Love of the beautiful is a prominent and highly developed Japanese trait. Their ideals of beauty differ much from Western ideals, and many things that they pronounce beautiful would not be so judged in the Occident. Most Americans at first cannot appreciate Japanese art, landscape scenery, or flowers; but a short residence here and an acquaintance with native life and scenes soon bring one to appreciate them. The esthetic faculty is much more highly developed than in America. It is possessed by all classes. The gardens of the rich are laid out with especial care, and no money or pains are spared to make them beautiful. I have seen day-laborers stand and gaze for a long time at a beautiful sunset, or go into raptures over a dwarfed cherry-bush just putting forth its tiny buds. Men who have worked in the fields all day, until they are exhausted, on their return home in the evening will stop by the wayside to pluck some beautiful shrub or flower and carry it back with them. Go into the room of a school-boy and you will almost invariably find his table brightened by a pretty bouquet of flowers. When the cherries are in bloom the whole population leaves off work and turns out to enjoy them. Japan is a beauteous land, and no people are more capable of appreciating her beauty than her own. The Japanese are open-minded and receptive of truth, from whatever quarter it may come. Were this not true it would have been impossible {60} for her to have become what she is to-day. When Buddhism was first brought to Japan it was seen to possess elements of religious power that Shinto did not have, and the people by and by accepted it. When Confucianism was introduced its moral teachings were seen to be lofty and inspiring, and it was given a warm welcome. When Christianity first came many of the daimios took especial pains to examine into it to see if it were likely to benefit their country, with the full intention of accepting it. How many of them did accept it is told in another chapter. The present attitude of opposition is the result of prejudice, instilled in part by past experience with Christianity, and in part by the misrepresentation of its enemies; it is not the result of natural intolerance. The readiness with which Western learning of all kinds has been adopted, and the patient hearing and investigation native scholars give to all new theories of science and knowledge, clearly show that their mind is an open and receptive one. A native professor has expressed this characteristic in these words: "The Japanese as a race are open-hearted, with a mind free from prejudice and open to conviction." But that it is as receptive of prejudice and misrepresentation as of truth and knowledge is evidenced by its present attitude toward Christianity.