(THE SERMONS OF KIU-Ô, VOL. I)
"If a man loses a fowl or a dog, he knows how to reclaim it. If he
loses his soul, he knows not how to reclaim it. The true path of
learning has no other function than to teach us how to reclaim lost
souls." This parable has been declared to us by Môshi. If a dog, or a
chicken, or a pet cat does not come home at the proper time, its
master makes a great fuss about hunting for it, and wonders can it
have been killed by a dog or by a snake, or can some man have stolen
it; and ransacking the three houses opposite, and his two next-door
neighbours' houses, as if he were seeking for a lost child, cries,
"Pray, sir, has my tortoiseshell cat been with you? Has my pet chicken
been here?" That is the way in which men run about under such
circumstances. It's a matter of the utmost importance.
And yet to lose a dog or a tame chicken is no such terrible loss after
all. But the soul, which is called the lord of the body, is the master
of our whole selves. If men part with this soul for the sake of other
things, then they become deaf to the admonitions of their parents, and
the instructions of their superiors are to them as the winds of
heaven. Teaching is to them like pouring water over a frog's face;
they blink their eyes, and that is all; they say, "Yes, yes!" with
their mouths, but their hearts are gone, and, seeing, they are blind,
hearing, they are deaf. Born whole and sound, by their own doing they
enter the fraternity of cripples. Such are all those who lose their
souls. Nor do they think of inquiring or looking for their lost soul.
"It is my parents' fault; it is my master's fault; it is my husband's
fault; it is my elder brother's fault; it is Hachibei who is a rogue;
it is Matsu who is a bad woman." They content themselves with looking
at the faults of others, and do not examine their own consciences, nor
search their own hearts. Is not this a cruel state of things? They set
up a hue and cry for a lost dog or a pet chicken, but for this
all-important soul of theirs they make no search. What mistaken
people! For this reason the sages, mourning over such a state of
things, have taught us what is the right path of man; and it is the
receiving of this teaching that is called learning. The main object of
learning is the examination and searching of our own hearts; therefore
the text says, "The true path of learning has no other function than
to teach us how to reclaim lost souls." This is an exhaustive
exposition of the functions of learning. That learning has no other
object, we have this gracious pledge and guarantee from the sage. As
for the mere study of the antiquities and annals of China and Japan,
and investigation into literature, these cannot be called learning,
which is above all things an affair of the soul. All the commentaries
and all the books of all the teachers in the world are but so many
directories by which to find out the whereabouts of our own souls.
This search after our own souls is that which I alluded to just now as
the examination of our consciences. To disregard the examination of
our consciences is a terrible thing, of which it is impossible to
foresee the end; on the other hand, to practise it is most admirable,
for by this means we can on the spot attain filial piety and fidelity
to our masters. Virtue and vice are the goals to which the examination
and non-examination of our consciences lead. As it has been rightly
said, benevolence and malice are the two roads which man follows. Upon
this subject I have a terrible and yet a very admirable story to tell
you. Although I dare say you are very drowsy, I must beg you to listen
to me.
In a certain part of the country there was a well-to-do farmer, whose
marriage had brought him one son, whom he petted beyond all measure,
as a cow licks her calf. So by degrees the child became very sly: he
used to pull the horses' tails, and blow smoke into the bulls'
nostrils, and bully the neighbours' children in petty ways and make
them cry. From a peevish child he grew to be a man, and unbearably
undutiful to his parents. Priding himself on a little superior
strength, he became a drunkard and a gambler, and learned to wrestle
at fairs. He would fight and quarrel for a trifle, and spent his time
in debauchery and riotous living. If his parents remonstrated with
him, he would raise his voice and abuse them, using scurrilous
language. "It's all very well your abusing me for being dissolute and
disobedient. But, pray, who asked you to bring me into the world? You
brought me into the world, and I have to thank you for its miseries;
so now, if you hate dissolute people, you had better put me back where
I came from, and I shall be all right again." This was the sort of
insolent answer he would give his parents, who, at their wits' end,
began to grow old in years. And as he by degrees grew more and more of
a bully, unhappy as he made them, still he was their darling, and they
could not find it in their hearts to turn him out of the house and
disinherit him. So they let him pursue his selfish course; and he went
on from worse to worse, knocking people down, breaking their arms, and
getting up great disturbances. It is unnecessary to speak of his
parents' feelings. Even his relations and friends felt as if nails
were being hammered into their breasts. He was a thoroughly wicked
man.
