all-absorbing, all-perplexing theme of the day. The question of
foreign policy was settled.

The next act of the statesmen of the Restoration was to sweep away
the abuses of the court, and to establish the basis of a firm internal
administration. The most effectual means of accomplishing this, it
seemed to the sagacious statesmen, was to move the court from the
place where those abuses had their roots. Ichizo Okubo,[6] a guiding
spirit of the Restoration, presented the following memorial to the
Emperor:

"The most pressing of your Majesty's pressing duties at the present
moment is not to look at the empire alone and judge carelessly by
appearances, but to consider carefully the actual state of the whole
world; to reform the inveterate and slothful habits induced during
several hundred years, and to give union to the nation....

"Hitherto the person whom we designate the sovereign has lived behind
a screen, and, as if he were different from other human beings, has
not been seen by more than a very limited number of Kuge; and as
his heaven-conferred office of father to his people has been thereby
unfulfilled, it is necessary that his office should be ascertained
in accordance with this fundamental principle, and then the laws
governing internal affairs may be established....

"In the present period of reformation and restoration of the
government to its ancient monarchical form, the way to carry out
the resolution of imitating the example of Japanese sages, and of
surpassing the excellent governments of foreign nations, is to change
the site of the capital....