Japan by Japanese, a study the inauguration of which almost corresponded in time with the establishment of durable peace by the Tokugawa Shogunate. A succession of savants followed in his wake, and the most noted among them were Mabuchi Kamo and his disciple Norinaga Motooeri. It was the latter of the two who brought the study of Japanese antiquities to its highest point in the Tokugawa age. The time of Motooeri covers the whole of the latter half of the eighteenth century, for he was born in 1730 and died in 1801 in the province of Ise. Before him the scope of researches into old Japan had been limited to the literary products of our ancient poets and novelists. Though the _Nihongi_ had been talked of by the scholars of the Ashikaga period and an edition reprinted before the advent of the house of Tokugawa, that part of the work which had been most widely read and commented on was its first volume, treating about the age of the gods and the mythical beginning of the Empire. In other words, the book had been prized not as an important historical work, but as a sacred book of Shintoism. It was Motooeri himself who first studied ancient Japan, not only from the Shintoistic point of view, but also philologically and historically. Classical literature, which became the object of his indefatigable research, was not restricted to books of mythology, but included also the ritual book of "norito," several collections of poems, and historical works. First of all, however, he concentrated his efforts upon the study of the old chronicle, _Kojiki_. He was of the opinion that the _Kojiki_ was more reliable as a historical source than the _Nihongi_, as it might, according to him, be easily judged from its archaic phraseology and syntax, in contrast to the latter, the historical veracity of which must have been surely impaired by its adoption of the Chinese rhetoric. He made the most minute, critical study of the text of the _Kojiki_, phrase by phrase, and word by word. The famous _Kojiki-den_, or "The Commentaries on the _Kojiki_," is the choicest fruit of his life-long study. In it the history, religion, manners, customs, in short, all the items concerning the civilisation of ancient Japan are expounded from the text of the chronicle itself, frequently corroborated by what is stated in other authentic sources. He had always in view, and laid great stress on the fact, that Japan had possessed from her beginning what was to be called her own, purely and entirely Japanese, quite apart from the culture which she introduced afterwards from abroad. It was to this unique and naive state of things in primeval Japan taken as a whole that he applied the term Shintoism. According to him, therefore, naturalness, purity and veracity were the cardinal virtues to be taught in Shintoism, from which he thought not only Indian, but Chinese elements also should be eradicated. Thus Shintoism was stripped of its religious apparel, with