Note 337 — ON THE WILL IN NATURE. [190] (continued 4)

The following account given by an American sea-captain, who had come to Japan, is very amusing from the naïveté with which he assumes that mankind consists exclusively of Jews. For the "Times" of the 18th October, 1854, relates that an American ship, under command of Captain Burr, had arrived in Jeddo Bay, and gives his account of the favourable reception he met with there, at the end of which we find: "He likewise asserts the Japanese to be a nation of Atheists, denying the existence of a God and selecting as an object of worship either the spiritual Emperor at Meaco, or any other Japanese. He was told by the interpreters that formerly their religion was similar to that of China, but that the belief in a supreme Being has latterly been entirely discarded—(this is a mistake)—and he professed to be much shocked at Deejunoskee (a slightly Americanised Japanese), declaring his belief in the Deity." [Add. to 3rd ed.]