Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1891-03-26
Japanese Reform

Japanese Reform
For the last two decades the career of
Japan has been startlingly acrobatic
Ever since 1868 when she made her great
evolutionary somersault over the backs of
six countries, from a feudal state into
the arena of modern life, she has been
turning her whole social system topsy-
furry, in her haste to be fully abreast OF
the latter end of the nineteenth century;
and the rest of the world has wondered at
the feat.
Unfortunately for this really remarkable
performance, Dame Nature is not addicted
to jumps herself, and objects to them in
her offspring; such lapse Of continuity
forming nc part of the material scheme of
education. In her domestic curriculum
progress of the kind is inadmissiLle.
Not simply is development necessarily
only be linked while still relatively close.
far asunder. We are witness to this in
everyday physical reproduction. Extremes
will not mate.
Symptoms, OF failure appear when the
civilized WEEDS with the savage. The. saw
That it seems TO be so is because, in most
OIIcI CASTS VI IdCLdi OlAO
couple are both of Aryan blood, and
therefore cousins of no very distant de-
gree.
The real barrier consists, not in dis
similarity but descent In other words, not
the want Of development of the one only,
but the difference in development of the
two. determines the fruitlessness of their
connection.
A well-known foreign physician in
Tokyo has found that among Eurasians,
those, that is, half of European, half of
Asiatic blood, the most inevitable tend
ency is to the dying out of the family. in
physique, the human gap between the OPP
posite sides of our world is already too
wide to be crossed. Yet anatomically the
variance is trivial. A slight difference in
the setting of the eye, one or two other
variations, not more important, and you
have the extent of the contrast. Psyihi-
caly, the opposition is much more mark
ed: for it causes that strange inversion so
striking to the one people in the other.
If then in body, where science can detect
so trifing divergence, nature finds an
impossible gulf, what must her difficulty
be in mind! If intermarriage prove bar
rem. will intercommunion of thought bear
fruit?
No such doubts, however, have disturb
ed Japan leading men. Quite obllviouo
TO a possible imposslblltty, they have
foisted foreign customs upon their coun-
try wholesale. The government has out
radicaed the radicals of any other land,
and even the opposition has had its breath
so taken away by the speed of the change
as to have none left with which to remon-
strate. The government, indeed, has
been a most remarkable experiment in
empires. A handful of men, educated in
European modes of thought, has revolu-
tionized, not simply the political, but the
social, the domestic, even the private GUS
toms Of an entire community. The only
point more surprising still has been the
enthusiastic acceptance of the same by the
thinking classes.
in a country town tailor was accus-
toned to make occasional pigrimages to
the nearest city to obtain his goods, and
he never resorted to writing unless In case
of dire necessity and haste. At one time,
however, he was in need of two of the
articles called "a tailor goose, and was
unable to leave home. So in great distress
he began to compose his note, which
speedily presented difficulty, beyond the
usual one of spelling the words properly.
in the shape of an unmanageable plural
Should he say geese" or .'gooses? At
last brilliant idea occurred to him, and
he sent eff the following note:
dear Sir: Please send me at once a
taiors goose, and obltge. Yours respect
fully. A. Brown.
''P. S.-Send me another"
Mks. FRANK LESLIE will devote her for