TŌKYŌ, October, 1896.
DEAR HENDRICK,--I have had several delightful letters from you, some of
which were not answered in detail, though deserving to be. Let me see
about my deficiencies in acknowledging your letters during recent hurry
and flurry:--That sermon, belonging to the 13th--or perhaps the 10th
century--was really an amazement. Thanks for kindly note about Lowell's
words of praise....
As for the university. Because the shadow of the Jesuit, broadening back
through the centuries, is very black, and because I saw stake-fires in
it, I didn't relish the idea of his acquaintance. But that _had_ to
come, you know. There was a weary matriculation ceremony at which all
of us had to be present; and it was purely Japanese, so that we could
not understand it. We had to sit for three hours and listen. So I and
the Jesuit, for want of anything else to do, got into a religious
discussion; and I found him charming. Of course, he said that every
thought which I thought was heresy,--that all the philosophy of the
19th century was false,--that everything accomplished by free thought
and Protestantism was folly leading to ruin. But we had sympathies
in common,--the contempt of religion as convention, scorn of the
missionaries, and just recognition of the sincerely and profoundly
religious character of the Japanese,--denied, of course, by the
ordinary class of missionary jackasses. Then we were both amused by the
architecture of the university. It is ecclesiastical, of course,--and
the pinnacles and angles are tipped with cruciform ornaments. "C'est
tout-a-fait comme un monastère," said my comrade of the beard;--"et
ceçi,--on en fera une assez jolie église. _Et pourtant ce n'est pas
l'esprit Chrétien qui_," etc. His irony was delicious, and the laughter
broke the ice.
Now comes a queer fact. The existing group of professors in the Library
college who keep a little together are the Professor of Philosophy
(Heidelberg), the Professor of Sanscrit and Philology (Leipsig), the
Professor of French Literature (Lyons), and the Professor of English
Literature--from the devil knows where. There is little affiliation
outside. Now all this group is--including myself--Roman Catholic
by training. Why it is, I can't say, except the Jesuit, we are not
believers,--but there is a human something separating us from the
_froid protestantisme_, or the hard materialism of the other foreign
professors,--something warmer and more natural. Is it not the _Latin_
feeling surviving in Catholicism,--and humanizing paganly what it
touches?--penetrating all of us--the Russian, the German, the Frenchman,
and L. H., through early association? Really there is neither art nor
warm feeling nor the spirit of human love in the stock Protestantism
of to-day.--I regret to say, however, that I have no Spencerian
sympathizer. In my beliefs and tendencies I stand alone; and the Jesuit
marvels at the astounding insanity of my notions. He, like all of his
tribe, does not quite know how to take the American. The American
Professor of Law--enormously self-sufficient, and aggressive--rather
embarrasses him. I saw him wilt a little before him; and I like him all
the better for it,--as he is certainly very delicate, and his shrinking
was largely due to this delicacy. But all these are only impressions of
the moment.
As a member of the faculty, I have to sometimes attend faculty meetings,
called for various purposes. One of the purposes was to decide the
fate of a certain German Professor of History--not nominally for the
purpose, but really. I could not help the professor, and I felt that
he was really unnecessary--not to speak of $500 per mensem. I do not
think his contract will be renewed. I did not like the man very much:
he is a worshipper of Virchow and an enemy of English psychology, etc.,
_ipso facto_. We could have no sympathies. But I was startled by the
fashion in which those who professed to be his friends suddenly went
back upon him, when they saw the drift of things. The drift was given
by the Japanese Professor of Philosophy (Buddhist and other),--a fine,
lean, keen, soft-spoken, persistent champion of Japanese national
conservatism, and a good honest hater of sham Christianity. I like him:
his name is Inoue Tetsujirō. He very sensibly observed that he saw
no reason why foreign professors should forever teach _history_ in a
Japanese university,--or why students should be obliged to listen to
lectures not in their native tongue. I felt he was right; but it meant
the doom of nearly all foreign teaching. (Perhaps I shall last for some
years more, and the professors of foreign _languages_--but the rest will
certainly go before long.)
I said to my little self: "Don't expect any love from those quarters,
old fellow: the Japanese themselves will treat you more frankly, even
if they get to hate you." I have no doubt whatever that there will
be as much said against _me_ as _dare_ be said. Happily, however, my
engagement is based on Japanese _policy_--kindly policy--with a strong
man behind it; and mere tongue-thrusts will do me no harm at all in the
present order of things.
"Sufficient for the day is," etc.