=A House-God= named Yabune is mentioned in one of the old rituals. A certain sanctity attaches to the Daikoku-bashira, or central pillar of the house, corresponding to our king-post. There is also a Gate-god (or gods), who guards the dwelling against the entrance of evil things, and, in modern times, a God of the Privy. GODS OF ABSTRACTIONS =Izanagi and Izanami.=—I have little doubt that these deities (see above, p. 21) were suggested by the Yin and Yang, or male and female principles, of Chinese philosophy. They were probably introduced into Japanese myth in order to account for the existence of the Sun-goddess and other deities, and to link them together by a common parentage. Their names are supposed to be connected with a verb, _izanafu_, to invite, and to refer to their mutual invitation to become husband and wife. They are not important in ritual. =Musubi= means growth or production. In the old myths there are two Musubi deities, viz. Taka-musubi and Kamu-musubi (high-growth and divine-growth). It is not difficult to conjecture that ‘high’ and ‘divine’ were originally nothing more than laudatory epithets of one and the same personage. Poetry recognises only one God. In later times there were no fewer than eight Musubi who had shrines in the precincts of the Imperial palace. The worship of this god is now much neglected. =Kuni-toko-tachi.=—Nothing is really known of this deity. The name means literally ‘land (or earth)-eternal-stand,’ and I offer as a mere conjecture that he is a personification of the durable character of the earth. The circumstance that he is the first god of the _Nihongi_ myth led to his receiving a prominence in later times which is justified by nothing in the older religion. There was an abortive attempt to make of him a sort of Supreme Deity, and to substitute his worship for that of the Food-goddess at Ise. DEIFIED INDIVIDUAL MEN Though all the greater gods of the old Shinto were Nature-gods, we cannot affirm that none of the numerous obscure deities mentioned in the _Kojiki_ and _Nihongi_ were deified individual men. The impulse to exalt human beings to the rank of deity has always existed, and may have left traces in the older Shinto, though the evidence that this was so in any particular case is not forthcoming. =Take-minakata=, the god of Suha, in the province of Shinano, _may_ be a deity of this class. He was a son of Ohonamochi, who refused allegiance to the Sun-goddess and fled to Suha, where he was obliged to surrender. Tradition says that the present high priests of his shrine are his direct descendants. They are held to be his incarnation, and are called Ikigami or ‘live deities.’ There are at the present day shrines to Suha Sama in many parts of Japan.