_ja_ or dragon centipede; the _tengu_ or long-nosed and winged mountain
sprite, which acts as the messenger of the gods, pulling out the tongues
of fibbing, lying children; besides the colossal spiders and mythical
creatures of the old story-books; the foxes, badgers, cats and other
creatures which transform themselves and "possess" human beings, still
influence the popular mind. These, once the old _kami_ of the primitive
Japanese, or _kamui_ of the aboriginal Aino, show the mental soil and
climate[16] which were to condition the growth of the seed imported from
other lands, whether of Buddhism or Christianity. It is very hard to
kill a god while the old mind that grew and nourished him still remains
the same. Banish or brand a phantom or mind-shadow once worshipped as
divine, and it will appear as a fairy, a demon, a mythical animal, or an
_oni_; but to annihilate it requires many centuries of higher culture.

As with the superstitions and survival of Animism and Fetichism from our
pagan ancestors among ourselves, many of the lingering beliefs may be
harmless, but over the mass of men in Japan and in Chinese Asia they
still exert a baleful influence. They make life full of distress; they
curtail human joy; they are a hindrance, to spiritual progress and to
civilization.


Fetichism.


The animistic tendency in that part of Asia dominated by the Chinese
world of ideas shows itself not only in a belief in messengers or
embodiments of divine malevolence or benevolence, but also in the
location of the spiritual influence in or upon an inanimate object or
fetich. Among men in Chinese Asia, from the clodhopper to the gentleman,