Now no one is from his mother's womb so wicked as this; but those who
persist in selfishness lose their senses, and gradually reach this
pitch of wickedness. What a terrible thing is this throwing away of
our hearts!
Well, this man's relations and friends very properly urged his
parents to disown him; but he was an only child, and so his parents,
although they said, "To-day we really will disinherit him," or
"To-morrow we really will break off all relations with him," still it
was all empty talk; and the years and months passed by, until the
scapegrace reached his twenty-sixth year, having heaped wickedness
upon wickedness; and who can tell how much trouble he brought upon his
family, who were always afraid of hearing of some new enormity? At
last they held a family council, and told the parents that matters had
come to such a pass that if they did not disown their son the rest of
the family must needs break off all communication with them: if he
were allowed to go on in his evil courses, the whole village, not to
speak of his relations, would be disgraced; so either the parents,
against whom, however, there was no ill-will felt, must be cut by the
family, or they must disinherit their son: to this appeal they begged
to have a distinct answer. The parents, reflecting that to separate
themselves from their relations, even for the sake of their own son,
would be an act of disrespect to their ancestors, determined to invite
their relations to assemble and draw up a petition to the Government
for leave to disinherit their son, to which petition the family would
all affix their seals according to form; so they begged them to come
in the evening, and bring their seals with them. This was their
answer.
There is an old saw which says, "The old cow licks her calf, and the
tigress carries her cub in her mouth." If the instinct of beasts and
birds prompt them to love their young, how much the more must it be a
bitter thing for a man to have to disown his own son! All this trouble
was the consequence of this youth casting his heart from him. Had he
examined his own conscience, the storm of waves and of wind would not
have arisen, and all would have been calm. But as he refused to listen
to his conscience, his parents, much against their will, were forced
to visit him with the punishment of disinheritance, which he had
brought upon himself. A sad thing indeed! In the poems of his
Reverence Tokuhon, a modern poet, there is the following passage:
"Since Buddha thus winds himself round our hearts, let the man who
dares to disregard him fear for his life." The allusion is to the
great mercy and love of the gods. The gods wish to make men examine
their consciences, and, day and night, help men to discern that which
is evil; but, although they point out our desires and pleasures, our
lusts and passions, as things to be avoided, men turn their backs upon
their own consciences. The love of the gods is like the love of
parents for their children, and men treat the gods as undutiful
children treat their parents. "Men who dare to disregard the gods, let
them fear for their lives." I pray you who hear me, one and all, to
examine your own consciences and be saved.
To return to the story of the vagabond son. As it happened, that day
he was gambling in a neighbouring village, when a friend from his own
place came up and told him that his relations had met together to
disinherit him; and that, fine fellow as he was, he would find it a
terrible thing to be disowned. Before he had heard him half out, the
other replied in a loud voice--
"What, do you mean to say that they are holding a family council
to-night to disinherit me? What a good joke! I'm sure I don't want to
be always seeing my father's and mother's blubbering faces; it makes
me quite sick to think of them: it's quite unbearable. I'm able to
take care of myself; and, if I choose to go over to China, or to live
in India, I should like to know who is to prevent me? This is the very
thing above all others for me. I'll go off to the room where they are
all assembled, and ask them why they want to disinherit me. I'll just
swagger like Danjurô [91] the actor, and frighten them into giving me
fifty or seventy ounces of silver to get rid of me, and put the money
in my purse, and be off to Kiôto or Osaka, where I'll set up a
tea-house on my own account; and enjoy myself to my heart's content! I
hope this will be a great night for me, so I'll just drink a cup of
wine for luck beforehand."
