forbidden to go to a foreign country, except in the rare cases of urgent
government service. By settled precedents it was soon made to be
understood that those who were blown out to sea or carried away in
stress of weather, need not come back; if they did, they must return
only on Chinese and Korean vessels, and even then would be grudgingly
allowed to land. It was given out, both at home and to the world, that
no shipwrecked sailors or waifs would be welcomed when brought on
foreign vessels.

This inclusive policy directed against physical exportation, was still
more stringently carried out when applied to imports affecting the minds
of the Japanese. The "government deliberately attempted to establish a
society impervious to foreign ideas from without, and fostered within by
all sorts of artificial legislation. This isolation affected every
department of private and public life. Methods of education were cast in
a definite mould; even matters of dress and household architecture were
strictly regulated by the State, and industries were restricted or
forced into specified channels, thus retarding economic
developments."[3]


Starving of the Mind.


In the science of keeping life within stunted limits and artificial
boundaries, the Japanese genius excels. It has been well said that "the
Japanese mind is great in little things and little in great things." To
cut the tap-root of a pine-shoot, and, by regulating the allowance of
earth and water, to raise a pine-tree which when fifty years old shall
be no higher than a silver dollar, has been the proud ambition of many