it may beco the matter Another I wrote you about innever dreamed of in the East What must be the ultimate results of this Western worshi+p of the Eternal Fee, and universal irreverence for things theof reverence? Already, in the West, the Family has almost ceased to exist

To an Oriental it seerown-up children should not live with their father, randparents, and support and love them more than their own children, wives, or husbands It seems to him sheer wickedness that a man should not love his mother-in-law,--or that he should love his oife even half as well as his own father or ly immoral He would deem worthy of death the man rote--

”He stood on his head on the wild seashore, And joy was the cause of the act;-- For he felt, as he never had felt before, Insanely glad, in fact

And why? Because on that selfsame day His mother-in-law had sailed To a tropical cliers and snakes prevailed_”

He first most loves his father,--then his mother,--then his father-in-law and mother-in-law,--then his children,--and lastly, his wife His wife is not of the faer,--not of the blood of the ancestors,--how can he love her like his own parents!

Now I half suspect the Oriental is right

To him the people of the West with their novels and poems about love seem a race of very lascivious people If indeed he should think h pity,--as a race of sexually starved beings, frantic with nyh refusal to obey the laws of nature ”They talk about their wives!--they write novels about their lusts!--they do not support their parents!--they do not obey their es!” Now they write love-stories in japan But who are the woirls ”If one must write stories about the passion of sex, let hihters of honest men--let him write about whores! A whore's business is to excite passion That of a pure woman is to quench it

What horribly immoral people the Western people are!”

--Don Juan is the iination of the West No japanese Don Juan--no Chinese Don Juan--ever existed or could exist He is a common type at home But the Orient rejoices also in exemption from one of the most terrible creations of Western life;--no Oriental is haunted by ”the Woman thou shalt never know”

What a curse and a delusion is that beautiful spectre! How many lives she makes desolate! How many crimes does she inspire, ”the Woman thou shalt never know!”--the impossible ideal, not of love, but of artistic passion, pursued by ware, always in vain

As her pursuer growsand fair

He waits for her through the years,--waits till his hair is grey

Then,--wifeless, childless, blase, ennuye, cynical, lass and finds that he has been cheated out of youth and life But does he give up the chase? No!--the hair of Lilith--just one--has been twisted round his heart,--an ever-tightening fine spider-line of gold And he sees her smile just ere he passes into the Eternal darkness

Then again, our social morals! We never in the West talk to people of their duties Do orators make speeches about duties? Do any, except priests, talk about social duties? But what do we talk to the people about? We talk to thehts_,--”by G--d!” Always, incessantly, _ad nauseahts_ Now to talk to people who know nothing of social science, of political economy, of ethical ideas in their relation to eternal truths,--to talk to such people about their _rights_, is like giving a new-born baby a razor to play with Or putting a loaded revolver in the hands of aa crowd of urchins to make a bonfire in the iunpowder And the Oriental knows this (Wherefore in China it was a law that he who should say or invent anything new should be put to death,--an extreme view of the necessities of the case, but not much more extreme than our own philistinism)

The japanese of the new school do not, however, keep to the Chinese wisdom They show evidence now of a desire to put to death those who say anything older than yesterday They are becoinning to love their wives more than their fathers and mothers;--it is much cheaper

By the way, I am in a world of new sensations My first child will be born, I expect, about September next The rest of my family have come from Matsue,--father-in-law, father's father also, a nice old ether There is universal joy because of the birth in prospect And I ah I am not sorry But I hope my little one will never have to face life in the West, but may always dwell in a Buddhist atmosphere

Ever most faithfully, LAFCADIO HEARN

TO ELLWOOD HENDRICK

kumAMOTO, April, 1893

DEAR HENDRICK,--Youra lonesohten it up Your wish about a japanese love-story has been partly answered in the March _Atlantic_; and in the June number, you will have a paper of mine, entitled the ”japanese Smile,” which you will find as philosophical as you could wish--No, I have been working well, but for a book only; and of that book only five or six chapters can be published in a azine I am not yet sure if the book will be published in the shape I want,--although the publishers show sootistic last tiet a very awful attack of the blues within the next five years

To return to japan and japanese life What do you think of the following? It happened near kuer what to do for his er said that she would get her sight back if she could eat a little hu body The peasant went ho, and told his wife She said: ”We have only one boy

He is beautiful You can get another wife as good, or better than I, very easily, but et another son Therefore, you ive my liver to your mother” They embraced; and the husband killed her with a sword, and cut out the liver and began to cook it, when the child awoke and screahbours and police came In the police court, the peasant told his tale with childish frankness and cited stories froes were ave only nine years in prison Really the er And this but a few onometry, and Herbert Spencer!

yet Western science and religion could never inspire that idolatrous self-devotion to a norant peasant and his wife had She thought it her sacred duty to die for her ht of a visit from the author of ”The Soul of the Far East” He is a lucky th, youth, and plenty of money He spends six months of each year in the Orient