inasmuch as some of the noblest types of _bushi_ were strongly
influenced by the teachings of this sage. Western readers will easily
recognize in his writings many parallels to the New Testament. Making
allowance for the terms peculiar to either teaching, the passage, "Seek
ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness; and all these things
shall be added unto you," conveys a thought that may be found on almost
any page of Wan Yang Ming. A Japanese disciple[7] of his says--"The lord
of heaven and earth, of all living beings, dwelling in the heart of man,
becomes his mind (_Kokoro_); hence a mind is a living thing, and is ever
luminous:" and again, "The spiritual light of our essential being is
pure, and is not affected by the will of man. Spontaneously springing up
in our mind, it shows what is right and wrong: it is then called
conscience; it is even the light that proceedeth from the god of
heaven." How very much do these words sound like some passages from
Isaac Pennington or other philosophic mystics! I am inclined to think
that the Japanese mind, as expressed in the simple tenets of the Shinto
religion, was particularly open to the reception of Yang Ming's
precepts. He carried his doctrine of the infallibility of conscience to
extreme transcendentalism, attributing to it the faculty to perceive,
not only the distinction between right and wrong, but also the nature
of psychical facts and physical phenomena. He went as far as, if not
farther than, Berkeley and Fichte, in Idealism, denying the existence of
things outside of human ken. If his system had all the logical errors
charged to Solipsism, it had all the efficacy of strong conviction and
its moral import in developing individuality of character and equanimity
of temper cannot be gainsaid.

[Footnote 7: Miwa Shissai.]

Thus, whatever the sources, the essential principles which _Bushido_