Cannot Be Made to Advance
Since the Meiji Restoration, talented men in government offices have devoted their considerable abilities to national problems. But because of certain unavoidable obstacles in their path, progress has been slower than expected. The chief obstacles have been the ignorance and illiteracy of the people. The government well understands what these obstacles are, and is accordingly promoting learning, clarifying the law, and instructing the people in ways to engage in business enterprises. It has both given advice to the people and taken the initiative itself in certain enterprises. Still, while it has been trying all possible means, the results have not been successful up to now. In fact, the government is as despotic as before, and the Japanese people continue to be stupid, spiritless and powerless. The slight progress made is out of all proportion to the energies and money spent for it. Why is this? In the last analysis, it is because the civilization of a nation cannot be made to advance solely through the power of the government.
Some people are saying that it is only a temporary expediency to use governmental means to manage the stupid people until they have sufficiently developed their intellectual and moral levels to be able to enter the stage of modern civilization on their own. This theory is easy to enunciate but difficult to realize in practice. Since time immemorial, the people of the whole country have suffered under despotic rule which did not allow freedom of expression. They stole security by deception, and escaped punishment by telling lies. Fraud and subterfuge became necessary tools of life; injustice and insincerity became daily routine. No one felt ashamed and no one asked questions. Honor fell to the ground and disappeared with the wind of the times. How, then, did men have time to love their country? Trying to correct these evil tendencies, the government would brandish its false authority all the more to intimidate and reprove them. But forcing them to be sincere only had the contrary effect. The situation was like using fire to extinguish fire. In the end, the superior and inferior strata of society had grown further and further apart to form separate spiritual mind-sets.
