way of improvement.

The fashion in which many landowners "despised exertion and lived
luxuriously" was another hindrance. These men looked down on
education, "thinking themselves clever because they read the
newspapers." Landlords of this sort were fond of curios, and kept
their capital in such things instead of in agriculture. Sellers of
curios visited the village too often. A wise man had called the
curio-seller the "Spirit of Poverty" (_Bimbogami_). He said that the
Spirit visited a man when he became rich--in order to bring curios to
him; and again when he became poor--in order to take them away from
him! After he became poor the Spirit of Poverty never visited him
again.

Yet another drawback to rural progress was petty political ambition.
People slandered neighbours who belonged to another party and they
would not associate with them. Such party feeling was one of the bad
influences of civilisation.

Further, "a mercenary spirit and materialism" had to be fought in the
village. There was not, however, much trouble due to drink, and there
was no gambling now. There might still be impropriety between young
people--formerly young men used to visit the factory girls--but it was
rare. Lately there had been land speculation, and some of those who
made money went to tea-houses to see geisha.

There was in the neighbourhood, this Buddhist pastor went on, a temple
belonging to the same sect as his own, and he was on friendly terms
with its priest. It was good discipline, he said, for two priests to
be working near one another if they were of the same sect, for their