The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1881-12-30
japanese Standards Of Honesty.


man for years and found him scrupu-
lousy upright. Never once has he failed
to point out defects, however trivial, in
the goods he sells you, nor ever hesitated
to take back anything that falls short of
the quality described. Yet your friend
goes, as stranger, to the same mer-
chant, and is not only grievously over
charged, but otherwise palpably VIC
timized. With us such conduct could
only receive one epithet. In Japan no.
body would be more surprised than the
offending merchant if you called him
dishonest. He refers his conduct to the
simplest possible principles. Different
merchants, he says, have different stand
ards of profit. Some are content with
five per cent, some consider ten mini
mum, and some look for twenty or thirty,
but none acknowledge any limit save oc-
casion. Let only opportunity be favor
able, and even your western trader will
pocket his cent per cent. without finch
ing. Did you never, he will probably
add, did you never, in your early days
of intercourse with the Orient, purchase
for string of cash goods that you knew
to be worth as many pieces of silver?
Were you then acting dishonesty? You
think not, and so do I; for you gave the
owner of the goods the full local value
of his merchandise, perhaps more, and
your heavy gains were the product of
your own superior shrewdness or business
experience, whichever men please to call
it. That shrewdness is property, val
liable, but not always marketable, and
to invest it at the highest possible rate OF
interest is, according to my creed, a le-
climate business. When, therefore,
foreigner and stranger visits my store,
and shows that he understands
neither the value nor the quail
ity of the articles he sees, /
should be defrauding not only my own
shrewdness, but also the experience of
those who are better informed, did sell
him my goods on the most favorable
terms. lrespect honesty no less than
you do, but the range of my obligation is
wider. l owe duty to my own acquire
ments, and I owe duties, variously inn
perative to the capacities of my custom
ers. When you bid me treat them all
alike you remove the premium that prop
erly belongs to the higher standards of
mercantile ability, whether possessed by
the buyer or the seller. Thus you will
find-to revert to our crafty tradesman-
that there will be no hesitation after.
ward about confessing the deception
practiced upon the foreign stranger. You
yourself before you became an intimate
were similarly treated, hut your subse-
quent remonstrances elected an apology
only for the want of courtesy to you per-
sonally, not at all for the violation of an
abstract principle. To practice integrity
for its own sake was luxury confined to
the gentleman of old Japan. His posi-
ton made him superior to all those cal
culations of pecuniary expediency that
found place in the merchants moral
ledger. His word was as good as his
bond, and his vocabulary included no
more opprobrious epithet than trades
man-ike." But if this was among the
distinguishing attributes of his station
we might reasonably conclude that his
example would beget imitators in the So
cial stratum next below his own. And
so it was. Beyond all question there
have been an0 are many merchants in
Japan whose business conduct satisfies
the strictest standard of probity ever set
up by any society. The balance of ex-
perience tends, however, to. show that
these are to be regarded rather as ex-
ceptional than typical. In most cases
the influences of environment, -opportu-
nifty and expediency seem to be more
powerful than the attractions of prin.
ciple.-Japan Weekly Mail. sri