It was in this period also that etiquette was cultivated to its uttermost,--that politeness became diffused throughout all ranks, not merely as a fashion, but as an art. In all civilized societies of the militant type politeness becomes a national characteristic at an early period; and it must have been a common obligation among the Japanese, as their archaic tongue bears witness, before the historical epoch. Public enactments on the subject were made as early as the seventh century by the founder of Japanese Buddhism, the prince-regent, Shotoku Taishi. "Ministers and functionaries," he proclaimed, [360] "should make decorous behaviour* their leading principle; for their leading principle of the government of the people consists in decorous behaviour. If the superiors do not behave with decorum, the inferiors are disorderly: if inferiors are wanting in proper behaviour, there must necessarily be offences. Therefore it is that when lord and vassal behave with propriety, the distinctions of rank are not confused when the people behave with propriety, the government of the Commonwealth proceeds of itself." Something of the same old Chinese teaching we find reechoed, a thousand years later, in the Legacy of Iyeyasu: "The art of governing a country consists in the manifestation of due deference on the part of a suzerain to his vassals. Know that if you turn your back upon this, you will be assassinated; and the Empire will be lost." We have already seen that etiquette was rigidly enforced upon all classes by the military rule: for at least ten centuries before Iyeyasu, the nation had been disciplined in politeness, under the edge of the sword. But under the Tokugawa Shogunate politeness became particularly a popular characteristic,--a rule of conduct maintained by even the lowest classes in their daily relations. Among the higher classes it became the art of beauty in life. All the taste, the grace, the [361] nicety which then informed artistic production in precious material, equally informed every detail of speech and action. Courtesy was a moral and aesthetic study, carried to such incomparable perfection that every trace of the artificial disappeared. Grace and charm seemed to have become habit,--inherent qualities of the human fibre,--and doubtless, in the case of one sex at least, did so become. [*Or, "ceremony": the Chinese term used signifying everything relating to gentlemanly and upright conduct. The translation is Mr. Aston's (see Vol. II, p, 130, of his translation of the Nihongi).]