JAPAN
This last magnificent specimen of religious sculpture is among the first objects towards which the traveller turns his feet on arriving in Japan, and perhaps among all the charmed impressions he carries away from that fair country, none survives longer than his memory of the majestic benignity and ineffable repose breathed by the noble statue.
Outside the sphere of purely supernatural motives, the Japanese religious gallery contains some sculptures which may be justly compared with the celebrated busts of Perikles, of Homer, of Sophokles, and other famous men of old. Not that there ever was such a thing as a bust among Japanese sculptures. That curious outcome of Roman practicality would have greatly offended Japanese taste. Yet the sculptures here spoken of may be compared to the bust in one respect, namely, that they derive their characteristics chiefly from the face. Such works are Unkei's statue of Vimala-Kirtsi Japanese Yuima, a contemporary of Gautama; the figures of Muchaku and Seshin in the Kofuku-ji at Nara, the statue of Seitaka-dōji at Hozan-ji, and a few others. These are not likeness effigies, though their remarkable realism suggests that idea. It is possible that the artists were assisted by Chinese pictures, but however that may be, these sculptures compel admiration as great creations of art. The supernatural endowment of the soul within, the almost divine characteristics of these immortal teachers and preachers of Buddhist mysteries, are here eloquently revealed by some subtlety of the sculptor's art which speaks of the men's achievements and not merely of their personality. Unfortunately such works are very rare in Japan. Of likeness effigies there are several, but ideal creations of art outside
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