the language, the philosophy, the religion, or even the inmost thoughts of the people.  This dominance of the communalistic type of social order has doubtless had an effect on the physical and psychic, including the brain, development of the people.  These physical and psychical developments, however, are not the cause, but the product, of the social order.  They are, furthermore, of no superlative import, since they offer no insuperable obstacle to the introduction of a social order radically different from that of past millenniums.

Before proceeding to elaborate and illustrate this general position, it seems desirable to introduce two further definitions.

Communalism and individualism are the two terms used throughout this work to describe two contrasted types of social order.

By communalism I mean that order of society, whether family, tribal, or national, in which the idea and the importance of the community are more or less clearly recognized, and in which this idea has become the constructive principle of the social order, and where at the same time the individual is practically ignored and crushed.

By individualism I mean that later order of society in which the worth of the individual has been recognized and emphasized, to the extent of radically modifying the communalism, securing a liberty for individual act and thought and initiative, of which the old order had no conception, and which it would have considered both dangerous and immoral.  Individualism is not that atomic social order in which the idea of the communal unity has been rejected, and each separate human being regarded as the only unit.  Such a society could hardly be called an order, even by courtesy.  Individualism is that developed stage of communalism, wherein the advantages of close communal unity have been retained, and wherein, at the same time, the idea and practice of the worth of the individual and the importance of giving him liberty of thought and action have been added.  Great changes in the internal structure, of society follow, but the communial unity or idea is neither lost nor injured.  In taking up our various illustrations regarding personality in Japan, three points demand our attention; what are the facts? are they due to, and do they prove, the asserted “impersonality” of the people? and are the facts sufficiently accounted for by the communal theory of the Japanese social order?

Let us begin, then, with the illustration of which advocates of “impersonality” make so much, Japanese politeness.  As to the reality of the fact, it is hardly necessary that I present extended proof.  Japanese politeness is proverbial.  It is carried into the minutest acts of daily life; the holding of the hands, the method of entering a room, the sucking in of the breath on specific occasions, the arrangement of the hair, the relative places of honor in a sitting-room, the method of handing guests refreshments, the exchange of friendly gifts—­every detail of social life is rigidly dominated by etiquette.  Not only acts, but the language of personal address as well, is governed by ideas of politeness which have fundamentally affected the structure of the language, by preventing the development of personal pronouns.