Page:A History of Japanese Literature (Aston).djvu/280

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JAPANESE LITERATURE

"Think not that God is something distant, but seek for him in your own hearts; for the heart is the abode of God."

"To forsake all evil and follow good is the beginning of the practice of our philosophy."

"The Way of the Sages is not sundered from matters of everyday life."

"That which in Heaven begets all things is in man that which makes him love his neighbour. So doubt not that Heaven loves goodness of heart and hates its opposite."

"Has not bravery itself its root in goodness of heart, and does it not proceed from sympathy? It is only when it arises from goodness that bravery is genuine."

"Once when I was in Kaga I heard a man say, 'All faults whether great or small may be excused in the eyes of the world upon repentance and amendment, and leave behind no stain of deep-seated baseness. But there are two faults which are inexcusable, even when repented of—theft, and the abandonment by a Samurai of a post which he is bound to defend with his life."

"Avarice and cowardice are the same. If a man is stingy of his money, he will also grudge his life."

"To the Samurai first of all comes righteousness, next life, then silver and gold."

Kiusō's righteousness and our righteousness are appreciably though not essentially different. The former approaches the Roman ideal more than the Christian. He uses the word to describe the conduct of the forty-seven Rōnins, who, having avenged an insult to their master which led to his death, by the murder of the