which has been pursued consistently ever since, and has raised Japan
from being the helpless victim of Western greed to being one of the
greatest Powers in the world. Feudalisim was abolished, the Central
Government was made omnipotent, a powerful army and navy were created,
China and Russia were successively defeated, Korea was annexed and a
protectorate established over Manchuria and Inner Mongolia, industry and
commerce were developed, universal compulsory education instituted; and
worship of the Mikado firmly established by teaching in the schools and
by professorial patronage of historical myths. The artificial creation
of Mikado-worship is one of the most interesting features of modern
Japan, and a model to all other States as regards the method of
preventing the growth of rationalism. There is a very instructive little
pamphlet by Professor B.H. Chamberlain, who was Professor of Japanese
and philosophy at Tokyo, and had a knowledge of Japanese which few
Europeans had equalled. His pamphlet is called _The Invention of a New
Religion_, and is published by the Rationalist Press Association. He
points out that, until recent times, the religion of Japan was Buddhism,
to the practical exclusion of every other. There had been, in very
ancient times, a native religion called Shinto, and it had lingered on
obscurely. But it is only during the last forty years or so that Shinto
has been erected into a State religion, and has been reconstructed so as
to suit modern requirements.[48] It is, of course, preferable to
Buddhism because it is native and national; it is a tribal religion, not
one which aims at appealing to all mankind. Its whole purpose, as it has
been developed by modern statesmen, is to glorify Japan and the Mikado.

Professor Chamberlain points out how little reverence there was for the
Mikado until some time after the Restoration:--

The sober fact is that no nation probably has ever treated its