INTRODUCTION. 25 



and Goa. The profits tliey made on their European mercliandise were commonly one himdred 

 per cent. ; so tliat, as Kfempfer has said, if their commercial prosperity had contimied but 

 twenty years longer, Macao would have been so enriched from Japan that it would have surpassed 

 all that was accumulated in Jerusalem during the reign of Solomon. As one of the old writers 

 expresses it, the Portuguese obtained " the golden marrow" of Japan. In fact they had but to 

 proceed prudently and they would ere long have been the dominant race in Japan. Many of 

 them had married the daughters of the wealthiest Christian Japanese, and no other nation of 

 Europe could have driven them from their strong position. 



It was about the year 1566 that the Portuguese first called the attention of the reigning prince 

 of Omura to the superiority of the harbor of Nagasaki over the ports they were accustomed to 

 frequent ; and it was at their siiggestion that a settlement was formed there. Bungo, Firando, 

 (Firato,) and Nagasaki were the principal places of commercial business. 



But all this prosperity was destined to have an end, and we are sorry to say it was occasioned 

 by the ecclesiastics themselves. Had the work begun by Xavier and his companions been left 

 in the hands of men like themselves, we very much doubt whether the severe Japanese laws 

 prohibiting Cliristianity in the Empire would ever have existed. But these prudent, inoffensive , 

 and laborious men were soon outnumbered by swarms of Dominican, Augustinian, and Fran- 

 ciscan friars from Goa and Macao, who were attracted by the flattering accounts of the remarkable 

 success of the Jesuits. They had not labored in making the harvest, they were ready enough 

 to go and reap it. The Franciscans and Dominicans quarrelled with each other, and all the 

 orders quarrelled with the Jesuits. In vain did the latter implore them to profit by their 

 experience, to be discreet and suppress their strife, to respect the laws and usages of the country . 

 In vain did they represent that their conduct would prove fatal, not merely to their own hopes 

 and purposes, but even to the progress, possibly to the continuance in Japan of Christianity 

 itself. All was of no avail. To the Japanese convert was presented the strange spectacle of 

 one ecclesiastic quarrelling with another, of one body of priests intriguing with heathens 

 to defeat another ; while even the poor native Christian labored to reconcile the feuds and 

 rivalries of these consecrated belligerents. 



The quarrels of these Eoman monastic orders may, therefore, be accounted as one cause of the 

 expulsion of Christianity from Japan. 



But this was not all. The pride, avarice, and extortions of the Portuguese laity had become 

 excessive about the close of the sixteenth century, and disgusted the Japanese. Very many of 

 the clergy, forgetful of the spirit of their office, instead of rebuking these sins, rather gave their 

 countenance to their wealthy countrymen, and often sustained their acts without inquiring into 

 their propriety. Indeed, their own pride quite equalled that of the laity ; and even the native 

 Christians are said to have been both sliocked and disgusted when they saw that their spiritual 

 instructors were quite as diligent in the effort to acquire their property as in the endeavor to 

 save their souls. The Japanese traditions, to this day, represent the downfall of Christianity 

 in the Empire as having been, in part at least, produced by the avarice, sensuality, and pride of 

 the ecclesiastics. They treated with open contempt the institutions and customs of the country, 

 and insulted the highest officials of the government by studied indignities. A circumstance is 

 related as having occurred in 1596, which is said to have been the immediate cause of the great 

 persecution. A Portuguese bishop was met on the high road by one of the highest officers of 

 the State on his way to court. Each was in his sedan. Tlie usage of the country required that, 

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