Note (return) — Chapter III · - "THE KOJIKI" AND ITS TEACHINGS

Thus from the emperor to the humblest believer, the god-way is founded on ancestor worship, and has had grafted upon its ritual system nature worship, even to phallicism.29 In one sense it is a self-made religion of the Japanese. Its leading characteristics are seen in the traits of the normal Japanese character of to-day. Its power for good and evil may be traced in the education of the Japanese through many centuries. Knowing Shintō, we to a large degree know the Japanese, their virtues and their failings.