The impersonal theory is amazingly blind to adverse phenomena.  Such a one is the marked sensitiveness of the middle and upper classes to the least slight or insult.  The gradations of social rank are scrupulously observed, not only on formal occasions, but also in the homes at informal and social gatherings.  Failure to show the proper attention, or the use of language having an insufficient number of honorific particles and forms, would be instantly interpreted as a personal slight, if not an insult.[CS]

Now if profuse courtesy is a proof of “impersonality,” as its advocates argue, what does morbid sensitiveness prove but highly developed personality?  But then arises the difficulty of understanding how the same individuals can be both profusely polite and morbidly sensitive at one and the same time?  Instead of inferring “impersonality” from the fact of politeness, from the two facts of sensitiveness and politeness we may more logically infer a considerable degree of personality.  Yet I would not lay much stress on this argument, for oftentimes (or is it always true?) the weaker and more insignificant the person, the greater the sensitiveness.  Extreme sensitiveness is as natural and necessary a product of a highly developed feudalism as is politeness, and neither is particularly due to the high or the low development of personality.

Similarly with respect to the question of altruism, which is practically identified with politeness by expounders of Oriental “impersonality.”  They make this term (altruism) the virtual equivalent of “impersonality”—­interest in others rather than in self, an interest due, according to their view, to a lack of differentiation of the individual minds; the individuals, though separate, still retain the universalism of the original mind-stuff.  This use of the term altruism makes it a very different thing from the quality or characteristic which in the West is described by this term.

But granting that this word is used with a legitimate meaning, we ask, is altruism in this sense an inherent quality of the Japanese race?  Let the reader glance back to our discussion of the possession by the Japanese of sympathy, and the humane feelings.[CT] We saw there marked proofs of their lack.  The cruelty of the old social order was such as we can hardly realize.  Altruism that expresses itself only in polite forms, and does not strive to alleviate the suffering of fellow-men, can have very little of that sense, which this theory requires.  So much as to the fact.  Then as to the theory.  If this alleged altruism were inherent in the mental structure, it ought to be a universal characteristic of the Japanese; it should be all-pervasive and permanent.  It should show itself toward the foreigner as well as toward the native.  But such is far from the case.  Few foreigners have received a hearty welcome from the people at large.  They are suspected and hated; as little room as possible is made for them.  The less of their presence and advice, the better.  So far as there is any interest in them, it is on the ground of utility, and not of inherent good will because of a feeling of aboriginal unity.  Of course there are many exceptions to these statements, especially among the Christians.  But such is the attitude of the people as a whole, especially of the middle and upper classes toward the foreigners.