The Sun-Goddess is described as the Ruler of Heaven and as "unrivalled in dignity." She wears royal insignia, is surrounded by ministers, of whom the Court of the Mikado is the obvious prototype, and is spoken of in terms appropriate to personages of sovereign rank. She is selected as the ancestor from whom the Mikados derive their descent and authority. Yet she is hardly what we understand by a Supreme Being. Her power does not extend to the sea or to the Land of Yomi. Her charge as Ruler even of Heaven was conferred on her by her parents, and did not by any means involve absolute control. When grossly insulted by her younger brother, instead of inflicting on him condign punishment, she hid in a cave, from which she was partly enticed, partly dragged, by the other deities. This is not the behaviour of a Supreme Being. The punishment of the culprit and other important celestial matters are determined, not by the fiat of the so-called Ruler of Heaven, but by a Council of the Gods. The celestial constitution, like its earthly counterpart, was far from being an absolute monarchy. The epithet _sumera_, translated "sovran," and derived from a verb _sumeru_, which means "to hold general rule," is applied not only to the Sun-Goddess but to many other deities--the Wind-Gods, for example--and also to the Mikados. The same is the case with _Mikoto_, which corresponds roughly to our "majesty." Of course Japan is not the only country which attributes royalty to the Sun. Milton speaks of the Sun's "sovran vital lamp." In some parts of the Shinto mythical narrative it is the actual Sun that the author has in view, as when he speaks of her radiance illuminating the universe, or of the world being left to darkness when she entered the Rock-cave. Elsewhere she is an anthropomorphic being, with no specially solar characteristics. She wears armour, celebrates the feast of first-fruits, cultivates rice, &c. Inconsistencies of this kind are inherent in all nature myths, and trouble their authors not a whit. Some of the modern theologians, however, are much perplexed by them. Motoöri concludes that "this great deity actually is the Sun in Heaven, which even now illuminates the world before our eyes, a fact which is extremely clear from the divine writings." His pupil Hirata, on the other hand, holds that the Sun-Goddess is not the Ruler of Heaven but the Ruler of the Sun, a distinction which never occurred to the myth-makers. Another modern writer attempts to smooth over difficulties by the explanation that the Sun-Goddess is actually a female goddess, but, owing to the radiance which flows from her, seen from a distance she appears round.