[Footnote 91: A famous actor of Yedo, who lived 195 years ago. He was
born at Sakura, in Shimôsa.]
And so, with a lot of young devils of his own sort, be fell to
drinking wine in teacups,[92] so that before nightfall they were all
as drunk as mud. Well, then, on the strength of this wine, as he was
setting out for his father's house, he said, "Now, then, to try my
luck," and stuck a long dirk in his girdle. He reached his own village
just before nightfall, thinking to burst into the place where he
imagined his relations to be gathered together, turning their
wisdom-pockets inside out, to shake out their small provision of
intelligence in consultation; and he fancied that, if he blustered and
bullied, he would certainly get a hundred ounces of silver out of
them. Just as he was about to enter the house, he reflected--
[Footnote 92: The ordinary wine-cup holding only a thimbleful, to
drink wine out of teacups is a great piece of debauchery--like
drinking brandy in tumblers.]
"If I show my face in the room where my relations are gathered
together, they will all look down on the ground and remain silent; so
if I go in shouting and raging, it will be quite out of harmony; but
if they abuse me, then I shall be in the right if I jump in on them
and frighten them well. The best plan will be for me to step out of
the bamboo grove which is behind the house, and to creep round the
verandah, and I can listen to these fellows holding their
consultation: they will certainly be raking up all sorts of scandal
about me. It will be all in harmony, then, if I kick down the shutters
and sliding-doors with a noise like thunder. And what fun it will be!"
As he thought thus to himself, he pulled off his iron-heeled sandals,
and stuck them in his girdle, and, girding up his dress round his
waist, left the bamboo grove at the back of the house, and, jumping
over the garden wicket, went round the verandah and looked in. Peeping
through a chink in the shutters, he could see his relations gathered
together in council, speaking in whispers. The family were sitting in
a circle, and one and all were affixing their seals to the petition of
disinheritance. At last, having passed from hand to hand, the document
came round to where the two parents were sitting. Their son, seeing
this, said--
"Come, now, it's win or lose! My parents' signing the paper shall be
the sign for me to kick open the door and jump into the middle of
them."
So, getting ready for a good kick, he held his breath and looked on.
What terrible perversion man can allow his heart to come to! Môshi has
said that man by nature is good; but although not a particle of fault
can be found with what he has said, when the evil we have learned
becomes a second nature, men reach this fearful degree of wickedness.
When men come to this pass, Kôshi[93] and Môshi themselves might
preach to them for a thousand days, and they would not have strength
to reform. Such hardened sinners deserve to be roasted in iron pots in
the nethermost hell. Now, I am going to tell you how it came about
that the vagabond son turned over a new leaf and became dutiful, and
finally entered paradise. The poet says, "Although the hearts of
parents are not surrounded by dark night, how often they stray from
the right road in their affection for their children!"
[Footnote 93: Kôshi is the Japanese pronunciation of the name of the
Chinese philosopher Kung Ts[=u], or Kung Fu Ts[=u], whom we call
Confucius.]
When the petition of disinheritance came round to the place where the
two parents were sitting, the mother lifted up her voice and wept
aloud; and the father, clenching his toothless gums to conceal his
emotion, remained with his head bent down: presently, in a husky
voice, he said, "Wife, give me the seal!"
But she returned no answer, and with tears in her eyes took a leather
purse, containing the seal, out of a drawer of the cupboard and placed
it before her husband. All this time the vagabond son, holding his
breath, was peeping in from outside the shutters. In the meanwhile,
the old man slowly untied the strings of the purse, and took out the
seal, and smeared on the colouring matter. Just as he was about to
seal the document, his wife clutched at his hand and said, "Oh, pray
wait a little."
The father replied, "Now that all our relations are looking on, you
must not speak in this weak manner."