THE AWAKENING OF JAPAN
that the enemy were using loose-shafted arrows, the heads of which remained
in the wound and caused a cruel and lingering death, he gave orders that all the Tokugawa arrowheads should be securely fastened and lacquered to the shafts. We believe, however, that the "Old Badger," as he is often nicknamed, knew full well the nature of Buddhist and Confucian teaching, and that his astuteness and knowledge of men did not fail to recognize the bearing which the Oriental philosophy of his day might have upon the furtherance of his system of government. Buddhism was never a menace to the state. The reason for this lies far back in the antithesis of the Oriental conception of the social and supersocial order. By that antithesis the ethical life of the householder is distinguished
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