and cowardly; in the condemnation of slavery; and in the training of men
and women to lofty ideals of character, the Christian teachers far
excelled their Buddhist or Confucian rivals.

The benefits which Japan received through the coming of the Christian
missionaries, as distinct and separate from those brought by commerce
and the merchants, are not to be ignored. While many things of value and
influence for material improvement, and many beneficent details and
elements of civilization were undoubtedly imported by traders, yet it
was the priests and itinerant missionaries who diffused the knowledge of
the importance of these things and taught their use throughout the
country. Although in the reaction of hatred and bitterness, and in the
minute, universal and long-continued suppression by the government, most
of this advantage was destroyed, yet some things remained to influence
thought and speech, and to leave a mark not only on the language, but
also on the procedure of daily life. One can trace notable modifications
of Japanese life from this period, lasting through the centuries and
even until the present time.

Christianity, in the sixteenth century, came to Japan only in its papal
or Roman Catholic form. While in it was infused much of the power and
spirit of Loyola and Xavier, yet the impartial critic must confess that
this form was military, oppressive and political.[25] Nevertheless,
though it was impure and saturated with the false principles, the vices
and the embodied superstitions of corrupt southern Europe, yet, such as
it was, Portuguese Christianity confronted the worst condition of
affairs, morally, intellectually and materially, which Japan has known
in historic times. Defective as the critic must pronounce the system of
religion imported from Europe, it was immeasurably superior to anything
that the Japanese had hitherto known.