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CHRISTIANITY IN JAPAN.
Bishop Hare, of Dakota, who has acted
for a considerable time as American mis
sionary bishop in Japan, has (says.the Times)
“published a statement regarding the pro-
gress of Christianity in that country, in tho
coarse of which he says that the whole state
of thought and feeling among the Japanese
forbids the introduction into Japan, as per
manent institutions, of branches of either
the English or the American church, and
that nothing would offend the national feel
ing and hinder the extension of the church
more than the giving the Japanese' just
cause for suspecting that missionaries
desire or intend to. impose on them a
permanent foreign episcopate. The same
view applies, in his opinion, to the organisa
tion of missionary schools. The reaction of
the past four years in Japan, Bishop Hare
says, was due in part to a.feeiing of chagrin
that foreign nations were forcing the
Japanese to' continue to acquiesce in pro
visions of treaties which had been exacted
from them in their ignorance and helpless
ness, partly to a recognition of the fact that
they had become competent to do for them
selves many things which they were at groat
cost employing the foreigner to do, and
partly to a consciousness that in their sudden
eagerness for foreign thought and insti
tutions and custom 9, they bad gulped
down a ' vast amount of ’ undigested
matter, and that if discomfort and harm
to the body, social and political, were to be
- time must, be., given for' digestion
and assimilation, floweyermuch thisreaction
may retard the immediate progress of
Christianity, he regards it as, on the whole,
thoroughly opportune a"d healthy. The
reaction has probably reached and passed
its maximum. Japan has advanced too far
in the new life ever to go backward. The
nation has too much intelligence and earnest
moral purpose ever to be permanently con
tent with that which is decrepit and out
worn. ‘The first lesson thoy learn who are
real helpers of the Japanese is to treat them
as equals and to bear one’s self to them not
with pity orcondescension, but with brotherly
love.’ ”
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